offensive material

[CocoaPuss Zine]

i'm not sure if this has ever been mentioned on here before, but i just thought of it because i was thinking about distros and all their guidelines. i'm not sure what to think about saying "no racist, sexist, homophobic, etc etc material will be accepted". i mean aren't zines supposed to be the one place where you can say what you want? is this just some other form of censorship? surely everything written is offensive to someone right?

i just feel really censored and uninspired right now, like i can't really say what i want to say without hurting someone's feelings and that really sucks. i mean, the distro thing doesn't really bug me, but just the fact that their are so many rules even in zines, just makes me irritated. can i really be offensive if i am talking about my own experiences? sometimes i want to write about types of people that annoy me or things they do, but then i'm racist or sexist or whatever. i'm not really sure i'm explaining how i feel properly. oh well.

[Dan 10things]

Erin H said:

When did I ever say anything about distros being the end-all for zines? I actually said before that just because certain distros don't want to carry racist shit doesn't mean you can't make a zine. I know there's more than just distros. You are saying it's my distro and I can carry what I want - yes, I know that. But my distro, and any other distro, isn't the only place you can get zines. If anyone doesn't like my submission guidelines, they don't have to submit. My distro "rules" are not rules for the whole zine world. I'm only commenting on what I do, because some people on this post were ragging on distro guidelines as if that was stopping them from getting their zine out there. It isn't.

Again, this isn't about you, yet you keep making it so. I think you're missing the point.

[Erin H]

People are talking about distros. I run a distro. I am talking about my guidelines in relation to the topic. A lot of distros have the same guidelines.

Please stop telling me I'm missing the point.

Dan 10things said:

Erin H said:

When did I ever say anything about distros being the end-all for zines? I actually said before that just because certain distros don't want to carry racist shit doesn't mean you can't make a zine. I know there's more than just distros. You are saying it's my distro and I can carry what I want - yes, I know that. But my distro, and any other distro, isn't the only place you can get zines. If anyone doesn't like my submission guidelines, they don't have to submit. My distro "rules" are not rules for the whole zine world. I'm only commenting on what I do, because some people on this post were ragging on distro guidelines as if that was stopping them from getting their zine out there. It isn't.

Again, this isn't about you, yet you keep making it so. I think you're missing the point.

[tim scannell]

yeah...right on! Fourteen minutes and 53 seconds have gone by...quick: say cheese!!

Dan 10things said:

Erin H said:

As a biracial disabled woman, I can tell you it is not "way more politically correct" or less alienating. And seriously, if you don't know the difference between being sexist/racist/etc and being cool edgy/fringe-y, then I don't know if I would want to see your zines. You know?

I think you are still missing the point, it isn't all about you you you or what you want to see. There is a greater zine community out there... and there are voices in that community that are saying all the rules make them feel like there isn't a place for their voice in this community. And there are a lot of zine readers that would like to see a wider variety of voices, especially weird and fringey ones. At least acknowledge that. And really, those publishers and readers shouldn't give a crap about what you personally want to see in a zine, or about what you personally will and won't distro. They should write about what they want and publish what they want. Fuck some distro's rules, who cares? You don't need a distro to carry your zine to be successful publishing a zine. And you certainly shouldn't let politically correct rules stifle your voice. The whole reason for me to self-publish is to have full control over my zine. No rules!

[tim scannell]

joe has a MIND...'isms and PC propaganda'...will destroy much more than zine-dom!!

Joseph Delgado said:

hey cocoapuss. i think what you are asking is a valid question. i agree that zine distros have changed dramatically and have fallen victim to PC rhetoric whereupon their guidelines are very limiting and vague at the same time. it is subjective of them when they create their distros, mostly probably out of a propensity for mental masturbation, and to gather like minded philosophies and discussions together. i dont think i have come upon a distro that accepts everything offered, not as warehousing and wholesale of like minded PC crap, but a diverse field of controversial writings, including even pamphlets, zines constructed out of hate, discontent, maliciousness; however do they not deserve their equal showcasing, filling the gap that many zinesters may feel is present lately with selections? i remember going to a local records shop and finding so many free and interesting zines, zines by neo nazies, black panthers, american indian movement, brown berets (chicano movement) and other radical zines for our consumption that many would find abhorrently offensive. i remember the homocore zines that are hard to find these days that would make a point of offending everyone they possibly could. its sad that many zines today are based off the rigors and fundamentals of isms and PC propoganda---its self-defeatist against zine culture; how can alternative culture which once opined for no rules is now stigmatized by all these rules, guidelines, and structures? it sucks but shouldnt deter you from continuing with your projects, with your writing no matter how dark, outside the box they may be. if they should be seen as racist, sexist, etc who gives a fuck? i dont. i could care less who gets offended or put off by my zines, fuck them, they shouldnt of picked it up in the first place. keep it going.

