Tolerating the Intolerable: When Fans Attack
Fandom has gotten mean.
Brutally, cruelly, savagely mean.
I'm not sure when it happened, but somewhere along the line, fandom changed. It changed from a small friendly village of people who all liked the same books or the same show to an armed camp in which each person attacks anyone who dislikes or opposes or criticizes that person and/or her friends and/or her stories and/or her friends' stories and/or any of her pet causes, favorite styles of writing, her favorite actor, etc.
I know for a fact that honest criticism is in decline. Small wonder. One person of my acquaintance recently informed a fanpoodle that her story would be more readable if it were punctuated. The fanpoodle was outraged at the suggestion. This was her response:
I know I asked you for a review but I don't want one now. You're too mean! I tried to tell you that I write that way. Its my way! If you was (sic) smart you could tell where things stopped and started! My characters are special to me and my narrator is not monotonous what ever the hell that means! Forget you ever got an email from me. Go away! And watch your stories because me and my friends (sic) will be FLAMEING (sic) them!
This ill-mannered toadspawn is now trying, with the help of friends and sockpuppets, to get all of the stories by the person who said she should use punctuation banned. And the toadspawn is the one who sought out the critic and asked for help in the first place.
Fandom campaigns against opponents are vicious, and can go on for months--sometimes a year or more. Truth is the first casualty of such a campaign, as the fanpoodles' main thought is to disgrace, dishonor and smear the reputation of the person whom they hate. Among the crimes that can provoke fanpoodle ire: expressing a dislike for slash or RPF; expressing dislike of a particular character that the fanpoodle likes; preferring one pairing to another; requesting that an author use English instead of chatspeak; and/or requesting that an author use standard paragraphing instead of posting one huge block of text.
Any insistence on quality or on competent use of mechanics is likely to provoke enraged comments such as "I just wanna have fun!," "It's fan FICTION, I can do what I want!," "ur a snob!," "im experimenting--and people generally figure out what i mean most of the time!" And over and over and over again, the cry of the fangirl: "U r so meen!!!!"
A fanpoodle campaign rampages across the Internet via e-mails, Live Journals, reviews in stories. Rumors are started. The person whom the fanpoodle and her pack have decided to hate is misquoted...though if challenged, none of the pack will come up with the actual quote that they feel is so scandalous. There may be harassing messages. Some may write libelous Real Person Fic. Comments about the person's looks, intelligence and sexual preference may be floated across the Web.
This is all most amusing to the fanpoodles--unless they are caught or the person whom they have hurt demands an apology, at the very least. Even so, their typical response is to pout and say that the person they targeted is just being oversensitive and taking it too seriously, it was all just in fun, can't you take a joke, I mean, geez.
There are also fanpoodles who don't wait for a situation to anger them, or for their rage to spiral things out of control. These people deliberately provoke others with repeated insults in hopes of starting flame wars for their own amusement--something akin to tying a firecracker to the tail of a dog and then laughing as it tries to escape from the painful flames attacking it.
Strangely enough, no one says anything about the morality of fanpoodle campaigns or deliberately caused flame wars. Such actions in the real world would fall under the classifications of harassment and libel--both felonies. Yet the prevailing attitude is a mixture of mellowness and toleration. The attitude is that this is ONLY fandom, and that other people's quirks, however odd, should be tolerated. That the fanpoodles and flame warriors are not tolerant of anyone--least of all those who are being asked to tolerate them--somehow escapes public notice.
Underlying the placating and tolerant attitude is fear. No one wants the relentless, cruel fanpoodles or flame warriors coming after them, which is exactly what each person dreads may happen. Taking a stand and saying, "This is wrong. This should not be tolerated," is dangerous. It's much safer to remain quiet, keep your head down and pray that they will all go away.
Of course, the fanpoodles recognize the fear and exploit it. For instance, I can't tell you how many people at the Pit of Voles--more conventionally known as www.fanfiction.net-- demand reviews for stories and then threaten to attack, with the help of their friends, anyone who gives them a marginally negative review. Despite their screams that anyone who dislikes their stories and urges them to correct the tales' flaws is trying to censure them, fanpoodles are all about censorship. They loathe everyone's opinion except their own. What they truly want, as more than one fanpoodle has said on more than one forum, is for everyone who disagrees with them to shut the fuck UP. Permanently.
