Labelling vs creativity?

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

OK, so I've been watching the warnings debate, and I've made a post in my own lj about what I, personally will do in future, because that seemed fair and reasonable, to let people know. And I didn't want to say "caveat lector" even though I do (rather selfishly) appreciate it, as a reader who doesn't have any major triggery issues but who really, really doesn't like spoilers.

But there was something about certain presentations of the pro-warnings argument that had me wriggling in my seat, fundamentally disagreeing with something in many, many of the posts, only I didn't know quite how to articulate it. It was something to do with the connection between "if you don't warn you are made of fail" and "it's only fanfic, what purpose is there in talking about artistic integrity", only I couldn't put my finger on it.

Then today I followed some metafandom posts and found the beginnings of what may become Phase II of the discussion - people thoughtfully disagreeing with the concept of blanket warning and/or labelling conventions saying why. Here are two examples:

1. in which swanswan makes the following point in comments: The subject of the presentation of our creative works is important to a lot of people, and there are valid reasons to be concerned about any blanket ruling on how those fictions should be treated. These issues have ramifications, and though they do not seem as pressing (and are not as pressing) as the plight of someone seriously affected by a disturbing story, they exist, and go to the heart of what we are as community and as artists, however pretentious that may sound.

2. In which phoebe_zeitgeist puts some pretty big ideas forward, very eloquently. My summarising here is probably crap, and missing many nuances, so go read what she says for yourselves, but anyway - she says that while a lot of fan writing, and reading habits, are about "comfort reading", "...Not all readers are looking for comfort reading, and not all writers are trying to provide it." As well as noting that many of the fics she likes to read don't fit comfortably into categories, she argues that a set of labelling conventions would in many ways impact on writers from the moment of story conception, with the end result being an increasing sorting or categorisation of fanworks, and that this is actually harmful in that it tends to limit the possibilities that writers may entertain.

That's the background. Discuss it if you wish, but really what came to mind and prompted me to post were these thoughts (which aren't, you know, solid opinions, but definitely ideas I'd like to kick around the restroom):

Is it possible we (in Pros) are already affected by a kind of categorisation, or 'streaming' of creativity? That there's more of a tendency to write according to a formula than there was 10, 20 years ago, when everything was new and in many ways revolutionary? Maybe because there's more knowledge around about story arcs, or "how to write a bestselling romance novel", we feel more secure following the same steps rather than stepping out on our own? Or does writing for a specific audience & their known likes/dislikes encourage more of the same? Writing for a particular comm - do people have different ideas about the sort of fic they'd write for a DIALJ challenge, or for the_safehouse or for T&SR? Does it matter if my next story is very much like the last one I wrote? What are we doing this thing called fandom for, anyway *g*?

Please discuss.