Speaker 1: Oh hey, it's still that throwback picture from when you
Speaker 1: wore baggy jeans and shell necklaces. Ali ward back with
Speaker 1: part two of a pop cultural and psychological episode. Y'all
Speaker 1: love the start of last week, so we're going to
Speaker 1: finish it off with more of your great questions, shall we?
Speaker 1: We shall? Okay, So if you have not listened to
Speaker 1: last week, you want to hop over to part one. First,
Speaker 1: you'll hear the definition of anthropology from an actual living
Speaker 1: breeding researcher whose Twitter bio reads anthropologist, entertainment futurist, YouTube enthusiast,
Speaker 1: and defender of teen girl taste. So in part one,
Speaker 1: we covered sports and religion and k pop goblins for
Speaker 1: good and the practice of Disney bounding, which I completely
Speaker 1: failed to ever define. It's subtly dressing like Disney characters
Speaker 1: in the theme parks in a way that only other
Speaker 1: Disney fanatics might catch. That's Disney bounding. We talked about
Speaker 1: fan fiction and Frasier and how complex and kind of
Speaker 1: evil algorithms tell us what to like. We talk about
Speaker 1: free range children, what to do if your favorite author
Speaker 1: turns out to be problematic, and more so. That is
Speaker 1: part one in this episode. We can hear about shipping,
Speaker 1: which is short for relationshipping, I suppose, or dreaming up
Speaker 1: unions that exist only in your horny day dreams, and
Speaker 1: fans versus stands stands being kind of the creepy variety,
Speaker 1: and the line between cults and fandoms, and the all
Speaker 1: important question of if you want to build an empire
Speaker 1: and fandom over which you preside, how do you become
Speaker 1: Internet famous? Do you want to be Internet famous? All
Speaker 1: that and more. A quick thanks first to all the
Speaker 1: listeners of Ologies. I could not do these interviews or
Speaker 1: make the show without the wonderfully weird and insightful questions
Speaker 1: from patrons. You can give a dollar or more a
Speaker 1: month to support the show at patroon dot com slash Ologies,
Speaker 1: as well as all the folks who just spread the
Speaker 1: word and the links and leave reviews. I creep on
Speaker 1: you and I read every single one, and this week
Speaker 1: thank you to Tricia S and also Bronze Kraken, a
Speaker 1: PD who wrote, dearest father, I hope this letter finds
Speaker 1: you well. I have verily enjoyed your audio recordings. I
Speaker 1: listened to each new one with gusto and look forward
Speaker 1: to the next. Your Internet child PD see proof, So
Speaker 1: leave one. Okay, everyone else who left one? I read
Speaker 1: it for sure, and your weird internet uncle dad hurts
Speaker 1: you very much and is earnestly so happy you're here. Okay,
Speaker 1: let's shove off into part two of panthropology with behavioral
Speaker 1: researcher and legit professional on her business card. Unironically, panthropologist
Speaker 1: Meredith Levine. I'm going to make us go through Patreon
Speaker 1: questions because there are questions I want to ask you
Speaker 1: that patrons asked, and so I'm going to ask it.
Speaker 1: There are questions through my mouth. Is that cool?
Speaker 2: Great? Let's do it.
Speaker 1: Okay. This one was at the top of my tongue
Speaker 1: and it was asked by patrons. Anna Thompson, El McCall,
Speaker 1: Matt Sicado Island, Helly, Bonnie Tamara Man, Carrie Caitlin Powell,
Speaker 1: Anya Levi, Burke, Hope, Lexi Reads, Rachel Weiss, Lee, Catherine Earhart,
Speaker 1: and John McClain all kind of wanted to know about
Speaker 1: obsessive fandom. Bonnie asked what's the line between being a
Speaker 1: healthy fan of something and obsession? And Tamara wants to
Speaker 1: know when does fandom cross the line to inappropriate and
Speaker 1: healthy and then also a stan. When does a fan
Speaker 1: become a stan? Good question?
Speaker 2: So let's start with obsessive Okay, Fandom has historically been pathologized, Okay,
Speaker 2: in a negative way. Yeah, and fans generally aren't bat all.
Speaker 2: They are generally not malicious. And when does it become unhealthy?
Speaker 2: It becomes on health health when you neglect all of
Speaker 2: the things in your life that actually lead to a
Speaker 2: healthy life, like eating and sleeping and like going to
Speaker 2: work and or school. But like, who's to say what
Speaker 2: a good use of time is, especially in an age
Speaker 2: where one can be a professional fan, if like that's
Speaker 2: the thing you want to do. When does it become
Speaker 2: unhealthy when your life and relationships suffer as a result. Right,
Speaker 2: plenty of people have found their life partners and like
Speaker 2: gotten married and stuff through fandom, And that's a thing
Speaker 2: that happens now. And by fandom, I mean like pop
Speaker 2: culture fandom, fandom with like a capital F. So that's
Speaker 2: not necessarily unhealthy. What is unhealthy is when you have
Speaker 2: the rogue person. And this happens a lot in like
Speaker 2: influencer culture and those kinds of fandoms, because this particular
Speaker 2: type of object of fandom is themselves for a living
Speaker 2: where I'm friends with a bunch of creators as a
Speaker 2: offshoot of my life, and oftentimes they get the question
Speaker 2: of like, what's the weirdest thing a fan has ever done? Yeah,
Speaker 2: or what's like the scariest or creepiest or whatever. And
Speaker 2: that is when it gets to be scary and creepy
Speaker 2: and bad. Is in those in person interactions for the
Speaker 2: most part of like screaming at someone in target, or
Speaker 2: like going and waiting outside of their house. Anything that
Speaker 2: is a breach of personal privacy for the object of
Speaker 2: fandom is when it gets to be bad, because then
Speaker 2: it's like actively dehumanizing to those people who are objects
Speaker 2: of fandom.
