on negativity in fandom

[xparrot]

I 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.

Comments

[galaxysoup]

Those are excellent points. It's really easy to get caught up in a debate and let it get hurtful by accident, and this is a good reminder to be mindful of context, surroundings, and passion.

[kimboo_york]

Ahhh, I really love this whole post. It resonates with me a lot -- and also as someone who in the distant past got dumped on hard in a major fandom wank, because even though it was kind of a ridiculous shipping war situation, it burned me on that fandom forever. I miss it. I'll never "go back" to it. These things are definitely A LOT about emotions.

So I like the way you frame this not solely as "be kind" etc. etc. but "be careful about your negativity." That is a very simple thing but powerful too.

I'm trying to be aware of that one both sides of the coin. In NiF there is one character I truly dislike and cannot be convinced is likable or redeemable, but that character is beloved by many, and I've had to just step away and remind myself that justifying my feels is not worth harshing other people's squee. This isn't complicated math, it is easy to just not discuss that character. It's...pretty sad how long it has taken me to learn that lesson, aaaack.

I too have hurt friends and possibly made people shy of writing/drawing/discussing what they love and honestly that breaks my heart. I just hope I'm doing better at not doing that these days.

[sheron]

Hearing that someone hates something you love can hurt, even when there is no hurt intended.

Oh boy yes to this.

I get this a lot with MCU movie canon, especially in adjacent places where there's like this blanket permission to diss stuff with the assumption that everyone must feel the same way and it really screws me up for days. And the thing is it makes me have to put in extra effort to stay in fandom. I'm acutely conscious of this effort I'm having to make because it's atypical of me. It's not like I'm hovering on the edge of "in" or "out" decision, it's more like I have to take a deep breath and bring to mind all the things I love about canon to remember why I'm here. Because for me, once I don't like canon, I move fandoms. I don't stay where I don't like the source material, and so it's so important for me to feel good about it.

I mean, needless to say, chasing creators out of fandom with mean comments is beyond the pale. But I think that happens relatively rarely compared to how often I see people just dismiss certain things as bad because they feel that way, and not realize this isn't a commonly held viewpoint. IMHO anyway.

And also what you said about comradely is so true. The more connected I feel to the people in the fandom the more I creative I feel. The cycle of reader-writer-artist-beta giving each other things is perpetuated on good will after all.

[sholio]

It's interesting to read this and think back on some of our old fandom debates, especially about Keller in SGA. XD But also:

Complaining about what we dislike as well as what we like is as 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.

I FEEL THIS SO HARD. It is something I've been trying to be much more mindful of lately, too, in particular noticing how affected I am by negativity in my fandoms, and how both of my past big Western-media fandoms (SGA and White Collar) are fandoms that I noped out on largely because of negativity - in WC's case it was also because of being severely burned by the ending, but I think the reason why I didn't stick around anyway and write oodles of fixits was largely because I'd been sidling out of the fandom for the past year or so anyway due to unrelenting negativity from the rest of the fandom on the parts of it that I was most invested in. I mean, in SGA's case, having brought it up above, it definitely wasn't you at all, but it was the whole entire ... just ... inability to even be in the fandom while avoiding wholesale hatred of the show that ended up making the fandom intolerable for me.

And yet it is also a case of being hoisted by my own petard, because I know that I've trash-talked things in the past! I was thinking a little while back about the Grant Ward mess in Agents of SHIELD fandom, and how strongly at the time I came down on the side of "this character is terrible! It is Teaching Bad Things!" but now, holy freck, after several years on Tumblr, seeing what the ad absurdum level of that argument is like, as well as various experiences with falling in love with the hated characters/ships in a canon, I am now very firmly settled on the "love what you love" end of the fandom spectrum. (I mean, I think I always kinda was anyway; it's just that it's become much more firmly entrenched due to seeing just how far it can go when you start judging other people's tastes as Bad and Wrong.)

But at the same time it's just so hard to accommodate the full range of what people want and need in a fandom. Another recent thing: a discussion with a fandom friend about one of her canons, which is a horror show that has been explicitly stated (by the creator) that they are not going to incorporate domestic violence into the various storylines. And we talked about how, on one hand, this is explicitly a selling point for some of the fandom! And that is entirely valid! (I mean, for the record, neither of us actually think this is a bad or wrong decision on the creator's part.) And yet it also shuts the show off from being able to deal with certain angles of horror, of emotional experience, and ... that's also valid, to want to explore those things?

This is the even farther end of Tumblr's ad-absurdum nature of arguing about things, where there are certain schools of thought out there that writing about things that are wrong IRL (from rape and underage, to racism and homophobia) means that you condone them, and even seeing those posts go by on my dash usually makes me hit the ceiling so hard despite the fact that I usually don't write about them anyway. XD But also, I personally know people in fandom who are legit triggered by the flip side of that: soft fluffy *ism-free worlds are what throws them into a negative headspace, and their experience is valid too!

