#it’s not *really* anti those ships but uh... tagging for the culture???

[miggydiaz]

For the salty ask 1, 4, 5, 6, 9, 10, 14, 16, 20, 22, 23 and 26 for cobra kai pretty please

My answers are so long, so I am putting this under the cut @wonderwolfballoon! Also I just noticed your Daniel icon I SWEAR I’M NOT DRAGGING HIM TO BE MEAN!!!

1. What OTPs in your fandom(s) do you just not get?* My biggest IDGI ships for CK are probably Elimetri or Kiaz. I’m not here to yuck other people’s yums or anything, but I do think there is something to the idea that Migueli isn’t popular because it’s a ship predicated on mutual respect for one another. Kiaz has the obvious enemies to lovers vibe and I just generally don’t sail those ships. Elimetri has... its problems, IMO, most especially around the idea that Demetri has to like... save Hawk from himself? Idk. I just like romances that I feel are based on love and mutual respect and not ...tropes.

 I am also not a Lawrusso shipper although I have a lot of those on my dash and you all are great! Again, not yucking yums! Daniel just makes me want to head butt him too much to pair him romantically with anyone 😂 I don’t even want his wife with him. He needs to self reflect~ 

4. Do you have a NoTP in your fandom? Are they a popular OTP?* 

I once saw someone ship Amanda and Anoush and I noped out of that so fucking fast I almost tripped over myself. I’m not sure if they’re popular. I just think some people feel the need to get Amanda out of the way to sail their ship and stuck her with Anoush which... no. Just no. Let Amanda be a messy single queen with a martini hobby, thanks! 

5. Has fandom ever ruined a pairing for you?* 

Not in CK. I’m lucky because I pretty much stick to my little Migueli bubble and I’m okay with that? Lmao lord knows the Squad on my dash is all about the DISCOURSE™️ so idk if I just don’t feel the need to get sucked into the wider ship wars because we have good healthy debates, but so far, so good. 

6. Has fandom ever made you enjoy a pairing you previously hated?* 

I never hated it... I just didn’t have many feelings on shipping with this show in general at first. Then I was in the CK tag one day and I saw Migueli fan art. Then I discovered @afurioushawk‘s falconry series and it was all over for me after that! So fandom DID make me love a ship, just not one I hated.

9. Most disliked character(s)? Why? Oh boy. How much time do you have? In some instances, it’s a good thing season 3 happened because otherwise, this would be a multi-page essay on the problems with race and class privilege as it pertains to Sam LaRusso and just some... generally not nice comments about Demetri that I’m conflicted about because I’m not sure if the writers are intentionally trying to write him a specific way and it’s just not translating to me or what. But season 3 revamped both of their images with me a lot. I’m way more flexible in terms of Demetri, but lmao I was the number one Sam LaRusso hater for a minute there (or maybe number 2, I can think of at least 1 other person who was in that boat with me back in like... August/September, but I won’t call them out because I don’t want them to get hate...) However, I have grown a bit in my opinions of Sam, and even though I still think she’s responsible  for a lot of shit she NEVER gets held accountable for, I also think that’s a reflection of the adults around her too, and this includes my otherwise unproblematic queen, Amanda.

But honestly, my most hated character (other than the obvious villain that is Kreese) is Daniel. No matter how handsome Ralph Macchio looks in cable-knits, because Daniel has always been a sanctimonious, shit starting drama king and I say that about KK Daniel too. I’m not saying Daniel was the ~true villain~ or anything, or that Johnny was innocent -- I can only drink so much Red and Yellow Kool-Aid -- but Daniel’s always been annoying to me as a protagonist, and turning him into a smarmy wealthy car salesman who is also a class traitor did not do him any favors in my book. I will say, I also like Daniel more in season 3 than I have in previous season, but since he is the adult, I will be mad at him longer than I will be at the kids, ya feel?

10. Most disliked arc? Why?

 Johnny’s entire season 3 storyline. The sheer level of REGRESSION at every turn drives me bonkers. It’s like watching him go through all of the stumbling blocks of season 1 all over again, but without the “he’s learning! He’s going to make mistakes!” free pass that I was willing to give him the first time around. He regularly jeopardizes Miguel’s recovery and it’s played for laughs. He fucks up on every level with Robby. He spends most of his time running away when things get hard or too real. He drops the ball completely with Hawk, and like, not to put too fine a point on it, but a lot of Hawk’s issues are because Johnny put Hawk on this ‘flip the script and be a badass’ path and then offered him no guidance for how to walk that path and instead left him in the hands of Kreese. And then he has the nerve to go to Hawk and basically be like “I made you what you are!” lmao yeah Johnny, you sure did, that’s why he’s breaking peoples arms, hoss. And then all of the nonsense with Ali and Carmen, like... if you were planning on teasing KK fans with Ali and him getting back together, why write her as married in the first place? Why even tease the idea of Carmen and Johnny until after you were sure what you were going to do with Ali as a character? Instead, they do what they did in season 3 and it makes him look like a colossal jerk. So yeah. Literally every choice they made with Johnny this season, I hated.

14. Unpopular opinion about your fandom? People who hate Tory are not valid, sorry not sorry.

16. If you could change anything in the show, what would you change? I would have kept Miguel entirely out of Tory and Sam’s beef. Or at least not directly inserted him into it like he was with the kiss. I know the writers thought it was necessary to push Tory to the point of inciting a fight at school, but I am just so exhausted over girls being unable to fight about anything but boys. Also I would bring Aisha back.

