The fact that no one (including me) seems to protest only contributes to the problem...

Oh, people are going to protest, and it won't take too much longer. I tried to head it off last time by requesting esclaramonde post a link to her community and invite people over. It shut things down a bit, but people are sick to death of it, so it's not going to take much to set people off. Specifically, if someone with a reputation for monumental cluelessness posts something else, we'll start an implosion and end up on wankitywank.

(Frankly, I was shocked that photosinensis didn't set it off. There are a lot of people who can't stand him.)

If the death posts start up again, we'll have a problem there, too.

Wait! That's it! Someone obscure related to Twilight could die, and mcity could post about it on fandom_lounge! Talk about a perfect storm...

Similarly, there seems to be a lot of confusion about which topics are too dark or disturbing: some people say that it's just bad to post things which are upsetting, others say it is okay, just as long as they are fandom-related.

Fandom lounge is for fun links. Oh, most other things are on topic, but "fun links" is its raison d'etre. Dark and disturbing is thus always off-topic, but is sometimes tolerated. Discussions are sometimes tolerated, though also actually off-topic, since they tend to move in non-lighthearted directions. Anything related to animals is entirely off-topic, though people did put up with staroverthebay's kitten posts for a few days before ripping into her. (Because kittens are cute.)

Things are tolerated since f_l is a very relaxed community for JF, and they're tolerated because, most of the time, it's not a problem.