Rumors of their death
I think we can all agree that the Internet has changed our lives in many ways, some of which were predictable (hey, we do banking and shopping online!) and some which have been decidedly surprising (Rick Astley? Really?). More specifically, being in a fandom changes people and our perceptions. I recently came up against an interesting example, and wanted to get some perspectives on this phenomenon.
My experiences in fandom have made me suspicious of death. To wit, the deaths of people I only know online, and the veracity thereof.
For those of you who are NOT in fandoms, it is a not-unheard-of occurrence for people to commit what's called "pseuicide." This happens among the more, shall we say, BATSHIT CRAZY elements of fandoms. Your basic brides of Snape, tinhat-wearing brigades of overinvested nutters. Someone's crafted a fandom persona, they have some kind of role they play within their social group, things may happen, inevitable drama occurs. And sometimes, someone just becomes DONE with it all. So how do they exeunt the fandom? Do they take their ball and go home? Do they just quietly stop posting or writing or whatever?
Well, that's what a sane person would do. But no. Some people have a greater need for drama than can be satisfied by merely fading away or executing a dignified retreat. These people have been known to fake their own death.
Oh yes. Not in a real-world sense involving police and stolen cadavers like in a Hitchcock film. Pseuicide only requires posting to the relevant fandom forums (usually under the guise of one of the person involved's sockpuppets) that so-and-so has died of a) a tragic longtime illness she's never previously mentioned, b) a car crash, c) her own hand, d) sudden infection or whatever. Then the so-called dead person gets to sit back and watch the fandom react to their "death." They have to retire all their usernames and start over, but that's a small price to pay for the Ultimate Fandom Flounce Off.
The annals of fandom_wank are FULL of pseucides who've been discovered through the ingenious tracking of IP addresses or slips of the tongue when the supposedly-dead person turns up again in another fandom or (even ballsier) the exact same fandom under a new set of identities.
It's to the point that when I hear of someone in a fandom, especially someone well-known in a fandom, dying suddenly, my first reaction is not to be sad, but to be suspicious. I've recently come across this in the Avatar fandom. I've been casually reading some fanfiction, sticking mainly just to my ship (because you gotta narrow it down somehow, oh my god the volume of fic is staggering), and there was one author who was very popular and had written some decent stories (like most young-skewing fandoms, ATLA is full of Really Bad Fanfic). Then I come to the end of one long story and it's a note, from her sister, saying she's died.
This may very well be true. I have absolutely no evidence that it's a pseuicide. But I'm especially suspicious when a family member or friend posts for someone who's died, because it requires that said family member or friend had so-and-so's passwords. Nobody has my passwords.
It just struck me when I saw that, that is it not normal to immediately be suspicious that someone who is reportedly dead might not be dead. That is not typical in the real world. That is a phenomenon unique to online life.
That is messed up, man.
My experiences in fandom have made me suspicious of death. To wit, the deaths of people I only know online, and the veracity thereof.
For those of you who are NOT in fandoms, it is a not-unheard-of occurrence for people to commit what's called "pseuicide." This happens among the more, shall we say, BATSHIT CRAZY elements of fandoms. Your basic brides of Snape, tinhat-wearing brigades of overinvested nutters. Someone's crafted a fandom persona, they have some kind of role they play within their social group, things may happen, inevitable drama occurs. And sometimes, someone just becomes DONE with it all. So how do they exeunt the fandom? Do they take their ball and go home? Do they just quietly stop posting or writing or whatever?
Well, that's what a sane person would do. But no. Some people have a greater need for drama than can be satisfied by merely fading away or executing a dignified retreat. These people have been known to fake their own death.
Oh yes. Not in a real-world sense involving police and stolen cadavers like in a Hitchcock film. Pseuicide only requires posting to the relevant fandom forums (usually under the guise of one of the person involved's sockpuppets) that so-and-so has died of a) a tragic longtime illness she's never previously mentioned, b) a car crash, c) her own hand, d) sudden infection or whatever. Then the so-called dead person gets to sit back and watch the fandom react to their "death." They have to retire all their usernames and start over, but that's a small price to pay for the Ultimate Fandom Flounce Off.
The annals of fandom_wank are FULL of pseucides who've been discovered through the ingenious tracking of IP addresses or slips of the tongue when the supposedly-dead person turns up again in another fandom or (even ballsier) the exact same fandom under a new set of identities.
It's to the point that when I hear of someone in a fandom, especially someone well-known in a fandom, dying suddenly, my first reaction is not to be sad, but to be suspicious. I've recently come across this in the Avatar fandom. I've been casually reading some fanfiction, sticking mainly just to my ship (because you gotta narrow it down somehow, oh my god the volume of fic is staggering), and there was one author who was very popular and had written some decent stories (like most young-skewing fandoms, ATLA is full of Really Bad Fanfic). Then I come to the end of one long story and it's a note, from her sister, saying she's died.
This may very well be true. I have absolutely no evidence that it's a pseuicide. But I'm especially suspicious when a family member or friend posts for someone who's died, because it requires that said family member or friend had so-and-so's passwords. Nobody has my passwords.
It just struck me when I saw that, that is it not normal to immediately be suspicious that someone who is reportedly dead might not be dead. That is not typical in the real world. That is a phenomenon unique to online life.
That is messed up, man.