[ SECRET POST #2177 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2177 ⌋

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

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 03 pages, 058 secrets from Secret Submission Post #311.
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]

17. http://i.imgur.com/oFee7.jpg

[(Anonymous)]

I feel like a need example. Not that you're wrong, OP, I'd just like something specific to consider.

[morieris]

Same. I'm tempted to think of the Disney fandom (only because I saw "true fans" in quotation marks and almost saw red), but it doesn't seem to quite fit.

[(Anonymous)]

Agreed... I need a specific example, because the things I can think of that I've picked up from shows doesn't seem so bad too follow in broad terms. But they're also the things you learn are important in real life as well.

[(Anonymous)]

The first thing that came to mind when I read this secret was "Dragon Age 2." Near the end, one of the characters (who is a possible love interest for the player character) makes a bomb and has it explode in a building that is the Dragon Age equivalent of a church. The chantry (church) happens to be the tallest building in a heavily populated city, and in the cutscene you can see the fire spreading to other buildings. There are A LOT of people who argue that doing was justified due to the oppressive policies of the religious organization as a whole, despite the fact that this was a building where regular civilians go to pray.

[kallanda_lee]

Same. It's not like I don't believe OP, but I must be in other fandoms, because I don't really come across this thinking.

Maybe because I enjoy morally dubious characters, I dunno.

Trigger warnings for lots of things

[(Anonymous)]

(Disclaimer: I'm talking about a part of the fandom, not every single fan of the show.)

Not op, but this reminds me of the My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and the hardcore Bronies.

It's a show for little girls, so there are explicit moral lessons in every episode; most of them about getting along with others.

Some of the fans take this too far, and think that everyone must accept everyone, faults and all.

This isn't a bad idea on paper, but in practice, it extends to fans excusing or denying that there are fans who are blatantly sexist, racist, misogynist, statutory rapists, pedophiles, who share way too much information about their sexual habits while reading fanfiction, who draw porn of the underage characters, etc.

They distort the messages of the show into: YOU MUST ACCEPT PEOPLE AS THEY ARE. THEY MUST NEVER, EVER CHANGE, NO MATTER HOW GROSS, HURTFUL OR VIOLENT THEY ARE, AND YOU MUST ACCEPT THEM AND NOT EVER "ATTACK" THEM. (Because calling people out on their bad behavior is meaaan and will get you dogpiled. Yes, hypocrisy.)

So, in practice, they want for you to accept them, but they can be as intolerant as they want to be. Like a fucking cult, like OP said. (And adding to the cult behavior; they ponify EVERYTHING. They see their entire lives through the lenses of ponies.)

[(Anonymous)]

I've run across this a few times. DA2, mentioned up thread is a good example. The Elder Scrolls fandom is prone to this, especially Skyrim with the civil war questline. The conflict in universe is pretty nuanced and neither side is wholly good or bad (there are bigots on both sides, both sides have committed atrocities, and both choices are probably equally good/bad for the world in the long run). But dumbasses tend to reduce it down to Empire = Manifest Destiny vs. Stormcloaks = Nazis. Or (missing the point even more), Empire = Good Guys vs. Stormcloaks = Bad Guys. And everyone who plays a character on the "wrong" side of the war is automatically as bigoted as the worst people on that side.

which ignores the fact that TES:Skryim is a ROLEPLAYING game, in which you might play a character who's a murderous asshole, or a racist, or any number of other things, without believing or endorsing those things yourself.

I've also dealt with this personally with a pair of SPN fans. They are basically convinced that all of the supernatural things in the show are real, to the point where they've started making charms and putting lines of salt around their windows and shit. I'm a skeptical atheist, I don't even believe in souls, and they started harassing me because I didn't subscribe to their particular brand of crazy. (Hence why I'm anon, because jfc.)

[diet_poison]

Came here to say this...I really wasn't sure what Op was talking about.

[(Anonymous)]

I'd add Narnia for an example. There are a lot of people out there who believe all true Narnia fans have to be Christians. I get why, but...I'm an atheist who still likes that kind of story.

