Guardians of the Galaxy 1. Chapter 1

Author's Note: Fanfiction doesn't seem to grasp the fact that everyone should be given a fair trial in a democracy and that moderators should act as police as well as a jury and lawyers rather than simply police. I'm kind of rambling right now, so if this doesn't make sense then please disregard it.

Anyways, simply because a society has 'laws' (rules, guidelines) is no reason to assume that no one is ever going to break them and that when people do break laws (rules, guidelines) they should be offered a chance to explain why they broke those laws. What i'm saying is that when I changed my story's rating from 'K+' to 'T' so that I could post this second chapter for my story (more like a series of drabbles, not gonna lie) I believed that I was obeying the site's rules. There is no sexual content and no extreme gore in this chapter (although there is intentional disturbing content to contrast with the fluffiness of my previous chapter) and I believed that it deserved a 'T' rating rather than an 'M'. I was upset that my story was deleted by the fanfiction admins because had they told me that the addition of this chapter meant that this story deserves an 'M' rating because I would have gladly altered the rating had they told me this beforehand. Had they changed the rating without my consent, yet kept the story on the site I would have been happy. As it stands, my previous chapter is now gone and I have no way to recover it and the chapter they wanted to get rid of is the only one I can post. I'm reminded of why I quit writing (publishing using a shared account) on Fimfiction. I remember that I stopped because every story had to be pre-approved by an admin, yet after a story of mine wasn't pre-approved and I spent 20 minutes trying to convince the admin that the story did meet all of the site's rules and getting a defeated message claiming that the next time I posted the story he/she would approve it I would get rejected by a different admin and have to copy-and-paste the entire conversation in an attempt to convince the different admin to allow me to publish my story. After the fourth time I just got tired of it.

I guess what i'm saying is that I would have preferred to have been given a fine (asked to comply with the sites rules, or have my story rating changed) rather than being thrown in prison (have my story deleted). I would have also liked to have been made aware that I had broken a rule before I was punished for breaking the rule. Just because i clicked the message at the end of the list of the site's guidelines that claimed that I read them, doesn't mean that I understood them.

* * *

It had been three weeks since the death of Rocket Raccoon and most of the members of the team were coping with their grief in their own ways. Drax had spent the past three weeks searching for the villain who had taken Rocket away from him, and if the rest of the team had taken the time to notice his obsession they might have told him that 'Rat poison' was not a villain that he could destroy. Gamora seemed to alternate between acting as though she was apathetic to her friend's death when in view of the other members of her team, and sobbing quietly to herself when she was certain that she was alone. Groot seemed to be the most well-adjusted after his best friend's death, if only compared to his other team mates, since he seemed to have deluded himself into believing that his friend would return to him if he planted his tail into the same pot filled with dirt that Rocket had planted his own remains in.

He would have planted the full body, but he was afraid of encountering the wrath of a severely deluded Peter Quill.

"How do you get so dirty my darling?" Peter asked the rotting, maggot-infested corpse of his raccoon 'bride' as he attempted to clean his fur using an assortment of brushes and a tub filled with soapy water. The raccoon's eyes, which had been replaced about a week ago seemed to sparkle as the water droplets that had gathered on the glass started to reflect the lights from the various machines in Rocket's room.

"We can't have you looking so dirty today my dear." Peter said with a grin as he gently pulled the corpse out of the water and proceeded to dry it off. "Not on our wedding day after all." The outlaw said as his expression somehow became even more happy than it already was. Not a single member of the group had dared to inform the deluded Peter about the state of his beloved raccoon or his delusional state for fear of angering a crazed man with access to some of the most dangerous weapons in the galaxy. As a result, they had agreed to 'play along' and attend a wedding between a necrophile and his horribly decomposed bride.

"Are you ready my love?" Peter asked his bride, sub-consciously knowing that he would never respond, as he dressed him in a pretty white dress that he had 'borrowed' about a week after Rocket's death and adjusted to fit his small body. He gently shook the body to make the raccoon appear to nod before smiling and carrying him towards the room where the rest of the team would reluctantly witness their union.


