unpopular opinions no. 92:

[parthenia]

I feel I ought to have an opinion about OTW, just because of the sheer volume of posts about OTW crossing my screen, but I still don't really get it.

Also, the emphasis on 'female community' drives me fucking mental. Sorry. I have many female friends, I think many women are awesome, I can see that fanfic brings loads of women together in a wonderfully countercultural anti-capitalist way, and I think it's marvellous that female fans organise stuff in spite of their ladyparts...I even am a woman myself. But I just don't get it with claiming the femaleness of the fanfic writing community as some special condition in need of praise and attention.

I mean. It's mostly a product of the sodding subject matter, isn't it? The majority of open source code writers are probably male. Gamers are predominantly male. Do they spend their time warbling about what a quintessentially male community they've created, apart from the couple of female programmers and gamers who've wandered by who are a bit of an anomaly but are all right PROVIDING THEY PLAY BY OUR RULES???? DO THEY? Actually maybe they do.

GAH. GAAAAAH, I SAY.

OK. I know I'm out of line with many of you. I just think that our attempts to claim the moral high ground for our odd little hobbies are very strange indeed.

If I had more time, I would love to explore the world of machinima a bit more (films and videos made using gaming software, like World of Warcraft); my son watches simple Runescape videos on Youtube.

I love the fact that the Internet has helped all this amateur, underground culture flourish. I came across a site today with links to recent good machinima,like this rather nice music video. Beautiful texture. Note the quintessentially male comments on the video. *g*

ETA, post-metafandom linkage. Oh holy fuck. I did not intend a personal rant dashed off on a Friday to be listed by Metafandom (to the point where I nearly specifically said so). Still, this is the way of the interwebs. I will reply to comments, eventually. Please be nice.

ETA 2: Don't you lot have homes to go to? *clears glasses, wipes tables, starts to stack chairs*

Comments

(Here from metafandom)

[featherofeeling.livejournal.com]

Hmm, I hadn't thought about the issue in the light of claiming moral high ground, exactly. I guess that would bother me--the "therefore not to be targeted by the powers that be" attitude you mentioned as carried to that extreme. But overall I do think the prevelence of women in fandom is one of its positive attributes. It's not simply because we're women and therefore we're better (which would be female chauvinism, yes), or because I automatically like all mostly-women spaces (heck, no). But I have been thinking of fandom as a place that lends itself in certain ways to feminist principles.

It's not because we have so many women that this makes me happy, because after all a lot of female-dominated spaces just reinforce societal constrictions on what a woman's place should be. But I think that fandom as a community (NOT necessarily in fic) does the opposite. My personal experience of it has shown me a place that tears down traditional limitations of who is qualified to speak and analyze and allows more women to exercise their intellects and voices. I've seen women, as a group often excluded from old boys' networks by their gender, or sometimes from the worlds of intellectual exchange by things like motherhood, form networks of serious discussion, support, and learning here.

It's also good to mention that this type of fandom is a female-dominated space, because that doesn't get recognized much in mainstream discussions of fannishness. Academic conferences about media studies (such as MiT5, I think?) have been dominated by male scholars. I have read of female scholars going to them and feeling marginalized, both in their areas of study (usually of the more female-dominated fan activities) and their credentials. In what academics have considered worth studying and in how the mainstream media represents fannish activity, traditionally "fanboy" pursuits and descriptions are given more weight. Add that to the male privilege that still influences academia, and you have a fan-studying space where men have more visibility and a louder voice. So raising visibility of women in fandom is helpful. And when I go to metafandom and read essays and discussions about fandom in which women predominate, I do find that more than interesting--I find it refreshing and empowering. In the wider world, even as it relates to fannishness, I still feel aware that I am a woman and of the power dynamics involved in that, and so have those scholars that I mentioned. Within fandom, being female is the norm. And I do think that not having to be a woman first and whatever else you are second is a feminist ideal.

So I think the argument is more "this is female-dominated and therefore (potentially) empowering" than "...and therefore good/mystical/holy." And I'm definitely not claiming that all of it's great--I've seen plenty of misogyny in slash fandom, whether it's fans talking about being squicked by 'girl parts' in a fic or women using gendered reasons to hate (http://chopchica.livejournal.com/113054.html) female characters or real women. But overall I do think some of fandom's inherent qualities encourage feminist principles, and that--along with greater visibility of women within overall fannishness--is why it's worth mentioning so much.

Re: (Here from metafandom)

[parthenia14.livejournal.com]

That was very nicely put. And I recognise much of that at times, while still being rather bothered by OTW making it a defining feature of their organisation.