Ruffling feathers - the results of the social experiment

[higure]

My head’s been hurting so much all day, but I was so set to post that I just had to. If this makes next to no sense because of the headache, then I apologize.

So The Anti-friending meme. Ever since I first got the idea presented to me, all I could think of was ruffled feathers. I know it was one of the things that could do that. Ruffle feathers that is. I am sorry if it felt like too much, too negative and completely unnecessary, and I hope you forgive me my extravagant moment of hosting it anyway.

My other concern with it was that it could turn to flat out hate meme. But people were pretty good with it, other than occasional efforts of trying too hard to make their point and failing at recognizing when it is better to stop. Then the meme got killed by a true hate meme (I has impeccable timing), so maybe that is a reason why people were rather civil too. Thank god for that because I almost did not sleep that night, afraid of letting it go unattended. In a way, this too is a conclusion, fandom can handle itself on occasions.

The whole thing was rather interesting. I’m sure I had more conclusions, but by now, the following three stuck in my mind, so here you go:

Pairings preferences, or lack of certain pairings among your OTPs, is a huge criterion in deciding whether to friend someone. To me this is interesting because I don’t actually consider the (more or less) delusional OTP concept of gay sparkle-ness to be such a huge part of my fandom. It is a huge part of the fic fandom, but JE is about music, hilarity, variety, boys being hot all on their own, about selling dreams and personality patterns and shiny, and well I feel that liking certain pairings, if any, is only a small portion of it and does not define me nearly as much as let’s say groups I follow.

Coherence is important. Be it understandable English, state in which you make posts, or the writing/expression style. All those made an appearance. It is interesting, but in a way I understand. If I had several people whose entries I would find difficult to read and comprehend on my flist, it would turn what is supposed to be a pleasurable experience into a rather painful and tiring one. That said different people have different levels of tolerance when it comes to coherence (or lack of thereof – clearly this is my expression today). It is interesting how high or low the limits can be set.

Connectivity? Let’s call it this. Apparently it is a disadvantage if you do not have a twitter and/or tumblr or if you admit to not being active on it. This, to me is a little puzzling if not sad because the last meme (and all the previous once that did not specify otherwise) were LJ friending memes. I mysle do have tumblr and twitter, but I work average 10 hours a day, sleep some more of the day away, and in the rest of my time, the timeline on my twitter moves so fast I can hardly ever keep up, if I am on my PC that is. I got twitter because it has become better source of fandom info, while LJ unfortunately is loosing this function. But the more of you I follow, the less I find there too. It makes me feel I might be getting old for this fandom because I can’t keep up with the evolution. Coming back to the friending requirements, it is then rather unfair and (sad) that to be someone’s friend on LJ you need to be participate in other social networks than LJ itself. Otherwise, anons say, they'd find it hard to connect with you.

Especially the last point makes me feel even more detached to people on my flist who post rarely, do not talk to me in comments and are active elsewhere.

Anyway, personal result of the meme. I suppose I have always known that being RyoDa fangirl means people are cautious of friending you. But lately I have had such a steady and nice friend list that I almost forgot. The meme reminded me that RyoDa fangirls are considered crazy and more thread than an asset to one's friends list. Therefor I now love you even more for giving me a try and tolerating my crazy. I know my mind can get very one-track sometimes when it comes to my OTP, but I hope I do not annoy you with it too much.

After that very serious fandom analysis (LOL, fandom is serious business), have my Saturday night joy. I spent my Saturday at work, but took a walk on my way home and got myself something to liven up my kitchen. With the choice I made, it seems fall is really coming.



It is a pretty fall though! The weather forecast for the next two weeks is sunny and still around 20 °C or only a little less so this is great *____________* I took a walk up to the castle today after work, so I need to sort and post those pictures sometimes. It was rather pretty.

And lastly, my sister, chivakaza is safely in Japan, probably sleeping more than 24 hours of travel and official business away. I am relieved, she seemed to have handled it like a boss and now she has an amazing year ahead of her. (LOL she also sent her friends to my journal to find out if the plane did not crush and since she might not have the internet for a while, I figured I'd leave this public so that curious people not willing to wait 5 months before getting worried know she is fine and safe)

Comments

[sashjun.livejournal.com]

That is the point, once they friend you, they see much more, so things like pairings usually stop mattering after you have already give someone a chance. Thus it puzzles me some people do not realize this and sort based on the criteria anyway to begin with.

