#but the show obviously loves louis and is interested in exploring his psyche so i hope they keep it up w this and add more layers | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

aintgonnatakethis · 3 months ago

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@worlds-tallest-fairy Not eaten, I'm just a criminally slow replier I'm afraid 😭

Yeah, apart from Spencer there aren't any actual breakdowns as such, are there? Surprising, as I reckon cabin fever would set in pretty damn quickly given the dismal situation they've found themselves in. The stones are the one thing keeping them mentally sane, but physically sane? Their bodies never get a break and that has to wear at them. For Rush, do you think the lack of stimulation would good/bad for him? I've found becoming overstimulated with autism to be extremely easy, and the lack of it to be pleasant, though I do have moments where my ADHD demands the opposite. Agree it would have been interesting to explore the dynamics of those on board from a mental health perspective more, beyond the psych evals that last only one episode. Long term depression, hypervigilance, PTSD, understimulation, lack of sunlight, starvation, dehydration… Some of them would be way more fucked up after 2 years up there than they are in the show imo.

I don't think there's any way in hell Rush would be able to pass a proper psych eval tbh, so I reckon the SGC rubberstamped him. Certainly not an uncommon thing where the military is concerned, who are far more more interested in what uses they can make of people than their members' health, physical or mental. Though I do have a section in the Telford-recruits-Rush fic I wrote during lockdown with Telford coaching Rush through the particulars of what questions he'll be asked, and Valium being a common thing to acquire from senior military medical personnel before the 'interviews'. I don't know if the latter is common irl obviously, but I can't see the military being a very "woke" environment, to put it mildly. Linking back to toxic masculinity, I imagine that ideas like PTSD = shellshock = cowardice are still quite common. So Rush wouldn't want to show weakness and the shrinks wouldn't want to see any weakness, which leaves Rush in a real bad place mentally.

I LOVE the idea of his neurodivergence making it so the chair accepts him easier than others! Hell, Destiny too. She never speaks to anyone else, right? (I need me another rewatch!) So maybe the unique way his brain works makes him the perfect person to do it all: break the cyphers, sit in the chair, talk to Destiny, carry out her mission. It makes me think of Telford saying to McKay: "What is it with genius and social skills?"

(plus can we discuss him thinking it was still Rush in David’s body and refusing to space Kiva and her people?? Because, despite their friendship, I truly believe Young would’ve spaced David for the greater good. He would’ve hated himself for it, but he would’ve at least given it more thought. I’m talking myself into OT3 territory here.)

Ahhh, I'm afraid I have an unpopular opinion about that scene. 😂 I think he sees David's body combat roll out of the gate and knows that it's David. I wouldn't call Rush clumsy, but neither would I call him graceful, and certainly not in a military-style way. So my thought process is that he only just got his best friend back, and can't bring himself to kill him again (even though the logical solution to that situation would be to vent the room and have TJ standing by to instantly provide CPR to David. Hell, they wouldn't even have to vent the room all the way, would they? Just enough to have everyone on the ground gasping for air and then they could amass at every entrance and storm the place… Or the most sensible thing which would be to vent the room pre-invasion, and then all the Lucians would have just stepped through into a vacuum. Anyway 🤷‍♂️) Both ways of viewing the scene are legit, don't get me wrong, I just have my David blinkers welded to my head by this point lmao

I would have really liked for the audience to see the actual body and not who's inhabiting it more. For that moment when the captured alien screams and it could've been Louis Ferreira and for seeing Lou Diamond Phillips in that jacket, but also for the shits and giggles. Have you ever watched Farscape? There's a bodyswap episode in that where the audience doesn't get their hand held and it was really fun seeing the acting choices everyone made.

I love Dom!Rush, specifically your take on it. I think he is in danger of being type casted, not unlike Young views him, as a submissive “not-doing-domination/masculinity-right” man vs. who he shows himself to be and the background you can read into him.

YES! Fandom in general does that so much: takes the smaller, shorter guy and automatically makes him the sub, or at the very least the bottom. Why I have to ask myself, when Young and Telford are right there! Imo it's so much hotter for the big tough guy to be the one being fucked! Telford especially gives me massive sub vibes lol

Me again! *waves*

So what are your thoughts on where Rush falls on the identity spectrum? (I’m thinking aspec specifically but also just in general). Any head canons for him specifically?

