I tend to be fairly low-key about holidays, but I kind of like this one and I have twenty minutes left, so... Happy Halloween!
posted by D.C. Fox 11:44 PM

Another day I'm glad is over--I have to admit that 32 is one of those ages that always seemed like fifth grade did from the vantage of second grade: an age when everything might still be possible because you're grown up enough and able to do all these cool things without having to deal with the pressure of graduating, you still have time... A kind of perfect age in that way.

I don't know, it's been a mostly good birthday, but there have been so many days this month that were so intense and that made them difficult, because I have so much to be happy about and grateful for and love, and then there's all this pain and loss and sadness and feeling both, feeling all these things at the same time is just--there's too much of everything, good and bad. The intensity is exhausting.
posted by D.C. Fox 12:04 AM

I'm so glad this day is almost over.
posted by D.C. Fox 11:04 PM

If I could ask all slash fans to answer two questions, it would be "how do you define slash?" and "what do you like about slash?" because I'm so curious about how close those answers are for most people. -- torch

I've been thinking recently about my deal with slash (not for the first time or anything, but I've never put it all together in writing before), ever since bettyp had a few days off and spent them analyzing how we define slash and the discussion led torch to ask the above question. Leaving aside for the moment things like usage shifts and the way people often conflate several different ideas and use the same word interchangeably to refer to those ideas, I think the first thing to do when talking about a complex definition (that is, one which includes several components) is to list the components… so I'm just going to go with the standard working definition and say that the two main components of slash are that it's about relationships that are a) same-sex and b) non-canonical. (Heather threw in subversive as a third component, which I disagree with because I think it's a function rather than a feature of slash, but I do agree that writing about either of the first two can be considered a subversive act).

Anyway, the problem that immediately comes out of this is that—assuming you can agree on the components in the first place—sometimes they're not all present and you have to decide how inclusive you want the category in question to be, how useful for you it is to have it be inclusive to that degree. Interestingly enough, I realized this about Mary Sues before I ever even bothered thinking about slash, because I'd see people arguing about whether the defining component was idealization or self-insertion and just be like, but don't you get it…? The point is, it's both. Except, confusingly, when it's not both—because that can and does happen too. Certainly in the case of slash the same-sex component is often enough for stories to be treated as slash, even if the writer isn't actively "slashing" because it's a canonical relationship... hm, maybe the verb should have a separate definition than the noun, in which case I could totally see "subvert" as one of the meanings. But how do we decide which components get priority or get included to begin with?

I think the answer, if there is one, is that it's a question of what the components have in common when it comes to the purpose each of them serves in the function of the definition itself as a whole. In other words, when you're defining something, what are you trying to do and why? Why do we care about the definition of slash anyway? And because our reasons for caring about things are so varied that what's relevant in a definition has everything to do with what we're using that definition for (if you look up the definition of the word definition itself it talks about breaking it down into explanation, description, and so on), I don't think you can have the answer to either question without the other. Or without considering the question of what category liking what you like puts you into.

Obviously which question people choose to focus on (if any) is going to depend on the individual in question, but I think it's absolutely fascinating how figuring out a definition of slash so quickly and easily becomes one of personal identity, sexual and otherwise. (Naturally this fascinates me because I think almost all questions come down to that, but whatever…). I've heard people talk about slash in terms of their sexual orientation before, but it kind of irked me when I heard it this time around and I needed to think about why for a while. Mostly I think it's because I have a lot of jealousy of people whose sexual orientation is one that could be described in terms relating to gender instead of to pathology. And most people would agree that the traditional set of labels we have for defining our sexuality leaves something to be desired anyway, even people who may happen to fit neatly into one of those categories, but I think what annoys me about people defining themselves as slashers in a primary or exclusive way is that it makes me feel, well, unnecessarily excluded (which has always been my problem with identity politics in general...). Because saying you're a slasher means you like slash--the way the term is commonly used, it doesn't mean, I'll read whatever gets me off which may or may not include slash depending on the particular writer/pairing/fandom/type of story--it means, you like slash. It's an exclusive label.