LOL I think parts of it have been much more calm, yes, as proven by the anti-friending meme not turning into hate meme, even if this has nothing to do with pairings and stereotypes. Also so much effort into analyzing someone based on what good night stories they like ;D

I think you need to elaborate on the last section :D I want to hear more in order to understand. (And I sometimes feels it is sad how fic driven fandom is actually because it may feel - not without a reason - that if you do not write fic - you don't have much chance to feel welcome and appreciated within fandom, thus resulting in lots of people who really probably never written for fun before or even considered it, starting to write and often with not so awesome results? /end of being potential snob/ And that sentence might have made very little sense).

[alienashi.livejournal.com]

re: fic-driven. I think I was trying to say that the difference between fandoms of fictions and real people fandom is that in fiction, so much of the meta revolves around analysis of canon source materials, and thus, what is presented to you is what is available for deconstruction. Real people fandom is more dynamic and at times, more exhausting because people aren't really meant to be understood and people evolve, thus certain perceptions that were assumed earlier might appear rather inadequate in nature. What I have observed in fiction-based fandom is that people draw a thick line between canon and fanon, and there's a certain acceptable perception of canon and fanon, which wouldn't happen in that scale in real people fandom because of aforementioned reason.

Simply put, when there is a heavier degree of certainty in materials, fans are less likely to depend on their imagination to derive their perspective of the characters given because the canon materials provide a solid base. And in that, because there's such a line drawn between canon and fanon, people are more defensive of their thoughts because they have, for the lack of a better vocabular, support for their thoughts. And because fiction-based fandom are mostly propelled by developments provided to them, there are always analysis done on character developments, motifs, themes in the material. It's like everyone's doing a study together, and in the journey of seeking enjoyment, most people find it in the analysis of the materials itself. We can put an exception for fandoms like Twilight or HP because the materials hardly come by that often; but for TV shows, anime, manga, games, often people thrive by debating with each other, reading off other people's debate with each other and stuff.

I think JE-fandom is fic-driven because of the dynamics with the people and because the canon materials scream for the girls' imagination to go wild. It has everything any slash fangirl can want - the love declarations, the bond, the togetherness. And because the men themselves has a persona created for them, it's easy to extrapolate these personas into a perception that has been craeted in mind. This is more or less the same as fiction-based fandom; only that JE people takes themselves far less seriously the environment is lax in nature, so naturally, the fandom should be lax? It's like, because there's an unlimited source of "canon" (interviews, fanreports etc) materials, there's a limitation to how much we can derive from it? In the end everyone stuck to what they have and stop debating much, letting the boys sway us with their evolution instead of looking for validations with every evolution. Not too sure if I nailed the difference but am too lazy to be extremely analytical atm.

SO. Fic-driven vs analysis-driven. I used to be in a fandom where it's more important to meta and analyse than write fic, because in the intense drive to have their opinions be proven valid, fangirls' focus on fics become secondary. I know, because I have seen f_w posts busting ridiculous debate essays and bashing essays, but not so much on fic-bashing. On a more personal level, when I did this transition, I took character analysis on a more personal level. Like say, if I dunno anything about Ueda, I can't write him.


...and secondly, haha, (I noticed that this issue is quite specific to the asian pop fandom) because there's such a polarising level of quality of fics, people are more driven to work on not falling into the er, less flattering category?

[alienashi.livejournal.com]

...there is a second part OTL



Thing is that, because of where I come from (I'm from Malaysia, no idea if you know it already) and we are known in fandom for less than passable level of English (accusations that are, sorry for betraying my fellow countrywomen, not unjustified, but that's something for another time), I tend to be self-conscious about how I write. At the risk of sounding like a complete snob, I do believe that I possess a level of English that doesn't require remedial help in order to make sense, grammatically or logically, thus for me, writing is a way to exercise my language usage. I have no qualms with people correcting my sentences because otherwise, how do I learn? A lot of time I wish people who ...er.. write with not so awesome results realise that if they are doing it, they are putting themselves out for criticism and if they are doing it, they might as well out some effort into doing it? By effort I mean, asking for people to help in checking for basic readability issues at least.


Last, on your point of people who don't write fic not being welcomed, I think it's the same in each fandom. In analysis-driven fandom, if you're not a generally-perceived intellect, you're not welcomed. In fic-driven ones, if you don't write, you're not welcomed. It's sad, yes, and I think that people do find friendship within their flailings. I sometimes wish that people don't try too hard to want to be recognised and don't recognise a person too much - it makes the distinction far too prominent and most of the time, appears to be much too intimidating to others.


