oh fandom, NO!

[rm]

http://community.livejournal.com/jackxianto/3668643.html
in which someone says something that sounds an awful lot like "die-hard SF/F fans are an oppressed minority."

http://community.livejournal.com/jackxianto/3668643.html?view=12636067#t12636067
In which I yell.

thanks for the heads-up from starstealingirl

Subcutlures, because they are by definitions not the mainstream dominant culture, are technically minorities.

But here's the deal, I'm a minority because I'm queer, because I'm Jewish, because I am not as white as look.

Engaging with enterainment in a non-culturally dominant way may be responsible for affecting the tone of huge swathes of my life, but it doesn't define it. Being a member of an actual minority does.

I am not a minority because I like SF/F or because I cried and cried and cried for Ianto or even because I have an unpopular fannish opinion in the sense that I'm not all worked up about RTD and whether he respects fandom or not -- I don't care, I don't need his approval.

Believe me, I get what you are saying. For older fen in particular, there is this very real sense of being in this small, sort of looked down upon subculture and since many of us interact with the world differently than the mainstream (there are studies on the high incidence of the non-neurotypical in the fannish community), I do sort of get why you chose this angle to frame your point.

But with things like Harry Potter, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Comic Con, Dragon*Con, and, yes, the Children of Earth miniseries, fannishness is now a pretty nearly mainstream activity.

But more than that: no one ever threw beer bottles at me for being fannish. No one ever threatened to rape me for being fannish. No one fucking threatened to beat my face in with a brick for being fannish. They have (the first two) because I was gay and (the third) because I'm Jewish.

Considering one of the biggest plot points and now fandom controversies relates to the show's handling of Ianto's sexuality, you really might want to check yourself here.

I am a minority and it's not because I loved a man who never was, even though I did.

Comments

[godofstrife.livejournal.com]

Oh dear, I commented.

[all the comments flying around about how it is only a very few of us that are upset over CoE, I found myself thinking about the fact that I have accepted the fact that I am part of this worldwide minority.

While I agree that there are less SF/F fans in the world than, say, white, straight males, you are clearly confusing numeric minorities (e.g. subcultures) with the contemporarily political and social meaning behind the term minority. I'm part of subcultures like SF/F, FPS games, gothic scene and I belong to minorities (mixed ethnics, gay, living in a foreign country), only being part of the latter has ever subjected me to discrimination.
Please think about different meanings many words in our language have before you apply them to yourself or anyone else.

From the comments: I'm a minority.

We are Pope! (Please, someone get this reference)
]

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

The "Wir Sind Papst" incident(s?), by any chance?

[godofstrife.livejournal.com]

Yes! Thank you. I was very embarrassed to be half German that day. But only the Bild can give us these rare gems of journalism fail.

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

To be totally honest, I wasn't sure what you were referencing but it sounded so very familiar and it bugged me so I googled it and when I found that I remembered watching the News at the time and LMAO!

[godofstrife.livejournal.com]

Oh I often have to google cultural references that happened before my time or weren't exactly covered in the media.

These "I'm a minority" comments made me think of that. It bears the same sign of over-eager stupidity.