Nominations Closed + Final Clarifications

[withinadream]

Nominations have closed! If yours haven't been approved, please check the below clarifications. Signups will open no later than Saturday, Sept 25 at 9 pm Eastern.

Marvel
Could the nominators of ships under the fandom "Marvel" please clarify which of our Marvel fandoms they meant these ships to fall under? If no one replies, the ships will be rejected.

The following fandoms have been combined:

• Private Practice and Grey’s Anatomy have even combined under ‘Grey’s Anatomy’. In future rounds, we’ll have this listed in the Shared Universe list under a broader fandom title.
  
• The L word 2004 and Generation Q have been approved under ‘The L Word (2004 and 2019)’

The Adventures of Tom Bombadil
Can Tolkien fans comment on how this should (or shouldn’t) be combined as part of the Hobbit books or with one of the other existing Tolkien tags?

Arrowverse
There are two nominations ("Astra/Alex Danvers" and "Astra/Cat Danvers") for Astra that don’t specify either General Astra or Astra Logue. If we don’t hear back, we will approve as General Astra.

There were several ships containing Zari nominated using the canonical tags, which include both canonical Zaris ("Sara Lance/Ava Sharpe/Zari Tomaz | Zari Tarazi (Arrowverse)", "Sara Lance/Zari Tomaz | Zari Tarazi (Arrowverse)"). Could the nominators clarify which version of Zari they wanted?

Original Work
We are unclear on the intended scope of the following tag: "lesbian who dates men/her best friend who calls her on being stupid though it doesn't stop her". F/M and F/F/M etc. requests may only be included as optional details in this exchange. If the nominator wishes to clarify or reword the tag please let us know, otherwise we will reject.

EDIT: We also need clarification on "Succubus/Incubus" - typically, incubuses are male. Does the nominator have a specified gender for the incubus? We've removed the tag for now but are happy to add back in.

Comments

[scintilla10]

Hello, I'm the Arrowverse Zari nominator. I'd like Zari Tomaz (aka Zari 1.0) for both of those pairings. Thank you for catching that!

[shopfront]

Awesome, thank you, I'll get those changed.

[(Anonymous)]

hi, I'm the one who nominated "lesbian who dates men/her best friend who calls her on being stupid though it doesn't stop her" the ship I'm wanting is the lesbian and her (female) best friend, I'm not wanting the men the lesbian dates to be any kind of involved!

The full tag I wanted to nominate was "lesbian who keeps dating men/her best friend who is in love with her and who she acknowledges would be better for her but doesn't want to date despite mutual feelings" but that was a mite longer than 100 characters.

[(Anonymous)]

would "lesbian who keeps dating men/her female best friend who gets her to stop being stupid" be an acceptable update? I do see how it's confusing.

[shopfront]

We'd be happy to approve this version. Or if the potential indecision factor is important, perhaps something more like this would suit: Lesbian still in the closet/Best friend in love with her who she cares for but is scared to date?

[(Anonymous)]

Not the nominator, but I'd definitely prefer this phrasing.

[(Anonymous)]

For what I want to request "lesbian who dates men" is important to keep in the tag because I don't want to spring that on anyone when they're just wanting to write a closeted lesbian confused about her sexuality. I'm going for her knowing she's a lesbian, being clear to her friends she's only attracted to people who aren't men, but dating men anyway as a form of self-punishment.

"Lesbian who dates men she isn't attracted to/her best friend in love with her" I think is clear and would fit?

[(Anonymous)]

Or maybe even "Lesbian who chooses to date men she isn't attracted to/woman she actually has feelings for" if that's more clear. The best friend part isn't a big deal, the lesbian's history of dating people she has zero interest in is the thing.

[withinadream]

Having talked it over with my comod, the lesbian's history of dating men makes this tag a poor fit for femslashex for the same reason we don't accept MFF threesomes - we can approve a version without the dating baked in, but if it's the most important part of the ship for you, you should nom it in another exchange. Apologies!

[(Anonymous)]

Except it's about her history not what I'm wanting in the exchange. What I'm wanting in the exchange is her finding a relationship where she's actually attracted to the person she's with and being true to herself. The male character(s) doesn't have to be (and honestly I'd prefer he not) be in the work at all. If the tag was "lesbian who has only dated men before" it would be fine, right? This is the same thing, just with more bad decisions.

[(Anonymous)]

What about "lesbian who was just broken up with by a man she chose to date/woman she's attracted to"

I'm honestly pretty baffled I'm having to clarify this this much. The relationship I want is between two women. One of whom makes bad choices involving men, those men are irrelevant.

