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Jul. 11th, 2003 04:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rmLivejournal, among other things, raises a lot of issues, for many of us I think, about "friendship" and "fans". It's the nature of the whole, "On the Internet, Anyone Can Be a Celebrity, Well, Kind Of" thing that is further complicated by the irritatingly named "friends" lists. For me, wanting to achieve the type of success that conveys fame, there's an additional level of peculiarity in matter, which has to do mainly with wondering if there's a balance between Not Being an Asshole and "If you wanna be a star, you better behave like one."
People toss the word fan around casually. We say things like "I'm your number one fan!" to cheer our friends, and throw support towards people we know more casually through this and other mediums. All of which makes me wonder what the criteria are for certain things, and how those things interact.
That is to say -- at what point do I know any of you?
At what point are you a friend?
What is a fan?
And if you're a fan can you ever be my friend?
And if you're my friend, do you have any business being a fan?
Is fan a word used too casually or too seriously?
How to role-models and aspiration fit into the fannish equation?
And where is media and image-making going in a world where everyone isn't famous for fifteen minutes, but everyone is famous in the eyes of fifteen people?
I don't bloody know. And I don't know that knowing the answers (presuming there are clear cut ones) would solve the non-specific dilemma I find in all this.
When people tell me they are my fan (just to be clear, this is yet to be another more than the occassional Internet occurance or related to my writing), I often respond with an incredulous "Why?" which makes me sound like an asshole. It is, among other things, not my business and can seem like and be fishing for compliments, which is bad. On the other hand, it is helpful to know what it is that I do that matters to people, so I can look at those things more closely. I remain uncomfortable saying merely "Thank you" because while probably appropriately gracious creates a power dynamic of distance, where notations of worth are conducted in only one direction. Similarly, the impulse to respond to someone liking or approving of their perception of some facet of myself, with an invitation to friendship ranges from a good idea to a bad idea to just plain stupid.
Having written this now, it occurs to me that one of the most egregious problems with the notion of fans, in any sense of the word is that our cultural set up for it forces both sides of the equation to be necessarily estranged from each other and unhappy, even as both provide so much to the other.
People toss the word fan around casually. We say things like "I'm your number one fan!" to cheer our friends, and throw support towards people we know more casually through this and other mediums. All of which makes me wonder what the criteria are for certain things, and how those things interact.
That is to say -- at what point do I know any of you?
At what point are you a friend?
What is a fan?
And if you're a fan can you ever be my friend?
And if you're my friend, do you have any business being a fan?
Is fan a word used too casually or too seriously?
How to role-models and aspiration fit into the fannish equation?
And where is media and image-making going in a world where everyone isn't famous for fifteen minutes, but everyone is famous in the eyes of fifteen people?
I don't bloody know. And I don't know that knowing the answers (presuming there are clear cut ones) would solve the non-specific dilemma I find in all this.
When people tell me they are my fan (just to be clear, this is yet to be another more than the occassional Internet occurance or related to my writing), I often respond with an incredulous "Why?" which makes me sound like an asshole. It is, among other things, not my business and can seem like and be fishing for compliments, which is bad. On the other hand, it is helpful to know what it is that I do that matters to people, so I can look at those things more closely. I remain uncomfortable saying merely "Thank you" because while probably appropriately gracious creates a power dynamic of distance, where notations of worth are conducted in only one direction. Similarly, the impulse to respond to someone liking or approving of their perception of some facet of myself, with an invitation to friendship ranges from a good idea to a bad idea to just plain stupid.
Having written this now, it occurs to me that one of the most egregious problems with the notion of fans, in any sense of the word is that our cultural set up for it forces both sides of the equation to be necessarily estranged from each other and unhappy, even as both provide so much to the other.
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no subject
Date: 2003-07-12 07:10 am (UTC)I'm not sure if I could become friends with someone being a fan *first*... I'm generally so in awe of talents that I don't have (singing, acting, dancing) that I kind of can't see the performer as a potential friend if I didn't know them first... I wouldn't know what to say in a social setting if I just ran into them and I'd feel at a strange advantage in any random conversation because I'd feel like I already knew more about them than they know about me.
LiveJournal makes all of that even more confusing! I have a bunch of people on my list (you included) who I've added because I met them and have really enjoyed getting to know them a bit more through the words here. But who are my friends? And what are just words on the page? A lot of the people on my list are somewhere between acquaintances (surely I know the people here "better" than someone I've met at a party or two and see a couple times a year) and true "friends"... and exploring that whole spectrum is pretty interesting.
I know from my friends and many, many other sources how difficult it is to succeed at something creative, so, I generally support anyone I know who is attempting that... whether it's buying books, going to shows or stocking up on CDs. Sometimes I turn into a fan... sometimes I don't... but, to me, it's all part of being a friend, even a casual friend.
Wow... sorry for rambling on so! :)