20. What is the purest ship in the fandom? 

I am probably biased, but I still maintain it’s Migueli. Look, Miguel stood up to Kyler for Eli and Demetri both. Hawk joined CK because he saw what it could do for some skinny nerd who was getting his ass kicked. And he took to CK, really took to it! Even flourished before he started getting mixed messages. And he and Miguel were pretty much inseparable after that. They coordinated their wardrobes ffs. Hawk dubbed him El Serpiente and no one else calls him that — it’s Hawk’s nickname for him. Miguel confides in Hawk only secondary to Johnny, who is like a father to him. The entire Coyote Creek exchange shows they can fight and disagree but... well, to use the cliche, they don’t go to bed angry, you know? They’re square the very next day. Hawk is the first person at Miguel’s side when he gets kicked over the balcony and the LOOK he gives the second floor where Robby is? That boy is out for blood immediately to avenge Miguel. So much of his s3 behavior is fueled by that need for vengeance because MD is wholly responsible for what happened to Miguel. And Miguel is so confused and betrayed by Hawk’s shift in behavior, and yet still holds out hope that Hawk will see through Kreese’s BS and come with him to The Dojo I Refuse to Name. And when Hawk does make that deflection finally, he shows up at MD with Miguel. There’s so much more that I know I’m missing but whether someone ships them or not, that is a tried and true love and respect for one another, a willingness to fight for and defend one another that you don’t often see in TV friendships... or even in most tv relationships. And I just think that’s the best ❤️

22. Popular character you hate?

 Daniel, hands down. I mean... I don’t even necessarily hate Daniel, you know? I just think it’s really, pardon the pun, rich that a guy of immense wealth and privilege can’t get a therapist or turn to his far too patient wife for help with his existential crisis over his high school bully opening up a karate dojo to make some money and help a kid who is getting the crap kicked out of him. I get that Daniel’s narrative is necessary for the rivalry, but it does nothing to make him sympathetic as a character.

23. Unpopular character you love?

 Tory, definitely! Everyone hates her and then there’s me and the Squad over here banging away on our Coors Banquet cans yelling TORY RIGHTS! Seriously she catches so much flack for a teenage girl who is... the sole income provider for her family? At 17? While caring for a sick mom and a little brother? And fending off a creepy landlord? Tory has it so rough and then she meets a cool girl at her dojo who asks her to hang out at some fancy ass country club which is probably the nicest place Tory has ever been in, and then she gets talked down to and accused of being a thief and has another girl lay hands on her, only to find out that same girl is her new boyfriend’s ex and... ugh. I HATE that Tory gets shit all over when Tory and Sam wouldn’t even have beef if Sam had apologized to Tory as she SHOULD have. Tory isn’t innocent, but damn, I’d be pressed too.

 My other unpopular character I love? Nathaniel. Seriously that kid is THE best. He’s a literal child but is out there like I WILL FUCK YOU UP, even though he’s MD. Honestly, his Cobra Kai energy is so ferocious I won’t be surprised if he moves back to CK eventually. Anyway, I love him.


26. Most shippable character?

 Miguel, hands down. It’s because he’s so affable and sweet overall. And because his hair is so fluffy and pettable that no one can resist touching it. I like to imagine that one day he and Hawk are talking about their hair and Hawk makes a joke about how Miguel’s mane is getting so long that it’s going to be bigger than his own, and then he reaches out to ruffle it and internally has a bisexual meltdown because oh no IT’S SO SOFT AND NICE. But uh... anyway, yes. Definitely Miguel.

[masked-disciple]

Hey so uh, referencing the post you reblogged about dni things, and I mean this as genuinely as possible! But what do you think proship means? I just ask because ah...in my experience it usually means people who ship minors with adults ; ;

You’re close but not quite on the mark. It means I do not give a single flying fuck what someone ships, so long as things are tagged and they’re not being disrespectful to others around them.

Hell, I don’t care if someone ships real people, so long as it’s tagged and they’re not stupid enough to bring it into any interaction with those people they may have. Not so many folks are all right with RPF, but that was one of my starts in ship fandom - shoutout to Sekihan and Piko for encouraging the hell out of it, though, they knew their audience - and if you’re not showing it to the people you’re shipping and you’re tagging it so people know what they’re clicking on, I don’t care.

Here’s the thing. Fiction does affect reality, but not in the way antis want you to think it does. Take 50 Shades of Grey, for example. There was a huge outcry against it when it came out, because it portrayed straight up sexual and emotional abuse as BDSM, and the BDSM community (at least in hindsight, I was 11 when the movie came out and if I’d known what their actual reaction had been in real time something would have been deeply wrong) was rightly pissed off about it.

Here’s the reason why 50 Shades’ misinformation pissed them off, and me writing a 10k underage incest fic (mind the tags) probably shouldn’t piss anyone off. 50 Shades was mainstream and portrayed as totally healthy and fine. That isn’t really an issue. What is the issue is that it was aimed towards young teenagers. I was maybe a year too young for it to be marketed to me, and this was 2011 when my entire concern was stealing every One Direction poster out of spite and drawing bikinis in permanent marker on their stupid bodies because all my classmates got official merch of their faves and I couldn’t get Vocaloid merch because shipping rates say no.

Ahem. That was the problem, right there. Because fandom does not simply ask but demands that you tag your shit. If you run a NSFW blog, it is not required by law per se but required by fandom culture to put an 18+ warning on it somehow immediately available.

