December Semi-Daily: fandom over time

[resonant]

destina, "how has your relationship to fandom changed over the years? By which I mean not just participation in it, but your level of tolerance/interest for the cyclical things about it, the way old arguments never really stop or die, etc, but also the ways fandom changes and new ways of doing fandom evolve. (And old ways evolve out, and terms evolve, etc.)"

I find that I almost never use the word "slash" any more; in any online community that accepts the existence of fanfic, the fact that some of it is gay and some of it is smut is just taken for granted.

Similarly, some of my older stories have a fair bit of groundwork for why this particular character might be prepared to have a same-sex relationship. I mean, not mimeographed-Kirk/Spock-zine level of groundwork, but I still went into the stories assuming that the readers would be assuming that everyone was straight. All that explanation seems a little weird to me now; I think a contemporary fanfic-reading audience is going to assume general multisexuality and you'd have to provide support for why a given character wouldn't be open to a same-sex relationship.

I have a history of either arriving in a fandom after the major fandom-splitting conflict has already burned itself out (Ray Wars? oh, yeah, I've heard they used to have some Ray Wars) or somehow not noticing the major fandom-splitting conflict. terminally_underwhelmed and I spent like half an hour one day trying to figure out where had I been that I managed to miss SuperWhoLock? was it after I abandoned the resonant8 tumblr? was it before I discovered tumblr? did it somehow happen while I was right there and I didn't notice it?

So my approach to fandom conflict is pretty much what it's always been, which is to vaguely notice some smoke and sirens off thataway and hope that it's not going to cut into my smut.





28 -- kass, "What do you like best about where you live?"
29 -- mecurtin, What is the most beautiful sight you see outside on a regular basis? Can be a building, landscape, plant, animal, artwork, people playing, whatever.
30 -- china_shop, "Your favourite book you read this year."
31 -- wolfshark, "what is your favorite story to reread of your own stuff? what was your favorite story to write?"

Comments

[norsellie]

So my approach to fandom conflict is pretty much what it's always been, which is to vaguely notice some smoke and sirens off thataway and hope that it's not going to cut into my smut.

Full same.

[resonant]

I think some people enjoy the kerfuffles, in the same way that some people enjoy going to Best Buy on Black Friday.

[norsellie]

OMG yes! That's a great analogy.

[unfinishedidea]

Oh, weird, I never noticed it, but I'm 100% the same; I can't remember the last time I used "slash." Interesting.

[resonant]

Isn't that odd? It's like it was so influential on the formation of fanfiction that now it kind of goes without saying.

[nestra]

Someone else (runpunkrun, I think) brought up the slash thing the other day, in that it was mentioned on Tumblr as something the old people say. Which was a surprise to me. I see that it's part of the other thing you mention, where we generally no longer have to explain why a character might be interested in a same-sex relationship.

I mean, it's great that the artificial divide between het and same-sex fiction is disappearing, but I still like knowing whether something is slash or het or gen just for categorization purposes. I guess it's a tagging thing now rather than a content thing.

[resonant]

I certainly wouldn't want to go back, but now we need to find a new uncrossable divide to stand between two characters so that we can write stories about them crossing it!

[raveninthewind]

I still use "Slash" for tagging, but interestingly enough, most slash stories in recent years have het pairings also or are "Mostly Gen" and the slash and het modify that.

I find that other sites (Reddit and DLP, for example) there are enough folks who are anti-slash that they would want to know to avoid. And of these folks, their default seems to be Het rather than Gen.

[out_there]

That sounds like a good approach.

And, hmmm, interesting that you mention the difference in groundwork required. It's true that even for a character with a canonical straight love interest / history you can write them as bi with very little groundwork involved. (A paragraph here, a musing mention there and it's accepted. Those very long figuring out I might be gay stories are much rarer now.) I hadn't noticed that shift happen.

[resonant]

A paragraph here, a musing mention there

In Venom fandom I'm seeing a lot of lists of ex-lovers that go "Jessica and Caleb and Annie ..."

[isabellerecs]

"So my approach to fandom conflict is pretty much what it's always been, which is to vaguely notice some smoke and sirens off thataway and hope that it's not going to cut into my smut."

This I think is the best possible way to survive in fandom long term. :) I feel the same about Superwholock, I'm pretty sure I was there the whole time but . . . blank. *shrugs* I'm pretty sure I just kept scrolling right on by.

[resonant]

Well, it's not really very interesting, ultimately. Just let me at the stories.

[raveninthewind]

I didn't get the SuperWhoLock at all. Now BondLock or PotterLock...that makes way more sense to me.

[mekare]

Huh. I hadn’t really noticed but you are right. Slash as a content marker or something is not really around anymore. I keep reading older fic (Sga over the holidays) and all those fics that deal with the huge issue of Don’t ask, don’t tell used to be a big thing (in other fandoms as well, for instance Hawaii 5-0). On the one hand I am glad that there isn’t such a focus on all the conscience wrangling of career over personal happiness anymore, on the other hand I can’t believe it’s all sunshine and roses right now. I mean I wish reality was the way fic portrays people’s attitudes to sexuality but I’m sure the problems have just shifted a bit rather than wiped out.

[resonant]

Yeah -- I'm obsessively reading Losers stories, for some reason, and that's another fandom with tons of DADT. I remember it in SGA, too.

[spikedluv]

I feel like I'm always on the sidelines of the 'smoke and sirens', too. Someone mentions a kerfuffle and I'm like, what, when, where?

[resonant]

"People were upset about that? Really??"

[monanotlisa]

" vaguely notice some smoke and sirens off thataway and hope that it's not going to cut into my smut."

:P

You know what; that works for me! I am thankfully rarely involved in fandom drama; I think the last idiocy I committed* was to argue with skywardprodigal like the White person I am during Racefail '09. I read up on fandom wank sometimes, if and when it concerns my fandoms or when I'm feeling spiteful (Supernatural, I'm looking at the mess you are), but just the fact that I have to go and look up wtf is going on...

* or remember committing, anyway

[resonant]

I'm now realizing that the last time I was active enough to consider getting involved in fannish conflict, I was assuming we were all roughly the same age. If I were tempted to get into an argument, I could easily be yelling at someone literally a third my age!

[minutia_r]

As I recall, Superwholock was mostly a fandom joke, and some people liked it and some people didn't like it and some people took it Way Too Seriously, but there wasn't any major drama as such. The Johnlock Conspiracy now, that was crazy (and some people ended up getting doxxed or otherwise harmed in real life by it). But I was never actually in Sherlock fandom except for reading fic by a few authors I already knew I liked from other fandoms, so I was just watching from the sidelines, and I'm sure my impressions are not necessarily complete or accurate.

[resonant]

That's another one that I mostly missed -- like it went by in the distance and I heard the noise without knowing what it was.

[copracat]

If someone had asked me, Vera, how well do you know Destina or Resonant, I would have said not very well, for a long time - gosh, since The Sentinel - but I wouldn't say know well. And that would be right but oh, the slow rise of dissonance as I read, when I thought this was Destina's post!

Maybe I know you both a little.

[resonant]

That's so funny! I don't really think I have a sense for the "voices" of people I know on DW -- even, as you said, people I've known for a long time -- but maybe I'm wrong about that.