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Cranky Old Fangirls

Cranky Old Fangirls

"Fangirl" here is a neutral term for someone who squees, squicks, and Was There. General fandom posts encouraged!

1642 members
Posted bySundaydinobotin/cranky_old_fangirls-Mar 30 at 5:39 PM

Towards a working definition of "anti"

Towards a working definition of "anti"

Most of us know it when we see it, but I figure any discussion about fandom antis and how to respond to them would benefit from having a solid answer to "what even is an anti, anyway?"

tumblr.com
Comments13
  • kallowayMar 30 at 5:54 PM

    This nonny's response will probably become my go-to should antis ever invade a part of fandom I requent.

    • MagessMar 30 at 5:57 PM

      LOL!

    • SundaydinobotMar 30 at 7:46 PM

      I'm going to have to use this in the future :)

    • highlander_iiApr 02 at 12:57 PM

      that is beautiful. =)

  • kslangleyMar 30 at 5:47 PM

    What's an "anti," please and thank you?

    • MagessMar 30 at 5:53 PM

      Someone who engages in

      1. A form of intra-community aggression within fandom, that
      2. Seeks, as its primary goal, to designate out-groups who are fair game for social brutality, by
      3. Categorically declaring certain forms of fan engagement (ships, characters, fic genres, fanart styles, video game mods…) to be intrinsically morally wrong and in need of stamping out, regardless of how or why one engages with them, and
      4. Justifies this by claiming a causal relationship between the targeted activities and some form of (usually SJ-flavored) real-world harm that they allegedly promote.
      • kallowayMar 30 at 6:17 PM

        I'd add in that a lot of antis specifically target older fans, by which they mean 'adults', because they don't believe fandom is for everyone, but only for kids/'them'.

        they'd be horrified to wander into any of the local conventions I frequent where it's perfectly normal for me to chat about anime for an hour with an octogenarian gentleman and then wander over and debate favourite Transformers with a friend's kids or something

      • kslangleyMar 30 at 6:40 PM

        "SJ-flavored"?

      • MagessMar 30 at 7:04 PM

        Social Justice-flavored

      • nomadicwriterMar 30 at 7:07 PM

        SJ stands for "social justice", so in this case "SJ-flavoured" implies a disingenuous argument that's framed in terms of being concerned with social justice issues (like, say, tackling sexism or racism or concern for abuse survivors) to make it harder for anyone to disagree without looking bad.

        Antis are basically the modern equivalent of old-school "But what about the children!!!" anti-slash or anti-smut crusaders - they make spurious arguments that a certain type of fic or art is Morally Wrong and has to be stamped out because it's harmful for people to stumble across it (and they're often completely hypocritical about it too, because it's not really about the content at all, it's about winning a shipwar or stamping out types of stories they don't like by 'proving' that X ship is terrible and you're a bad person if you like it).

        Unfortunately in the modern fandom environment on sites like Tumblr, that kind of argument can get a lot of traction because it's common for people to get publicly called out and shunned or piled on by hundreds of people if they're deemed to be into anything Bad. So no one wants to be the one to argue with someone saying, "Liking this sort of thing makes you a terrible person and here's why," no matter how ridiculous their argument is. (Even though it's often things like, "Shipping two adult characters with a big age difference is exactly the same as saying you support real-world child abuse," and the like.)

      • kslangleyApr 01 at 3:40 PM

        Interesting. I would not have the slightest problem spitting in the face of an "argument" like that--one of the benefits of being old.

        People (not just fans) can be so fucked up at times. Makes my wrinkled ass tired.

        :-)

  • MagessMar 30 at 5:46 PM

    Solid post. I manage to avoid most antis on tumblr, which i guess is a combination of following the right people and being relatively unknown or in small fandoms.

  • SundaydinobotMar 30 at 5:39 PM

    I'm glad that people are starting to talk about this. The abuse in fandom is getting out of hand on tumblr. I thought this post had some good points.

Cranky Old Fangirls

Cranky Old Fangirls

"Fangirl" here is a neutral term for someone who squees, squicks, and Was There. General fandom posts encouraged!

1642 members
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