An Open Letter to Patreon (Please Read) (Patreon)

Patreon,

Being an adult content creator is quickly becoming a confusing and demoralizing experience on your platform. Whether through intent or honest miscalculation we are being made to feel shame and fear on a regular basis - feelings we are all too familiar with during the normal course of our lives where our very existence is seen as taboo.

I am now in a position where I have to defend the creative merit of my work to what are, in effect, moral police who have judged my work to be either ‘unsafe’ or ‘untrustworthy’, which I do not know. Which work, they would not even initially say. When they did say, they provided subfolder links which I do not list on my Patreon campaign or as a Patreon reward.

What’s more is that these works were created far before these guidelines were established as written today and have been publicly available for years. They do not exist as any sort of ‘reward’ for participation in my campaign. This puts myself and creators like me on edge. It means that Patreon can demand creative control on personal websites regarding works which do not currently have any tangible link to Patreon at all.

If this indignity were not enough I furthermore believe that this comic exists as a specific exception under Patreon’s own rules against depictions of non-consensual sex.

We understand that some topics on this list such as incest or rape are a little bit more complicated because these situations are, unfortunately, part of real life. As a result, when reviewing these types of creations, the Trust and Safety team will take into consideration context including personal, historical or educational narrative.

In the opening scene of Arcadia, boy is given a script to read. When he reads from the script he becomes the role from which he reads. He’s made to stand on stage and read those lines against his will and becomes forever changed as a result. Below you’ll find a philosophical discussion which takes up nearly half the comic which is very much relevant to the comic’s message. The metaphor for transgenderism in this comic is, to me, frankly obvious, but the fact I have to explain it at all is the failure here.

Patreon has forced me to out myself in this way in order to justify my work’s existence which is deplorable in and of itself. They have held up an example of my work as unacceptable, work which is deeply personal to me and I will defend it’s artistic merit without reservation. Work which I honestly believe deserves to be funded on Patreon even though it isn’t and is free to the public.

If this is not a mistake, the real issue here isn’t the intent or message of the work, it is very unfortunately the fact that it comes with images that make people uncomfortable. Patreon needs to step back and evaluate how it handles these cases from here on out. Apologies would not fix the problems inherent in this type of system. The system fails every time an artist has to explain the artistic merit in their obvious metaphor or explain the good these discussions do for marginalized communities who have been made to feel shame for their entire lives.