Amy (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
such_heights) wrote2014-03-06 11:35 am
such_heights) wrote2014-03-06 11:35 am
Entry tags:
oh noes! someone is wrong on the internet!
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif){kind=small}
f_march_madness has started up again, and the preliminaries are filled with people who seem to fundamentally not understand how fandom works, and the errors in argument involved are really frustrating me. So! In the prelims, ie when people vote for a character from each fandom to go forward into the main competition, there's a theme in some of the major fandoms where a minor or former character will end up being selected, which seems disingenuous when five minutes hanging out in the fandom on tumblr, LJ, AO3 etc will make it apparent that, say, Jo Harvelle is not the most popular character in Supernatural. Some people over at the comm say that the fact she wins is just posturing by people trying to make themselves feel better about their choices. Which demonstrates a total lack of understanding about what's going on when people vote for these things and it's aggravating.
From this year's post comes the ever so charming: 1. Vote for your FAVORITE character in each poll. Stop playing. This is an Internet Competition™, not your grand stand against the patriarchy.
Excuse you, FMM mods. Everything I do is a grand stand against the patriarchy! *Night Vale voice* Everything.
And then there's this comment (contains gifs, is nsfw, may make your head explode) which includes the line FMM is not about pretending we are all better social justice warriors than we are, it's about a Deathmatch of favorites.
And I'm so annoyed because that's not even what's happening. You're not polling each fandom for their favourite character on the show, you're polling all of fandom to pick characters from a bunch of fandoms that will include shows that they have never seen or actively dislike. And that's where the voting for minor characters comes from.
With mega fandoms like SPN, and particular in the days of tumblr, although not everyone voting is an actual SPN fan, most people probably have an opinion of some kind about the show and a sense of who the characters are, and particularly with massive fandoms I think it's quite common for people not in the fandom to get invested in underdogs and the characters that the people in the fandom are terrible towards - see Martha Jones' strong polling in Doctor Who or Sansa Stark for Game of Thrones. So for any given poll, I'd argue that a decent chunk of the people voting aren't even active in that fandom, but they think that this one woman seems pretty great via tumblr.
FMM isn't a vote of fandom favourites within each fandom, it's a vote of fandom favourites via fannish osmosis. I've never watched Arrow but I'm charmed by Felicity in the gifsets. I don't particularly care about BBC Sherlock so I'm unlikely to vote for the leads, but I've seen enough to believe that Molly Hooper is a perfect human being. I really liked Peggy in the half a dozen Mad Men episodes I watched. Etc, etc. Obviously pretty much all my favourite characters are women anyway because that's how I role, but even with people who aren't quite so primed that way the point holds.
And I absolutely think that there's a larger point to be made about how all of these fantastic female characters earn very enthusiastic and fun fan campaigns during this contest but that same enthusiasm isn't reflected in the fanworks that people make, consume and rec, but jfc FMM commenters seem to be very obtuse this year. Don't make me come over there!
no subject
no subject
no subject
Man, part of this larger point is that kind of commentary is exactly why some fanworks producers don't bother with creating fanworks that don't fit the mainstream of their fandom
no subject
no subject
Also I think "who on this show do you want to write porn about" and "who on this show is the best character" are two completely different questions, so it's ridiculous to say "there's more fanfiction about X therefore X is the best character." That's . . . those two things aren't even vaguely related!
For me, the larger question also comes down to: if a bunch of people want to spend one month talking about and posting gifsets for and getting excited about women characters and characters of colour and underdog characters in general, why do we have to examine the motives for that? Can't we just be pleased? If you want JohnLock go hang out on tumblr, there's no shortage. Maybe this is one time when a lot of people express their love for those characters when they otherwise wouldn't, because in other places in fandom it's not popular to do so and no one cares about your Jo Harvelle feelings. So can we conceptualize it as a haven for feelings that we don't get to express otherwise, rather than as a bunch of people pretending to have feelings they don't have?
And like . . . who is giving me credit for being anti-patriarchy by voting Skyler White or whoever? No one's going through the votes and noting ppl's names in order to say, "oh, wow, twings is really good at supporting women characters! What a good person!" You don't get a cookie for it, so what's the motivation if it's not love/spite/other feelings?
