Policy for acceptable stories

I know that many people have issues with the policies for the contents of stories that are acceptable to be published on Gayspiralstories.com

Hugh was always very liberal about what he allowed, but just like me, he had to be careful not to get into any legal troubles. There is just no money to back us up in case someone chooses to sue us.

And then there is the issue about morality and taste… both of which has very different borders for each individual.

I want to give you a chance to openly discuss this, but the final decision will always be mine to make, because I’m the one to be held responsible for everything that’s posted here.

As a reminder here the current list of rules for stories as Hugh created them:

  • The story should include some kind of mind control of men.
  • Characters being mind controlled and/or having sex must be believably 18 or older.
  • No father/dependent son incest stories.
  • No celebrities, real-life or trademarked (including superhero and comic book) characters!
  • No vore.
  • The story must be yours! Do not repost someone else’s story here. Email the original author and ask them to post it instead.
  • The story must be at least 1000 words long.
  • You must be over 18 to post a story.

So if you have an issue with any of these, please write that in this topic. You can post anonymously, so don’t be afraid (I wont allow offending postings, though).

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I have yet to actually post any stories, however I’m curious about this point. Some of the fantasies I’ve had can focus more on the transformation aspect than on the guy necessarily being mind controlled, so if I were to write and submit them they may not pass this guideline. Is this a hard rule, or is transformation enough by itself?

An example might be a guy’s body or body parts being altered or swapped; there might not be any actual mind control there, but maybe a change in dynamics or perception of themselves or others.

I think I just want to be clear.

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First, I’ll say again I applaud Hugh for rescuing this site a couple years ago and all the work he did to keep it going. However, I’ve thought several of the restrictions on stories he imposed were just plain silly. If Nifty.org can maintain a far more ‘public’ profile, a far bigger readership for 25-freaking years with gay-themed stories involving celebrities, incest, and underage topics clearly labeled in every menu then banning them here only seems to reflect the site developer’s personal taste and not any legitimate fear of the ‘authorities.’ Should these themes be tagged? Hell, yes. But I don’t think they should be censored.

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Transformation is just fine. In general, we’re quite lenient about we interpret this rule. Basically, we’re just looking for something out of the ordinary that makes people behave differently than they would under normal circumstances.

So just go ahead and submit anything you’ve got!

It’s a fine line to walk. Currently, text stories are shared quite openly over the net and I’ve never heard of anyone getting into trouble for that - after all no one is hurt by a text story.

Personally I don’t have a problem with incest stories at all. So I’ll probably just drop that policy.

Underage is a problematic topic. I do have a problem with the argument that underage people cannot consent to having sex as a reason for banning these stories - especially since this whole site is about unconsented sex in one way or the other…
I totally understand why many people are having a problem involving underage characters having sex. For me, if someone would have sex in real life (most 16 years high school kids do), there’s just no reason to ban stories about it. And, as you said yourself, many sites allow that. Is there really a difference between coercing a 16 year or a 18 year old into having sex by using means of mind-control?

Anyway, I want to hear your opinions before I change anything for this. I don’t want to offend anyone, and there has to be drawn a line somewhere, but I want to work this out with all of you.

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As somebody who had a couple submissions refused due to Hugh feeling the characters were underage, (they weren’t actually my own stories, they were CodyTaylor’s who’d given me permission to re-submit them), the thing that really annoyed me was inconsistency of the rules being applied, especially when there are still stories on the site that I feel push the underage rule far more.

I’m more than happy to respect rules, but not if their implementation depends on how the person making the decision is feeling that day.

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@mw-scot: I understand your feelings. If you want, I can look at the stories again. If I think they’re fine, I’ll undelete them. Would that be ok for you?

But I’ll only do that if an author asks me for it.

Personally, I’d definitely be more comfortable if underage stories were not permitted–while I don’t feel there’s anything wrong with teens having sex or making their own choices in that regard, that’s not the same as adults portraying teens, often having sex with adults. Frankly, the larger the age gap between a 16 year old and their partner, the more it’d bug me, but for simplicity’s sake and, of course, the fact that you don’t want to get into legal trouble, I feel like simply banning those stories would make sense?

But definitely agreeing with @mw-scot in that if this rule does get implemented, it definitely needs to be done with consistency.

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I agree with @glamgod. I don’t want to see stories of 15 year olds getting mind controlled to have sex with adults or whatever. I think we can ease up on the “believably 18” aspect though; as long as it’s stated somewhere the characters are 18, then that’s fine.

