#the one thing you can say about mcyt is that none of them post shipping wars stuff

[utlana]

to think, I was *this* close from escaping mcyt to go back to my anime roots, only to be hit with the discourse™

and I thought to myself, yeah, I think I'm just going to stay here

[antimony-medusa]

I read your post on boundaries and the MCYT community recently and have been thinking about as posts that contradict it cross my dash, and I’ve been reflecting on how a lot of what we call “boundaries” are more just like. Community rules? Like take “no sexualization,” for instance. If I’m talking to someone at my workplace, I am not comfortable with them making sexual remarks about me. If someone did, I would tell them so, and not engage in that conversation with them. That’s an actual boundary — something governing how people interact with ME that I am in charge of enforcing. I don’t say “no one is allowed to think anything sexual about me at work ever or tell their friends I’m hot” bc that’s just insane and none of my business, quite frankly. Streamers are well within their rights to say they aren’t comfortable seeing people sexualizing them in their chat or like very publicly on Twitter, but saying no one can sexualize them ever is actually just a community rule, not a personal boundary. Based on how I understand what a boundary is, it can’t be boundary breaking to do something that a creator definitely will not see, because the creator isn’t interacting with the content, and boundaries are about governing comfort in interactions. And saying “I don’t want there to be sexualization or sexual content about me in the main tags bc my main audience is children who browse those tags and they shouldn’t be exposed to that” is a reasonable enough rule to ask your community to follow, but it’s just straight up not a boundary? Like am I misunderstanding what a boundary is? I’m confused bc I’m seeing all this stuff about boundary breaking content and how it’s disgusting even if the creator will never see it and I just don’t get it?

Yeah, I think this is a situation where we're using words to mean something they don't technically mean (see also, "lore"), and then this leads to us also having community arguments about what is acceptable, and it's all totally unnecessary.

Cause the workplace comparison is a good one! If I was telling fellow coworkers how hot they were when they'd said they didn't want to hear that, or walking up to the barista and saying that I wanted them to weigh in on the porn I'd written about them, that would be workplace sexual harrasment and, depending on the severity of the situation, literally a crime I could be charged with. Absolutely inappropriate to do, and I can't express how extremely fair it is that streamers get to say no to that. I am FULLY in support of CCs setting those limits for their spaces and think it's healthy and we all need to respect that.

But "boundaries", as a term, is technically about controlling your own behaviour and people's access to you. You set a boundary and say to your parents "if you bring up grandkids at the christmas meal I will be leaving", or "if you mention [latest discourse] on my blog I will block you". It's about controlling your experiences via your own behaviour and the stuff that you actually see. CC equivalent is saying that any sexualization or shipping in their chats or replies will lead to a block or a ban. That's them controlling their own experience and that's A-ok. Asking a CC to weigh in on what sort of fan work they're comfortable being shown, that's also about them controlling their own experience and is totally fair.

Asking a CC to weigh in on what sort of fan work exists in general— that's not boundaries any more, that's something else entirely. The closest equivilent is companies trying to control what sort of materiel their image or trademarked material show up in, I think? Which is a thing you can do when you're licensing your image, but isn't actually a thing you can do with fan works. Celebrities get to say no they're not going to appear in a commercial advertising an oil company, because they have a moral disagreement with oil companies, but that's because the interaction there is a company offering to pay them money for their image and them declining the money. That's not how fan works operate. The celebrity isn't in a position to decline the money for their "image" being used, because no money is being offered, because the fan isn't making money. It's not a copyright/licensing situation, it's fan works. The celebrity shouldn't be part of the conversation at all, because they should never see that.

And like, there's issues of impersonation or endorsement where it's bad form to do something that looks like it comes from the celebrity, as though they approve of what is being depicted, which is why AI voice lines and deepfakes are being increasingly spoken out against. But man, someone writing Captain Puffy's and PearlescentMoon's cubitos kissing each other on Ao3 and keeping it on Ao3 is not a situation where celebrity endorsement or licensing or impersonation comes in at all. That's a conversation totally within the fandom, without the creators involved. And I really disagree with asking the creator to treat all of fandom like their community, which they should moderate and like, control their image and make kids-and-advertiser-friendly, because that's not how fandom works and also that is unfair to ask of them.

