Work Text:
It was a long and difficult day as the fangirl, sitting in front of her computer, sat staring at the screen with the best of intentions: of commenting on fic she'd read and saved in open tabs, of making some rec posts, of perhaps getting up the courage to write a fill for that particular kinkmeme prompt, of finally crossposting some stories to the Archive of Our Own and cleaning up her bookmarks there, of checking out whether delicious was still -- or yet again -- unusable to find more fics for her preferred pairings in a few dozen of the fandoms she was currently focused on, of updating the Wikipedia article on her favorite television series for which she had a cite about its renewal status; yet again and again and again she was confronted by messages about the protest action (and urges to take action herself) against the SOPA and PIPA bills making their way through the legislative branches of the U.S. government and their likely effect not just on her, but on her friends in other countries, and on anyone anywhere who in future might wish to watch a classic The Professionals fanvid on a site like YouTube or one of the other (few, remaining) video sites -- and it was not that she did not care or had not herself already take action; she had signed the MoveOn petition and the EFF one, she had called her senator's and her representative's offices to request they vote against any such bills, she had emailed information about the negative effects of these bills to friends and family, she had even posted about it on some of her favorite fannish sites -- yet the continuing presence of the banners, the blackout pages, and calls to action in time became too much; although she believed in their cause, at long last, wholly convinced that her enjoyment -- quite legal and legitimate in many cases -- of many entertainment properties would be severely if not completely curtailed in its richness of expression and community if even half the sites expressing concern about such initiatives would be negatively affected by them to the extent of no longer being able to provide service or much of their content if the bills were passed, she moved away from the tempting screen and decided to make a valiant attempt to do what people must have done in the before-times: with eyes turned resolutely away from the enticing glow of any internet-connected devices, she sat down upon her sopha with a book, turned to the first page, and began.