Being in a tiny fandom is always being stuck between “I wish more people knew about this thing” and “I know exactly what problematic elements of the story and annoying discourse topics are going to consume the fandom if more people find out about this thing”
before this blows up or anything I’d like to clarify: This is not me expressing “Oh no if more people join this fandom I’ll have to think critically about this story and acknowledge that it has flaws.”
This is me expressing, “Oh no, if more people join this fandom there will be enough people for the fandom to develop weird subgroups of people who can’t acknowledge the story’s flaws at all, people who ship gross stuff, people who hate the people who ship gross stuff, people who just hate the story for having flaws, and also any major blogger who belongs to a minority group will be attacked by type #1 until they develop acute emotional fatigue from being in the fandom at all,”
and also “The 3 and a half people who are on tumblr who seem to know about this thing have discussed the flaws and problems this story has at length with me and each other, but we also want to enjoy the story and don’t particularly want to have to recirculate The Discourse on our blogs to prove to a bunch of strangers that we’re enjoying the story critically.”
y’all know about the AO3 search hack for only getting fics with a single pairing listed, right? Just click on the pairing tag you want, and then filter and put “otp:true” in the ‘search within results’ box and BAM. Nothing but fics with that one pairing. Heaven.
Omg this is the most incredible life hack I’ve run across in a long time. I just tried it and it works. Will be really helpful for rarepairs, I imagine.
oh my god? the x files-fandom was the fandom that invented the word ‘shipping’? JESUS CHRIST I LOVE Y’ALL
Yes, back in the early days, there were two camps of fans: “Relationshippers” (people all about the MSR) and the “NoRomos” (people all about the platonic partnership.) Relationshippers was eventually shortened to “shippers.”
The X-Files popularity just happened to parallel the birth of the internet. Philes took it by storm with the creation of fan forums, chat groups, and hundreds of websites devoted to the show, characters, and the actors. 🙂
The X-Files fandom also coined the term UST (Unresolved Sexual Tension) as a fanfic descriptor. 😀 Fandom history is pretty neat.
fruck man
Man X-Files was my intro to fandom and fic and it shaped me so much
You know this post?
It’s true! But the corollary is, “And if not Star Trek, probably X-Files.”
People who try to tell me things are ‘not that deep’ fundamentally misunderstand me, I am not a fish desperately in search of the ocean, I am a magpie that roves the canons, searching for shiny things to put in my nest. Whether or not it actually is given deep narrative weight by canon itself is of secondary importance to the fact that it has the potential to be interesting, and thus, I covet it.
“It’s not that deep”
Maybe not originally, but the ground is soft and I’m ready to dig.
“The ground is soft and I’m ready to dig” is the best description of the fanfic attitude I’ve ever seen.
First paragraph of the actual fic: I judge the whole fic by the first words and I assume you do too so here it is
“Just a series or drabbles/headcanons/prompts”: Someday I want to write an incredible 200k fic but for now have fun going through all the chapters trying to figure out which one is the one you actually want to read
“Will X be able to find love before Y happens?” And other questions: I read entirely too many YA novels
Quote from the actual fic: I watch entirely too many movie trailers
“Basically just an X fic with Y characters”: I can probably write a good summary if I cared a little more
Song lyrics: I have no idea how summaries work and I’m trying to be like the people with poem quotes
Poem quotes: either the best thing you’ve ever read or 13-year old English literature purple prose there is no in-between
Lol I can’t do summaries: I’m not entirely sure if I want you to read my fic
“Wtf is this” or other author questioning themselves: it’s either porn or crack
Explicit rated fics: listen my man I know you’re not gonna really read the summary just read the tags and decide if my sin is the sin for you
Paragraph of tags and one line summary: ok listen I can’t do summaries but I’ve got this ok IVE GOT THIS
dictionary definition: fluff or angst here you go
Either a meme or a tumblr imagine your otp: I was bored and I had emotions about my ship you can have emotions about them too
Paragraph from the source the fic is from: I’ve basically written my headcanon and made it prettier
“I’m so sorry” or “I cried while writing this” : I was in a sad mood and I needed a healthy way to release these emotions so now y’all get to suffer
No summary: it’s either porn or a small drabble and it all depends on the word count
Actual fic summary: *rocks back on old wheelchair* listen kid *smokes cigarette* I’ve seen and read a lot of things *blows smoke* and I know it’s hard but there’s still hope in this world ok? *looks into the distance* also you might wanna read the tags because the chances of gore and/or character death being in my fic have gone from 0 to 75
oh my god? the x files-fandom was the fandom that invented the word ‘shipping’? JESUS CHRIST I LOVE Y’ALL
Yes, back in the early days, there were two camps of fans: “Relationshippers” (people all about the MSR) and the “NoRomos” (people all about the platonic partnership.) Relationshippers was eventually shortened to “shippers.”
