Fandom as a female space

[alias_sqbr]

So there's a been a lot of discussion on metafandom about fanfic-fandom as a female space, both wrt OTW and (looking back) in general.

This has bugged me a bit, especially when I've seen some of the practical implications. Nothing I have to say here is all that new or exciting, I just feel better getting it out.

Now with respect to OTW my main problem is that they claim to be speaking for all creators of "transformative works", many of which (like machina, parody etc) do not come from "primarily female communities". But I'm assuming this contradiction will be ironed out one way or another in time (I asked on their feedback page, so we'll see) and don't feel too comfortable giving them crap about their policies until I'm sure of what their policies are.

(EDIT: I am so totally not accusing OTW of the stuff I'm complaining about below, it's just that discussions about OTW stirred up general-fandomy-people's nasty opinions.)

Unlike a lot of people, I have absolutely no problem with fanfic-fandom being a feminist space, or a safe space for women (I only wish it were true of sff fandom). And the fact that most fanfic is written by women is a basic fact that's silly to deny. Men who come in going "But..you guys should stop talking about kissing and start doing more explosions!" are being equivalent to a tourist complaining about those silly chinese people putting soy sauce on their pasta instead of bolognaise(*).

My problem is when fanfic-fandom is treated as equivalent to "women's spaces" like the women's room at uni. (EDIT: this isn't quite what people are doing, certainly noone says men aren't allowed. Here's the best essay I could find on the subject after a brief search, and here's the same basic idea expressed in a much dodgier way)

Unlike deliberately female spaces, fandom isn't defined as being female, it's just the
collection of everyone who likes fanfic etc. As it happens it has ended up mostly female for historical etc reasons, but that's different from a social group which was deliberately and explicitly created to cater to one group. There are plenty of all-gender social events for non-female people to go to, but if a man likes fanfic then it's not like can just go to the "mens fanfic club" and discuss it there, this is all there is.

I'm trying to think of examples...the best I can think of is that childrearing used to be "women's work" and is still pretty much done just by women. This has led to single fathers being excluded from parenting rooms and parenting groups which just assume that everyone who wants to use them is female.

Similarly, gay men and trans or genderqueer people are often excluded from fandom-y things along with the straight cisgendered men, with the argument that fandom is a women's space and they are not women, so they should shut up. I've seen it happen a bunch of time, and I don't like it.

On the whole, it seems to me that the not-women(**) in "female spaces" are more likely to be the sort to buck traditional gender roles and so be already marginalised in the wider society. Defining these spaces so rigidly that these not-women are excluded or marginalised here is beyond just defending ourselves from the patriarchy, it's perpetuating the patriarchy in it's oppression of a different group.

(*)And from the sound of things, a lot of male academics in this area are like italian chefs going on about how Marco Polo invented pasta, and who only reference the chinese at all to smirk about how they have no idea how to cook pasta sauce. To extend this metaphor past breaking: at the same time, that doesn't change the fact that spaghetti bolognaise is delicious, and not everyone who likes it hates China (or soy sauce) *is now hungry*
(**)And self identified women who don't fit the everyone's definition of "woman", like transwomen.

Note: I have a new policy of cutting down my internet time quite dramatically, so this was written on the fly. Sorry if it's all crap! EDIT: Haha, and now I've been metafandomed. Hi guys, I appreciate the comments but may be slow to reply :)

Comments

[penchaft.livejournal.com]

THEN WHY ARE THERE NO LESBIANS IN FANDOM

[strangedave.livejournal.com]

My lesbian housemate with the towering slash collection is obviously imaginary.

[penchaft.livejournal.com]

God, next you'll be saying that you know a girl who plays MMOs. Check your pills, man.

[strangedave.livejournal.com]

I asked the same thing of Cathy about OTW. There are so many areas that are equally transformative works, some of which have even worse copyright issues, that they have more or less ignored for now, and even somewhat biased themselves against by choosing to define themselves as a fancentric and feminist focussed organisation - mash-up DJing is another example.

As far as fanfic fandom being a womens space, angriest has already noted that this isn't even that true for all fandoms, Dr Who fandom historically featuring many gay men, for example. I agree with your viewpoint - men acting as if its male space are being obnoxious, and its only polite to acknowledge the nature and values of the community you enter, which happens to include it being mostly female and feminist. But that shouldn't be exclude anyone for who they are (though it may occasionally exclude people for the way they act - as all communities ultimately do).

[alias_sqbr]

Mmm, exactly. I got all excited to start with about the idea of an organisation that really was for all transformative works, but have since pretty much resigned myself to them being a things-fanficcers-like organisation with a fancy name :/ (This irks me somewhat as someone who does not-fanfic transformative works like skeletor_hordak)

What did she say when you asked her? I thought about commenting on one of her OTW-squee posts but it would have been horribly off-topic and kind of rude. I've gotten into a few discussions about it on general meta but not with anyone who really knows anything concrete, and have pretty much decided to just try to ignore the bazillion OTW metafandom posts from now on.

