If You've Got Nothing Nice to Say...
Azkatraz is over; we are now in LA, and tomorrow we're going down to San Diego for Comic Con. I seriously doubt I'm going to have time for a con report any time soon, but I did promise these to the folks who attended my roundtable on Sunday (If You've Got Nothing Nice to Say, Should You Say It Anyway?).
When I'd introduced the panel, the crowd mostly went YES YOU SHOULD! >.> So we sort of veered into a mostly unstructured discussion of various topics like fandom_wank (fun fact: ask a roomful of HP fen if they read fandom_wank regularly, and about 5% of them will admit it XD) and participant-submitted index cards listing their number one fandom "don't" behaviours (i.e. things they feel Should Not Be Done by fen).
These were covered in the discussion:
Circle-jerk (when friends rec each other).
Fannish entitlement: no one owes it to you to read your fic, comment on your post, like or dislike people because you want them to, etc. Please don't give guilt trips or make whiny, self-indulgent posts.
Anonymemes and leaving the anonymous messages to your flist.
Those who ask for reviews and then go all weepy if they get one that is not A+.
Thinking you actually ARE your favourite character.
Taking yourself far too seriously.
Losing one's temper (especially CAPS, blowing up when someone criticises you, and bullying others).
Faking your death.
I don't have time to recap the discussion, but generally participants were able to raise both pro and con sides of the argument, which was fun. The central idea I wanted to demonstrate was that there is no universally accepted standard of behaviour, because we all have different reasons for being in fandom (and, by extension, whether or not we engage in criticism should be decided by the individual, not the community).
Here are the ones we didn't get to cover during the roundtable and I said I'd post here -- if you guys want to pick 'em up and run with them, feel free to! It'll be like an online continuation of the roundtable, only, you know, not at Azkatraz. Or face-to-face. >.> Also, I edited nothing, so if you submitted a silly one, it's down there too. :P
Not responding to comments.
Epic n00bism. For instance, on forums, posting repeat threads, pointless WTF threads, bumping threads, and using phail 12-year-old n00b chat speak. Worse, spazzing out when corrected on these behaviours by veterans, and continuing in the undesirable behaviour.
Threatening RL punishment for (legal) fannish activity/behaviour (outing, threats of visits/call my boss, threats against family members, etc.)
Bullying/piling on.
Sucking really hard but having a big ego.
Whingeing (complaining about things but doing nothing about them).
Giving JC alcohol in the middle of the day.
Incorrect details that are easy to check and/or out of character behaviour that's not clearly labelled as such.
Theft of art/fic and reposting under your name.
Trying to suppress discussion of criticism in public (e.g. communities) forums.
Posting pictures (fanart) without permission. Pocket magic. Bucket magic. Hi f!
Sockpuppetry (x3)
Obsessing over top/bottom dynamics.
Don't assume we are BFFs because we share the same fandom interests!
Don't be an idiot D: (AKA random ships with no logic).
Shameless self-promotion/attention whoring/conniving to be a BNF/special snowflake-ism (unless it's a November Snowflake!)
Plagiarism (x7)
Lying in warnings.
Acting like other people (whether friend or not) owe you something in terms of what they like or who they ship; or like someone's preferences personally offend you. Example: "If you tell me how much you like my OTP, don't turn around and ship those characters with someone else. How am I supposed to feel? You're stabbing my pairing in the back!"
Being generally disrespectful of other members of fandom (aka general assholery) -- e.g. writing a fic exchange gift based on someone's squicks rather than requests. (x2)
Taking yourself and your fandom opinions too seriously. Be flexible.
Entitlement complexes.
Taking other people's pet peeves as personal attacks.
Breaking f-lock.
Violation of a person's privacy (revealing RL info to fandom/revealing fandom to RL). (x2)
Threatening people IRL
Pseuicide (you don't have to lie about your death to leave fandom). (x2)
Posting an opinion that gets a lot of negative attention and then deleting it because you don't like the comments/attention you received.
Flame trolling
Nothing. Fandom is for fun and it's make-believe. Seriously.
Being harsh in a public comment; concrit in a private message.
People who post anon to say something critical.
Improper warnings for death fic.