... uh, okay, this has now wandered pretty far afield from your point, but I guess bringing it back around to the topic: I completely agree about keeping things positive as much as possible, and yet, fandom is wide and diverse, and some people need squeeful talk about the best parts of canon, and some people need to vent about the bad parts, and often those are the same people at different times, so ... how do we handle that?! I guess proper cut-tagging and clear labeling is really all you can do. (This isn't even negativity per se, but I try to consistently tag my Iron Fist posts and often cut-tag as much as I can, both here and on Tumblr, because I know there are people who follow me who really hate it on a borderline triggery level, and I want to make it easy for them to avoid it -- if they want to continue engaging with me; I also understand and am fine with people simply unfollowing/blocking me because of it, and that's valid too! But I'm not going to just not talk about it at all -- I kinda did do that for awhile and then I was like, self, this is ridiculous -- because it's my big fandom right now and if the mere existence of it in my space is an issue for people, they are going to have to leave/avoid me. Which I'm totally okay with; I understand that protecting yourself is the most important thing! So I try to walk the line between being super happy and delighted with my canon, which I am, and not really wanting to engage with the bad/problematic bits because that's just not how I do fandom, in general; but also recognizing that for other people, the bad bits are too overwhelming for them to want to be in the same room with the canon, and making sure they have the space to have that, too.)

Anyway ... I guess what it comes down to is that I think "Make squee not war" is a good life strategy and I am going to try to follow it more myself. :D

ETA: Bet you missed these comment-box-breaking comments of mine, huh. XDDD

[ratbones]

Oh, yes, this -- I completely agree. I don't want people to feel like they have to constantly walk on eggshells, but a certain amount of awareness of who might be reading something and how it might affect them is good for everyone. It can be a tricky balance, though, so I guess there will always be slip-ups even if we're trying.

I try to remember also that even though I'm in a small fandom, I don't actually know everyone who's reading stuff. People might be poking around, trying to decide whether to join in and how (this was me, several months ago), and I want to either encourage more people to join the merriment or at least not discourage them. Don't really want to ruin the day of any committed lurkers, either, ideally.

[dar_vidder]

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.

This part really resonated with me. I'm in Game of Thrones fandom and the final season was controversial to say the least. The final arc screwed over my favorite ship which has led to a lot of folks in my corner of fandom being super negative since the finale aired. I agree with a lot of the criticism, but sometimes I get overloaded by the negativity, especially when others start bashing everything that came before the ending...including the scenes that made so many of us shippers in the first place.

I don't know, there's a sense that because the ending sucked for us, everything that came before it is retroactively ruined and there's kind of this shaming thing going on, with BNFs (or today's equivalent of that term) constantly telling the rest of us we were all fools and should've known the showrunners didn't give a fuck about our pairing at such and such a point, blah blah blah.

There's also the fact that the book series isn't finished yet and seems to be pointing in a different (better) direction for our ship so there are lots of folks just trashing the show up one side and down the other and putting all their eggs in the book basket, as if that's the only valid version of the ship. Which again, I don't disagree with exactly. I, too, am hoping the final books will be published and give us a better ending, but at the same time I'm tired of feeling like the book shippers around me are beating up on show-only shippers and kind of making them feel shitty if they still liked stuff from the show. It's all a bummer.

ETA: And it's funny that I used to get upset about nasty ship-wars, but now it's like the call's coming from inside the house. No one can harsh my buzz faster than a shipper who ships the same goddamn ship as me who rants up a storm and does it in such a way that implies I'm stupid for still feeling fondly about the ship.

[ranalore]

Wow, do I feel this whole post. And it really is something I think we have to constantly weigh, because fandom is about our passions, our extremes of emotion, so it's very easy to get caught up in the urge to wax poetic about either your likes or dislikes. And that's okay, but there's a reason for the rise of subject lines that include the words "squee post," and cut tags that include the warning "read no further if you like X." Because a lot of social media-based fandom has learned the lesson of considering other people's feelings, but also we want to share our passions with like-minded people; most of us, at least, are not looking to hurt people or start arguments when we talk about our likes and dislikes.

That probably sounds like I'm preaching. I'm not. I can't. I've messed up way too often. I've ranted about NOTPs and characters and even fandoms I dislike without thought, and I've hurt friends, and I've assuredly hurt strangers. I used to say, a lot, "I'm just a schmuck with a keyboard, and I have as much power over you as you give me." But, you know, that attitude only goes so far. As does the idea that our journals are our own spaces. That may all be true, but we are still responsible for things we say in public, and unless we're talking behind lock, posting to DW—or AO3 or Tumblr or Twitter—is public. We are still responsible for effect, even if we didn't intend harm. That's something I have to remind myself of frequently. It's something I was very bad at in MCU. It's something I want to do better at in Guardian.

