The fall of fandom etiquette and the rise of the ship war →
I don’t know how I missed this piece from Clare McBride, but it’s an incredibly thorough argument for HP as being the start of what has since become a strong fandom cultural shift–and, I think, a vital read for anyone trying to engage with creator/audience dynamics as a whole. As someone caught in between (adjacent to creatives, and on the path to becoming one, but also adjacent to fandom, and still situated somewhat in them), it’s often hard not to feel like the conversation about what it means to discourse with fandom is incomplete. The case McBride makes here, that it comes down to a lack of understanding and education in fandom history, is one that I have made before, and one I really urge those on both sides of the issue to dive into.
I always told myself I’d write as if toxic fandom didn’t exist, but I know now it’s a comforting lie. It’s not an additive influence for me, however — it’s subtractive. There are two characters I cannot imagine myself ever writing about again as long as I maintain a functional presence on the internet; it’s simply not worth it even breathing their names in the reply to a Tumblr ask, much less typing them into a manuscript. I know to do so would be to at least temporarily render my asks, replies, and comments unusable for anything else.
Maybe one day I’ll ghost and let the internet war unknown to me, but I’m not yet ready to depart antisocial media just yet. It would feel like I was turning my back on a particular form of connectivity and society.
