This Post Brought to You By Procrastination

[alixtii]

I'm so ready for this semester to be over. I just . . . yeah. Over, please. You have no idea how much I want to bang my head against the floor until I am knocked unconscious and they find me passed out in the commuter lounge.

* * *

The "dogpiling" discussions make me laugh. So many interesting and productive conversations as a result of a soi-disant dogpile over whether dogpiles ever result in anything interesting or productive. Erm, case closed?

I mean, really. The Krystalnacht discussion was full of people wondering when it was okay to use historical tragedies and when it wasn't and how we could do it respectfully and whether oversacralizing the Holocaust makes it too easy to believe it can't happen again and there were so many different opinions. I wasn't paying attention to the internets as much during the OSBP because I still had some willpower left then but there were discussions about objectification and enlightenment and good intentions and there were guides how not to objectify and then maybe the guides were objectifying and again, lots of opinions.

So, exactly, where is all this groupthink and quashed dissent that's supposed to be going on? Do people really want to be racist or misogynist or homophobic or anti-Semitic that much?

We're fans. We analyze everything to death; that's what we do. For every two of us there's at least three opinions.

I mean, just looking at a week's worth of metafandom reveals the type of diversity of opinion that I honestly wouldn't know how to find anywhere else. Are people just in a completely different panfandom than I am?

Comments

[ithiliana.livejournal.com]

I read some comments on the post where they talked about how the OP had confused one activity (a newbie on a community making an error and 87 people jumping on hir to say WRONG) which could be called excessive, I think (I've thought as much myself), and the kind of wide ranging discussions that can take place around and about various issues, whether how to write, how to beta, or how to avoid using racism language and be asshats, etc.

When I read the original post, I had a flashback to all the nice girlz/mean girlz debates of a few years ago as well.

But yes, analyze and discuss. Whatelse are we in LJ for (well the smut of course...but even that we analyze and discuss!)

[tacky-tramp.livejournal.com]

Well, remember, Rule One of fandom is Never Make Anyone Feel Bad. Unless, of course, that person feels bad about racism, sexism, homophobia, antisemitism, etc. Then their bad feelings are totally not important.

[http://users.livejournal.com/peasant_/]

Yeh, but bear in mind that for every two people diving into the discussion there are six sitting back and saying the whole thing is ridiculous. Those are the posts and comments that don't get linked on metafandom and all the eager discussers seldom get to see, but believe me there are tons of them out there. On my flist and in RL discussion with other fans I saw far more people saying 'a plague on both their houses' over the OSBP than felt they had to dive in and add to the dogpile for either side. And no, it wasn't a discussion about discussion, it was 'god, they are at it again' and then moving on to something more interesting. That attitude is always going to be the dominant one in fandom whilst these discussions are so unpleasant because most people just don't have the mental energy to waste on something so upsetting. And they really are upsetting, not by virtue of the subject matter - I don't think I've ever seen anything on LJ that upset me in terms of subject matter - but because of the nastiness of the dogpiling. I've been dogpiled on two or three occasions and I know I didn't benefit from the experience, I seriously doubt the dogpilers benefited from the experience, and I also doubt the lurkers benfited. I also know I've never observed a dogpile and felt I learnt anything from it other than sympathy for the pilee and contempt for the pilers. Dogpiling is just bullying as far as I'm concerned - cruel and non-constructive. It's not a coincidence that the people shouting loudest about most of the recent kerfuffles are also some of the most controversial and least liked people in the fandom.

Oh and as for metafandom - that is not a true diversity of opinion. Only left of centre stuff ever seems to get linked there. I can count on the fingers of one hand the right of centre commenters who I've seen get metafandomed. That reflects the political bias of fandom as a whole of course, but the right of centre comments are out there, you just have to know where to look. (Mostly flocked to avoid dogpiles from the lefties, of course.)

Sorry to vent, but the self-rightousness of a lot of what I've seen in fandom makes me sick. However much I may or may not agree with a particular issue, I can't stand dogpiles.

[coffeeandink.livejournal.com]

Metafandom will link any open post whose URL you contribute and which falls under their fannish remit. They will not link flocked posts. If you want to see more rightwing posts, submit links. If they are persistently made by particular posters, metafandom admins will add those journals to their watchlists.

[http://users.livejournal.com/peasant_/]

Yes, I know. That wasn't meant as a dig at metafandom itself. metafandom just reflects what is discussed in public, I'm not saying its responsible for the bias, as far as I can tell the bias already exists in fandom and metafandom just reflects it. The trouble is its a vicious circle - right of centre fans only ever see right of centre opinions getting dogpiled on, so not surprisingly they are shy of posting their opinions in public, so everyone thinks that only left of centre opinions are welcome in fandom, so right of centre fans don't post their opinions in public and so on.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

Yeh, but bear in mind that for every two people diving into the discussion there are six sitting back and saying the whole thing is ridiculous.

Out loud or silently?

I need to work on my paper right now, but I think I might take a stab at the rest of this from work today.

[http://users.livejournal.com/peasant_/]

Out loud but briefly, mostly. Though there is the usual slew of 'kerfuffle, what kerfuffle? Thank God I missed it' comments as well.

Please don't let me distract you from work. It's my busy time as well so I have been hanging off replying to your last comment.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

Oh and as for metafandom - that is not a true diversity of opinion.

We seem to be defining "diversity" differently. For me, it is not necessarily that the full spectrum of possible beliefs--for example, that 2+2=5--be represented (and certainly not that they be represented equally), only that a number of starkly differing opinions be. When I look at metafandom, I see that.