Speaker 1: But wouldn't some people argue that they have taken themselves
Speaker 1: out of being a human and been striving for something
Speaker 1: like superhuman where they are getting more than a normal
Speaker 1: human's share of attention or wealth or privilege. So I mean,
Speaker 1: and I'm saying this as someone who also knows a
Speaker 1: lot of creators is a creator. Is there anything where
Speaker 1: there's been a consensus that you have surrendered your privacy
Speaker 1: by selling it?
Speaker 2: No, In my opinion, everyone is entitled to their privacy
Speaker 2: and as much of it as they want cool. That
Speaker 2: being said, it's also important for objects of fandom to
Speaker 2: understand that and be a little bit more careful with
Speaker 2: their personal information. In the event that you are an
Speaker 2: object of fandom or want to be an object of fandom,
Speaker 2: Step one is cultivate an audience. But in that process,
Speaker 2: people with kids have to make the decision how much
Speaker 2: of their kids' lives are part of their brands. And
Speaker 2: that's a personal decision, especially if their kids are too
Speaker 2: young to consent to that. And there are choices that
Speaker 2: everyone has to make about, like how much of their
Speaker 2: personal lives they want to show, and celebrities deal with
Speaker 2: this also, it's a little bit less of an issue
Speaker 2: when you're a non human entity with fans.
Speaker 1: I'm hoping she means non human entity like Gritty, the flupy, grumpy,
Speaker 1: flaming orange figurehead of the Philadelphia Flyers, who has been
Speaker 1: described by newspapers as quote an acid trip of a
Speaker 1: mascot and a ghastly empty eyed muppet, so neither human
Speaker 1: nor beast. Gritty was born in twenty eighteen out of
Speaker 1: the design prompt something you'd high five but not hug
Speaker 1: and sure I did go down a rabbit hole looking
Speaker 1: at pictures of gritty tattoos, such as one bearing the
Speaker 1: words chaos reigns.
Speaker 2: But even still, like showing up to a place of
Speaker 2: home or work is when it gets to be obsessive
Speaker 2: and bad, which is not the same thing as toxic fandom.
Speaker 1: Yeah, can we talk about toxic fandoms? Because patrons Mike Manakowski,
Speaker 1: Samantha Ryan Jesse, Dragon, Anna Thompson, Justin McCormick, and COLLEENI Bee.
Speaker 1: Also Will Johnston wanted to know. Will Johnson asked, what,
Speaker 1: in your opinion, is the most toxic fandom, and also
Speaker 1: what's the best fandom? And why is it Terry Pratchett's
Speaker 1: Disco World or disc World. I thought it's a Disco World,
Speaker 1: and I was like, that sounds tight. But I guess
Speaker 1: Discworld maybe that's Frisbee. I don't know. I earnestly thought
Speaker 1: that Discworld was similar to Terry Bradshaw's NFL video game,
Speaker 1: but with Ultimate Frisbee, and then I realized that it's
Speaker 1: actually John Madden's NFL game anyway. Discworld is a series
Speaker 1: of novels set in a flat world perched on the
Speaker 1: back of four giant elephants. Perched on Giant Turtle. It
Speaker 1: was written not by NFL coach Terry Bradshaw, but by
Speaker 1: literary figure Sir Terry Pratchett. My point is that discworld
Speaker 1: fandom has nothing to do with sports or disco pantsuits.
Speaker 2: I would totally go to disco World too, dude, I
Speaker 2: would love it there. So what is the most toxic fandom?
Speaker 1: Yeah, Like what is toxic fandom? Like when does it
Speaker 1: become shitty? Because I'm trying to think of Like all
Speaker 1: I can think about are like people who are out
Speaker 1: in thirty degree whether with no shirt on, in their
Speaker 1: body painted sports colors. And I'm sure that that is
Speaker 1: like not even toxic compared to what is out there.
Speaker 1: That's just uncomfortable fandoms.
Speaker 2: So like, generally, when people refer to toxic fandoms, they
Speaker 2: refer to like intra fandom fighting with ad hominem attacks
Speaker 2: and actively like shutting other people down and yucking their
Speaker 2: yums and generally being like know it all is what
Speaker 2: blankets gatekeepers, and like shunning and shaming people who like
Speaker 2: the same things. So when when those kinds of tools
Speaker 2: get used within a fandom, or like when actions are
Speaker 2: taken against marginalized identities or those are not respected. Oftentimes,
Speaker 2: that is another thing that's referenced as a toxic fandom.
Speaker 2: I'm all for sports fans who go shirtless in the
Speaker 2: middle of winter to paint their bodies like you do
Speaker 2: you your body whatever. I'm not going to tell you
Speaker 2: to put on a sweater, but pink. Shame someone for
Speaker 2: their fan fiction, which also came up a lot, and
Speaker 2: that's kind of bad, or like telling someone that they
Speaker 2: don't belong or that they're not fan enough. Everyone starts
Speaker 2: as a beginner, and just because someone doesn't have the
Speaker 2: same fandom origin story as someone else doesn't necessarily make
Speaker 2: them less of a fan or less of a worthy fan.
Speaker 1: So do other fans call newbies posers? That's a little toxic. Now. Confession,
Speaker 1: I have actually never seen Rocky Horror Picture Show Live
Speaker 1: because I heard that they write a V for virgin
Speaker 1: on your forehead if you've never been like with lipstick,
Speaker 1: And I think that's good natured and not toxic. But
Speaker 1: I was so afraid of getting a constellation of pimples
Speaker 1: in a V on my forehead on my bad teen skin,
Speaker 1: so I chickened out at every opportunity to attend a
Speaker 1: Midnight fish Netted screening. But yes, fandoms in which people genuinely,
Speaker 1: not good naturedly harass each other, those are the bad ones.
Speaker 2: Sometimes it happens also when there are ship wars that happen,
Speaker 2: and like there are two dominant ships that come to
Speaker 2: the forefront of the fandom and they actively like don't
Speaker 2: believe and are against each other, which is its whole
Speaker 2: shipping culture as its whole other it's part of fandom
Speaker 2: with Capital F. But it's this whole other thing. And
Speaker 2: if you want to know a lot more about fan
Speaker 2: fiction and shipping culture and that kind of fandom, fandom
Speaker 2: with Capital F, I highly recommend the fans Planning podcast
Speaker 2: with Flourish Clink and Elizabeth Minkle. Great podcast if you're
Speaker 2: interested in Capital F fandom.