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh @worlds-tallest-fairy you've activated me, and have joined @tragedycoded in asking a simple question and getting an essay long infodump for your troubles! 😁 I offer you a great many thoughts about Doctor Nicholas Rush, below the cut because LONG LONG LONG

I've always thought of him as demisexual for sure. I can't for the life of me remember where I wrote it (the ADHD makes everything blur together: stuff I've actually written, stuff I've only talked about, stuff I've read, stuff I've daydreamed; so I never know where my headcanons come from >.<) but I do distinctly remember writing Rush telling Young that Gloria was the only woman he's ever slept with. Young's response was something like: "I bet she really liked that", in typical Young fashion completely missing the point!

I've seen him also classed as demiromantic, but I like to lean towards the Love At First Sight trope for him when it comes to Gloria. There must be a specific label for people who experience romantic attraction but only very very rarely, right? Personally I think that would be a good fit for him, and he'd still fall under the aromantic umbrella.

I don't think he has a gender preference for either sexual or romantic encounters. Intelligence and the ability to engage with someone on an intellectual level are far more important factors for him. Was 'sapiosexual/romantic' deemed to be a problematic term? I can't remember, but as a descriptor I feel it works for him. He wouldn't be able to form a connection with someone if they couldn't meet him stroke for stroke mentally. A friend once said that the way he banters with Young is verbal sparing as a love language and they couldn't have been more right!

As for other headcanons, I agree with the popular ones of him being autistic and that he was abused as a child, though for the latter the general use I see is that it was his father who was the abusive one, while I think it's much more interesting if it was his mother. There would be an extra layer of shame there due to society's views on gender and how gender roles/stereotypes are "supposed" to work.

As for my own headcanons… I think he worked on the docks in Glasgow when he was a boy, as back then it would be the easiest way he'd be able to get honest work, and Glasgow as a costal city would have had a booming fishing trade. In the 450k fic I wrote during lockdown, I have this interaction between Rush and Telford (excerpt starts halfway through a scene - Gloria's still alive when Telford recruits Rush and he's driven them to her doctor's appointment. Him and Rush are in the waiting room. Link near the start is to another excerpt which explains the eel thought.)

Telford sat and Rush began to pace. There was a slight ache in his wrists which he presumed was from recoil and it helped ground him as he made laps of the room. The fish were still there; he counted them this time: seven. He hoped the tank was large enough for seven. He knew that fish required more space than was obvious. He could feel Telford’s eyes on him, but didn’t have anything particular to say to him so didn’t turn around. He watched the fish swim to and fro and thought about how different their movements were to that of the Goa’uld. Maybe if he watched eels, like Telford had said, he would see similarities. He wondered if intelligence factored into the way you moved, or whether it was instinctual. What was the most intelligent fish? He knew dolphins were smart. He had the impression that seahorses were too but wasn’t sure where he’d received that piece of information. Were seahorses fish? He supposed they must be. When he pictured fish he didn’t think of seahorses or dolphins or these small pretty things in front of him. He thought of solid and grey and gasping. They were always so fucking cold.

“So,” Telford said from just behind his shoulder. Rush jumped because the state of the room hadn’t had Telford in that position a second ago. A long awkward moment passed where it was obvious that Telford had noticed and it was equally as obvious that he was resisting the urge to say something about it, maybe out of respect of where they were or from a fear that if he said the wrong thing Rush would snap apart. “I’m watching the fish,” Rush said tightly. “You like fish?” Telford asked, sounding careful but almost drifting into boredom despite himself. Rush hooked a hand over his shoulder in an ineffectual attempt to create some sort of barrier between them. “Not particularly.” “You said you knew how to spear fish.” Rush thought this was a strange thing to say. He looked around. He couldn’t see any way to access the tank and nothing that could be fashioned into a spear. He felt if he said that then Telford might produce a spear out of his back pocket in typical absurd fashion. “I don’t think they’d approve of us killing these fish,” he said instead. Telford laughed and the sound relaxed something in him Rush couldn’t put a name to. “It’s not exactly a common talent.” It took a moment for Rush to realise that Telford was asking him a question, and maybe complimenting him at the same time. He knew that normally he would shy away from sharing personal information, even if that information didn’t seem technically relevant. But this wasn’t a normal place; he didn’t like doctors or waiting rooms, and he didn’t like fish either. Suddenly he didn’t want to be looking at them anymore, so he turned his back and lent against the glass, transferring his focus to Telford. “I worked on fishing boats when I was a kid,” he said, trying to resist the urge to throw up. He couldn’t decide whether the genuine interest in Telford’s eyes was calming or disturbing. “It was an applicable skillset.” Telford watched him for a few seconds, and then spoke quietly, “I only learned to swim when I was fourteen.” This, Rush thought, was an incredibly pertinent slice of data. It narrowed the possible places Telford could have grown up considerably. Maybe somewhere within this desert’s radius? Rush didn’t know how many deserts there were in America. He knew there were Great Lakes somewhere but couldn’t have pointed them out on a map even if there was a gun to his head. But it still took huge swaths of the country out of the equation: no coastline, nowhere near lakes or large rivers and a great many places had those things. Give me a map, Rush thought, and I’ll show you where you could have come from.

