I'm sorry that you've felt abused, Daisy-Belle. That's an awful feeling, along with the sense that you've been commodified, whispered about, and constrained to express some things more than others. I hope you continue to write in whatever publications allow you express yourself as you want, because I look forward to your writing and your perspective and your expression, not because it fits all my perspectives, but because it often challenges them and does so with such good writing.

If I may offer my own dissenting perspective, I am reluctant to tag what you describe here as "abuse," however. It seems to be the ugly underbelly of just about any attempt to get readers or viewers in this world, but more petty and sordid than malicious. It is, as you note, gaming the system. It's been widely observed that trauma is the dominant form of narrative expression (and argued against, esp. Parul Seghal, "The Case Against the Trauma Plot," New Yorker, Dec. 27, 2021 https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/01/03/the-case-against-the-trauma-plot) so The Narrative Arc isn't unique here. Would your sense of abuse be different if that were advertised more clearly, that is, if publications like The Narrative Arc specified that they favored trauma narratives?

Please take care, and if any of this gives offense, forgive me. You are absolutely under no obligation to reply.