[penchaft.livejournal.com]

And hell, it's pretty much LJ only-fanficcers. (Or it was when there was the big ruckus on the f_w comms.)

[alias_sqbr]

Mm, oh yes, all that too. But that can theoretically be blamed on the sorts of hiccups that happen at the beginning of any organisation, they at least have made some attempt to appear inclusive in that respect, even if they actually aren't (I'm only in lj-fandom myself, so can't say :))

one

[cupidsbow.livejournal.com]

I don't remember what I specifically replied to Dave when he asked me. My opinions may even have shifted somewhat since then, as I am reading the questions raised, the criticisms and discussions, and thinking about them.

I do have responses to a few of your specific points; I can tell you where I'm coming from with regards the OTW, but keep in mind that the Organisation is bigger than the sum of its parts.

--First up, the OTW does not "claim to be speaking for all creators of 'transformative works'".
That would be an impossible task just on the face of it, as fandom is not a cohesive unit; but also, not all transformative works are fannish. For instance, pro-writers have used similar sources and techniques, and so have "fans" of things outside of what is commonly understood to be fandom in this context of "media/sf/rpf" (and how I wish we had a better name for this part of fandom, which is narrow enough to distinguish fans of transformative works from the broader fandom of convention-goers and so on, but still wide enough to allow people clearly working within this context to feel included). For example, I went to Keating the other night, and it has a lot in common with RPF, but clearly is not arising from the same tradition, and its writers would not fall under the charter of the OTW (for that work anyway, perhaps they are closet slashers :).

What the OTW is attempting to do -- our mission -- is to serve fans of these kinds of transformative fan works, if they wish to use our services. "By fans for fans," that's the motto.

--Regarding this idea of primarily female space: no one at OTW, as far as I'm aware, has ever said that non-female fans have no value or are unwelcome to participate in the Organisation. In my opinion, it is possible for the OTW to value the historical roots of the fanfic/vidding/fan-art/meta part of fandom we're discussing, which as you say, is and continues to be primarily, but not exclusively, female, while also valuing other creators of transformative works. They aren't mutually exclusive ideas -- we can value both. We may well make another change to the wording of this aspect of our Values statement -- it's something we are still actively considering and fine-tuning.

There are several reasons the OTW makes a positive statement about valuing the predominantly female nature of this part of fandom, among them: this aspect of our history has been a big influence on our fannish traditions and values, and hence the values of the Organisation; female-centred arts communities are still unusual in the wider culture, so it is worthy of notice; and leaving it out is a kind of silencing of a central part of how we came to be.

two

[cupidsbow.livejournal.com]

--As for this idea that the OTW may not cover every conceivable type of transformative fan worker, I would hope that the Org is flexible enough to consider each request for help on its merits, and without favouritism or consideration of whether that person is a "voting member". That is certainly the goal I'm working towards.

That said, there's no reason the OTW should be the only fanservice organisation of this kind, and I do think it's a little unreasonable that some detractors seem to want it to be. There is plenty of space for another organisation of a similar nature but with a different focus, or even several such organisations. To make a comparison to a local example: there is no reason there cannot be a WASFF equivalent in every state of Australia; but it is not WASFF's job to create such groups, or to fill the lack.

The OTW is a little like an online WASFF, albeit with a larger mission and greater number of fans who may potentially choose to use our services; and I'm sure OTW will get just as much flack as WASFF ever has -- and it should! These kinds of fannish organisations should listen and be responsive to the needs of their community, and should be accountable to the community being served. Non-profits are somewhat unwieldy structures in this regard, as they do have a tendency to react slowly; however, the offset is that they last and last, so there is time to get it right as long as there are willing volunteers to do the work.

To continue the comparison: when I look at the impact of WASFF, I see that WA's convention scene is very healthy and vibrant, and I think that is in part thanks to the umbrella WASFF offers. OTW will have many similar strengths and weaknesses; what I hope and am working towards is that the strengths will far outweigh the weaknesses. Other members of the OTW will have slightly different priorities and dreams, and I hope that all of those different voices mean that the Organisation will work towards other equally worthy goals as well, and remain focused on fan service and helping as many people as we can.

Replying to both at once

[alias_sqbr]

Ah...good point about you guys not referring to professional transformative works, just fannish ones. The word "fan" appears enough times on the site that I can't claim this as anything but me being dumb :)

And I actually don't really have a problem with the "primarily female space" thing if you're just talking about the fanfic/vidding/fan-art/meta part of fandom, for all the reasons you state.

BUT...what about the other parts of fandom, that are both fannish and not primarily female? Or, for that matter, any that are both fannish and primarily female but are not connected to the whole fanfic subculture?(*) Are they not really OTWs area but you might represent/study them if it comes up? If so I think it should be made clear. Or do you see them as merely off-shoots of the female bits of fandom? Because I don't agree, and even if this were so you're still going to alienate and confuse less historically minded creators of machina etc.

