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shadowkatDoing the fannish history post has unfortunately brought back unpleasant memories ...we fought in fandom about dumb things on both lj and off. Seriously? Does it REALLY matter if your friend hates Joss Whedon or Spike or Angel or any of those characters with a passion? Isn't there another reason you liked them, (your friend not the characters)? If not, were you friends?
Fandom fights...mostly were about personality clashes. There were just a handful of people that I could not abide in fandom. They were usually the people who could not see a point of view other than their own no matter how many times you tried. Like arguing in a circle. Sort of like the Christian Right or the far Right and far Left in US politics. I'm RIGHT you are sooo very WRONG! You are clearly an idiot and let me start to educate you. And they'd be so SMUG about it. Let me paint the ways that you are wrong. (And sigh, I hate to admit this...but on some topics, such as same-sex marriage and gay rights, I'm just as didatic. I don't understand why people are against same-sex marriage. They have to be idiotic homophobes. There is just no other explanation! Damn it!)
See this is the problem with tv shows that are based on emotion. OR soap operas. The reason TV series like Supernatural, Buffy, Doctor Who (RT Davies - Who at any rate),
Daytime Soaps, Vamp Diaries, etc end up with such strong reactions is to a degree they are about emotion. They elicit strong emotions from the viewer, appeal to the non-rational mind, the gut. And we react to them from that part of ourselves.
I remember wanting to kill people online. Okay, maybe not kill, just kick them. Verbally. Couldn't do it physically of course. And I'd do it. Then I'd regret it. Always regretted it. It never worked out the way I thought. It never ever does. Because of course they kicked back and often harder and with far more accuracy. You'd think growing up with a younger brother would teach me not to attempt this? But noooo. And I'd get all embarrassed and want to delete everything I wrote and slink off into the never-never, licking my wounds.
This still happens occasionally. Actually it happened today. [Note to self, do not post when you are irritable.] Sorry to say. I'm an emotional writer. I tend blog from my gut as much as from my head. Which can be problematic. And I rarely think or plot it out ahead of time. Also, confrontational - not passive aggressive. I will tell you if you piss me off. And I will tell you if I hate something. Whether you want to know about it or not. Or if I have mixed feelings. And I'm not good at ignoring posts that piss me off. Yet, I despise conflict. And like to avoid it.
Fandom is dicey for me. I never know how to quite deal with it. It can be an emotional powderkeg. And if you give in, it's like going on a drunken bender, afterwards, when your sober - you think, damn - that's embarrassing. Why'd I do that? Ugh. And it's there for all to see? Ugh. Because fandom, at least to me, is a marriage of mind and emotion, fueled mainly by raw unfettered emotion which my mind is struggling to figure out. It doesn't tend to be rational. Or even logical. When you fall in love...the mind isn't often present.
But I came into fandom...with an obsessive desire to solve a puzzle. Something resonated and I wanted to figure out what it was. I got compulsive about it. Drove people around me nuts. And it came mainly from a desire to distract myself from things that hurt in my own life. We find ways, I think of distracting ourselves when we aren't happy or things aren't going as well as we'd wish. It's either that or rant and whine about them incessantly. I've found distraction works better, far more constructive. Well that and other things.
It's mainly the puzzle that grabbed me. So it was emotion wrapped around a mental dilemma. And the story hit my kinks. The problem with stories hitting our kinks - is if someone starts criticizing our kinks, it's really hard not to that personally.
For example? The Spike/Buffy story hit a lot of my kinks, some of which I'm embarrassed about. When people attacked it - it felt personal. Like they were attacking me. Sometimes they actually were attacking me - there were a few people in fandom who literally did attack me. They came right and said it. There was NO QUESTION in anyone's mind, including mine. In fact, in one instance - I remember limping off a fan board (I was depressed about other things and trying to escape from said depression) and a bunch of friends, one a lurker, coming to my defense. My lurker friend ripped the skin off of my attacker. Because it became personal. But not everyone did. Some people were actually able to get across the idea that they just didn't agree and couldn't quite wrap their brains around why I, a smart person, didn't see it their way. That I can deal with. Those people I'm still friends with.
