Fandom Meta: How Wank Kills Fandom a Little More Every Day ...
Because she is one of the most awesome, awesome people in this fandom, and because she seems to be capable of incredibly fearless acts of pure courage when it comes to speaking her mind in a public forum, I'm going to re-post a comment I made in response to something the incomparable janissa11 touched on in her Live Journal HERE. Because I really think it needs to be pointed out even though I don't know what the solution is. If I did, I'd tell you. But tragic the reality: I don't.
But in response to this:
Discussion is not automatically wank. Discussion is not, by any means, automatically negative, or a Bad Thing. At times I bring up issues here that I feel warrant discussion, often because I feel there are surprisingly few places in LJ where discussion actually happens.
I said this:
OMG! I so love you right now. I always love you, but I just love you with a firey-white-hot burning love at this particular moment in time. There are so, so, so many times on LJ that I want to comment on something I've read in a comm or on someone's journal and actually have a CONVERSATION for the sake of ELUCIDATION to either help me understand what was said, or to help others understand my agreement or disagreement with what was said. And I just don't.
Not because I don't think there are many, many, many people who would have wonderfully enlighting things to tell me that would make my brain a better place, but rather because fandom, by it's very nature, is such a wank whore that if said conversation even remotely touches on, or implies it might touch on, about seventeen hotbutton topic, then there is NO WAY it will avoid becoming wank. Because it only takes one fuckin person with their head screwed on sideways to ruin the discussion for everyone. And turn my journal into Dogpile On Dodger Day or Dogpile On Someone Talking to Dodger Day. And both of those dynamics piss me off too much to deal with. And they totally overshadow any positive, informational benefit the conversation might have spawned with the ninety-eight people who were genuine and thoughtful and open-minded and had their heads screwed on straight.
And I HATE that. I HATE it. Because by nature, I am hardwired to have far more interest in discussing controversial and complex subjects than I am the ones where everyone agrees, or where the disaggreements that do get out of line will just turn into Johnbashing rather than actual, bona fide wank.
So does that make me a puss for not being willing to discuss those things and the wankers can give themselves a good yank or not as they see fit? Maybe. But it also makes me someone who would rather be a productive force in my fandom and protect people who talk to me from getting their asses unfairly masticated by wankers who were NOT invited into the conversation, but who seem to arrive in drove anyway. God knows where they caught the scent of blood. Because that's what they are: rubberneckers and ambulance chasers who troll the LJ communities for signs of a potentially bloody accident in the making. And then they jump in like the fucking stalkerazzi to make sure that accident not only happens, but also becomes a public spectacle the likes of which will never be forgotten in the anus of imfamy.
And that so pisses me off. And the only real ways to avoid that dynamic that I've ever found are A) Keep your mouth shut on specific fan-hot-spot subjects even if you have something important and/or relevant to say, and even if you would like to hear what other fans you respect have to say. or B) Friends-lock every conversation of that sort to a filter that only includes access for fans you know well enough to be able to trust them not to go wanktastic in the blink of an eye. Which defeats the whole fuckin purpose of the conversation in the first place. Because those fans? I likely already KNOW their fucking opinions on the subject. And my FLIST? That isn't a popularity contest to see who is in the "in crowd" enough to read flocked posts. I don't flock my posts for exactly that reason: because I can't friend everyone I love talking to in this fandom or I'd be so overwhelmed by my friends page that I'd never see the light of day again. And I certainly can't friend people I don't freaking know yet who might be lurking, or who might wander by, and have an opinion I want to hear, dammit.
So I completely, absolutely, and totally not only fucking LOVE you for saying this, Em; I also grok your pain in ways even Micheal Valentine Smith would find fucking scary enough to call me psychicgirl.
PS: And just know, although I shouldn't have to say this, if anyone uses my post as an excuse and/or justification to go over and wank off on Janissa11 for the Fat!Jensen crap she's been struggling through recently, or mpreg, or any other damn subject under the sun, I will hunt you down and kill you. Slowly. Without anesthesia. Or snark. And I am not kidding. Or exaggerating. Trust me on this.