muladhara | (no subject)

Current Mood: annoyed
Current Music: Marathon: The Forerunner Mix (Gamma) - Nick Singer

Entry tags:

(no subject)

(if you feel like you've read part of this before, you may have; I accidentally hit post earlier).

For most of this year, I have been dissatisfied with my output of "stuff" this year. Not the amount of it, because I've made a lot of things, and I've put a heck of a lot of work into the abominations story. But generally, I've made a thing, looked at it, and gone, oh.

Like, literally nothing I have done has pleased me (apart from the aforementioned storying, because I think I can't plot for shit, and that thing has a full-blown plot. Ditto for the magical girl story, as it happens. THAT SAID. I know I am going to not get sufficient feedback from one person I asked to look through the one story, and that makes me feel sad. Because she has this horrible trait of not pointing out any flaws in anything, ever, and even when I point flaws out, she'll gloss over it and I dislike that about her. She's a great friend, I love her to bits, but I wish she'd be a bit more critical sometimes).

I could get really negative here. But I'm not going to. I'm sure you can probably imagine what I'm thinking. (Also not helped by the fact that I just sort of had an argument with my mum, so now I'm feeling doubly shit).

It's not even art guilt, it's just feeling perpetually underwhelmed and frustrated by my skills or self-perceived lack of them.

I'm also really fed up with tumblr. I'm fed up of the in-fighting in fandoms. Fandoms are supposed to be fun. We're supposed to share our love of a medium, not spend time shitting on other people who don't agree with us*. (Not that I do this, you understand, but it's how it feels to me). I'm fed up of people assuming if you like a character who isn't as pure as the driven snow that that means you condone all their (fictional) actions (I know some people do, but personally I don't)**. (This is an exaggeration, although honestly this is how it feels ALL THE SODDING TIME AND I HATE IT).

I'm also fed up of being told parts of my personality/experience aren't valid. Nobody's done it directly (partly because I don't interact much with anyone on there), but that doesn't matter. I don't need it. I'm sick of it.

And my internet has been shit for over a year now***, which doesn't help because tumblr is so image-oriented, and everyone has image-heavy custom themes (well, OK, not everyone, but you know what I mean), so everything takes three hours to load (a slight exaggeration), and that makes everything not fun, too.

*It frequently makes me feel really sad, because Farscape was my first online fandom that I participated in and, for the most part, everyone was really nice to each other. Even when we disagreed. If there was shit flinging I either didn't know about it, or didn't see much of it.

**My favourite example here is Wesker, because he's been one of my fave RE characters since forever ago. Do I condone ANYTHING he does in any of the games he's in? No I do not.

***Local council done fucked up when doing something to the road and, because we are a small village in the middle of nowhere/the upper end of the valley, we don't matter as the large town where the council's based.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

So many things here that I can nod along to.

I don't really beta for people anymore (time and effort) but I know that I did use to have a problem with drawing attention to things that could possibly be changed because I was worrying about offending people. Perhaps your friend is similar? Maybe ask someone else to give you critical feedback and show her the kind of things she should be pointing out to you, because if you can take 'harsh' feedback from a stranger you certainly can from a friend.

I 100% feel you on the 'you like a problematic* character so you're a shit' boat. There's also the other end of the spectrum where characters do things that are objectively awful but it's YOU who's the bad person if you comment on this, because 'likable/interesting character' and 'does terrible things and is perhaps not even justified doing so' are mutually exclusive apparently (and I do wonder how much of the people with the former attitude have happened because of people acting like the latter).

I'm also fed up of being told parts of my personality/experience aren't valid.
This is something I also understand, I don't know what you're specifically referring to but having your experiences ignored because it's convenient for other people is frustrating as hell.

* and everything being problematic drives me up the wall too

It's possible that that is the case with my friend, and I have thought so before. I'm going to wait to see what she says first, because it is entirely possible that she might surprise me.

Yeah, I was going to mention the "You're awful for pointing this out about x character", but I got tired and frustrated (as you could no doubt tell) so ended up forgetting. And I totally agree about everything being problematic. I mean, yeah, no thing in this day and age (sadly) is going to be 100% inoffensive, but it's not like most people don't admit that things have these problems.

Well, some of the stuff I just don't talk about but some of it has to do with being told I can't find a fictional relationship distasteful and or triggering even though I have been in an abusive relationship in the past and absolutely find that reflected in the presentation of said fictional one. So there's that. Which is mild by comparison to some of the stuff, but fuck no. I'm not going to pretend everything is all happy and shiny and I like something when I actually don't.

I hope things do work out for your proof reading friend! Hopefully if you've told her you want more critical comments she'll oblige you. :)

I see of the 'don't ever point out my favourite character did a bad thing, pointing it out is literal oppression' on tumblr A LOT at the minute so it's the first thing that came to mind for me. Dragon Age has some...interesting fans.

It's fine not to talk about it, don't worry! Sorry if that came across as prying for details, it wasn't my intention at all. Even without getting into how it's about related to something personal in your life, people should be allowed to view something and find it distasteful for whatever reason. Other people having different opinions on a character/ship/whatever doesn't have to detract from someone's personal enjoyment of it and people shouldn't be going around saying 'well, that's not valid' just because it's contrary to something they like. People are butts. :|

Dragon Age has some...interesting fans.

