June Something: Harry Potter is the Schitt (Public Post)
https://squidgiepdx.dreamwidth.org/297595.html
Skipping around because what is order, anyway?
Compare and/or contrast your very first fandom obsession and your very latest fandom obsession.Under the cut - Harry Potter, Schitt's Creek, Buffy ( Read more... )
Skipping around because what is order, anyway?
Compare and/or contrast your very first fandom obsession and your very latest fandom obsession.Under the cut - Harry Potter, Schitt's Creek, Buffy ( Read more... )
I think part of the problem is that spaces which are purely fannish are harder to find
This is true, yeah. Because I also agree that toxic fannish spaces will always exist, unfortunately, but it's easy to distance yourself from those toxic areas in a fandom and stay in your own little corner, it's definitely better by curating your own experience by following the right people and enjoying the fandom that way instead of engaging with every single part of that particular fandom. However, if a fandom doesn't have much fannish enthusiasm in terms of engagement it can be discouraging from continuing to be in that fandom.
Although I've adapted to the way some platforms, such as Tumblr, operates when it comes to fan engagement (gifs, fanart, etc) and while I wish meta and discussions existed more without them being hijacked and derailed by douchebags who want to start a fight, I am happy whenever I see a fandom produce a lot of fanmade content such as that. There are a lot of fandoms that don't have anything like that, and the interaction via those means are minimal to none, which is disappointing.
if anything will kill ships for you, it was the ship wars. Good Lord, the ship wars.
Ship wars have always existed in fandom, even before HP, but the way ship wars have evolved from "my ship is better than your ship" to "you shouldn't ship that it's problematic" is both disturbing and exhausting to deal with. Listen, I have a lot of ships, but shipping isn't the be all/end all of the fandom experience and the more you realize that it's pointless fighting over a fictional ship the more your fandom experience will be better, imho.
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experience by following the right people and enjoying the fandom that way instead of engaging with every single part of that particular fandom.
Exactly, as well as accepting that there will be "bad days" so to speak in every corner - not just the internet, but in life, honestly. People can be a-holes sometimes. The difference is when the entire fandom is like that, or at least an entire fannish space. Or when the a-holes dominate the space, which I'd say is more common, honestly.
Interaction is SO hard to come by. I miss that too. And meta. I find too that it's far more common to form parasocial relationships, since you might follow a person but that doesn't mean you're friends. I guess even back then it happened, though.
Re: Ship wars, I'm not sure the "your ship is problematic" argument was as much a thing when I was more involved? That being said, I do think it still happened, it just got shut down faster, whereas tumblr seems to have come full circle on kink shaming. Which. Dude.
In my experience a lot of it was just personal attacks in general. "If you ship Ron/Hermione, you're elitist." "If you ship Harry/Hermione, you're delusional." "If you don't have any slash ships, you're homophobic." Just... come on. You can ship something or not ship something and be a reasonably decent, intelligent person.
Then of course you have the whole MsScribe debacle, which... *rubs head.*
So yeah, now I'm just... ship what you ship. Enjoy your kinks. None of it matters.
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That, or, people not necessarily being assholes but just being overall negative. I've been in fandoms where it seems the majority of people end up disliking the direction of the story and all I see are rants and complaints, and believe me I used to be that person too where I would use my journal to rant about things. But it took a lot of emotional energy out of me and I stopped, it just wasn't healthy. And while venting out your frustrations can be good, doing so all the time and having an entire community in a specific fandom do the same thing can be emotionally and psychologically exhausting to deal with.
I'm not sure the "your ship is problematic" argument was as much a thing when I was more involved? That being said, I do think it still happened, it just got shut down faster
It's certainly more of a recent thing, I think. I'm sure it happened before and, as you said, was shut down quickly because most of fandom had the "ship and let ship" and YKINMKATO mentality, something I wish current fandom would learn/relearn.
