Also here from thisweekmeta - I've read a fair amount of meta about the rise of the current incarnation of fandom antis (thanks, comment section!) and this was really insightful on some points I haven't seen elsewhere. Specifically the mechanism by which the warped social justice logic make playing oppression olympics literally the only way to win arguments. Y i k e s.
Like a lot of commenters here, I came to fandom during an Anything Goes era, and am grateful for it. But I'm frustrated about how antis using this rhetoric is going to (and probably already has) make it that much harder to have discussions about how fandom as a whole can perpetuate or reinforce larger societal problems like racism or homophobia. There are ways that fans can do fandom that cause real harm - look at all the examples of homophobia and early 2000s slash fandom in this one comment section - but it feels like trying to talk about that now would get lost in all the noise about age gaps and multishipping. Or worse, get mistaken for more of the same, to the point where we don't have any good language left to talk about actual social justice.
Maybe I'm being too pessimistic. Anti energy seems to be largely focused on individual, "impure" fanworks or tropes, rather than larger systemic problems. But the language they use makes it sound like they're fighting systemic issues, and that worries me.
no subject
Like a lot of commenters here, I came to fandom during an Anything Goes era, and am grateful for it. But I'm frustrated about how antis using this rhetoric is going to (and probably already has) make it that much harder to have discussions about how fandom as a whole can perpetuate or reinforce larger societal problems like racism or homophobia. There are ways that fans can do fandom that cause real harm - look at all the examples of homophobia and early 2000s slash fandom in this one comment section - but it feels like trying to talk about that now would get lost in all the noise about age gaps and multishipping. Or worse, get mistaken for more of the same, to the point where we don't have any good language left to talk about actual social justice.
Maybe I'm being too pessimistic. Anti energy seems to be largely focused on individual, "impure" fanworks or tropes, rather than larger systemic problems. But the language they use makes it sound like they're fighting systemic issues, and that worries me.