I'm not worried that men are being excluded, I'm worried that everyone from these other fandoms is being excluded by an organisation that on the surface seems to include them. I mean I don't think it's a huge deal if it gets made less ambiguous once you guys have more time to work on your wording, which is why it's not the focus of my rant. But every time I've seen a "OTW is for all of us!" post I find myself thinking "Yes but are they for me(**)?".

And I realise OTW can't cover everything, I'd just feel happier if I knew what was and wasn't covered. To use your example, the "WA" in "WASFF" lets people from Victoria know it's not really for them, if they called themselves "The Science Fiction Association" and you had to dig to find out that they only covered WA, well...that would be less good.

Anyway, whoever you do and don't represent I still think the OTW is a good and necessary thing on the whole. I really don't understand the people bagging on the archive: it's free open source software! Designed especially for fanfic! How is that not a good thing? (I mean I'll understand once it comes out if they have specific holes to pick, but I can't see anything wrong with that in principle :))

NB: I am now at home with crappy aircon which is making me much grumpier than I was when replying to everyone else, sorry if this is curt!

(*)I don't really know of any, to be honest, but they could be out there somewhere :)
(**)As a creator of parody comics and Neverwinter nights modules etc, not just as the creator of more obviously acceptable fanart

Re: Replying to both at once

[cupidsbow.livejournal.com]

You don't at all come across as curt, just interested.

It seems the main contention you have is this: "And I realise OTW can't cover everything, I'd just feel happier if I knew what was and wasn't covered."

So would I... except I do worry that if the OTW makes that kind of statement too early it will exclude fans unnecessarily, and that is the last thing the Organisation wants to do.

I understand why fandom wants the OTW to pin down exactly what will and won't be covered -- so that people can decide if they are included or not, and hold us to our word. Both reasonable things, especially in the face of corporate entities who are renowned for their weasel-word ways.

The problem the OTW faces is that we won't know what will fall under the Organisation's umbrella when it comes to the transformative works on the fringe of our charter until several things have happened, such as: the formation of our Terms of Service, which will be done in consultation with the community, as we plan to open the drafts for public comment; a real fan comes to us for help with an actual borderline case; and we have a better idea of what our yearly budget will be.

For instance, despite all our plans, it may turn out that we will flat-out not be able to afford to offer more than a referral to another body, such as the EFF, when it comes to legal matters.

The biggest problem, though, is that the "transformative works" part of fandom is hard to pin down and define. Believe me, we have been trying.

By their very nature, transformative fanworks tend to break boundaries and celebrate differences. The OTW values that -- it's certainly one of the things I love best about fanfic -- but how on earth does the OTW describe the breadth of fanworks of this nature, let alone weigh in on what "counts" and what doesn't? And how does the OTW do so, while still making it clear that it's not here to offer services to pro-writers, or other parts of fandom that already have infrastructure (like conventions, which often have WASFFs or whatever), or fans who may be creating art, but not art that is playing with works in active copyright/trademark (or libel/slander in the case of RPF), and so on?

Wherever the OTW draws the line (a metaphor problematic in itself, as fandom seems more like overlapping circles in a venn diagram to me, with the same fan often being both a transformative worker and, say, a convention fan), there will undoubtedly be a fan who is creating something that exists outside of the "line" and yet is still creating the kind of thing the OTW wants to welcome into the Archive.

For all of these reasons, the definition of the OTW's mission is something that will undoubtedly be reconsidered regularly throughout the lifetime of the Organisation, no matter how long that ends up being. But I don't think there will ever be a simple answer to your question, just due to the nature of fandom and fanworks.

Of course, if you have ideas about how this dilemma can be resolved, please do contact the Community Relations committee and let them know you want to get involved. That's the beauty of this kind of Organisation -- everyone working for the OTW is a fan, and has the same kinds of concerns you do. The Content Committee isn't something I'm actively involved with at the moment, but I know they have looked for volunteers from time to time to help with the ToS, so there may well be a way you can get more actively involved.

Or, if you don't have time to get involved, you could still offer your own suggestions. Email them to Community Relations (comrel@transformativeworks.org), or talk to me about them next time we meet and I can pass them on.

Re: one

[dr-jekyl.livejournal.com]

Chiming in late here. And I feel as though I'm repeating some of what's been said but...

Part of what is causing all the fuss is that, as you say, you are trying to cover as much as possible. But at the same time, it's sounding like your vested interests are in just a few places, and those places are the areas of fandom that are female-dominated. You're saying, point blank in OTW's values statement, that fandom's identity is valuable because it is not male, or queer, or anything . And that is exclusionary.

Now, I know that it's not be meant to taken that way, but it can very easily be read that way. And I honestly don't think you can say that you value IDIC if you're also stating a preference for the values and history of one group before all others.

