*wades cautiously into the wank-infested waters of Fan Discourse, pulls out megaphone*
AS FANFIC IS PRODUCED FOR FREE, IT’S KIND OF SHITTY TO COMPLAIN ABOUT ITS LITERARY QUALITY OR THE FREQUENCY OF UPDATES. THESE ARE COMMERCIAL EXPECTATIONS THAT CAN’T BE FAIRLY APPLIED TO WORKS CREATED AT AND FOR NO COST.
THAT BEING SAID:
AS FANFIC IS PUBLISHED FOR PUBLIC CONSUMPTION, IT’S KIND OF DISINGENUOUS TO COMPLAIN ABOUT READERS HAVING CRITICAL REACTIONS TO THE CONTENT. CRITICISM IS A LITERARY REACTION THAT CAN’T BE FAIRLY DENIED ON THE BASIS OF WHETHER OR NOT THE WORK COST MONEY.
THAT BEING SAID:
REGARDLESS OF WHETHER A WORK IS COMMERCIAL OR FANNISH, GOING OUT OF YOUR WAY TO SEND HATE OR CRITICISM DIRECTLY TO THE AUTHOR IS A DICK MOVE. YOU CAN DISCUSS THE CONTENT, MERITS AND/OR FAILINGS OF A GIVEN WORK WITHOUT THE NEED TO MAKE THEM AWARE OF YOUR FEELINGS. EVEN WHEN A WORK IS CREATED COMMERCIALLY, CREATORS ARE NOT BEHOLDEN TO THE PREFERENCES OF INDIVIDUAL FANS, NOT LEAST OF ALL BECAUSE THIS IS A PHYSICALLY IMPOSSIBLE STANDARD FOR ANYONE TO MEET. SOME WRITERS ARE HAPPY TO BE MADE AWARE OF CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM IN WHATEVER FORM, BUT MANY EXPRESS A PREFERENCE NOT TO SEE ANY, OR PREFER TO DO SO ONLY AT CERTAIN TIMES. IF YOU’RE NOT SURE, ASK FIRST. THIS IS BASIC COURTESY, BOTH PERSONALLY AND PROFESSIONALLY.
THAT BEING SAID:
SOME INTERACTIVE ONLINE SPACES – SUCH AS AO3, GOODREADS AND TUMBLR – ARE FAIRLY USED AND INHABITED BY BOTH CREATORS AND READERS. AS THESE SITES ENCOURAGE READER RESPONSES AND COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT VIA COMMENTS, REVIEWS AND REBLOGS AS A BASIC FUNCTION, IT’S GROSSLY UNREALISTIC FOR CREATORS POSTING IN THESE SPACES TO EXPECT TO ENCOUNTER ZERO CRITICISM EVER. SOMEONE EXPRESSING ABUSE OR UNWANTED COMMENTARY DIRECTLY TO A CREATORIS NOT THE SAME AS READER/READER ENGAGEMENT TAKING PLACE WHERE THE CREATOR CAN SEE IT. YOUR MILEAGE MAY VARY AS TO WHERE THAT LINE EVENTUALLY BLURS, BUT THE POINT IS THAT IT DOES BLUR AS A MATTER OF COURSE, AND THAT THIS IS A FEATURE RATHER THAN A BUG – ONE THAT WE ALL HAVE TO LEARN TO NAVIGATE.