[tim scannell]

as i said earlier...'chockablock with GROUP THINK'...............the oldest Liberal ploy in the book...pit group against group...to hell with hyphenated anything...just another ISM.

Joseph Delgado said:

its interesting to see how everyone defines 'edgy.' tim edgy for you is obvious world wide issues concerning very real and dangerous situations and i agree that is noble and should be discussed. however edgy for me is the gentrification of the barrios of the country's cities; to me edgy is discussing why the 500 year old forced occupation of american soil continues; why native and indigenous youth are still dying, why the us government is still poisoning reservation water supplies with uranium, pharmaceuticals. edgy to me is why 13 year old girls in waco texas like to shoot up heroin, edgy to me is why 3 million american children are homeless, edgy is why gays are still being beat in large american cities and rural towns, edgy to me is cocoapuss exploring the beauty and darkness of her sexuality and that to me is what im interested. we all have our soap boxes and to each his/her own. its noble that you would highlight such evil, but what about the evil here at home?

cocoa keep doing ur zines, without em, i fear our world will be just a little bit poorer.

tim scannell said:

zines are CHOCKABLOCK with...'group think'...their 'edgy' and 'fringe-' stuff is merely
LIBERAL CRAP...no judgement...no discernment...no right/wrong...etcetera. The
ZINE WORLD does not deal with REAL subjects...like the murdering of Christians
round-the-world...or the enslavement of Muslim women...or the absolute corruption
of the UN...deal with some REAL 'edginess'...then get back to me about silly American
wee-wee boo-boos...FAUX ISSUES!! "Edgy' topics...what a laugh!!!

[tim scannell]

joey....it ain't...'UR'...if it's here at home!!

Joseph Delgado said:

hey cocoapuss. i think what you are asking is a valid question. i agree that zine distros have changed dramatically and have fallen victim to PC rhetoric whereupon their guidelines are very limiting and vague at the same time. it is subjective of them when they create their distros, mostly probably out of a propensity for mental masturbation, and to gather like minded philosophies and discussions together. i dont think i have come upon a distro that accepts everything offered, not as warehousing and wholesale of like minded PC crap, but a diverse field of controversial writings, including even pamphlets, zines constructed out of hate, discontent, maliciousness; however do they not deserve their equal showcasing, filling the gap that many zinesters may feel is present lately with selections? i remember going to a local records shop and finding so many free and interesting zines, zines by neo nazies, black panthers, american indian movement, brown berets (chicano movement) and other radical zines for our consumption that many would find abhorrently offensive. i remember the homocore zines that are hard to find these days that would make a point of offending everyone they possibly could. its sad that many zines today are based off the rigors and fundamentals of isms and PC propoganda---its self-defeatist against zine culture; how can alternative culture which once opined for no rules is now stigmatized by all these rules, guidelines, and structures? it sucks but shouldnt deter you from continuing with your projects, with your writing no matter how dark, outside the box they may be. if they should be seen as racist, sexist, etc who gives a fuck? i dont. i could care less who gets offended or put off by my zines, fuck them, they shouldnt of picked it up in the first place. keep it going.

[tim scannell]

there's a place for us / somewhere a place for us / peace and quiet and open air / wait for us / somewhere // there's a time for us / some day a time for us / ...:)

Dan 10things said:

Erin H said:

As a biracial disabled woman, I can tell you it is not "way more politically correct" or less alienating. And seriously, if you don't know the difference between being sexist/racist/etc and being cool edgy/fringe-y, then I don't know if I would want to see your zines. You know?

I think you are still missing the point, it isn't all about you you you or what you want to see. There is a greater zine community out there... and there are voices in that community that are saying all the rules make them feel like there isn't a place for their voice in this community. And there are a lot of zine readers that would like to see a wider variety of voices, especially weird and fringey ones. At least acknowledge that. And really, those publishers and readers shouldn't give a crap about what you personally want to see in a zine, or about what you personally will and won't distro. They should write about what they want and publish what they want. Fuck some distro's rules, who cares? You don't need a distro to carry your zine to be successful publishing a zine. And you certainly shouldn't let politically correct rules stifle your voice. The whole reason for me to self-publish is to have full control over my zine. No rules!