Would someone who is a member of a fandom that is not and never has been traditionally female, read that values statement and then feel comfortable approaching OTW for help? Would they feel confidant that, all other things considered, that they'd get the same treatment as someone in a female dominated fandom? If money is tight, who gets first dibs?

That's the litmus test. I think the language of that one statement needs to be changed so that it would pass the test 99% of the time. We can still honour that fact that great swathes of fandom are female and that this is awesome and unusual, but as an organisation trying to work for as many fans as possible, you also need to assign positive value to the spaces that aren't female.

Re: one

[cupidsbow.livejournal.com]

We can still honour that fact that great swathes of fandom are female and that this is awesome and unusual, but as an organisation trying to work for as many fans as possible, you also need to assign positive value to the spaces that aren't female.

How? That is not meant as a dismissive question: I genuinely would like you to send your suggestions for change to the OTW.

No one person wrote those statements; many people have worked on them, more have critiqued them, and the OTW is still open to changing the wording again (and I hope the Organisation always will be open to such changes, as fandom changes).

However, what we have now is the best wording we can currently think up which fills both our intended mission and is as inclusive as possible given that mission.

If you can think of an alternative wording that does those things better, please send it to Community Relations. It will be read and considered.

Re: one

[boogieshoes.livejournal.com]

i suggested on cesperenza's lj that the words 'history' and 'identity' in Value Stmt #2 change places:

We value our *history* as a female-dominated space, and our *identity* of rich creativity[...].

as a woman, in all the senses that count, i find this so much more inviting than what's on the page now. the main problem i have with what's there now is that 1) i really *don't* value fandom as a female dominated space - i'd be doing this if there were no girls here tomorrow, and i'd be happy and 2) frankly, *i'd* rather be valued for *what i contribute* than for a genetic quirk i can't actually control. i didn't have a choice in being born female, and i don't contribute to being female, and therefore, having value as a female is kinda useless. it's *far* more flattering and appropriate to have value *as a contributor*.

perhaps the most ironic thing about the paragraph above is that yes, i'm fully cognizant of the fact that the reason i *can* have value as a contributor in most spaces is because feminists have fought for my value as a woman to be the same as the value of a man. it just seems really weird for that intrinsic value to supersede now, especially in an area that's not exactly subject to hiring quotas...

-bs

Re: one

[cupidsbow.livejournal.com]

That was you? Thank you. We are currently considering that change.

Re: one

[boogieshoes.livejournal.com]

thank you :-)

i know wording values stmts and such is hard, but as i've said elsewhere, that's the very reason i think nitpicking it now is important. and this particular section has caused the sort of reaction that indicates it's important enough to be a major factor in OTW's success.

i feel kind of weird pimping my own wording in various lj's, but i've come to the conclusion that this is important enough to fight for. i know OTW wants to be as inclusive as possible, so it's really important to have the right wording - for all of us.

-bs

Re: one

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

Second'ing boogieshoe's suggestion.

Re: one

[dr-jekyl.livejournal.com]

boogieshoes' suggestion isn't a bad one. I'm playing around with the wording myself and, who knows? I might come up with something. If I do, I'll send it in.

The thing I'd suggest straight off the bat, though, is changing the actual hierarchy of values. Move value 5 (IDIC) to position 2, and bump the others down a level. This would mean that your value statements reads as “what we do - who we are – where we come from”. Where we came from is important, yes, but it's not as important as where we are now.

With boogieshoes’ changes, it’d read something like:

1. We value transformative fanworks and the innovative communities from which they have arisen, including media, real person fiction, anime, comics, music and vidding.
2. We value infinite diversity in infinite combinations. We value all fans engaged in transformative work: fans of any race, gender, culture, sexual identity, or ability. We value the unhindered cross-pollination and exchange of fannish ideas and cultures while seeking to avoid the homogenization or centralization of fandom.
3. We value our identity as a diverse community that is rich in creativity and commentary, and honour our history of being a predominantly female space.
4. We value our volunteer-based infrastructure and the fannish gift economy that recognizes and celebrates worth in myriad and diverse activities.
5. We value making fannish activities as accessible as possible to all those who wish to participate.

Re: one

[cupidsbow.livejournal.com]

We have, in fact, already considered the sequencing option you suggest, and decided it didn't work for the reasons I gave in an earlier comment in this thread -- where we came from has so deeply influenced the ideology of the OTW and why it came into being. This heirarchy of values may change in future, as fandom changes and the OTW changes in response. If you would like the idea to be reconsidered before then, please send it through to Community Relations.

The reason OTW has formal channels of communication is so that if something happens to individual members (if I get sick, for instance, or Sophie, who isn't a member, deletes her LJ), your ideas still get through to the right place. So while I do appreciate that you want to discuss this here, this isn't an appropriate venue (sorry, Sophie).