THAT BEING SAID:
THE FACT THAT SOMEONE HAS WRITTEN SOMETHING THAT YOU FIND QUESTIONABLE, IMMORAL OR OTHERWISE AWFUL DOESN’T MEAN THE CREATOR SHOULD LOSE THE RIGHT TO CREATE MORE THINGS, OR THAT SUCH WORKS OUGHT TO BE ILLEGAL. YOU ARE WITHIN YOUR RIGHTS TO OFFER UP CRITICISM OF THE WORK ITSELF, THE TROPES IT EMPLOYS AND THE CONTEXT OF THEIR USAGE, BUT THE PROBLEM WITH ADVOCATING FOR THE TOTAL BAN OF PARTICULAR TYPES OF CONTENT IS THAT FICTION IS INHERENTLY LIMINAL. GIVEN THAT DEPICTION DOES NOT EQUAL ENDORSEMENT AND THE FACT THAT THE IMPACT OF A NARRATIVE IS ULTIMATELY DETERMINED BY THE INDIVIDUAL READER, IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO BAN ALL STORIES WHICH USE “IMMORAL” DEVICES UNCRITICALLY WITHOUT SIMULTANEOUSLY BANNING STORIES WHICH EXAMINE AND ACKNOWLEDGE THEM IN DIFFERENT WAYS, AND THAT’S BEFORE YOU TRY TO GET A ROOMFUL OF PEOPLE FROM DIFFERENT COUNTRIES, CULTURES AND BACKGROUNDS TO AGREE ON WHAT “IMMORAL” MEANS IN FICTIONAL CONTEXTS IN THE FIRST PLACE, WHICH DEFINITION IS NEVER GOING TO OVERLAP PERFECTLY WITH WHAT “IMMORAL” MEANS TO THE SAME PEOPLE IRL.
THAT BEING SAID:
THE FACT THAT FANFIC IS FREQUENTLY WRITTEN IN THE SPIRIT OF NARRATIVE COUNTERCULTURE DOESN’T STOP IT FROM CONTRIBUTING TO THE SPREAD OF TOXIC TROPES OR STEREOTYPES THAT ARE ALSO PRESENT IN MAINSTREAM CULTURE AND/OR COMMERCIAL MEDIA. DEPICTION IS NOT ENDORSEMENT, BUT IT IS PERPETUATION, AND THE FACT THAT SOMETHING WAS WRITTEN FOR FREE DOES NOT MAGICALLY BALANCE ITS POTENTIAL NEGATIVE IMPACT AT EITHER AN INDIVIDUAL OR COLLECTIVE LEVEL. WRITING FIC IS OFTEN DESCRIBED AS A HOBBY, BUT AS IT IS LARGELY A SHARED ACTIVITY UNDERTAKEN WITHIN A DEDICATED COMMUNITY, IT IS A PUBLIC HOBBY, AND CAN THEREFORE POTENTIALLY IMPACT MORE PEOPLE THAN JUST THE INDIVIDUAL WRITER. KNITTING IS ALSO A HOBBY IN WHICH INDIVIDUALS CAN INVEST A GREAT DEAL OF TIME AND FEELING – AND, INDEED, MONEY – BUT IF SOMEONE IN YOUR KNITTING CIRCLE STARTED BRINGING IN SWEATERS THEY’D MADE EMBLAZONED WITH RACIST SLOGANS, THE IMPACT OF THIS ACT ON OTHER GROUP MEMBERS WOULD NOT BE AMELIORATED BY THE REMINDER THAT ‘IT’S A HOBBY’. IF THIS IS A VIABLE DEFENCE, IT IS A DEFENCE THAT CAN BE USED EQUALLY BY THOSE WHO WANT TO ACT WITHOUT CONSIDERATION FOR OTHERS IN THEIR COMMUNITY AND THOSE WHO WISH TO ENJOY THAT COMMUNITY WITHOUT FEAR OF BEING PERSONALLY DISPARAGED, AND IS THEREFORE LESS A DEFENCE IN EITHER CASE THAN A STATEMENT OF FACT WITH NO ACTUAL BEARING ON HOW TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM.