He smiled. “I can’t imagine you being fourteen.” Telford ducked his head and grinned. He looked very charming like that. Rush imagined a fourteen year old Telford flailing about in a pool and found it very amusing. Telford spoke softly, looking up through his eyelashes, “Tell me how to spear fish.” Rush didn’t have the faintest clue how David managed to make that sound flirtatious. What a preposterous idea: to bond in any way over the killing of another creature. Have you ever tortured anyone? Have you ever killed an alien? So what, he was a hypocrite? He didn’t give a shit. “You have to stand very still,” he said. He was holding eye contact and it felt as if he wasn’t able to drag himself away. “If you move they’ll know what you’re doing. You can’t let them know you.” Telford shifted his weight so he was leaning into Rush’s space. The glass at Rush’s back felt very unforgiving as far as any attempt at retreat was concerned. “You’re talking about doing it by hand?” Telford’s voice was quiet and impressed and Rush wanted more of it desperately.

“Yeah.” He lifted his hand and made a spear-stabbing motion. Telford definitely looked appreciative now. “I thought you meant with a spear gun.” Rush shook his head, feeling a little like he was the one underwater instead of the fish behind him. “The fishermen didn’t have that kind of money. We used spears and nets.” Telford’s eyes flicked down over Rush, almost quick enough to miss. “You gut them too?” “Yeah.” The word almost stuck in his throat. He could remember the blood coming from the fishs’ gills after they were cut and how it always seemed like such a small amount of blood to possess. Rush had always thought that fish should be larger than they were, and therefore have more blood. He assumed the idea had come from a childish mind. “I bet you’d look good with a knife.” Rush came back from the visions of blood to find Telford very close, one hand resting on the glass next to Rush’s head. He didn’t want to do this here. It didn’t fit. It wasn’t exact. It didn’t make sense in the context he’d been given. Telford moved and there was a hand drifting gently up and down Rush’s arm. Rush shifted away. “Nick?”

Rush wrapped his arms around himself, as if somehow that would make a difference. “I’m sorry.” He’d entered into something he couldn’t finish. Why did he have to lead people on like this? What did he think was going to happen when he started talking about killing things? He knew what David was like. Why couldn’t he think of these things ahead of time? Why did he always do this? “I feel very guilty right now.” At least that was the truth, even if Telford would draw a different conclusion than what the reality actually was. Rush’s face felt hot at the blatant weakness he was showing. “You shouldn’t feel guilty,” Telford said slowly. “You’re not doing anything.” He was right, Rush tried to grasp. Telford was the one who was leaning forward, invading his space. Rush was just standing here. He wasn’t doing anything. He couldn’t quite convince himself. He let out a self-deprecating, scornful laugh. “You think mere action affects guilt.”

“If thoughts were a crime I think we’d have bigger problems.” Telford very deliberately placed his hand back on Rush’s arm, left it there a few long moments, and then withdrew entirely, taking a few steps to the side and leaning against the glass himself. Rush watched him watch the fish. He didn’t seem angry about the sudden change of direction. If Rush had been in his place, he would have. He would have felt hard done by. He didn’t want Telford to think he wasn’t up to this. He would have continued their conversation if they’d been elsewhere, just not here.

So he's a strong swimmer (though it would depend on if he kept up with it in California as to how strong, as the muscles you use for swimming will get weaker if unused just like any other muscle), and an apt catcher-of-fish. It always annoys me when we have the Young-and-Rush-stranded-on-a-planet-together trope and Rush proves himself to have negative points in his Survival Stat. Not only because of the spear-fishing thing, but also because he grew up in poverty - he would have had to steal and learn certain skills to be able to survive. He definitely wouldn't be useless! Hell, another headcanon is his criminal activity history which I'll get to in a second, but I bet he could rig up some snares as well, from sneaking onto the posh estates' land for rabbits and the like.

Now, crime!

