Meta Monday

fangirlunderground:

I got involved in fandom in the mid-90s when I was around 14 years old. My cousin @lyndanaclerio sent me VHS recordings of the Sailor Moon dub, and I fell in love… I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before.

Since then, I’ve been in a lot of different fandoms: from manga to YA, Tolkien to Xena, Harry Potter to Teen Wolf, Star Wars to Marvel, and countless mini-fandoms along the way. And I’ve met a lot of cool people online over the years — older and younger alike, including my best friend of 15 years — on all sorts of platforms. I’ve built myself fandom homes on shitty GeoCities fansites and moderately less shitty sites I made from scratch; on Yahoo! Groups and LiveJournal; on AO3 and Tumblr… and that’s nothing compared to others!

But, last week, I turned 36, and according to some, I’ve already overstayed my welcome in fandom by at least a decade. I guess I’m supposed to put all my comics and collectibles on eBay, swap out my fanfiction with whatever the fuck a beach read is, and spend the rest of my life cloistered in my house where I won’t offend society. (I mean, I’m kind of a hermit, but that’s not why.) 

And let me be clear here: by some, I mean some. While there is indeed a frightening trend here on Tumblr, in which some young people have embraced bizarrely conservative views about women and sexuality, with the Trumpian rhetoric to match, I think the problem is bigger than that. I recently talked about the pressure I felt to abandon fandom when I was 25 when Tumblr was still brand new, and nothing like it is today. It’s clear there were (and are) more societal forces at work than just a toxic sub-culture on a struggling platform.

So, this post isn’t about the vast majority of young people in fandom, nor am I here to yell “get off my fandom, you pesky kids!” when no one ever said that to 14-year-old me. In fact, this post is as much for fangirls as it is for fanwomen because you deserve to know that getting older doesn’t mean giving up the things you love. But you don’t deserve to tell others to conform just because you’re uncomfortable that they exist. There are already enough toxic fanboys trying to keep women out of geek culture, so don’t help them hold the gates closed from the outside.

And if you are older, and already let that shit drive you out of taking a more active part in fandom, I’ve been there, and I get it. But you can still come back; not just on your private Tumblr, or your secret AO3 account, but for real and any time. One of the most freeing choices I’ve made is to stop pretending I think all of this is stupid. The world needs more quirky, eccentric women, anyways.

Sorry this one is so long, but apparently I have FEELINGS this month — especially after the Bog of Eternal Stench I had to trot through while researching this one — and there are a lot of people who’ve articulated them better than I did here (see the following meta recs). I promise we’ll move on next week! As always, let the authors know you appreciated their work by engaging however you can. And if you ever feel alienated on this site, please feel welcome to talk to me! 💛  

Fandom – Ageism

Adults in Fandom by @littlesystems, […] There are a lot of different factors at play with the current fandom purity thing. It’s primarily being driven by minors, which is why I’ve used that as a stand-in, but there are older people who are obsessed with this and younger people who aren’t. Nuance! Exciting stuff. I think the two biggest drivers here are a genuine but misguided desire to make fandom a better place, paired with plain ol’ run-of-the-mill sexism. I’m not the first person to say this and I know others have said it better, but here are my two cents.

Age and Experience in Fandom by @tppfandomstats, This month’s @threepatchpodcast episode, When I’m 64, looks at fandom and aging. To go along with these discussions, here are some demographic stats from a few fandom surveys on the age distribution in our online fandom communities. 

Age Appropriate Activities by @telesilla, So this post, another in a long series of “find a bridge club you embarrassing old ladies” posts, came around. And I adulted hard all day and it just really pissed me off and caught me at a bad time. 

Ageism in Fandom by @badtech-reblogs, Seeing yet another post about ageism in fandom and I’m trying to do some root cause analysis. That ageism in fandom is tied up with misogyny is a given. There is almost no age too young to start ridiculing a woman for her hobbies and interests, and even young girls are expected to have a maturity and patience beyond their years. The misogyny is coming in from the larger world outside of fandom like how misogyny, ableism, anti-blackness etc. seeps into all subcultures.

Ageism in Fandom: Too Old to Fangirl? by @ravenmorganleigh, @vulgarweed, et al. Most Fandoms are comprised mostly of women, young and old. It’s interesting to me when Young Women– who are the most likely to champion women’s rights can turn around and show their youth-bias when it comes to Older Women in Fandom.  

Fandom culture wouldn’t be where it is now if it wasn’t for Old Fandom by @thepalmtoptiger, I almost forgot that ageism in fandom is a thing. Apparently once you hit 25/30 years old you’re supposed to stop having interests in things. People need to freshen up on their fandom history and realize that fandom now wouldn’t be what it is if it wasn’t for older fans.   