	2. Chapter 2

If you want a debate i'll give you one, it won't matter much though since I suspect we're both two hard-headed to change our opinions very easily.

"Unfortunately, the website isn't actually a democracy, because the word "democracy" technically means that everyone in a polity has a say, or has a say through their representatives, in how the rules are developed."

Everyone on this site in theory does have a say in how the site runs. If not, there wouldn't be public forums and we wouldn't be asked to give our opinions on how the site is running on the front page through tweets and forum participation.

Your point about the ratings is valid, but I wouldn't suggest pursuing it further. We're kind of playing in the administrators' "sandbox", unfortunately, so although I think you're right, I don't think your protest will have "teeth".

The admins have no power unless we give it to them, just like governments have no power unless we give it to them. The power that the admins have exists because we gave it to them, and the fact that we have the power to take it away makes them theoretically servants to us. If we have a legitimate complaint than as our public servants they need to listen to our complaint and use our complaint to improve the website to appease us. One man such as myself has no 'teeth' but a group of men and women such as myself would. I actually remember a group of people on this site who were angry with the way that it ran and formed their own site not too long ago, the fact that the site is 'invitation-only' (or was the last time I checked) meant that it was at a disadvantage to this site though.

Ohhhhh, now I think I know where the misunderstanding occurred. This chapter DOES contain mature content "in spirit" if not "mature according to the rules", since you have a guy trying to marry a corpse and have a rather graphic description of how the corpse is maintained and dressed up in a wedding dress. The problem was that there was no technical injunction against this in the rules, which specify sex and violence. That is why you felt you weren't violating the rules.

Offensive and disturbing content is not necessarily 'mature content'. People often forget that no cartoon before 1996's "Spice City" was given an 'Adults Only' rating despite the fact that cartoons before had depictions of death (Beavis and Butthead), gore (80's cartoons), insanity, veiled sexual references and other content that people deemed offensive and disturbing yet were not convinced deserved a 'Mature rating'. There was actually two Powerpuff Girls episodes which featured 'disturbing content' that were deemed suitable for the shows audience of small children. One episode in particular depicted a mentally unstable miss Bellum and a deceased mayor that she in her insanity refuses to believe is dead and still holds on to her feelings of either friendship or love for. The other episode featured a magician dying a tragic and gruesome death and coming back to life later on as a zombie in order to destroy the power puff girls. Yes, people were offended and yes the content was disturbing, but the censors did not believe that the content was 'mature'.

And that's the issue that I have. Yes, I depicted Peter as a mentally unstable man who refused to accept the death of his lover. No, I did not depict anything beyond that. I did not describe any acts of love besides a simple kiss and cleaning the dirty pelt of Rocket. Again, I am fully aware that people were disturbed by the content and possibly offended (although in order to be offended it would have had to relate to them in some way) yet I honestly did not believe that necrophilia by itself should be considered mature content given the way that I portrayed it in my chapter.

I see. Well, I still think you're technically in the right, since you didn't actually break a rule, and the mods should have spelled out what included mature content and what did not.

Are you aware that police officers in my country (I don't know what country you live in at the moment) often give people warnings for certain offences because the person who broke the law didn't understand that they broke the law. I was once stopped by a police officer for biking on the wrong side of the road (which would mean that I would have had to pay a fine) but after I explained to him that I wasn't aware of the law I was let off with a warning. "necrophilia in the form of love, not just in sex, also classifies as mature content" is not an official rule, therefore it would make sense that I wouldn't be aware of it. It's like how p*** by itself is not against the law unless you actually m*** a child, in which case you would be a child molester.

Now i'm just rambling. You made some good points and I applaud you for them, but I wouldn't be a very good debater if I didn't at least attempt to argue with you.


End file.

Guardians of the Galaxy, Romance, Tragedy