50 Shades was marketed to teenagers, and that’s a damn problem. When I write my 7k DDLG father-daughter incest fic (mind the tags and that is a different fic than the first one), I am not writing it for a teenage audience. When you click on either of those fics, AO3 straight up says this:

You know what this is? This is them saying “This is explicit material. If you agree and see it and have issues, then that’s on you, because we asked you if you were cool with it. If you lied to us, we can’t do fuckall about it.”

Teenagers are teenagers. Teens will sneak onto porn sites and take kink quizzes with their friends and also probably lose their virginity before they’re 17. Most of my classmates had lost it by 16. I’d been writing sexually explicit fic since I was 12, not that I was any good at it.

To imply teenagers are simply baby children and then mature at 18 into fully-functional adults is actually really stupid, especially considering how many of them rightfully get really pissed off if you treat them like children. So why the hell is it that teenage antis get really upset because you wrote porn?

It’s because you wrote porn of a ship they don’t like, and making you out to be a horrible child abuser makes them sound legitimate because they don’t want to recognize that being disgusted by something doesn’t mean that the thing that disgusts them doesn’t deserve to exist.

I write sexually explicit material of teens largely to deal with my teenage self never getting to actually understand her own desires and capabilities, because she missed out due to dysphoria and alterhumanity she didn’t fully understand. You know how people are like “If you’re 23 and need that comfort blanket then just get the comfort blanket to please your inner child, psychology says reparenting yourself like that is actually good?” What do you think I’m doing? That’s pretty well it.

I don’t care if people write fucked up things. People write fucked up things for all sorts of reasons, and it is not my place to ask them if they’re traumatized and thus ‘justified’ in doing it. Either you force everyone to lay out their trauma before you let them write things that could potentially disgust a teenager who is not allowed to be there in the first place, or you just live and let people live.

And if you really want people to lay out their trauma and then get grilled before you let them deal with it in ways that you personally don’t like, wow, that is serious ableism right there. You know all those “support trauma victims even when it’s not pretty!!!!1!!!” posts? Are fucking meaningless if you don’t actually support them. And supporting them means not asking them about things that broke them to satisfy some moral high that doesn’t need to exist.

I don’t care if people ship minors with adults. I don’t. Tag your shit. Tag it so people know what they’re walking into. I have issues when people post porn when I didn’t ask to see it. But saying ‘proceed’ on that AO3 warning is asking to see it. Opening up an 18+ blog is asking to see it. Going into the tags without an adblocker is asking to see it.

If you really think people can’t write what they want without appealing to you, personally, about it, then you need to work on your own disgust and how you deal with it, because demanding they stop because it upsets you - when you were never involved, and especially when you’re not supposed to be there - is rude, disrespectful, and not something I tolerate.

I’m not saying this to be mean. I’m really not. And most of this is general-you, not you-anon-in-particular, because I have no idea who you are. I ought to redo my pinned post anyway because I have been getting a lot of folks who say proship dni following me despite the fact I am pretty proship and I should make that more obvious so they know what they’re getting into - again, this is me tagging my shit - and I’ll do that probably tomorrow, but still.

If nobody is actually getting hurt to make the thing, which fanfiction and fanart does not unless you are really fucked up and in which case you know you’re fucking doing it, then I don’t care. Thoughtcrimes aren’t real crimes, and I will never treat them that way.

So I know exactly what proship means, and I’m proship. My AO3 has explicit fics on it that would make antis froth at the mouth, and you don’t need to go looking for them, I linked them for anyone who wants to read it. I’ve never hidden it, and I wouldn’t. It’s tagged. You know what you’re going in for. If you agree to see it, then you were warned, and there’s nothing more we can do.

Simply as that.

[echodrops]

Kicking the Hornet’s Nest...

I’m procrastinating hard on other tasks, but in chit-chatting (both on tumblr and on Discord) about my stance on criticism of fanfiction, I realized that there’s a very low-hanging analogy I can make to explain my thoughts on this, so…

Uh first, please remember this is my personal blog and just my personal opinion. If you think that giving unsolicited concrit is the worst, I promise I’m not here to grab you individually, shake you by the shoulders, and try to change your minds. We can agree to disagree; I’m fully aware my opinion is unpopular on tumblr but also fully aware of the irony of people giving unsolicited criticism on a post about why unsolicited criticism is a good thing.

And second, please note that the analogy used below is only an analogy and not meant to be a one-to-one comparison–obviously the issue of vaccination is a far more critical, serious, and solemn issue and the topic of criticism on fanfiction (of all things) is not equal to a global health crisis that has cost real people’s lives. I’m drawing radical comparisons to thought processes because it’s shocking, not genuinely comparing fanfiction comments to moral and ethical world health decisions because I think those two things are equitable in importance.

Uh and third, please don’t respond unless you’re going to read it all. I'm happy to take your constructive criticism after you're finished with the whole thing. I get so tired of people rushing to my inbox after only getting half way through my arguments–90% of the time, I already addressed the thing you wanted to come yell at me about and you just didn’t make it there, promise.

So, at the risk of pissing off just about everyone who thought they respected me before this:

The current anti-concrit mindset stems from a similar logic to the one used by anti-vaxxers.

(This analogy lasts a grand total of five paragraphs or something, don’t get your jimmies too rustled.)