Speaker 1: Well you know, dove tailing off of that. Listeners Diane
Speaker 1: bout Taren Fernatz, Kelly Seaman, and Jamie Kishimoto. Jamide a
Speaker 1: great question and asked, have you done any studies on
Speaker 1: the phenomenon of queer baiting and how it creates die
Speaker 1: hard fandoms of shippers but never delivers a happy queer ending.
Speaker 2: I would say never, say never. The media landscape is shifting,
Speaker 2: and we have an example of that recently. But my
Speaker 2: guess is there's a specific ip behind this, and my
Speaker 2: hunch is that it might be teen Wolf.
Speaker 1: Okay, so I look this up, and the MTV series
Speaker 1: Teen Wolf debuted in twenty eleven, and I'm going to
Speaker 1: quote an article from The Advocate to sum up the
Speaker 1: beef with the beefy but ultimately empty romance arcs. So
Speaker 1: the Advocate said, the continued teases that a character might
Speaker 1: be bisexual with no payoff, the same sex romances that
Speaker 1: end as quickly as they begin, the disappearance of gay
Speaker 1: characters without explanation, and the absence of any well developed
Speaker 1: LGBT character four seasons into a show that appeared to
Speaker 1: bank heavily on its queer appeal early on have left
Speaker 1: vocal fans howling. End quote. And though its final season
Speaker 1: was in twenty seventeen, many moons ago history remembers Teen
Speaker 1: Wolf is kind of a hairy situation.
Speaker 2: Ooh, And I personally think that queer baiting is exploitative,
Speaker 2: as are a lot of the tropes that get used,
Speaker 2: like barrier gaze and fridging and that sort of thing
Speaker 2: that shows historically have used and I think that as
Speaker 2: queer voices become more prominent in writer's rooms and in
Speaker 2: in the production process, I think that will happen less
Speaker 2: and less, especially since fans also can take collective action
Speaker 2: and do grassroots like awareness of what these issues are
Speaker 2: and why it's harmful. Having very coded behavior is also
Speaker 2: very typically Hollywood and stems from like a very long
Speaker 2: history of what was acceptable on in film and television
Speaker 2: by those standards, and like Hayes code stuff, what it
Speaker 2: means to get like a rating for PG thirteen versus.
Speaker 1: Are Hayes codes side note I looked it up. Were
Speaker 1: essentially written in the late nineteen twenties via Jesuit priest
Speaker 1: and a church elder as a sort of code of
Speaker 1: standards for the motion picture industry, and it set precedents
Speaker 1: forbidding all kinds of fun stuff such as nudity, suggestive dancing,
Speaker 1: discussions of sexual perversity, any ridicule of religion, any interracial relationships,
Speaker 1: lustful kissing, and any scenes of passion. Obviously, this was
Speaker 1: not friendly to any queer depictions or were wolf makeouts,
Speaker 1: to say the least.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of institutionalized things to unpack around clearbaiting
Speaker 2: because to attribute it to a writer's room isn't entirely
Speaker 2: the whole story, and to attribute to a marketing team
Speaker 2: isn't entirely the whole story. In my opinion, it's unfortunate,
Speaker 2: but also tends to draw out people who are like
Speaker 2: minded and want to go into that level of imagining.
Speaker 2: I don't love it, but also the effects of it
Speaker 2: have done community building things. So a lot of the
Speaker 2: times why queer ships exist is because there aren't as
Speaker 2: many well rounded characters to imagine and re imagine and
Speaker 2: reshape that are women and non binary and on the
Speaker 2: other gender spectrum, m Hollywood still incredibly male dominated. Yeah,
Speaker 2: when it comes to playing around with characters, often the
Speaker 2: best ones are guys.
Speaker 1: Hmmm, that's interesting. That's such a good point. So because
Speaker 1: movies and TV and comic books seem to be well
Speaker 1: stocked on manned people in general, those lead characters are
Speaker 1: fleshed out with more complexity, and so they get shipped
Speaker 1: more often in fan fantasies, because who wants to ship
Speaker 1: a boring character. It's like trying to make a sexy
Speaker 1: sandwich with one soggy bread slice. No, thank you, give
Speaker 1: me two nutty rich tangy slices, I don't care what
Speaker 1: gender they are. Now on the topic of that, and
Speaker 1: kind of off of that, listener Sylvia Shriff had a question.
Speaker 1: They wrote, people talk about fangirling or fan boying over
Speaker 1: a person, what is the gender neutral term for this behavior?
Speaker 1: It isn't fanning signed a gender person who definitely does
Speaker 1: this thing, but it's neither a girl nor a boy.
Speaker 3: So I if I have to remove gender from it,
Speaker 3: I would say fanning out as a phrase, Okay, I'm
Speaker 3: fanning out.
Speaker 2: But fangirling and fanboying often like have implied different sets
Speaker 2: of behaviors mm okay, regardless of gender, but having to
Speaker 2: do with typically masculine and typically feminine traits based on
Speaker 2: their portrayals in the media. So like, when I hear
Speaker 2: fan girling, I hear a sound. Yes, oh, of course,
Speaker 2: of course, And I'm sure everyone hears this sound of
Speaker 2: like it's a squee s q u e e, and
Speaker 2: it's a sound. And I hear like beatlemania and crying
Speaker 2: and fainting, and a lot of it is associated with
Speaker 2: proximity to object of fandom, yes, yes, versus like being
Speaker 2: a fanboy. I ascribe to regardless of gender, slightly more
Speaker 2: pedantic behavior and the behavior of like nerd jocking, yeah, fanning,
Speaker 2: which is quizzing people and having all the information. And
Speaker 2: there's a very outdated model about uh affirmational and transformational
Speaker 2: fandom that was like an academic paper from like I
Speaker 2: think maybe the late nineties, possibly the early two thousands
Speaker 2: mm hm, about ways that fandom capital ath express themselves
Speaker 2: and some is in transformation and some is in completionism
Speaker 2: of like, are you reimagining and playing with the work
Speaker 2: the work is a springboard for one's own imagination or
Speaker 2: is it more encyclopedic and religious, where like it's about
Speaker 2: knowing everything and like being an expert in the thing.