[CocoaPuss Zine]

i wish i could find those zines from long ago. i would love to read the black panther zines, sexist as they sometimes are. i want to write about my fear of being fat and how i think that's disgusting and the huge obesity epidemic int his country and about road rage and how i sometimes don't want to be a mama and i don't really understand the whole "pride parade thing" (you parade down the street in a thong because you want to be able to adopt? um ok) and i really was thinking about offending people and not being "feminist" but all of you are so right. fuck it. i already started writing #4 and so far so good.

there's this distro from the UK that i really like, which is huge for me because most of them are just so/so, but just looking at their site really inspired me to keep going. i want to buy all their stuff, which is really saying a lot.

http://www.handmedowndistro.org.uk/



Joseph Delgado said:

hey cocoapuss. i think what you are asking is a valid question. i agree that zine distros have changed dramatically and have fallen victim to PC rhetoric whereupon their guidelines are very limiting and vague at the same time. it is subjective of them when they create their distros, mostly probably out of a propensity for mental masturbation, and to gather like minded philosophies and discussions together. i dont think i have come upon a distro that accepts everything offered, not as warehousing and wholesale of like minded PC crap, but a diverse field of controversial writings, including even pamphlets, zines constructed out of hate, discontent, maliciousness; however do they not deserve their equal showcasing, filling the gap that many zinesters may feel is present lately with selections? i remember going to a local records shop and finding so many free and interesting zines, zines by neo nazies, black panthers, american indian movement, brown berets (chicano movement) and other radical zines for our consumption that many would find abhorrently offensive. i remember the homocore zines that are hard to find these days that would make a point of offending everyone they possibly could. its sad that many zines today are based off the rigors and fundamentals of isms and PC propoganda---its self-defeatist against zine culture; how can alternative culture which once opined for no rules is now stigmatized by all these rules, guidelines, and structures? it sucks but shouldnt deter you from continuing with your projects, with your writing no matter how dark, outside the box they may be. if they should be seen as racist, sexist, etc who gives a fuck? i dont. i could care less who gets offended or put off by my zines, fuck them, they shouldnt of picked it up in the first place. keep it going.

[James N. Dawson]

Hoping not to blow my own horn too loud and too often, but we had a good, long discussion on this site I think is relevant to this issue---"representation"---and I think we've got some balls rolling toward that goal:

http://wemakezines.ning.com/forum/topics/the-big-inclusive-zinereview

Jerianne anounced that a truncated version of Zine World should be out by the end of January.

Cocoapuss:

Mac and Zines Distro, in progress, said on this forum it was going to try to be pretty inclusive:

http://wemakezines.ning.com/forum/topics/you-too-can-help-mac-and-z...

I've only used one distro, and just a few times---Quimby's, based in Chicago. I never bothered to read their guidelines, but my impression is that they're pretty inclusive. They accepted my zine with no questions, though there's nothing *overtly* "offensive" about it.

Have you tried or considered Etsy?

For review/advertisement, Syndicate Zine Reviews (www.syndicatedzinereviews.blogspot.com)? Xerography Debt? Media Junky? Papernet Gazet?

Maybe I'm getting a little off topic here, but there've been threads about how people have liked Etsy and have been selling successfully on it. I've been trying to be open-minded, but I find browsing it tiring. What's your experience doing that been? Maybe it's just me. How about Syndicate Zine Reviews Blogspot? Have any of you have spent much time browsing and/or reading it? Did you find any particularly interesting zines? Did you order them? Was/is it an enjoyable/relaxing/fun experience? Have you ever gotten any orders, trades, etc. from Syndicated Zine Reviews or other on-line review sites?

[ciaraxyerra]

opinions are very subjective & everyone is perfectly entitled to their own, but as someone who runs a distro & understands from the inside out what an incredibly overwhelming & thankless job it is, it's really disheartening to hear someone dismiss the overwhelming majority of distros out there as merely "so-so". i am certainly not impressed with the selection in every distro catalogue i see, but anyone who runs a distro that actually functions (ie, maintains a reasonably updated catalogue, receives & fills orders in a halfways timely manner, actively seeks out new zines) is working wicked hard. no distro can be all things to all people, of course, but it's a lot of time, effort, energy, & money for pretty much no payback besides feeling like you're helping out zinesters to some extent & getting zines into the hands of people who want to read them. hearing that work described as "so-so" & therefore basically irrelevant is really depressing, & certainly does not inspire me to want to rush out & check out more of your zines. zinesters that have some degree of respect for all the effort distro folks are doing are far easier to work with, & i won't work with someone who dismisses the work that a distro does, no matter how awesome their zines are. no one who runs a distro is looking for a medal or anything--but a little basic courtesy is nice.

