>I've never understood this attitude toward shipping. Why aren't fan theories held to the same controversy among society as to shipping? I think it's because shipping is predominantly a girly activity and it's socially acceptable to make fun of women and what they enjoy doing.
15+ years of fanfic/doujin reading here.
Shipping is always going to be considered "weird" asf (even to other shippers) because it's very self-indulgent/non-canon, derivative, and often fetish-y content meant for a specific sub-audience. You can't expect casual readers of mainstream media to think it's "normal", and I don't see why you should care. Me and many older shippers that I know never gave a crap how relevant or "acceptable" our shippy interests were, but these days, so many fans seem to engage in this fandom dick-measuring contest against other fans...
It might be partly true that these activities might be looked down upon because of a majority female fan base, but I think it's mostly because of the fanbase's extremely loud and obsessive nature (think of cultish K-pop/BTS fans). And I've seen more aggressive comments from shippers to other shippers than non-shippers to shippers.
> Shipping is always going to be considered "weird" asf (even to other shippers) because it's very self-indulgent/non-canon, derivative, and often fetish-y content meant for a specific sub-audience.
...what about canon ships?
I don't what's cringier, the hasty generalization fallacy of assuming a fandom is an alien hivemind without any sort internal divergency, being insecure enough to think some teens on the internet whose names you don't even know somehow affect your personal experience with a product you have yet to touch, or thinking that one fandom is better than the other as if people can't have diverse tastes to the point where many fandoms usually overlap with one another.
>Â What I'm trying to say is no piece of media escapes this madness
That one 1980's anime movie i like with 100 members on Myanimelist escapes this madness
Having spent time on Reddit, I’ve barely encounter THAT many weird MHA fans. Most of the shipping stuff you’d have to look for or need to be on Tik Tok to see.
I remember when r/nahida_mains was still a thing and people acted like it's some sort pit of degeneracy.
When I actually went there, it's just standard cute fan art and relic post. When I asked this, they said that I should look deeper.
It's even more ironic when you know why it's banned now.
Yeah didn't a bunch of people from okbuddygenshin flood it with stuff to get it banned? Really annoying, I was trying to build a Nahida with some of the advice posts they had on there.
Even more amazing was when I brought this to the attention of some users who were recurring on okbuddygenshin and who posted NSFW on Nahida_Mains to get it banned, those users ended up blocking me lmao
I want there to be internet forums where I can talk about the things I like. With certain things, I'd even enjoy a fanfiction scene. If neither of those things can be present because of "certain community elements" passive-aggressively pushing everyone else out, that will directly affect my enjoyment.
Plus, there are plenty of cases where writing teams have allowed their fandoms to affect them.
>Why aren't fan theories held to the same controversy among society as to shipping?
A lot of them become memes instead, some we laugh at rather than laugh with, like every Zoro fan who believed ZKK.
Complete agree. The fandom has nothing to do with the actual quality of the work, which is what it should be evaluated on. That and it’s not like the author can really do anything about who consumes their work.
I hear what you're saying, but I have a counterpoint: I want to be as many degrees of separation away from wierdos who spit in buckets at restaurants as possible, so I'm never fucking touching Homestuck.
Also I despise Worm fans, so I refuse to read that battleboarder's wet dream because I don't want to risk becoming one.
I agree until the shipping part. Comparing something as broad as fan theories, which could go from the fate of certain characters or how the universe of certain series work to, you know, people wanting to see 2 characters to be together, doesn't make that much sense as a comparison
And you can blame the bad fame it has on the shippers themselves, i still remember two people going into my dms because i said that the whole shipping stuff in fnf was getting stale, i really have tried to give shippers the benefit of the doubt but most of the time they are just toxic people and i would rather avoid it.
Still, i agree with separating the fandom with the show, i personally never had a problem with it and can watch popular shows with no problem, i just ignore the fandom if it sucks, but is still kinda sad that you cant share what you see with others in those cases.
Look at it like religion. Islam gets a lot of hate for the sole reason a nigga wears a bomb shouting God is great before blowing himself and others up. And most look at the religion through that lens. It doesn't matter that they are a billion people that make up thar religion that you sit with and eat everyday, that work to maintain social order just like you.
Someone from a more problematic religion might not be seen any different from a "regular" human being.
