on negativity in fandom
Nov. 17th, 2019 04:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xparrotI was writing this whole long rambling post about responsibility, and apologizing for and trying to minimize accidental harm, but then it changed tangents and I think what I most want to say is this:
In fandom, please be careful about how negative you are, and how you are negative.
This relates to anything from offering unsolicited crit on a fic (or heck, solicited crit) to hating on a part of canon, or to being an anti, or to discussing your dislike of a popular fic trope.
I'm not saying this for reasons of courtesy and manners, though I think that counts for something. But it's really for a much more selfish reason: Negativity can make people disengage, and that's overall detrimental to fandom. Which I selfishly care about, as a fan.
Spoilers: fandom is a really fucking emotional thing for most people. Our interests and obsessions are a pretty core part of our identities, and we wouldn't be devoting time and energy to them if we weren't mentally and emotionally engaged. Hearing that someone hates something you love can hurt, even when there is no hurt intended. That's even before we get into the question of fanfic and fanart and vids and other fan creations, and how personal one's art is to most artists. Especially for amateur artists, who aren't getting paid and so the only impetus to share our creations is for emotional validation.
There have been more than a few fic writers who have quit writing because of crit -- because getting crit is really hard even for many professional writers, and people writing for fun may not have the emotional energy to deal with it, or just don't want to, and so they stop, or stop sharing their work publicly. But it's not just direct crit that can do this. If you're writing a trope you love, or a pairing you love, and then you see people talking about how much they dislike that trope or how gross that pairing is, it can make you hesitate to keep writing, or at least hesitate to share your work, knowing you might be inviting crit. Or even just thinking that no one is going to want to read it. (Then, some of us are the opposite and such things inspire us to keep going out of pure spite; but even for me that's something I have to work myself into and it takes its own emotional toll.)
And this hurts, not just the writer, but the fandom as a whole, because someone quitting writing means less fic in the fandom for the rest of us. And even if it's not fic that you like personally, that you'd be happy not to see any more of -- someone else surely would like it, and want more, and do you want to spoil their fun, too?
Likewise, talking about disliking canon can stop discussion, because it can be hard to contradict someone -- especially someone with whom you share a fandom, so there can be that sense of comradery, being in the same community. So if you see a fan friend talking about how X canon thing sucks, rather than argue back that you love that thing, it can be easier to not rock the boat, to not say anything -- but then not feeling comfortable to talk about what you love in a fandom can drain your interest in it, and with it the fandom; and then you drift away, and the fandom shrinks.
To be clear, I'm not saying don't be negative. For one thing, sometimes it's important to do so. Calling out things like racism or toxic behavior can be seen as negative but can also be really crucial for the overall health and safety of a community and the members in it. Pointing out that a fic isn't sufficiently tagged can be a type of criticism (and can hurt a writer) but may help many other fans who could be impacted.
For two, complaining about what we dislike as well as what we like is a big part of fanning for a lot of us -- for me definitely; I enjoy a good hard critical analysis, and I'll be honest, sometimes I take guiltily gleeful pleasure in shredding something I didn't like. And sometimes, too, it feels great to talk about and find out I'm not alone in hating X thing. But I try -- have been trying harder -- to limit how I do it. When I criticize canon, I try to tag/mark it for negativity and squee-harshing, so people who don't want to see it can avoid it. When I criticize fanworks (either a specific fic I don't like, or a trope/ship/etc) I try to ensure it's not personal, and/or to keep it in more private locked channels that won't get back to the writer(s), because that's really all about me and what I like; it's not another fan's fault that I have my preferences, and the last thing I want to do is get in the way of the fun of someone else who is enjoying the fandom as much as I am, if in a different way.
I'm far from great at this -- I've hurt friends on more than one occasion without meaning to because I got too into a fannish debate and didn't realize the feelings I was provoking. I have no doubt that I've discouraged other fans from fanning on and writing things they enjoy, and I'm sorry for that. But I'm trying, and will keep trying -- I've been trying harder especially lately because my current fandom is quite small; just about all of us non-lurkers in it have interacted with each other to some extent, so it makes any interactions more personal than they would be in a larger fandom in which many people don't know each other. I'm not perfect but I'm doing my best. And hopefully my fandoms will be a more encouraging place for it.
tl;dr: make squee, not war?
ETA: this post's original subject was "not-so-vague vague-posting" because I was originally inspired to write it by a mess in my current fandom. My original intent morphed in the writing of it, though, to be more about my own changing feelings about how I interact with the fan communities I'm in, for better or for worse, so I've adjusted the subject to match.
In fandom, please be careful about how negative you are, and how you are negative.
This relates to anything from offering unsolicited crit on a fic (or heck, solicited crit) to hating on a part of canon, or to being an anti, or to discussing your dislike of a popular fic trope.
I'm not saying this for reasons of courtesy and manners, though I think that counts for something. But it's really for a much more selfish reason: Negativity can make people disengage, and that's overall detrimental to fandom. Which I selfishly care about, as a fan.
