On Gifts
I've no idea whether people have become more materialistic, greedier or less mindful of those around them.
However, I definitely find myself deeply repulsed by the - as I perceive it - open greed of some requesters of fic in gift-exchanges like Yuletide. I can't compute this in any other way, try as I might, when someone asks for one specific kind of story only, and rejects across the board everything else, including what that fandom may be most famous for, without leaving any freedom of choice and expression to the writer, than this is the height of self-serving egotism for me. And as such the requester is not exactly a person I find enjoyable.
This behaviour, to illustrate it maybe better, to me is like holding out the hand and asking for money, enough money to engage a professional ghostwriter and have the fic written by her. I've seen this kind of behaviour, a very few times, in real life and indeed the people showing it were the most unpleasant I have ever met. It's greed and no concern of anyone else.
With regard to gift-exchanges, to me these are very naturally evenly weighed: giver, recipient and fandom. The giver should be made to enjoy writing the gift just as much as the recipient has expecting it.
Part of the the fun in the writing is to find something unexpected, something the recipient hasn't thought of, but might like and enjoy. Obviously a recipient who expects his writer to write "as per one and only one order" makes this quite impossible already.
Part of the fun is also writing the best possible story one can write, and being able to stand by it. Again this is made impossible, if the recipient asks for something and only this thing, which the writer feels incapable of doing. One such example might be asking for a religious piece from someone who loathes religion.
Part of the fun is writing something which is in line with what the fandom is about. E.g. writing about magic and boarding schools in the Harry Potter 'verse. Any recipient who completely bars his writer from writing either magic or Hogwarts may take the fun out of it entirely for that writer.
Yet, trawling the many Yuletide letters while not an overwhelming occurrence, there still are quite a few prompts like what I detailed above. Indeed, I made the mistake of engaging in a wank about this (yes, I know, my bad, idiot me), where people rather naturally claim that the writer should write exactly what the recipient requests, otherwise s/he is an asshole, instead of the other way around.
What really kills me though is something else entirely: how can anyone, who claims to be an artist herself, stifle the artistic expression and ability of someone else in such a self-serving manner? I'm not talking triggers or severe squicks, I'm talking of making people "paint to numbers"...
Duh!
However, I definitely find myself deeply repulsed by the - as I perceive it - open greed of some requesters of fic in gift-exchanges like Yuletide. I can't compute this in any other way, try as I might, when someone asks for one specific kind of story only, and rejects across the board everything else, including what that fandom may be most famous for, without leaving any freedom of choice and expression to the writer, than this is the height of self-serving egotism for me. And as such the requester is not exactly a person I find enjoyable.
This behaviour, to illustrate it maybe better, to me is like holding out the hand and asking for money, enough money to engage a professional ghostwriter and have the fic written by her. I've seen this kind of behaviour, a very few times, in real life and indeed the people showing it were the most unpleasant I have ever met. It's greed and no concern of anyone else.
With regard to gift-exchanges, to me these are very naturally evenly weighed: giver, recipient and fandom. The giver should be made to enjoy writing the gift just as much as the recipient has expecting it.
Part of the the fun in the writing is to find something unexpected, something the recipient hasn't thought of, but might like and enjoy. Obviously a recipient who expects his writer to write "as per one and only one order" makes this quite impossible already.
Part of the fun is also writing the best possible story one can write, and being able to stand by it. Again this is made impossible, if the recipient asks for something and only this thing, which the writer feels incapable of doing. One such example might be asking for a religious piece from someone who loathes religion.
Part of the fun is writing something which is in line with what the fandom is about. E.g. writing about magic and boarding schools in the Harry Potter 'verse. Any recipient who completely bars his writer from writing either magic or Hogwarts may take the fun out of it entirely for that writer.
Yet, trawling the many Yuletide letters while not an overwhelming occurrence, there still are quite a few prompts like what I detailed above. Indeed, I made the mistake of engaging in a wank about this (yes, I know, my bad, idiot me), where people rather naturally claim that the writer should write exactly what the recipient requests, otherwise s/he is an asshole, instead of the other way around.
What really kills me though is something else entirely: how can anyone, who claims to be an artist herself, stifle the artistic expression and ability of someone else in such a self-serving manner? I'm not talking triggers or severe squicks, I'm talking of making people "paint to numbers"...
Duh!