I just wanted to say that if you did decide to write a bit about the psychology of how people relate to fiction that would be SO COOL.
Thank you :D:D I might do it.
I just went and reblogged my older post about shipping and balance theory / cognitive consistency theories since that’s the most straightforward piece, but I do think it might be valuable to go into a lot more depth about the nonlinear ways in which we connect to fiction and the difference between apologia, propaganda, ‘normalizing’, and ‘romanticizing’ on the one hand, versus depiction, exploration, examination, and fantasy on the other hand.
To me that’s where the crux of so much fan debate comes from.
and then a further post to explore how we get to “how could you ship that ship, it’s evil/gross/abusive” on the one side and on the other its like the marge with a potato meme “i just think its neat”. and discussing where those feelings are actually coming from on both sides, and where the difficulty in reconciling them is.
(because fandom is a perfect example of the Moral Foundations Theory and literally everyone should reach Haidt’s research, even if I disagree with his ‘everything is perfectly equal and valid’ stance the insights are so freaking essential to understanding people!)
and then we can cycle back to cognitive dissonance and shipping debates and group dynamics and effort justification theory to explain why as soon as someone steps into the discourse it becomes incredibly difficult to break away, particularly if they are on the anti side of that debate (courtesy of the values and moral foundations of authority and loyalty that side tends to employ and the social dominance leanings...)
gosh i need to do a whole Fandom and Psychology series, don’t i?