Most people on tumblr are happy–downright gleeful–to mock anti-vaxxers. The average anti-vaxxer is considered close-minded, self-centered, and under-educated. Although the issue of anti-vaxxing is probably more complicated than we paint it here on this website (to be fair, I wouldn’t know if it’s more complicated, since I agree that anti-vaxxers are generally stupid and don’t look into their arguments very often), almost no one on tumblr has any issue with anti-vaxxers being dragged up and down the block for their bad choices.

Usually, the logic of anti-vaxxers is understood to work something like this:

Anti-vaxxer: I don’t want to expose my child to something potentially harmful, so I am not going to vaccinate them.

Literally everyone else: You’re exposing your child to far greater risk in the long-term by not vaccinating.

Or:

Anti-vaxxer: My child doesn’t need to be vaccinated; they’re fine as they are. Those diseases aren’t a big deal anymore.

Literally everyone else: This mindset will make those diseases a big deal again.

On paper, sometimes anti-vaxxer logic works out–it is true that some children suffer very painful and awful reactions to vaccinations. It IS true that poorly made or contaminated vaccinations have killed children and will continue to do in the future. It IS true that vaccinations are painful and stressful for children in general and can even–depending on how the children respond to pain and how their doctors/nurses treat them–result in long-term phobias and health care aversion. There can be serious lasting consequences from vaccinating.

But most of us laugh in the face of anti-vaxxers. Why? Because we know that in comparison to the number of benefits, the risks are minimal. In the long-term, the number of people helped by vaccines far, far exceeds the number of people hurt.

I hope you can see where I’m going. At its core, the issue of giving unsolicited constructive criticism follows a similar pattern of short-term risk aversion. Authors who don’t want constructive criticism and choose to actively refuse it are following a similar thought process to anti-vaxxer parents:

Author: I don’t want any constructive criticism. Criticism can be painful, and my writing doesn’t need to be exposed to that.

Or:

Author: I don’t need any constructive criticism because my writing is fine as it is and I’m just doing it for fun anyway.

The general attitude seems to be that exposing fanfiction authors to unsolicited constructive criticism carries more risk than it does reward. And please be aware that I’m talking about genuinely constructive criticism here, well-intentioned and polite comments (the vaccine in this analogy), not troll comments deliberately designed to hurt people’s feelings (which would be equivalent to say, an injected contaminated drug in this analogy–no one should be okay with those).

But like anti-vaxxers who insist that the short-term risks of vaccines are more dangerous than the long-term risks of major diseases… is there really any evidence that genuinely constructive criticism, even when unsolicited, really does discourage and upset a large number of fanfiction authors? Or, more to the point of the analogy–is the number of people who would be entirely discouraged from writing ever again by some constructive criticism really greater than the number of people who would benefit from getting some (again, polite) tips for improving their writing? Which is the greater risk–being hurt in the short-term or losing out on the opportunity for growth in the long-term?

Clearly there are different opinions on this and I suspect that my opinion is heavily colored by the fact that I am older than the average tumblr user and therefore have many more years to look back on to weigh on the scales of this debate.

But I will always, always argue that the long-term benefits of helping other writers where you can far, far, far outweigh the short-term risks, for a couple reasons.

1) The world is a shitty, disappointing, stressful, and painful place. We encounter harsh criticisms every single day. Your teachers will give you poor grades. Your bosses will tell you your work isn’t up-to-par. Your friends will tell you the new top you bought and absolutely love… actually makes you look like you’re wearing a potato sack. If you’re into relationships, you’ll probably experience at least one break-up in which you hear that it’s YOU, not them, who is the problem. Your feelings will be hurt by callous comments from others an uncountable number of times. Your confidence will be shaken, if not actively crushed. I’m sorry to say it, but for almost all of us, having some miserable, anxiety-inducing and extremely discouraging moments in life is part of the unavoidable human experience. (And this is doubly, maybe triply true when we are starting out new hobbies or first entering a new field. Anyone who has ever tried to learn how to skateboard and gotten laughed at by experienced skateboarders knows exactly what I’m talking about.)

The world is full of truly awful things. And I’m not the kind of person who thinks we should just be exposed to all of them right from the get-go and fuck you and your snowflake feelings or things like that. I highly urge people to tag for triggering content and am on the record again and again telling people to block characters or ships that make them uncomfortable.

But many fanfiction authors are young authors, some of whom are posting work for public consumption for the very first time. Still more have no positive experiences with constructive criticism in the first place, and the extent of their literary criticism knowledge comes from really awful and boring high school English classes. When budding writers encounter a sudden explosion of access to readers–from having maybe one or two friends read their work to suddenly having their words in front of the eyes of thousands of strangers on the internet:

It’s disingenuous to give starting writers nothing but positive feedback. Only hearing positives about your work actively discourages change and self-reflection. It gives writers an unrealistic picture of their work that can result in far more serious disappointment and embarrassment later. When someone is awful at singing and they’re only told how nice their voice is, eventually when they sing for a more serious group of strangers, they’re going to be in for a very, very miserable time.

It’s a terrible missed opportunity for young writers to get a glimpse of what “professional” writing is like. Everyone benefits from genuinely constructive criticism–both the person getting it and the person giving it. We create young writers who are passionate about improving their writing by inducting them into the culture of planning, drafting, bouncing ideas off each other, finding beta readers, and taking others’ advice to grow their abilities, and oftentimes, one of the first experiences a person has with that process is someone spontaneously going “Hey, what if you tried this instead?” People often become inspired to become doctors and nurses after witnessing a family member experience a medical crisis–people often become inspired to become writers after receiving thorough feedback on things they have written. It’s impossible to really know whether or not you want a piece of constructive criticism until after you have heard what the criticism is, and adopting a “no unsolicited constructive criticism” policy as a whole creates an entire generation of fan writers who would miss out on opportunities for growth and inspiration.