Speaker 1: So transformational fandom is like, hey, thanks for making this
Speaker 1: world these characters. As fans, it's now ours to run
Speaker 1: with and make more elaborate and weirder if we want to.
Speaker 1: But affirmational fandom is like, this is what the creator intended,
Speaker 1: and we may only observe and fawn over and memorize
Speaker 1: this particular world and character. Also, if you like video games,
Speaker 1: name all the video games.
Speaker 2: And so these conflicting models of like what people think
Speaker 2: of as fans can often inhibit the experience of being one.
Speaker 2: Because one of the other questions that gets asked a
Speaker 2: lot is like, do you have to be part of
Speaker 2: a community to be a fan, And the answer is no.
Speaker 2: You can be a fan all on your own and
Speaker 2: like do whatever it is that you do and not
Speaker 2: interact with a soul around it and still be a
Speaker 2: good fan, because being a fan is something that one
Speaker 2: imagines themselves to be, not like a set of behaviors.
Speaker 1: And but we would call that in general fanning out,
Speaker 1: fanning out, like fanning out if there's.
Speaker 2: A gender neutral term for having an overwhelming moment of
Speaker 2: excitement as a result of something having to do with
Speaker 2: the object of fandom that makes oneself sensorially overloaded or
Speaker 2: sensorally like frozen. Uh huh, I would call it fanning out.
Speaker 1: I love it. I love it. And on the topic
Speaker 1: of forging ahead with neologisms, which is a word that
Speaker 1: I can never say, neologism, neologism, new works only read
Speaker 1: it neologism. Anna Thompson and Forrest Dot's had questions, do
Speaker 1: people typically connect more with podcasts than other types of
Speaker 1: media because listening is more intimate.
Speaker 2: Oh, thank you for your podcast voice. I love this
Speaker 2: ASMR moment. There are a lot of things that have
Speaker 2: to do with connecting with podcast hosts. Part of it
Speaker 2: has to do with being in someone's ears and how
Speaker 2: intimate actually talking is, especially in the age of like
Speaker 2: visuals and texting. Part of it has to do with
Speaker 2: how much time podcasters spend in the ears of their fans.
Speaker 2: It's somewhere between twenty minutes and an hour or two
Speaker 2: a week, depending on what kind of podcast you're listening to,
Speaker 2: and it's like every week. So this is a friend,
Speaker 2: this is a familiar voice. It's the kind of experience
Speaker 2: you put on to be a little less alone whilst
Speaker 2: usually whilst doing something else like driving or dishes or
Speaker 2: laundry or going on a walk. That dedicated podcast listening,
Speaker 2: high fidelity style of this is all I'm doing. I'm
Speaker 2: sitting and I'm listening to my voice or whatever. A
Speaker 2: little less prevalent behaviorally, but there is a lot of familiarity.
Speaker 2: Assuming that the library can sustain that. Most podcasts don't
Speaker 2: make it over over ten episodes do really, Yeah, a
Speaker 2: lot a lot fail in the first ninety days and
Speaker 2: we'll have a season. But to be able to sustain
Speaker 2: and develop an audience in podcast form often requires a
Speaker 2: lot of dedication to the format and ability to do so,
Speaker 2: and there are a lot of people who dabble. As
Speaker 2: the podcast scene gets more robust, there are more podcasts
Speaker 2: that can't go on indefinitely. But yes, like there is
Speaker 2: a certain level of intimacy that is similar to vloggers
Speaker 2: because of the amount of time that this person as
Speaker 2: themselves spends with the audience. It's a very audience inclusive format,
Speaker 2: and so yes, there is a great reason as to
Speaker 2: why podcast hosts have fandom in a way that feels
Speaker 2: a little bit more friendly than Jared Paddillac, which is
Speaker 2: beautiful and a lot easier under the independent creator model
Speaker 2: than it is to do when you are a major
Speaker 2: studio with like a massive legal team and like all
Speaker 2: sorts of issues like with including any idea that didn't
Speaker 2: come out of the writer's Like there are a lot
Speaker 2: of infrastructural reasons why big studios can't do what podcasters do.
Speaker 1: I know, I never thought that I would that I
Speaker 1: would love this medium as much as I do. It's
Speaker 1: just been so rewarding, I think because of that connection
Speaker 1: to listeners. And I have said before and even more
Speaker 1: so now that we're in an era of not in
Speaker 1: person weddings. But if two ologites met through the show
Speaker 1: and get married, I am a universal life church minister.
Speaker 1: I will be happy to zoom marry you. What wims
Speaker 1: us to.
Speaker 2: Day?
Speaker 1: I feel like it is my duty.
Speaker 2: You heard it here, Ologize, you heard it here? Do
Speaker 2: you want dad word to marry you two? All you
Speaker 2: have to do is meet somebody and then fall in
Speaker 2: love and then decide to get married.
Speaker 1: There is an ologies Facebook singles group. I think it's
Speaker 1: called flirty Ologites or Flirtology, one of those, but I'll
Speaker 1: put it in a side. Please see the Facebook group
Speaker 1: Flirtology Singles quote a place for olagites and other nerds dueebs,
Speaker 1: wonks and boffins to meet, mingle, flirt, chat and canoodle.
Speaker 1: There's nine hundred and eight hot dorks waiting for you.
Speaker 1: So maybe maybe this is the universe aka me telling
Speaker 1: you to maybe join text a crush about the banks
Speaker 1: you just cut. We're all gonna die anyway. Just take
Speaker 1: a chance. Also quick ad break right now. A double
Speaker 1: donation was made to the Project for Awesome thanks to
Speaker 1: sponsors of the show and links to sponsors and to
Speaker 1: that charity are in the show notes. Okay, I think
Speaker 1: we were talking about yes, flirtology singles. So if you're
Speaker 1: single and you like learning things about slug dicks, let
Speaker 1: me hook you up with someone. A lot of people
Speaker 1: asked about the positives and benefits of certain fandoms. Bailey
Speaker 1: Spurling letters from eleanor Rigby, which is a great name.