Getting older doesn’t actually feel like anything by @catchmewhispering, The hilarious thing about growing up, that all the ageist people here are gonna very harshly realise, is getting older doesn’t actually feel like anything. You don’t “turn into” an adult, it’s just another year that passes and, sure, it might become easier to make decisions or figure out how to fix a sticky situation but overall, you don’t suddenly Enter Adult World and never have a goofy thought or a messy moment ever again.   

The idea that you will someday be ‘too old’ for the stuff you find fun by @freedom-of-fanfic,  […] The idea that you will someday be ‘too old’ for the stuff you find fun now is a long-standing cultural message that I’m sure many anti-shippers – many adolescents of all stripes – have absorbed. that message caused adolescent me to think I would outgrow fandom, and I don’t think that message has particularly changed.  

If other people in fandom are older than you, by definition, they have been your age by @codenamecesare, […] If other people in fandom are older than you, by definition, they have been your age. When fans write about younger characters, we’re not peering through a keyhole at young people now and creeping on them. We are drawing on our own experiences, thoughts, feelings and memories of what it was like when we were that age.

I’m old as balls by @warlordenfilade, […] Just realize that with 30+ year old franchises there will be 30+ year old people who grew up with the franchise and still love it.  Tumblr may be a relatively recent platform but fandom as an institution is waaaay older than I am and the Transformers fandom in particular has fans in their 40s and 50s whom I am personally acquainted with, fans who have adapted from photocopy fanzines and snail mail mailing lists to bulletin boards, newsgroups, forums, and, yeah, tumblr, in their many years of fandom.  

I wish we’d stop telling each other – and ourselves – that there’s a point at which we’re too old for fandom by @vantasticmess​, I spent every year from 14 to 25 telling myself that eventually I’d grow out of fandom: I would get too old to cosplay and I would write my own original stories instead of ‘just’ fanfiction. After all, adults don’t write fanfic and adults don’t make costumes for themselves. Adults get married and have kids and make costumes for their kids and write real stories and get published.  

“like, i’m not saying that adults don’t have a place in fandom.” by @porcupine-girl​, @melifair​, et al. […] Fandom is vast and encompasses a multitude of interests and age groups. We all fandom responsibly, and those who abuse that at the expense of someone vulnerable or impressionable are not tolerated. This does not mean that anyone specific group of fandom should be limited. Nor does it mean that the only entertainment media created ever should be accessible to all viewing audiences. Young fandom will grow to understand this, not only in fandom but in life.

“Lmao 30-year-old women don’t belong in fandoms. Go knit or have kids or something.” by @rainbowloliofjustice, @the-salt, et al. […] It’s the fact I don’t get what these people think happens when you turn 18 it’s not like the second you turn 18 you just immediately lose interest in everything you were interested in at 17 and from then on only like strictly ‘adult™’ things. A lot of people who were in fandoms as teenagers stay in fandoms as adulthood. Fandoms aren’t minor-only spaces and never have been and there’s literally nothing wrong with adults in fandom environments.

Older fans are crucial to the survival of fandoms by @muchymozzarella, […] Not ONLY because they’re literally the ones keeping fandom afloat (AO3 wasn’t created or maintained by kids, let’s just say), but because older fans generally don’t attack or bully or fuck up a fandom by being aggressive or volatile or overzealous, destroying any enjoyment of a medium. 

PSA by @bugsieplusone​, I’ve been sitting on this post for a while because it probably reveals more about me on a platform that I’d rather not reveal but here goes. I’d like to talk about fandom and ageism. If you are older, you are: Allowed to like things, Allowed to create fan works, Allowed to discuss things with other like minded fans, Allowed to participate.

Reblog if Older Fans Are Welcome In Fandom by @cameoamalthea​, For many fandom is a life long passion that starts young, but being a geek isn’t something you have to grow out of and put away. I didn’t start cosplaying until my 20s (I couldn’t have, and probably won’t be financially secure enough to do all the things I want until my 30s).

tumblr’s disgust for older people in fandom by @bai-xue​, @awkward-smiley​; […] I’m young now, but I was scared that I wouldn’t be over fandoms when I got older. I’m sick of it, how about we all just like what we like and not judge people?

you are never too old for fandom by @hils79​, […] You are never too old for fandom and if you think that’s true I pity you when you reach whatever arbitrary age you think is the cutoff point.  

You are reinforcing a stereotype by @asocialjusticeleague​, @olderthannetfic​, et al; […] Whenever you question a woman’s right to this space because of her age or parental status, you are reinforcing a stereotype that has effects that reach beyond that one situation. The expectation, for example, that 40 year old men be catered to when writing comics, but that characters of interest to 40 year old women are obsolete or unprofitable.