Can one or both of the creators say they don't want to see that? Totally fair. That's a boundary. Can they say that it shouldn't exist in their main tag that kids check? I'm on the side of tagging things to keep them away from minors and people who don't want to see it anyways, rock on. That's a community rule. Can they say that it should never exist ever, anywhere on the internet? That's just not how this works. A) that's not how fan works have ever worked, fan works are for transforming and celebrating existing canon, not for creator approval, and we should stop shoving all of them in creators' faces or asking them to weigh in, B) "boundaries" is entirely the wrong word for what's going on there, like you said. Cause is the mere existence of a thing in a seperate space infriging on the creator's experience and reasonable for them to control? That's what a boundary is, this isn't. C) This isn't even community rules that it makes sense for them to moderate! When you are talking about an entirely different space, cut off from the CCs, doing their own thing to the characters, with age barriers and trigger warnings built in, "boundaries" isn't the right term, but also this doesn't make sense as a space that we're inviting creators into to moderate. This is a seperate space, and stories or art in it aren't hurting people, even if the cc's wouldn't want to see that or even want them in their main community tabs. So yeah when it comes to us enforcing our own community rules, keeping creator boundaries and community rules in mind, the mere existence of a thing does not seem to me like the end of the world. A lot of people have come out and said that all our work needs to be sqeaky clean and able to be shown in the creator's chat, as though the creator is moderating the space and their personal boundaries are involved. And (listing things yet again, this is a post of lists), first of all there's a real focus on sexualization in that case and never on things like family dynamic or kidfic or gore or whump that could also make creators uncomfortable if it was shoved in their faces. (But somehow when anyone brings up those "boundaries" everyone comes to the conclusion that something entirely off on the internet somewhere and never shown to the creators is not going to harm them. Curious.) And second of all, I just disagree that that's a good way to run a fandom community. This is a space for fans, not for the creators, bringing up the "weird stuff" publically to creators is incredibly cruel to people who shouldn't have to see that, AND it's a bad atmosphere for creativity to always want the creators to approve things, fandom is for saying "fuck the man" and doing your own thing. Just tag it to keep it away from people who don't want to see it, and filter the tags for your own experience. Keep everything in its own space and you're good. There's tons of stuff in the fandom that isn't to my taste, ranging from characters that just don't do it for me to tropes that are active turn offs to people writing and undertagging things in ways that is concerning to me. We have got to learn to say "that's not for me" and "that's not for the cc" and put it away (block if you have to) and move on.

[hermitcraftx]

I agree with your post about hermit fans in regard to things being very popular. I’ve seen more people being angry and annoyed about scarian in the last six months than people celebrating it. Not tagging shipping is shit but it’s better than harassing people. I don’t know what was put in the water but something changed drastically and I’m glad I’m not the only one who’s seen it.

IT'S FUCKING INSANE! This fandom used to be so positive and welcoming and overall way more pleasant than some... other MCYT fandoms, but now??? I can't log on without seeing untagged negative interpretations in the main tags, can't express an opinion without getting anons calling me heterosexual sympathizers and hoping that I die, everyone has turned their back on everything that used to make this fandom really... fun? Like, I don't tag ON MY BLOG, but usually I don't maintag my shipping posts, and if I do, I tag the ship name so people can filter it.... I don't maintag duo names. What the fuck happened to make everyone so- miserable. Anons are probably going to be permanently off for me, too many people comfortable with their opinions and not comfortable with mine and desperately needing to tell me that.