Speaker 1: Cary Simo, Kathleen Sachs, Natalie Rhodes, and Kim Bonneker all
Speaker 1: kind of asked, like, what's the most moving thing you've
Speaker 1: ever seen a group of fans do for someone else?
Speaker 1: Or what's been the most wholesome view of the world,
Speaker 1: what kinds of experiences have really touched you.
Speaker 2: What's having a moment this year which is a really
Speaker 2: beautiful thing to watch is fans rallying together to be
Speaker 2: pro social with causes and to actively help shape the world.
Speaker 2: Like there is this budding form of activism called fan activism.
Speaker 2: And one of my favorite instances is the Project for Awesome,
Speaker 2: which has been going on for like over ten years now,
Speaker 2: which is a nerd Fighter, John and Hank thing, but
Speaker 2: extends to their larger network of creators that actually started
Speaker 2: as like an algorithmic hack to get on the front
Speaker 2: page of YouTube back when that was a thing and
Speaker 2: is now a major fundraising for charity. Experience. Fandoms do
Speaker 2: all sorts of beautiful things. There's a great book called
Speaker 2: Will the Vampire People Please Leave the Lobby about fans
Speaker 2: funding other buffy fans in like the nineties to like
Speaker 2: get them playing tickets and get them to like fan meetups.
Speaker 2: I've seen K Pop fans doing, honestly, doing some great
Speaker 2: work this season. There are a lot of Twitch streamers
Speaker 2: and gamers who do a lot of fundraising for charity.
Speaker 2: Saint Jude is a recipient for a lot of those.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of beautiful stuff that happens when you
Speaker 2: can get a community together and move them in a
Speaker 2: positive direction. Like what I'm really enjoying right now is
Speaker 2: the community of people on TikTok who are building the
Speaker 2: ratitue musical.
Speaker 1: Is it cast with real rats please say yes.
Speaker 2: No no, But it's this beautiful work of like collaborative creativity.
Speaker 1: So this was recorded in December. Side note out of
Speaker 1: order with the Rats episode, which you may reference if
Speaker 1: you would like to know all about Rodents and Ratituey
Speaker 1: TikTok musicals, and also hear a career rodent cologists talk
Speaker 1: about the zanious things he's seen a rat abscond with. Also,
Speaker 1: I do break down into tears about rats giving each
Speaker 1: other presents like a chewed on biscuit or a dead moth.
Speaker 1: That's normal, Everything's fine. Are there any thoughts that you
Speaker 1: have about fandom being cultish or religious? A ton of
Speaker 1: listeners who I will say their names and decide your
Speaker 1: names my mouth. Let's do it, Tony Jane, kat Lindsay Reagan,
Speaker 1: El Hereford, Hillary Larson, Ashley Scribner, Shirka Alahi, Kathleen Sachs,
Speaker 1: and Amber Lee Noel? Or are those just so different
Speaker 1: in severity and harm and emotional impact that they're not
Speaker 1: even comparable?
Speaker 2: Oh? I mean, if you are cutting off all of
Speaker 2: your social ties and devoting all of your financial capital
Speaker 2: to a fandom, it's probably a cult. But outside of
Speaker 2: those contexts, communities develop language and rituals all the time.
Speaker 2: And if your ritual is, you know, buy yourself a
Speaker 2: dozen roses and have your girlfriends over once a week
Speaker 2: to watch The Bachelorette.
Speaker 1: I don't want to be a cliche, but I'm not
Speaker 1: here to make.
Speaker 2: Friends ritual not cult? Okay, which admirable ritual by yourself
Speaker 2: a dozen roses every week, That is a great treat.
Speaker 2: Why not? Meredith?
Speaker 1: Ever, the anthropologist says that from a community evolutionary perspective,
Speaker 1: we as big bald apes are constantly trying to find
Speaker 1: who is chill and who is sus. And when fandoms
Speaker 1: get too large, like even over two hundred people in
Speaker 1: a group, it's scary for us to trust each other.
Speaker 1: So people get bitchy. Folks begin to bicker, subfandoms skiz
Speaker 1: them off based on who they ship or maybe what
Speaker 1: seasons or franchises they like more.
Speaker 2: Are they cults? Mostly not. Again, if you or someone
Speaker 2: you know is cutting off everybody who doesn't belong and
Speaker 2: also devoting all of their financial resources to this outside organization,
Speaker 2: probably a cult. Most fandoms are not. In fact, I
Speaker 2: can't really think of a fandom that is aside from
Speaker 2: occasional like actual cults of personality, in which case they're
Speaker 2: small but hold a lot of weight, or religions like scientology,
Speaker 2: which are large and hold a lot of weight. Mm hmm,
Speaker 2: I mean, do religions offspring off of like off of objects?
Speaker 2: Of fandom and like works of science fiction, Scientology is
Speaker 2: an example of that happening, So it could happen. Mm hmm,
Speaker 2: it's not outside the realm of.
Speaker 1: Possibility Scientology episode anyone, JK, I'm too scared and you
Speaker 1: know those are based on science fiction books scientology in particular.
Speaker 1: And that one last patron question I have to ask
Speaker 1: are so many Hannah Miss Kitty, Monica first time question asker,
Speaker 1: Irena Dizazzo, Caitlin Powell, Monica Aviva, Elizabeth, Paulina Krassinka, Samantha Ryan,
Speaker 1: Jolanta Banal, Lauren Masca, Broda, Deborah Boden, and Samantha steel
Speaker 1: Man all had questions about fan fiction and they wanted
Speaker 1: to know. Monica asked, what is the academic discussion surrounding
Speaker 1: of fan fiction writing? Are they taken seriously in academic context?
Speaker 1: And Arena's the first time question asker and wants to
Speaker 1: know just what your thoughts are When does it cross
Speaker 1: the line from creative expression to privacy invasion?
