Shipping Wars

[shipperx]

Old ship wars never die, they just repeat themselves. Endlessly. And in entirely new reiterations (which isn't as much of an oxymoron as you'd think!)

Who knows why we ship certain fictional couples. It has a lot to do with what entertains us, what intrigues us, what we think is hot, what we think could be interesting, what... Actually there are a lot of possible whats. It doesn't really matter what fic kink is the root of our attraction. Everyone is allowed theirs.

Not everyone feels the same way about these things. That's life... and love. It's only when people start to be judgmental about it that ship wars break out. Now, I admit there have been some fics that make me scratch my head and wonder "what the freaking hell?" And there have even been a few fics that make me want to reach for brain bleach to erase the memory of them (one particularly -- epically -- bizarre Supernatural fic I ran into once falls into that category.) But, you know, since they weren't my thing, I didn't spend a whole heck of a lot of time complaining about them or complaining about the way others spent their free time writing fic about stuff that doesn't happen to interest me. It only needed to interest them to be sufficient reason for the creation of fanfic.

There have been/are some fairly popular ships in many fandoms that I don't 'get.' I remember back in my X-Files fandom days, Krycek/Mulder was a hugely popular ship that I just. did. not. understand (beyond the obvious that Nic Lea and David Duchovny were incredibly, freaking hot. I was perplexed not dead). But I would always return to the sticking point of "Krycek murdered Mulder's father!" Same thing would happen to me when Krycek/Scully fic would pop up. I would wonder, 'but, wait, he murdered Scully's sister...') Still, you know, in all my not feeling the ships, I don't think I ever once wrote a screed saying I was viscerally horrified when Krycek/Mulder smut or Krycek/Scully smut popped up on Gossamer or Ephemeral. I would've thought that it would be pointless, silly, and possibly offensive to some authors if I posited that fans had no businesss writing or at least were morally questionable for writing such fics or how bothered I was to see it show up on general fandom comms! Mainly I didn't write such things because I didn't feel that way. My feelings were more easily categorized as a puzzled head tilt and a 'huh' before moving on to the Scully/Mulder MSR that I was watching the list for. (And I had a serious issues with the now departed fic comm mod (Not Ephemeral or Gossamer) that up and forbade Doggett fic -- not just Doggett/Scully fic but any mention of Doggett at all...because she felt it somehow in some inexplicable way threatened her ship. I thought the attitude was absurd and quit the comm over that display of 'how dare people ship stuff that I don't ship!' entitlement.) People's interests vary. Not everyone likes what I like or vice versa. No one need explain themselves to me.

Why can't it be that simple?

There have been/are canon and fanon ships in a number of fandoms that don't do a damn thing for me. There's a huge shipping faction in True Blood that falls into that category. I understand why some people ship it, but I just... don't. Just today I ran across a post in a Being Human comm of "Why aren't there more Mitchell/Annie fics?" which took me by surprise, not because anything was wrong with it but just because it never crossed my mind to ship Mitchell/Annie in the first place. I have friends that ship couples that I just shake my head, puzzled over what the attraction could be, because it doesn't interest me. Heck, in one (relatively popular) canon/fanon pairing in a non-BtVS fandom, I cannot manage to like the characters individually, making it doubly difficult to understand why there are people who ship them together. But, you know what? It doesn't matter. There's nothing wrong with either of us. It's just a matter of preference. Not everyone likes the same thing.

Where fic is concerned there are a near endless list of things that can be done with any ship. There are good, thought provoking, and engaging fics that can be constructed out of just about any pairing if the writer is talented and interested enough. And sometimes the writer's preference and the reader's preference hits that sweet spot of perfect agreement. When that happens, whee!!!

But proclaiming "thou shalt not write X+Y fic (or X+X or Y+Y) because I don't like it" or that "You are only permitted to write X+Y fic (or X+X or Y+Y) under a the conditions I specify and consider to be acceptable" is sadly common and completely ridiculous. Fanfic is made for fans to enjoy. If you aren't a fan of the ship, move the heck along. The fic isn't meant for you. Proclaiming that someone else can't/shouldn't write whatever ship they like because it doesn't float your boat? Out of line.

Now, someone point me to some "how could you write that?!" OTPp penguin fic! Hee! >:)

Comments

[menomegirl.livejournal.com]

I love this post. So much. You have no idea. Well, I take that back-I'm sure you do but still.

Thank you for writing this.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Glad you liked it. I was just bitching. :)

[rahirah]

It's been like a (bad) trip down memory lane lately... :P

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Everything old is... still really old. Why do they insist that it's new again?