Personally, I liked the stricter rules Hugh enforced. Without them, then we might have another flood of superhero/celebrity stories like the old NCMC. I feel like Hugh really reined it in when he took it over, and I appreciated that. The old NCMC felt like the wild west of erotica; anything went, and it showed.

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I have a slight nit pick with this one. I don’t write these types of stories and I feel like I know what it’s trying to prevent; but it comes across vague to me and a bit like incest gatekeeping, if that makes any sense. I’d like a little more clarity on in it.

The underage is a must for me in that 18+ should be enforced. But 18+ is 18+ and agree with others that the rule has been used a little strictly (although I found Hugh to be helpful in correctingany problems).

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Like many people here, I firmly believe that when it comes to any type of remotely sexual encounter, characters should certainly be believably over 18.

When it comes to simply being mind controlled however, I do not see the problem with younger characters being affected, as long as nothing sexual or overtly harmful is occurring. There are plenty of stories I would like to write involving mass hypnosis, perhaps of an entire school, or town, that I feel I cannot do currently - even if the main characters are of an appropriate age - simply because it would implicitly involve other minor characters under 18 also being subjected to the same influences.

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I see why people wouldn’t want certain things to be posted. I myself can’t stand vore or bestiality, for instance. But I’m pretty open and tolerant and I understand that, the same way I don’t like those two fetishes, other people could be disgusted with what I like to write or read. Still I understand how bothersome it is to have the feed flooded with stuff you don’t even wanna see mentioned.

To solve that and keeping everyone happy and showing an open-minded atmosphere, some sites allow users to select what they wanna see when they log in. So if someone didn’t want to have anything related with incest in their feed or while navigating the site, for example, those stories would simply not exist for them.

My programming skills are at lvl. -10 lol but I assume the system made invisible those submission according to their tags, the same way the present searching system of the Gay Spiral works. Tagging was mandatory, though, and not doing so meant penalties.

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I agree that stories should not feature anything sexual with anyone under 18. I would go so far as to say I’d be so uncomfortable with any stories featuring underage sex, consensual or otherwise, that i wouldn’t visit the site any more. I’d apply the same rule to father/dependent son incest. Agreeing with the other points these rules must be applied consistently so authors and readers know what they should expect.

Like @hauntedskin I’d be curious about the mind control point. I’m not sure that rule is absolutely required, but it does lead to a question about what is this website for? Should it remain specifically for mind control, or should it be just for stories we find hot, probably with some kind of change to the characters (physical or mental), or should it be even broader? I think if this rule was to be removed, the site will need a new mission statement to make sure you get the right content and readership.

The superhero/celebrity point is an interesting one and i think that comes more to admin preference. I don’t think it should be a hard and fast rule though like the others.

Hope that’s helpful!

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I guess I’ve opened the proverbial can of worms here! :sunglasses:

But I like this discussion. A lot. Thanks to every single person who stated his opinion.

First: You cannot accommodate everyone. You have to find compromises most(!) people can live with. Even if you lose some people in the process.

That’s an important point for me. There are countless sites on the net featuring gay stories. But most of them leave me completely cold. The reason I stuck with NCMC and later GSS was that the idea of being(!) mind controlled is really striking a special chord inside myself. So for me, this theme is an essential part of GSS and it will not be dropped or even toned down. It’s what makes GSS one of a kind.

Now, mind control comes in different flavours. Some of them are more appealing to me, others less. But this is not just about me, a story which does nothing for me might be the hottest thing ever for the next guy.

What I’d like to do is to strengthen tags or categories, so that it’s easier for the reader to know beforehand what he can expect from reading a story. Maybe something like a mandatory main category the author has to select and a minimum number of secondary tags?

I could implement a permanent filter, customizable by the user, so stories with certain tags are just not shown to this user. That way, if you don’t like incest, superhero or robot stories, you’d never even get to see them…

This would mean LOADS of work for me, but I think it’s the best option all around, isn’t it?


So, about the other sensitive issue… the age thing:

It goes without question, that the idea of abusing children or juveniles in any way is just completely out of the question.