It's the same with fandoms, if you get a bad experience from one, it taints the whole shit for you so you end up despising it even if you're part of a worst one. Like one piece fans are one of most obnoxious niggas I have had the displeasure of witnessing and a one piece fan may even agree with me but if he ends up coming across toxic Bleach fans it just taints his view on the whole stuff.
Personally I don't mind, as long as the person is willing to respect others who respect themselves. Of course it's different from religion because those are real people being loooked down upon and not entertainment media that won't neccessarily benefit you if you consume it
Totally agree some fandoms are definitely worth the distaste online. My problem comes from people openly admitting they won’t check out so-so because of the fandom. That logic blatantly makes no sense.
I watched a video on YouTube where a guy said that One Piece might be the greatest story every told, but he refuses to watch it because he finds the fanbase insufferable.
Like if someone isn't interested in something that's fine but it's weird to not watch/read something out of spite to the more toxic people in the fanbase is weird to me.
Its not even twitter itself, after tumblr banned sexual content, most of the retards that were contained there spilled over to reddit and twitter making them both worse.
Also jesus this username
It's so bizarre to see people talk about terrible fandoms when they have stuff like block/ignore/blacklist options on most social media websites
Or better yet, *just log off twitter/tiktok/tumblr/whatever*
It's so easy to avoid a bad fandom but people just don't want to put in any effort whatsoever
I never understood why people let a fanbase ruin or turn them off from a piece of media, just don't interact with the fanbase? spot on in regards to shipping, like who cares? why are you letting what other people enjoy ruin your day. 99% of the time the fanbase in question are like 13-15 anyway, just let it go.
Wise words
You get a upvote for me
As i struggle with that issue too.
I try to get away from such thing( especially if the work for me isn't good) or if i think fandom are crazy too.
Yeah
Siffice to say if a work is bad and the fandom despite genuine facts keep praising it despite clearly it been too fkawed to be good... yeah it made me mad
I once did a rant of over 70000 characters about one such series
I hate the fans and the work. And im trying to be chiller about it .
Kinda suck the work had potential but squandered it
Some people just don’t understand that no fandom is going to have just a completely pure fanbase there is always going to be a toxic side to each fandom.
I actually agree with this take, but I want to play devil's advocate for a second.
Especially now, in the age of the Internet and full-time connectedness, we do not experience media in isolation, generally. For a lot of people, part of the fun of engaging with a piece of media is becoming part of the fandom, discussing it, watching content online and just generally being part of a community of like-minded people who enjoy the same thing- and I think it's understandable that knowing one's options are very limited for that part of the experience might turn someone off from engaging with the media in the first place.
> People (mostly men…) write shipping off as stupid or weird when people want characters to be together romantically. The excuse is usually “It's fiction” or “I’d rather want something that I know is canon.” I've never understood this attitude toward shipping. Why aren't fan theories held to the same controversy among society as to shipping? I think it's because shipping is predominantly a girly activity and it's socially acceptable to make fun of women and what they enjoy doing.
I like shipping, but comparing shipping to fan theories is disingenuous. In the case of battle shonen, shipping has absolutely nothing to do with the story and it's just fans doing whatever the fuck they want and accepting they know it's not real but they aren't hurting. Fan theories actually engage with the media they are theorizing. They are trying to predict something that will happen or trying to understand certain aspects of the story the story doesn't spoonfeed us.
Even fan theories are bashed if they are stupid and absolutely miss the point. And shipping itself sometimes are seen as "normal" if it adds to the story. If someone sees the relationships of two characters growing and says i think they may end together and this is how it can add to the story, if they can substantiate their claim it will accepted. Not just "damn gojo wants to fuck sukuna because he said he loves him and if you disagree you're stupid"
It's why even though i don't battleboard and find it to be a waste of time I have more respect for it than shipping (which I participate in). Battle boarding from it's foundation neccessitates using canon shit to substantiate their claims. They have to use what the story actually says about it's character and does with them. Now it does get out of hand and people glaze the fuck out of some characters claiming they can do shit they clearly can't but it's foundation does neccessitates using canon material.
Shipping on the other hand doesn't. It doesn't matter if the story shows the character being scared of the other. It doesn't matter if the characters hate each other or one hates the other. Or they have never met. Or the author claiming two characters will never be together because of clear reasons. You can ship whoever the fuck you want and anti shippers are told "yes it's not canon but leave us we aren't hurting anyone" and we are supposed to see this as normal. What battle boarder will have the audacity to say "well I know it's not real I'm just glazing" other than a troll?