Not too long ago I did a felony bingo tag game for pre-canon Rush, and I came to the conclusion that Rush as a kid had shit going on. He had a lot of run-ins with the police, starting from when he was 8 and acting as an early warner for street dealers, to waiting until rich people went on holiday and robbing their houses, to his discovery that he rather enjoys setting things on fire! 😈 I couldn't quite manage to get a bingo sadly, but I'm interested to know what you think?

As for Gloria, Rush was terrified of meeting her parents because her family were rich and therefore he assumed they'd hate him. Her parents however turned out to be the sweetest people. Her brother was the twerp.

That made Gloria's lips twitch in amusement. Despite her not liking him fighting she did value his strength. Rush could still clearly recall the look of restrained glee on her face when he had punched her brother in the nose, the man having spoken down to him once too often.

I also remember writing a bit in the 450k lockdown fic where Rush tells Telford about hitting Gloria's brother and how from the expression on his face it was the first time he'd been hit in his entire life, and the two of them having a Masculine Bonding Moment™ over it, but I can't find it in the mess that is my filing system (multiple stories in one document with no way of finding specific pieces unless I can remember the exact wording for CTRL+F 💀)

I think he's also got some ADHD going on, though it's undiagnosed the same as the autism. Technically there is free healthcare in the UK, but only at what I would call the 'point of sale'. You can go to a general practitioner and be prescribed meds (unless they're specialised medications which can only be prescribed by a specialist - stimulant ADHD meds being one example - and then you have to go on a looooong waiting list), but you still very much have to pay for the prescriptions. It's obviously cheaper than in the US, but having just looked at my prescription list, if I didn't have a prescription prepayment certificate - which is £114.50 a year - I would instead be paying £1,306.80 a year, which would be impossible to maintain. Fairly, I'm on quite a few meds, but Rush's parents - being the shits they are - wouldn't want to even try to fork out a fraction of that, never mind drive him to any appointments. And after he'd got away from them, he wouldn't try to get diagnosed because of the idea that asking for help = weakness that's been drilled into him.

He's obviously got problems with authority, and I think it's worse when it comes specifically from other men. He's gentle with Chloe in a way he would never be if she were a man. I think this stems from suffering extreme bullying from other men for his entire life, due to the way he looks, speaks, etc. Men like Young who think they're automatically better than him because they're more masculine… Well, I'll have to do a separate post to infodump about Young, but Rush has met a lot of men like him who instantly dismiss him as weak or in need of protection or not up to the task of Being A Man because he's small and has long hair and glasses and isn't performing masculinity correctly. This could tie into the headcanon I've seen going around the last few years of him being a trans man - there are a lot of really interesting discussions going on in the trans community about masculinity, the demand of a performance of it, and the societal consequences for perceived failure that I really relate to. Before people started writing trans Rush I'd deliberately avoided reading anything in any fandom (or indeed media in general) that depicted trans people, due to the fear of transphobia cropping up. I get enough of that irl - I didn't want to accidently stumble across it in my downtime, you know? Thankfully that hasn't happened in the SGU fandom, but I still wouldn't venture into other fandoms to read trans stuff and I also don't know if I'd want to write it myself.

But coming back from that tangent, this attitude he's been received with his whole life informs the way he is now with men like Young: impatient, dismissive, defensive; because he knows the doubt in his abilities is coming, and he's sick and tired of trying to prove himself to people who make snap judgements about him. For example when Young makes the truly absurd leap that Rush knew Destiny would recharge fine in the sun and let them launch the shuttle with a ton of a supplies on it anyway, Rush doesn't even try to defend himself. He's thinking 'what's the point? Why should I put in an imbalanced amount of emotional labour to convince people I'm innocent when there'll just be something else to mistrust me over tomorrow, whether I'm guilty or not?' He keeps secrets like the bridge because he's so used to having to make himself indispensable, otherwise people will discard him at the first opportunity.

I do find it really interesting that he 100% doesn't expect physical violence from Young. When Young tells him he knows about the whole framing-for-murder thing, Rush approaches him without fear. I could even go so far as to say it's a bad acting choice because 1. Rush knows men like Young are violent due to past experience and 2. Young's body language is clearly predicting violence: stepping back when Rush approaches so that they're on level ground and squaring his body straight on. Rush should recognise shit like that! But when Young punches him, there's explicit shock on Rush's face. I want to come up with an explanation for why he doesn't expect violence from an angry wronged military man. What do you think?