[(Anonymous)]

Or you said you'd be okay with "lesbian who keeps dating men/her female best friend who gets her to stop being stupid" I'd be fine with going with that, too, if you're still willing to accept it. (Or "lesbian who has repeatedly dated men/her female best friend who gets her to stop being stupid" if you want it to be really clear the man is not important) But honestly at this point I'm reluctant to request/offer it regardless.

[shopfront]

What I'm wanting in the exchange is her finding a relationship where she's actually attracted to the person she's with and being true to herself.
This angle could work. We just need a tag that matches only on the f/f component, not what the f/m component lacked, if that makes sense? I apologise that it’s a bit like splitting hairs especially with the character limit, but we want to find a wording that leaves it optional how/if your creator delves into her (negative or otherwise) experiences with men.

Would this suit: Lesbian who has only dated men/Woman she is attracted to and feels true to herself with

You'd be welcome to pair this with optional requests that her experiences with men were negative or to DNW positive experiences with men, as long as you're also okay with a gift that skips over addressing them either way.

[(Anonymous)]

Forget it. The part that's important about the tag is the part you have an objection to.

I just wanted to ask for a story about a complicated disaster lesbian who makes bad choices and then changes because she finds someone she actually likes but you want to take all of the teeth out of it.

[(Anonymous)]

With all respect: what on earth? I'm a new anon here and have no horse in this race but as a longtime participant in this exchange, this feels like a bizarre judgment call. It's your exchange, of course, and therefore your call, but how does "F/F ship where one character has a history of dating men" make the ship less F/F? By that logic wouldn't you have to exclude every character in the tag set who dates, has dated, or has made reference to dating men in canon?

[shopfront]

Women who also date(d) men are definitely welcome in this exchange, we're just trying to find the right line between where this specific tag ends and optional details should begin. It's not something we need to do very often (particularly when most tags are names not descriptions) and hopefully my new response above is clearer, but please let us know if not or if it raises other concerns!

[(Anonymous)]

I've giving up explaining this. Won't be signing up either. I thought it was obvious I don't want or care about the relationship with a man when it's a femslash exchange.

[withinadream]

I apologize for the poor phrasing on my part! The only things we're trying to avoid are prescribing a) that a character needs to have had past relationships, and b) how a character feels about their past relationships with men. Specifying that someone's made bad decisions in or regrets dating men in the past is something that's a better fit for optional details than the ship tag itself, and if it's the only necessary part of the relationship tag for you, it's a bit too specific for the exchange. Sorry we couldn't come to an agreement!

[(Anonymous)]

It's an original work tag. How is "is self hating, makes bad choices with men" complicated. If that's not included and it's put into the additional detail it would just be original female character/original female character. It would absolutely not be appropriate to slap "I want this character to have a messy past with men before this relationship which is healing" on "witch/knight" or whatever, because it means that people can't opt in to that mess.

Again, I'm truly baffled that this is an argument. The relationship I want is between two women. The tag is perfectly clear that the relationship is between two women because that's what the "/" between two female characters means. The optional details would be "please feel free to include the men the lesbian has dated in a wider relationship, or even a polyamourous situation with the other woman!" if I wanted that, but I don't. Because the relationship I want is between the two women.

[(Anonymous)]

Also, the reason I'm frustrated is because we did come to an agreement, you said you were okay with "lesbian who keeps dating men/her female best friend who gets her to stop being stupid" you then changed your mind, which is fine, but your reasoning also excludes approved tags because of implicit men.

Such as:
Conquering Kingslayer General/Newly-Widowed Queen She Marries to Legitimize Her Rule (OW)
Famous Author of Reverse Harem Series/Protagonist Who Is Secretly Bored Of Her LIs (OW)
Mail Order Bride/Her Prospective Husband's Daughter
Noblewoman Entering Arranged Marriage to Man/Courtesan She Buys for the Night Before the Wedding

I no more wanted the man or men involved than these tags do.

But whatever, like I said, not signing up this year.

[shopfront]

I'm sorry for that about-face, that's on my misunderstanding. I read your initial explanation and first rewording more from a closeted experience coming to an end angle and once we had more info it no longer seemed like a good fit.

I do however think the scenario you've described requires a lot more and fairly specific non-optional grappling with f/m content and what it means for the character, even if the men themselves are offscreen and the endgame pairing is f/f. A past/boring/future relationship can potentially be addressed briefly within a minimum length gift. As I said, I realise this is a bit splitting hairs but we do think it's a meaningful difference for an exchange that only matches on the f/f part so this is where we'll be drawing a line.

[(Anonymous)]

except I did try to offer solutions that more fit within that line, it's just that the line you are drawing is not remotely clear, with the tags you were offering ignoring the entire premise.

