do u have any advice for dealing with ageism in fandom spaces especially if you're older? idk feels like anytime you wanna argue about a character or discuss meta, ppl act like you're suddenly too old for something or like it's an insult??
I mean I'm "older" too, which is to say, still fairly young but with a decade of actual out-of-college work experience and bills and such lol. Yeah, I see the ageism. Yes, it annoys me.
But here's the thing: if we're lucky, you age. Those people who are young and being brats will also age if they are lucky. Then they get to deal with the reality of getting older and realizing that there is no magic switch that turns you into an adult whose only interests are reading the Constitution and doing taxes. Who you are is whom you will become.
What I would advise people is to cling to what you love. That's not youth. That's not immaturity. That's what brings you delight in life. Life should have joys in the midst of *gestures at the hellscape of the world.* If those joys are fandom, good. Continue to indulge in it. It makes you smile.
Life's too short to avoid that because of what, people twenty years younger than you who worry about what's cool? Why should I care what you kids think about what brings me joy? You're just scared of getting older yourselves. It's hopefully gonna happen, inevitably, barring tragedy. Learn to invest in what you like when you're young. That's the advice I'de give young people. And the best way for older people to do that is to lead by example.
I also promise y'all that the best fanfics and such in your fandoms are mostly written by actual adults. Not entirely, of course, because I don't want to dismiss the value of young people either.