What other headcanons do I got… He's good at Domming, not only the main event but the pre and post requirements as well. He has a phobia-like reaction to dealing with his finances due to growing up poor, so Gloria handled everything to do with money. He baits people because he knows they'll hate/hit/etc him soon anyway, so he gets ahead of it and says/does things that make people hate/hit him and that way he's still the one in control. He is super self-sabotaging.

Phew! I'm gonna go have a lie down 😂 Am excited to hear other peoples' thoughts as always!

#worlds-tallest-fairy #sgu

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laurapearson1-blog · 7 years ago

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Discuss the role of affect and emotion in art, fan works and practices.

Laura Pearson BA Fine Art Central Saint Martins Unit 6 Essay

‘Celebrity is the religion of our consumer society. And fans are the mythical adepts of this religion who dramatize moods, fantasies and expectations we all share. You may find their intensity unusual or alarming but that is because no one has ever allowed them to express their feelings so comprehensively’ (Vermorel, 1985, p.247). This essay will discuss how affect and emotion is so obviously present throughout art and fan practices, the different forms in which this is translated into and the problems/questions raised when this emotion is fixated upon. To look comparatively between the every day fan and the extremities of certain fan practices will give an insight into how affect and emotion manifests itself within fan culture.

The affect theory is a concept introduced within the works of philosopher Baruch Spinoza. In his comprehensive analytical study of religion and spirituality, Spinoza describes affects as ‘states of mind and body related to (but not exactly synonymous with) feelings and emotion” (Spinoza, 1667). This transmitting alter conscious state passed between bodies is referenced to a physical affect, ‘affects circulate publicly or are transmitted contagiously’. (Kluchin, 2013) An example of this is saliva being produced by the mouth when shown a photograph of a chocolate cake, or a fan fainting at a concert. The transformation of the emotive to the tangible becomes a noticeable affect, influencing physical behaviour. When the affect is studied through the lens of art, the theory becomes a subconscious notion that is established within most practices. The artist is always attached to the work they make. Drawing on personal experience, the input of emotion is unavoidable for work to be truly authentic. Feeling is engrained in both the process of making and viewing art and it is understood that many works have astounding affects on the human psyche.

Conceptual art, whilst being incredibly emotive is often removed from itself. There is an invisible intellectual boundary between the work and the audience. A new modernity, the altermodern (Bourriaud, 2009) emerges within the field of contemporary art. In terms of exploration and critical thinking it is extremely progressive; the constant introduction of new ideas transgresses with the socio-normative expectations of society, creating a platform for those who naturally break away from the norm. Shia Lebouf’s stunt at the film premiere of Nymphomaniac (2013) where he wore a brown paper bag over his head reading ‘I AM NOT FAMOUS ANYMORE’, transgressed against the high-brow culture of film festivals and red carpet events. (Frey, 2016, p.24)

Fig.1: Lebouf, 2014.

Fig. 2: Emin, 1995

Tracey Emin’s drawings of herself as a young girl uses a particular medium to come to terms with traumatic events in her life. Her work is an ‘uncompromising self-examination: the effort to confront all aspects of her existence,’ (Kieran, 2009). Labelled controversial due to the explicit nature of the drawings, she is directly transgressing the societal perception of young girls and sexuality in relation to abuse. Louis Althusser’s theory of interpellation details the way in which ideas are never simply our own, they are put upon us from birth and significantly shape our lives. However, we believe cultural ideals as if they were our own to the extent in which they have a never ending hold on us, (Mowitt, 2002). Transgression is directly correlative of interpellation, to not transgress would be to accept these ‘ready made’ specific roles that are already coined for us by society. In the modern day politically hostile environment these ideas become key to the artist and a necessity for the wider viewer. Contemporary artists have to correspond with and respond to current climates, yet this necessary but often burdening contextual ‘excess’ on top of the artists core passion and emotion can create a barrier between the work and the viewer. When studied comparatively in relation to fan made practices this barrier becomes very evident. The complex nature of fan culture can be significantly more black and white than that of conceptual art; there is no ‘excess’ in fan made works as the process of making is very different. An artist considers audience, context, space, time etc yet a fan is driven solely by idolisation and passion, (Halter, 2009). The unfiltered and often strongly emotional response produced from this fan driven pride is simply a manifestation of passion. Here we can begin to understand how the affect theory plays heavily into fan culture. A shared consciousness and intelligence is created and the mindset of the fandom is spoken about as a ‘collective’ rather than multiple individual voices, (Fiske, 1992).

