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[Tags reflect things in the comments as well as the post itself]
Things I want to write about for Friday Spam:
--Betrayal and the chain of command in Life on Mars
--Stories--seeing our life in them, interpreting our life by them. Sparked off by phoenix64--"Character-bashing" is not the same as "Honest character discussion", and why can't I say that I don ( Read more... )
Things I want to write about for Friday Spam:
--Betrayal and the chain of command in Life on Mars
--Stories--seeing our life in them, interpreting our life by them. Sparked off by phoenix64--"Character-bashing" is not the same as "Honest character discussion", and why can't I say that I don ( Read more... )
Comments 95
AMEN!!!!
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*headdesk eleventy billion*
And WRITERCON!!! Woot!
Actually, I am ded from Writercon but we have some v.v. cool announcements coming up. I'm serious.
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*ditches grown-up-edness long enough to boo at the Cheerleader Moms for you*
I can't wait for the cool announcements!
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(Although I will Boo at Arch Nemesis. To be fair, AN isn't really a bad person and she is an incredible asset to our school but we are like chalk and cheese and I grit my teeth a lot. And she's trying to make me dance. To High School Musical. *sigh*)
First one is up at the LJ! One thing about Writercon is that we are all about each other and scholarships are a HUGE part of our culture. We raise money and every penny is put into helping fans get to WC. If we have any money left at the end of the con (our goal is break even) it goes into the next con's scholarship fund. The next fundraiser is going to be awesome in that you can donate cash *or* fic. But shhh...that's not coming until next week.
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Disliking characters has always been a little hard for me to relate to (with one exception, which I might post about someday) but as long as I've been in fandom, I've seen and been involved in great discussions with people who both like and dislike the same characters. It makes things interesting! It's when people start using the word "hate" in an aggressive way, reacting to mentions of the character with "hope [they] die," and deriding fans with a different opinion that it seems overboard.
what do you do about the things you love, in a place you hate?
Yeah.
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Yes! It's just like religion!
Yeah, there's a way to have discussions without going overboard, and without involving actors or fans in the negative opinions. "I don't like Gwen, and here's why, using examples from canon", for instance, and NOT "(Actress whose name I forget) SUCKS, she's such a @#$%, LOL!" And NOT "Anybody who likes Gwen is a @#$%@ just like her!"
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Intelligent discussion is so much about the way we use language. Sometimes I wish I could give fans my mini-lecture on Verbal Hedges and How to Use Them to Not Incite Wrath. :)
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IME, it matters considerably *why* the person likes/dislikes the character. There are some characters in my main fandom I can have a civil discussion about, and others I've found that to be impossible about. I've never had a civil discussion about Yoda with a fan of Yoda. Ever. Largely because most fans of Yoda consider him sacrosanct-- not only *an* example of a wise mentor, but *the* archetypal wise mentor. Saying that he's cruel, self-righteous, and manipulative not only offends their perception of a character, but goes to the heart of what they think a wise mentor *is*. I've learned it's just going to bring me wank if I say what I think of him. OTOH, saying that Anakin is "whiny" doesn't seem to bring the same level of vitriol from Anakin fen. He's less iconic to people, I think.
It's when people start using the word "hate" in an aggressive way, reacting to mentions of the character with "hope ( ... )
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The Office
If you tell me that Jim and Pam are not MFEO, I will bash you over the head, because omeleventy!! YOU WILL LOVE TEH JAM!!! And if you don't agree, you suxors.
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"Jam"? *shudders* Smushed pairing names make me cringe! People who use them suxors! But Jim and Pam are Teh Cute.
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Smushed pairing names make me cringe!
Hey, be glad you weren't in the Buffy fandom, where we tossed around words like Spuffy and Bangel.
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I can see where sometimes a complaint about the character is really a complaint about the writers. Well, I guess it always is, really, but there's two ways it can go. Either they've failed to create the character that they think they've created (like Gwen on Torchwood, and to a lesser extent, at least IMO, Rose on DW), or they deliberately create a character who has character traits that make you dislike her.
In the second case, you can still say it's the writers' "fault", but they've succeeded in what they meant to do. It's the first case that drives me crazy--when clearly you're supposed to think, "Oh, what a wonderful person!" when you're really yelling at the screen, "NO, WHAT YOU JUST DID IS NOT OKAY, YOU WITCH!"
And the Rose Wars? Have NOTHING on the Ray Wars in Due South fandom. *shudders*
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Either they've failed to create the character that they think they've createdYes, this exactly, this is exactly what I meant. It's often but not always a "too much telling" thing. Do you watch NCIS? Because Ziva was that way in the beginning. I think the writers were so busy trying to make viewers accept the person who took a beloved dead character's space that they went completely overboard. Every episode that season was about how wonderful she was, how much she could do, how she had every Action Girl skill and then some, and how she wisecracked with one of the male leads in *exactly the same way* as the dead character. I thought she was a dreadful Sue then, I like her a lot now (better, even, than Kate)-- because the writers wisely backed the hell off at one point and started writing her ( ... )
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It'll be interesting to see what you make of Donna (fourth season Companion on Doctor Who--she also was in the second Christmas movie, a full season before she showed up as Companion.)
(NOTE: I tried to avoid spoilers in this comment, but I talk about a lot of generalities. If you're worried about your opinions being influenced, might want to skip over the rest of this. I don't really know your level of spoiler-phobia. Also about people trying to make you love characters, because I love Donna. *g*)
Lots of people hated Donna in the Christmas movie. Of course this was right after Rose left the series, so anybody was going to get hated at that point, but her character was...well, very different from Rose, and by then I wanted different, I wanted to see someone who completely failed to be impressed by the Doctor. And Donna did. And I loved her for it ( ... )
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