Sure, it's 9pm and I can't quite focus on anything but am not ready for sleep, seems like a good time to knock out a few more of the
June Something prompts.
Day 3: What's a favorite, or at least memorable fandom meeting/interaction that you've had?...you know, now this is making me sad, because my first thought was about fannish friends I'm so glad I had a chance to meet in person but have since passed, and that's just...true but depressing to ponder. You know what, I'm really glad that I wound up at the same uni as
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newredshoes when we were both vaguely LJ friends in LOTR fandom, and that I actually stopped by the campus coffeeshop she worked at to talk to her, because I'm pretty sure she was the first RL friend I made through fandom. And between her just being an excellent person to pal around with and the confidence that experience gave me to occasionally reach out to other fannish friends later on -- yeah. That.
Day 4: What are the origins of your penname/username?This one comes around every couple of years, and I have nothing new to add to the story. There's a waterfall, I was thirteen, it seemed like a good idea at the time. Still grateful I didn't pick a fandom-specific pseud, because this way I've been able to maintain the same fannish identity for...more than twenty years, oh god.
Day 5: Compare and/or contrast your very first fandom obsession and your very latest fandom obsession.So that would be X-Files vs. Old Guard, huh? Apart from being a crossover I would actually love to read...well, there's both a supernatural element and a found family vs. the world mentality, which are common threads throughout most of my fandoms. Very different approaches to both, though -- in X-Files, it's all about the need to understand the unbelievable, to
prove it, whereas Old Guard kind of doesn't give two shits about the
why of their immortality. Which I find refreshing! In terms of shipping -- I imprinted SO HARD on Mulder/Scully, the push and pull of them, the somewhat unhealthy level of codependency they evolved into over the course of the (original) series. Endless UST, of course. In TOG, Joe/Nicky are the MOST established of relationships, and while their backstory has some similar dynamics (diametrically opposing viewpoints, albeit far more violently so), they're just so
comfortable together, so casually warm and loving, and that's new for me in terms of just about any OTP I've ever shipped.
In terms of the fandoms themselves...I was too young in the XF days to really register a lot of the intrafannish dynamics, but I know there was a degree of toxicity between the shippers vs noromos, and then the wacky slashers doing their thing off to the side. It was a BIG and vocal fandom, which meant that there was more potential for drama, but on the flip side, it was big enough that everyone could kind of go to their own corners and have a thriving fannish ecosystem in their own niches and ignore the rest. TOG is one of the smaller fandoms I've been active in, and one of the more aggressively toxic -- although in fairness, part of that is simply the nature of modern social media amplifying the ugly way out of proportion. As with any fandom, it's a small but loud minority that creates most of the drama; most of us are just here to enjoy ourselves respectfully. I love that fandom is more likely to call out racism and misogyny now. I hate how virulently certain folks push back against that, or try to weaponize it. But what can you do? I try to listen to the good faith critiques and take them to heart in my own depictions of the characters, and to amplify the voices of POC creators where I can, but I can always do better.
Day 6: What's a fandom that you wish had a bigger following?...that's definitely a monkey's paw wish right there. Look, I will always have a fondness for the History Boys fandom, but let's be real, it's better off small.
Day 7: What's the longest time you've been in a fandom. Not necessarily your oldest fandom, but a fandom that you started and still continue to read/write/create content for in some way.I rarely truly leave fandoms; I still go through cycles every couple of years where I seek out old XF fic, for example. But X-Men is the obvious one for me. I started reading and writing fic for it in 2002 and have never really stopped -- I just go on pause for brief periods of time. It's just so infinitely malleable as a fandom. So many characters! So many versions of their stories! Mutant and proud.
Day 8: Crack!fic - We all know it. What's your opinion of it, and if you want, show us an example.Not my thing. Really, really not my thing. I find it OOC and irritating, and avoid it whenever possible. (There are always exceptions, but I can't think of any off the top of my head.)
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