Speaker 2: I have never had fan fiction written about me, so
Speaker 2: I don't have a lot of experience about privacy invasion,
Speaker 2: but a lot of it is imaginings rather than spying.
Speaker 2: On someone m h. Academia takes fan fiction very seriously,
Speaker 2: does it. Really? It's a very interesting subject of research
Speaker 2: for a lot of people. It blends into fan labor discussions,
Speaker 2: it blends into representation discussions. There are a lot of
Speaker 2: people who have done math and like quantitative analyzes of
Speaker 2: the fan fiction landscapes. It blends into like legal challenges.
Speaker 2: Like it's a really interesting space for fan studies and
Speaker 2: it's a really interesting place to be, which is one
Speaker 2: of the reasons I think it's so heavily associated with
Speaker 2: the idea of fandom. I think it's a delight. I
Speaker 2: used to read a lot of it. I read less
Speaker 2: of it now, mostly because time and tastes change, and
Speaker 2: the fandoms that I'm interested in reading about, like the
Speaker 2: kinds of thick I want, isn't necessarily the kinds of
Speaker 2: fick that's prolific, because I want like story continuity fix
Speaker 2: Like right now I'm starting to hunt down fick for
Speaker 2: the Magicians because that series ended, and I really just
Speaker 2: want more of those characters and of that world, and
Speaker 2: it left on a really great like new beginning ending,
Speaker 2: rather than like everything that had to have been said
Speaker 2: was said ending, So like there was a lot of
Speaker 2: negative space in that show for imagining, and I really
Speaker 2: am like interested in that. But FICK is also really
Speaker 2: heavily into like it crosses over heavily into ship, although
Speaker 2: not all FICK is shipping by any means, and not
Speaker 2: all shipping happens in Thick by any means, and erotica
Speaker 2: and sex positivity. There are all sorts of genres that
Speaker 2: people may take some sort of issue with, like real
Speaker 2: personfic or dub con or non con.
Speaker 1: Just a quick jargon rundown fanfic again is fan fiction
Speaker 1: shipping once again creating relationships and dub con and non con.
Speaker 1: I had to look it up, and it means portraying
Speaker 1: sexual elements of dubious consent or non consent. So, of course,
Speaker 1: fan fiction about real people and depictions of violence are
Speaker 1: areas people get understandably squiky about.
Speaker 2: But one of the things about fan fiction, and one
Speaker 2: of the interesting things about the Internet, is like when
Speaker 2: fan fiction was happening, there was almost no way that
Speaker 2: an object of fandom would read it. Writers' rooms can't
Speaker 2: because they can't risk ideas from Thick. They can't risk
Speaker 2: the idea of like idea theft so like writers for
Speaker 2: writers rooms can't read FICK for their own series, or
Speaker 2: it typically can't. I only know a few writers, but
Speaker 2: that's generally the operating procedure, which isn't to say that
Speaker 2: authors don't write FICK and like writers and writers don't
Speaker 2: write FICK. They do, but like under pseudonyms and stuff
Speaker 2: like that, because of the way that intellectual property works.
Speaker 2: And I think it's fascinating because you can see the
Speaker 2: most interesting characters are male. It's very very white. It's
Speaker 2: a microcosm of the Internet more broadly, where there are
Speaker 2: issues of representation and issues of expression and issues of
Speaker 2: labeller like. It's just a beautiful little microcosm of all
Speaker 2: of the other issues that as a society we're dealing
Speaker 2: with today. In this a varying quality, nicheified experience for
Speaker 2: people who want that. So I'm very pro fan fiction,
Speaker 2: even though I don't read a lot of it.
Speaker 1: So fan fiction is a way to create art that
Speaker 1: perhaps breaks the bounds of what a lot of typical
Speaker 1: mainstream studio entertainment looks like, where executives have to answer
Speaker 1: to shareholders and corporations rely on a few big tent
Speaker 1: pole movies to keep the whole studio standing, and fan
Speaker 1: fiction doesn't have those restrictions. Anything can happen in your
Speaker 1: own word processing doc or notebook. So creators are kind
Speaker 1: of like, y'all dream up whatever you want, but your
Speaker 1: tweets are not going to influence what I want to write.
Speaker 1: My very very good friend, Dalen Rodriguez is a showrunner
Speaker 1: for the show Queen of the South, and she says
Speaker 1: her dms get filled with people sending their opinions on
Speaker 1: storylines and relationships between characters. She doesn't even open them.
Speaker 1: She appreciates the enthusiasm, but doesn't engage because she has
Speaker 1: a whole show to run.
Speaker 2: Being good on Twitter is its own skills. Not all
Speaker 2: creators of objects of fandom have any interest or ability
Speaker 2: to be objects of fandom themselves. And this is where
Speaker 2: like respecting the creative I think happens is like one
Speaker 2: of the other things that happens a lot is a
Speaker 2: lot of fan entitlement, of like there's a balance between
Speaker 2: the creative process and what audiences want, and it's a
Speaker 2: lot easier for independent creators to give audiences more of
Speaker 2: what they want. But there's also that Ford quote of like,
Speaker 2: if I ask the people what they want, they would
Speaker 2: have said faster horses, and so like, there's this balance
Speaker 2: between the creative process and like the stories that creators
Speaker 2: have inside themselves and want to get out versus design
Speaker 2: by committee. Yeah, which you know can be good, but
Speaker 2: also can take things to weird or less compel, less
Speaker 2: emotionally compelling places for the sake of fitting everything in.
Speaker 1: Right, last couple questions of my own biggest flim flam
Speaker 1: about fandom, any myths that you would like to get
Speaker 1: on a soapbox at bust.
Speaker 2: That it's only for teenage girls haha. Conversely that teenage
Speaker 2: girl taste doesn't matter, right, Like, how can this be
Speaker 2: such an important cultural phenomenon and discount one of the
Speaker 2: loudest contingencies of it. If I could soapbox forever, it
Speaker 2: would be like teen girl taste matters to what actually
Speaker 2: becomes popular and commercially viable in this and other countries.
Speaker 2: So I think it's like derision of teen girl taste.
