Random thoughts the second: On Hostility in the Fire Emblem Community, part 2
Yesterday, I published a post reflecting on an incident of harassment that took place in the Fire Emblem: Three Houses community on Tumblr. Today is the second half of that post, the part that is more relevant to most people. I will ramble more about why it’s important that everyone learn from things like that and how we can build a better community. (And perhaps it’s even more relevant today given an incident that took place on Twitter regarding Fire Emblem Heroes!) Please, read this post with an open mind. If I have changed even one person's outlook, I will consider it a success.
Let’s take a step back and zoom out to the broader ill that is impacting us: hostility. The vast majority of hostility is not high profile, extreme incidents like what happened to that fanartist a year ago. The vast majority of hostility are small things that are unfortunately normalized as everyday behavior. By this, I mean stuff like backhanded comments over a playstyle or mildly mean jokes about a favorite character. It’s not extreme, but it is what causes the most harm altogether. The low-impact behaviors do add up because they are far more frequent. They wear down other people and cause them to become less open to participating in the community. This is what leads to people getting bad impressions from interacting with our fanbase or with specific sectors of our fanbase.
Perhaps the bigger issue with hostility is the impact on self. If you fall into this bad habit of being aggressive towards others, you will personally experience several bad effects. Firstly, you will be training yourself to assume bad faith in others – in other words, you turn into the metaphorical hammer that sees everything as a nail. You also isolate yourself from other people. Both of these things make you more likely to get comfortable with things that shouldn’t be happening in our community. Of course, being passive-aggressive one time is not a slippery slope that leads to committing grave harms against other people, but one must remember that all hostile behaviors form part of the same continuum. Most of all, you lose a sense of why you joined fandom in the first place. I highly doubt you joined the fandom to get into petty arguments with people. No, you joined the fandom because you felt an invitation in your heart to get out and talk about what you love, to create content about what you love. Getting into petty arguments, turning hostile against other people, being mean is only a distraction.
Everyone knows that this is a problem. I don’t have to point to extreme incidents like the one I reflected on yesterday to show that it’s a problem – you could probably ask any friend if they’ve experienced someone being mean, and they would say yes. It’s not exclusive to any subsectors either, not to debates about Three Houses nor to the elitists fighting the Awakening/Fates babies nor to playstyle debates as seen recently on Reddit. It’s a problem across the community.
What is the answer to this? How can we stop hostility? The antidote is simple: it is love. Specifically, it is charity, the pure love which is the recognition of the humanity within oneself and others. Charity is the foundation of the bond that brings us all together in this community to talk about the video games and other media that we love. Nurturing the virtue of charity not only decreases the hostility that one gives towards others but also helps one resist hostility towards other people. Someone truly motivated by charity tries their best to be welcoming to all people. I mean it when I say all people: there are no exceptions to the category of people whom you should be charitable towards. It is quite radical to say this, but it’s the truth: the only way we will get better as a community is if we are willing to extend a charitable attitude towards everyone.
What about people who are saying dumb things? (I don’t mean things that one would disagree with, I mean truly bad ideas or opinions that a reasonable person would say is wrong.) Should we be hostile to them? No! Being hostile only makes them dig in deeper. If you want to be charitable, you can try to politely explain why what they are doing is wrong. We aren’t perfect and we’re not ready for that all the time, so if you don’t feel like explaining, just ignore and block. Being rude to the person will only make the situation worse.
How about people who are hostile themselves? Surely giving them a taste of their own medicine is warranted, right? Also no! You are only feeding into their perception that they are the victim. I understand that humans want to get revenge, but a tit for tat does not solve the problem. It only makes it worse. Hate and anger are not solved by more hate and more anger. Love is what washes away the flames of anger. One who is overtaken by the flames of love will have no room for anger within their heart. So if you meet someone who is being hostile, either ignore them or reach out and invite them to share in your love, share your compassion with them, let them know that you are willing to reach out to them and understand them. Who knows – a simple act of compassion could be enough to change someone’s life!
I understand that our nature means that we humans are not perfect. We are all susceptible to having off days where we are a bit mean. If that happens, do not be afraid to apologize for what you did. It doesn’t undo what happened, yes, but when you apologize, you make yourself vulnerable and invite others to share in your vulnerability. In fact, even if you did something really bad in your past, do not be afraid to apologize! Other people may not accept it, but your willingness to apologize is a necessary first step to changing and making yourself an agent of love rather than an agent of hate.
Many of you would say that it is idealistic to expect that a community can be free of hatred or anger or hostility. I agree – it is a fact that in a community of our size, there will always be some sour grapes. But that doesn’t mean that we have to accept it. Imagine how much better we would be if all the energy spent on hostility, on gossip, on petty arguments, on bigotry, and everything else negative was spent instead on building each other up. We can work to change this one step at a time, starting with ourselves. If we each change ourselves, we can change those around us. Little acts can make big differences!
In a separate post, I will publish a self-reflection, or examination of conscience if you will. It’s a way to take a step back and consider what you have or have not been doing with the community. I try to ask myself questions like this regularly because I think it is useful for evaluating what I have been doing and whether it has been good or bad. It won’t work for everyone, but I encourage you to take a look at it.
I will conclude by returning to the metaphor of the invitation, the invitation to partake in this community. To this day, people still say YES to the invitation to partake in our community even as so much strife continues to take place. This is through the effort of people who are willing to be welcoming, who are willing to open up their heart and share their love with others. That invitation is still on the table for us. Every day, we must respond to the invitation to bond with others in our community with a resounding yes. Yes, I want to talk about the Fire Emblem series with other people! Yes, I want to form bonds with other people! Yes, I want to make as many other people feel welcome! Yes, I want to give love and charity to other people just as others have given it to me. Let us help ourselves and others to accept that invitation, every day, from now on. It will not undo what happened in the past, nor will it make everything perfect in the future, but if we try, we will succeed.
