"I like my shota sweet and hardcore, like I like my yaoi."
- CLAMPisbest 07-15-2006, 08:02 PM on Tokyopop Message Board
I've been reading the hilariously angry writing of the Ex-fansubber. Her sentiment a survey of anti-yaoi fangirl articles that was taken by Renegade Anime Blog back in 2006. This includes the landmark rant at Tainted Blogs by Ashley, which summed up the complaints about yaoi fangirls
- They take their yaoi too seriously for the non-yaoi fans to relate to.
- They are authoritative in their ignorance.
- Some of them are too loud and disruptive on forum and at Cons, therefore hard to ignore.
The purpose of this rumination is to explore the basis of the heated reactions at work. Toward the end of an earlier post, I touched on creation versus consumption as way to deepen my appreciation of the hobby. The alternate probably would have been lessening the amount of time and interest, getting out of the hobby.
I think that all fans reach this point. After the initial surge of interest, the question becomes "what's next?" And the answers are to deepen the interest or pull back. As an example, Ex-Fansubber creates doujinshi, attends cons (at least for now), and maintains a formidable blog; this is one fan who entrenched in the hobby. This process of deepening interest plateaus, because there are limits to time and energy. However, over a period of time, people generally will stop watching, become casual viewers, or become devoted fans . [2]
In this process of becoming a hard-core fan, the hobbyist 1) develops a stronger sense of discernment or taste and 2) crosses a line into ownership or identity.
Let's trace the development of a hypothetical fan to illustrate these ideas. Otaku A gets hooked from Escaflowne [3] and enjoys shounen romances and a smattering of shojo. He watches a load of other mecha shows and swords and sorcery. He builds a collection. As Otaku A's experience grows, a baseline of expectation is established.
A show just about robots isn't going to excite him, unless it's well done or does something new. He develops definite categories of quality: unwatchable, mediocre (I've seen this before), good, etc. He can identify the tropes (high school transfer student, childhood friend, mega-sweat drop). In a way, Otaku A has become a bit jaded. On the other hand, his interest has led him to dig through the available information and read up on the nitty-gritty production details (directors, animators, seiyuu) and seek out like minded people who he likes to talk shop with.
As Otaku A invests more time and energy into anime, his opinions are going to be more important to him. This doesn't mean that he's going to start flame wars, but by refining his sense of "good", what is not good becomes "bad". Ex-fansubber and Renegade obviously judge much or most or, perhaps, all of yaoi in the "not good"category. The second part of my description, delves into why the reactions are so heated.
Language is revealing in hobbies. Observe a sports fan. He'll talk about who "we acquired", that "we couldn't stop their passing game", or "we suck." This is an obvious change from "I am a person who watches the BoSox" to "we hate the Evil Empire". [4] The anime hobbyist goes from watching something on the screen to identifying as a fan or an otaku. This invokes the root of fanatic back into the term fan. In other words, the fan participation has crossed from isolated acts into regular behavior.
These language tags go beyond semantics, because they are signs of ownership. The thought collection on a forum, the physical space at a convention, and the social construct of a fandom become precious to Otaku A and potentially for all the fans out there. Even if Otaku A could brush off loudness as a casual rudeness, he may still take umbrage at the fan girls who run around as described in the above posts. [5] The behavior that he finds detracting also detracts from a part of his own identity.
Whether the heat is legitimate or not, is a question for another post. And it's not one that I'm going to tackle at the moment.
= = =
[1] The title is thanks to my older brother, who reminded me of the other half of the Tao of Pooh.
[2] This may be a big assumption on my part, but my experience has borne this out. Free time is scarce for most people, and they are actively searching for enjoyment and entertainment. Note the verbs, this is a dynamic process.
The opposite of dynamic is static or stagnation, which itself is not a state of equilibrium, but of a spiral downward. This intuitively makes sense when you think of someone sitting or standing still, while time moves inexorably forward.
[3] OK, I admit that it's kind of old school, but it's what I know.
[4] Though in actuality, you Bostonians ARE an Evil Empire now.
[5] And if he'd wanted to get spanked, he would have gotten hazed by Sigma-Upsilon-Kappa back in college.
