#(i.e. people who almost never chat but emoji react to things)

[not-poignant]

Had a question. I've been in the Fae Tales Discord server for several months now, but a lot gets sent in it, and I don't have the time or energy to keep up with it. I end up basically lurking and reading what gets said without replying much beyond sticker replies. I feel bad about it, but I get really anxious whenever I try to be more active in the discord. It seems like you're all quite tight-knit and full of knowledge and wit. Is it bad if I just read along and don't say much? I can try more if that's better

Hi anon!

There's actually a ton of lurkers in the Fae Tales Discord and it's perfectly fine! I only know some of them when they emoji react to stuff and I love that. (Seriously we have some regular 'emoji react' lurkers and I get so excited when I see them reacting to stuff).

Fae Tales and my writing in general has always drawn in quite a few people with high anxiety and social anxiety, so it's only natural that the server itself would be totally fine with people who have to lurk. That's normal!

In fact, it even says in the rules:

"You can expect spoilery content if you haven't read everything (even outside of post-update-spoiler-chat), people talking too much about media, fae, politics, fandom, general silliness, a lot of lurking (you are also welcome to lurk), and a queer-friendly atmosphere."

Lurkers being welcome is codified into the rules and has been since the very beginning. Trust me anon, the only reason you don't realise you aren't alone in your social anxiety is because the other lurkers aren't talking ;)

(Also, it's perfectly fine to just chat once a month, or once every few months too. This happens! Though the chat might seem tight-knit, and some of us do turn up daily, there are folks who only chat once or twice a week, or once or twice a month, but have just been in the chat for so long that they're familiar.

Some folks turn up like 6 times a year. Some turn up once. Some just emoji react when it suits them. Some only visit one or two channels and have the rest muted. There's absolutely zero judgement no matter if / how often / when etc. you decide you want to participate. Folks can test out de-lurking and then lurk again, folks who have never lurked can try lurking for a while, and so on. It's literally there to work for you, in that sense. I'm sure you have way more knowledge and wit than you realise, but I can understand having social anxiety in group situations absolutely.

Imho, if you have high social anxiety, you can just mute it and then check occasionally for excerpts and fanart, because a lot of fanart gets posted there that never gets posted on Tumblr or even Instagram - and same with excerpts, so it can just be a good way to intermittently access things you wouldn't normally see otherwise)

(Also for folks who didn't realise there was a Fae Tales Discord / Discord for my writing, it's here!)