I agree that boogieshoes's suggestion is a good one, and it's currently under consideration.

Re: one

[dr-jekyl.livejournal.com]

The problem then, I guess, is that the OTW board comes from a different place than I do, and I don't really know or understand what that place is. Ah well. I suspect I already knew that.

I will type up my thoughts on the values order, and on the perils of focusing too much on what was instead of what actually is, and send it on, though I would prefer open, rather than closed, discussion with the board on this issue. It's perhaps the most contentious issue to come up so far (now that the bandom stuff has more or less died down, anyway) - perhaps OTW should open an official, public dialogue channel rather than waiting for commentary to come to you.

Re: one

[cupidsbow.livejournal.com]

Thank you for agreeing to put your thoughts together to send along to Community Relations; that will be helpful.

Sorry my last reply was a little abrupt -- I was fitting it in between teaching sessions.

To explain further: my previous comments to alias_sqbr in this thread were largely made up of my own opinions and what I'll be working towards within the OTW as a concerned fan and willing volunteer. You were asking for official word or debate, which isn't appropriate in this forum for the kinds of reasons I mentioned before.

Speaking for myself, I may open up some discussions about upcoming issues in my own LJ, as it would help me to hone my own opinions before they are discussed within the Organisation.

I can also tell you that it is OTW policy to read and consider all suggestions, and changes have been made because of ideas that have been sent to Community Relations or left in otw_news. This will be an ongoing process, but due to the need for checks and balances and given we all have real lives etc, the Organisation will often move at a slower pace than fandom tends to in informal interactions -- especially while the Organisation is still inventing policies and procedures. As these are settled, things should go much faster, especially once the ToS are complete.

OTW should open an official, public dialogue channel rather than waiting for commentary to come to you

Yes, I agree. This kind of outreach will become more common as the Organisation develops. If you look at otw_news, you'll see that we have a chat session scheduled for tomorrow. In that forum, your questions would be appropriate, and an official transcript will be created and posted so that all interested parties can read it.

Re: Replying to both at once

[alias_sqbr]

Ah, see, I had a feeling you hadn’t 100% decided who you represent yet, and that’s fair enough.

But as it stands the website and the statements of people who support it’s language don’t give that impression, it gives the impression that it’s fairly obvious who you do and don’t represent, and there is a definite conflation of “works which are transformative”=”stuff we respect and value”=”fanfic/fanvids etc”. There’s a big difference between “we respect you but you’re not under the umbrella of this organisation” and “what you do doesn’t count”, and until your comment I hadn’t noticed any effort to make the distinction or express even hypothetical interest in other fandoms.

I think you need something on the FAQ/About us page like “We respect the diversity of all transformative works and their associated communities, and feel that they are all worthy of respect and protection. This particular organisation currently has a focus on the (largely female) community surrounding fanfic and fanvids etc (often called “media fandom”), and since we are in our early stages it’s not clear how far beyond that community we will be able to extend out reach. However, we welcome the input of everyone from the wider community of fannish transformative works, and are very interested in forming close relationships with other similar organisations.” Of course one of the reasons I Don’t Do Committees Anymoreis the trouble caused by my preference for unvarnished, pedantic truth versus simple, positive spin, so you might not want to take advice from me…

I like the “female history”, “creative community” change suggested boogieshoes.

I understand that you're just starting and can't be expected to know everything yet. And I understand that you also want to get the word out now, rather than later, so that people join and get involved and help you actually do stuff.

Unfortunately, this has led to an avalanche of unclear and somewhat contradictory information (the “Why I joined OTW” posts for example), which in turns leads to a lot of people asking questions, and there's only a small number of people who aren't sure of the answers yet to answer them. For example, I first asked about this on the official “Ask your questions here” post over two weeks ago, where only one of the seven comments has been responded to. This rather put me off giving further suggestions.

While I do think OTW is worthy and necessary, I don’t see myself getting very involved myself since I’m more interested in conventiony fandom and creating original works, fanfic etc is very much a sideline hobby for me and none of the OTW volunteer stuff I’ve seen has really been my bag. That said, I have been sticking up for you guys when people say blatantly untrue things like “None of them write RPF” or “I doubt any of them have any idea how to make this archive”. It’s been hard not just linking to those board members whose lj-nicks I know and going “See?” :)

As an aside: so you’re definitely not dealing with based-on-out-of-copyright stuff? That seems like a rather arbitrary distinction in all but the legal sense (where it’s perfectly logical) but fair enough.

Re: Replying to both at once

[cupidsbow.livejournal.com]

For example, I first asked about this on the official “Ask your questions here” post over two weeks ago, where only one of the seven comments has been responded to. This rather put me off giving further suggestions.

You questions are being discussed. As I said before, the downside of these kinds of organisations is that they move slowly. I can give a fast answer because it's my opinion, but my voice is only one, and may well be over-ruled.