Because we basically said - "okay, it's time we agreed to respectfully disagree, because hello, we're getting nowhere."
That's the problem with discussing things you care a great deal about. It's embarrassing to admit that you care about a cultural work of art as much as you might your child, a pet, or a piece of your body...but there it is. Works of art when they resonate on a deep level can elicit that type of response. You want to defend it.
Or at least I do. But I feel embarrassed at the same time. And I don't know about anyone else? But I do not deal with embarrassment well. Never have. If I did? I could do improve. And uhm, really can't.
This is a sort of apology, for being an emotional clod at times. Online. I know I piss people off. But they piss me off too. It seems to be the nature of human interaction, mutual pissing of each other off.
Fandom fights...mostly were about personality clashes. There were just a handful of people that I could not abide in fandom. They were usually the people who could not see a point of view other than their own no matter how many times you tried. Like arguing in a circle. Sort of like the Christian Right or the far Right and far Left in US politics. I'm RIGHT you are sooo very WRONG! You are clearly an idiot and let me start to educate you. And they'd be so SMUG about it. Let me paint the ways that you are wrong. (And sigh, I hate to admit this...but on some topics, such as same-sex marriage and gay rights, I'm just as didatic. I don't understand why people are against same-sex marriage. They have to be idiotic homophobes. There is just no other explanation! Damn it!)
See this is the problem with tv shows that are based on emotion. OR soap operas. The reason TV series like Supernatural, Buffy, Doctor Who (RT Davies - Who at any rate),
Daytime Soaps, Vamp Diaries, etc end up with such strong reactions is to a degree they are about emotion. They elicit strong emotions from the viewer, appeal to the non-rational mind, the gut. And we react to them from that part of ourselves.
I remember wanting to kill people online. Okay, maybe not kill, just kick them. Verbally. Couldn't do it physically of course. And I'd do it. Then I'd regret it. Always regretted it. It never worked out the way I thought. It never ever does. Because of course they kicked back and often harder and with far more accuracy. You'd think growing up with a younger brother would teach me not to attempt this? But noooo. And I'd get all embarrassed and want to delete everything I wrote and slink off into the never-never, licking my wounds.
This still happens occasionally. Actually it happened today. [Note to self, do not post when you are irritable.] Sorry to say. I'm an emotional writer. I tend blog from my gut as much as from my head. Which can be problematic. And I rarely think or plot it out ahead of time. Also, confrontational - not passive aggressive. I will tell you if you piss me off. And I will tell you if I hate something. Whether you want to know about it or not. Or if I have mixed feelings. And I'm not good at ignoring posts that piss me off. Yet, I despise conflict. And like to avoid it.
Fandom is dicey for me. I never know how to quite deal with it. It can be an emotional powderkeg. And if you give in, it's like going on a drunken bender, afterwards, when your sober - you think, damn - that's embarrassing. Why'd I do that? Ugh. And it's there for all to see? Ugh. Because fandom, at least to me, is a marriage of mind and emotion, fueled mainly by raw unfettered emotion which my mind is struggling to figure out. It doesn't tend to be rational. Or even logical. When you fall in love...the mind isn't often present.
But I came into fandom...with an obsessive desire to solve a puzzle. Something resonated and I wanted to figure out what it was. I got compulsive about it. Drove people around me nuts. And it came mainly from a desire to distract myself from things that hurt in my own life. We find ways, I think of distracting ourselves when we aren't happy or things aren't going as well as we'd wish. It's either that or rant and whine about them incessantly. I've found distraction works better, far more constructive. Well that and other things.
It's mainly the puzzle that grabbed me. So it was emotion wrapped around a mental dilemma. And the story hit my kinks. The problem with stories hitting our kinks - is if someone starts criticizing our kinks, it's really hard not to that personally.
