[ SECRET POST #3311 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #3311 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 029 secrets from Secret Submission Post #473.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

11. http://i.imgur.com/wx4dpjD.png

Transcript by OP

[fscom]

I joined a facebook group that said it was geared towards older fans, thinking it would be a good fit.

Instead it's all middle aged ladies with kids who got into fandom within the past year. So they're total babyfans, but think they're experts and so mature.

Pairings are canon or they're crack, writing anything with a non-canon "crack ship" makes it an AU, drabbles are supposed to be 10k plus words and novellas are anything under 500 words, male/female pairings are slash because look there's a slash in it, and Dr. Who is the official spelling and also his name is Who, duh.

If I try to say anything about how that's not really how most mainstream fandom defines things I get dogpiled and mocked. And anyway fandom words aren't real words so they can define them however they want.

I just want to hang out with people who remember geocities and mailing lists, the rise and fall of livejournal, that there has always been epic wank as long as fandom has existed, and that meta and shipping can coexist peacefully.

I feel like everything's been taken over by babyfans, and I feel like you can't complain about them without sounding like an elitist jerk gatekeeper. I like new fans, I just wish there was a place for us older fans too.

[(Anonymous)]

We have a bunch of older fans here IIRC

[(Anonymous)]

Since these fans seem to be unaware that "novella" is a real word with a real meaning (that isn't "less than 500 words"), I think the problem is not their age or that they are new to fandom. The problem is that they are morons.

Get a new group. This one sucks.

[(Anonymous)]

isn't what you're looking for pretty much here at FS? maybe get involved in the next friending event?

[elaminator]

I thought this too, but we're probably not 'active' enough for OP. (A couple of hours or so after the post goes up, most people are done commenting.)

Since they made a secret they already frequent this place, so they must be looking for somewhere else to hang out in addition to f!s. (Which is understandable.)

The best place for OP would probably be a community, but given that most communities have died out at this point (and the one they found on facebook didn't work out)...I don't know what else to suggest. Unless OP wants to try making a community, and seeing if it'll take off. (Which I understand is a lot of time and effort, and isn't for everyone.)

Honestly, that's why I'm still here; I love communities, and don't think there's anything quite as satisfying in fandom as a good comm.

Maybe try message boards, OP?

[(Anonymous)]

I love message boards. I've found fandom less enjoyable since they're decline.

OP

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah. I'm not looking for anything super-intense, just somewhere I can share general geeky things and preferably multi-fandoms stuff. That's why I was hopeful for the facebook group, it pinged a lot of the same interests.

And I'm not wanting some elite thing where everyone has to prove their geek cred to join, I just want the sort of laid back but fun attitude that sometimes pops up when you've done this rodeo a few times. Where you can have some topics on, say, feminist themes in shows that are generally respectful without too much table flipping. But also have topics on how adorable an actor's hair is.

And dear lord, no kinkshaming. What happened to the days of sharing baby jesus buttplugs and laughing about weird erotica without someone coming along to tut tut how gross it is and sex is horrible and shameful.

Mainly it seems older fans have a little more distance from issues. They can discuss drama without acting like it's brand new and never happened before. I like comparing and contrasting new and old drama.

I know it wouldn't be perfect, nothing ever is, but at least it wouldn't be the babyfan drama.

And there's nothing wrong with debating a preferred fandom definition! Is drabble exactly 100 words or anything under 500-ish? Is cosplay costumes + acting? Only Eastern properties while Western falls into costuming, so a Naruto cosplay or a Jack Sparrow costume? Or is it original is costuming and fancostumes are cosplay, Jack Sparrow cosplay vs. a generic pirate costume? People can discuss that, I like hearing options on it, I don't like "Cosplay's just another word for costuming and fandom words aren't real words so stop trying to give them a definition."

Plus maybe a little less pearl clutching over gay and non-canon pairings being shipped. "How could ANYone ship...." Because they're not unimaginative toads with giant sticks up their butts? There's nothing wrong with deciding you only like to ship canon, but most older canon shippers I've met understand that people are allowed to like different things.

[gaffsie]

Have you tried looking up old LJ peeps on Tumblr? Some have kept their aliases through several platforms and are still going strong over there.

[(Anonymous)]

I've thought more than once about trying to start a comm here on DW

[type_wild]

Please come hang out with me. I used the .txt trick to hotlink images from Geocities and got an LJ invite code and lied about my age to read smut on FFN.

