It bears pointing out that when we mention purges of unsavory content, kids' first knee reaction might be "yay, they'll rid the fandom of those freaks/weirdos/perverts/adults!"

Historically, no. The fandom itself is unsavory. Not the specific content.

If you have never seen this happen/lived through one of this, I'm sorry. Historically, the process is always the same. For profit owners are not your friends and they're not here make fandom a space to your liking.

Platform purges are preeetty much part and parcel for fandom. Fandom builds a community in a free site, gains enough traction that someone goes hmm, we could make money off of that, and once the site changes hands, the new administration ostracizes the fandom community over the

Legality and perceived risk of hosting copyrighted and legally grey content.

This is why AO3 and DW were built the way they are, without ads and without profits.

Also, if you've never lived through a content purge, you might feel the urge to moralize it. It's a tempting coping mechanism, but you should know it's not true. It will set you up for some pretty harrowing mental disconnects.

No, they don't come only for those who "deserve" it. No, this isn't about turning fandom into a morally pure space with only "good" fic in it. It's about marketability and profit, and if you think corporations have morals... sorry, did you sleep off the last four years?

And, no, being targeted in a content purges is not a moral or personal failing. That's the point. Corporations don't care who you are, as a person, they care if you're statistically likely to make them money. Historically, fandom as a whole is in the "probably not" pile.