And like- look. I get not liking interpretations. Personally I'm not a fan of the Double Life cheating arc because of how abusive and out of character people made Grian be, and I had to avoid ao3 for a bit because of that and filter the fucking tags. Same thing with found family dynamics. Just because you don't like something doesn't make it "overrated and popular" and just because you don't like something doesn't make it immoral or unethical either!!! People have to make everything a moral standpoint nowadays and it's really exhausting-

But that's a tirade. All over all the confessions blogs there's "scarian is overrated" despite Grian having nearly 10mil subscribers and most of them being on YouTube and considering all the hermits friends or family truthing them. Yes, there is more shipping than before- that's because Hermitcraft season 8 made it very obvious that the people on the SMP and the people IRL are very different, and it's no longer considered RPF. None of the real hermits died via moon explosion, ZombieCleo often says she's doing "lore", they make different skins, even GRIAN acknowledges that he's acting and playing a part with the permit office. Despite all that, there's STILL wars on shipping and people insisting that we're shipping real people, I fought this war on the DSMP side of things and it's SO TIRING.

DND podcast listeners, do you ship the people playing the characters? NO!!!!! Unless you do, in which case, have fun with that. I don't really care about RPF and I filtered the tags for it a long time ago, so maybe they do do that.

Every other day I see "Third life is overrated" "Last life is overrated" (LAST LIFE IS OFTEN THE LEAST FAVORITE SEASON I SEE PEOPLE SAY!), "the life series is overrated" "the cactus ring is fucking stupid" "they left the desert but we didn't" "no, THIS interpretation of scarian is bad and wrong" and like... guys. Guys. Fandom is supposed to be fun. It is not supposed to be a full time job. It is not supposed to be moral or ethical and you shouldn't feel the need to police shit. Jesus Christ, every other month there's a new fad that tumblr users flock to and once it's over everyone goes "EWWW THAT WAS LAME AND OVERRATED AND I NEVER LIKED IT ANYWAY" like.... I promise you cannibalism as an allegory for love is not mainstream you are just on Tumblr.

Like Good God. If it's so bad here go to Twitter. I'm sick of all the complaining and misery and hatred and I miss when things were fun- people are so scared of being cliche that they don't want to write things that they enjoy. Where are the coffee shop aus???? Where are the fun silly things??? Where are the 100k grimdark fics with worldbuilding??? Wheres the 500k fics that aren't even about the same characters anymore but that we love just the same??? Where are the forums and people talking to each other in comments and meeting each other that way??? Where are the roleplay servers?????? What are you all doing??????

People are scared of being judged. They want to do what everyone else is doing. They don't want to be cringe or cliche and every day I see a "cringe culture is dead" post and then someone making fun of another part of fandom, an antithesis to their previous statement. They don't want to be late to things, either. Who cares if Last Life was a couple years ago? Draw the fanart anyway!

I'm scared. Maybe I'm just old, but every post I see I notice that I get maybe a 10th in reblogs of what I do in likes, and I don't even post my art or fics to this site. Every post is like that. More and more people only like posts and they die, unseen, by everyone. More and more people misuse archive of our own's functions, treating it like it has some algorithm, when it doesn't, and it never has and hopefully never will. I see fic reuploads to "gain traction" (not how it works) and people reaching out to find RP partners (breaking TOS) and all sorts of other shit on both sites and it fucking horrifies me. I'm not even that old- I'm eighteen, and I can already tell how fandom has changed for the worst for everyone. Fandom used to be a community. Not consumption.

It's just... sad. Old fandom had PLENTY of fucking problems, and we have problems here too, but at least the positives outweighed the negatives. It's so... mean here, now. Even the happy things are mean-spirited. People treat it as if certain people have invaded this fandom space, spreading horrible opinions and ruining it for everyone, but the truth is is that shipping is always going to be a thing. It's a foundation of fandom- fandom started with housewives in the 1950s writing Star Trek fanfiction. You can never get rid of shipping. You can just interact with what you want to interact with and leave others to mind their own business.