Can't reply to the rest in detail now, as I'm off to teach again in a moment, but the "not dealing with based-on-out-of-copyright stuff" is not a yes or no answer either. ToS isn't written yet! I imagine it will be welcome into the Archive, but there is unlikely to be a potential legal question to answer for those stories, so it isn't relevant to the legal part of our mission.

Re: Replying to both at once

[cupidsbow.livejournal.com]

Okay, to answer in a little more detail:

until your comment I hadn’t noticed any effort to make the distinction or express even hypothetical interest in other fandoms

Well, I'm discussing the issues as I see them, but those kinds of distinctions may end up being approached differently by the Organisation as a whole. The OTW's focus is on transformative fanworks and practices rather than individual fandoms, in part as there is no way to produce a complete/inclusive list of fandoms that would come under OTW's umbrella. I wasn't actually speaking of "counting" in terms of fandoms in any case, I was speaking in terms or borderline transformativeness of the fanwork (ie. a largely original work which riffs on a fairy tale as a repeated metaphor rather than a major plot point -- does it count as transformative work? Context would be everything in terms of whether it came under the umbrella: is it published by a fan as a fanwork, or for money in an anthology? etc.)

The Vision and Values statements are meant to be the big picture ideas of the OTW, and for that reason much of the detail of how things will work is still in a grey area. The ToS and other policy documents will focus on the nitty gritty, and in the process answer many of these kinds of questions. These documents will also have the most thorough discussion/comment process.

The FAQ is also still being invented, as the Org comes up with answers to newly asked questions -- yours has been passed along (I will check up on it). A new version of the FAQ is already on the drawing board, which will include things like the answers to the "Anti-fanfic Bingo" card.

Re: Replying to both at once

[alias_sqbr]

Yeah, fair enough that you aren't really in a position to answer this stuff definitively, thanks anyway I understand things a lot better now.

Personally I think there needs to be at least a vague "Thanks for your input" response to people's comments, my default assumption when noone responds to my query isn't "Clearly my question was so probing they are all locked in deep thought about it" but "I guess noone read it" or "I guess it was so dumb they didn't bother replying", and this in turn means I almost certainly wouldn't have bothered making any further suggestions.

But I may go write an email to the community relations person now (about that and other things). That said, I really do prefer open, multi-person discussions, email is too formal and I think too slow for real-time chat :) To be honest I can't see how email is preferable to lj comments on a specific "leave your input here" post which (I would assume) is read by the same person. On lj I can point to a comment later on when discussing things with other people and make sure I'm not repeating an earlier, already answered question/suggestion.

I think I was misreading the whole OTW thing: the fact that you're such polished writers and webpage designers etc means that the site etc come across as a lot more final than I get the impression they really are, so it felt like ambiguities etc were signs of a policy I didn't understand and you hadn't explained rather than the fact that you're still figuring things out.

Re: Replying to both at once

[cupidsbow.livejournal.com]

To be honest I can't see how email is preferable to lj comments on a specific "leave your input here" post which (I would assume) is read by the same person. On lj I can point to a comment later on when discussing things with other people and make sure I'm not repeating an earlier, already answered question/suggestion.

Yes, otw_news comments go directly to the Community Relations committee.

The idea of more chat-style discussions, and more general discussion/suggestion threads hosted on otw_news are ideas we're considering -- we're still inventing our outreach too, trying to find a balance between the more formal needs of a non-profit Org, and the free-for-all discussion preferred by fandom. We still have some work ahead of us in getting the balance right, but we intend to keep trying stuff until we find a combination that works.

signs of a policy I didn't understand and you hadn't explained rather than the fact that you're still figuring things out

We opened our metaphorical doors as soon as we could, so that fandom could get directly involved in the creation of the Org. We are not like stereotypical corporations in that regard. We want to serve fandom, and to do that we must be by and for fandom and co-operatively invented by fandom. That's the stage we're in now.

In fact, the website isn't even the final version; it's stage two, and has barely anything on it yet compared to what we have planned. It's practically a shell. So, yeah, the set-up isn't even close to anything like finished, and won't be until the end of the year, I'd guess. And even then, that's just getting the ground floor built; after that, there's a whole heap of other projects that have been suggested.

Speaking just for myself, I expected criticism at this stage. Perhaps not quite so much, and certainly not for some of the reasons given, but certainly that it would come from every quarter. But then, I've heard what people say about WASFF, and I've also seen the good and bad of how that's turned out.

Re: Replying to both at once

[cupidsbow.livejournal.com]

Also, thanks for sticking up for us; I saw one of the comments you made about me being a real person. :)

Re: Replying to both at once

[alias_sqbr]

You're welcome :)

I think people are being way too paranoid about you guys. I mean it's one thing to say you're doing everything wrong (a guaranteed complaint against any organisation doing anything ever) but I don't get the assumptions of malicious intent. Even if I didn't know you personally, everything OTW has done and said seems to me to quite obviously come from a love of fandom. If I didn't think you were interested in doing what's best for fandom I wouldn't bother complaining when I think you're doing it wrong :)

Re: Replying to both at once

[cupidsbow.livejournal.com]

The OTW sees most of the criticism as a good thing for exactly that reason; we want people to engage and help, and a lot of the critique so far *has* been helpful in honing the Org's policies, wording, and general thinking about how to approach things.