Spoilers: fandom is a really fucking emotional thing for most people. Our interests and obsessions are a pretty core part of our identities, and we wouldn't be devoting time and energy to them if we weren't mentally and emotionally engaged. Hearing that someone hates something you love can hurt, even when there is no hurt intended. That's even before we get into the question of fanfic and fanart and vids and other fan creations, and how personal one's art is to most artists. Especially for amateur artists, who aren't getting paid and so the only impetus to share our creations is for emotional validation.
There have been more than a few fic writers who have quit writing because of crit -- because getting crit is really hard even for many professional writers, and people writing for fun may not have the emotional energy to deal with it, or just don't want to, and so they stop, or stop sharing their work publicly. But it's not just direct crit that can do this. If you're writing a trope you love, or a pairing you love, and then you see people talking about how much they dislike that trope or how gross that pairing is, it can make you hesitate to keep writing, or at least hesitate to share your work, knowing you might be inviting crit. Or even just thinking that no one is going to want to read it. (Then, some of us are the opposite and such things inspire us to keep going out of pure spite; but even for me that's something I have to work myself into and it takes its own emotional toll.)
And this hurts, not just the writer, but the fandom as a whole, because someone quitting writing means less fic in the fandom for the rest of us. And even if it's not fic that you like personally, that you'd be happy not to see any more of -- someone else surely would like it, and want more, and do you want to spoil their fun, too?
Likewise, talking about disliking canon can stop discussion, because it can be hard to contradict someone -- especially someone with whom you share a fandom, so there can be that sense of comradery, being in the same community. So if you see a fan friend talking about how X canon thing sucks, rather than argue back that you love that thing, it can be easier to not rock the boat, to not say anything -- but then not feeling comfortable to talk about what you love in a fandom can drain your interest in it, and with it the fandom; and then you drift away, and the fandom shrinks.
To be clear, I'm not saying don't be negative. For one thing, sometimes it's important to do so. Calling out things like racism or toxic behavior can be seen as negative but can also be really crucial for the overall health and safety of a community and the members in it. Pointing out that a fic isn't sufficiently tagged can be a type of criticism (and can hurt a writer) but may help many other fans who could be impacted.
For two, complaining about what we dislike as well as what we like is a big part of fanning for a lot of us -- for me definitely; I enjoy a good hard critical analysis, and I'll be honest, sometimes I take guiltily gleeful pleasure in shredding something I didn't like. And sometimes, too, it feels great to talk about and find out I'm not alone in hating X thing. But I try -- have been trying harder -- to limit how I do it. When I criticize canon, I try to tag/mark it for negativity and squee-harshing, so people who don't want to see it can avoid it. When I criticize fanworks (either a specific fic I don't like, or a trope/ship/etc) I try to ensure it's not personal, and/or to keep it in more private locked channels that won't get back to the writer(s), because that's really all about me and what I like; it's not another fan's fault that I have my preferences, and the last thing I want to do is get in the way of the fun of someone else who is enjoying the fandom as much as I am, if in a different way.
I'm far from great at this -- I've hurt friends on more than one occasion without meaning to because I got too into a fannish debate and didn't realize the feelings I was provoking. I have no doubt that I've discouraged other fans from fanning on and writing things they enjoy, and I'm sorry for that. But I'm trying, and will keep trying -- I've been trying harder especially lately because my current fandom is quite small; just about all of us non-lurkers in it have interacted with each other to some extent, so it makes any interactions more personal than they would be in a larger fandom in which many people don't know each other. I'm not perfect but I'm doing my best. And hopefully my fandoms will be a more encouraging place for it.
tl;dr: make squee, not war?
ETA: this post's original subject was "not-so-vague vague-posting" because I was originally inspired to write it by a mess in my current fandom. My original intent morphed in the writing of it, though, to be more about my own changing feelings about how I interact with the fan communities I'm in, for better or for worse, so I've adjusted the subject to match.
no subject
Date: 2019-11-18 05:08 pm (UTC)But my fanfic? My reams of meta? My squee? SG-1 and Glee and Guardian. And what always happens is, a vid will cross one of my feeds, or a gifset, or sometimes even a fic by a friend with really catnippy tags. And then I'll go watch a couple episodes, and the show will be itself, and then I'll want to chatter on Dreamwidth about it, because cheerful, witty, low-stakes snarking about media is fun! "OH MY GOD, FRIENDS, I JUST HAD A GREAT TIME WATCHING THE SILLIEST, TRASHIEST NONSENSE, THE PLOT IS TEN CLICHÉS IN A TRENCH COAT, IT'S ANOTHER TOTAL SAUSAGE FEST, AND THE SET IS MADE OF FELT AND POPSICLE STICKS buuuuuut it has this one element I quite like, and this one character's deltoids in motion are worth a second look, so I'm gonna keep watching, don't worry, I'll be done in a week, I have no intention of going fannish about this one...."