IN CONCLUSION:
THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN GOOD MANNERS, PERSONAL POLITICS AND FREEDOM OF SPEECH IS A COMPLEX ONE. IN THE WHOLE OF HUMAN HISTORY, NOBODY HAS YET SOLVED IT TO THE PERFECT SATISFACTION OF ANYONE OTHER THAN THEMSELVES, AND WHILE THAT DOESN’T MEAN THERE ISN’T A BETTER SOLUTION TO BE HAD IN THE FUTURE, I GUARANTEE THAT NEITHER CREATIVE ISOLATIONISM NOR BLANKET CENSORSHIP WILL GET US THERE, BECAUSE THE ONE THING BOTH THOSE POSITIONS SHARE IS FEAR OF CRITICAL ENGAGEMENT WITH A PERSON WHO DISAGREES WITH YOU, WHICH IS THE ONE THING YOU ABSOLUTELY NEED IN ORDER TO PROGRESS A DISCUSSION PAST WHATEVER STALLED YOU IN THE FIRST PLACE.
*flings megaphone into the distance, dons portable sharkcage, wades irritably back to dry land*
When English isn’t your first language, reading fanfics in your first language (if there are even any) becomes so much more embarrassing???? And sometimes I wonder why native English speakers don’t get that feeling when they are reading in their native language???
scrolling through the comments on this people with at least three separate native languages have chimed in to agree that English is the porn language. This… is amazing. I never knew.
I have these Native American reenactments in the summer, okay. We dress in authentic Native garb and go teach about our culture and whatnot at historical events. There’s this one on a weekend that housed all reenactors from Ancient Greece to World War II–you can walk through a timeline of living history. It’s cool.
So there are these guys in a tent on the far hill called the Scottish Highlanders. They bring about two to five people to their thing per year. They do all the good medieval Scottish jazz. Kilts, weapons, challenging you to fights.
But theres this one guy that is there every time. I always go visit to hear him give in depth talks about Scottish Reavers and their malitia and weaponry and stuff. He’s fun, so I go talk to him and he’s asking about what school I’m going to, what I want to do, etc.
So I tell him I want to be a history teacher and I like to write. He asks me if I have anything published, and I say no, thinking he means an actual book. But he waves me off and asks, “No, online. Have you ever heard of Fanfiction.net?”
Let me explain a thing. This guy. Is well over six feet. His biceps are bigger than my head, he’s about 45 years old, he has the thickest Scottish accent you’ve ever witnessed, he can wave two axes around like nobody’s business, he usually resolves friendly arguments with full on battle in armor with real weaponry with the scars to prove it, and he kind of has a biker gang.
And this guy starts telling me about the 700 page Doctor Who fanfiction that he’s been writing for six years and still running.
Shamelessly continues to explain how he gets together with his badass biker buddies and they ride to his house with bottles of Jack Daniels and talk about the next fanfiction that they’re going to write together. (More Doctor Who, Xena Warrior Princess, Agents of Shield, Lord of the Rings…) They dare each other to write crossovers for interesting character interaction. This guy raves with excitement over character development and analysis.
I cried.
By the way
Here he is. Mike. In his Scottish glory.
Here he is with his buddy, Bear.
Here he is with his buddy Bear and me.
And here he is holding an ax to my throat.
I LOVE THIS. The perils of a site like Tumblr which is dominated by people under 30 (not on my dash, though, but that’s what demographics insist is true) is they genuinely don’t think anyone older has any interests in common with them. I feel like Livejournal was more varied in this regard, though again, my flist on LJ had all ages on it, so maybe it was just me. The only over 40s they know are the adults in positions of authority like parents and teachers, and surely Mom and Mr. W the Chem teacher have never heard of fan fiction or have the least interest in anything on the interwebs. A kid at work (I work at a university) who I jokingly called a meme lord once told me I needed to stop learning such things from my kid – who is 11 and basically uses the internet to watch Minecraft videos on YouTube, but of course she must be the one teaching me all these modernfangled intertoob things!
I admit though that I have fallen into the stereotype that fandom is all women, because that’s been my experience by far; I think the number of male-identified people I’ve come across in my various fandoms wouldn’t pass the single digits. But that’s probably due to the nature of my reading and the way I curate my dash. Where’s a big ol’ 40 something biker dude who writes Stucky?? Point him out to me and I’ll add him to my dash!