This is waxing REALLY philosophical, but bear with me here, because this is also a well-documented concern of mine: we are entering an age in which people are no longer responsible for the media choices they make, where the internet is no longer viewed as a the equivalent of yelling into a crowd of (potentially dangerous) strangers, and the onus for protection is shifting away from self-preservation “I need to not put myself near upsetting things” to “other people have the responsibility not to expose me to upsetting things.” I’ve seen a lot of people say “If authors want constructive criticism on their fics, they can just say that in a note!” My ladies. My guys. My non-binary buddies. This is the utter opposite of how the internet functions. When you put anything on the internet, you are literally putting it before a crowd of an absolutely uncountable number of strangers and there are no rules (barring the laws of their home countries) dictating how they can respond to the things you put out there. Posting your writing on the internet is explicit consent to receive constructive criticism from anyone at any time unless you take actions to prevent that in advance. Sites like AO3 actively grant you the power to dictate who can SEE your work, comment on your work, give you the power to remove messages, screen comments before they appear, block comments entirely, or simply write in any of your notes sections that you do not want constructive criticism. (If it’s that easy to write “I want constructive criticism!” why is not seen as equally easy to write “I do not want constructive criticism!”?)

Public spaces on the internet are opt out, not opt in.

Why do many (though lord knows, not all) tumblr users easily agree to the idea of “If you don’t like a ship, you should just block it” or “If you see properly tagged content you don’t like on AO3 and you click it, that’s your own fault for not reading the tags,” but have the complete opposite mindset when it comes to constructive criticism? “I’m submitting my work in a public place where anyone can express their opinion on it… But even though there are multiple tools at my disposal for discouraging and blocking opinions I don’t agree with, it’s actually other people’s responsibility not to say anything that might upset me.”

As I said, waxing philosophical here, but this is kind of a scary mindset. The ability to enter a public space–and the internet is the MOST public space in the world–and then declare that you simply don’t want to listen to dissenting opinions is scary. I mean, this is how we get a common anti-vaxxer mindset–I don’t want to listen to your opinion because I have my source telling me I’m right and that’s all I need. “I put my work out in a public place and left it accessible to everyone, but I don’t want to listen to what everyone says about it.” I don’t mean to jump off the slippery slope, but this issue is a slippery slope in and of itself. Down this way lies a dark future. “It’s other people’s responsibility to curate my social experience for me.”

But really, after all this… I just flat out think it’s important to give genuinely constructive criticism to each other without people needing to ask for it because it just kind of sucks to see a fellow writer struggling with something and not say something about it. It’s not about feeling superior or thinking you know better than someone else; we all have our own strengths and weaknesses, and spotting something that could use a bit of work in someone else’s writing doesn’t make you a better writer, it just means that’s not your particular weakness. When someone is struggling to learn to swim, you don’t just leave them to their own devices and assume they’ll figure it out–even if they swear they’ve got it. When someone is learning to sew and you, who has sewed that exact thing before, don’t offer any advice, that’s not encouragement, it’s apathy. There will be many, many, many times in your life where you did not know you needed advice. Where you did not know HOW to ask for advice. Where you might have known you needed advice but not really wanted to admit that. Where you might have known you needed advice and been too shy to ask for help. Where a piece of advice completely from the blue changes the course of your life. Fandom as a whole–fan creators as a whole–cannot become a culture that closes the door to that vital form of communication, rejects willingness to not only uplift but also help each other grow even when we least expect it.

Anyway, I’m literally just writing this to avoid real responsibilities, but the point I’m trying to make is:

Most writers, even very young writers, will not be discouraged by polite, well-intentioned criticism. They may not like it. They may not take any of the criticism to heart, but most people, even young people, are far more resilient than tumblr (which on the best of days is a negative feedback loop that can romanticize a victim mindset because having the saddest backstory makes you immune to cancellation) wants to give them credit for, and a vast majority of writers will not be traumatized or scared away from writing by people trying to offer them genuine advice. Remember, no one here is advocating for asshole trolls who post comments like “Your writing sucks and you should delete your account.” A majority of writers, even very young writers, will be able to weather the storms and tosses of even really rudely-worded advice and recover. Sometimes it might take a while, but human beings have survived as a species because we’re really, really persevering.

(But some people aren’t! you might say. Some people really will give up writing if they’re criticized! And you’d be correct. There are people who will give up, even if all they are faced with is a single gentle, well-intentioned piece of criticism. But the truth is… People give up on hobbies for all kinds of reasons! Not every hobby is for every person! Every hobby carries with it its own challenges, its own share of risks, and its own pains. Learning a new hobby consistently requires putting yourself out of your comfort zone. Wanna learn how to ride a snowboard? You will get bruised. Wanna learn how to play chess? You will lose. Wanna learn to draw? Someone will make fun of your early drawings. You will make fun of your own early drawings. Wanna post your writing on a public platform? Someday, someone is going to say they’re not a fan.

And that leads me to address the point that just keeps coming up and coming up in this issue: People aren’t always posting their fics to improve as writers! A lot of times people are posting for just fun or for personal reasons.