[menomegirl.livejournal.com]

Because to the newer fandom parties, it is new?

I dunno.

[ladypeyton.livejournal.com]

It's been like a (bad) trip down memory lane lately... :P

I know, right?!?! Last week when I commented in your journal that we needed a new shipper war between the Spuffies and the Bangels I wasn't *serious*!!!!

[next_to_normal]

WORD.

[ms-scarletibis.livejournal.com]

Okay, I've missed something...

Someone's been saying you can't write ship X because they don't like it or something somewhere?

Wtf dude.

And do they really think that by saying that, it will somehow make people stop shipping it? Huh.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Apparently it's a low-grade kerfuffle in a fanfic comm. Somethihng about writing pre-soul Spuffy is wrong, unacceptable, and icky. You would think that old dead horse would have been beaten into a fine, grainy pulp by now. But, apparently, there are some who think it should take more beating. [wish there were eyerolling icons]

[flake-sake.livejournal.com]

Word.

I don't get the "moral outrage trope" either, becaus no one forces people to read a pairing they don't like and all fanfic will always be a bit weird if you're no emerged in the scene.

In the end I tend to think those moral outrages stem from lack of creativity.

I recently ran into some people in SPN fandom, who were extremely looking down on wincest. I'm not reallly into that fandom, but to me it seemed obvious that they were annoyed how many the wincest fans are in their fandom and how productive they are.

Same goes for the latest BtVS discussion, the person seemed mostly annoyed that the Spuffy fans where the most creative about an episodes where the canonical ship has not begun.

[shapinglight]

:applauds:

Nothing pisses me off more than this holier than thou stuff. So ridiculous- especially coming from someone who is a fan of a pairing where one of the parties is equally a mass murderer.

[hkath.livejournal.com]

Here via petzipellepingo's link. Very well said! Except that now I'm curious about all the things you referenced without explicitly naming characters, ships or fics.

Also, maybe sometimes it suits me to be accused of being morally reprehensible ;)

[slaymesoftly.livejournal.com]

Well said.

here via petzepellepingo...

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

...to say: thank you. Someone needed to say it, and I'm glad you did.

[quinara]

Now, someone point me to some "how could you write that?!" OTPp penguin fic! Hee! >:)

... I can't get the penguin kink!fic I outlined to somebody (gillo?) out of my head, where it's exhibitionist post-slaughter debauched underwater sex (and possibly bizarre avian buggery...). But I refuse to write kinky porn with penguins. I'm not going to be that person!!

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Hrmpfh! I have on good authority that you've thought about and seriously considered writing emo emu pr0n, so I can't take your stance on 'bizarre avian buggery' seriously. You're just anti-penguin. What? Because they aren't tall and fluffy?! Penguins are fluffy as babies (not that I'm implying that I want underage penguin sexxing.) So, really, you have no moral leg to stand on. They're both flightless birds. So there! Besides, penguins are notoriously devoted OTPers, unlike whorish emus! :P

[words-by-ash.livejournal.com]

If this is a response to what I think it's a response to then I have to say that shippers who are constantly at war will see issues with everything regardless of whether it is actually offensive.

That post did not say that "thou shalt not write X+Y fic (or X+X or Y+Y) because I don't like it" or that "you are only permitted to write X+Y fic (or X+X or Y+Y) under a certain conditions that I specify as acceptable".

The post simply states the opinion of the Journal owner towards S3 Spuffy from a canon standpoint and why it doesn't work for her. The last sentence even asks for opinions on this matter from all shippers about this topic.

In case you were wondering, I do agree with the post from a canon stance but I agree with your view on fan fiction. It's open to anyone's imagination. That's why it's there.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Admittedly, I'm not delving into the guts of the current kerfuffle because the concept of it bores me to tears. This little shipwar and all the kerfuffles surrounding it in all its weird and wonderful permutations have been been going on for a nearly decade now. If agreement hasn't been reached, it's never going to be reached... leaving the only question being whether opposing factions can at least manage a tolerant co-existence. (And if not, are we twelve?)

However, the thought of posting requests/requirments that someone justify their ship or their fanfic subjects just makes me roll my eyes. It comes with implied blinders. One usually only demands that someone defend something if the person requiring this starts with a negative assumption that someone should have to play defense. Included in this position is almost always the correllating assumption that they (the person demanding the defense) considers themselves as having moral high ground/authority to arbitrate such a question. That's one heck of a lot of assuming going on. And you know what they say about assume...

