#love yourself enough to raise the bar to a micron off the floor.

[utilitycaster]

The below is a long rant but it is something I feel deep in my bones and informs the vast majority of how I engage with both works and fandoms but really it boils down to the following tenets:

The full phrase is "all interpretations are valid provided they are supported by the text", and in this context "valid" means "not incorrect, though also not uniquely correct". There are invalid and incorrect interpretations, namely, those not supported by the text.

All headcanons are valid in the sense that no one else can tell you that your thoughts are wrong to have, but there are no shortage of headcanons I or others think are fucking stupid and terrible and yeah, in direct conflict with the text sometimes. [sidebar: headcanon to me means 'think you think would be cool to have in the story but may or may not be in any way supported by it'; interpretation means 'thing you believe could be the canon of the story.' headcanons need no evidence; interpretations always do.]

If you need internet strangers to tell you that everything you think is good and correct, that's pathetic and burdensome and unless you address it you will be a negative presence in a fandom through this neediness.

Creator confirmation after the fact is great if it, as mentioned above, clarifies something supported by canon. If it is not officially supported by canon but not in conflict then I guess it's fine but it doesn't actually mean anything, and if it's actively in conflict it's worse than useless.

Conspiracy theory-esque "confirmations" are on par with needing the validation of internet strangers if not lower.

Are you genuinely happy with being told and not shown? (not a tenet but a question to ask yourself)

I think I can best express this by going down that list and giving some examples or expansion.

I'm going to return to my old favorite example, The Giver, which as a middle-grade book is extremely accessible. It ends with Jonas and Gabriel fleeing into bitter cold, and at the very end, Jonas thinks he hears people nearby, "but perhaps it was only an echo." My interpretation, as a 10 year old, was that he did hear people. My mother's was that he was dying of hypothermia. These were both valid interpretations at the time (later books by Lois Lowry confirm that Jonas survived, but without that information available the idea he died is not incorrect). It's an ambiguous ending, and either a bittersweet story in which he survives but is now someplace strange, or one in which he dies having known emotions and freedom unlike most others is thematically consistent with the story at large. If you had an interpretation of, I don't know, "he was abducted by aliens" you'd be a fucking idiot because there is no support for this.

As mentioned, interpretations and theories need textual support - not just lack of contradiction, but actual textual support - to be valid. Headcanons do not. I don't personally care for headcanons that conflict with the text but like, you can have them. It's in your head. I don't get to tell you what can be in your head. Only you can. I can think your headcanon is dumb though. You can think my headcanon is dumb. We can all hate each other's headcanons. It's technically true that headcanons are all valid but ultimately that's a useless statement because of point 3. If your headcanon is that Jonas is himself an alien because you think it will be funny I think that's dumb as shit, but like, you can think it and the consequence will be that I think your headcanon is dumb as shit.

This is pretty self-explanatory but anecdote time. The first anon hate I got on this specific blog was in response to someone who, on anon, was excited about iirc some sorcerer feature and I was like "ok? I don't care" and they kept pushing and I finally was like "oh my god happy for you but I said I don't care" and then they sent the hate and it's like. pal. I do not care. I am also a complete stranger to you. Whether or not I like the thing you like or think your theories or D&D build is good is immaterial. Anyway virtually all hate/harassment I have personally received boils down to "waaaaaaah why don't you like things I like" and it's like well. I am an individual person with my own brain. Why don't you like the things I like. Why do you care. Why do you feel both in need of and entitled to my approval. Why are you remotely invested in what I think at all. Desire (for the approval of random-ass strangers) begets suffering (of everyone because you can't act right) and then this all turns into a truly wretched feedback loop because obviously when you start acting like a fuckhead towards people when they didn't validate you, they will now disapprove of you harder. I don't have an answer on how to stop this other than get off the internet and go to therapy.

First case: classic example is Korrasami; there is obvious in-world textual support for them being in some way involved but no hard confirmation of Yes They Are Girlfriends. Clarification is nice. I don't think it's necessary per se to enjoy the relationship, and I'd duprefer in-world confirmation, but sometimes it is useful to have. Dumbledore is a case of "not in conflict but not really supported either" (at the time that was said): we'll talk more in point 6 but really it's like yeah sure he's gay I guess, didn't get a single bit of like, canonical representation of queerness out of it though. I don't have an example for the third case but like, I don't know, it's probably happened for some show out there where the creator and actor vehemently disagreed and one of them says something fully contradicted by the canon at which point it's just like, well, everyone for themself.

I had some of this in a post in queue that I am perhaps wisely putting here below a cut instead but: I'm talking the 'well on this poster their hands are 2 mm closer than anyone else's hands are' mentality. I'm talking about 'she seemed to be blinking in his direction a little bit while out of character, so...' But most of all I'm talking about people claiming merch photos as ship validation. The best analogy I have here is that when people do shit like this it reads to me as if they are crouching down on a subway platform to desperately lick the filth-encrusted gum thereon in the hopes of obtaining a molecule of flavor. It is deeply sad, and I pity them but I'm also kind of grossed out and uncomfortable by how nakedly desperate it is and I'm like. I want to give you some real food, but also you seem to actively be into this so I'm going to leave instead.

Putting all of the above together: think about your favorite textually canonical relationship or character detail. Imagine the story and how it unfolded. Now imagine that you didn't have that at all but the creator was like uhhhhh sure yeah whatever, yeah they're together, yeah this character is this thing you thought. Would this satisfy you in the same way, even a little? Does it feel good to you to be told "the thing you didn't get a single moment of would in some other timeline maybe have happened?" while getting nary a peek at that other timeline? This is somewhat rhetorical but like, it's not dissimilar vibes to the previous point. This is what you're settling for? Someone saying "yeah we never gave you what you wanted but sure maybe under wildly different hypothetical circumstances, anyway we shall not elaborate, you still don't actually have that story." Like, hey bro, there's a gay character! it never comes up but like, it's there! Hey! There's a million dollars in your wallet! Well actually there's not but I think there could be! Does this satisfy you?

I warned this was a rant but just...the thought of this sort of thirst for validation without any substance behind it is so deeply sad but also alien to me, and, more than anything, sounds fucking exhausting. The compressed version of the above really is "damn bitch, you live like this?"

I think we need a return to 2000s-era "word of god is a cop out" attitudes. Like... it's one thing if someone clarifies something supported by canon or adds character details in interviews, and but like. Even before jkr revealed herself to be horribly transphobic we were side-eyeing the "Dumbledore is gay I just never wrote a single word indicating that in the text" statement and now people will be like hello creator could you confirm my crack ships and unevidenced headcanons as if that means anything.