Mike the Doctor Who Scottish badass fills me with hope and love. ❤
okay but what’s his username I want to read a 700 page Doctor Who fan fiction
i will protect the baby star wars fans who’ve only been here for less than a year from the nasty 40 year old veterans who think they own the saga with my life
Protect them from…what, exactly? The thing is, the “baby” Star Wars fans are essentially the majority now. They are the ones who loved the original movies, maybe liked the prequels, and then, along with 95% of the world, embraced the “new” Star Wars. The Star Wars tag on tumblr is filled with Finn, and Rey, and BB-8 and Poe. The Star Wars tag on A03 is filled with stories about Kylo Ren and General Hux. The tumblr banner on May 4th was BB-8. The world is full of fans making fan art, writing fic, and generally flailing all over the new Star Wars. Hell, even Wookiepedia has sectioned stuff into “canon” and “legend”. The stories that I loved, the characters that I grew up with (including some incredibly strong women who were pilots and smugglers and jedi and sith) have been trashed. The family saga, the story of a family who overcame the dark, who were better than their parents, who saved the galaxy and then remade it, those stories are gone. Finished, done. And the thing is, sure, I can collect the books, read them over and over again, but going forward? They will be lost. Lost, because new fans would have no reason to read stories about Han and Leia’s three children or Luke’s wife Mara. They will have their new stories. So the 30 some odd years of collaboration, and world building, and love for this shared, combined universe is gone. Forever. Once the generation of “nasty 40 year old veterans” goes, who will be left to remember anything of what was created in the time since Return of the Jedi and before Disney? The new fans won. You get a new movie every year, new comics, new games, new tv shows. You get countless works of fan art, fan fic, fan anything. You get it all. Us bitter old fans can’t even comment about the mechanics of the existing Star Wars universe (because Star Wars isn’t ye old scifi) without getting screamed at for being a bitter old fan who is ruining everyone’s fun. My stories, my characters, are gone forever, but if I’m not jumping for joy over the new disney Star Wars, if I don’t shout my love for Rey to the heavens, then I am nothing more than a bitter old fan who just needs to sit in the corner and shut up and let the kids have fun. It’s like a bunch of kids on the playground who discovered a new way to play hopscotch that has nothing to do with squares and numbers and when the one kid who always played it the other way says “but wait, what about what we used to have” they gets shoved into the mud and told to stop complaining and being bitter already. So, no, I’m not going to protect new fans. I’m not going to worry about being inclusive in the fandom. You have 95% of the rest of the world to do that for you. I’m going to take my 26 year-old, bitter, nasty self, and quietly collect what I can from the old canon and mourn my stories in peace. And yeah, sometimes I’ll interject on a post. Sometimes I’ll be bitter. I think I’m allowed that much.
Signal boosting this because I think it’s worth reading and knowing.
To me, it’s not the new fans who need to be held accountable for Disney taking three decades worth of EU and going “yeah, none of that is canon anymore. Just focus on the stuff we’re trying to sell you now! :D“
But I also don’t like the pressure I’ve seen brought to bear on the part of the fandom that knows / cares about / remembers the rest of Star Wars. This flurry of defensiveness, asserting that the only reason anyone would possibly not love TFA is [insert disparaging remarks about everyone who isn’t relying on JJ Abrams to introduce them to Star Wars] has been presumptuous, insulting, and single-mindedly focused on shutting up anyone who didn’t like this film.
I get that a lot of money hangs in the balance. If older fans were to criticize TFA on social media as openly as they lambasted the PT, Disney would be very screwed indeed. But I care a lot more about fandom being a space where people can express their feelings honestly than I do about protecting some company’s profits.