I'm not sure where the more vitriolic mistrust is coming from either, but change is scary, so it may in part be motivated by fear, which is understandable enough.

Re: Replying to both at once

[alias_sqbr]

I was pondering, and I think part of it is that unlike most fandom groups you're deliberately not coming across as amateurs, but as a formal, professional organisation (and for very good reasons). I think that set off people's automatic "Evil Corporate Overlords" alarms :)

Also, thanks for responding to my question on otw_news!

[david adam <zanchey> (from livejournal.com)]

Anyone coming in saying "less kissing, more explosions" is an idiot anyway - they should be asking for "less kissing sans explosions". Everyone loves a good pash during a novelty oversize explosion.

[alias_sqbr]

Heh, yes that does have pretty universal appeal :) (and indeed, a fair amount of fanfic has both kissing and explosions, admittedly not always concurrently and the latter is usually a thin pretext for the former)

[penchaft.livejournal.com]

Only if the explosions are happening to the people kissing.

It would be like an STD! You could make a game out of it! *_____*

[greteldragon.livejournal.com]

You have a strange strange mind dear.

[deathwombat.livejournal.com]

Will someone, please, think of the Canon?

Me and "Fandom" don't go too well together. There are a certain series' I cannot not touch with a 10 foot science pole because of the fandom attached to it. It's mostly Anime and Video Games in which the fangirls have turned me away from. It's their overly enthusiastic interactions with series that plays the major part. For example: That one group of girls at Wai-Con who win the cosplay contest EVERY YEAR... Because of them I cannot not play/watch/read Kingdom Hearts, D-Grayman and almost Death Note(Which I decided to read after being given the live action movies). Harry Potter fandom just shits me.

What was the subject again, ah yes. No, I've forgotten again because I just thought what would possibilities of Portal fandom be besides the endless quoting of "The Cake is a Lie", like what would female Portal fanfiction be like, because all male outlets of fandom seem to be parody comics these days.

[ataxi.livejournal.com]

It's just fallacious reasoning.

Being mostly female is an emergent, not an essential, characteristic of fanfic-dom. Demographics don't provide a basis for argument here - just imagine any man trying to delineate any historically male-dominated "space" - politics, say, or board memberships - as being for men only.

This is not to quibble with communities policing themselves and making their own standards. But turning "the way it's always been" into "the rules we must enforce" should usually carry a heavier burden of justification, I would've thought.

[alias_sqbr]

I didn't express the concept well enough (I've edited the post somewhat, will try again in the morning when my brain is less dead): noone says men aren't allowed, but they're often treated as visiting "our" space. This post was inspired by this conversation, for example, and the line "being a dude in fandom is kind of like being a straight ally at a queer social event".

[ataxi.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I (thought I) got the point. I wasn't talking about banning or anything.

The straight ally analogy seems off the mark to me. Isn't gender rather more intrinsic to sexuality than it is to fanfic writing?

Anyway, I agree that OTW is a poor choice of name, the scope's quite blatantly too broad. And it seems preemptive for that community to formalise its "female space" status instead of just letting it continue of its own accord. I haven't noticed huge numbers of men wanting to inflict themselves on fanfic either as readers or as writers lately? Is that actually a problem in any sense?

[alias_sqbr]

Right, well then you understood me despite what I actually said :)

There actually is a problem with men complaining about fanfic not being aimed at them, though I personally haven't seen it happening TOO often. This essay goes into it pretty well. Unfortunately, it does take a certain amount of deliberate effort to protect enclaves of the internet from the usual grind of racistsexisthomophobicloudmouthtroll.

Something I've seen is gay men complaining that slash is unappealing to them, which is more complicated than straight out sexism in my opinion (I mean, it is about gay men).

But afaict there's more of an issue with journalists, researchers etc ignoring/belittling the female parts of fandom because it's silly icky girly stuff rather than the Serious Important Worldchanging Stuff done in the male parts of fandom, even when the female stuff has been around for twice as long (as with vidding)

[ataxi.livejournal.com]

Hmm. This complexifies.

I noticed the essay you linked to links to this post (http://community.livejournal.com/fanficrants/1313922.html) where some guy complains about the treatment of men in fandom. More accurately, it links to the braindead first response to that post. To be honest, my reaction to the post itself was quite favourable. Or at least, if there are sections of the fanfic community that:

"... will talk and talk about men. And they'll subtlely bash my wonderful gender. They'll say that isn't it wonderful that women can identify with characters regardless of gender and men can't do that."

then I question their purposes. You've got to suspect anyone when they're wandering around normalising the crassest of crass generalisations as hard fact.

