On Fandom(ing) w/r/t Sanctuary
Every time I read around in a fandom, I find myself frustrated with the same set of things. They've cropped up again in Sanctuary fandom, and because it's Monday and I should be working, I've decided to write a few thoughts down instead. No matter what I say, some people are bound to take them as an attack, but they're really not meant as one. They're meant, no more, no less, to attempt to address head on the things that divide us as fans that just keep happening.
Maybe I'm a pollyanna, but I think, it's actually that I'm an Old Fandom Hag. There is nothing new under the sun in fandom, so why don't you damned kids get off my lawn? *shakes invisible cane*
Ahem.
That said, I really am not attacking anyone, even though certain posts did inspire my decision to do this today. If you wrote one of them, and you feel like yelling at me, go ahead.* You're likely to find I won't yell back, and if you're civil, we may even bridge the unbridgeable divides. ;)
So here it is.
1. Shipping Wars
Really? We're still doing this thirty years later? Forty? Who CARES? I like beef, you like chicken. What of it? So what if one ship is canon, and another isn't? So what if one ship is "more" canon than another? So what if you absolutely HATE beef and you want all beef to die in a fire?
IDGAF (I Don't Give A Fuck) should really be a fandom motto. What you do in your journal with the characters we're ALL borrowing from SOMEONE ELSE'S SANDBOX is exactly that. What YOU do in YOUR journal with characters we're ALL borrowing from SOMEONE ELSE'S SANDBOX.
You like John/Helen, I like Will/Helen, so what? Write what makes you happy, find other people who feel the same way, and share. Fandom's collective, collaborative, and it really should be supportive. Maybe IDGAF shouldn't be the motto but another old chestnut: Do Unto Others...
I mentioned I'm an Old Fandom Hag, right?
2. The Great Characterization Debate
This takes a lot of forms. Is Character A an Alpha male or a Beta male? Is he a Top or a Bottom? Do these things even matter, what do they mean? Could he ever really be gay? Would he ever sleep with his brother/best friend/evil overlord? Is Character B in love with Character C? Does Character B even know Character C exists? How can you say that Character D and Character E are friends when in Episode 5473 they CLEARLY HATE EACH OTHER? Is F a smoker? Does G drink? Does H, would H, ever do drugs? How could you dare write beloved Character I as a RAPIST or an abuser or with WINGS while you're at it?
Here's the thing. Meta's great. I love meta. I write a lot of it (duh). But even when I say "Sam Winchester is an Alpha male and a top" and here are the 50 BILLION reasons why, it's just my opinion. Even if Kripke or Gamble (and Sera G. totally would if you asked her) came right out and said, "Yes, that Old Fandom Hag is correct," YOU could still say "I disagree, here's why."
This something academics do all the time. Interpret texts. Interrogate them. And the funny thing is, when we write papers about them, we always have to acknowledge our own bias. That's part of the process. We talk at length about our core methodologies, the utility of seeing something the way that we do, and the best of us (in this Old Fandom Hag's...OFH for short, thanks...opinion) acknowledge upfront that there are OTHER WAYS OF SEEING.
So, your Will's sweet, dorky, a little bit clutzy, scared of heights, and really not that great at dealing with violence, and mine's more confident, more perceptive, more aggressively protective? I'm not right and you're not wrong. I'm probably interpreting from different incidents than you are, and that's okay. But what's also okay is for me to depart from canon to make Will a connoisseur of fine wines and an expert in tantric sex and perfect in every way, if that's what I want to write. Granted, considering this is Will we're talking about, I'd think that was pretty silly unless it was AU, but that would also be just my opinion.
Same's true with Druitt: mine's a serial killer and a rapist who may or may not have control over his actions and its a tragedy, but them's the breaks; yours is an incredibly sweet guy who got totally screwed by his powers and the parasite, and he worships Helen and would never hurt her. *shrug* Both are just interpretations. Even if the creators say differently.
Guess what, they're not always right. They don't have a lock on interpretation. Sometimes they misunderstand the value and beauty of what they've created. Sometimes Sam Winchester can't tie his shoelaces or do math, but other times he does the New York Times Saturday crossword in ink and has the willpower (what, show, did we forget?) to contain Lucifer! Inconsistencies and plotholes. We can has them.
Fandom, more or less, EXISTS to exploit these inconsistencies. I don't have to like your interpretation, but I also shouldn't feel threatened by it. You're not wrong, I'm just right. I know, I know, I know. But this is one of those times where 2+2 = 3, not 4. Trust me. I might even find your argument compelling and agree, and STILL think you're wrong. Why?