[kit feral]

I just want to say I find none of those topics really offensive (of course, depending how they're written) and I'd LOVE to read about them. :)

CocoaPuss Zine said:

i wish i could find those zines from long ago. i would love to read the black panther zines, sexist as they sometimes are. i want to write about my fear of being fat and how i think that's disgusting and the huge obesity epidemic int his country and about road rage and how i sometimes don't want to be a mama and i don't really understand the whole "pride parade thing" (you parade down the street in a thong because you want to be able to adopt? um ok) and i really was thinking about offending people and not being "feminist" but all of you are so right. fuck it. i already started writing #4 and so far so good.

there's this distro from the UK that i really like, which is huge for me because most of them are just so/so, but just looking at their site really inspired me to keep going. i want to buy all their stuff, which is really saying a lot.

http://www.handmedowndistro.org.uk/



Joseph Delgado said:

hey cocoapuss. i think what you are asking is a valid question. i agree that zine distros have changed dramatically and have fallen victim to PC rhetoric whereupon their guidelines are very limiting and vague at the same time. it is subjective of them when they create their distros, mostly probably out of a propensity for mental masturbation, and to gather like minded philosophies and discussions together. i dont think i have come upon a distro that accepts everything offered, not as warehousing and wholesale of like minded PC crap, but a diverse field of controversial writings, including even pamphlets, zines constructed out of hate, discontent, maliciousness; however do they not deserve their equal showcasing, filling the gap that many zinesters may feel is present lately with selections? i remember going to a local records shop and finding so many free and interesting zines, zines by neo nazies, black panthers, american indian movement, brown berets (chicano movement) and other radical zines for our consumption that many would find abhorrently offensive. i remember the homocore zines that are hard to find these days that would make a point of offending everyone they possibly could. its sad that many zines today are based off the rigors and fundamentals of isms and PC propoganda---its self-defeatist against zine culture; how can alternative culture which once opined for no rules is now stigmatized by all these rules, guidelines, and structures? it sucks but shouldnt deter you from continuing with your projects, with your writing no matter how dark, outside the box they may be. if they should be seen as racist, sexist, etc who gives a fuck? i dont. i could care less who gets offended or put off by my zines, fuck them, they shouldnt of picked it up in the first place. keep it going.

[CocoaPuss Zine]

by so-so i mean they all pretty much sell the same types of zines by the same types of people. i'm just bored with them really. i've bought zines from you before, but i'm not really interested in working with you either for the record. i'm doing just fine thank you. i'm sure you are too, you don't need my work and i don't need you to sell zines for me. i'm just making observations about what i see and if it offends you then maybe i am doing my job. i personally don't care how you feel. the offensiveness is starting already...

the one distro i have worked with was proun and they were excellent.

as far as etsy goes, etsy is definitely exhausting to browse through but i have sold a bunch of zines on there since i started doing zines in march. i'm taking a break right now because i'm on vacation and not at home. all the other stuff james is talking about, no i haven't done any of that yet. still just getting started but it's fairly obvious i'm already forming opinions of the whole process.

ciaraxyerra said:

opinions are very subjective & everyone is perfectly entitled to their own, but as someone who runs a distro & understands from the inside out what an incredibly overwhelming & thankless job it is, it's really disheartening to hear someone dismiss the overwhelming majority of distros out there as merely "so-so". i am certainly not impressed with the selection in every distro catalogue i see, but anyone who runs a distro that actually functions (ie, maintains a reasonably updated catalogue, receives & fills orders in a halfways timely manner, actively seeks out new zines) is working wicked hard. no distro can be all things to all people, of course, but it's a lot of time, effort, energy, & money for pretty much no payback besides feeling like you're helping out zinesters to some extent & getting zines into the hands of people who want to read them. hearing that work described as "so-so" & therefore basically irrelevant is really depressing, & certainly does not inspire me to want to rush out & check out more of your zines. zinesters that have some degree of respect for all the effort distro folks are doing are far easier to work with, & i won't work with someone who dismisses the work that a distro does, no matter how awesome their zines are. no one who runs a distro is looking for a medal or anything--but a little basic courtesy is nice.