Yeahhhhh bullshit. No, no, hang on–I don’t mean that people don’t have fun writing and posting fics, or that fics can’t help you through traumatic experiences because everything I’ve ever posted is basically me dealing with my own personal shit–what I mean is that there’s always an additional dimension to posting your fics on large-scale public websites. People write stories and share them with their friend groups for fun. People write characters overcoming trauma and share them with their therapists (or the friends who help to fill that role) for healing. People post their stories publicly, where anyone can respond, for validation on top of their fun and healing. There are ways to hide your fics entirely on many sites. You can leave things in drafts. If a fic is appearing as unmoderated and open to the public on a major fic site such as AO3, Wattpad, ff.net, etc., it’s because that fic’s author wants responses from others! They want views. They want subscribes. They want kudos. They want comments. There’s literally no reason to post publicly except for your work to be viewed by the public.

The fun one has writing a fic is often tied directly to the thrill of seeing a comment or kudos notification pop-up in your inbox. We love seeing people enjoy our fics–it absolutely makes my day when someone sends me a message telling me they re-read my fic for the third time.

It’s NOT fun to write something and get no response.

Writing something and getting no response is actively discouraging, actually.

So whenever someone says “They’re not writing fics to improve as writers; they’re just doing it for fun!” I have to laugh a bit–because when the concept of “fun with fanfiction” is tied so closely to the experience of having your work viewed and enjoyed by others, the fastest and surest way to increase the fun you have with your fanfics… is to improve as a writer. The more you write, the more you improve. The more you improve, the more loyal readers you gain. The more loyal readers you gain, the more excited people you have to gush about your fics with. Want a Discord server full of people willing to help you brainstorm ideas for your favorite AU? Write well, attract followers. Want fanart of your writing, probably the most fun and exciting thing I can think of as an author? Write well. Just plain old want more friends in the fandom to talk about your favorite characters and fic ideas with? Make writer friends.

People have fun writing about their favorite characters and post publicly to receive responses and validation for their creations… Responses increase the fun writers have because they make the hard work of writing worth it and give you people to keep writing for and with… Improving your writing increases the number of people attracted to your works and the number of people willing to spend time responding to them… The bigger the response you get, the more invested you become in your fics, the more fandom friends you make, and the more you want to write–it’s a process that is self-fulfilling, but also one that exposes you to criticism by its very nature. The very act of seeking responses from readers means that you’re open to responses that you don’t necessarily want to hear.

And I actually don’t mean this in the way of “If you can’t handle the heat, don’t jump into the fire.” What I mean is that it is impossible to create a world in which everyone who starts writing sticks with the hobby and keeps churning out works for us to enjoy forever. It is impossible to create a world in which no young writer will ever feel discouraged and give up. The writer you decided not to give constructive criticism to might just as easily become discouraged and quit writing because they didn’t receive enough response.

The first time you give your child a new vaccine, you cannot predict the results. Your child might suffer an allergic reaction. They might die. Every year, numerous severe reactions to vaccines do occur. But the majority of people don’t question the effectiveness of vaccines because we understand that the number of people who have severe reactions is very low in comparison to the number of people who benefit from the vaccine. The number of people who will be discouraged from writing by genuine, polite, constructive criticism is minuscule in comparison to the number of people who will either 1) benefit from it directly and be thankful you gave it, 2) not benefit but not be upset by it, 3) be mildly upset by it but then benefit, or 4) just be mildly upset by itself and then move on with life unharmed because sometimes people say things we don’t like but that doesn’t ruin our lives every single time it happens.

I’m not saying that providing polite constructive criticism doesn’t have risks, just that its risks are smaller than its benefits.

And I’ve successfully whittled enough time away with this now that I can go to sleep without guilt over the things I didn’t finish, but I started this by saying the long-term benefits outweighed the short-term risks and I feel obligated to defend that…

The long-term benefits of well-placed constructive criticism are enormous. Sometimes people need ego checks. Sometimes we need wake-up calls. Sometimes we need a gentle helping hand and didn’t even realize other people could be the help we needed. Sometimes we need a reason to get fired up–even if that reason is spite, trying to prove a critic wrong! Sometimes the answer is glaring us in the face and we don’t notice until someone else points it out. Sometimes we just plain out make mistakes. Sometimes we need a teacher because the ones in school let us down. Sometimes (oftentimes) other people bring incredibly unique perspectives to our stories that we would never have been open to on our own. Sometimes we write something unintentionally hurtful and need some gentle correction. Sometimes we could be having a lot more fun if we knew the tips and tricks others had to offer. Sometimes improving ourselves is hard but worth it. Sometimes bitter medicine is the only thing that will cure an ailment.

Shots hurt. People avoid them because they aren’t fun–what parent wants to expose their child to the painful, stressful situation of getting stabbed with needles? (What parent looks forward to the yearly flu shot themselves?)

We naturally flinch back from criticism. There are many times when we swear we don’t want it, don’t need it, can’t bear it! In the moment, it is incredibly difficult to be confronted with someone basically implying that you should change something integral to yourself–your art. No one likes to feel like they’re being picked apart for weaknesses, definitely not.

But sometimes a single comment can make a massive difference in your life–even when you didn’t want it at first.