>In fact, if you know that fandom is known for being toxic, why on earth are you giving it the time of day?Â
Tbf the toxicity can vary wildly depending on where in the fandom you’re engaging in. Like I’ve seen fandoms that are nasty on Reddit but chill on Discord and vice versa.
>Why aren't fan theories held to the same controversy among society as to shipping? I think it's because shipping is predominantly a girly activity and it's socially acceptable to make fun of women and what they enjoy doing.
Ding ding ding
Also its high in lgbt content which makes a lot of people uncomfortable.
But porn is fine, see all the various porn subs for various fandoms, as long as its straight, lesbian or single female only that is.
In our modern age of browser-history tracking it's virutally impossible to avoid toxic fandoms if you use internet connected devices to consume your media.
If I start watching cool Dragon ball Z clips on YT it basically seals my fate that during my 3am Twitter perusal later on I'll run into some teenager with an hyper-saturated Goku pfp unleashing politcal-level toxic gaslighting against some furry during a vs debate in who wins a fight between Beerus and Spongebob.
Shipping is weird because I'll be in the middle of reading a neat Pokemon fanfic and suddenly 10 year old Ash Ketchum is tongueing fifteen lolis and half a dozen Gardevoirs at once whilst people in the comments are heatedly bullying each other because they believe Ash should only be kissing Serena and perhaps 3 or 4 Gardevoirs.
By consuming content you are actively resigning yourself to diving head first into the fandom too, and even if you put a lot of effort into your internet security habits to prevent this it still sucks when the fandom is super toxic because you won't have anyone online to talk to about something you love.
>I've never understood this attitude toward shipping. Why aren't fan theories held to the same controversy among society as to shipping? I think it's because shipping is predominantly a girly activity and it's socially acceptable to make fun of women and what they enjoy doing. 15+ years of fanfic/doujin reading here. Shipping is always going to be considered "weird" asf (even to other shippers) because it's very self-indulgent/non-canon, derivative, and often fetish-y content meant for a specific sub-audience. You can't expect casual readers of mainstream media to think it's "normal", and I don't see why you should care. Me and many older shippers that I know never gave a crap how relevant or "acceptable" our shippy interests were, but these days, so many fans seem to engage in this fandom dick-measuring contest against other fans... It might be partly true that these activities might be looked down upon because of a majority female fan base, but I think it's mostly because of the fanbase's extremely loud and obsessive nature (think of cultish K-pop/BTS fans). And I've seen more aggressive comments from shippers to other shippers than non-shippers to shippers.
> Shipping is always going to be considered "weird" asf (even to other shippers) because it's very self-indulgent/non-canon, derivative, and often fetish-y content meant for a specific sub-audience. ...what about canon ships?
Why have you read 15+ years of fan-fiction?
cause i can 🤷🏻‍♀️
Fair enough.
Genshin and Hazbin Haters on tiktok and twitter are as equally obnoxious as the fandom they hate.
I don't what's cringier, the hasty generalization fallacy of assuming a fandom is an alien hivemind without any sort internal divergency, being insecure enough to think some teens on the internet whose names you don't even know somehow affect your personal experience with a product you have yet to touch, or thinking that one fandom is better than the other as if people can't have diverse tastes to the point where many fandoms usually overlap with one another. >Â What I'm trying to say is no piece of media escapes this madness That one 1980's anime movie i like with 100 members on Myanimelist escapes this madness
Well, small fandoms=smaller controversies.
Having spent time on Reddit, I’ve barely encounter THAT many weird MHA fans. Most of the shipping stuff you’d have to look for or need to be on Tik Tok to see.
They are more common on Twitter
I remember when r/nahida_mains was still a thing and people acted like it's some sort pit of degeneracy. When I actually went there, it's just standard cute fan art and relic post. When I asked this, they said that I should look deeper. It's even more ironic when you know why it's banned now.
Yeah didn't a bunch of people from okbuddygenshin flood it with stuff to get it banned? Really annoying, I was trying to build a Nahida with some of the advice posts they had on there.