In order to recognise this collective, creative output, we can refer to individual fan practices. In their simplest form they appear as alternate narratives to already existing works, an example of this being fan fictions and works created to prolong the story of a favourite tv show. The popular programme Sherlock Holmes has a huge cult following. Fans create memes in order to identify their ‘OTP’ (one true pairing), re-thinking and re-writing already published storylines.

Fig. 3: MarFitzherbetFletch, (2015)

There are many examples of this kind of response within popular culture. Artists Ian Forsyth and Jayne Pollard base their entire practice around the reenactment of prevalent icons. They perform staged live recreations of David Bowie’s legendary farewell concert as Ziggy Stardust in A Rock and Roll Suicide, (Forysth, Pollard, 1998) and have the world’s longest running Kiss tribute band (see Kiss my Nauman, 2007). When the TV series comes to an end, the band retires and the film finishes, there is an empty void to be filled by the fan’s desire to materialise alternate plot lines and endings. The fan never capitalises from this work unlike the artist who comments on the very nature of fan practice; the fan is involving themselves within a ‘gift economy’, (Hellekson, 2009), where work isn’t necessarily ever purchased and consistently made for free. An amateur, or ‘lover of’, defines those attached to a particular vocation in an gratuitous manner. In terms of fan practice, one could say all fans are amateurs. In the book Passionate Amateurs, (Ridout, 2013) the word is characterised as ‘someone whose work is undertaken within capitalism, but is motivated by a love that desires something different - and can thus make us think afresh about notions of work, time, and freedom.’ No monetary value is placed upon fan work, unlike professional art practices. This presents the singular, most principal motive for production; passion. We can understand emotion and obsession as also being driving forces behind this. A fan is not a societal defined ‘expert’. He or she is an amateur in their field, gaining nothing but self satisfaction and acceptance from a particular community for their tireless dedication to an idol.

Since the early to the mid twentieth century, musicians have countlessly been bombarded by overly excited teenage girls. The Beatles ceased to play live concerts as their music could not be heard over the screams of their fans in the audience (Fandom At The Crossroads: Celebration, Shame and Fan/Producer Relationships, Zubernis and Larsen, 2012). The challenging nature of the fan is something that appears timelessly again and again throughout fan culture. The audience steps over the invisible containment of the viewer and into the realm of the idol, not necessarily always respecting the boundary between the two as the real and fictional are compromised. The role of emotion within this aspect of fan culture is not only integral but it is self-destructive and counterintuitive to the self. At the very height of the spectrum the overwhelming excitement becomes exaggerated thus leading to potentially threatening circumstances. In Heroes, Mass Murder and Suicide, Berardi (2015) suggests similar ideas in relation to capitalisms affect on mental health. He studies cases such as the Aurora ‘Joker’ killer; a mass shooting in the US in 2012 when James Holmes murdered 12 people in a cinema during a midnight screening of The Dark Knight Rises. The mass shooting gained global media attention as the event was ‘inspired’ by the Batman franchise. (Holmes’ house was filled with superhero memorabilia.) Berardi (2015) suggests that the impact of social media and the entertainment industry has paved the way for formidable transformations unto our collective pathological environment. This notion is widely represented throughout popular culture, other examples include Leave Britney Alone (2007). Chris Crocker’s YouTube video in which an over emotional teen hysterically cries to his camera, expressing his upset with the media’s handling of Britney Spears’ public meltdown - a passionate video diary turned viral internet meme. Another more dated example; Lisztomania; an intense fan frenzy toward the Hungarian composer Franz Liszt, (Lisztomania, 1975) characterised by acute hysteria from audiences at live concerts in an age where excitement surrounding musicians was not yet the norm. This visceral fixation of a celebrity figure is evident when studying fan communities and sub-cultures.

Fan frenzy in todays media-centric culture is prevalent in a younger demographic. The documentary film Crazy About One Direction (Asquith, 2013) follows multiple groups of young girls in their attempt to track down members of the pop band. It is interesting when observing the behaviour of the girls, their young age demonstrates emotional adolescence. The intense behaviour is perhaps psychologically impacting; ‘many girls practice their first kisses on posters [with their favourite band]’ (Anderson 2012), ; a situation devoid of the very real traumas of teenage sexuality. Girls fantasise of relationships with the band members, allowing the exploration of ‘interpersonal relations’ without the ‘reciprocal commitments’ (Lewis, 1992), yet often inhibits social maturity as the relationships with an idol are fabricated. (Jensen, 1992) The image of the idol is manufactured through the lens of a commercial society, the carefully constructed role of the figure; devoid of true authenticity in the media poses something different to the actual person themselves. This commercial insincerity produces a god-like, celestial figure. An unbeknown occurrence in the everyday life, fans latch onto this fake image ‘in demand for a psychotherapeutic placebo’ (Vermorel, 1985 p.7).