It's also a pain in the ass because I feel marginalized, since on the one hand I'm not not a slasher, but... if the purpose of defining slash & self-identifying as a slasher is to create and participate in a community--which for right now let's just say that it is, although there may be other reasons too--and I actually do participate in that community, then logically the community needs to expand its definition of slash (or feminism, or bisexuality, or whatever) to include my experience or just admit that there's a problem with insisting that these definitions are anything more than useful shorthand and stop treating them as if they're something real and essential. I mean, I get that as with everything in life, sometimes you want to just be with other people who get it in exactly the same way you do, and other times to be with people with whom you have illuminating differences, and both those things are crucial. And I don't want to come across as being all dismissive of people for whom slash really has a significance that is absolutely alien to me, but… I really just don't get it. (Or rather I do get it, but it troubles me for reasons which I will not go into at this juncture). Because to me one of the main reasons for being in fandom is to get to bring together as many of my categories as possible, not subcategorize myself further into… well, a what, rather than a who, you know?

Aside from my personal issues with any kink (including slash) as a sexual orientation, I think one of the things I have trouble with about labeling sexuality like that is that if you believe the whole queer theory assumption that gender, sexuality, desire, and the normative and/or deviant nature of any of these things are socially constructed (which is not to say that they are any less deep or fundamental as a result) why would you buy into that by taking any particular set of labels seriously? Because I tend to believe that sexuality is a fluid, idiosyncratic thing, and can be of other kinds and exist along so many other continuums than the ones commonly acknowledged--and I think people can be repressed, but trust me when I say that in my personal and professional experience, there are very few people who are "straight" or "normal" when it comes to their sexuality regardless of their gender preferences. I think what I'm trying to say is that for me, seeing slash or sexual orientation period as inherently about any one thing is a problem because I lean towards the anti-essentialist view that nothing is inherently anything... or rather, that there is no one essential quality that makes something what it is when taken apart from all the other qualities that make up that thing's identity.

Like, I don't think there's a lot of middle ground here because I'm a hardcore nominalist--obviously I find categories useful in making sense of the world as we all do, but they're only liberating or even, uh, true (and I'd qualify my use of the word "truth" a lot further except I'm already worried that I've lost most of my audience by this point since this is supposedly the fandom blog, not a philosophy one, but, I'm trying not to be overly technical, I swear) if I can get them so incredibly narrow as to create a set of which only one member exists, me. It's only by getting my categories that narrow that I can appreciate the uniqueness of things--people--in a way that I can't when I leave them broad and open and undefined. For me it's a better thing to have more rather than less information, because details like, the first person I was ever in love with was a girl, the last time I had sex it was like a drug, have you read this book, are going to tell me more about someone than a category which may allow room for differences between members, but will never really render the distinctive features that make us who we are.

What all of this means is that while the definitions are useful and certainly it's important to acknowledge that, I'm not sure that it works for me to categorize what I am (queer, feminist, a slasher, never mind my sexual orientation which I've never thought of as mainly about gender at all so then how can I be bi or straight?) when it comes to this stuff as opposed to, you know, how my mind works or why I like what I like. So I guess I wouldn't even define myself as a slasher for the very reasons I think I am one--because one of the main reasons I like slash (when I like it) is because it doesn't always insist on viewing desire and identity and sexuality in terms of gender, thus allowing for the uniqueness and complexity of individuals--of us as human beings--and the appreciation of ambiguity and passion and need in a much less limited and more realistic way. I also think that it's tied up with my feelings about sex & the power in knowing forbidden things, but I think that's one of the underlying drives that's directed my entire life--and I like certain types of slash stories because they lend themselves to the exploration of power dynamics and emotional issues of trust and betrayal, intimacy and risk, that I'm drawn to regardless of where I see them.