[spicler-man]

thanks for the tag!!!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

75

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

214,434

3. What fandoms do you write for?

oh jeez. we'll stick to just what ive got posted bc otherwise this list will crash my computer. mcu, obviously, but there's also stranger things, gravity falls, danny phantom, miraculous ladybug, random kids movie called the little vampire that i got obsessed with, atla, my old mcyt fics, mia and me, phineas and ferb, my old sanders sides fics, stardew valley, exactly 1 undertale fic, and mha. i refuse to make pseuds or new profiles if you subscribe to me you WILL see all my works.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

i think they're all irondad? nobody knows like a waterfall System Error: Reboot i’ll always come back mr. dad❤️🔧 yep. all irondad

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

i try to! but i have bad adhd and completely forget most of the time. trust me, i see it and i love it and then i forget to answer it

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

probably The Phantom Menace just because it's short and there's no closure. one of my earliest irondad works, if not my earliest

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

good question!! most of mine are pretty happy or at least hopeful, i'd say mr. dad❤️🔧 just because there's little to no angst throughout the entire thing

8. Do you get hate on fics?

yep! as previously mentioned, i have horrid adhd, so sometimes ill get stuck in a little echo chamber of my own brain, and ideas that make sense in my head, with all the surrounding details i've come up with, the full thing won't make it into the story so it makes little to no sense.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

i've never written a smut fic, i tried my hand at writing smut (with ocs) when i turned 18 just to see if i could. however i sincerely doubt it'll exit the specially made password-locked document i made for it

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

i don't, not really, so i guess i'll have to say my pnf and irondad crossover, which is less crazy when you remember phineas and ferb already did that.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

nope! no one wants 'em

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

also no

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

i've been a supportive cheerleader on the sidelines for a couple of my friends fics, as well as an idea generator that they've been like "ooh thats good i want to use that" but never a co-writer

14. What’s your all time favourite ship?

i might have to go with my stupid little elf polycule from mia and me. its my all time favorite because if i don't love them, who else will?? and i can never get tired of content from them bc there is none.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

oh god. ive never finished a multichapter. did you all know that about me?? i've never made it all the way through. the final chapter of silent spidey has been complete since november 2022. but i haven't made it there yet. and now i doubt i ever will.

16. What are your writing strengths?

dialogue. i like to think ive got a good handle on dialogue. also spelling and grammar are fun for me so none of those pesky little errors

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

my willingness to sacrifice important plot points for a joke i found marginally funny. looking at you, stranger things wips.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

depends!! i'm bilingual, so if it's a language i've got a handle on then yeah, why not? if i gotta translate it, i'll probably include the translation in there somewhere with an html code

19. First fandom you wrote for?

miraculous ladybug, back on wattpad. if you find my old unfinished fic on wattpad with no clues from me ill give you five bucks

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

i really like to be a bit of warmth for you. it was fun to write and i can still reread it without cringing so i count that as a win!

no pressure tags: @creative-girl @multifandomforthemostpart @call-me-coley @ironfidus

(under the read more is the blank questions for everyone)

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

3. What fandoms do you write for?

oh jeez. mcu, obviously, but there's also

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

8. Do you get hate on fics?

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

14. What’s your all time favourite ship?

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

16. What are your writing strengths?

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

19. First fandom you wrote for?

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

20 Questions for Fic Writers

thank's for the tag @waitingondaisies

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

- 180

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

- 1,701,826 (Holy Crap!)

3. What fandoms do you write for?

- All of my fics are MCU, predominantly Irondad but there are a few Spiceychell fics mixed in there too.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

- A Parent Apparent (528,718 words, 7,349 kudos) A really freaking long slow burn Irondad co-parenting with May fic.

- So Many Things to Say (82,998 words, 3,914 kudos) A electivly mute, foster child Peter fic. This is the first part of an extended series.

- What I Really Need is You (18,520 words, 3,581 kudos) A fluffy 5+1 of Peter needing things from Tony.

- Distracted by a Dime (56,169 words, 2,476 kudos) A homeless Peter AU- Stony AU. This is the first part of a series.

- Suspended (3,607 words, 2,177 kudos) A One-shot about Pter getting suspended and Tony picking him up from school.

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

I try really hard to reply to every comment!