An interesting observation is to question the idolisation of celebrities from a gender based perspective, as fandoms are most often talked about in terms of women, (Craig, 1992). This unequal weight in the production of fan works influences their connotations. Girls aspire to be or to look like their idols. Implications towards female pathologies concerning self worth and objectification arise and we can experientially understand the mainstream media’s portrayal of women; the cultural norm is for women to be portrayed as younger, thinner and more beautiful than the majority of the demographic. Julia Wood describes femininity as passive; a stereotypical assumption that the modern entertainment industry inflicts. Women ‘may be strong and successful if and only if she also exemplifies traditional stereotypes of femininity, subservience, passivity, beauty, and an identity linked to one or more men.’ (Wood, 2009). In terms of fan practice this is heavily influential. These stereotypes effect fan output as many works convey a more female-driven passion and many idols often refuse to see the sincerity of the ‘teenage-girl fan’. (Pollard, 2016). A report by the American Psychological Association affirms how ‘insidious’ consequences of the media's exploitation of women can be damaging toward mental health and how it ‘fragments consciousness.

‘Chronic attention to physical appearance leaves fewer cognitive resources available for other mental and physical activities’. (APA, 2007) These gender idealisms are almost exclusive to women, the characterisations of males are usually unproblematic and even ‘laudatory’ comparatively to the standard of female portrayal (Craig, 1992). Fandom culture bares impact on sexual identities (Anderson, 2012; Sesek and Pusnik, 2014, cited in Mendelsohn, 2014). Members of a boy band for example, can become fixations of sexual desire, thus creating differing social understandings of sexuality. Interpreted in different ways, ‘one of the most common ways sexual expression manifests is in fan-fiction’ (Mendelsohn, 2014), these kind of practices are considered ‘juvenile’ by the wider society. This is perhaps because male sexuality is more regularly expressed therefore widely accepted in comparison to that of woman. To explain her allure to erotic fan-fiction, a member of the One Direction fandom said, “men like to watch pornography with two women, girls like to read about two handsome men” (Sesek and Pusnik, 2014, p.119 cited in Mendelsohn, 2014). A reclamation of the female sexuality in terms of fan-fiction is necessary, just as the book Starlust: The Secret Life of Fans (Vermorel, 1985) achieves, its collection of fan written accounts of intimate experiences offers a comprehensive expression of the often ‘rejected’ aspects of fan culture.

Close-knit communities of fandoms are often efforts to escape a difficult age, these implications are only amplified through advancing social media technologies. Twitter allows for fans to be updated on their idols whereabouts, actions, struggles, relationships etc. ‘#cutforzayn’ trended on Twitter in March 2015, causing significant amounts of harm and putting young people online in a dangerous position. It is concerning when the boundaries of privacy between the fan and idol are compromised, note cases such as Steven Spielberg’s stalker; 'Mr Spielberg told the court he feared stalker Jonathan Norman intended to ‘rape or maim him’ (BBC, 1998). Björk’s stalker Ricardo Lopez shot films of himself obsessing over her; ‘being in love, having an infatuation, is a euphoric feeling, and I was very happy. I had something to look forward to every day’ (ABC news, no date). Note that the blend of fandom with ‘celebrity and presumed media influence in relation to pathological behaviour’ (Lewis, 1992) is ever more common in fan culture. These occurrences, from the first recorded fan suicide of Peggy Scott in 1926, surrounded by photographs of Rudolf Valentino shortly after his death, to Mark Chapmans’ execution of John Lennon in 1980 ‘illustrates how disastrously this can sometimes end for both subject and object’ (Vermorel, 1985, p.247) and bares the compelling reality of resemblance between the growth of consumerism and the evolutions of hysteria.

