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Entry tags:
Hate, anonymity, deconstructing and…pointlessness.
I probably owe shout outs to a lot of people; in fact I know I do, but I'm going to hit only one: ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
amothea You're a doll. I won't reiterate the conclusion you've already come to, but I will say thank you and sincerely wish you never feel called upon to do that again. Nobody, including me, is worth putting yourself through that, honey. But you know, your choice. Just thank you.
It's entirely possible I will take this down at some point, or make it private, but for now…
The spn hate meme is gone, among others, the hl hate meme is still up there but it's pretty weak and yes, I know, you know, we all know that avoidance of such things is usually the wisest course. I've been in fandom long enough to know that too. But, you know, train wreck.
There is absolutely no way to say any of this without being accused again of trying to garner the kind of sympathy/empathy/cadre/clique that most fans with any kind of name recognition are often accused of trying to marshall… and maybe there's even some truth to it. And the other truth is that while some of those that foster such vitriol and angry, biting, rhetoric (sorry,cereta. I can't think of another word for it) toward other fans, are only going to roll their eyes and nod and just let this confirm what they already think about me. And the rest of you, the majority of you probably don't think that of me or one would assume you wouldn't be here.
Not everyone is going to like what I write. They aren't going to like my personality. They aren't interested in the things I'm interested in, they find my notes boring, my plots plodding and confusing. I don't have to like that opinion, whether I'm confronted with it head on or just know it somewhere in my back brain. And right or wrong. the adage about if you don't like it, don't read it doesn't play here either because I suspect, despite their eschewing of everything I write, that like me, they get to hear about stories form their friends, that their friends love, that they wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole. In their view, my presence, the presence of other writers who are prolific or popular or both is invasive and pervasive. Our work pops up on comms they are members of, on rec lists they read looking for stories other than ours, discussions about stories show up in the comments of friends-friends lists. It annoys the starch out of them.
Other than completely pulling out of this fandom or fandom altogether (which I'm sure some people would really like me to do) there is nothing I can do or say that will change that opinion or that perception of me.
Aside from being a writer they don't like, there's also the perception that because I'm either popular or prolific, someone whose work or name people recognize, I have obligations to fandom. I have the obligation to nurture new writers, to elevate unknown writers, to comment more often (which assumes that I read more than I do -- also a problem, even though the issue there is lack of time, rather than lack of interest.) I should be reccing more, preferably people they approve of, whose work they think should be recognized. That whatever status or presence I have should be used there, even while they completely resent and disdain that same status -- a status and presence I am undeserving of because I fail in areas where they think I should be leading.
See, that's where the pointlessness comes in.
I can be accused of being sanctimonius. There's probably even some basis for that, because I have to work at not being a total bitch in public. I bite my tongue more often than I say things I'd like to. I have to practice tact because I am not, in my basic nature, a tactful person. I have to fake not being offended or hurt or just pissed off because all of those things happen to me. I have to use the same skills and restraint in fandom that I have to use in my job -- because I frequently deal with pissed, angry, panicked, nasty, people who are afraid they will lose their jobs if this thing or that thing isn't fixed, or corrected now and by God, if they are going down they are going to find someone to blame, and since I'm the voice at the other end of the support line phone, I'm as good a target as anyone.
A good many other people got slammed a lot harder than I did in the recent round of anonymous attacks, and it's been awhile since I was actually a target of something like that. Ten years, a little less, since I left Highlander fandom. Then, most of the attacks fell into the either amazingly public realm of lists and alt.tv boards or they came in personal emails. It didn't make it any easier, but it did give you the leverage of having at least an email address to identify. You were neither blindfolded, nor were your hands tied. When you were attacked you knew there was one, maybe two or three people who joined the pile on to take you down.
What's happened recently around here isn't like that. This really does feel more like being in a dark room with your hands and feet tied and blindfolded. You can comment back, but you don't know if the person got it or if the person who responded is the initial poster. It's anonymous. It can come from any direction. It could be the person you betaed for yesterday, or who you exchanged comments with the day before. It could be someone on your friends list who you thought you could trust.
You can hope you have the ability to tell the difference between those who are having a good time with you and those who resent you enough to get on your friends list just so they can find reason to refill the reservoir of resentment.
I have never claimed to be the best writer. I work very hard on my stories and I enjoy the hell out of writing them. I was and am flattered to be nominated to the Lawrence awards and I have a love/hate relationship with most fannish awards. I think the drive behind them is pure fannish glee. I think the people who organize them do their very best to be fair, to make them open to anyone who wants to participate. I think people nominate and vote in good faith.
I've also never claimed to be the benevolent queen of fandom; I don’t comment as much as I should, or beta as much as I would like to, or rec as often I used to. My primary focus in fandom is writing. It always has been. But I do encourage discussion where I can, I've opened lists, helped out on comms, but it always comes back to the writing.