Speaker 2: I really hate it when talk show hosts drag out
Speaker 2: fan fiction and fan art as like a tool for
Speaker 2: embarrassment of the actors in an ip.
Speaker 1: Oh that sucks.
Speaker 2: I hate that it wasn't written for you, and so
Speaker 2: like there's that. There's also the assumption, like in my job,
Speaker 2: and I get this a lot, is like, oh, you
Speaker 2: study fandom, so you must study the fandom that I'm in,
Speaker 2: and that is absolutely not the case. Like I did
Speaker 2: not grow up in like emo bandom. Like I can't
Speaker 2: tell you about the culture of my chemical romance fans.
Speaker 2: I know they exist, that's the extent of my knowledge.
Speaker 2: And so it's really easy to have the fallacy of well,
Speaker 2: fandom only exists in my experience of fandom mm hmm,
Speaker 2: which is not the case, because the experience of being
Speaker 2: a fan is just like just as diverse as the
Speaker 2: people who are fans of stuff.
Speaker 1: Mm hmm. I imagine you must have heard a lot
Speaker 1: about really upset Game of Thrones fans who are just like, well,
Speaker 1: I'm done now, done forever.
Speaker 2: Yeah, when fans willfully break uh huh and are like, nope,
Speaker 2: this is not part of my identity anymore. M not
Speaker 2: realizing that, like, hating on something is still a form
Speaker 2: of fandom because you're still caring. Like the opposite of
Speaker 2: love isn't hate, it's apathy.
Speaker 1: Mostly I hate the way I don't hate you, not
Speaker 1: even close, not even a little bit. Is that what
Speaker 1: you hate the most about your job not Game of Thrones,
Speaker 1: but people having assumptions about it or what's the worst
Speaker 1: thing about being a panthropologist.
Speaker 2: Probably that people have a very monolithic understanding of fandom
Speaker 2: and really want to define it however they went into it,
Speaker 2: like it's hard to broaden horizons. Is the hardest part
Speaker 2: and worst part about my job, because it's so tied
Speaker 2: to identity, either on the production side or the consumption side,
Speaker 2: Like change is hard and slow and there's a lot
Speaker 2: of risk aversion is probably the hardest part about my
Speaker 2: job is convincing people to one take risks and to
Speaker 2: have empathy for the other parts of the process.
Speaker 1: So a lot of us think we know what fandom
Speaker 1: is and entails, but panthropologists know that identity and self
Speaker 1: care and brand loyalty and exploring your own faults through
Speaker 1: fiction is very complicated, which is why panthropology is fascinating.
Speaker 1: What about the best that's the coolest part? Is it
Speaker 1: all the free lanyards you get and going to conventions
Speaker 1: when there's not a plague.
Speaker 2: I think it's just opening my eyes to what other
Speaker 2: people like and are interested in. I get to see
Speaker 2: so many facets of the cultural landscape that I Because
Speaker 2: I work in the private sector, not in academia, my
Speaker 2: research is dictated by my clients, not my personal research interests,
Speaker 2: and so I get to explore all sorts of other
Speaker 2: worlds that I would otherwise consider myself too old for
Speaker 2: or too young for, or would not normally gravitate towards it,
Speaker 2: or any other number of traits. So I get to
Speaker 2: see a much wider version of culture than most people's
Speaker 2: individual feeds would feed them.
Speaker 1: How do you feel when people tell you that they're
Speaker 1: a big fan of you? Uh?
Speaker 2: Doesn't happen a lot. I'm one of those professionals that like,
Speaker 2: I know what it takes to be famous and build
Speaker 2: a brand on the Internet, and I have actively and
Speaker 2: deliberately chosen not to do that for myself.
Speaker 1: No, man, And what do you tell people who are like, hey,
Speaker 1: my niece wants to be Internet famous and you're like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I hold the keys to that in a little box.
Speaker 1: What do you tell people?
Speaker 2: I think, well, okay, so if your niece wants to
Speaker 2: be Internet famous, m I would say that they need
Speaker 2: to figure out what they like to make MM and
Speaker 2: then make a lot of it's like make a lot
Speaker 2: and understand what about it they like, what about it
Speaker 2: they don't like, get help where they can in the
Speaker 2: stuff that they don't like doing, and spend a lot
Speaker 2: of time watching stuff that they like for the express
Speaker 2: purpose of under standing why they like it. A lot
Speaker 2: of creative professionals spend a lot of their time consuming
Speaker 2: other people's content in order to look at it with
Speaker 2: a critical eye. So in the age of the Internet,
Speaker 2: it's like, well, what is unique to you and what
Speaker 2: do you want to borrow from other stuff you like?
Speaker 2: And having that blend of unique to you and borrowed
Speaker 2: such that it is familiar is really really important in
Speaker 2: that beginning stages, as is knowing what you want out
Speaker 2: of being a creator, Like are you doing this because
Speaker 2: you want to be famous? But do you want to
Speaker 2: be famous? Because it's sometimes a proxy for having financial stability,
Speaker 2: Like drill down into the why that is it because
Speaker 2: you want to have fun and communicate the having fun part?
Speaker 2: Is it about having freedom of expression or is it
Speaker 2: about financial stability? Or is it about per growth needs
Speaker 2: like learning how to develop a skill? Why are you
Speaker 2: doing this? What do you like about the content that
Speaker 2: you consume and make a lot of it and understand
Speaker 2: how to tweak the stuff that you're making if you
Speaker 2: want to grow, Like cause, if you want to be
Speaker 2: a professional, you have to scale to a size that
Speaker 2: can sustain being a professional. But if you just want
Speaker 2: to make stuff to make stuff, then make stuff and
Speaker 2: make a lot of it and practice and build those skills.
