It is part of what I'm researching, and it turns out nearly everyone (barring two) who responded was in fandom of some kind before finding footballslash. It may not have always been "big slash fandom" (there's a lot of anime and various band fandoms, and as someone who was in 'various band fandoms' I'm not surprised at that) but there was always some other fandom involved.
The parts that show up on Fandom Wank when I was reading it was pretty much all het fandom? I can't say I know much about it, but if you end up there you don't exactly get to claim maturity. Maybe you're not looking in the right place? (And, well, canon fanfiction, at least to me, is boring. That's what the canon is for. You don't need to rewrite the text if what you want is provided in it.)
I keep insisting you're being blamey because it sounds that way to me? It's very much "why aren't they all doing what I want what's wrong with them" couched in words of concern for the societal misogyny that these poor lambs are buying into. It's extraordinarily condescending, especially since you put it in terms of "maturity" and talk about how much better you are (than everyone else) now that you've figured it all out. I know that's probably not what you're going for, but that's the way it comes across. Especially since you don't know what everyone is doing in other fandoms. It comes across as blaming the people in this fandom who want to write about relationships between footballers - who respond to the relationships and characters they see presented in the media, and want to engage with and interpret them - for not instead responding to the minor female characters that you have to dig extremely deep to even find, much less develop a character to interpret. Instead of saying "hey I'm interested in football hetfic is anyone else interested in that?" you came out swinging, insisting that anyone who isn't interested in hetfic in this fandom is just not at your rarified level, without even engaging in the issues surrounding (the lack of) female representation in football. That's why it seems like you're blaming the fandom instead of trying to find a space for het in it.
(That's fine. I'm not saying you have to be interested in Ulrike, it just struck me as odd that since you were insisting that we pay attention to the women involved in football but that you couldn't imagine being interested in her without being interested in her man. Hell, there's plenty in football fandom I am not at all interested in - I am having to force myself to read things about Daniel Agger and Fernando Torres and whoever's on Atletico Bilbao so I can write about them for my thesis, because I just do not find them interesting at all. I'm actually very picky with who I'll even read about. I have to be interested in a character already in some way, otherwise my eyes will sort of glaze over and I can't pay attention any more. Even reading most Spain NT fic is a bit of a chore for me.)
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2012-06-03 11:24 am (UTC)The parts that show up on Fandom Wank when I was reading it was pretty much all het fandom? I can't say I know much about it, but if you end up there you don't exactly get to claim maturity. Maybe you're not looking in the right place? (And, well, canon fanfiction, at least to me, is boring. That's what the canon is for. You don't need to rewrite the text if what you want is provided in it.)
I keep insisting you're being blamey because it sounds that way to me? It's very much "why aren't they all doing what I want what's wrong with them" couched in words of concern for the societal misogyny that these poor lambs are buying into. It's extraordinarily condescending, especially since you put it in terms of "maturity" and talk about how much better you are (than everyone else) now that you've figured it all out. I know that's probably not what you're going for, but that's the way it comes across. Especially since you don't know what everyone is doing in other fandoms. It comes across as blaming the people in this fandom who want to write about relationships between footballers - who respond to the relationships and characters they see presented in the media, and want to engage with and interpret them - for not instead responding to the minor female characters that you have to dig extremely deep to even find, much less develop a character to interpret. Instead of saying "hey I'm interested in football hetfic is anyone else interested in that?" you came out swinging, insisting that anyone who isn't interested in hetfic in this fandom is just not at your rarified level, without even engaging in the issues surrounding (the lack of) female representation in football. That's why it seems like you're blaming the fandom instead of trying to find a space for het in it.
(That's fine. I'm not saying you have to be interested in Ulrike, it just struck me as odd that since you were insisting that we pay attention to the women involved in football but that you couldn't imagine being interested in her without being interested in her man. Hell, there's plenty in football fandom I am not at all interested in - I am having to force myself to read things about Daniel Agger and Fernando Torres and whoever's on Atletico Bilbao so I can write about them for my thesis, because I just do not find them interesting at all. I'm actually very picky with who I'll even read about. I have to be interested in a character already in some way, otherwise my eyes will sort of glaze over and I can't pay attention any more. Even reading most Spain NT fic is a bit of a chore for me.)