Because I like mine better the other way.
3. Issues We Can Has Them
Domestic abuse, drug use, anxiety, miscarriages, incest, other crippling emotional or psychological disorders, PTSD, rape, sexual abuse, assault, bullying, gaybashing, homophobia, racism, sexism, abandonment, and so on (no scale or hierarchy is implied, omission is not exclusion, I just can't be exhaustive) - let me show you them. In every single fandom I've ever been in, there's been a class of fic where one or more main characters (sometimes the boys with the mpreg and miscarriages, I'm not even kidding) is written to suffer these things, often at the hands of other characters. Every time it happens you hear at least three things:
a) OMG so and so would never do that - whether it's the doer or the do-ee
b) OMG no one should write about that, it's horrible - whatever it is
c) OMG that person shouldn't write about that, because they don't know what it's like - whatever it is
Coupla caveats: all of these things ARE horrible. I don't want any of my friends ever to suffer them, and even though I've written insane godlots of incestfic, I really don't think it's okay. I'm not an expert on most of those things. Some, I'll grant, I know a lot more about than I usually admit in public, but that's really not the point here. What I want to say upfront is that no matter what I say below, NONE of these things are good things and if you've been hurt by them, I'm so terribly sorry.
That said, what I firmly believe is that writing and stories are how we work out our world. Narrative is a way of organizing and understanding the things that have happened to us and the people we love. It's how we try to have empathy for things we haven't suffered, and how we try to cope with things that we have, or our friends have.
To some extent, all fandoming is self-insertion; whether fic or otherwise, we're engaging with another world, another reality, created by someone else. So say I'm a rape victim. In our world, rape often goes unpunished and rape victims often go untreated and unsupported, they're often blamed for their attacks. And I'm a fanfic writer who writes in Sanctuary fandom. I see myself as a strong woman, who has gotten over what happened to her. But maybe I'm not all the way over it. Maybe there are still times it hurts or maybe I'm not over it at all. Maybe I wish my abuser had been punished. Maybe I wish there'd been someone to comfort me. I might, very well, write a story about how one of the strongest women I've seen on TV handled the same issue. I might, very well, say that she needed her shrink boyfriend to comfort her and guide her through it umpteen years later because in the 1800s, rape didn't really exist.
Maybe you're not going to like that, because you think "oh Helen Magnus would never let that happen." You could be right. Or, you could be wrong, because hey, I'm pretty strong and it happened to me. And maybe you think "Well, if it did happen, she wouldn't need a man to cosset and comfort her," and maybe she wouldn't, and maybe in a feminist world, she shouldn't, but maybe she would or should and maybe I did.
The same goes for domestic abuse, drug use, PTSD, and on. We write to work out our worlds. So, yeah, okay, sometimes it's just annoying and really crappy when someone takes an incredibly strong female character and turns her into [insert your epithet of choice here], or really interesting male character and turns him into [insert your epithet of choice here]. And maybe good writing isn't therapy (debatable; to some extent, I think all writing is therapeutic, at least in the sense I mentioned above, but lots of better writers have disagreed).
Fandom, though...fandom's not about perfection. Fandom's about us and how we intersect with the worlds and characters we love.
But we need to remember that we don't actually know each other, most of the time. You don't know whether I'm actually a rape victim or not (and right now, I'm not going to tell you, because that's kind of the point). What you know is that I wrote that story (I didn't, by the way; I've not written Helen doing much of anything, except hitting Will with her car), and if my Helen Magnus didn't handle being raped the way you would have or the way you'd write it, then maybe that's not because I'm wrong but because you and I, we're different.
Now, before I dig myself into a pit I don't want to be in,** I'm not saying it's okay to be a misogynist or a racist or a sexist or an ageist or cisgenderist or ableist, nuh uh, no way. If I write an AU story where every single black character has a menial or service job and all the white people are doctors, I damned well better be making a point about what's wrong with that picture. Because that is not okay. And it's not okay to valorize Helen Magnus getting raped, nuh uh, not okay.
But it is okay to write about it, to explore it, to come out of it different ways.
So, to sum up, GET OFF MY LAWN. And, there is no RIGHT ship, no RIGHT characterization, no RIGHT way that a character would approach an issue, and your depression doesn't look like my depression.
Oooookay?
*Seriously, folks, I'm not picking on anyone. If you decide to argue, my journal, my rules: no flaming, no attacking, no calling names. You can argue as much as you want, but be civil to each other, or I'll ban your asses.