And of course that's another reason I have trouble with calling myself a slasher--because it's really hard to separate my feelings about slash from my feelings about slash fandom and fandom period, since it's not like there's something I get from slash specifically that I can't get from het or gen that meets my mental and emotional needs just as well. In fact, in some ways better, because I do see some sexism and even misogyny among slashers and in slash fiction. (Ins and I actually ran a panel on this at Escapade, but it had to be scheduled as alternate programming which kind of said something right there). However, although these things manifest differently in slash (for obvious reasons), I also see sexism and misogyny in a lot of het fiction too and it bothers me wherever I see it, so I'm not going to pick on slash today. I will just say that I feel I could never be exclusively interested in it because of the one step remove from women writing about sex for other women, but not writing about women, when they write slash--which is not to say I don't understand and get off on the fantasy and projection of reading about men too, but I relate to women much more because I am one... so any genre where they're consistently absent or less important isn't going to be able to meet all of my needs.

Oh, and before anyone starts going hey, what about f/f slash, I'll just add that a lack of men wouldn't meet all my needs any more than a lack of women does because men are a part of life too, even for women who aren't interested in them sexually--and besides, femslash is marginalized within the traditional slash community to some extent as well (starting with the fact that it has a separate name). Not only are a lot of female writers of m/m slash simply uninterested in f/f, many are actively uncomfortable with it (for reasons I won't even go into because that's another rant)--a few to the point of saying it shouldn't even be called slash at all. And again, while I must reiterate that none of this is limited to slash (because it's so not, even though okay, apparently maybe I am gonna pick on it a little), I find prejudice like that ridiculous.

It's like with sex work, you've got dancers and dominatrices and escorts, and the dancers are all, I may take my clothes off, but no one ever touches me and the doms and escorts are like, yeah, but anyone with the price of a couple of beers can see your tits, whereas the escort is like, I may have sex but I'm getting paid a few hundred dollars and it's private and I don't have to do anything weird, and the dominatrix is all, I'm in charge and I don't even have to take my clothes off and I'm certainly not having sex with any of these guys and the escorts and dancers are like, but you do all sorts of sick, kinky shit and I would never do that, and you see where this is going... So I've never been surprised that that sort of bullshit exists, but I completely lack patience when it comes to dealing with it. Which should be another post too probably, but these things are all intertwined...

I recently met a girl in Smallville fandom who upon meeting me told me apologetically "I write hetfic", and I was like, yeah, and? I mean, so fucking what? But I've been around long enough to know that there's a reason for her attitude, because there is definitely a healthy streak of anti-het prejudice alive and well among some slashers--not all, and not many of the ones I'd want to hang out with, probably, but it's there. However, what struck me about the whole encounter is that I was left going, why does this girl, a relative newcomer to fandom, care if people like what she writes or not? Obviously some people are more secure than others and getting involved in online fandom as a twenty-nine year old woman with a lot of other life experiences to compare it to made me more secure than than if I'd gotten into it as a fifteen year old girl, but the point I wanted to make is that in addition to my other experiences I also had experience with zine fandom as a fifteen year old girl and I think that made a huge difference for me.

I think one of the reasons I don't write any more has to do with the Internet and the nature of laziness and instant gratification. I wouldn't go back, but I think for me part of what made me write the stories I did write way back when was that I looked at all the stories I'd seen doing a particular fandom cliche (eg. Cally comforts Avon by sleeping with him post-"Rumours of Death", for anyone who was into B7) and was just like, no, it wouldn't have gone down like that. But the thing is, the amount of stories I could find to look at was so limited that it was easy to conclude that no one had gotten it right yet, so I had to write it… With the advent of the Internet, the pool of stories to search through became much larger and instead of being forced to rely on my own devices, much more often as soon as I thought of something I could find it, or something close enough to it that I lost that edge of need that might have otherwise impelled me to write about it myself.