Yeeeessss. It's mostly them I'm thinking of when I say this stuff. Which is not to say they don't exist in other fandoms, because they do.

Oh no, you didn't! I have a tendency to occasionally overshare stuff I'm willing to talk about. Yeah, like I'm not even going to shit on people that are definitely into said fictional relationship, I'm just going to keep scrolling, and/or add mentions of it to my blacklist (provided I am somewhere that has that function). And on the flip side, if someone said something I was into made them feel upset, I would totally understand, not sit there screaming at them that it "didn't count" because of whatever.

Fandoms. Perhaps I'm not following enough fandom-y blogs, or perhaps I've just been lucky, or there is the fact that I just don't pay attention enough to fandoms see much fighting. BUT, I have heard similar stories from other people, so obviously it must happen and I feel you. What I see a lot of are SOCIAL JUSTICE blogs and EVERYTHING NEEDS TO BE ABOUT SOCIAL JUSTICE. At the rate things are going, no one is going to really remember what real social justice means.

Wesker. My experience with Wesker has purely been through the RE novelization and the movies (I know, I know). I prefer book!Wesker because there was actual meat to the character versus his film counterpart that comes off as cliché and hokey. But, make no mistake, the guy is an asshole. An interesting asshole, but an asshole nonetheless. Just because you and I find him interesting, does not mean we think he shouldn't get his proper due.

Another example: Timothy Olyphant's character in Live Free or Die Hard. I loved his character because Olyphant plays Snarky Prick so goddamn well, but let's face it. His character with a thief and terrorist I wouldn't wish what he did on even my worst enemy. In the end, I was glad he got what was coming to him.

Yet another example: Someone tried to condemn MCU!Thor for Loki's actions in Marvel's The Avengers because he didn't do A,B, & C so Loki went and did D,E, & F. Nuh-uh! Loki still made the choice to do what he did, not Thor. I believe Thor tried to talk his brother back to the good side and Loki was having none of it.

Council. Sounds like a bunch of assholes to me, lol.

I haven't seen it outside of Dragon Age and U2 fans, but I've heard my friends talk about it within shared fandoms and ones I'm not into. And yeah, I see the social justice thing too, and I agree with you.

I haven't seen the RE films with Wesker in YET - I have them on DVD, but I haven't watched them. But I can believe that he's clichéd in them (they wrecked Jill, and she's my absolute fave, so I don't expect better for anyone else, tbh). I will never say he's not an arsehole, though, because he is. Everything he does is in his own interests. (He's also kind of ridiculous when you stop and think about it). And yeah, when he gets his comeuppance, he totally deserves it.

Yeah, my local council are arseholes. There's a lot of stuff that's been neglected at my end of the valley because they're more interested in keeping the biggest town looking nice (which I can understand, but it shouldn't come at the cost of other towns in the locale).

I hear you 100% on the negativity. I like a lot of characters who are hugely problematic. Does it mean I think they're great and flawless? fuck no that's why they're interesting.

When I joined fandom in my late teens I was fortunate enough to fall into a group of FF fans who included some older folks (I think our oldest was in her 70s) and they politely put a stop to any and all insulting nonsense and cultivated a sense of respect and camaraderie - disagreements happened and they never tried to stop them from happening, but they sure did step on asinine behavior, and I think that's something lacking in the fandom I see on Tumblr.

Does it mean I think they're great and flawless? fuck no that's why they're interesting.

THIS THIS 100% THIS.

*nods* I think this is what happened with Farscape for me - I was one of the youngest on the message board we chatted on, most of the fans were in their thirties/forties (and older) at the time, and I know all the mods were among the older peeps. So I reckon probably they shut the bad things down quickly.

I realize I'm doing the "in my day uphill in the snow both ways" bullshit but like I swear that when I got into fandom we were much nicer to each other? Maybe I just stumbled into a particularly nice group and/or I misremember the past but seriously.

Oh no, I totally agree with you, and that's what makes me feel so angry/sad about the whole thing.

I don't understand this trend towards "your faves are bad and you should feel bad", I really don't - isn't part of the fun of liking evil characters precisely because they're that way? I mean, I adore a lot of morally dubious mad scientists (although I guess Wesker fits in that bracket as well?). Do I actually agree with what they're doing? No (plus you'd never get funding in real life). Would I like to meet them in a dark alley if they were real? HELL NO. But, in media? Give me more!!! Have people just forgotten that entertaiment is mostly a form of escapism? :( Besides, pure characters are so dull...

Exactly! It's great being able to see them doing horrible things we would never think about doing! Also I think this is part of the reason I hate the trend of "oh that character's not evil, they're just misunderstood and had a terrible childhood!" which wipes out the fact that some people are just asshats, and that applies whether they're fictional or not. I prefer characters who are evil for the sake of it, because they enjoy it, because I enjoy them enjoying it.

Oh god yes, pure characters with no faults are so boring.

(Also yes, Wesker is totally a mad scientist type with dubious morals, and I would certainly run SO FAST in the opposite direction if I ever met him in real life).

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only