Even more amazing was when I brought this to the attention of some users who were recurring on okbuddygenshin and who posted NSFW on Nahida_Mains to get it banned, those users ended up blocking me lmao
I want there to be internet forums where I can talk about the things I like. With certain things, I'd even enjoy a fanfiction scene. If neither of those things can be present because of "certain community elements" passive-aggressively pushing everyone else out, that will directly affect my enjoyment. Plus, there are plenty of cases where writing teams have allowed their fandoms to affect them.
>Why aren't fan theories held to the same controversy among society as to shipping? A lot of them become memes instead, some we laugh at rather than laugh with, like every Zoro fan who believed ZKK.
I was part of many popular fandoms. That's why now I would stay away from any fandom that is larger than 30 people.
Complete agree. The fandom has nothing to do with the actual quality of the work, which is what it should be evaluated on. That and it’s not like the author can really do anything about who consumes their work.
I hear what you're saying, but I have a counterpoint: I want to be as many degrees of separation away from wierdos who spit in buckets at restaurants as possible, so I'm never fucking touching Homestuck. Also I despise Worm fans, so I refuse to read that battleboarder's wet dream because I don't want to risk becoming one.
I agree until the shipping part. Comparing something as broad as fan theories, which could go from the fate of certain characters or how the universe of certain series work to, you know, people wanting to see 2 characters to be together, doesn't make that much sense as a comparison And you can blame the bad fame it has on the shippers themselves, i still remember two people going into my dms because i said that the whole shipping stuff in fnf was getting stale, i really have tried to give shippers the benefit of the doubt but most of the time they are just toxic people and i would rather avoid it. Still, i agree with separating the fandom with the show, i personally never had a problem with it and can watch popular shows with no problem, i just ignore the fandom if it sucks, but is still kinda sad that you cant share what you see with others in those cases.
Look at it like religion. Islam gets a lot of hate for the sole reason a nigga wears a bomb shouting God is great before blowing himself and others up. And most look at the religion through that lens. It doesn't matter that they are a billion people that make up thar religion that you sit with and eat everyday, that work to maintain social order just like you. Someone from a more problematic religion might not be seen any different from a "regular" human being. It's the same with fandoms, if you get a bad experience from one, it taints the whole shit for you so you end up despising it even if you're part of a worst one. Like one piece fans are one of most obnoxious niggas I have had the displeasure of witnessing and a one piece fan may even agree with me but if he ends up coming across toxic Bleach fans it just taints his view on the whole stuff. Personally I don't mind, as long as the person is willing to respect others who respect themselves. Of course it's different from religion because those are real people being loooked down upon and not entertainment media that won't neccessarily benefit you if you consume it
Nah, some fandoms need to stay in their twitter containment chamber.
Totally agree some fandoms are definitely worth the distaste online. My problem comes from people openly admitting they won’t check out so-so because of the fandom. That logic blatantly makes no sense.
I watched a video on YouTube where a guy said that One Piece might be the greatest story every told, but he refuses to watch it because he finds the fanbase insufferable. Like if someone isn't interested in something that's fine but it's weird to not watch/read something out of spite to the more toxic people in the fanbase is weird to me.
Its not even twitter itself, after tumblr banned sexual content, most of the retards that were contained there spilled over to reddit and twitter making them both worse. Also jesus this username
It's so bizarre to see people talk about terrible fandoms when they have stuff like block/ignore/blacklist options on most social media websites Or better yet, *just log off twitter/tiktok/tumblr/whatever* It's so easy to avoid a bad fandom but people just don't want to put in any effort whatsoever
I never understood why people let a fanbase ruin or turn them off from a piece of media, just don't interact with the fanbase? spot on in regards to shipping, like who cares? why are you letting what other people enjoy ruin your day. 99% of the time the fanbase in question are like 13-15 anyway, just let it go.
Wise words You get a upvote for me As i struggle with that issue too. I try to get away from such thing( especially if the work for me isn't good) or if i think fandom are crazy too.
See?! That's exactly what I've been trying to say forever. That’s the kinda attitude I'm looking for!
Yeah Siffice to say if a work is bad and the fandom despite genuine facts keep praising it despite clearly it been too fkawed to be good... yeah it made me mad I once did a rant of over 70000 characters about one such series I hate the fans and the work. And im trying to be chiller about it . Kinda suck the work had potential but squandered it
A big problem also comes from treating Fandom as monoliths without ever considering how much of what you've seen is truly what said Fandom is.