The other thing that was good about the print zine world was that I had no way of knowing who most of the people were, and I didn't care—sure, I realized that older people had the means and the interest to get more involved and go to more cons and publish zines and stuff, but I was just in it for the reading and writing and I struck up my correspondences and acquaintanceships the same way I do online…and it was a slow process, writing to people, writing LoCs (and submitting stories occasionally—the submission process was another thing that forced interaction, so it didn't just feel like posting into a void as self-publishing can—someone had to tell you if the story was any good or not). It still is. I'm not even sure what my point is, but maybe it's that I wasn't looking for more acceptance than I found—I never had a story rejected, but I feel like because there were fewer people involved, people were more inclined to accept you for just being there. I mean, if you were into an unpopular pairing, you just kind of nursed your obsession and wrote your fic in secret (or with the few other people you'd discovered who would deal with or were actually into said pairing), but at least in my experience there wasn't this sense that it was some kind of a fannish failing that made you uncool or unpopular or unfit to hang out with the really hip fans. (Cutting all sorts of stuff about character identification and fandom status because this entry is already five pages long in Word). Maybe because I was so young and most of the people seemed older I felt like I was taken seriously just because they let me participate at all, but I wasn't interested in the politics of the fan fiction culture--or rather, I was interested in much the same way I am now, considering that it was like, all gossip about the actors and thirdhand accounts of drama between big name fans who were never even identified half the time and I was just like, this shit really goes down? Who knew? But wait, yeah, that makes sense, of course it must.

And this isn't one of those online fandom has ruined everything and it was so much better in the old days rants, by any means--because I'd probably still be buying a few zines a year when I could afford them, but I wouldn't be here now if it weren't for the Internet--but it's also true that fans didn't write about each other or about fandom nearly so much, um, back in the day (and you can't imagine how entertaining it is to me that I can say that, because how could I have imagined that all those hours devoted to my secret life and lonely obsession would potentially translate into some equivalent of fannish street cred? Not that I think I have a ton of it or anything, but even inconsistently it's been, God, almost twenty years). But I do think the visibility of being in online fandom, as well as the fact that there's just so much more of it, leads people to self-classify more and place more importance on doing so. And again, while I appreciate the usefulness of doing that and do it myself when I feel it's helpful, the problem with dividing people into categories of any kind is that by trying to seek neat definitions we often miss out on a true and accurate description of the whole person. So.

I like some slash stories, I'm part of the slash community, it's not an exclusive thing and it doesn't have to be any more than the fact that I have blue eyes is mutually exclusive with, I don't know, my birthday or my religion or that I like to eat pizza--what I'm trying to say with all of this is that I look at fandom as a place I go to be more of my self. I want it to be inclusive. And maybe--no, definitely--I have those early fandom acquaintances (as well as my friends now) to thank for making me feel that way, and for making me feel accepted... with all my individual traits intact.
posted by D.C. Fox 12:35 AM

I wrote this…oh, about six weeks ago, but I didn't finish or post it because… oh, who cares now? Someday I'll finish my recs page too. School cannot be over too soon…. Anyway, from mid-April, 2002:

A bunch of people are still posting about the intellectual issue. And it occurs to me that maybe I wasn't honest enough in my previous entry/rant--or thorough enough--because I really think that when a group of grad students are fighting it's not a question of who's being intellectual and elitist because hello. Pot. Kettle. It's just a lack of rhetorical/communication skills or, and this is what I think everyone isn't sufficiently acknowledging, that they just don't like each other. 'Cause that is what it comes down to sometimes--I think what's interesting is why.

I mean, it's no fun having discussions with people you don't like because they make you uncomfortable, but as to why people make us feel this way… I think that's tricky, because on the one hand I'm always analyzing things in terms of, what are the fears this person or situation brings up for me? What do I need to learn about myself as a result of that? Because I know that when something makes me uncomfortable, it's usually because whatever it is reminds me of something within myself that I'm not comfortable with. But I also think sometimes people make us uncomfortable because they're just plain obnoxious. No matter how emotionally and intellectually secure we are, we're not going to feel comfortable spending time with someone who--for whatever reason--is constantly putting us down.

