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angua9's essay on Appropriating vs. Appreciating.
She talks mostly about Pirates of the Caribbean and Harry Potter, because those are her fandoms. But I've seen a lot of the 'Appropriating vs. Appreciating' attitudes in Atlantis fandom over the last six months - my own behaviour and the behaviours of the fans in my segment of the world included - so I think this is relevant for Atlantis fandom as well.
Really, read the whole thing, but take note of the conclusion!
"I somewhat sort of understand why people seek their own personal version of fictional works, tweaked to fit their own tastes and interests, but I don't think I'll ever understand the vengeful anger they often seem to feel when something goes wrong with this, to the point that they're actively and openly rooting for the movie to tank at the box office, the show to get cancelled, or the next book to get remaindered. I don't understand why they seem to want everyone to agree with them that the work they used to love totally sucks now, and - most of all - why they want and expect sympathy and understanding for their pain. For myself, I'm too busy feeling sympathy and understanding for the poor authors who tried to provide an entertaining and satisfying fictional experience only to see it hijacked, distorted, misunderstood, and misinterpreted to feel pain for people who were maximizing their own pleasure. They chose the pain when they chose the pleasure is my feeling."
angua9's essay on Appropriating vs. Appreciating.She talks mostly about Pirates of the Caribbean and Harry Potter, because those are her fandoms. But I've seen a lot of the 'Appropriating vs. Appreciating' attitudes in Atlantis fandom over the last six months - my own behaviour and the behaviours of the fans in my segment of the world included - so I think this is relevant for Atlantis fandom as well.
Really, read the whole thing, but take note of the conclusion!
"I somewhat sort of understand why people seek their own personal version of fictional works, tweaked to fit their own tastes and interests, but I don't think I'll ever understand the vengeful anger they often seem to feel when something goes wrong with this, to the point that they're actively and openly rooting for the movie to tank at the box office, the show to get cancelled, or the next book to get remaindered. I don't understand why they seem to want everyone to agree with them that the work they used to love totally sucks now, and - most of all - why they want and expect sympathy and understanding for their pain. For myself, I'm too busy feeling sympathy and understanding for the poor authors who tried to provide an entertaining and satisfying fictional experience only to see it hijacked, distorted, misunderstood, and misinterpreted to feel pain for people who were maximizing their own pleasure. They chose the pain when they chose the pleasure is my feeling."
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Further on in the thread, someone points out that:
I'd actually extend that further and say that the more spectacularly
delusionalenthusiastic appropriators are the ones that identify so strongly with a character in the first place that they can't separate the fictional development of that character from the things they hope for for themselves: the character becomes a projection of everything that they'd like to be and to experience. Depending on exactly what the appropriator is dreaming of, you get either a Mary Sue or a rabid shipper (or some combination of the two).To be honest, this is the kind of appropriation that seems to be rampant in the SGA and SG1 fandoms: over-identification with character to the point where a slight to the character is a slight to the fan.
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