What I do have a problem with, though, is the hypocrisy of using an arbitrary number to decide whether something is absolutely ok or a complete atrocity. One day I can be sent to prison for doing something… but if I wait for just a single day doing the same thing would be fine, because someone has had his birthday…

And anyway, if I would have a son, the idea of him being turned into some mindless sex-slave by some old horny fuck would be just as disturbing and horrifying… no matter whether my son would be 16, 18 or 21! There’s just no difference.

However, I think there might be a solution for that. Please read it without prejudice and let me know if you’d think this would be acceptable:

I just don’t want to read a specific age below 20 in any of the stories!

Actually, I don’t think specifying an exact age is a good idea anyway: “He was in his late 30ies” is just as good as “he was 38”.

If a story describes a young man in his late teens, it must be made perfectly clear that we’re talking about a fully grown, fully developed person. E.g. a scene where he’s shaving himself. Then it’s just not necessary to tag some number to him to prove he’s supposedly old enough to be coerced.

I’ve read stories where the author goes to great length to tell us that the protagonist is 18, but the way the guy is described, he actually sounds more like he’s just turned 15. That’s just forced and unhonest to me, a way to get around the rule just by using a number.

I don’t want that!

What do you think about such a policy?

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I actually have to agree personally in terms of mind control–it’s why I’m here. I enjoy transformation and other gay-themed stories but…I have other sites for that. This is pretty much the place I go to to scratch a specific itch and there’s not really a lot of it elsewhere, at least not for gay men? Or in general for men being the subject of it at all, gay or otherwise, since most straight mc stories will have the woman be the recipient. I enjoy it in general as a bi guy but it’s definitely far easier to find the content I love here than any other mind control/hypnosis geared site.

In terms of age, it’ll always be tricky. I definitely get the whole…issue with such an arbitrary number, since yeah, same, I’d be creeped and upset as hell if a kid of mine was involved with a creep whether 17, 18, 21, etc. I think I like the idea of not being specific with age if they’re under 20, but also–like you said–not describing the character as what’d only make sense as a minor, not a grown adult.

There could be a couple issues arising from it though–firstly, the simple fact that people do develop differently. I’m well over 18 and I just naturally, if you don’t see me naked–look EXTREMELY young. So, this would basically be limiting moderation to some stories to just judging if a character ‘looks’ old enough or not.

That in itself brings another slight issue–the one of consistency. When you don’t have an arbitrary age, it gets a lot harder to moderate, with some staff maybe letting things slide because they think that looks ‘old enough’ and another one thinking that’s not okay. Which could go back to some authors feeling cheated, if their story was rejected/deleted but another story with similar characters was accepted.

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@Corin I’ll send you an email about the affected stories when I get a chance.

Regarding the mind control aspect, one of the things I’ve always liked about NCMC/GSS is that it’s not strictly about mind control, and includes stories that involve some form of magical/mythical alteration. I think the current mix works well.

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I don’t have a problem with the 20 age thing at all, if that’s the direction you want to go, then i’m fine with that.

But what about if the master is 16-17 and the slave is the adult one? Would that be a reason to ban since the teen is the one with consciousness about the situation and consent to do that?

For the age thing: I’m not sure that’s the best solution. People develop at different speeds. I could easily describe a REAL 22 year old man in a way that sounds like a 15 year old, because the reality is that there are certainly many guys in their early 20s who are either a) incredibly immature in terms of personality, or b) physically underdeveloped/late bloomers. These are ‘men’ that are of legal age, but still essentially boys. That is not at all uncommon or unusual.

The way I interpret your suggestion is: 'You can include characters in your story only if they fit this predetermined descriptive mould". With this rule, you are saying only a certain type of person can exist. To me, this is actually more arbitrary than a simple number.

Not criticizing you personally, Martin, and I appreciate you holding a public discussion on this. This is just my thoughts on it.

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I don’t see it as being a fine line at all. If a story has underage characters, celebrities, or incest themes or has scat, furries, or vore, it’s tagged/labeled and the reader is aware and makes his decision to continue before the story is opened. I’m not particularly into any of those themes, but I have read great, interesting, curious, hot stories on this site, it’s predecessor, and other sites in the past that have (except maybe furries… I just can’t!). I think it’s kind of weird where and how inconsistently the lines are drawn. I just think once you start closing doors to creativity, you start closing doors to a vibrant community. Remember guys, this whole site is about themes that are ‘problematic’ in one context or another, a great deal of it is about a lack of consent and coercion, and most if they attempted in the real world people would be in prison or worse. No one is forcing you to read what you don’t like.

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