("I'm not putting you down," the person in question may protest, "that's just your perception", and that may or may not be true in a particular situation, but I'm talking about the times it's not true and they are saying things no one who spoke the language could possibly see as benign. This also gets into the poor communication skills area, but that's a different issue although the person in question does usually have lousy communication skills too). My point is that I have stayed out of conversations with people I thought might have something of intellectual value to offer because I was just like, that's interesting, but god, I really hate that bitch--dealing with her isn't worth it, even for the sake of an interesting conversation. And sometimes I've gotten into it with people when I shouldn't have because I had personal issues with them and pretended I was just discussing whatever it was in general terms--not that I didn't mean what I was saying, but there was a whole other level to it that I couldn't post in public blog comments because it wouldn't have been appropriate…and I think that's really at the heart of this whole blog thing and my reservations about it, because I can say now what I didn't say then, but is it appropriate now because this is my space?

Fuck it. Because it was directly concerning this issue, and I was so pissed off at the time (and still am) because I was worried that people would somehow see me as being anti-intellectual just because I said that much as I love philosophical debate, I find it really annoying when people--myself included--use intellectualization to avoid facing up to their own emotional reactions to things. Especially the things they're afraid of. (Te used to have a Natalie Goldberg quote on her blog's sidebar that said "Write what disturbs you, what you fear, what you have not been willing to speak about. Be willing to be split open."… which is what I love about Te. She's honest and she'll talk about things other people won't touch--I mean, I don't read every blog out there, but I don't think anybody other than Te (and probably Thamiris, but I haven't read all her blog entries so I'm not sure) has ever come out and talked about masturbating--personally, that is, because everyone with even the slightest interest in slash has doubtless talked about hot guys masturbating at some time or other…. Still, what do we do with all this smut? I can't be the only one who's really happy that I never have to rent porn when I want to get off--especially since like many women I prefer the written word to visual images for autoerotic stimulation, and I couldn't rent porn this good anyway. Wow, I've digressed--welcome to one of my other blogging fears, that anyone who doesn't have attention deficit disorder will be really unamused by my rambling).

But I don't just find it annoying. I think it makes me uncomfortable because when people are dishonest with themselves and/or me, I get scared of my own capacity for denial and am reminded of all my own insecurities and fears. With the whole academia thing, Kat wrote an entry which speaks to this for me; in it, she talks about her own experience of deciding not to go for her doctorate and her feelings about that world now:

"... it was like I'd been spending a lot of time living in the high mountains, and while that's exhilarating -- very clean, very pure, huge epic vistas -- at the same time, the air was getting a bit thin for me, it was cold up there, and I started losing my grip on what I was doing, having bad falling dreams, and finally I decided it was time for me to pack up and haul ass back down into the lowlands, with all the proles , and do other things with my life.

. . . I remember what it was like to be in the game, the pure, exhilarating, soaring joy of it; and it's still fun sometimes to go out and knock the ball around, even though I can't really get it out of the infield any longer. But I'm not in the game; I won't, or I can't, suit up and go out for the full nine innings."

I think what moves me about that is not only how much I personally relate to it, but how much it scares me that I don't always know the difference between won't and can't, and how much the loss that both those words contain hurts. Because no matter what I choose to do with my life, loss is unavoidable. And I miss things I never even had, and I lack even the certainty of knowing I was giving them up because I chose something I knew I loved more. Sometimes I missed having them just because I wasn't equipped or ready for them--my recent breakup comes to mind--and I wonder if knowing that things I may have wanted were never even a real option for me is even harder to accept than letting myself believe that I just didn't choose to do them… some days I think, the academy or something else? Or, marriage and children or something else, to use the more traditional example? Whatever you decided you wanted or needed--is it some personal failing or lack if you can't do that? And how can you live feeling so divided, always knowing that you were capable of loving someone or something so much, but not having that in your life? That your life--whatever it will be--is elsewhere? How can the greatest love you've ever known not be enough, and what if nothing will ever be enough? How can you come to terms with the fact that you're not who you always thought you were, or what you hoped you might become, and that you have no idea who you're going to be (assuming this isn't it, because please god don't let this be all there is)?