And the posting, and the yes, comments I get back. The affirmation, the pat on the head, the back. I am an approval suck. I like it when people like what I write, be it a story or a comment. I very much like it when people like me. I'm not going to apologize for preferring to be liked rather than disliked.
But I'm also not changing who I am to get people to like me. I write what I write and I post it. Somtimes that encourages conversation, and the conversation about the story turns into conversations about other things, and the next thing you know, I've got a friend, maybe not close or forever but someone I wouldn't mind opening my house to or flying or driving across the country to go meet. I'm not going to apologize for using fandom as the springboard for relationships that exist outside of fandom any more than I would if I were interested in knitting, or NASCAR, or indie bands or whatever.
All of those things appear to some people as me being pretentious. That in trying to foster a place around me that insists on people at least attempting to be civil in public makes me sanctimonious. Since I rarely say anything that cuts publicly, I must, therefore be extra vicious in private.
And you know what? Sometimes I am. Sometimes I actually don't manage to control my anger or my disgust at behaviors or actions that I find annoying and revolting. Sometimes I fail at being the person I want to be. Sometimes it happens quietly and sometimes it happens spectacularly.
I rant about trends and behaviors in a general sense and I'm guessing that I've hit a chord more than once, made someone I don't even know twitch and recoil and think I'm talking about them. But they can't be sure because I don't use their name or their story title -- and they don't believe me when I say, one story does not a rant make.
I make bad impressions on people. Either directly or indirectly. Bad enough that if you like what I write or what I have to say, if you talk about me or my work in other forums, you are, by association just as worthless and stupid as I am. If you agree with my opinions, you are just as lame.
You are guilty by association. Be really clear on that.
And let me restate: there is nothing I can do or say that will change that opinion or that perception of me. Or you.
I've disabled comments on this post, because honestly (whether you believe me or not) I didn't post it because I want sympathy, empathy, or approval or reiteration of my value either as a person or to fandom. The vast majority of the people reading this already give me that in wonderful amounts.
I'm posting it because I'm pissed off, because I'm hurt, because I'm tired and because if people really want fodder for hating me or what I do or how I act, I'd rather give them something real than whatever shit they are making up in their heads.
One last thing: There was one single comment made to a larger rant on BNF's. One anonymous comment that for all I know was actually meant as a sarcastic reply to the other poster. Because it was anonymous I have no idea. Because I was in a dark room, blindfolded and with my hands tied, I have no way of knowing how it was meant.
But this is how I took it: to the person that had something to say about my mother?
You got me. You found the weak spot in my carefully constructed armor. Congratulations.
Fuck you.
amothea You're a doll. I won't reiterate the conclusion you've already come to, but I will say thank you and sincerely wish you never feel called upon to do that again. Nobody, including me, is worth putting yourself through that, honey. But you know, your choice. Just thank you. It's entirely possible I will take this down at some point, or make it private, but for now…
The spn hate meme is gone, among others, the hl hate meme is still up there but it's pretty weak and yes, I know, you know, we all know that avoidance of such things is usually the wisest course. I've been in fandom long enough to know that too. But, you know, train wreck.
There is absolutely no way to say any of this without being accused again of trying to garner the kind of sympathy/empathy/cadre/clique that most fans with any kind of name recognition are often accused of trying to marshall… and maybe there's even some truth to it. And the other truth is that while some of those that foster such vitriol and angry, biting, rhetoric (sorry,
cereta. I can't think of another word for it) toward other fans, are only going to roll their eyes and nod and just let this confirm what they already think about me. And the rest of you, the majority of you probably don't think that of me or one would assume you wouldn't be here.Not everyone is going to like what I write. They aren't going to like my personality. They aren't interested in the things I'm interested in, they find my notes boring, my plots plodding and confusing. I don't have to like that opinion, whether I'm confronted with it head on or just know it somewhere in my back brain. And right or wrong. the adage about if you don't like it, don't read it doesn't play here either because I suspect, despite their eschewing of everything I write, that like me, they get to hear about stories form their friends, that their friends love, that they wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole. In their view, my presence, the presence of other writers who are prolific or popular or both is invasive and pervasive. Our work pops up on comms they are members of, on rec lists they read looking for stories other than ours, discussions about stories show up in the comments of friends-friends lists. It annoys the starch out of them.
Other than completely pulling out of this fandom or fandom altogether (which I'm sure some people would really like me to do) there is nothing I can do or say that will change that opinion or that perception of me.
Aside from being a writer they don't like, there's also the perception that because I'm either popular or prolific, someone whose work or name people recognize, I have obligations to fandom. I have the obligation to nurture new writers, to elevate unknown writers, to comment more often (which assumes that I read more than I do -- also a problem, even though the issue there is lack of time, rather than lack of interest.) I should be reccing more, preferably people they approve of, whose work they think should be recognized. That whatever status or presence I have should be used there, even while they completely resent and disdain that same status -- a status and presence I am undeserving of because I fail in areas where they think I should be leading.