Anyway, specifically, it's never crossed my mind to write Season 3 Spuffy. I wouldn't know where to begin or how to make it work for me. Out of personal preference, I tend to stay close to canon (or at least my subjective view of canon) and it would take a great deal of canon wrangling to make such a thing work for me. However, not everyone feels that way. And there is no reason why anyone should have to. Fanfic functions for them too. (Although, I will say that the whole kerfuffle actually caused me to wonder how I could make the thing work for me. And if it weren't for sheer laziness on my part, I might actually try. And then post it. And defend it if I had to.)

In the end, if we're talking about a general fandom comm or one that presents itself as a general fandom comm, then, quite frankly, I don't get where this even starts. In fanfic there is room for all. It's not a limited creative space where only a pre-determined number of possibilities exist in the belief that there is only finite space to hold them. There's always room for more. If a fic that doesn't appeal to one person's taste, no one is required to click on the link. It doesn't take a whole lot of effort to scroll right by.

Anyway, it seems terribly presumptuous to me for someone to imply that certain groups need to justify their ships and their fanfic subject matter to other shipping fanficcers. If we can't live and let live... well, I think that's somewhat ridiculous because it's fanfic for goodness sakes! Fics-I-don't-agree-with comprise most of all fanfic in most all fandoms, because it's a very narrow niche-serving phenomenon. It's predicated on story/ship itches, not mass marketability. And if someone wants to limit ship participation then I think a ship specific comm is a way to go. However, if it's purportedly a general comm then --> general.

If it's something I don't like/understand/enjoy, I won't read it. And I'll do so without requiring anyone else justify themselves. It's not like said justification would meet my preferences anyway. I'm starting with a whole set of pre-determined opinions and preferences of my own. The two things may not be mixy. That doesn't, however, mean that what doesn't suit me doesn't suit someone else. And more power to them.

(And since I've had no contact with the original poster that inspired the current, wider contretemps, none of this is individual specific)

[words-by-ash.livejournal.com]

But the point of my post was that there was no "kerfuffle". It was simply a person stating their opinion on a subject. Are we not all allowed to do this? I've read the post several times (especially after reading your response) and there is no asking others to defend anything. Just a sentence that asks for opinions on the subject.

Your opinion is that this is fan fiction and everyone should be allowed to write whatever they want. I agree. But I also defend the right to disagree with types of fan fiction that are not my cup of tea (for whatever reason). Whether it be too campy, too much angst, too much porn, too ridiculous to comprehend, too boring to exist, too sexiest, etc. Freedom of speech goes both ways as long as there is no coercion to follow a specific belief.

I do not feel that the original post did this (intentionally or unintentionally) at all and that is my major problem with your post(s). It seems as if you see this situation as an attack on the freedom of fan fiction when it's simply nothing more than one persons preference.

The preference isn't even about the ship but the time frame of the ship in fan fiction. I'm still not understanding what the big deal is here, but I'm not apart of shipper wars. So maybe I'm missing the subliminal charge for war that the original post made.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

You're really going to make slog through posts to hunt it up again and parse it rather than make assumptions based on the bits of kerfuff that have popped up in my f-list?

Not an unusual request, but geez, I don't wanna! :)

Which, btw, isn't unlike the originating post (or at least what I believe is the originating post. Given fandom's domino effect, who knows. That's why my post wasn't calling out any one person. A kerfuffle isn't one post. However, a bunch of posts referencing a post/subsequent threads/replies/reactions? Once the dominoes start falling... Well, sometimes the domino effect takes on qualities resembling kerfuffle).

At any rate, the original post (I think) begins with a statement of being 'horrified' by fics in what (I think) is a general fandom community, fics that the poster states the they have not read. Therefore, the 'visceral' 'horror' can only stem from subject matter/ship.

This is then followed by a list of 'someone explain this to me!' questions based on assumptions about unread fic, asking how could anyone create a viable fic on that subject while stating that such a fic must 'ruin' Buffy (while also coming up with a similar scenario with Angelus that apparently didn't 'ruin' Buffy. That ship treatment of the same subject matter was acceptable while an unread fic of a different ship that --for all that the poster knows since they haven't read the fics nor a significant sampling of the genre -- might follow a similar path. It's... all in the subject heading?) I can see why this caught the attention of a few people who felt this placed them on the defensive. [And don't take this as stipulation that the poster should have to read the fics. I don't... but I also don't write wide ranging assumptions about the fics or their writers motivations.]

Whether it be too campy, too much angst, too much porn, too ridiculous to comprehend, too boring to exist, too sexiest, etc

Except the person never read the fics. It's the existence of the fic in general, a judgment of any story said fics might contain regardless of execution.