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I don't really do angsty endings... So Maybe this one? Breathe, Kid (You're Not Alone) (4,086 words) Ned Dies and Peter feels responsible. Tony is there to help him pick up the pieces. The ending is hopeful and comforting- but there is no instant fix.

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Oh geez. You want me to pick one??? Uh... Let's go with this one because it has some sweet Christmassy vibes. Secret Sugarplum Spiderling (27,923 words) Peter is a ballet dancer and he doesn't want Tony to know- yet. Lots of super sweet fluff.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Sometimes. Usually, it's someone who has decided that my fictional story filled with fictional characters who have fictional superpowers isn't 'realistic enough.'

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I have written exactly ONE smut fic- but it has NEVER been posted. 😘

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

One- by request. It was a mini-fic about Pokemon trainer Peter and Pokemon Professor Tony. Rotom Roundup (979 words)

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Nope. My art, despite emailing them several times, is still up on a 'coloring sheets' website though. Which mostly annoys me because what they nagged was a draft. I would have happily sent them the clean line art.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

No. I had someone offer once and gave full permission but I don't htink it ever happened.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes! I have co-written a few fics. And I have one in the works with @waitingondaisies

14. What’s your all time favourite ship?

Most of my fics are platonic relationships. But I often have background relationships in them; usually Stony or Pepperony. Some spideycelle and once, Ned/Peter.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

I hope I eventually finish all of them! But there is one I found that I am not even sure where it was going. All I have written is 800 words of Kraven the Hunter confronting Peter.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I think I am pretty good at dialogue.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

I am still learning a lot about POV depth, visceral details, and deep introspection.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I don't use it much, if at all. But it doesn't bother me.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Irondad

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

Oh! It's a tie!! So Many Things to Say will always me towards the top of my favorites lit. But my newest fic, The Hoax, is starting to creep into 'favorite fic of all time' territory.

I am going to tag (If they are interested) @spicler-manie @cajun-fangirl @asyouleft @thwip--thwip @justme--emily and @kubabergen

[mariaiscrafting]

I’m the anon about fanfic and fanart. I just want to say that I’m fine with analysis when they talk about how dnf react to each other when they say or do something but don’t really like how they bring that point into their relationship. It’s one thing to me to say they have a flirty friendship but insisting that they have something more in private bothers me. I always thought that fanfiction and fanart are ways to analyze creators or dynamics so I was curious on what you thought of them. Fans always project things onto creators they like so they make things arolving them. I know you’re worried about how this can strain the content creators and other fandoms, but establishing boundaries is important and it was already addressed by the Dream Team themselves so I don’t see why you have to go out of your way to tell dnf shippers to not to analyze them. I’m not here to hate you but wanting to understand how making a call out post to tell dnf shippers to not to psychoanalizing interactions instead of trying to put more of a distance between yourself and the blogs without putting them down. On Twitter, there was a tweet that misinterpreted Dream and George’s first meeting and Dream corrected them but never condemned them for shipping. He also said in many tweets and said in stream that just how they are and said that fans are allowed to do what they want when it comes to them. Also liking a fan tweet where #Dreamfell was dnf related even though the situation didn’t need to be. Twitter is directly involved with the creators themselves so of course it’s hard to ignore. Even then in Twitter you can still mute words. I’m here for a conversation and not out hate. This is Tumblr where it’s mostly Fandom focused and some dnf shippers like to analyze to project whatever onto them so if we don’t want to see it, asking for a tag so you can block it here. Like #dng long post or just block the analysis tag. We’re all responsible to create our own fandom experience so I don’t want to call fans disgusting when they haven’t done anything wrong since Dream had stated He’s fine with it. I don’t want you to feel excluded in the dnf side of Tumblr since you still find the ship nice, but if you don’t want the long analysis posts since it feels morally wrong to you then we can try to agree on separating the casual and the analytical side of dnf. Your feelings towards dnf blog analysises are valid so your fandom experience should be catered to.

I am actually half delirious while answering this, so Imma keep it short and simple.

I do cater my own tumblr experience to what I want. I do block people who post stuff I don't like so I don't see it in the tags. All your advice is nice, but unnecessary.

