#idk if its this fandom or the current way we consume media as a society

[jimalim]

wow it’s actually really depressing to see that out of the 30 fics I’ve written for The Wilds/Leatin, my longest (45k) fic-the one I spent THE MOST time writing, the one that’s my absolute favorite piece of writing I’ve ever done...has the least amount of kudos at a lowly 70

this is why I have a really hard time finding the motivation to write. when I spent nearly 6 months planning and writing what I think is the strongest thing I’ve ever written with a very fun and rewarding plot for those who read the whole thing (it’s a freaking choose your own adventure fic! You get 4 whole ass stories in one!) and it only has 70 kudos after being up for almost 2 months

this lack of engagement is what makes content creators inevitably stop making things, at some point the disappointment isn’t worth it, and the ‘do it for yourself’ mentality isn’t enough. and now that tumblrs tag feature is broken (hopefully temporarily) this only discourages people more. reblog culture is absolutely abysmal these days and with the tags being broken, it’ll only get worse.

I know I probably sound like I’m whining any time I complain about this, but it really is an issue not enough people take seriously. everyone’s all for reblogging posts about how we need to support creators-but how often does that actually translate to a change in the way people consume this media? basically if you like something, SHARE it! COMMENT on it! let creators know you appreciate the work they do FOR FREE! it’t the absolute LEAST you can do

[canmom]

thinking about the weird, convoluted chain of events that led to people arguing about the translation of that one line in eva...

to grab just a few, the ongoing occupation of palestine, the formation of groups claiming solidarity with palestinians and their understandings of what would supposedly help, the schisms and ideological currents in the Japanese and “international left” (the JRA were Maoists among other things so we could just, drop the entire history of, say, China and the Soviet Union here), the American occupation of japan and the effects it had on its media culture and society more broadly

and then more proximally, you have the sarin gas attacks in 1995, anno (or whoever wrote that episode’s script) using the idea of terrorist attacks while filling out a background detail in a tv show airing in the same year, all the dynamics of cults and so on that produced those attacks - filtered through the way they might have appeared to a very depressed animator and the team working for him, all trying to speak to his present and future

and more than 20 years later, the role of the abe government, the renewed attempts to rewrite history as the survivors of wwii slowly die out, the creation of external and internal ‘enemies’ to justify repression

and elsewhere, the development of a massive western anime audience, the accumulation of a load of capital in video streaming and netflix’s attempts to get more and more involved in the anime industry; their power to determine what people watch and talk about in this part of the world, what constitutes the ‘shared culture’ or ‘conversation’. (i saw few people talking about evangelion until a week or two ago, now it feels like i’m surrounded by it and a bunch of my friends are watching for the first time)

not to mention the development of peripheral fandoms and the trade in figures and so on, sustaining evangelion and building its status as a ‘classic’; a young medium’s need for respectability and a ‘canon’ of more ‘artistic’ works and its uneasy tension with the most nakedly capitalist aspects of its industry; the traumas and common experiences that lead people to find value in evangelion in the first place. the influences that created the mecha genre before that.

and there’s this creepy asshole translator guy, and the things that must have shaped him: e.g. the reactionary politics of imageboards etc., the increasing(?) political polarisation of media consumer subcultures across the board... (idk, i’m speculating here, i know very little about this guy and don’t super care to find out)

all of this structured by broader dynamics: gender (and therefore homophobia, csa, etc.), capitalism, imperialism (however you theorise it), the friggin cold war, whatever factors drive people to form cults and sects and police their boundaries...

all of that context, and this barely scratches the surface, you could follow any of these threads so much further... all of that behind every translation & localisation decision. or act of communication in general. everything causing everything else.

i think a lot about a line in a song by daniel kahn - “every pair of pants and grain of rice/contains a horror story in its price/a story about factories and fields/a story of the power people wield”. sometimes... i end up trying to think of the story hiding behind the commodity, often when walking back from the supermarket with groceries. and it’s just... a lot.

(to pick just one strand in all this, I wonder what anime fandom is like in palestine anyway. obvs. would depend where you go and who you ask, just like anywhere. google just finds western anime fans talking about palestine, mentions of japanese directors talking about palestine, or articles about israeli anime conventions on the other side of the border walls. i guess there won’t be a lot written in english language, but still. there’s been a couple of animated films made in palestine/by palestinians, that’s as close as i have gotten.)