See, that's where the pointlessness comes in.
I can be accused of being sanctimonius. There's probably even some basis for that, because I have to work at not being a total bitch in public. I bite my tongue more often than I say things I'd like to. I have to practice tact because I am not, in my basic nature, a tactful person. I have to fake not being offended or hurt or just pissed off because all of those things happen to me. I have to use the same skills and restraint in fandom that I have to use in my job -- because I frequently deal with pissed, angry, panicked, nasty, people who are afraid they will lose their jobs if this thing or that thing isn't fixed, or corrected now and by God, if they are going down they are going to find someone to blame, and since I'm the voice at the other end of the support line phone, I'm as good a target as anyone.
A good many other people got slammed a lot harder than I did in the recent round of anonymous attacks, and it's been awhile since I was actually a target of something like that. Ten years, a little less, since I left Highlander fandom. Then, most of the attacks fell into the either amazingly public realm of lists and alt.tv boards or they came in personal emails. It didn't make it any easier, but it did give you the leverage of having at least an email address to identify. You were neither blindfolded, nor were your hands tied. When you were attacked you knew there was one, maybe two or three people who joined the pile on to take you down.
What's happened recently around here isn't like that. This really does feel more like being in a dark room with your hands and feet tied and blindfolded. You can comment back, but you don't know if the person got it or if the person who responded is the initial poster. It's anonymous. It can come from any direction. It could be the person you betaed for yesterday, or who you exchanged comments with the day before. It could be someone on your friends list who you thought you could trust.
You can hope you have the ability to tell the difference between those who are having a good time with you and those who resent you enough to get on your friends list just so they can find reason to refill the reservoir of resentment.
I have never claimed to be the best writer. I work very hard on my stories and I enjoy the hell out of writing them. I was and am flattered to be nominated to the Lawrence awards and I have a love/hate relationship with most fannish awards. I think the drive behind them is pure fannish glee. I think the people who organize them do their very best to be fair, to make them open to anyone who wants to participate. I think people nominate and vote in good faith.
I've also never claimed to be the benevolent queen of fandom; I don’t comment as much as I should, or beta as much as I would like to, or rec as often I used to. My primary focus in fandom is writing. It always has been. But I do encourage discussion where I can, I've opened lists, helped out on comms, but it always comes back to the writing.
And the posting, and the yes, comments I get back. The affirmation, the pat on the head, the back. I am an approval suck. I like it when people like what I write, be it a story or a comment. I very much like it when people like me. I'm not going to apologize for preferring to be liked rather than disliked.
But I'm also not changing who I am to get people to like me. I write what I write and I post it. Somtimes that encourages conversation, and the conversation about the story turns into conversations about other things, and the next thing you know, I've got a friend, maybe not close or forever but someone I wouldn't mind opening my house to or flying or driving across the country to go meet. I'm not going to apologize for using fandom as the springboard for relationships that exist outside of fandom any more than I would if I were interested in knitting, or NASCAR, or indie bands or whatever.
All of those things appear to some people as me being pretentious. That in trying to foster a place around me that insists on people at least attempting to be civil in public makes me sanctimonious. Since I rarely say anything that cuts publicly, I must, therefore be extra vicious in private.
And you know what? Sometimes I am. Sometimes I actually don't manage to control my anger or my disgust at behaviors or actions that I find annoying and revolting. Sometimes I fail at being the person I want to be. Sometimes it happens quietly and sometimes it happens spectacularly.
I rant about trends and behaviors in a general sense and I'm guessing that I've hit a chord more than once, made someone I don't even know twitch and recoil and think I'm talking about them. But they can't be sure because I don't use their name or their story title -- and they don't believe me when I say, one story does not a rant make.
I make bad impressions on people. Either directly or indirectly. Bad enough that if you like what I write or what I have to say, if you talk about me or my work in other forums, you are, by association just as worthless and stupid as I am. If you agree with my opinions, you are just as lame.
You are guilty by association. Be really clear on that.
And let me restate: there is nothing I can do or say that will change that opinion or that perception of me. Or you.
I've disabled comments on this post, because honestly (whether you believe me or not) I didn't post it because I want sympathy, empathy, or approval or reiteration of my value either as a person or to fandom. The vast majority of the people reading this already give me that in wonderful amounts.
I'm posting it because I'm pissed off, because I'm hurt, because I'm tired and because if people really want fodder for hating me or what I do or how I act, I'd rather give them something real than whatever shit they are making up in their heads.
One last thing: There was one single comment made to a larger rant on BNF's. One anonymous comment that for all I know was actually meant as a sarcastic reply to the other poster. Because it was anonymous I have no idea. Because I was in a dark room, blindfolded and with my hands tied, I have no way of knowing how it was meant.
But this is how I took it: to the person that had something to say about my mother?
You got me. You found the weak spot in my carefully constructed armor. Congratulations.
Fuck you.