Christ, I can't believe I'm getting into this.

[acari]

This is a response to miladyhawke's post: What We Say We Stand For - Viggo/Orli & Domlijah Rant - What the Shit is this!? . I'm posting it here because it got way too fucking long.

Comments

part 2

[acari]

... continued

I can't entirely fault everybody for not getting involved with this though because these things have a way of getting ugly, and it does drain one's stamina.

Gah. Don’t remind me. Been there, done that. I’m just saying that there are places that make me sick to the stomach listening to the hate-speech, and no one says a word. But it can be avoided by just not venturing there, it’s harder to escape the casual comments thrown around all over LJ. I only say things when something seriously pisses me off; choose your battles and all that. It is not worth it when the only thing you succeed in is the perpetrator feeling as a victim because you dare to criticise her behaviour.

My tolerance reaches only so far as it isn’t harmful what people do or say. I highly value freedom of speech but there are limits.

And I want to thank you again for coming here, and for being willing to listen to me and share your thoughts.

PS. You didn’t offend me by using the word "tinhat". It was just one of the many misunderstanding in this whole mess, I think. I use the term in the way it was originally meant and you in the reclaimed way. I do think both domlijah and viggorli have a lot in common when it comes to believers. If you’re ever interested, I have a whole bunch of links to very interesting posts on the tinhat (how I mean it) issue.

Re: part 2

[miladyhawke]

You know, it’s funny. I had a decent response prepared last night and lost it, but on reading your last response to me again today, I pretty much agreed with everything you said without feeling the need to qualify or add to anything except one thing which I’ll get to.

Basically, I have to say first that what I liked here about your attitude and your opinions is that you’re not seeing everything as black and white the way many people do. And as you said, these issues are quite complicated (over-simplification is one of the horrors of this kerfluffle), and you seem to have a very balanced and fair perspective.

There is one point that you brought up though that was actually the subject of my entire post at Missiedith’s blog, the Beautiful Dreamers response. I have a feeling that anyone other than yourself who sees it is going to give me all kinds of grief and mock mercilessly, but what can I say. I’m a hopelessly romantic sap. I’m happy that way.

The point is this:

I do think it's mostly the truly rabid Orlando fangirls who bash Kate, but there is a connection to Viggorli believers. It’s not so much self-hatred but the tendency to over-idealise the men and their “love” as something pure, untainted and untouchable, I think. I does make me uncomfortable because it’s so easy to see potential girlfriends or simply close male friends as a threat.

This is a very interesting, and I think, valid, point. I’d like to add two things to that statement that I think I mentioned over at Missie’s. Firstly, I’m quite willing to bet that feeling a threat to V/O is where the Kate-bashing of any V/O believers comes from. I’m not quite sure that the idealization of a pure love is all that dangerous of a corrupting temptation for most V/O believers though. I see whether one bashes or not as being about individual maturity, and it’s because most don’t bash that the idealization doesn’t concern me, I also tend to think that idealization is what many OTPs are about. To back up what I’m talking about, the V/O/K triangle is a lot like Aragorn/Legolas/Arwen (sorry, I must bring my OTP into every conversation, lol). The exact same perception of a threat to their OTP is what leads some A/L shippers to bash Arwen in their fics, and anyone who reads A/L is quite familiar with the phenomenon. However, it’s still the few, and most are mature enough to leave Arwen out of it or else treat her fairly in their fic. Of course the V/O shippers who bash are more of a problem though because they are so very visible on lists. I’m watching one or two get taken over by it.

This is getting long again, I’m sorry. I’m not trying to turn you into some sort of spokesperson

I think that’s what I became after my journal entry was linked to in your newsletter ;) which I just friended, but it’s all good. I was just confused as all hell where in the woodwork all these random people were coming from. Originally I was just wanking in my journal for the sake of personal release and sharing with my little set of friends, not expecting anything to come of it. I’m not really the best person to continue running my mouth off about all this (lennongirl and others have been much better spoken), but I hope that even if people don’t agree with me, my willingness to talk will rub off and spread.

Thanks for the contd conversation; it’s been my pleasure being here.