Well, those are my fears, anyway. I suspect the answers to those questions come with time and age. Kat (and my friend Robyn, whose wisdom comforts me) are both in their early fifties, and as I'm just entering my thirties I figure I have a few years to attain the serenity I'm missing. But changing careers (and it's strange to think of sex work as a career, but it was, but that's a whole 'nother post…) and being back in school right now have made me acutely sensitive So what does this have to do with fandom? Let's see--in an entry titled "Fandom and Stupidity", Naomi wrote:

"Why, on a similar note, is it that every time the fan-related journals I read get into a long, satisfying discussion about the ethical or moral or metaphysical or historical or whatever implications of a favorite book or TV show, half a dozen people start whining that (a) we have made them feel stupid (without their consent? uh, whatever); (b) we have been mean and nasty and judgmental (this is said with no trace of irony); (c) we are stupid, and have been engaging in a pointless wankfest*** (usually a shorthand way of expressing (a) and (b) together)? . . . If it makes you feel stupid, I am profoundly sorry for you and profoundly angry about the educational system that failed to teach you the difference between feelings of inadequacy and lack of intellectual capacity, but I'm not going to shut up just because of that."

And I can see her point. It never shuts me up either, although I may privately complain to my friends about how whoever the whiners are are annoying me again (are you sensing a theme here?). But I have been around for more than one of these and I don't think it's just about people and their feelings of inadequacy (which we all have about something or other, I don't care who you are--further, I think there's a huge difference between 1) being able to define and differentiate between feelings of inadequacy and lack of intellectual capacity and 2) being able to separate your emotional reactions in the same way, and that the inability to do the latter is a failure that goes way beyond that of the educational system (assuming Naomi is using "educational system" in the sense of school, or wherever we hopefully learn to make intellectual distinctions like 1) above)). I think it's about the people having the intellectual discussion using it as a cover for their underlying emotional issues and agendas… and I believe that this is because they. can't. deal.

A few months ago I said in someone else's lj comments that I thought defense mechanisms in general and intellectualization specifically had their drawbacks (which is really stating the fucking obvious, but whatever), and then went on to say that one of the things which bothers me about mainstream academic discourse is that it privileges analytical reasoning with the implicit message being that other forms of discourse are inferior and that when it comes to fandom, it's like, why can't we borrow what's useful from academia without also adopting its prejudices? And that I thought it was both possible and desirable to be emotional and intellectually rigorous at the same time, and a couple of other things, but those were initially the main points. And guess what? The next thing I knew I was being accused of hostility to rigor and hatefulness to people who just want to think seriously, along with a lack of consideration and basic courtesy. And I was like, excuse me?

I'm truly not judging anyone's defense mechanisms--God knows I'm the queen of them and some of mine are a lot more harmful than intellectualization--but the damage they do to us (and others) is as real as the protection they afford. (And even that is situational--because obviously, defense mechanisms can be healthy sometimes and are a survival trait, which I see as positive by default). But… I hate being accused of hostility to intellectuals and/or academics when it's obvious to anyone that I love being intellectual and I can read a book a day when I don't have other things to do just like the fucking rest of us--I just don't like emotional dishonesty, repression, and absolutism, because to me those things are lies. (Not the fictional kind). And I hate lies above all things. Which relates back to what I was saying about fear and discomfort with people who won't openly discuss their shit and use intellectualization as a defense mechanism, blah blah blah…. But it's like, what are you so afraid I'm going to see? That you're insecure and terrified and unhappy? So what? So am I--so is everyone, sometimes--but at least I try to admit it.