**Disclaimers aren't get out of jail free cards. If I screwed up, tell me, and we can talk about it. Because I need to be educated too.
Maybe I'm a pollyanna, but I think, it's actually that I'm an Old Fandom Hag. There is nothing new under the sun in fandom, so why don't you damned kids get off my lawn? *shakes invisible cane*
Ahem.
That said, I really am not attacking anyone, even though certain posts did inspire my decision to do this today. If you wrote one of them, and you feel like yelling at me, go ahead.* You're likely to find I won't yell back, and if you're civil, we may even bridge the unbridgeable divides. ;)
So here it is.
1. Shipping Wars
Really? We're still doing this thirty years later? Forty? Who CARES? I like beef, you like chicken. What of it? So what if one ship is canon, and another isn't? So what if one ship is "more" canon than another? So what if you absolutely HATE beef and you want all beef to die in a fire?
IDGAF (I Don't Give A Fuck) should really be a fandom motto. What you do in your journal with the characters we're ALL borrowing from SOMEONE ELSE'S SANDBOX is exactly that. What YOU do in YOUR journal with characters we're ALL borrowing from SOMEONE ELSE'S SANDBOX.
You like John/Helen, I like Will/Helen, so what? Write what makes you happy, find other people who feel the same way, and share. Fandom's collective, collaborative, and it really should be supportive. Maybe IDGAF shouldn't be the motto but another old chestnut: Do Unto Others...
I mentioned I'm an Old Fandom Hag, right?
2. The Great Characterization Debate
This takes a lot of forms. Is Character A an Alpha male or a Beta male? Is he a Top or a Bottom? Do these things even matter, what do they mean? Could he ever really be gay? Would he ever sleep with his brother/best friend/evil overlord? Is Character B in love with Character C? Does Character B even know Character C exists? How can you say that Character D and Character E are friends when in Episode 5473 they CLEARLY HATE EACH OTHER? Is F a smoker? Does G drink? Does H, would H, ever do drugs? How could you dare write beloved Character I as a RAPIST or an abuser or with WINGS while you're at it?
Here's the thing. Meta's great. I love meta. I write a lot of it (duh). But even when I say "Sam Winchester is an Alpha male and a top" and here are the 50 BILLION reasons why, it's just my opinion. Even if Kripke or Gamble (and Sera G. totally would if you asked her) came right out and said, "Yes, that Old Fandom Hag is correct," YOU could still say "I disagree, here's why."
This something academics do all the time. Interpret texts. Interrogate them. And the funny thing is, when we write papers about them, we always have to acknowledge our own bias. That's part of the process. We talk at length about our core methodologies, the utility of seeing something the way that we do, and the best of us (in this Old Fandom Hag's...OFH for short, thanks...opinion) acknowledge upfront that there are OTHER WAYS OF SEEING.
So, your Will's sweet, dorky, a little bit clutzy, scared of heights, and really not that great at dealing with violence, and mine's more confident, more perceptive, more aggressively protective? I'm not right and you're not wrong. I'm probably interpreting from different incidents than you are, and that's okay. But what's also okay is for me to depart from canon to make Will a connoisseur of fine wines and an expert in tantric sex and perfect in every way, if that's what I want to write. Granted, considering this is Will we're talking about, I'd think that was pretty silly unless it was AU, but that would also be just my opinion.
Same's true with Druitt: mine's a serial killer and a rapist who may or may not have control over his actions and its a tragedy, but them's the breaks; yours is an incredibly sweet guy who got totally screwed by his powers and the parasite, and he worships Helen and would never hurt her. *shrug* Both are just interpretations. Even if the creators say differently.
Guess what, they're not always right. They don't have a lock on interpretation. Sometimes they misunderstand the value and beauty of what they've created. Sometimes Sam Winchester can't tie his shoelaces or do math, but other times he does the New York Times Saturday crossword in ink and has the willpower (what, show, did we forget?) to contain Lucifer! Inconsistencies and plotholes. We can has them.
Fandom, more or less, EXISTS to exploit these inconsistencies. I don't have to like your interpretation, but I also shouldn't feel threatened by it. You're not wrong, I'm just right. I know, I know, I know. But this is one of those times where 2+2 = 3, not 4. Trust me. I might even find your argument compelling and agree, and STILL think you're wrong. Why?
Because I like mine better the other way.