Look, I have no issue with being puzzled by how Season 3 Spuffy would come to pass or how it would work. I'm in that boat myself. I honestly don't know. It would take a lot for such a fic suit my tastes. It isn't a fic type that I actively seek. However, I can't a) tell whether or not this is the case based on nothing but title and heading. And b)don't require that fics that I don't read suit my tastes. I have no comment on the quality or direction taken within the fics. I have not read them. I simply am not going to pre-judge them without having read them or make assumptions about why they were written (especially when said assumptions can easily be taken as insulting the writers).

I'm certainly not horrified by the existence of fics I don't read nor am I surprised when they appear in a general comm. I also don't assume that I know/understand what inspired the existence of fic I haven't read by commenting that it must be cheek bones or woobification (a reference that really can't be used in any way but the ironic or the derogatory, and I'm pretty sure the use in this case is closer to the latter.) That isn't a critique. That's not "too campy", "too much angst". It hasn't been read. It's a summary judgment based on ship and open-ended questions that pretty much boil down to "explain [this thing that I'm horrified by and which I've made many leading assumptions about] to me" i.e. 'defend this ship.' I'm not sure how anyone successfuly does that, but I'm not shocked that there are people who felt defensive enough to comment about it... which caught my attention, which led me to write a very generalized, non-person non-ship specific stance about the way that fanficcers placing other fanficcers on the defenseive strikes me as pointless.

[words-by-ash.livejournal.com]

I'm not going to make you :)

The original post stated that she didn't read the fics that had been posted over at fantas magoria not that she hasn't read S3 SB fics at all. And the next sentence even stated that the fics in question could be brilliant.

I think we're just going to have to agree to disagree on this :)

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Which is fine. :)

I'm just not entirely certain of the original poster's consistency on this issue. Just days after being 'horrified' with Buffy/Spike fanfic because Spike killed the magic shop owner the same poster squees over sonic-boom B/A sex just after Angel ordered the muder of several hundred slayers. Seems a bit inconsistent, y'know?

::shrug::

Live and let live.

[words-by-ash.livejournal.com]

That may be so but I only have an issue with the reaction to the original post. Defending the post is one thing, defending a person that I don't personally know is another.

I agree *nods*

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

That's fair.

Though I keep forgetting to comment on the icon. I loved Michael and Maria back in the day. Even wrote a couple of M&M fanfics. :)

[words-by-ash.livejournal.com]

Weren't they something? The best part of Roswell for me.

Where'd you house your fics? I might have read them.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

They've probably been eaten by time. But once upon a time they were on Crashdown under my old screen name. I have to confess I don't even remember the titles. :)

[cindergal.livejournal.com]

Seriously, how are we still talking about this? I'm all for fic crit, but it's the morally superior attitude that bugs me. And also the fact that no one on the "it's just wrong" side even read the fics in question.

[electricalgwen.livejournal.com]

Not everyone likes what I like or vice versa. No one need explain themselves to me.

YES.

The existence and acceptance of slash was this huge validation to me, when I found it on LJ; obviously it doesn't float everyone's boat but the fact that there was this space where those of us who do like it could share and enjoy it was surprising and wonderful to me. I'm fine with people not liking slash, or Spuffy, or Spike/Faith, or insert-your-wtf-pairing-here, but please let me sit over in my corner and enjoy it, yes? I will simply fail to click on links for Angel/Connor, D/s, watersports, whatever, and we can all get along.

I can see someone objecting to a fic in which two characters who don't make particular sense are thrown together and simply get it on with no logical reason to (I never watched X-Files but Krycek/Mulder seems like that would be one such pairing, from what you're saying), on the grounds of bad/lazy writing. I kind of *like* stories that manage to show me why/how a particular crack pairing *could* work - it's a challenge. (I once got assigned Gunn/Andrew for an exchange. Uh.) But hey, some people just like the visuals and PWP is fine - and again, I don't have to read that fic and there's not much point in my being offended by its very existence. The entire concept of shipping wars has never made much sense to me.

Hee, too funny re: Mitchell/Annie. I've only seen up to 1.4 but so far the show seems to be shipping them for me! *g*

[goodbyebird]

I completely agree. Standing up and condemning those that dare ship something different than you is brattish, entitled behavior of the fun-sucking kind. How anyone fails to see how hypocritical it is just baffles me.

[quinara]

Now, someone point me to some "how could you write that?!" OTPp penguin fic! Hee! >:)

I had to come back to this, because funnily enough...