So in closing, being too intellectual/analytical/meta/whatever is not and never has been the issue--what people are responding negatively to when they complain about the overintellectualization of fandom debates usually has everything to do with the tone of the discussion and the personalities involved, not its actual content. Because when even the people doing the complaining are smart creative types who live for things that challenge the mind and imagination, how could it be otherwise? And that's why it upsets me to see analytical discussion becoming a source of contention in fandom when it's--I think "the lifeblood of our community" may be an overly melodramatic way of putting it, so let me just say, one of the most important things in fandom for me.

Because I think what's great about fandom--one of the things I love most about it, anyway--is that we can discuss so many of our obscure interests with the few other people in the world who are likely to appreciate so many of them. Or at least I've been able to. Naomi wrote,

"But the *NSync people can discuss Justin and J.C. in fandom circles without anyone raising an eyebrow, whereas I have to make lots of weak jokes and self-deprecating remarks if I want to bring Origen into discussions outside the academy, or outside the classroom (where I have the huge advantage of, y'know, being able to assign grades), without people tuning me out. I'm pretty sure nobody lists "early Christianity" as a fandom on the multi-fandom lists."

And yes, okay, obviously, if you're in a forum devoted to discussing the latest episode of a WB show you might be straying a little off topic if you start rehashing your entire dissertation, but I've gotten into private email correspondences with people that started when they referred to a topic in their list or blog posts that I thought I'd never find anyone else interested in… for example, I first wrote to one of the people in fandom I'm friendly with now after she posted something in her lj complaining about how most of the Dostoyevsky criticism out there sucks (not a topic I think more than a couple of thousand people on the planet are passionately interested in, y'know?). And it's so incredible to me that I have fandom (and now the Internet) to facilitate meeting other people who are interested in that stuff that I thought no one else would ever be interested in in the same approximate combinations as I am… Because frankly, when I can discuss clothes as character development at 3AM, the world is a happy place and I love my life. And I think that is all I have to say about that.
posted by D.C. Fox 10:53 AM

I can't believe I'm doing this… I may in fact never write an entry again. I have refused to do this for so long for what seem to me very valid reasons that I feel silly starting now, but I'm not going to go into that because I think having blogging be the subject of my first entry would be way too self-referential, or something--can you tell it's 4AM? Anyway, I have a lot of fears about it, which can basically be attributed to the fact that I have difficulty with boundaries, and I'm really fucking insecure and I don't want to turn this into performance art and only write about things that I think make me look cool, and I'm not sure I have the emotional maturity to handle myself appropriately--but that's another entry. For now, I'm just going to continue writing what I was writing in the comments section of Maren's livejournal before my post became three pages long…. In an earlier entry, she had written:

"I can take criticism. I can take disagreement. . . . I just have a hard time handling it when it's meted out like justice, some legal response to my arguments. I don't want to feel like I'm in court. I enjoy discussions. I just want them to be among friends."

And I was just like, I know we're total strangers, but I had to thank her for coming out and saying that, because it's what I would have written--although probably not so concisely--during the past few months if I could have summed up my dissatisfaction with certain aspects of (or maybe just personalities within) fandom in a single paragraph. Of everything she wrote today the only thing I disagreed with was her dismissing her sensitivity as a "problem" or failing--I hate the whole word/concept of oversensitive anyway, like it's somehow good to be hardened because emotions are a weakness?--when I see it as one of her strengths. (Of course I'm completely oversensitized on that subject because I've been reading Jean Baker Miller's Toward a New Psychology of Women, but that is likewise another entry). Like why on earth is it a problem to respond personally to fannish discussions? I'm suspicious of people who don't. It upsets me that someone so obviously bright and thoughtful and articulate would feel like she sucks at discussion or isn't smart just because she's well-adjusted enough to question how enjoyable it is "to have discussions when people come along and shoot down every single thing you say?"