And if your immediate thought is “but what about fans who act like massive douchebags?“ they enable themselves. My focus right now is on people who do feel the sting of social shaming and are feeling pushed to embrace the ST, or be silent if they can’t be positive. Because fandom should be diverse enough that at least some of us can listen to and commiserate with the longtime fans who feel like they lost, and feel like the new stuff just isn’t for them, and are disappointed about it.
I’m saying this even though “Leia and Han got married and had three kids“ never appealed to me. I can still look at what @djemsostylist is saying and really get that the new films have written people she loved and admired out of existence. And changed the course of Luke and Han and Leia’s whole life. And that because the old-EU was Jossed, most of the fannish energy going into Star Wars now will completely bypass the stories she grew up with.
Until she pointed out what that felt like, I hadn’t understood what a significant loss it was. But I’m certainly thinking about it now.
The conclusion I’m drawing is that
the EU gave the SW franchise a handy and relatively
low-profile way to go left where the movies went right, thus
appealing to people they would otherwise lose. And that in the marked
hierarchy of what SW is willing to risk money on, ground-zero
of what constitutes “real” canon continues to focus on Skywalkers and
Solos (and potentially Kenobis) and center the life and times of white men.
Is it less like that
than it was? Yes. I don’t think they can afford not to change. But if
this recent “none of the old canon counts anymore unless we incorporate
it into what we’re making now” should telegraph anything, it’s that the stories that only get told in
the EU are uniformly vulnerable to being dismissed at any time, for any
reason. And a lot of fans will argue that the low quality of the
books justifies their being Jossed.
Now – a lot of the books are
canon-endorsed action adventures with Gary Stus and Mary Sues in space.
There is an overabundance of mediocre white guys saving the galaxy and
angsting over the force and getting laid. But we also lost POVs and
characterizations and stories that the movies have zero time for. Lando
Calrissian had a trilogy of books dedicated to his adventures. So did
Boba Fett, who thanks to the PT retcon, is PoC and arguably also
books-canon asexual. Several of the villains got books
dedicated to them. And so did a number of the members of the Jedi order
who weren’t central in the movie. The PT
got fawning publicity for being so fair and enlightened,
because three whole women got to hold lightsabers
onscreen. Regrettably, AFAIK no one who didn’t fixate on them can remember
their names, because they weren’t allowed to do anything. But – all these people who were basically extras on camera,
in book-verse some of their characters got adventures. And people read the books and loved them hard because it was
that or nothing.
It’s not great. It’s not even
adequate. But it was something, and now that has all been shoved aside.
Reblogging because this is important.
There are many, many people who were introduced to Star Wars via the OT, expanded their repertoire with the books and comics, and then some of them grew to love the PT and animated series as well. And many of those people were also shocked and hurt and felt abandoned by the franchise when Disney and Abrams did their thing. And one of the strongest threads that I have seen in common for many of these people is that it’s because the new Star Wars doesn’t… feel like Star Wars to them. And that’s a very personal thing. It’s like being evacuated from your house by the sea and then being told that now you’re living in the mountains. But you get there, set up all your things in a house that looks exactly like your previous one, has the same layout, the same architecture style, but… it doesn’t feel like home. And now you have your new neighbors telling you “Well why? Same house. Same things. Feel comfortable. Enjoy the mountains. They’re huge. You were just spoiled living by the sea so long.”
But it’s not about that. It’s about very personal feelings of belonging, and… your home by the sea might have had all kinds of problems and nothing was perfect, and maybe you complained about the plumbing or hated the salt in the air, but it was still home. And now it’s gone, and you’re being told you can’t go home again except by looking at all your old picture books and watching your old home videos. Sometimes your new neighbors will watch them with you, and some of them say “Well this looks pretty fantastic. The ocean looks amazing.” And that feels pretty great. But when most of them tell you “Yeah, yeah, ocean this and ocean that. You miss it but come on, there’s a mountain right there. Let’s climb it,” of course you don’t feel heard. And it feels like nobody cares, because they’ve never lived by the ocean or maybe they visited on vacation once, but… and here’s the crux of the matter, it’s not the same. It’s not meant to be the same, but whether it was meant to or not has little bearing on the way you feel about it.