I think that I should be allowed to criticize circles that I am in in the hopes that they will approve and shift what they consider the norm. Yes, Dream said that he is okay with shipping and has engaged with it and panders to the audience with it. But to take anyone's green light on any issue involving their personal lives, and to run rampantly with it is still fucked.

And look, I don't think I've properly articulated why I call this behavior disgusting. I want to emphasize that I view it as dehumanizing. To reduce a person's behaviors and tendencies to whatever vicarious romantic gratification you can get from them is an appalling act, devoid of empathy. It exemplifies the commodification of CCs for the audience's sole entertainment and that audience's lack of basic respect for them or acknowledgement that they are real life human beings who function beyond whatever romantic framework you fantasize them in. I keep bringing up this example, I know, but it's what incited this whole discourse for me in the first place, but that analysis of Dream's few seconds of silence as him focusing on George's voice because he's just so in love with him? That analysis, and the overwhelming consensus on that post perfectly exemplify just how dehumanizing this crossing of a line can be. It erases the conceptual space for any other, rational and non-romantic explanation for a few seconds of silence that could have easily been attributed to distraction, a moment to collect his thoughts, etc. It also perfectly exemplifies how, through the overanalysis, shippers force CCs into two-dimensional boxes that best fit their wants, devoid of nuance. In this instance, Dream is not a busy content creator who hasn't streamed very often for the past few months and might be readjusting to consistently talking in front of a live audience, or a young adult with ADHD whose brain jumps from point to point in its search for dopamine, or literally any other kind of human being with multiple characteristics and personality traits influencing his behaviors; he is a prop for our self-idulgent ship. I'm reading way too much into this one example, I know, but I just want to also say that this is like a much higher problem than just one post. I don't care about the content of one fucking post, I care about what that post and the methods of analysis employ imply about the rest of dnf shippers. This community is following behaviors that are concerning, and this is just one example of hundreds that exemplify that.

Projection is fine. Projection is employed in RPF fanfictions, character headcanons, different fanart styles - it's all over the mcyt fandom and I don't have a problem with it. My PROBLEM is with people who act like their analyses of Dream and George and literally any other content creator are actually representative of reality. My problem is with people who don't understand that there is a difference between stanning and creating/consuming fan content for a creator's persona, and theorizing about what that creator's actual character as a real life human being is.

Okay, also, I might just be getting more irritable because it's 2 am and I want to be asleep, but I actually do have a problem with you essentially saying that a preferred solution for me is to simply cut myself off from half the community. Basically, I should just plug my ears and shield my eyes if I see problematic content I am morally against? Fuck off, mate. There are many, many things I choose not to start discourse on and simply block or mute because I don't care enough to try and change it. But dnf shipping is something that I actively engage with, is kind of a significant part of my online presence and experience, and also a way I've made a lot of friends in this community. So yeah, I have a vested interest in making sure it doesn't go down the same, fucked paths I've seen other shipping communities go down, and if that means making a discourse post that makes you uncomfortable, I suggest you block me.

I'm not advocating for this fandom to partition up based on what we all think is right and wrong. I want integration of different ideas, useful discourse, and self-growth. And none of that is solved by creating a separate hashtag

[insidious-apple]

LONG POST ABOUT SHIPPING IN FANDOMS

Last night, my gf and I were discussing shipping in fandoms (specifically mcyts) and it got me thinking so I’d like to present my fully awake thoughts on the matter.

okay so!

Shipping isn’t new. shipping has been around since fandoms have been around and fandoms have been around a long time. but with how expansive and connective the internet is, fandoms have become way more of a thing and so has shipping and ship art and parasocial relationships and all that jazz. parasocial relationships are actually completely normal because as humans, we seek to form social connections with people, so when we hear or see them (i.e. on TV or on youtube), we seek to establish a friendship bond with them. This is why celebrity crushes are a thing. The problem with that is that these celebrities are people too and they can be completely overwhelmed by all the attention, especially if it’s sexual in nature. None of this is new information.