[http://users.livejournal.com/peasant_/]

By definition you cannot possibly know what the unstated beliefs might be. I would have thought that you of all people would be concerned that some people are expressing the fact they have a difficulty speaking out in the current climate.

OK, let me try to make this a feminist issue for you. A piece of research mentioned in the Telegraph yesterday showed that women prefer face to face communication because they need the signals of body language and context it provides, whilst men are less reliant on those and thus find both face to face and remote e-mail style communication equally useful. (This work was done by getting single-sex pairs to try to persuade one another of a case for something, so it is directly relevant to a discussion about 'discussing'.) This means that as a man you have an inherent advantage in utilising the prevalent online form of communication and thus it is not surprising that you are comfortable in expressing your views under any circumstances online. Women however, who find the online form of communication harder to use, will be at a greater disadvantage and we perhaps should not be so surprised that those who do not have the advantage of being in the majority opinion in the particular environment they find themselves in feel more than usually intimidated. I would imagine that as a feminist it might behove you to investigate the possibility that a change of culture as regards to 'dogpiling' and the like might facilitate more women to express themselves. Then you can find out if their opinion actually adds up to 5 or if it is in fact a perfectly respectable 4. Your current attitude is coming across as 'I'm alright, Jack, so why should I worry about all these bleating wingers who complain they find it too scary'.

Can you personally do much about it? No, of course not. But you could at least refrain from sneering at the people who are saying they dislike and are disadvantaged by the current situation.

[quillori.livejournal.com]

Given that both cofax7 and coffeeandink felt it a genuine risk that the OP would be attacked and vilified for bringing up that matter in the first place, and given I can think of several people who reluctant to mention race except in flocked posts or even only in person, it doesn't strike me as inconceivable that interesting and productive conversations are being shut down.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

Given that both cofax7 and coffeeandink felt it a genuine risk that the OP would be attacked and vilified for bringing up that matter in the first place

You mean the so-called dogpilers' opinion--the one that supposedly we're all brainwashed to believe and about which dissent is never possible? That in itself shows that one can never predict what people are going to think.

given I can think of several people who reluctant to mention race except in flocked posts or even only in person, it doesn't strike me as inconceivable that interesting and productive conversations are being shut down.

I couldn't--and wouldn't--deny that people think "Is this going to be wanky?" before they post and this influences them; it just seems that there happens to be a healthy dialectic nonetheless. There's always going to be conversations not taking place for one reason or the other, but so many do.

[http://users.livejournal.com/peasant_/]

it just seems that there happens to be a healthy dialectic nonetheless.

No. Sorry, alextii, but I have seen so many people from your side of the debate say things like that and it is just wishful thinking. There are large numbers of people who are too afraid to express their views in public. In the current state of fandom it is virtually impossible to express conservative views on race in public. I have tried and failed too many times to think it is possible any more. Every time I have tried to get into a discussion in public, even in the mildest terms, I have seen one or two people say they agree with me but are afraid to express their opinion in public, then the dogpilers descend and I have to give up again. That is not a healthy dialectic, it is one or two extremist views dominating the whole thing. Just as happened in your own journal a few weeks ago indeed - what started as a normal interesting and fruitful discussion got turned into something I had to abandon because I couldn't cope with the dogpile. There may well be interesting discussions going on within that particular radical subset, but for anyone with opinions outside the radical opinion there is nowhere to discuss race within fandom that I know of except in flocked posts. Look around and you will see people saying this and things like it time and time again.

It drives me mad. I want to discuss these things, I find them interesting and important and I want to understand why people believe the things they do believe, I want to learn more about how folk think it all works and hold up my own beliefs to a critical lens in the process, and fandom with its huge range of opinions and people from all over the world should be a perfect opportunity to do just that, but time and time again the radical dogpile comes charging in and discussion becomes impossible. I'm not a complete coward, I have a reasonable control on my emotions and can withstand a modicum of abuse and pressure, but like everyone I have my limits and the second a discussion stops being useful or enjoyable then these days I give up. If it means the dogpilers get the last word so be it, I'm not so proud that I care. But I do care that I can never discuss things on LJ, because I would love to.

[quillori.livejournal.com]

Has anyone suggested brainwashing is taking place? Or even that dissent is impossible? I thought the issue was merely whether dogpiling is a helpful and desirable way to police fannish standards or something that does more harm than good. I don't think any amount of dogpiling is likely to destroy fandom, or silence all debate or do anything exceptionally bad; I do think that, overall, we would be better off with fewer dogpiles and that some of the proffered defences of dogpiling are rather questionable. That fact that some people are put off posting, that some topics become lightening rods for wank, even when the poster is trying to discuss them seriously, that dogpiles can be indiscriminate and end up attacking people who in retrospect didn't deserve it, these are all examples of the darker side of pile-ups, and they are not mitigated by pointing out that other people are not put off posting or that there are plenty of people who have never been attacked.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

Has anyone suggested brainwashing is taking place? Or even that dissent is impossible?

I feel like it, yes. This, admittedly, is one way that misunderstandings can occur when panfandom meta discussions take place--people end up judged by their allies' worst arguments. Still, I tend to think light is generated as well as heat.

[quillori.livejournal.com]

It's definitely a real risk, and once misunderstandings start, they general snowball. You respond quite reasonably to a stupid argument, I assume it's a response to a sensible argument and that you think attacking an overly dramatic straw man is a good debating tactic, and right there is the potential for a nasty fight when it's quite possible we are pretty much in agreement, or at any rate the area of disagreement is pretty small.