And a loss is a loss, whether it is a house you lived in for twenty years or if it’s a fandom that has changed hands overnight. And people should be allowed to mourn their losses without being shamed for it.
Some people never adjust to mountain life. The elevation makes them feel weak, heights make them dizzy, the winding roads and the sudden weather changes are disorienting and intimidating, and the horizon makes them feel claustrophobic. But… some people do. Some people take up skiing, some people discover they love playing in the snow, and some people fall in love with the stark beauty of the rugged scenery.
And just the same, many people into the old Star Wars also made a personal choice to love the new Star Wars stuff, despite it all. Not because they felt they should, but because they found something there they could also enjoy. And grow to cherish. And that’s great, it’s fabulous, but it’s not a requirement and it’s not a gauge of how right or wrong one is over the other.
So yes. Protect the Star Wars newbies, for everyone should be able to enjoy what they love without having someone rain on their parade, but. Also. Protect the Star Wars oldbie who may or may not like the new stuff, for they are still a part of this fandom too, protect them because their parade has already been rained on and they’re still here, still loving it, and their emotions are just as valid. Please protect them both, please treat each other well.
me judging big blockbuster movies: ugh again with these tired romance cliches? come on, aren’t we above this? this is gonna suck
me reading fanfic: *opens the 700th coffee shop au with unintentional bed sharing i’ve ever read* damn this is gonna be So Good
I recently tried to watch a Hallmark movie and it hit me that the reason I can’t stand these tropes in romance movies is because they’re often presented in infuriating ways. They were doing the enemies to lovers trope by having the guy insult what the woman did for a living and call it frivolous then rudely making loud noises in the hotel room next to her and not stopping even when she complained.
In movies this trope tends to be played as the man being an absolute asshole but them still getting a happily ever after, which sends the message that women should put up with and forgive this behavior once the man is willing to love her.
In fanfic the enemies to lovers trope is portrayed as the characters being competitors or having misunderstandings. In these fics they usually don’t do anything hurtful to each other, they just bump heads. Their initial interactions aren’t toxic and they have a believable foundation for a healthy relationship.
Hollywood is stuck, it’s been portraying these tropes the same way for decades and they tend to be subtly sexist. Sometimes it’s not even that subtle. Fanfic uses the same tropes as romance movies but they do them a little differently and those differences speak to more people.
Also, fanfic tends to have them explicitly work through their issues before moving into a relationship – or else showing that not doing so causes more problems later – while movies tend to flip switch to “relationship time” and ignore everything beforehand, which is weird and creepy.
everybody has that one kink that they will never ever admit to liking and will secretly read every fic ever written about it but will vehemently deny it if you ever mention it
so i just googled the phrase “toeing out of his shoes” to make sure it was an actual thing
and the results were:
it’s all fanfiction
which reminds me that i’ve only ever seen the phrase “carding fingers through his hair” and people describing things like “he’s tall, all lean muscle and long fingers,” like that formula of “they’re ____, all ___ and ____” or whatever in fic
idk i just find it interesting that there are certain phrases that just sort of evolve in fandom and become prevalent in fic bc everyone reads each other’s works and then writes their own and certain phrases stick
i wish i knew more about linguistics so i could actually talk about it in an intelligent manner, but yeah i thought that was kinda cool
Ha! Love it!
One of my fave authors from ages ago used the phrase “a little helplessly” (like “he reached his arms out, a little helplessly”) in EVERY fic she wrote. She never pointed it out—there just came a point where I noticed it like an Easter egg. So I literally *just* wrote it into my in-progress fic this weekend as an homage only I would notice. ❤
To me it’s still the quintessential “two dudes doing each other” phrase.