Because I love fierce analytical debate, but the reason I got bored with posting to glass_onion and went back to just talking about stuff privately with my friends (aside from getting to mock the people I hate for personal reasons, which obviously can't be done in public) is that I don't need to write a legal brief every time I want to say something about fandom or Buffy or whatever. And it isn't that I can't engage in that type of argument--it's that I don't like it. Or at least, not a steady diet of it. I never doubted my intelligence, but...

It's like this time I was at a Columbia party years ago, a bunch of grad students at someone's apartment and we're all sitting outside on the roof and there's drinks and it's really cool and these people start getting into a conversation about the subjunctive and how English doesn't have it and I was like, oh, I know about this, and out of habit I started to say something and then I was like wait, why do I need to start swinging my intellectual dick when what I'm really thinking right now is guys, we're at a party--this is boring! Which is not to say that I might not have found the same discussion fascinating under different circumstances, but sometimes you just want to have fun and if that isn't always your idea of fun, maybe you need other friends whose style of discussion/idea of fun is more like yours, you know?

Along these lines, I think I also get tired of having the same discussions over and over with all and sundry, since I feel that in them a lot of people don't even listen to what's being said because they're too busy scanning the argument for flaws--and because they're busy doing that they don't adequately explore and share their own ideas and feelings, and arguments with people like that are never fruitful or stimulating. Once I've thought through a topic and written about it (and I find that often I have no idea what I think until I see what I say, but that's the whole point of interaction with others to me--if everything had to be a perfectly polished finished thought before I opened my mouth, I'd never learn anything and how boring would that be?), it's not that interesting to see how many ways I can defend my Position Statement--especially to people who make me feel emotionally invalidated. ("Invalidated" is like the best therapy word ever, because you can't argue with it--if you think something's invalidating, then it is. And the little struggles for fandom status/dominance can be really invalidating even when you're relatively emotionally secure--and dude, it's not being oversensitive when the hostility is real).

The other really irritating and ironic thing about all this is that for people supposedly concerned with rigorous intellectual argument, a lot of the time I come away from these debates going wow, I've never seen such a bag of cheap rhetorical tricks in my fucking life. It's ludicrous the way people think that the ability to take any argument and completely turn it around by misinterpreting it is a sign of good debating skills--and I'm tempted to say something about that particular type of bullshit sophistry being a product of certain educational institutions, but this is already enough of a rant--when really it just shows poor reading comprehension. It's like come on, guys, you may be able to distract the impressionable with this crap but do you really think you're fooling the rest of us?

The upshot of all this being that I end up not posting on lists and (apparently) (maybe) starting a blog, and just watching my shows and reading stories and working on various projects and ignoring fandom when it gets cranky. And it's been especially cranky lately…so perhaps I may be forgiven my crankiness as well. I'm very sleep-deprived. Uh, I don't know, here endeth the blog...?
posted by D.C. Fox 5:31 AM

I've definitely had enough. This is the best I'm going to do right now.... I think I will go make eggs. I really need a nap. The frustrating thing about playing with the template like this is that when I get something right or wrong, I have no idea why it is that way. And it's really frustrating.
posted by D.C. Fox 8:25 AM

Fuck this.
posted by D.C. Fox 6:48 AM

I hate everything.
posted by D.C. Fox 6:44 AM

All right. Making some progress. Finally. I think.
posted by D.C. Fox 6:33 AM

Damn.
posted by D.C. Fox 6:24 AM

Okay, this is unbelievably annoying. Why can't I figure out how to make tables? What am I doing wrong? Why did the person who was teaching me how to do this have to go home? Why won't my upstairs neighbors just go the fuck away? I'm hungry.
posted by D.C. Fox 6:17 AM

I just downloaded this in case I ever want it. Not that I do or anything.
posted by D.C. Fox 2:35 AM

nia
te
sheila
angela
kat
anna
v5
jenny-o
jayne
naomi
kit
shrift
kest
gemma
jessica
max
...more
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