All my life, I have been helped along by teachers, family, and friends who refused to settle for patting me on the back. The people who mean the most to me, who I most credit with getting me where I am today, are not the people who just told me I was good at things. They’re the people who told me I was good at things BUT. They people who challenged me to not just sail through life or even coast in my hobbies, content with the level I entered on–they’re the people who had faith in me and trust that I could refine my skills, could have even more fun IF I took that next step, challenged myself to go a bit harder… They’re the people who took the time not just to skim over my writing and slap a thumbs up on it, but the people who thought hard enough about it go: “This story was good, but have you thought about…”

Today, I’m a professor of English because I started writing fanfiction when I was 11 years old. Because I started posting fanfiction when I was 13. Because at 14 years old, someone–without being asked–taught me the correct way to format dialogue and how to strengthen my dialogue tags. Because at 15, someone flat out laughed to tears at a cliche metaphor I’d extended too far and I was ashamed, but they taught me something else to try instead. Because by 18, I’d received–and taken–enough unsolicited writing advice to land myself the highest paying on-campus tutoring job my university offered. Because by 19, someone challenged me to write something I told them was impossible for me. Because by 20, that impossible writing became the sample that got me accepted to grad school. Because by 21, I was furious enough at the criticism I received from my creative writing masters classmates to write a thesis so feverishly overwhelming that it inspired one of the foremost postmodern poets in the country. Because by 27, it was brutally honest criticism that gave me the gall to finally leave an abusive job and apply for a teaching position. Because by 30, I got to sit at a public literary journal volume launch and watch an entire class of my creative writing students become published authors.

And even though I joked about why I was writing this, and even though I’m really not, at the heart of it, trying to persuade any one person over to my side, I hope it’s clear how much of a labor of love this post is. How passionate I am about this topic.

This whole thing is a drawn-out plea: Please, do not let fandom creation sites become a place where no one offers advice unless it is begged for. Do not miss your chance to help someone else improve. Do not close the door to criticism that could change your life. Do not let fear of short-term discouragement prevent you from seeking long-term growth. Do not let the immediate side effects cloud your view of the global benefits.

Inoculate yourselves with good advice as a shield against the very hard future.

A dearth of criticism will not make fandom a better place. It will just make it a quieter one.

[keprambles]

Tagged by @amortentia-on-her-lips​

GOT PREFERENCES (THIS GOT SO LONG. I AM SO SORRY.)

Do you watch the episodes when they air?

I do. I still do. At least most of the time. I think I was late for a few days of the last season but I was also in Europe at the time and in Europe HBO won’t let me access my HBO account so...Um...I was late to the show then....Literally. 

I also didn’t watch season 4 when it aired because I was in a place where I was not able to access the internet for very long. So I watched that all a little later...In a hospital...2014 was a weird year.  

How often do you rewatch it? Do you rewatch it from season one?

I used to re-watch it a lot before things went to shit in Season 5. God damnit Season 5.

But anyway I re-watched season 1 and 2 in the ICU in 2013, and later I watched all of season 4 one of the times I was hospitalized for either a bowel obstruction or to recover from the first attempt to repair my damaged abdominal wall in 2014...Those things were all related.  Don’t...Get Acute Necrotizing Pancreatitis guys 0/10.

ANYWAY, Aside from those events I also did a bunch of non-hospital room re-watching back in the day of seasons 1-3 between 2011(it might have been 2012)-2013 This is all way too specific.

Do you rewatch the previous episode before the next one airs?

No. Definitely not for seasons 5-7 at least. I don’t struggle keeping the events in order since I am obsessed lol.

Do you eat anything while watching? if so, what do you eat?

Not usually. 

One character that everyone seems to like that you don’t care much for:

Oh my God, probably so many. I don’t like Davos, or Samwell and Robb Stark is the only name I have in Tumblr Savior. The reasons I dislike them are also THE WORST. It’s mostly because they are all good people who wanted to do the right thing and have MORALS and don’t fuck up everything they look at... Robb to be honest though is TumblrSaviored because I don’t have any interest in Throbb...And most people don’t tag it as “Throbb” so I just blacklisted ALL of Robb. Nothing against Throbb fans. I’m just not into it. 

Your 3 favourite pairings:

Theon Greyjoy x Ros/Kyra [AKA the empty sex ship of disaster]

Theon Greyjoy x Sansa Stark [Sass Prince + Sass Princess = the King and Queen of Sass and tragedy and bad life choices and living with your mistakes. They are very similar characters actually. ]

Theon Greyjoy x Ramsay Bolton [I think a lot of antis think this is seen as a romantic ship... It’s not to me at all. It’s the relationship between an unchecked sadist who gets to torture a POW and the POW whose every choice led him there. It’s a lot of things to me, personally...Also some people are really into guro, torture porn...I’m in it for the pure tragic violence.] 

[all ships lead to Theon lol]

Favourite scene:

All the Theon scenes. But LET’S DO ONE FOR ALL 7 SEASONS. OKAY. LET’S GO: “Now here you are, your enemy’s squire...” SE1 EP4 I like A LOT scenes from SE1. But I am posting THIS ONE BECAUSE IT’S THE ONLY SCENE WHERE THEON AND TYRION TALK BEFORE SE6 AND UNLIKE WHAT TYRION SAYS IN SE6 THE ONLY PERSON WHO WAS AN ASSHOLE BACK AT WINTERFELL WAS TYRION. GDI SHOW. FOLLOW YOUR OWN CANNON. GOD DAMNIT.  Well...No, there is also this NSFW-scene with Theon being a jerk about everything ever. but TYRION WAS NOT THERE. Also, this is AFTER the last scene. AHHHHHHHHHH- “I’VE TAKEN YOUR CASTLE!” SE2 EP 6 “IT’S PRINCE THEON NOW.” I love this scene. I love how Theon is like I AM A PRINCE NOW. I love how how when Bran is like “No, I’m not giving u the castle! NO CASTLE 4 U >:(” Theon is like “YES YOU WILL >:((((((((” like a petulant child. I love how Theon sits on Brans’s bed like “OK. U CLEALY DON’T KNOW HOW THIS WORKS. I WILL EXPLAIN IT TO YOU.” and Bran is like :| I love Theon’s conflicted expression when Bran asks, “Did you hate us the whole time?” “So Let’s Play a Game” SE3 EP6 On a very personal level I have never seen something before or since that looks and sounds like how my C-PTSD feels. It’s not just the torture, it’s...Everything. For that reason this is my favorite scene in the entire show. I think it’s my favorite scene in anything.  Also: “I win” :)