3. Issues We Can Has Them
Domestic abuse, drug use, anxiety, miscarriages, incest, other crippling emotional or psychological disorders, PTSD, rape, sexual abuse, assault, bullying, gaybashing, homophobia, racism, sexism, abandonment, and so on (no scale or hierarchy is implied, omission is not exclusion, I just can't be exhaustive) - let me show you them. In every single fandom I've ever been in, there's been a class of fic where one or more main characters (sometimes the boys with the mpreg and miscarriages, I'm not even kidding) is written to suffer these things, often at the hands of other characters. Every time it happens you hear at least three things:
a) OMG so and so would never do that - whether it's the doer or the do-ee
b) OMG no one should write about that, it's horrible - whatever it is
c) OMG that person shouldn't write about that, because they don't know what it's like - whatever it is
Coupla caveats: all of these things ARE horrible. I don't want any of my friends ever to suffer them, and even though I've written insane godlots of incestfic, I really don't think it's okay. I'm not an expert on most of those things. Some, I'll grant, I know a lot more about than I usually admit in public, but that's really not the point here. What I want to say upfront is that no matter what I say below, NONE of these things are good things and if you've been hurt by them, I'm so terribly sorry.
That said, what I firmly believe is that writing and stories are how we work out our world. Narrative is a way of organizing and understanding the things that have happened to us and the people we love. It's how we try to have empathy for things we haven't suffered, and how we try to cope with things that we have, or our friends have.
To some extent, all fandoming is self-insertion; whether fic or otherwise, we're engaging with another world, another reality, created by someone else. So say I'm a rape victim. In our world, rape often goes unpunished and rape victims often go untreated and unsupported, they're often blamed for their attacks. And I'm a fanfic writer who writes in Sanctuary fandom. I see myself as a strong woman, who has gotten over what happened to her. But maybe I'm not all the way over it. Maybe there are still times it hurts or maybe I'm not over it at all. Maybe I wish my abuser had been punished. Maybe I wish there'd been someone to comfort me. I might, very well, write a story about how one of the strongest women I've seen on TV handled the same issue. I might, very well, say that she needed her shrink boyfriend to comfort her and guide her through it umpteen years later because in the 1800s, rape didn't really exist.
Maybe you're not going to like that, because you think "oh Helen Magnus would never let that happen." You could be right. Or, you could be wrong, because hey, I'm pretty strong and it happened to me. And maybe you think "Well, if it did happen, she wouldn't need a man to cosset and comfort her," and maybe she wouldn't, and maybe in a feminist world, she shouldn't, but maybe she would or should and maybe I did.
The same goes for domestic abuse, drug use, PTSD, and on. We write to work out our worlds. So, yeah, okay, sometimes it's just annoying and really crappy when someone takes an incredibly strong female character and turns her into [insert your epithet of choice here], or really interesting male character and turns him into [insert your epithet of choice here]. And maybe good writing isn't therapy (debatable; to some extent, I think all writing is therapeutic, at least in the sense I mentioned above, but lots of better writers have disagreed).
Fandom, though...fandom's not about perfection. Fandom's about us and how we intersect with the worlds and characters we love.
But we need to remember that we don't actually know each other, most of the time. You don't know whether I'm actually a rape victim or not (and right now, I'm not going to tell you, because that's kind of the point). What you know is that I wrote that story (I didn't, by the way; I've not written Helen doing much of anything, except hitting Will with her car), and if my Helen Magnus didn't handle being raped the way you would have or the way you'd write it, then maybe that's not because I'm wrong but because you and I, we're different.
Now, before I dig myself into a pit I don't want to be in,** I'm not saying it's okay to be a misogynist or a racist or a sexist or an ageist or cisgenderist or ableist, nuh uh, no way. If I write an AU story where every single black character has a menial or service job and all the white people are doctors, I damned well better be making a point about what's wrong with that picture. Because that is not okay. And it's not okay to valorize Helen Magnus getting raped, nuh uh, not okay.
But it is okay to write about it, to explore it, to come out of it different ways.
So, to sum up, GET OFF MY LAWN. And, there is no RIGHT ship, no RIGHT characterization, no RIGHT way that a character would approach an issue, and your depression doesn't look like my depression.
Oooookay?
*Seriously, folks, I'm not picking on anyone. If you decide to argue, my journal, my rules: no flaming, no attacking, no calling names. You can argue as much as you want, but be civil to each other, or I'll ban your asses.
**Disclaimers aren't get out of jail free cards. If I screwed up, tell me, and we can talk about it. Because I need to be educated too.