Speaker 1: Skills deck skill. Ough, that's such good advice. That's going
Speaker 1: to change at least one listener's life. I'm sure just
Speaker 1: so exciting. That's like literally like the end scene of
Speaker 1: pulp fiction with the briefcase. You're like, here's what's in it? Guys,
Speaker 1: Oh my god, that's what's in it. I in no
Speaker 1: way did I intend to make this a two hour interview,
Speaker 1: and I'm so thankful you stuck around. This looks like
Speaker 1: it's going to be a two parter. I'm sure. This
Speaker 1: has just been so exciting ever since I was handed
Speaker 1: your business card, it has been on my desk for
Speaker 1: probably a year, So I'm so excited and finally talk
Speaker 1: to you.
Speaker 2: Likewise, can I give you my interview questions? Yeah? Okay, absolutely,
Speaker 2: So Allie, what do you consider yourself to be a fan.
Speaker 1: Of Oh, Okay, things I'm a fan of. I think
Speaker 1: that I'm the biggest, like Stan of probably Fiona Apple.
Speaker 1: I think that if I were to ever meet her,
Speaker 1: I think and I have met her very briefly, and
Speaker 1: I just I don't even think I said a sentence.
Speaker 1: I think I just was like she was like in
Speaker 1: a lobby leaving an event as I was coming in.
Speaker 1: I think that that would be probably someone that I
Speaker 1: have so much awe and respect for in whose music
Speaker 1: and words and mission and ethos have meant probably the
Speaker 1: most to me over time. Probably, Yeah, She's She's someone
Speaker 1: who just I'm never disappointed by her.
Speaker 2: What is your earliest memory of being a fan of anything?
Speaker 1: My early okay, okay, all right, do you want to
Speaker 1: know my first cosplay?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 1: Okay. I was the youngest of three girls, and I
Speaker 1: also is the youngest. Like just I watched way too
Speaker 1: stuff that was inappropriate for my age because my sisters
Speaker 1: were older. So like tons of our movies when I
Speaker 1: was just barely in kindergarten, it was just like they'd
Speaker 1: be on cable and so but we we would watch
Speaker 1: Escape from New York too much, And when I was
Speaker 1: five or six, really was excited about dressing up like
Speaker 1: Snake Pliskin. So I cut off the arms of a
Speaker 1: shirt into like a muscle tank and I made a
Speaker 1: rubber eye patch out of an old bike tire, and
Speaker 1: then also took my mom's She was not happy about it,
Speaker 1: but I took her eyeeshadow and made a five o'clock
Speaker 1: shadow call me Snake, and I was like in bliss
Speaker 1: and I think we may have had a toy gun.
Speaker 1: But I just remember marching around the backyard being like,
Speaker 1: I am Snake Pliskin. I'm not dressed as Pliskin right now.
Speaker 1: I am Snake Pliskin. I've escaped from New York played
Speaker 1: by Kurt Russell in a post apocalyptic world, and there's
Speaker 1: somewhere there exists a polaroid of it, and it's one
Speaker 1: of those treasures that if my family, if we ever
Speaker 1: find it, Oh my god, the bounty I would pay.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that was me at my most badass. I peaked.
Speaker 1: I peaked.
Speaker 2: Thanks so much for taking like more than an hour.
Speaker 1: Oh I love this? Are you kidding? I was like,
Speaker 1: as soon as you're like, I don't have anywhere to be,
Speaker 1: I was like, game on, So what is the lesson here?
Speaker 1: Y'all ask smart passionate people about the smart passionate people
Speaker 1: they study, study people who study people who study characters
Speaker 1: and cup banks if you want them, and just make
Speaker 1: a lot of stuff, Just make things get dirty, be
Speaker 1: weirder than you think is okay to be. Meanwhile, follow
Speaker 1: at Meredith Gene on Twitter. She's also on Clubhouse, where
Speaker 1: she's been leading discussions on things like fandom and the
Speaker 1: attention economy. You can follow me if you like at
Speaker 1: Ali Ward with Bonel on Twitter and Instagram. We're also
Speaker 1: at ology on both. You can join the Facebook Ologies
Speaker 1: podcast group. Thank you Aaron Talbert for admitting that you
Speaker 1: can find other ology heights in the wild with merch
Speaker 1: at ologismerch dot com. Thank you Shannon Feltis and Bonnie
Speaker 1: Dutch of the comedy podcast You Are That for managing
Speaker 1: all that. Thank you Noel Dilworth for keeping the whole
Speaker 1: ship running. Thanks Emily White and all the transcribers for
Speaker 1: making transcripts available on our website at alliwar dot com.
Speaker 1: Slash Ologies extras. There's a link for those for free
Speaker 1: in the show notes, as well as bleeped episodes. Thank
Speaker 1: you Caleb Patten for bleeping them and thank you to
Speaker 1: editors Jared Sleeper, Megahunk, who hosts Quarantine Calistenics every weekday
Speaker 1: at nine am Pacific on Twitch, and to Jurassic Park
Speaker 1: Fanatic and Kittie Lover Stephen Ray Morris of the podcast
Speaker 1: See Jurassic Right and the Percast and a new Everything
Speaker 1: but the movie A Star Wars Books podcast. Nick Thorburn
Speaker 1: of the very good band Islands wrote and played the
Speaker 1: theme music. They have a new album due out in
Speaker 1: June exciting and at the end of each episode, I
Speaker 1: tell a secret, and this week it's not very juicy,
Speaker 1: but it's something I think about all day.
Speaker 2: Every day.
Speaker 1: There's this long strip of plastic tangled in my neighbour's
Speaker 1: eucalyptus tree, and it's probably like fifteen or twenty feet
Speaker 1: in the air, and I see it whipping in the
Speaker 1: wind every day, and I think, should I risk breaking
Speaker 1: several femurs to just go remove that? Because it bums
Speaker 1: me out and I keep staring at it, and I
Speaker 1: keep thinking, how am I going to get that thing down?
Speaker 1: So stay tuned. I gotta make it. I got to
Speaker 1: do something anyway. Okay, I'm a fan of you. By pacadermatology, homeology, cryptozoology, lithology, technology, meteorology, fatology, apology, ceiology,
Speaker 1: elinologynic dici. But Bevan and by good and all't be great.
Speaker 3: Butt your picture on my walk.
Speaker 1: It's from his street that it's not so, that it's
Speaker 1: not so.
Speaker 2: Mm hm