The X-Files popularity just happened to parallel the birth of the internet. Philes took it by storm with the creation of fan forums, chat groups, and hundreds of websites devoted to the show, characters, and the actors. 🙂
The X-Files fandom also coined the term UST (Unresolved Sexual Tension) as a fanfic descriptor. 😀 Fandom history is pretty neat.
fruck man
Man X-Files was my intro to fandom and fic and it shaped me so much
You know this post?
It’s true! But the corollary is, “And if not Star Trek, probably X-Files.”
Bucky the vampire slayer is also a strong contender
Word of God is not canon. If you’re in the Harry Potter fandom, then you are intimately familiar with this concept.
Fanon is never going to affect or take away from canon. One person’s headcanons or ships won’t change what’s actually in canon. Someone shipping non-canon ships is not “taking away your representation” because your actual representation is still in canon and probably very present in the rest of the fandom.
The author is dead. This is a true statement for every fandom. The creator of a work may be able to speak with the Word of God but, to continue that metaphor, they are not a god you have to listen to or follow.
Fandom is meant to be a creative playground. Limiting ourselves to “acceptable” and canon ships and “acceptable” tropes and all that doesn’t do anything except limit the potential our fandoms have. It’s fun to explore different relationship dynamics, it’s fun to explore alternate universes, it’s fun to explore different tones and genres, and a fandom that does those things stays fun and interesting for the people in it.
There are bigots in fandom. There are racists, homophobes, transphobes, queerphobes, ableists, xenophobes, antisemites, islamophobes, and every other kind of bigot in fandom. This doesn’t mean that fandom is bad, just that it falls victim to the exact same issues that literally every community in the world does.
There is no age requirement and no age restriction. There are 80 year olds reading fanfiction written by 12 year olds. There are 18 year olds reblogging fanart drawn by 60 year olds. There are meta discussions spanning generations. Adult spaces should remain for adults and kid spaces should remain for adults, but intergenerational friendships are not inherently weird or creepy.
On that same topic, adults in fandom are not responsible for the overall safety of kids in fandom. It’s our responsibility to tag properly, warn for nsfw content, interact with children appropriately, drive out known predators from our spaces, and similar things. It is not our responsibility to parent anyone except our own kids.
Fandom is not activism. It can be used for that, and often is, but nothing about it is inherently political. A person’s fandoms, ships, favorite characters, etc tells you nothing about their political beliefs. Fandom is not about how “progressive” we can be with our headcanons, it’s about having fun.
Feel free to add more.
If you headcanon a character to have one sexuality/disability/whatever and someone doesn’t share that headcanon, they are not -phobic or -ist or whatever just for that.
eg: if you headcanon a character with no canonical sexuality (who we’ll name Lucretia totally at random) to be a lesbian, that’s fine. But if you act like people who write or portray Lucretia as NOT a lesbian are lesbophobic, homophobic, and are somehow “taking away representation” by not also headcanoning her as a lesbian, then you’re an asshole.
No I’m not still bitter about a bunch of assholes in one fandom what are you talking about?
ifesbob 