[qikiqtarjuaq]

Yeah. I think being mindful of framing and how it affects other fans' willingness to engage & how welcome they feel in a fandom space is always a good thing to consider. No one gets hurt with reasonable, straightforward statements like "I'm not into RPF" or "I generally don't read non-con in fic." And we're probably not hurting anyone by mocking the bad dye jobs on Guardian.

But the kind of negative statements that try to make sweeping, insulting conclusions about the opposition will quickly turn a small fandom space into a place where people feel attacked for subjective preferences. You can't know how grateful I was when you posted your epic novel/drama Guardian fusion, because for the longest time, a really commonly held opinion was that people who fused novel/drama were too dumb to understand that the book and drama are different if they thought those two disparate worlds could be reconciled. And I think that was just the result of a bunch of people who disliked mixing the two canons whose voices drowned out a minority who would have wanted to explore those concepts - not absolute fact.

And I think that's what it comes down to in the end. There's a kind of toxic and public negativity that's almost aimed at driving away content someone doesn't like to see, by making people too self-conscious to respond and by making it seem like opinion A is the only correct opinion. And we should be mindful that we're not doing that, even during venting.

[asya_ana]

Thanks for this thoughtful post! You chose a thorny (but important) topic indeed. I feel this so much, because I both can be negative about things and also feel very bad when other people are negative about things I love. :) I do have to catch myself sometimes, and it is hard. But I also know how bothered I can be when I see certain Opinions, so I try to be mindful (and I do fail). My default mode and preference is squee, however. I just don't have the energy after RL stuff to engage in too many thinky thoughts. (Even this is a lot!) I come to fandom to unwind and look at the pretty and roll around in feels, so that's my happy place and what I'm looking for here. But I do understand that there are many different ways to engage fandom and people are seeking different things, and for good or ill critique is definitely one of those things.

Part of the difficulty is that we're talking about different types of commentary when we say "negative" and imo they are not all the same thing.

I don't mind critique when it is part of thoughtful meta, but I wonder if sometimes after a fandom has been having a convo for a while, some meta loses its nuance for shorthand purposes and can become a bit flippant, simplified, scornful, or monolithic, and that's when it can start to hurt feelings. Likewise, once fandom gets to a place where we have the same conversation about something over and over, and some people feel like x and others feel like y, it can start to seem like you're beating a dead horse.

It's also different when you criticize out of love vs. out of derision. If someone in Guardian gently pokes fun at production value, that doesn't really bother me and can usually make me laugh in affection. But if someone not in the fandom dismisses the show for having bad special effects, then I can get defensive.

As you noted above, critiques for misogyny, racism, etc. are important conversations to have even if they make us uncomfortable or unhappy.

I think the type of negativity that bothers me most is around individual fanworks, styles, tropes, etc. This is in a slightly different category to me because it pertains to something that fandom creates and because negativity around it is so often rooted in individual preferences that aren't always rational (and hence not conducive to debate). Again, with exceptions for convos about racism or meta conversations about things like how we can be a safer space for everyone, I really don't GAF about all the things you personally don't like in fanworks or the fics you personally thought weren't that great. All that does is make me feel like if I create or enjoy those things there must be something wrong with me or that if I create things other people won't like them. It leaves me self-conscious rather than energized. Especially where so much of fanfic is just hitting the id (whether people want to own that or not), sometimes it's hard to be more intellectual about it other than "that trope makes me squee" or "that trope makes me cringe."

One of the things I most treasure about fandom is its gift economy, where we are all building this thing together, and also that it's a space for amateurs. You don't have to be GOOD to create in fandom. You're not getting paid. Some people may be "practicing" for professional publication, but a lot of us have absolutely no aspirations for that. We are creating because we enjoy creation for its own sake and we love something about the verse or the characters. We're having fun. As a result, the expectations I have of both myself and others are much more relaxed. It's not about meeting some standard but about contributing. It honestly really bothers me when people approach fanworks from a "consumer" perspective and become evaluative. Read what you enjoy, and don't bother with what you don't enjoy. Before disparaging tropes, styles, genres in public (for example the number of times I have had to listen to people act like SFF is an intellectually or artistically superior genre to romance...), consider if you are enriching the world of what creators might play with or shutting people down.

[amalthia]

I hear you! I left a few fandom/shows because so much negative discussion about the source material kind of ruined the show for me. Having said that I have returned to fandoms for movies I hated because the fan fiction is so awesome. So I guess distance can help...I've changed how I've interacted with fandom over the years.

finding the right forum for fannish venting

[rheasilvia]

I try -- have been trying harder -- to limit how I do it.