I have to wonder why the fanpoodles are so easily angered by a difference of opinion. It is as if each and every dissenting thought is an assault upon some unseen fortress. They do not seem to grasp the fact that others are NOT attacking them simply by not sharing the fanpoodles' opinions. Disagreement is not an attack--but you couldn't prove it to a fanpoodle. And a fanpoodle who has been attacked, or who thinks she has, will pursue the issue until the destruction of her opponent...or until she becomes bored, whichever comes first.
Is it any wonder that fans are becoming reluctant to speak up, even on subjects they care about?
I think, though, that fans have to break away from the 'we must tolerate everything' concept so prevalent nowadays. No one should have to tolerate rudeness, disrespect, cruelty, harassment or libel. By tolerating everything, fandom is saying that its members must tolerate those things as well. And that is wrong. There is some behavior that is so egregious, so odious, that it cannot be tolerated, for the sake of the society being plagued by this behavior.
There must be standards, even if they are unspoken. There must be expectations of respect. Respect does not mean tolerating rude, savage, brutal behavior. Respect is EVERYONE, including fanpoodles, treating everyone else--even opponents--as if they matter and as if their opinions are worthy of consideration. What we currently have are on one side fanpoodles, displaying contempt and loathing for everything non-fanpoodle, and the others, urging those plagued by fanpoodles tolerate the smears and the harassment and the attacks in the name of compassion, self-esteem and general niceness.
I sense a certain lack of equity there.
Fandom also needs a social response to uncivilized behavior--just as any society does. There has to be a way of saying, "No. You cannot smear others. You cannot mount flame wars for your own amusement. This is unacceptable. This is discourteous. This is wrong. And, for the sake of others in fandom, you cannot do this. These will be the consequences for your actions." Fandom desperately needs a means of saying NO to unacceptable behavior--and a means of backing up that NO in a way that gives it teeth. Fanpoodles, by and large, have never been reprimanded in their lives; they need to learn, swiftly and irrevocably, that, "No, this is wrong and you cannot do it" will have unpleasant consequences for them if they say, "Tough shit, we are going to do it anyway."
I do not honestly expect any of these things to happen, though they desperately need to occur. Sadly, I fear that pragmatism, toleration and fear will continue to be dominant; it is, after all, much easier to do nothing than to do something, and doing nothing is far less risky than active opposition...isn't it?
Yet I think that someone has to speak up and say, "This is wrong." Toleration of the intolerable does not guarantee safety. Think of Martin Niemoeller, who said:
"In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up."
Brutally, cruelly, savagely mean.
I'm not sure when it happened, but somewhere along the line, fandom changed. It changed from a small friendly village of people who all liked the same books or the same show to an armed camp in which each person attacks anyone who dislikes or opposes or criticizes that person and/or her friends and/or her stories and/or her friends' stories and/or any of her pet causes, favorite styles of writing, her favorite actor, etc.
I know for a fact that honest criticism is in decline. Small wonder. One person of my acquaintance recently informed a fanpoodle that her story would be more readable if it were punctuated. The fanpoodle was outraged at the suggestion. This was her response:
I know I asked you for a review but I don't want one now. You're too mean! I tried to tell you that I write that way. Its my way! If you was (sic) smart you could tell where things stopped and started! My characters are special to me and my narrator is not monotonous what ever the hell that means! Forget you ever got an email from me. Go away! And watch your stories because me and my friends (sic) will be FLAMEING (sic) them!
This ill-mannered toadspawn is now trying, with the help of friends and sockpuppets, to get all of the stories by the person who said she should use punctuation banned. And the toadspawn is the one who sought out the critic and asked for help in the first place.
Fandom campaigns against opponents are vicious, and can go on for months--sometimes a year or more. Truth is the first casualty of such a campaign, as the fanpoodles' main thought is to disgrace, dishonor and smear the reputation of the person whom they hate. Among the crimes that can provoke fanpoodle ire: expressing a dislike for slash or RPF; expressing dislike of a particular character that the fanpoodle likes; preferring one pairing to another; requesting that an author use English instead of chatspeak; and/or requesting that an author use standard paragraphing instead of posting one huge block of text.
Any insistence on quality or on competent use of mechanics is likely to provoke enraged comments such as "I just wanna have fun!," "It's fan FICTION, I can do what I want!," "ur a snob!," "im experimenting--and people generally figure out what i mean most of the time!" And over and over and over again, the cry of the fangirl: "U r so meen!!!!"
A fanpoodle campaign rampages across the Internet via e-mails, Live Journals, reviews in stories. Rumors are started. The person whom the fanpoodle and her pack have decided to hate is misquoted...though if challenged, none of the pack will come up with the actual quote that they feel is so scandalous. There may be harassing messages. Some may write libelous Real Person Fic. Comments about the person's looks, intelligence and sexual preference may be floated across the Web.