Then there’s a completely different thing, which is shipping. When fans ship a celeb or cc with one of their closest friends, that can make stuff a bit weird. Like, imagine if all the randos at your school thought (and told you) that you and your best friend would make a really good couple. Or even if they said that you and an acquaintance of yours would be really good friends. Kinda creepy, right? Because it’s none of their business who you date or who you’re friends with. Same concept, only it’s hundreds of thousands, or maybe even millions, of people telling two celebrities or content creators that they would be really good friends or make a really good couple. It’s creepy and it’s none of the fans’ business.

On one hand, fandoms should stop shipping altogether. It’s creepy and rude and it’s especially tolling for these celebs that can’t get out of the limelight, whether that be physically, mentally, or online. It’s got to be extremely difficult to just let all that stuff wash over them all day every day. This includes fanart and fanfiction (both sfw and nsfw), comments on videos, blogs, everything. Also, it’s kind of dehumanizing. When a person is famous, they get all these pictures painted of them, but the unknown gaps are always filled in, whether they want them to be or not. This turns the person into more of a brand or character that can be whatever the fans want them to be and that can pressure the person into trying to be more like that character instead of being more like themselves. Stuff like this can also violate boundaries as some people are just straight up not okay with seeing fanart or fics of themselves, to name a couple of things. And these celebs are people and their boundaries should be respected. If you draw a weird drawing of your friend that you know they wouldn’t be okay with, you wouldn’t post it on the internet for everyone to see because it would hurt their feelings. Same goes here, just on a much larger scale. This ESPECIALLY goes if the celebs or content creators are young and still mentally developing. And I don’t just mean young like under 18. I mean young like college age, like 25 and younger. These people are still developing in the world and the fact that they have to encounter all this stuff about them on a daily basis is just not good for their mental health and we should respect that. Like even if they said they’re completely fine with it, it still gives me weird vibes when I remember that the art or fic or whatever is about real people who are trying to live their lives without everyone knowing every little tiny detail about them, yet they still know that people are trying to find every detail about them. This sucks because fans aren’t entitled to every little detail. That’s just a fact, and always will be. And fandoms are kind of riddled with this. It almost looks like people trying to talk behind someone’s back, which always weird for they person they’re talking about, whether they’re talking shit or talking good.

On the other hand (especially with the dream smp), fanart and fics are so fucking cool! Being inspired and making art out of your inspiration will never not be one of the coolest things the human brain can do. And holy FUCK there are so many talented individuals out there who can do so much with so little information, it’s insane. And fandoms are the perfect place for these people because they have stuff to go off of, but they also have the freedom to express themselves. Especially when celebs say that they’re okay with stuff, it opens up a whole new world of expression and I think that’s super fucking cool.

Another note: the internet has free speech, which i think is pretty damn cool. However, this does not include freedom from consequences. If you say some dumb shit or some fucked up shit on the internet, I guarantee you there will be consequences. These can come in the form of your post getting taken down for violating community guidelines or someone calling you out in the comments. And I think that’s a good thing. Reporting and blocking are some of the best functions on the internet and i think that people should use them more often, especially in relation to aforementioned things that violate people’s boundaries. Often, people will just comment and share it saying “yo wtf this is gross” but that just draws more attention to the fucked up thing in question.

I didn’t really have a place I was going with this, but basically: - Don’t violate celebs/content creators’ boundaries. - Don’t dehumanize people just because you don’t know every little thing about them. - DON’T MAKE NSFW ART/FICS ABOUT MINORS. - Don’t push stuff on celebs/content creators. They’re people too. - Differentiate between characters and the people behind them in your works. The difference is VERY important. - If you do any of the above things, don’t be surprised if you get called out about it. - Most importantly, have fun! Don’t be afraid to put fanart or fanfic out there if the celeb/content creator is okay with it. The internet and fandoms are supposed to be fun for everybody, including the fans and the thing/people they are a fan of.

Okay that’s all I have to say about that for now. *steps off soapbox*