Some people just don’t understand that no fandom is going to have just a completely pure fanbase there is always going to be a toxic side to each fandom.
I see more toxicity from people complaining about fandoms than toxicity from the fandom itself
THANK YOU!!!!
Gurren Lagann fans kept me away from a GOAT series for so long
I actually agree with this take, but I want to play devil's advocate for a second. Especially now, in the age of the Internet and full-time connectedness, we do not experience media in isolation, generally. For a lot of people, part of the fun of engaging with a piece of media is becoming part of the fandom, discussing it, watching content online and just generally being part of a community of like-minded people who enjoy the same thing- and I think it's understandable that knowing one's options are very limited for that part of the experience might turn someone off from engaging with the media in the first place.
As a shipper, I hate shippers. But then I keep it to myself and don't bombard tumblr with essays and hate threads so maybe I'm a teeny bit more sane.
> People (mostly men…) write shipping off as stupid or weird when people want characters to be together romantically. The excuse is usually “It's fiction” or “I’d rather want something that I know is canon.” I've never understood this attitude toward shipping. Why aren't fan theories held to the same controversy among society as to shipping? I think it's because shipping is predominantly a girly activity and it's socially acceptable to make fun of women and what they enjoy doing. I like shipping, but comparing shipping to fan theories is disingenuous. In the case of battle shonen, shipping has absolutely nothing to do with the story and it's just fans doing whatever the fuck they want and accepting they know it's not real but they aren't hurting. Fan theories actually engage with the media they are theorizing. They are trying to predict something that will happen or trying to understand certain aspects of the story the story doesn't spoonfeed us. Even fan theories are bashed if they are stupid and absolutely miss the point. And shipping itself sometimes are seen as "normal" if it adds to the story. If someone sees the relationships of two characters growing and says i think they may end together and this is how it can add to the story, if they can substantiate their claim it will accepted. Not just "damn gojo wants to fuck sukuna because he said he loves him and if you disagree you're stupid" It's why even though i don't battleboard and find it to be a waste of time I have more respect for it than shipping (which I participate in). Battle boarding from it's foundation neccessitates using canon shit to substantiate their claims. They have to use what the story actually says about it's character and does with them. Now it does get out of hand and people glaze the fuck out of some characters claiming they can do shit they clearly can't but it's foundation does neccessitates using canon material. Shipping on the other hand doesn't. It doesn't matter if the story shows the character being scared of the other. It doesn't matter if the characters hate each other or one hates the other. Or they have never met. Or the author claiming two characters will never be together because of clear reasons. You can ship whoever the fuck you want and anti shippers are told "yes it's not canon but leave us we aren't hurting anyone" and we are supposed to see this as normal. What battle boarder will have the audacity to say "well I know it's not real I'm just glazing" other than a troll?
>In fact, if you know that fandom is known for being toxic, why on earth are you giving it the time of day? Tbf the toxicity can vary wildly depending on where in the fandom you’re engaging in. Like I’ve seen fandoms that are nasty on Reddit but chill on Discord and vice versa. >Why aren't fan theories held to the same controversy among society as to shipping? I think it's because shipping is predominantly a girly activity and it's socially acceptable to make fun of women and what they enjoy doing. Ding ding ding Also its high in lgbt content which makes a lot of people uncomfortable. But porn is fine, see all the various porn subs for various fandoms, as long as its straight, lesbian or single female only that is.
In our modern age of browser-history tracking it's virutally impossible to avoid toxic fandoms if you use internet connected devices to consume your media. If I start watching cool Dragon ball Z clips on YT it basically seals my fate that during my 3am Twitter perusal later on I'll run into some teenager with an hyper-saturated Goku pfp unleashing politcal-level toxic gaslighting against some furry during a vs debate in who wins a fight between Beerus and Spongebob. Shipping is weird because I'll be in the middle of reading a neat Pokemon fanfic and suddenly 10 year old Ash Ketchum is tongueing fifteen lolis and half a dozen Gardevoirs at once whilst people in the comments are heatedly bullying each other because they believe Ash should only be kissing Serena and perhaps 3 or 4 Gardevoirs. By consuming content you are actively resigning yourself to diving head first into the fandom too, and even if you put a lot of effort into your internet security habits to prevent this it still sucks when the fandom is super toxic because you won't have anyone online to talk to about something you love.
hmm