Things I Have Learned About Fandom.

Things I have learned about Fandom.

Tips for beginners.

I’m staring down my 9-year anniversary here on Tumblr, and I thought I’d share some thoughts from that perspective. I discovered fandom (and Tumblr) when I was 41, so I’ve obviously never been a teenager online, but I think these are pretty universal for newcomers of any age.

Pick a name that doesn’t reflect your current fandom, because the odds that you will move on in 1 or 5 or 10 years are very high, and changing your url often means that your old friends don’t recognize you anymore.

Keep your friends! Your current fandom friends are going to migrate to different fandoms than you will. You will generally not be able to convince them to love your Next Hyperfixation. Learn to enjoy the eclectic oddness that your dash will eventually become.

Don’t be afraid to move on. Fandom is Brownian Motion. You will drift from one space to another as the spirit moves you. It’s okay. In the beginning, it can feel like a betrayal to leave a fandom, to start reblogging things your current friends aren’t in to, to lose interest in their meta/writing/art, to change the feel of your dash. It’s okay! Everyone does it, although some take months and others take years. Just let them know that your hyperfixation has changed, but your heart and friendship has not. It’s that simple.

Be Kind. To everyone. You have no idea what they’re going through or who they are. Try to not say anything to others that you wouldn’t want aimed at yourself. (You’re going to fuck this up. Everyone does. Give yourself some slack and remember to absorb the lesson, if there’s one to be learned.)

You are going to stumble. Especially in today’s hypercritical climate. You are going to say something that starts a fire. Just say sorry (if it’s warranted) and move on. Delete that post and take a break for a couple of weeks if it gets too hot. LEARN from it, but don’t fixate on it. Make liberal use of tumblr’s Block feature.

Learn to recognize wank (“discourse”). Know that if you jump in with your opinion, you will very likely become some rabid person’s target. So make that choice with your eyes open. Try to avoid black-and-white thinking (we’re right –> they must be demons). It’s really not helpful.

Online stress is real. Online hurts are real hurts. So learn how to protect yourself. Curate your dash, block people and tags. Learn to recognize when tumblr thoughts follow you into your real life and affect your happiness. When that happens, take a break. Change the makeup of your dash.

Don’t make assumptions. Your friend might be older or younger than you, might be from an entirely different culture. It’s easy to assume everyone on the other side of your keyboard is a mirror image of you, with similar experiences. They very likely are not, so always tread lightly.

Guard your personal information. No one needs to know your real name! And probably, they don’t need to know your age, either. Especially if you’re young. You are your url, and in a fandom community, that is enough.

Being part of a fandom community takes time and effort. You make friends by commenting, reblogging, encouraging others in their writing/art/meta/whatever. If you are a creator yourself, please don’t be discouraged by a slow lift-off. That happens for everyone (except a lucky few).

It isn’t necessary to make friends with the BNFs out there: make friends with other newbies. Your shared experiences will be stronger for that!

Have fun! And if you realize it isn’t fun anymore, walk away. People take breaks from fandom all the time, and it’s still there when they return. Even if it’s been decades. 😉

My Article Fact-Checking Protocol

Thorough Version

Read the full article. Keep an eye out for emotionally loaded words, and all-or-nothing language

Keep an eye out or anything that sounds too good to be true, and in contrast, anything that sounds so awful it must be true

Run the website/source through the amazing Media Bias/Fact Check. They'll tell you about a publication's bias and history of accuracy

Go to the website's home page and read through the headlines. Look at what topics they cover/prioritize, sensationalist headlines, and whether they're framing anything in a way that feels odd/off to you

Do a search related to the topic. This can be keywords, a question, or even just copy-paste the article title (Recommended: use DuckDuckGo so the results don't change based on what Google thinks they can sell you)

If multiple highly credible sources that say the same thing pop up, and there's no major societal biases that might affect the coverage of the topic in those sources (e.g. anything related to the Israel-Palestine conflict/Palestinian genocide, no matter which side), then I'm done!

If there are major societal biases, or I can't get a consensus of sufficiently credible sources, then I do some combination of:

(1) search the topic again + the words "controversy" and/or "fake"

(2) search the opposite of the topic, or do some sort of other filtered search

(3) look up a sufficiently credible news outlet with the opposite point of view of my source, and see what they have to say

(4) if it's a big enough topic, start by looking up 2 of the top national papers and 1 major paper for your region (I usually do the ones in the US, because that's where I am In the US: the LA Times, the Washington Post, and the NY Times)

Adjust "news" to "relevant type of source, e.g. tech, environmental" as relevant for all of the above options

If no red flags come up, and it's a topic I understand enough to smell huge bullshit,

Then I'm usually done!

If there are red flags, or I actually need a certain amount of detail/understanding, then it gets more complicated, but that would be a whole other thing to break down and such

tl;dr

Quick Version

Read the full article. Keep an eye out for emotionally loaded words, and all-or-nothing language

Keep an eye out or anything that sounds too good to be true, and in contrast, anything that sounds so awful it must be true.

If I don't know the website:

Run the website/source through the amazing Media Bias/Fact Check. They'll tell you about a publication's bias and history of accuracy

If I trust the source, but something else pinged my radar:

Do a quick web search to verify anything that sounds suspicious or too good/bad to be true (Recommended: use DuckDuckGo)

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mothymyths

7 months ago

friendly reminder for washingtonians, vote NO on all the initiatives! the seattle stranger has a good run down of them as well as thorough endorsements of the candidates.

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mothymyths

6 months ago

This is a reminder to:

Never mention a possible pregnancy/abortion to anyone, especially not through a social media app messaging service such as messenger, WhatsApp, Instagram DMs, Snapchat, etc.

Delete all period tracking apps and to start tracking using a planner or physical calendar

Book appointments for a form of birth control if possible, or to always carry condoms for yourself and other

Look into sterilization options if that is the route you want to go down (here is a list of 1000 doctors willing to sterilize you without a fight)

Protect your fellow person, protect the women in your life, the queer people, the disabled people, everyone will be affected by this

Form communities. Tell your people that you love them. Protect one another. Check in on one another. None of us are alone.

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