From: Tavia tavia@btinternet.com
Based on personal observations only, the demographics of the B7 fan population appear to be heavily skewed towards people who saw the show
when
it was first aired in their country of residence, ie mostly 30s--40s. I know that there are a few children who have been introduced to B7 by fannish parents, but they'd form a tiny minority.
But a minority does not become irrelevant simply for being tiny. There are children in fandom, and that must be taken into account. The Horizon Newsletter (for those old enough to remember what they used to be) started to feature a 'Children of Auron' page for younger members, where for no additional fee whatsoever you could have your kids patronised by Diane Gies. Since there are children in fandom, we ought to assume that some of them might well read fan fiction. If we assume that, we have to acknowledge that there are zines out there that maybe they shouldn't read. Which is why adult zines require an age statement (very sensibly).
So-called 'gen' material in 100% genzines commonly includes a degree of violence that (whilst in keeping with the show) might shock young
children.
I suppose it might, but my (admittedly limited) experience of young children suggests that they're happy to lap up any amount of violence. 2000AD, though aimed at an older teen/twenties audience, has many young readers, and the blood almost oozes off the pages at times. An earlier comic, Action!, expressly aimed at young teen or pre-teen readers, was ultimately banned because of its violent content. But I don't somehow think it was the readers who were complaining.
It seems to me that the depiction of sexual relationships of whatever nature is hardly any *less* suitable for children than the depiction of, say, torture.
A very fine sentiment in theory, but with society the way it is a parent would have to think very carefully before exposing children to sexual theory, if only to avoid censure (or having the kids taken into care).
A blanket ban on mixing any adult material with gen material tends to result in fanzines that are (to my mind) rather dull -- either masses and masses of Our Heroes running round in corridors blowing things up, or masses and masses of erotica in the style insert tab X into slot Y.
I have to disagree. Adult material polarises fans too much (as recent discussion on this list clearly illustrates). The real problem with 'gen' is that it has come to mean anything that isn't 'adult', but that leaves a lot of things that still qualify as gen but are not necessarily suitable for younger readers. Violence, possibly, or strong language.
Conventionally, only explicit sexual material gets an age categorisation (in Britain anyway, AFAIK). And even then that doesn't apply to graphic sex scenes in a mainstream novel. Violence and language seems to be unrestricted. This problem is not terribly applicable to fanfic because extreme violence and especially strong language are pretty rare. The only B7 story I know to feature the word 'cunt' is one of mine, though I presume there are others.
Neil