I think different fic communities develop different phrases too! You can (usually) date a mid 00s lj fic (or someone who came of age in that style) by the way questions are posed and answered in the narration, e.g. “And Patrick? Is not okay with this.” and by the way sex scenes are peppered with “and, yeah.” I remember one Frerard fic that did this so much that it became grating, but overall I loved the lj style because it sounded so much like how real people talk.
Another classic phrase: wondering how far down the _ goes. I’ve seen it mostly with freckles, but also with scars, tattoos, and on one memorable occasion, body glitter at a club. Often paired with the realization during sexy times that “yeah, the __ went all they way down.” I’ve seen this SO much in fic and never anywhere else
whoa, i remember reading lj fics with all of those phrases! i also remember a similar thing in teen wolf fics in particular – they often say “and derek was covered in dirt, which. fantastic.” like using “which” as a sentence-ender or at least like sprinkling it throughout the story in ways published books just don’t.
LINGUISTICS!!!! COMMUNITIES CREATING PHRASES AND SLANG AND SHAPING LANGUAGE IN NEW WAYS!!!!!!!
I love this. Though I don’t think of myself as fantastic writer, by any means, I know the way I write was shaped more by fanfiction and than actual novels.
I think so much of it has to do with how fanfiction is written in a way that feels real. conversations carry in a way that doesn’t feel forced and is like actual interactions. Thoughts stop in the middle of sentences.
The coherency isn’t lost, it just marries itself to the reader in a different way. A way that shapes that reader/writer and I find that so beautiful.
FASCINATING
and it poses an intellectual question of whether the value we assign to fanfic conversational prose would translate at all to someone who reads predominantly contemporary literature. as writers who grew up on the internet find their way into publishing houses, what does this mean for the future of contemporary literature? how much bleed over will there be?
we’ve already seen this phenomenon begin with hot garbage like 50 shades, and the mainstream public took to its shitty overuse of conversational prose like it was a refreshing drink of water. what will this mean for more wide-reaching fiction?
I’m sure someone could start researching this even now, with writers like Rainbow Rowell and Naomi Novik who have roots in fandom. (If anyone does this project please tell me!) It would be interesting to compare, say, a corpus of a writer’s fanfic with their published fiction (and maybe with a body of their nonfiction, such as their tweets or emails), using the types of author-identification techniques that were used to determine that J.K. Rowling was Robert Galbraith.
In an earlier discussion, Is French fanfic more like written or spoken French?, people mentioned that French fanfic is a bit more literary than one might expect (it generally uses the written-only tense called the passé simple, rather than the spoken-only tense called the passé composé). So it’s not clear to what extent the same would hold for English fic as well – is it just a couple phrases, like “toeing out of his shoes”? Are the google results influenced by the fact that most published books aren’t available in full text online? Or is there broader stuff going on? Sounds like a good thesis project for someone!
@fandom please stop using “i dont want any more heteronormative relationships” as code for “get the female characters out of here”
Fandom writes a lot of woman-erasing slash for canon where the female characters are badly written or absent. In fandoms where there was numerous well-written female characters, femslash is huge and women are everywhere.
Fandom is not the problem here. Canon is.
fandom shoves out women even if they are well written and even if the male characters they are discarded for are terribly written.
Fandom operates on a double standard with women characters.
Fandom demonizes female characters who exemplify the exact same qualities as male characters.
Fandom uses gendered insults about female characters’ sexuality while prizing male characters’ sexuality.
Fandom reduces women of colour characters to tropes while developing extensive backstories for minor white male characters.
Fandom writes female characters as plot devices and volunteer wombs for male characters, reducing them to their bodies and how they can be used for male characters.
Fandom has shown through fanfiction that they are absolutely capable of turning bad writing into good fanfiction.The fact is fandom absolutely chooses to turn that talent to almost exclusively white male characters to the detriment of female characters and male characters of colour.
Fandom has demonstrated that when canon is the problem, they are perfectly capable of fixing those problems. Fandom itself is a problem because of how it makes the choice of what problems to fix.
Steel Phoenix Studios 