in which I am a big ol' hypocrite
Apr. 17th, 2010 08:43 pmI know there are people in the world who do not love their fellow human beings, and I hate people like that.
--Tom Lehrer
Recently it seems like the latest big fandom is Fandom - that the majority of fan-related discussions I'm seeing on my flist are not about series or characters or pairings but on trends in fanfic, and trends in responses to fanfic, and metaing about trends in fannish meta. It's rarely squeeful meta, either; there's some fanfic recs, but most of it is about how this aspect of fandom is problematic or that behavior is harmful. And it's not that these are bad topics, a lot of these issues are important to people, and it's good to open or continue dialogues about them. At the same time, lately it's been feeling like many fans - myself definitely included! - are doing more talking about fandom than actually fanning. And more than that, some of this meta to me comes across as very critical, not just of fandom trends, but of the fans who participate in such trends - it is really hard (maybe impossible?) to criticize a behavior without passing some sort of judgment on the people who do the behavior. Which tends to leave me feeling:
There are fans in Fandom who judge their fellow fans, and I think that is totally wrong!
Which isn't really true, because as I said, I think that a lot of these discussions are important; and a lot of them aren't trying to pass judgment anyway but simply offering opinions and talking about personal experiences and wishing things were different about their communities, which is all cool...but I miss my fannish experience being more about "Coolest ep EVAH ZOMG!" and "I have the most CRACKTASTIC AU in my head" and even "oh man did the writers drop the ball? on my foot? from 100 stories up? or was that just me?? :P" and less about "I don't like it when other fans do This."
...and yes, self, part of the problem, much?! >.>;;; I need a new series...I've watching a hell of a lot of TV lately, but none of it has struck quite the right chords; not sure if it's the shows, or it's me, or a combination, but it's awful frustrating, to want to be out sailing but to have no ship...