Mine was "assuming everyone is in fandom for the same reasons", but after Azkatraz, I have to say that "standing up, introducing yourself, and waiting for applause in an IRL fandom discussion" is now a close second. I witnessed this a staggering number of times this weekend, and it gave me the mother of all embarrassment squicks every time. >_
When I'd introduced the panel, the crowd mostly went YES YOU SHOULD! >.> So we sort of veered into a mostly unstructured discussion of various topics like fandom_wank (fun fact: ask a roomful of HP fen if they read fandom_wank regularly, and about 5% of them will admit it XD) and participant-submitted index cards listing their number one fandom "don't" behaviours (i.e. things they feel Should Not Be Done by fen).
These were covered in the discussion:
Circle-jerk (when friends rec each other).
Fannish entitlement: no one owes it to you to read your fic, comment on your post, like or dislike people because you want them to, etc. Please don't give guilt trips or make whiny, self-indulgent posts.
Anonymemes and leaving the anonymous messages to your flist.
Those who ask for reviews and then go all weepy if they get one that is not A+.
Thinking you actually ARE your favourite character.
Taking yourself far too seriously.
Losing one's temper (especially CAPS, blowing up when someone criticises you, and bullying others).
Faking your death.
I don't have time to recap the discussion, but generally participants were able to raise both pro and con sides of the argument, which was fun. The central idea I wanted to demonstrate was that there is no universally accepted standard of behaviour, because we all have different reasons for being in fandom (and, by extension, whether or not we engage in criticism should be decided by the individual, not the community).
Here are the ones we didn't get to cover during the roundtable and I said I'd post here -- if you guys want to pick 'em up and run with them, feel free to! It'll be like an online continuation of the roundtable, only, you know, not at Azkatraz. Or face-to-face. >.> Also, I edited nothing, so if you submitted a silly one, it's down there too. :P
Not responding to comments.
Epic n00bism. For instance, on forums, posting repeat threads, pointless WTF threads, bumping threads, and using phail 12-year-old n00b chat speak. Worse, spazzing out when corrected on these behaviours by veterans, and continuing in the undesirable behaviour.
Threatening RL punishment for (legal) fannish activity/behaviour (outing, threats of visits/call my boss, threats against family members, etc.)
Bullying/piling on.
Sucking really hard but having a big ego.
Whingeing (complaining about things but doing nothing about them).
Giving JC alcohol in the middle of the day.
Incorrect details that are easy to check and/or out of character behaviour that's not clearly labelled as such.
Theft of art/fic and reposting under your name.
Trying to suppress discussion of criticism in public (e.g. communities) forums.
Posting pictures (fanart) without permission. Pocket magic. Bucket magic. Hi f!
Sockpuppetry (x3)
Obsessing over top/bottom dynamics.
Don't assume we are BFFs because we share the same fandom interests!
Don't be an idiot D: (AKA random ships with no logic).
Shameless self-promotion/attention whoring/conniving to be a BNF/special snowflake-ism (unless it's a November Snowflake!)
Plagiarism (x7)
Lying in warnings.
Acting like other people (whether friend or not) owe you something in terms of what they like or who they ship; or like someone's preferences personally offend you. Example: "If you tell me how much you like my OTP, don't turn around and ship those characters with someone else. How am I supposed to feel? You're stabbing my pairing in the back!"
Being generally disrespectful of other members of fandom (aka general assholery) -- e.g. writing a fic exchange gift based on someone's squicks rather than requests. (x2)
Taking yourself and your fandom opinions too seriously. Be flexible.
Entitlement complexes.
Taking other people's pet peeves as personal attacks.
Breaking f-lock.
Violation of a person's privacy (revealing RL info to fandom/revealing fandom to RL). (x2)
Threatening people IRL
Pseuicide (you don't have to lie about your death to leave fandom). (x2)
Posting an opinion that gets a lot of negative attention and then deleting it because you don't like the comments/attention you received.
Flame trolling
Nothing. Fandom is for fun and it's make-believe. Seriously.
Being harsh in a public comment; concrit in a private message.
People who post anon to say something critical.
Improper warnings for death fic.
Mine was "assuming everyone is in fandom for the same reasons", but after Azkatraz, I have to say that "standing up, introducing yourself, and waiting for applause in an IRL fandom discussion" is now a close second. I witnessed this a staggering number of times this weekend, and it gave me the mother of all embarrassment squicks every time. >_