Two completely disparate fannish things
1. I'm a total remixing n00b, never done it before this round with who_remix. I know that the modly powers are posting the remixes one at a time so that we'll have time to actually read and appreciate each of them, and that this is a good an logical thing, but the suspense is killing me. The novelty factor is at 100% for me, and I cannot wait to see which of mine got put in a blender.
2. Back when it was generating wank--or generating the first wave of it; haven't kept up with Trek fandom to know if it's still ongoing--there was something about the "canonize Kirk/Spock" campaign that bothered me. Something in addition to the obvious squick-outs, I mean; the hijacking of RL issues to promote a freaking ship of all things, the default focus on the m/m side of things, and the undercurrent of erasing Uhura are sort of givens. But even if I ignored those things and assumed the best of all possible motives for the campaigners and that some were even queer themselves, I was pretty sure there was something else about it that bothered me though I couldn't put my finger on what.
Well, it finally occurred to me what the additional squick is, and it's something simple enough: Asking someone else to do your talking for you. It's true that people who write for major franchises like Star Trek that permeate the popular consciousness have a kind of power that Jane Blogger and I don't. Yes, it would be nice if they used that power to tell the most bitching of all possible stories and also to give airtime to worthy ideas like that Uhura is fucking awesome oh wait they did that. But it still strikes me as a terrible and dangerous idea to go around asking other people to be your voice, much less the voice of an entire group of other people.
You want to see more queer representation, serious portrayals that don't involve jokes about musical theatre and how cute that hat is? Groovy. You want to reshape the available mythos itself, because maybe you don't think it's quite up to the job of illuminating human nature? I concur. So fucking write it already.
2. Back when it was generating wank--or generating the first wave of it; haven't kept up with Trek fandom to know if it's still ongoing--there was something about the "canonize Kirk/Spock" campaign that bothered me. Something in addition to the obvious squick-outs, I mean; the hijacking of RL issues to promote a freaking ship of all things, the default focus on the m/m side of things, and the undercurrent of erasing Uhura are sort of givens. But even if I ignored those things and assumed the best of all possible motives for the campaigners and that some were even queer themselves, I was pretty sure there was something else about it that bothered me though I couldn't put my finger on what.
Well, it finally occurred to me what the additional squick is, and it's something simple enough: Asking someone else to do your talking for you. It's true that people who write for major franchises like Star Trek that permeate the popular consciousness have a kind of power that Jane Blogger and I don't. Yes, it would be nice if they used that power to tell the most bitching of all possible stories and also to give airtime to worthy ideas like that Uhura is fucking awesome oh wait they did that. But it still strikes me as a terrible and dangerous idea to go around asking other people to be your voice, much less the voice of an entire group of other people.
You want to see more queer representation, serious portrayals that don't involve jokes about musical theatre and how cute that hat is? Groovy. You want to reshape the available mythos itself, because maybe you don't think it's quite up to the job of illuminating human nature? I concur. So fucking write it already.