SORRY I vomited feelings in your comments but I was so angry about this <3 thank you for posting you are lovely
PS your use of Night Vale voice was flawless
no subject
I want this screen printed on tote bags, tshirts, across the office door of the lecturer I'm working for this term...
no subject
no subject
This post. Awesome.
I really wonder about the presumption behind those FMM instructions, that a female character couldn't possibly, really be your favourite, like, not your REAL ACTUAL FAVOURITE, and if you say they are you must be lying! Like, you couldn't possibly have watched that show and love this minor awesome lady character more than Teh Boy Heroes, because all love for women is just Political Correctness, whereas love for male characters is because the characters are awesome. </ end rant>
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
Also, with regards to the whole "Vote for your FAVORITE character in each poll" thing: that's not how voting works. People generally vote for the thing they want to win, which is a different thing altogether, because you have to take into account the competition - sometimes voting for your second favourite is a better tactical move than voting for your favourite, because sometimes victory is making sure that someone else loses. We see it all the time in everything from reality TV to politics.
[There could be many reasons why more female characters are getting chosen. Women could be getting more representation in media; writers could be writing their female characters better; fans could be changing the way they look at female characters (eg: not holding them to different standards compared to male characters); fans could be realising that they can have good female characters, and we all know that when fans want something, they will make it happen in their own way.]
no subject
no subject
And clearly these fans have no understanding of voting strategically to eliminate someone or trading for votes or forming coalitions etc. in order to get underdog/favorites through before everyone turns on each other in the later rounds, so no, it's not just straight-up voting for your faves all the time. Isn't that part of the fun?
Ugh, fandom.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
I want that on a t-shirt, pls.
And in the case of Sansa Stark, although she's absolutely a contentious character, a quick look at the AO3 tells me that she's the most written about character in the fandom by some margin. So, it's not just that the point is stupid in a grander cosmic sense (although it is) it's that that in some cases it's objectively wrong and I have numbers to prove it. NUMBERS, PEOPLE.
no subject
I shouldn't laugh, but that combined with the subject of this post made me giggle.
I actually haven't seen the comments on the fmarchmadness posts -- LJ does this weird screwy thing where it won't show me comments at work, but sometimes will if I log-in from home -- and then I read that comment thread and had to breathe deeply and resist the urge to post a comment. (No good comes from feeding the trolls. Telling someone they're wrong on the internet usually only leads to arguments.)
Obviously pretty much all my favourite characters are women anyway because that's how I role, but even with people who aren't quite so primed that way the point holds.
And it is fannish osmosis, certainly. I don't watch Parks and REcreation, but I know people on my RList do and love Leslie Knopes, so I voted for her anyway. Shows I don't know at all, I don't vote in.
I absolutely think that there's a larger point to be made about how all of these fantastic female characters earn very enthusiastic and fun fan campaigns during this contest but that same enthusiasm isn't reflected in the fanworks that people make, consume and rec
That. There's a difference between having a favourite character and wanting to read/write/create fanworks about them. I mean, in Mad Men, I adore Joan. I want to see her rule the world. I would watch an entire show that just shadowed her day in, day out. This doesn't mean I want to write fic about her on the AO3 or that I have any meaningful narrative ideas I want to explore about her. I just... love her as a character.
There's a lot of shows where I have a definite favourite even if I don't write. Even if they're not part of the fandom's favourite pairing.
Plus, there can be a big difference between "favourite character that I adore" and "biggest OTP of fandom". For me, it usually correlates (ie. I like John/Sherlock and John's my favourite ever; Agent Phil Coulson is my fave in the MCU, and I'm rather fond of Clint/Coulson for that reason) but not always (I love Britta in Community, but I don't have an OTP for her. The OTP of that show is clearly Troy/Abed).
...Plus, y'know, it's a popularity poll run on LJ. There's nothing in the rules that says you have to be active in slash fandom to vote. You have to have an LJ account, which includes a lot of fans of the show that might be a lot less focused on the M/M action.
no subject
(March Madness is starting to occupy a really weird position in fandom in general, though. The no-livejournal-account-created-during-the-poll rule is a terrible rule now that the entire younger contingent of fandom is made up of people who don't have LJs. So now the polls are only for old guard fans?)
no subject
no subject
no subject
♥ ♥ ♥