Fandom and let fandom, y'all

[rogueslayer452]

There is this fandom meme I've seen that I may or may not do in the near future, but there were some questions on there that I felt deserved to be answered separately since they were more generic instead of specific fandom based.

Have you ever unfollowed someone over a fandom opinion?
When it comes to LJ, not really. I don't think I've ever defriended anyone who had different fandom views or opinions unless they were starting unnecessary drama with others who disagreed with them. On Tumblr, however, yes I have unfollowed people who have had certain opinions, viewpoints, or attitudes about fandom that I felt I didn't want to see all over my dash, especially since many over there can be so damn aggressive to the point of being annoying. But I find that with Tumblr, it's a very impersonal space where you can follow/unfollow/block people on a whim and it doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of things, as opposed to LJ where there is more of a personal connection between you and your mutual online friends. Honestly, I love it when online friends have different opinions on things, I love reading what other people think about something that we mutually like, we don't always have to agree. Just don't be a dick about it.

Has fandom ever ruined a pairing for you?
Unfortunately, yes. I usually try not to let fandom opinions ruin my fun or my preferences, but sometimes the shipping wars and pushy fanatical shippers of certain pairings that I actually like can be so persistent and overwhelming that it seems impossible to avoid unless you distance yourself from the fandom altogether. This can even happen with pairings that I was mostly indifferent towards but ended up hating because of the sense of entitlement of the fandom itself. It's why I try to stay away from the intensity of certain sides of fandom.

Does not shipping something ‘popular’ mean you’re in denial and/or biased?
Absolutely not. I never understood this mentality that you had to ship what the majority of people in the fandom shipped, as if that ever made a difference in anything. It implies that if you're not on board with the most popular thing in fandom then you're in the wrong, which is just ridiculous and immature. This is kind of entitlement is what fuels most, if not all, shipping wars. It doesn't matter if you ship something that is popular or not, canon or fanon, just ship whatever the hell you want to and don't let anyone else tell you otherwise.

What are your thoughts on crack ships?
Love them. Listen, I have plenty of crackships myself, and there's just something I enjoy with seeing the "what ifs" of characters being together, especially if they aren't even from the same fictional universe. It's just fun imagining the concept. That is the beauty of what makes fandom so great, we have so many options and possibilities to make what seems the impossible work.

Comments

[author-by-night.livejournal.com]

Plus, fandom has become incredibly hostile when it comes to shipping, and not just with shipping wars but just the overall mentality that shipping must be "pure" or some form of activism, which is exhausting to deal with so I keep most of my ships to myself.

That's bonkers. :/ I'm glad it wasn't that bad in my fandom spaces when I was more involved. Don't get me wrong, there were still a lot of problems, but that wasn't quite one of them.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

I'm very thankful that my first introduction to fandom during my formative years was where there was this understanding of "ship and let ship", that even if you didn't like a particular pairing or kink you could just walk away and find something else to your liking. You didn't have to bash it simply because your eyeballs saw it. Yes, there were obnoxious shipping wars, but as a whole nobody was shaming or policing others for the things they liked or wrote in fics and whatnot.