This is all most amusing to the fanpoodles--unless they are caught or the person whom they have hurt demands an apology, at the very least. Even so, their typical response is to pout and say that the person they targeted is just being oversensitive and taking it too seriously, it was all just in fun, can't you take a joke, I mean, geez.
There are also fanpoodles who don't wait for a situation to anger them, or for their rage to spiral things out of control. These people deliberately provoke others with repeated insults in hopes of starting flame wars for their own amusement--something akin to tying a firecracker to the tail of a dog and then laughing as it tries to escape from the painful flames attacking it.
Strangely enough, no one says anything about the morality of fanpoodle campaigns or deliberately caused flame wars. Such actions in the real world would fall under the classifications of harassment and libel--both felonies. Yet the prevailing attitude is a mixture of mellowness and toleration. The attitude is that this is ONLY fandom, and that other people's quirks, however odd, should be tolerated. That the fanpoodles and flame warriors are not tolerant of anyone--least of all those who are being asked to tolerate them--somehow escapes public notice.
Underlying the placating and tolerant attitude is fear. No one wants the relentless, cruel fanpoodles or flame warriors coming after them, which is exactly what each person dreads may happen. Taking a stand and saying, "This is wrong. This should not be tolerated," is dangerous. It's much safer to remain quiet, keep your head down and pray that they will all go away.
Of course, the fanpoodles recognize the fear and exploit it. For instance, I can't tell you how many people at the Pit of Voles--more conventionally known as www.fanfiction.net-- demand reviews for stories and then threaten to attack, with the help of their friends, anyone who gives them a marginally negative review. Despite their screams that anyone who dislikes their stories and urges them to correct the tales' flaws is trying to censure them, fanpoodles are all about censorship. They loathe everyone's opinion except their own. What they truly want, as more than one fanpoodle has said on more than one forum, is for everyone who disagrees with them to shut the fuck UP. Permanently.
I have to wonder why the fanpoodles are so easily angered by a difference of opinion. It is as if each and every dissenting thought is an assault upon some unseen fortress. They do not seem to grasp the fact that others are NOT attacking them simply by not sharing the fanpoodles' opinions. Disagreement is not an attack--but you couldn't prove it to a fanpoodle. And a fanpoodle who has been attacked, or who thinks she has, will pursue the issue until the destruction of her opponent...or until she becomes bored, whichever comes first.
Is it any wonder that fans are becoming reluctant to speak up, even on subjects they care about?
I think, though, that fans have to break away from the 'we must tolerate everything' concept so prevalent nowadays. No one should have to tolerate rudeness, disrespect, cruelty, harassment or libel. By tolerating everything, fandom is saying that its members must tolerate those things as well. And that is wrong. There is some behavior that is so egregious, so odious, that it cannot be tolerated, for the sake of the society being plagued by this behavior.
There must be standards, even if they are unspoken. There must be expectations of respect. Respect does not mean tolerating rude, savage, brutal behavior. Respect is EVERYONE, including fanpoodles, treating everyone else--even opponents--as if they matter and as if their opinions are worthy of consideration. What we currently have are on one side fanpoodles, displaying contempt and loathing for everything non-fanpoodle, and the others, urging those plagued by fanpoodles tolerate the smears and the harassment and the attacks in the name of compassion, self-esteem and general niceness.
I sense a certain lack of equity there.
Fandom also needs a social response to uncivilized behavior--just as any society does. There has to be a way of saying, "No. You cannot smear others. You cannot mount flame wars for your own amusement. This is unacceptable. This is discourteous. This is wrong. And, for the sake of others in fandom, you cannot do this. These will be the consequences for your actions." Fandom desperately needs a means of saying NO to unacceptable behavior--and a means of backing up that NO in a way that gives it teeth. Fanpoodles, by and large, have never been reprimanded in their lives; they need to learn, swiftly and irrevocably, that, "No, this is wrong and you cannot do it" will have unpleasant consequences for them if they say, "Tough shit, we are going to do it anyway."
I do not honestly expect any of these things to happen, though they desperately need to occur. Sadly, I fear that pragmatism, toleration and fear will continue to be dominant; it is, after all, much easier to do nothing than to do something, and doing nothing is far less risky than active opposition...isn't it?
Yet I think that someone has to speak up and say, "This is wrong." Toleration of the intolerable does not guarantee safety. Think of Martin Niemoeller, who said:
"In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up."