(There's been conversations surrounding the uptick up this trend of kink shaming in fannish spaces and where it stems from, and while it's definitely complicated and nuanced the general consensus seems to be that it most likely it stemmed from the whole Twilight/FSOG era and hijacked by radfem/TERFs where their rhetoric has bled into and invaded fannish spaces which has somehow led to a more conservative way of thinking re: shipping, kinks, fannish interests, etc.)
In my experience a lot of it was just personal attacks in general. "If you ship Ron/Hermione, you're elitist." "If you ship Harry/Hermione, you're delusional." "If you don't have any slash ships, you're homophobic." Just... come on. You can ship something or not ship something and be a reasonably decent, intelligent person.
Shipping wars have always been a personal attack on some level, since the main motivation is just that you don't like a ship, don't want to see it anywhere, and want to bully people into not shipping it anymore and/or wanting them to ship your ship instead. Which doesn't work because you cannot convince someone to not ship something if they really enjoy the ship, nor can you convince someone to ship your preferred ship if they, in turn, don't like it. It's pointless and it goes nowhere. And really, all shipping wars are the same, and most recently it's just been repackaged with a "woke" appearance which, like all faux woke shit is merely performative.
Calling liking certain ships "delusional" still exists, it's just wrapped in a vaguely condescending tone of "why would anyone even ship this?"/"there are people who actually ship this? really?" which is a passive aggressive way to shame people for liking said ship, and that's childish in itself.
But what's interesting is that before saying things like, "if you don't have any slash ships you're homophobic" has now become "if you're straight and a woman (esp a woman) and you ship m/m pairings you're fetishizing gay men and are homophobic" which is a complete 180 from what I remember. Which, yes, there is a discussion to have in regards to that particular subject, but that's a serious conversation to have and it seems that none of the people who are making these accusations want to actually have such a discussion, and considering the nature of the Internet these days nuanced discussions about these kinds of topics cannot be handled by most because unless it's a quick Twitter-style clapback comment it is not worth their attention span.
(Granted, a lot of these are, like, a minority that I've seen but it's a loud minority which gets noticed more.)
So yeah, now I'm just... ship what you ship. Enjoy your kinks. None of it matters.
Exactly.
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100%! And I did the same exact thing. It was not healthy.
Which doesn't work because you cannot convince someone to not ship something if they really enjoy the ship, nor can you convince someone to ship your preferred ship if they, in turn, don't like it. It's pointless and it goes nowhere. And really, all shipping wars are the same, and most recently it's just been repackaged with a "woke" appearance which, like all faux woke shit is merely performative.
Yeah, and that's an issue. It's performative and all about a reason to argue, which is gross and counterproductive to actual problems in the world.
I'll admit that when I first discovered slash, I... kind of did think it was just kids being silly and making fun of gay men, but in retrospect I think that was because (a) I couldn't understand who'd seriously ship Harry/Draco (sorry, I realize now there are many reasons people do, but when I was new to fandom I just "knew" Draco as a racist bully, you know?), and (b) I was a kid myself and that WAS exactly what the kids I went to school with would've done. "Hahaha Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck are gay hahaha." Plus, IIRC the fic wasn't well written. Now I realize that while maybe some of those fic writers really were kids being gross, it's more likely that they were serious, if perhaps not the best writers. Or maybe they were and I just jumped to conclusions. BUT once I realized no, a lot of people honestly saw those characters together, I shut up. I also feel horrible about some of the comments I left in the meantime, and even went back and apologized.
and considering the nature of the Internet these days nuanced discussions about these kinds of topics cannot be handled by most because unless it's a quick Twitter-style clapback comment it is not worth their attention span.
Right?? That's why I don't bother. I also think it's because people really just want to be agreed with, a lot of the time, even if it IS a quick twitter-style clapback comment. They're not really going for a conversation, they just want to have said something, which puts you in a bad position if you try adding anything to the conversation - even if you're agreeing with them.
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