And then. Oops. Watch me turn sheepish, because something in ep. 3 just hit my id like an anvil/that actor just demonstrated unexpected chops/I tootled over to AO3 and found fifteen of my favourite writers all cheering on each other's WIPs.
And then off I plunge into the fandom, hoping none of the friends-in-potentia I would now like to seduce have noticed my, uh, initial skepticism, or if they did, they were endeared. And I think I have a bad habit anyway of assuming my flist understands me perfectly, and knows when to take me unseriously, because it feels like it's full of old friends but really there's a steady trickle of new people who came in for something specific, like all the Jane Austen criticism I posted last year. And it would behoove me to be more honest with myself about how much of my snark is just pointless ego, like, needing to make sure people know my tASTES are reFINeD! and my INTellect UNdeCEIVED!!! no matter what my id is humping.
I think I shall crosspost this comment on my own blog, just to have as a reminder to self, for next time my new fandom radar blips. Squee early and often. Rec imperfection. Never be that old witch who hesitates over the kudos button because the fic had a malaprop in it. Always slam the kudos button.
no subject
Date: 2019-11-19 08:37 am (UTC)... this is pretty much verbatim my original not-a-rec for Guardian though? (Except with a lot more waxing poetic about Zhu Yilong's face and Bai Yu's everything and THE FEELS). And yeah, I DEFINITELY have the thing where I can and do love genuinely fantastic shows, but my fannish heart belongs to those with cracks and flaws to work with. A show like Guardian, which genuinely suffers from a lot of budget and quality issues? But features compelling characters and actors able to sell the most rickety foam pillar as an unyielding obstacle, saving pathos from diving into bathos by sheer force of craft and skills?
Guh. I am GONE. There's so much magic about Guardian it's difficult to really say why it works when... *gestures* But it does, and I love it so much.
And I used to talk fondly of it as "trash" (look - felt and popsicle sticks is incredibly fair) because to me that didn't mean it was bad, it just meant it wasn't mainstream good?
But yeah turns out that hurt feelings, and while I still visualize myself as a happy little racoon in a ditch, clutching a shiny lollipop wrapper of a treasure, I learned to modulate how I express the whole "this poor show I LOVE IT SO MUCH" feeling without coming across as dissing it. It's still a playful kind of exchange I have with friends who know me and how I express my affections, but I wouldn't rec the show the same way today, and I try to avoid dwelling on the (to me) obvious flaws unless explicitly asked to give my honest opinion.
But yeah! I'm super happy and comfortable loving things I don't find perfect, and for me the lesson has been that not everybody has the same fond reaction to hearing our darling beloved show called "trash". XD
no subject
Date: 2019-11-19 08:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-11-19 08:48 am (UTC)Type A fandoms are the things I adore that I think are absolutely brilliant and shove at people and recommend to everyone; I'll rewatch most of them when I get the chance. They might have flaws but everything else is so good it can be overlooked. I rarely write or read fic for Type As, because they're so satisfying as-is.
While as Type B fandoms are the ones that are kind of ridiculous and have major issues but also have elements that are unexpectedly brilliant and hit the id HARD and make me want MOOOOOORE, they'll get me writing fic because I need this and that and also HOW COULD CANON DO THAT. They'll obsess me and I adore them. I'll rewatch the whole show to share with someone, but I usually prefer to rewatch just my favorite scenes (over and over and over again)...
And I can't honestly say which type I love more, or which brings me more joy, but yeah, part of the joy of a Type B fandom for me is in its imperfections, in the parts that make me scream OH NO THAT'S SO DUMB...and makes me feel totally fine with grabbing onto the canon and ripping it up a bit to pull out the bits I love and just ignoring the rest. Like, a Type A fandom might have an end that makes me cry but I wouldn't really want it any other way. While as a Type B I will very happily live in denial and just ignore what doesn't work, and I do not take it too seriously and in fact cannot take it too seriously, because if I did it wouldn't be so fun, not in the same way.
And Guardian is quintessential Type B for me (as was SGA, oh SGA -- I got into it at the beginning of s4, we marathoned the first three seasons in a week, and at the end of season 2 my sister and I had a serious conversation about how the show was okay but also so frustratingly flawed and its universe building had so many issues and we didn't see why people were that into it, really...and then by the end of season 3 I was starting on writing more fic than I have for any fandom. ^^)
But. Yeah. That's my way of fanning, and other people do it differently, and sometimes my loving snark for those flawed babies can come across as something worse to people who don't fan like that. And also, yes, we can always do with more squee in the world, no matter how silly or imperfect the thing we're squeeing about is -- if it brings us joy, it's doing something right!
ETA: and also yes Naye beat me to it but:
OH MY GOD, FRIENDS, I JUST HAD A GREAT TIME WATCHING THE SILLIEST, TRASHIEST NONSENSE, THE PLOT IS TEN CLICHÉS IN A TRENCH COAT, IT'S ANOTHER TOTAL SAUSAGE FEST, AND THE SET IS MADE OF FELT AND POPSICLE STICKS
YES that is Guardian!! (I love it so much~~~~)