[(Anonymous)]

everyone talks about how 'oh, fs! is great for this and we're all old fans'

and yeah, it's true, there's old fans and some of them are really good

but also this community is dying out, no one has a plan to really revitalize it, and I'm not sharing space with that fucking asshole racist troll that infests this place more than I have to... which I guess means dipshit is winning.

[(Anonymous)]

Why not try starting your own groups?

You could always make these things prerequisites for joining

- Had a geocities website in the 90s
- Used ICQ
- Actively discussed fandom on mailing lists
- Actively discussed fandom in old school chat rooms

I mean, there are a lot of us still out there, I think it's just that we're more spread out now? Fandom is a lot larger on the internet now then it was in the 90s/early 2000s.

[(Anonymous)]

OMG, I forgot about ICQ. Ah, memories.

[mudousetsuna]

I'm...

I'm still logged into my ICQ right now. ;;

[blitzwing]

Maybe someone could start a seasoned-fan network on Tumblr? Or come up with a unique tag to spread.

[otakugal15]

Not on Tumblr. Anyplace but Tumblr. -_-

Let's get Dreamwidth back into the game. D:

[(Anonymous)]

[lj] scarfman

I'm 56 and I wrote for paper fanzines before the animated Star Trek debuted. I'm on Tumblr.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm 45. I never wrote for paper fanzines, but I did buy them. I wrote on newsgroups. I have a tumblr and I'm still in the same fandom as when I started (though I have added a lot more).

[(Anonymous)]

Define older fans. I mean, seriously, where's the cutoff? I find it kinda interesting, surely some fandoms, by default must be full of oldies.

I guess I'm one myself but I've been lurking almost 2 decades. (Ye Gods!) I just don't tell anyone how incredibly ancient I am.

I guess the older you get the less likely you to invest time if fandom debates and art etc. Hmm...

OP

[(Anonymous)]

I'd say minimum three years and three different fandoms. That's usually long enough to knock off the shiny and make you start learning the ropes on how not to come barreling into a fandom and acting like you deserve special treatment because you, as a brand new fan, can totally see all the things older fans can't see and think new ideas that they haven't thought of before and thus your opinion is the most valuable.

I mean it's fun when you find the occasional "Omg you were into DBZ when it first aired on TV too? Did you visit X sites/forums?" and nostalgia geeking. And I'm not nearly so arrogant to think I'm anywhere near as old as a lot of the fans out there.

So yeah, old enough not to scream the sky is falling over every little thing and to respect when people talk about stuff that happened before.

One incident was people calling bullshit when I said when Doctor Who first started getting popular you had to call it Doctor Who, because Dr. Who wouldn't get you any results on Amazon and would miss a lot of sites on Google. That it took time for search engines to catch up to the new spelling. But no, Dr. Who is the RIGHT spelling and I was just making things up to be mean.

[(Anonymous)]

I want to know what FB group this is so badly. But seriously OP, my condolences. I'm an older fan myself and know older fans, but unfortunately, we're not very active on any particular platform anymore.

[smallearthcat]

Total bummer. Back in the heyday of LJ, I used to be pretty active in fandom, but ever since its decline, I've sort of lost touch with my group of friends. I miss it a lot, but as you've proven, it's not terribly easy to find another group who have been around for awhile.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm 27 and I still watch anime a lot. Not everything (get the moe stuff and the panty shots away from me!), but I also look up new ones that might look interesting (do have to say that there are not a lot).

But I NEVER EVER participate in the fandom. Especially for the new ones. There is so much WANK about so much stuff! Worse offenders are obviously the ship wars, but then there are also a lot of people who project everything on the characters (idk why it's worse in anime fandoms) - from sexual orientation to mental illnesses and all the kin stuff. Then there are the people that don't get that anime characters are not white and also that Japan works differently than the USA (or the west in general).

For example, I never thought I'd find a fandom worse than Glee when it comes to all that, but Free! has it beat and that show is way more harmless.

So I'm just sitting in my bubble with my carefully chosen blogs to follow and a few friends I talk to, ignoring everything else.

[(Anonymous)]

I remember Geocities! I was a community leader there, it was so much fun. There was such a sense of community on that site. Livejournal too, in its heyday. And on email lists. Remember Egroups before it was bought by yahoo and went to heck? There were so many good active groups. So much email. Some of the groups I was in were so active you'd get 100s of emails a day. Now they are deader than anything. (I still belong to a few!) Way back in the 90s when Star Trek, Stargate, X-Files and Buffy were amongst the top fandoms. I miss those days.