Yatsufusa 2025-05-25 04:59:59

Did those people elaborate on 'why' they were browsing NG with disabled filters then?

The fault here lies not with you but with them. If 'they' had filtered out "A"-rated submissions, they would not even have seen the drawings in question. To me it sounds you were targeted. (And if you were to write a PM with their names to TomFulp, it might turn out that they were targeting a lot of NSFW-artists...)

Yatsufusa 2025-05-26 00:14:07

@CaptainUnikittyFreak I cannot help you in concerns to other places, but NG is very protective of their artists - regardless of their skill level, if that's something you're worried about.

If somebody writes an abusive review (or PM), you can report it with the little [Flag]-button. Just make sure you're not reporting somebody over a difference in taste - but likewise: Somebody who complains at length about 'you not catering to their personal preferences' can get lost.

Most other hosters of art (especially NSFW) have similar means of defending against "un-constructive feedback" (to put it lightly), although I'm hearing DeviantArt and Instagram are "not the best" at actually following through.

Yatsufusa 2025-05-27 20:37:35

@CaptainUnikittyFreak Hm... I had a look at a small sample size of your "A"-rated art.

I think their criticism stems from the fact that your characters do not look like Barbie(TM) dolls. To phrase this politely: Certain people struggle with concepts such as 'tolerance' and 'body positivity'. In certain corners of the internet, these views can even be "enforced". Personally, I suspect that those people were either "drilled" by our modern media landscape to only accept "normal" people as beautiful, or look like troglodytes themselves and are trying to "redirect" the hate/intolerance they are experiencing themselves in order to try and feel better.

Quite a while back, I watched a documentary about (amongst other things) dwarfism. Something a woman with dwarfism and mother of 2 children with dwarfism said resonated strongly with me to this day. To paraphrase what she said:
"I am not "sick". Dwarfism is not a "disease".
I do not _suffer_ from dwarfism; I _live_ with dwarfism!
I 'suffer' from how society treats people with dwarfism."

From personal experience, I can tell you that "small" people are "big" people - in compressed form! If you want to address the criticism certain people raised about your work online, or just want to improve as an artist in general, I would say focus on faces - not on body size.
Your art style would not lend itself to "hyper-realistic" faces, but you can telegraph age through subtle lines, representing wrinkles. Look at the faces of people. Ideally, ask people you know "Hey, can I have a close look at your face? It's for my art." You'll notice a lot of differences when you compare the faces of children/underage teenagers and young adults such as yourself.
If you have made any 'artist-friends' on this site, you should ask them for pointers in this regard. If not, you could browser the recent submissions to the Art Portal until you find an artist who has a comparable art style but more practice and ask 'them' for pointers.

I hope this helps.