‘The way the public functions in the public sphere is only possible because it is really a public of discourse. It is self-creating and self-organised, and herein lies in its power’ (Warner, 2002). The fandom is self-creating, its innovative output of speaking, writing, thinking etc engage us in a public. Warner emphasises the importance of conversation at the heart of a community as ‘text themselves do not create publics’. The constant cross-communication within and between fandoms creates an affective community where feeling is mutually understood and passed around from fan to fan. Fans establish rules, distinctions between differing levels of enthusiasm are taken seriously. ‘You’re not a real fan’ is heard often, indicating shame. Fans are heavily rejected across global societies. However shame acts performatively; generating a spreading affect throughout a community, but we have to make some distinctions between the cultural normativity of the fan and the obsessed recluse. How is the idea of fandom manifested in every day life? ‘Each fan type mobilises related assumptions about modern individuals: the obsessed loner invokes the image of the alienated, atomised ‘mass man’; the frenzied crowd member invokes the image of the vulnerable, irrational victim of mass persuasion. Alienation, atomisation, vulnerability and irrationality- are central aspects of twentieth-century beliefs about modernity.’ (Lewis, 1992) Yet in reality the fan is most similar to every other person, they simply fantasise and pursue perfection like the rest of us (Vermorel, 1985, p.7). The only difference is the way in which we express this.

Shame is a prevalent feeling within fan cultures, differing from guilt it ‘attaches to and sharpens what one is’ (Sedgwick, 2003, p. 37). It is intrinsically in fan nature to break traditional norms and the mediums in which they are conveyed; 'material re-appropriation into fan-zines, costumes, adult interaction games, slang, computer programming’ (Lorrah, cited in Jenkins, 1988 p.473, cited in Malchevski, no date). However stereotypical depictions around fandom can cause shame-related affects, the ‘individuals are simultaneously (a) put down and made to feel guilty for their interests, and (b) perceived as disrespecting their fandom community by not defending their interests (Stanfill, 2013 cited in Mendelsohn, 2014). However the inflicted feeling of shame and the need for reclamation inspires fan activities; fantasising, role-playing, archiving- the embodiment of intolerance toward the culture turns shame into a performative reclamation (Bennett, 2010). In Starlust the fan stories are expressed in likeness to shame, thus self acceptance prevails over the cultural societal perception of ‘indecency’. Oscar Wilde’s De Profundis (1897) is a letter detailing his relationship with Lord Alfred Douglas and his spiritual awakening in prison. Wilde turns his shame into something potentially productive; a response to criticism. He transforms ‘appalling denunciation’ into erotic confession’. (Bennett, 2010, p.23) ‘Pleasure seems inextricably intertwined with the sense of shame’ (Zubernis, Larsen 2012, p.11), an evident observation throughout fan practice. Velvet Goldmine (1998) presents both the transformation of and adherence to shame. Shame makes a ‘double movement,

‘Toward painful individuation, toward uncontrollable relationality,” (Zubernis, Larsen, 2012, p.25). The isolation that shame creates pushes people towards a seemingly impossible but much rewarding reality; to be more of yourself, because you can’t become anything else. This is illustrated by Slade and Wild in Velvet Goldmine (1998) by their determination to enforce their queer, glam rock and non-conventional roles within the 1970s music industry. The reclamation of shame in relation to fan practice is heavily present throughout conceptual art. The exhibition Love To Love You in Los Angeles (2013) united artists to explore ‘fandom as a unique opportunity for shared social experience’.

Fig. 4 Shaw (2007) [from Love To Love You]

Fig. 5 WhyNot (2016)

Displaying various methods of artistic practice the exhibition aimed to transcend ‘material consumption’ in order to create a conceptual, transient ‘world of devotion’ (MoCa, 2013). Other examples include artist Lois Weaver’s alter-ego as Tammy Whynot?, an experimentation of different, performative personas intertwining her past and background with her lesbian, feminist performance artist career (Tammy WhyNot, 2016).

After studying the examples given throughout this essay, we can recognise that criticising of fan culture is a form of discrimination, however reclaimed by the oppressed, leading toward evermore transgressive reclamation and positive re-representation. Even though fan work is culturally criticised and often deemed controversial, it is a byproduct of our celebrity-centric culture. The output of art, writing, film etc. is influential toward not only conceptual art practices, but also toward the media, entertainment, music, film, television industries and the individual person. Perhaps the growing advancements in technology and a society developing a dependence on social media is problematic toward safe practice of fan culture. Virtual communication is prevalent so much so it is definitively intertwined with ideas of interpellation (Althusser, cited in McGee, no date), yet arguably this only creates the need for more potent transgression; a necessity within the social climate. Aside from rampant emotions and unconventional sexual desire, the true heart of the fandom is passion, driven by instinctive resistance towards the forever forced power of authority.

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0 notes