For example? The Spike/Buffy story hit a lot of my kinks, some of which I'm embarrassed about. When people attacked it - it felt personal. Like they were attacking me. Sometimes they actually were attacking me - there were a few people in fandom who literally did attack me. They came right and said it. There was NO QUESTION in anyone's mind, including mine. In fact, in one instance - I remember limping off a fan board (I was depressed about other things and trying to escape from said depression) and a bunch of friends, one a lurker, coming to my defense. My lurker friend ripped the skin off of my attacker. Because it became personal. But not everyone did. Some people were actually able to get across the idea that they just didn't agree and couldn't quite wrap their brains around why I, a smart person, didn't see it their way. That I can deal with. Those people I'm still friends with.
Because we basically said - "okay, it's time we agreed to respectfully disagree, because hello, we're getting nowhere."
That's the problem with discussing things you care a great deal about. It's embarrassing to admit that you care about a cultural work of art as much as you might your child, a pet, or a piece of your body...but there it is. Works of art when they resonate on a deep level can elicit that type of response. You want to defend it.
Or at least I do. But I feel embarrassed at the same time. And I don't know about anyone else? But I do not deal with embarrassment well. Never have. If I did? I could do improve. And uhm, really can't.
This is a sort of apology, for being an emotional clod at times. Online. I know I piss people off. But they piss me off too. It seems to be the nature of human interaction, mutual pissing of each other off.
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no subject
Date: 2012-01-24 02:47 am (UTC)There were some pretty nasty fights even on ATPOBTVS, though people tell me it was more civil than a lot of other places. Sometimes the people who got into it were personal friends and it was hard to stay out of it.
Everybody wants to be right, but sometimes nobody is. I certainly need to be reminded of that occaisionally.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-24 03:00 am (UTC)Oh yes. So did I. Actually I needed to be reminded of that recently. LOL!
I can remember having a Buffy site or two recommended to me, going there and being greeted with a warning from the person in charge that read something like "If you don't agree with me about Buffy+So-and-So then don't post here." Didn't matter if I agreed or disagreed I didn't go farther into the site. Considering how bitter some people got it was understandable why they wanted to limit what was said. On the other hand if there is no give and take what's the point?
I remember having a discussion with some friends at lunch way back in 2001 - where I said it would be cool if everyone would just agree with me. And they said that would be incredibly dull. To always be agreed with. And how would you ever know if you were wrong. Much better to be friends with people who don't agree with you all the time and can call you on it.
I always remember that discussion. Because it resonated on such a deep level.
And I've followed it.
There's a saying: "Beware of the Righteous man, the one who believes he is absolutely right, because there lies the road to hell." Or something to that effect.
To admit you are wrong is not a bad thing. It's actually admirable. I like Obama because he has admitted he was wrong at times. My difficulty with Bush Jr and Dick Cheney was they couldn't do that. It scared me.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-24 03:38 am (UTC)That seems like the appropriate message for today. But seriously, if we didn't feel strongly about these things, we'd be dead inside. You should never apologize for being passionate. Just sometimes count to 10 before you respond. :)
no subject
Date: 2012-01-24 03:44 am (UTC)Sigh. ;-)
Also responding at lunchbreak during work - not the smartest thing in the world. Or late at night.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-24 04:07 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-01-24 04:18 am (UTC)Agreed. It is all about tone. Some people were better at it than others. I loved to argue to with Darby, Doc, and Sophist, also Caroline. Rah and I also had some good debates. We still do. Fresne was fun.
I didn't deal with perceived smugness well. But I did enjoy fighting. Because I definitely engaged on lj and on the boards. LOL!
And I have to admit I loved some of the fights. And yes, I do enjoy reading the kerfuffles on lj - as long as they aren't in my journal and I'm not directly involved.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-26 01:33 am (UTC)THe other thing I was thinking about was how I loathe fighting in real life - this wasn't always true. I was always ready for a bit of a to-do with my family or friends. But now I'm always seeking to find a way around this stuff. I can't think when the last time I lost my temper was!