Bring me Moat Cailin  SE 4 EP 8 I really liked this scene in the book, and It’s condensed to Hell but I liked the show version a lot too anyway. Also if you pay attention you can hear Theon do the “My name is Reek, it rhymes with LITERALLY ANYTHING THAT RHYMES WIYTH “REEK” insanity mantra. I thank God everyday this part of Theon’s arc didn’t get murdered like the rest of his arc in the shit show that is the bullshit of SE5...SPEAKING OF SE5!!

“I can’t talk to you anymore.” SE5 EP8 [this season was only almost saved kind of by Alfie Allen’s and Sophie Turner’s A++ chemistry.] This scene is so hard to find for no reason but I liked this scene because Theon verbally transitions from Reek to Theon to Reek again and he does this a lot in the books but it’s harder to see in the show (duh) BUT this scene makes it REALLY clear as it’s happening. Theon goes from saying “There is no Theon” to “I (Theon) deserved everything” to “I (Theon) can’t talk to you anymore” to “Not Theon! Reek.” “You’re...Not Coming With Us?” SE6 EP2 God damnit show you ended the one good thing you still had going for you for NO REASON. So anyway Theon leaves Sansa but the amazing actor chemistry remains and A++ guys. You did it again...See also this is not the dumb Tyrion/Theon scene mentioned above in SE1′s rant because while that scene is good in many ways it’s also NOT FUCKING TRUE. AHHHHHH-

Theon’s last scene in Season 7 SE7 EP7 This scene came around when I really needed it. It says a lot of things to me. Mostly that trauma, and horror and missing body parts do not have to condemn you to the fucked up bullshit everyone and everything tells you it does. And also it proves my point that castration is A. Not a punchline and B. doesn’t make a man not a man and C. THEON WILL FUCK YOU UP AND SMILE ABOUT IT. >:D 

One character you wish got more appreciation:

...THEON GREYJOY. 

Fanfic or nah?

Nah...

Favourite quote:

“I’ve been a cynic as long as I can remember.” -Tyrion Lannister EDIT: OMFG I FORGOT. IT’S NOT THAT ONE. ITS: “There’s no men like me. Only me.” -Jaime Lannister Also let’s be real Cersei’s “I choose violence.” is good to.  WHY NO THEON QUOTES??? All of his best quotes are in the books.

Do you avoid spoilers?

NOPE. I don’t avoid them for almost EVERYTHING. 

Favourite house words:

WE DO NOT SOW.

One character you’d bring back from the dead:

RAMSAY...AND ROS.

Which was more satisfying: Ramsay dying or Joffrey dying?

You know what. Ramsay’s death in the show SUCKS. Because for TWO reasons, ONE it was predictable. And that’s a thing with the later season of the show, they are 100% predictable standard averageness. But also because Sansa was DRAGGED INTO THEON’S ARC AND THEN SHE KILLED RAMSAY AND IT’S LIKE...WAIT WHERE WAS THEON? Ramsay was literally MADE MY GRRM FOR THEON’S ARC. FOR THEON.  But the show fucked up in SE5 and then they were like OH SHIT. EVERYONE IS MAD WE DID THIS TO SANSA UH...WE SHOULD HAVE HER KILL HIM AND SEND THEON FAR AWAY AND NEVER TELL HIM LALALALAA. FUCK. So Joffrey. Joffrey’s death is better. Sansa’s even THERE TOO BUT SHE DIDN’T KILL HIM (knowingly) AND IT MAKES SENSE ON EVERY LEVEL. UNLIKE THE GARBAGE SITUATION IN SE6. GDI. AHHHHH- 

One character you’d kill, or kill sooner than they were killed?

...Samwell Tarly...Because he annoys me and I am mad that I had to watch him clean bedpans and shit in SE7. 

Direwolves or dragons?

TROGDOORRRRRRR

Wildlings or the dothraki?

The Dothraki are more interesting IMO even though they are kind of like just The Worst Aspects Of A Nomadic Warrior Culture. 

Favourite lannister?

Tyrion Lannister of course. Tyrion’s arc and character is so good...Fuck it’s good. I would have been obsessed with him if not for Theon. 

Tyrion Lannister | The Way -by Heroes Fan Productions

Favourite stark?

The lady, Sansa Stark of Winterfell. Duh.

Sansa Stark | Survivor -by Tap101Dancer

Would you rather be able to be resurrected anytime, but gain scars and all like Beric, or become a faceless man?

I literally already am Beric Dondarion. 

Would you rather have the rebellion tv show or the conquest tv show?

This is such a weird question that no one can make sense of from what I can see...Also uh... @quarkitty did you get tagged yet? I am so bad at tagging.  /End of this novel of a post.