Today's rant

[boot_the_grime]

Fandoms can be very frustrating, as we all know. Unless you find a very special safe haven where intelligent discussions can be had, you're going to get depressed and angry all the time. Art may be subjective and open to interpretation, but as you venture into online discussions of popular TV shows, books and movies, chances are that you're going

Comments

[kikimay]

I didn't saw Hunger Games - and I didn't read the book, for the matter - but I know about BtVS fandom, about Buffy bashing, fandom wars and so on ...
I'm right there with you with the anger. Right there with you.

[boot_the_grime]

The Hunger Games is a book trilogy (the first book, which has already been made into a movie, is called The Hunger Games; the second, Catching Fire; the third, Mockingjay). It's a future dystopia about life in an oppressive society, about violence, revolution, morality of war, the influence of mass media and its manipulation etc. It's pretty awesome. It may be classified as YA books, but I'm much over that age and I really enjoyed them

[kikimay]

Maybe I will catch up. I was curious mostly because the character Katniss and the actress who plays her (I think she's funny!) But, yeah, right there with you. .__.

[selenak]

Re: where did it all start? Definetly not with Buffy. I don't think the majority of Gone With The Wind fans ever forgave Scarlett for not falling in love with Rhett the moment he showed up and at the latest when he expressed interest.

Re: Smallville, I only observed via fannish osmosis, but I think Clark WAS hated - for leading Lex on and not loving him back, i.e. tell him the truth. Not for the women. Lex wasn't hated for anything, for verily, he was the fannish woobie. I also seem to recall Lois was hated by some Chloe fans and Lana was hated by next to everyone. But the main Smallville ship was Lex/Clark, and that followed the pattern of emotional approval only being given to one part of the pairing, with the ship only being rooted for because that's what the loved character wants.

[boot_the_grime]

Re: Smallville, I only observed via fannish osmosis, but I think Clark WAS hated - for leading Lex on and not loving him back, i.e. tell him the truth. Not for the women.

Ah, that makes sense. I guess Clark's role in that case was that of the Bitch (i.e. the traditionally female role) "leading on" our Woobie. In some ways, woobification may be worse than bashing. It usually makes an interesting character look much duller and one-dimensional than he* is, and after a while you just get sick of the excessive idealization and whitewashing.

* "He" because it's usually a male character. Are there many female woobies?

[selenak]

Female woobies are very rare but do exist. Morgana in Merlin is definitely one, and arguably Faith at least in some fannish circles. (I'll never forget Jenny O arguing Buffy was entirely to blame for everything Faith did in s3 because she behaved "like Stalin" to Faith in "Comsequences". One early experience in "what show were you watching?" I had.)

The overwhelming majority of characters getting the fannish woobification treatment is male, though, and it more often than not is tied to the bashing of a love interest if one exists. And yes, it's a case of "with such friends, who needs enemies?" For the character, who quite often in the source material is interesting and not woobified at all.

Veronica Mars was an interesting case of carried over shipping issues. I remember a lot of Veronica/Logan shippers were embittered Spike/Buffy shippers determined that THIS time, they'd get their way. Never mind these were different characters. When Duncan who was perceived as a mixture of Angel and Riley (doesn't actually work,

[itsnotmymind]

Something that really irritated me about the attitude towards Fred is that people would read her as aware of Wesley's feelings and being deliberately malicious in her insensitivity, whereas there was no evidence for her being anything but clueless. Whereas Spike's post-coital comments in "Wrecked" were more often dismissed as male cluelessness, even though Spike has manipulation as an established character trait and had used Buffy's issues with her sexuality against her in the past.

[rebcake]

Where did it start? Maybe in the book of Genesis, when we were cast out of paradise just because some woman had her own opinion of how to handle things?

It probably goes back farther than that...no doubt there's some Sumerian story about a fickle gal who ruined everything. Whatevs.

I see your point, and it's upsetting when a heroine's work is never done, emotionally speaking. It's like housework, isn't it? Nobody expects men to do it, or thinks about it at all unless it's not happening. And if a man does do it, he gets tons of praise, while the reverse is never true.

However, I do think it's possible to have sympathy for the lovelorn guy (or girl) without blaming the non-lover for their lack of reciprocation. It's called seeing seeing both sides of a situation.I think it's a more fun way to interact with the material.

[boot_the_grime]

However, I do think it's possible to have sympathy for the lovelorn guy (or girl) without blaming the non-lover for their lack of reciprocation. It's called seeing seeing both sides of a situation.I think it's a more fun way to interact with the material.

Definitely. Unfortunately, I've seen far too much blaming of the non-reciprocating party. People like to take sides, instead of trying to see where each character is coming from.

[pocochina]

AMEN.

[eilowyn]

Sigh. If only all fans were as rational and intellectual as we are. Really liked this post, agreed with all of it. I could kind of figure out which shipping factions you were referring to based on past behavior. I can get carried away myself sometimes, but at the end of the day you have to realize some people just weren't watching the same show you, and accept that it's okay.