Community Guidelines

The short version

Write scary things. Don't hurt real people.

What's welcome

Whispering Shadows exists for horror fiction — blood, death, hauntings, cosmic dread, body horror, disturbing and unsettling themes. That's the genre we're here for, and our moderation is built to allow it: the automated word filter only ever checks identity fields (your display name, bio, tag names), never story or comment text, so "corpse", "kill", or "ghost" in a story will never get flagged for being dark.

What isn't welcome

• Harassment, threats, or targeted abuse of another member — in a comment, a profile, or anywhere else on the site.
• Spam — content posted to advertise, scrape, or flood the site rather than to tell a story.
• Impersonation — pretending to be another member, or a Whispering Shadows admin.
• Inappropriate profile images, or any image content that violates our Terms & Conditions.
• Anything illegal, and in particular: we have zero tolerance for child sexual abuse material, non-consensual intimate imagery, or sexually explicit content involving minors, in any form. See the Terms for what happens to an account found posting this.

If you're ever unsure whether something crosses the line: real-world harm and illegal content are the line. Fictional intensity is not.

How moderation actually works

• Stories publish immediately right now — we're not requiring admin review before a story reaches the shelves at this stage. Reports still work exactly the same: a flagged story goes to an admin, same as always.
• Comments post immediately (no pre-review), but any member can report one. A flagged comment goes to the admin queue for review.
• Profiles can be reported too — for a name, bio, or image, not just posted content.
• Reporting doesn't take a story or comment down by itself; it puts it in front of a keeper, who resolves the report, removes the content, or blocks the account if it truly violates these guidelines.

How to report something

Every story, comment, and profile has a report control. Reporting flags it for a keeper — you don't need to argue your case in public, and you can only report a given item once (so re-reporting doesn't inflate the queue). If you believe an account should be removed entirely rather than a single piece of content, report the profile directly.