[(Anonymous)]

preach

[dethtoll]

Do... do people actually do this?

[ninety6tears]

Huh. The only fandom I've ever known of being like this is the one for the Bible.

[elephantinegrace]

It's not always people reading a book or watching a movie and then sharing morals with certain characters; it could be that people read a book or watch a movie because they already do share morals with certain characters. So when a new person joins the fandom with different values, it can get really ugly.

[(Anonymous)]

Creeeeepy ...

Seriously, there's some shows/books/movies that have good messages, but a lot don't, or have reprehensible protagonists, or characters who just plain make bad decisions. It's ok to take inspiration from a character who's gone through something tough, or has an inspiring quote that helps, but taking the entire show as gospel and claiming if you don't you're not a "true fan" ... wtf?

Take the show Person of Interest. I enjoy the characters and love watching the show, but I would FLIP OUT if people had that kind of surveillance on me or my family. I'm not fond of the way Reese goes in all guns a'blazing almost every episode either. Hate their tactics, love watching the shenanigans.

[femme_androgyne]

I hope my fiction preferences don't dictate my morality. I love sympathetic villain types* way too much to want that to carry over.

*Both in the sense of being morally ambiguous like Magneto (comics version mostly) or Lunatic (Tiger and Bunny) and/or in the sense of having a backstory that makes it hard not to at least feel for them a little like Sephiroth

[velvet_mace]

I really hate coming across fans who can't seem to separate reality from fiction. That's one of my biggest squicks. The armchair psychologists (who always get it wrong because they aren't) are bad enough, but the fans who act like a character has all the moral rights of a real person just kill me with second hand embarrassment.

[(Anonymous)]

This totally reminds me of the 'true fan' nonsense that Butch Hartman started by condemning all yaoi and all fans who enjoyed yaoi, banning them from his official forum... while making mpreg canon.

[(Anonymous)]

...People do this? Really? O_o That's...kind of scary, actually,

[citrinesunset]

What you're describing is definitely creepy and weird. I can't say I've personally observed that, but I would be annoyed, too.

On an individual level, though, I don't think there's anything wrong with feeling like a moral from something fictional clicks with you, as long as it's something that can be applied to real life. I mean, calling yourself a Jedi and deciding to live by the Jedi code would be extreme and impractical. But finding a scene in Star Wars inspirational and taking a message away from it isn't, necessarily.

[(Anonymous)]

I haven't run into this, much. At least, not under the name you're giving it. I know some kids shows try to promote slavish adherence to a ham-fisted moral code, but ... I've yet to see even most young fans get particularly into that.

OTOH, I have seen something similar in fandom with, for instance, Death Note. I don't know what it is about that canon, but a lot of people seem to react by trying to see the world through genius!detective eyes. That's not a good description for it, but I don't have a better one. The series has a number of typical shonen-genre biases, but they're accepted more uncritically because L / M / N said it. Or sometimes, because Light agrees with them.

[eaten_by_bears]

I agree with you. I can admire characters or enjoy something about their show without subscribing to either the characters' beliefs or the writers'.

Even my beloved, pro-social propaganda, usually right on the ball Friendship is Magic has some dubious lessons. ('Feeling Pinkie Keen' comes to mind. The lesson isn't that you should be respectful of people even if you think they're incorrect? The lesson is that if one day of observation with no control group doesn't reveal the mechanism behind a strange phenomenon, you should accept the improbable folk explanation without question? Really?)

[(Anonymous)]

My first thought was Loki because it's the only time I've had people tell me i must be an immoral psycopath for wanting to read about a bad guy.

It was very @_@ moment and reminded me why I'm not in fandom. I just find the bad guy perspective interesting because it's the opposite of usual media. It doesn't mean I sympathise or want to commit genocide or anything.

[moit]

AGREED.

I write fictional incest. That SO does not mean I wanna bone my little brother. Gross.

[otakugal15]

My Little Pony, nonny? Cause that is basically the entire Brony fandom.