...oops. rambled again. I'm so sorry :(

[alienashi.livejournal.com]

I forgot to add something -


To sum it all. Personally, the difference between me that was learning and meta-ing in an analysis-driven fandom vs fic-driven fandom is the purpose. (sorry for having to add another comment, because it just came clear to me, I'm unorganised like that) In an analysis-driven fandom, I learned about the characters for the sake of a subconscious search for validation. I started a fiction and learning about a character and scream YESSSSS when what I have predicted in mind came true. It doesn't help that fictions are mostly workings of a human mind and no matter how unpredictable a story is, there are always tropes and cliches that come to play. A work of fiction, no matter how great, has always been confined within the workings of a human mind.

In a fic-driven fandom, I learned about the characters in order to work them in my mind and thus, eliminating the need to validation. It's especially so for real people fandom, because the limitations of character development is no longer confined within the workings of a human mind, but the dynamics of the world. So, it's like, learning about a character/person has become less of an intense discovery but more of a journey of character study?

...forget of all these made no sense :|

[sashjun.livejournal.com]

Okay ....

I think I get now what you are trying to say. I also get how when you have let us say manga and you work with set amount of material written, people would get into trying to prove that their own perception is the right one. And I get that with fandom like ours where there is still new and new material coming out, we re in constant motion and thus it is much harder to validate one's opinion. That however doesn't mean we do not have stereotypes for them :D

Anyway, with all that, for me writing is fun, all this fandom is fun, so I just do not feel like I am going this deep, not consciously anyway. I guess I do because if I am not sure about something when I write, I read an interview or two, or I watch a video, and I try to make my characters believable. But on the other hand, the never ending pool makes me feel like I might be completely wrong because even the translated things I could get my hand on, I don't have time to go through it all. And another interview, another video could totally shift your perception. In that way I guess I get the lax part. All characterizations, in a way, are possible.

But the analysis and fic are only a part of what I call fandom. I like to just watch a video, have a good laugh and then go to sleep without asking why Ryo was moaning like an idiot when they massaged his foot, without thinking if this makes him M (and tons of my fic is thus invalid) or without thinking if this was scripted. I will maybe flail about how he looked good moaning. But that will be it (Or I will cover my ears and eyes and won't be able to finish the video due to second hand embarrassment). That part of my fandom, the entertainment (because well that is their job - to entertain) is for me as important, if not more, than the fic one.

But I guess it would be annoying if everyone analyzed everything, so I do get where you are coming from in comparison. Because for me, this whole experience is just about fun, and relaxing and winding down, not about finding reasons behind everything all the time. (This post and this comment chain proves I do make exceptions ;D)

I has two parts too ;D

[sashjun.livejournal.com]

As for learning and improving English with writing (and you do not sound as a snob, and yes I knew you are from Malaysia, I asked you on twitter), I agree. I think my own written English improved much because I started writing in English. I also think the overall English is kept on a certain level because I have the fandom and thus an excuse to interact in English all the time. Otherwise all I would do regularly is read contracts in English and that is no fun (well okay sometimes it is but). The only thing that got worse is my spelling because I have never written as much in text editors as I do now, and thus tons of times spell check does things for me that I used to know.

I also agree about making effort to make fics readable when you try. I will however say once again, it is not so easy to find the person willing to help. This is why I try to go easy on certain level of mistakes in fics. When I started writing fics, started on LJ, I had no friends that were English natives or had a level of English that was better than mine. And "beta" has to have at least that to help. It is hard to get out of the circle of those people speaking "communicative" English only. Then you need to beg. For the longest time my sister beta-ed some stuff. But I couldn't booster her all the time (and she is not even in fandom). Then I found a person who was for some times willing to beta for me and she was amazing. She taught me so much and was very thorough. Unfortunately, due to certain circumstances, she cannot do it anymore, and now I am, again, stuck with begging my friends left and right and am sometimes unable to find a beta at all. And I have much wider and VERY English based friends circle right not. This is why lots of my random fics that are not dedicated to anyone isn't beta read at all. I just read it like ten times, but stop seeing the typos and grammar hitches at some point. So every time I come back to it, I end up fixing some. This again is why fandom need to realize that people who do not have their fics beta read often just did not find anyone willing so. (Sorry this totally strayed from the subject, but I stumbled upon this issue on a hate meme again, and got all angry because it was going way overboard. Clearly I am still not over it). BUT I will also say that you should recognize when your English just isn't up to par for (published) fic writing.

However, then, if you can't translate, can't share scans, and can't write fic, can't write or make awesome fan videos, you feel like you do not belong. This is why I wish fic would matter less in fandom in the big picture.

This is long. And I don't know if I responded to all of the things how I wanted. But thanks for explaining. <3