more fic than I expected

[tielan]

I took a look at the sga_flashfic tags last night while hunting up an old story of mine. And realised (to my shock) that I'd written 50+ Flashfics over the course of five years.

Fifty-something fics! o_O

I know I write a lot. But I feel very unproductive - probably because I write for the less-popular characters and pairings, and I don't write memorably, so in my head, it doesn't 'count'.

Comments

[thothmes]

I first noticed you here because I found your fiction memorable. You've pretty much moved on from SG-1 fic now, and that's about all I read, so you won't find me commenting much on most of your fan fic now. But I have no doubt it's memorable.

Then I found out that you had interesting things to say about fandom in general, and life at large, so here I am.

[tielan]

See, I like my fic, but I feel like only a handful of other people really enjoy it - and only then if I write about the "right" characters, pairings, and scenarios.

[thothmes]

In some senses that is right, but more because of the way the world is ( 1. For any given show there will be more people interested in the female lead and the male lead and their possible ships than anyone else. 2. Currently, this means that chances are the male lead's a white male, and the female lead's a white female.) but that doesn't mean that you shouldn't keep putting it out there.

The new National Geographic arrived here this week. They had a poster to commemmorate the fact that the human population will pass 7 billion (!) this year. The poster showed little humans figures, and if you put it on the wall it formed what they said is the "average" human face. It was a twenty-eight year old Han Chinese male, and they pointed out that in umm... maybe 30? (I forget exactly) years that face will be from the Indian Subcontinent.

The future will look a great deal more like you than like me, and we need to broaden our views.

I'm still mulling over what I've read of your Nano fic for this year, because I found it intriguing, and the main character compelling.

The most important thing is for you to like what you produce. If we out here are a handful, we're a happy handful, and the longer it's all out there, and the more there is, the more people will discover you from one thing, and take a chance on reading another.

There are always more people that read than that comment, and you may be sending ripples out into the world that don't echo back to you, but make an impression on the silent majority.

At least when you look at pageviews here the chances are higher that the viewers actually read what they saw. Published authors get sales figures, and they never know how many of those volumes actually exist only as expensive paperweights that are never opened.

[tielan]

Unfortunately, it doesn't matter who the majority are: the gatekeepers to information, authority, the legitimacy of heroism are all white and continue to put out that white people are the important ones, the leaders, and the true arbiters of what's morally right.

I don't see them giving that up anytime soon.

[thothmes]

I can very easily see why and how you feel that way. Your experience certainly legitimizes what you say. It is the way things are now.

Still, I am white. I don't claim to be any of that, and I don't view myself as one of the "them" that refuses to give up "our" stranglehold on the gatekeeping position. I don't view programs/movies/books as less interesting because they are not about people like me. But then I lived in Greece and Palestine as a kid, where I was the outsider because I was a white American. I also lived in center city Philadephia, where my Northern European complexion made me stand out like a sore thumb. I want to understand worlds and places and ways of life that are not mine, and will never be mine.

I think that ultimately, like the policemen in Tahrir Square, those who are the gatekeepers are going to be outnumbered and overwhelmed by the masses who are fed up with the status quo.

Yes, as long as Adventures of the Aryan and Entitled continue to sell like hotcakes, "they" will keep producing it, but more and more there will be people who want to tell their own tales, and with the newer technology that can produce beautiful HD product at relatively modest cost, a much wider pool will have access to the means of production, and consumers will vote with their eyeballs, their dollars, and in their vast numbers for the stories they want to see. And I bet that Adventures of the Aryan and Entitled won't be earning such wide ratings.

I have a strong feeling that the status quo will change in our lifetimes, and it will be in part because of people like you, the many people like you who say "Wait! I want to see some of my story out there!"

There will always be people who are afraid of change, and who fight to maintain the world the way it is. History shows that this is not a winning strategy.

[tielan]

*hugs*

Can I just say that I really really appreciate your comments? Not just here but, well, everywhere I see them - on other people's meta posts and life posts and fic posts. You've always got amazing, thinky thoughts and well-considered answers. And you respond, which sometimes is enough to keep people believing that there could be change.

[thothmes]

Thank you.

You couldn't have known, but it's been a wearing day in a wearing week, one of those where nothing big went bad, but I've been putting out sparks here and there constantly.

What you just said made my day.

[tielan]

Glad to have returned the favour. :)

*big hugs*

Go get some sleep - surely it's bedtime now for you?

[thothmes]

That's the theory.

As you may have guessed, I am very, very, very bad at bedtimes.

I think I have a permanent and very active inner five year old.

Come on, Mummy, just one more story?

Yeah. I should probably head to bed.

[tielan]

I'm bad at bedtimes, too. But I think I will have to be better, because I'm exhausted.