I typically don’t get involved with fandom drama, but today I’ve had ENOUGH of the bullshit.
I usually stay silent whenever someone tries to come for me because it’s never worth my time or energy, and because I know my silence pisses them off more than anything I could say in response. This time around I’m breaking my silence. I have some things I want to share in regards to this post made earlier today by @keepitmovinshawty and the post she’s responding to by @outlawarya:
First of all, I apologize profusely for offending anyone with my head canon post yesterday in which I talked about if Gendrya were living in 2020, I totally think they’d participate at the BLM protests that have been occurring for the past week throughout America and the world. That was absolutely NOT my intention to upset anyone and I’m very sorry. I was upset that it seemed like it was business as usual in the Gendrya tag for the past week with no one mentioning what is going on in the world right now. Especially when there are 21 Covid-19/quarantine fics. @foxtrot9o9 explained it the best in her reply to keepitmovinshawty’s post about what I was trying to accomplish with my post:
I’d now like to direct your attention to this gorgeous mood board that was posted in the Gendrya tag and ask you what is so different about this post, which deservedly received 75 notes, depiciting Gendry as a protestor wearing a Black Lives Matter button, compared to my post that expressed my head canon of Arya and Gendry being active participants at BLM protests?
The difference is that I didn’t create this lovely mood board.
There have been people within this fandom who have been trying their hardest for months now to run me out of the Gendrya fandom, simply because they don’t like me or my fic (which, I’d like to point out, they used to read/give kudos/comments to.) They have been actively policing the entire fandom, insisting on what people CAN and CAN NOT do/say/write/create/think. And they have ran off SO MANY AMAZING PEOPLE out of the fandom over the last year with their fandom policing and gatekeeping behavior. They claim there is so much negativity within the Gendrya fandom but their complete lack of self awareness has blinded them from seeing that THEY are the ones creating a hostile environment and stirring up fandom drama when they could have simply blocked me and the other writers that they’ve tried running out of the fandom in the past. I’m not the first “punching bag” of the Gendrya fandom, and as long as they continue behaving the way they have been, I won’t be the last either. They have turned what was once a lovely and thriving fandom community into a fucking SUCK FEST. Everyone is now afraid of what to write, what to post because of what this gang of fandom police will do or say about it. They have been stifiling people’s creativity.
I’m fucking sick of it. And I want those people to know that they may have successfully ran off other fans from participating in this fandom. But you will NOT run me off, boo. I’m sticking around, baby. Not only because I’m still in love with this ship and still in love with the fic I’m writing, but also because I know how much that will piss you off.
I’m done being nice.
This has to stop.
Everyone who doesn’t get what the problem is about people trying to police fellow fans have to take a lesson in fandom etiquette.
1. Don’t like, don’t read
2. My kink is not your kink
3. Ship and let ship
4. Don’t tag your hate*
5. Give credit where it’s due
6. Don’t spoil anything
7. Don’t fan shame
8. Give concrit only when asked
9. Don’t repost
That’s what I can think of rn. Please feel free to add.
This incident today exhausted me to no end. I was shaking and dizzy and it gave me a headache on a day I was feeling brilliant so far.
Fandom should be fun.
Expressing negativity will always ruin that fun for someone and is the surest way to lead to drama.
Therefore, ‘if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all’ applies.
You wouldn’t comment on a fic just to say you didn’t like it, would you?
Furthermore, no one in fandom has superiority or seniority or whatever claim you wanna make to create authority over other fans.
You can unfollow, block and filter tags if you don’t like a creator or certain content is triggering.
No one says everyone has to like everything and everyone.
But everyone is responsible for curating their own fandom experience by using the means mentioned above to have agency over what content they expose themselves to.
It is not a creator’s response not to create content that you don’t like/ makes you uncomfortable/ triggers you.
This is the internet for god’s sake and if you want supervision you’ve come to the wrong place.
I’m digressing heavily but I am sick of this shit.
With everything going on in the world atm, everyone suddenly seems to have become an expert in politics/ social sciences and the entitlement and audacity of people on the internet to call out creators like influencers on IG, but really any creator on any platform, is astounding.
You can’t do right by these people.
You address the issue, you’re being insensitive or simply wrong; if you don’t address the issue (because you’re not an expert/ don’t know what to say) you’re being called out for inaction.
Can you self proclaimed experts give others time to read all those books that are being recommended, listen to all the podcasts, find the best fund to donate to, please?
We’re in the midst of a global health crisis and now what is hopefully a social revolution on top of that.
That shit is scary!
Let us cope with it on our own terms ffs!
Fuck off with your additional negativity.
*sort of implies not to make call out posts, I feel, so just wanted to clarify that what @keepitmovinshawty and @moonstruckandkissedinsane have done now was in reply to the mentioned post to give op a taste of their own medicine. It should be a last resort, which in this case, I feel it was.
PREACH!