"lesbian who was just broken up with by a man she chose to date/woman she's attracted to" was one of my suggestions, can you explain how this isn't within the scope of what you want?

I was willing to work within your boundaries, it's just that I have no earthly idea what the line you're trying to define is. I was requesting a relationship between two women. one of those women has baggage to do with men, the same can be said of plenty of non-original characters. It doesn't require grapping with f/m content, it requires a female character who is not attracted to men to pursue a relationship with someone she likes. If people did not want to engage with a female character who has that kind of baggage, they don't have to.

it seems like you're trying to prevent people asking for effectively male character & female character 1/female character 2, or male character /female character 1/female character 2 in a tag thus forcing people to include a male character in the exchange, which is not something I was doing any more than the tags I mentioned were.

if it was "lesbian repeatedly abused by men/woman who helps her overcome her trauma" would that be valid? what about "lesbian who married a man/woman she cheats with"?

[shopfront]

There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with that tag but it also doesn’t specify the negative experiences with men that you described. Just that she was dumped by a man. I’m not sure it conveys the bit where she grows and changes in a healing relationship either, hence my second tag suggestion to try and incorporate that more specifically. At the time we were still trying to word a more precise tag for you.

So yes, it fits well enough with keeping optional how/if your creator delves into her experiences with men. If you’re okay with that level of optional detail now then yes, this is fine. Something like this but with additional detail on the f/f side would also be welcome.

[(Anonymous)]

"lesbian who was just broken up with by a man she chose to date/woman she's attracted to" conveys what I wanted - a lesbian who chose to date a man. because as I said, I was happy to adjust to what you were looking for. But I couldn't work out what that actually was. Please consider looking at your responses, because you really seemed to fixate on things I wasn't saying. I get that you must have missed these comments I made here https://femslashex.dreamwidth.org/83692.html?thread=954604#cmt954604 but even so, I tried to work with you, and all I got back was "no m/f at all ever, what about an idea unrelated to the concept"

[withinadream]

I really do apologize for the miscommunications! Both my comod and I had a difficult time figuring out what the essential parts of the tag were for you, and I'm afraid that's made the conversation needlessly complicated. If you're happy with "lesbian who was just broken up with by a man she chose to date/woman she's attracted to", I can put that in the tagset for you!

[(Anonymous)]

I appreciate the apology. I was on the fence about participating this year because of other commitments, and I think it's worked out that I really shouldn't, but otherwise I would.

[tamoline]

Just looking at the original work category, and I spotted Succubus/Incubus — the latter usually being a male version of the former. I’m surprised there’s not a clarification like ‘genderqueer/non binary/trans-female incubus’, or something like that.

[shopfront]

Good catch, thank you! That might have slipped past me, I'm not very familiar with the nuances there. I'll remove that one from the tagset for now and we'll get a note edited into the clarification post about it a.s.a.p., but if the nominator happens by and wants to clarify their intention for the tag we can add an updated version back in.

[narya_flame]

Tom Bombadil nominator here! 'Adventures' is a separate collection of poetry which, while named after Tom Bombadil, is normally treated as a separate fandom in exchanges as most of the characters that appear don't come into the Middle-earth tales. They could be combined with Hobbit and LotR books and treated as 'in-world' poetry though.

[shopfront]

Are the settings etc. all consistent with the books, even if the characters aren't shared? If they are, it sounds like it might fit the shared universe requirements. I'm happy to leave these until closer to sign-ups opening to see if anyone else wants to weigh in either way though, particularly if the poetry format limits how clear it is that the setting is shared or if there's any other issues like that.

[narya_flame]

It's complicated; many of the poems aren't explicitly set in Middle-earth and there are some tonal inconsistencies, but that can be explained by them being intended as in-world documents. I would say the setting is less "shared" than The Silmarillion, though, which is in as a separate fandom, despite very definitely existing in the same continuity as LotR and The Hobbit.

All that said, I don't have a strong preference, and I'm happy to wait and see if other Tolkien fans have a view!

[shopfront]

Ah, gotcha, thanks for the Silmarillion comparison, that helps a lot. I'll leave it open a bit just in case anyone else has a strong opinion, but if there's no further comments then I'll approve it as a separate fandom.

[(Anonymous)]

Not sure if my pointing this out is helpful/appropriate or not, but there are two duplicate tags in the Worst Witch 2017 fandom: Dimity Drill/Julie Hubble (WW 2017) and Dimity Drill/Julie Hubble, and Hecate Hardbroom/Ada Cackle (WW 2017) and Ada Cackle/Hecate Hardbroom. Just thought it might confuse things at the sign up stage. Thank you so much for running this!

[shopfront]

Always appropriate, thank you! That one nearly slipped through the cracks.