fanatical fandom

by

Condescending Is As Condescending Does

Today I want to talk about a topic that gets me angrier than your grandmother when the mailman is running late: gatekeeping hobbies. I know I’ve talked about this before, but gatekeepers annoy the hell out of me, and since I was thinking about it, I thought you should too. This is kind of a long one, so strap in.

If you’re not familiar with the term, let’s get nerdy for a minute. “Gatekeeping refers to the act of setting arbitrary rules or standards around a particular activity or interest and then using those rules to exclude others who don’t meet those standards.” And boy, do some people take it seriously. These folks are the kids who became hall monitors – back in the day when hall monitors were a thing in school – and fell in love with the power. They were so taken with their own righteousness that they were giving out demerits willy-nilly and burning bridges at the same time.

Back then you couldn’t go to the bathroom without a note. Now, you can’t like something or do something as a hobby, until you prove yourself somehow worthy.

You’re not a “real” fan of a particular band unless you know every single song on every single album. The ones who sneer at your attempts to learn a new skill because you’re not a “natural.” The ones who insist that the only way to enjoy a particular hobby is to spend a not-so-small fortune on equipment or materials. You know, rich assholes.

This isn’t just annoying.

When people start gatekeeping hobbies, they’re not just saying that certain people aren’t welcome. They’re saying that certain people aren’t good enough. They’re reinforcing the idea that there are “right” and “wrong” ways to enjoy things, and that if you don’t do it their way, you’re doing it wrong.

But here’s the thing: there is no “right” way to enjoy a hobby. What if my hobby is to watch seasons of Friends out of order from the last season to the first. Are there rules? Is it allowed? Do I give a shit what your opinion is? No. Yes. No. Those are my answers.

“You can’t watch the show like that.” Why? Will the universe collapse on itself? If so, I think we need to ask ourselves, do we care? I mean, have you seen the state of the world today? I digress. But the truth of it is, I have done this, and we’re all still here. So there’s that.

Side note: Oddly enough watching the show backwards, the cast somehow goes from young looking to old looking. Figure that one out.

Another example. Twitter adults (yes, adults) were roasting the young people who had just discovered Metallica through the show Stranger Things. Now personally, if you’re gonna roast anyone, it should be the adults who never introduced their kids to Metallica in the first place. The very same adults who are now on Twitter gatekeeping Metallica’s music. Kudos to Metallica for jumping in and shutting that shit down.

from Metallica’s official Twitter account

Sadly, gatekeeping is not alone… it has an even more self-righteous little cousin – what I call Virtuous Judging. And this is what got me started on this rant today.

random meme that found its way onto my social media feed

Are you judging someone in what you think is a positive way? Yeah, that’s still judging, people! Plus, it’s not positive – it’s condescending, even if you’re not saying it out loud. I get that you might have good intentions, but how about you go about your day without always thinking about what other people are doing. Condescending thoughts are still condescending because they give you the illusion that your opinion should matter to the people you’re judging.

The person who wrote this meme is probably patting themselves on the back for having such altruistic thoughts, but why do they even care why anyone’s at the gym? No one cares what you think. People are just trying to live their lives in relative peace. Their existence doesn’t need to be judged by you. They don’t require your validation. Mind your business. Leave. People. Alone.

Whether you’re judging and gatekeeping someone out loud or just in your mind, stop. I mean, it’s easy enough. Just don’t do that.

We need to just do ourselves and not in a “that’s what she said” way. If we worry about ourselves, and everyone does the same, then we’d all be responsible for ourselves and it would be so much easier to take care of ourselves with no judgment, even from ourselves.

And if you were playing a drinking game and every time I wrote “ourselves” you took a shot, you need to give your keys to someone now. Maybe go lay down.

by

Don’t be a Gatekeeper

Perhaps I’m wrong (no surprise there), but I seem to remember a time when liking things and having hobbies wasn’t something that needed rules. You could casually talk about a TV show at work with your colleagues, you could go to see a band play live without knowing their entire catalog of songs inside and out, or you could watch football without some jerk telling you you’re not a real fan because you don’t know the personal history of every player from the last three decades.

I’ve talked about this before in more depth, but I’m bringing it up again because it sure seems like gatekeeping other people’s fun is gaining more and more steam in society today. Worse than grammar police, gatekeepers take it upon themselves to protect and guard every single hobby, fandom, or interest that anyone anywhere might enjoy by making it clear that you are not a real fan and even if you were, you’ll never know as much about it as they do. Essentially, they’re the gatekeepers of fun. They might as well walk around with a loudspeaker and shout “Stand clear! Casual enjoyment is NOT tolerated here.” It would certainly help people know who they’re dealing with and I, for one, would be thrilled if those red flags flew high. You know, for visibility. 

Some people have an uncontrollable need to make absolutely everything into some sort of competition. Everything you can do, they can do better. Gatekeeping joy is no different.  I’ve thought about why some folks do this, and it really seems like it’s a matter of giving their ego a nice, long, painstaking massage. They want to prove that they’re more of a fan than you. A better fan. A bigger fan, if you will. Most important, they’re desperate to prove you’re not a fan at all. Now, why? Just why? Perhaps, they are a little bit insecure about something themselves, so they just want to appear more knowledgeable, even if that knowledge bank is just Witcher lore or thesis-level data on the original Marvel comics vs the MCU. Or maybe, just maybe, they do it for no other reason than they’re a pain in the ass. There’s a lot of that going around.

What would happen, I wonder, if two of these people met each other? What if two gatekeepers engaged in verbal warfare? Would they both stubbornly pretend they knew more than the other? Would one concede defeat and just pretend they didn’t really care? Is that scenario even possible? Or would they create a standoff for the ages, where an unstoppable force meets an immovable object and both of their superiority complexes combine to create an unbearable, condescending atmosphere? Perhaps the world would explode. In an Earth shattering kaboom, as Marvin would say. 

One of the worst places for this isn’t in real life, though; it’s online, specifically on social media apps like Facebook and Twitter. If you tweet a one-off, harmless opinion about how you think Tom Holland is the best Spiderman, your replies will be full of fandom police telling you that you obviously haven’t seen the original movies with Toby Maguire. Don’t even get me started on Andrew Garfield. If you’re bopping along to Fleetwood Mac and tweet, without thinking, that you thought Rumours was a great follow-up album to their debut, well, I’m sorry, but you’re about to meet an unfortunate demise.

“You fool! The original lineup had way more albums before that! And they were better! Blues is better than pop! Look at this idiot trying to talk about something they know nothing about – so cringe!”

Your common interest with these people about something you both enjoy is lost to the wayside in favor of fandom measuring. I guess you should have known better than to express enjoyment, right? On another note, do we still say “cringe?” 

When did liking things become so stressful? There aren’t supposed to be any rules to liking something. Celebrate the commonality instead of trying to make someone feel lesser than. Share the joy instead of stealing it. Stealing someone’s joy doesn’t make you the golden protector of your chosen fandom. It just makes you an asshole.

truer words were never spoken