This, so much. For me, that is really the key point to keep in mind - everyone WILL dislike some things, and that's just as legitimate as other people loving those exact same things. There's nothing wrong with hating pairing X, canon aspect Y or fic trope Z, and it can be cathartic to vent, but it's absolutely possible to do it in a way that doesn't harsh the squee of people who love XYandZ.

It's all a matter of finding the right forum.

In RL, you probably wouldn't start loudly exclaiming how ugly you find purple clothes if someone in purple were standing right next to you. You might not understand how anyone can fail to see the hideousness of their eye-searing outfit, but if it makes them happy, then good for them, right? You can freely vent about the onslaught of lavender, periwinkle and violet later on, in private, to your Purple-Free Knitting Circle. It's really no different in fandom.

Fandom is composed of a huge variety of people, all of whom are in it for different reasons. All fans will find some other fans' preferences and fannish loves weird, incomprehensible and even actively unpleasant. But that's not a bug - it's a *feature*.

I am still working on this myself! I have chosen the wrong forums in the past, and... yeah. For example, when I first started out in fandom (four score and seven years ago), I routinely gave authors detailed feedback that included what I loved about their story as well as what I thought *didn't* work, and why. My intent was to offer constructive criticism, but I have since come to realize that because I was misunderstanding the context, I was basically being a dick in some cases. (I also did this to some published authors, btw, and in those cases I would still do it - but fanworks have a different intent and expectation.)

But that's a somewhat different (if related) topic, so, yeah. Finding the right forum! Not always easy, but vital for making fandom an open space for everyone.

[clevermanka]

I have lots of thoughts but my brain needs to focus on writing fic for the next couple days so I'm not going to be able to comment on this in a timely manner. So this is just to say Yes and This and I'm going to respond to all of this in a post of my own AFTER I finish my fic.

[stultiloquentia]

Oh man, this is so timely, because I have just had reason to reflect on the ridiculous way I fall into new fandoms, which has been consistent for, oh, twenty years now, and STILL lands me on my ass every time. I never go fannish for "prestige" shows. If you ask me for a "best of" list, I'll be like, "Oh ya, Slings and Arrows, Underground, The Get Down..." and probably bully you into borrowing my Slings and Arrows DVDs if I think I can get away with it.

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.

[riventhorn]

It's so true that negativity about the thing someone loves can be really hurtful and damaging. I think there's also a difference between negativity and valid criticism, and it can be difficult sometimes to distinguish between them and also cope with receiving the latter. Early in my career as a fanfic writer, I wrote an AU fic set in America in the 1700s. One of the characters was a black woman, who in canon loved a white man. In the fic, I initially chose to ignore the racial attitudes and discriminatory laws of the time and had the two characters love each other without any problems, as happened in canon, although I tried in other respects to make the fic historically accurate. A reader pointed out to me the racially insensitive problems with this approach and rightly stated that by investing a similar level of research, I could have depicted the relationship in a historically accurate way, showing the problems but also the fact that there were many cross-racial relationships at the time.

I initially felt really terrible about the whole thing, and it was hard to receive that criticism. I'm sure it was also hard for the reader to speak up about it, because it would have been easy to attack them for it. Hopefully, I handled it in a relatively mature way. It was an important learning experience for me, exposed me to a lot of perspectives on race that I had never encountered, and led me to rewrite the fic and take a new approach.

So I think that there can be a place for some criticism in fanfic, although it requires respect and politeness on both sides for it not to blow up into something nasty. But negativity simply for the sake of being negative or expressing a dislike for something another person enjoys does poison things.

[kari_izumi]

I spent my formative fan years on Godawful Fanfiction. Even after I grew bored of snarking fanfic, that toxicity I learned and even internalized took years to overcome. Its a big reason why I'm so pro-ship now: I've been where they've been. I've seen it and it's not good or healthy to focus so much time on tearing down things you hate.

[alessandriana]

*swans in five days late with Starbucks*

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.

I am so grateful when people do this. Media is my happy place; I frequently don't go into much more analytic depth with it than 'did I enjoy this/not enjoy it'. (I'd argue it's because my RL job involves lots of intense analyzing and critiquing things and I don't want to spend the brainpower outside, but tbh I've just always been like that.) Reading too much negative analysis of something can definitely sour me on a show, or on a fandom. I also have difficulties not arguing when someone has an opinion I think is wrong or unfounded... so it's nice having the option to step back & not engage in a conversation I know is just going to frustrate me.

[esteefee]

This is great.

[silveradept]

Thanks for writing this, it was a helpful springboard to some of my own thoughts about feedback, positive interactions, and some of the work that I'm doing in other spaces.