Speaking as a guy I think I understand why some men might get upset with the prevailing norms of the fanfic community. After all, everyone's always been fairly accepting of the idea that slash gained popularity because it subverted the gender roles of the transformed works (buff male protagonists become gay, etc. etc.). It confronts the dominant view by flipping the table over. But if you spend your entire time within that confrontative space, it acquires its own offensive normativity which you're then inflicting on others.

And so some gay men object to having sexual acts that, in some sense, "belong" to them cheapened in slash fic in much the same way as I've heard lesbians rant about the wholly inaccurate treatment of lesbian sex in male-oriented porn. And why shouldn't they? It probably is rather offensive to them to have the scope of their sexuality abused by women who feel like blowing off steam about their own, sometimes queer but mostly hetero (sorry for the crass generalisation, but I'm reasonably certain it's accurate), lives, loves and sexuality.

The argument seems to go back to whether anti-discriminatory / liberation movements in general should allow themselves to become a reflection of what they were fighting against. If fanfic is a dialectic antithesis of the thesis presented by mainstream texts, is there enough synthesis going on that actual progress is occurring?

(Well, actually, I'd say there is because we now see the values of fanfic constantly re-reflected in mainstream TV etc., but eh. I'd guess there are some within the fanfic community who are interested in re-contributing their ideas to the mainstream, and others who want it to be, ideologically, an unchanging walled garden.)

Of course, as soon as one leaves the confines of fanfic one is back in the heavily male-dominated wider world. So it isn't reasonable for men within the community to pretend there's no oppressive external context for the playfulness of slash-fic.

I think part of the trouble is that on the internet, everyone's mandatory return across that boundary (fic-space --> "real world") is not apparent. Those encountered within the community of fanfic are generally never encountered outside it, so it's a struggle to contextualise the viewpoints they're bringing to discussion.

I probably shouldn't comment further because I don't really spend time reading fanfic. But if one reappraises polemic like:

"It should not be seen as "anti-male" to admit that I'm mostly writing for other women. And we shouldn't have to keep fighting for the spaces that, I have to say yet again, we made for ourselves."

from the obvious other-perspective of a man, it's quite clear that it can be expected to offend some men to the point of objection, in much the same way as, say, the male-oriented domain of TV sport tends to rile women. And yet, when confronted by women (my mother, maxfenig, random women with whom I've discussed my affection for sport) I don't defend my enjoyment of football on TV by saying "men created this space for ourselves and shouldn't have to fight for it". Usually I say "yeah, it is a shame it's so male-centric, because I don't think I enjoy it just because it's a guy thing, if you know what I mean". To me that particular gender boundary is mostly quite regrettable ...

[alias_sqbr]

I actually have noticed some women in fandom being smug about how men's "transformative works" are, you know, nice and all, but they tend to lack the subversive blah-dee-blah of the stuff women make. Which, while less damaging (and usually less strongly worded) than the equivalent statements from men (there's a lot of odious attitudes towards women writers out there) is also rather sillier, since there's several thousand years of well documented evidence of male creators being able to think to think outside the box.

But, well, people suck. Look at the way sf fans act as if speculative fiction is the only genre to really explore the limits of the human spirit or whatever. It's certainly not an accepted fact that men aren't as good as women at fanfic, just a subtle implication. There's also an implication that people like dr_jekyl and myself are homophobic and sex negative 13 year old boys for preferring G rated fanfic to R rated slash. For all female fanficcers have a point about the toxic, misogynistic atmosphere of male dominated fandom, female dominated fandom has it's own toxicity to those who don't fit the norm. I'm inclined to say it's not as toxic and there's more of a culture of tolerance and diversity, but that may be because I'm a girl :).

I'd go into it further, but I've just been metafandomed. Eep!

[ataxi.livejournal.com]

"men's "transformative works" are, you know, nice and all, but they tend to lack the subversive blah-dee-blah of the stuff women make."

Ecch. That would just be annoying.

"Look at the way sf fans act as if speculative fiction is the only genre to really explore the limits of the human spirit or whatever."

Yeah, the old "literature of ideas" spiel. As if there aren't any ideas anywhere else.

The sum total of it all is "isolate any group of like-minded individuals and before long someone starts talking absolute bunk and most of the people listening quite astonishingly find themselves in agreement". Which is why "spaces" can be a dumb idea.

I don't really like media fandom, though. Or fanfic, or ... so I should really shut up now.

[alias_sqbr]

That's because you're a big smelly man :)

[ataxi.livejournal.com]

Well, to be honest, I do actually tend to like the majority of the fanfic that I read ... which is limited to the output of relatively subtle authors like bantha_fodder, and in her case I only read the works "transformed" from canon in which I have an interest: Narnia, Dune.

I can't verify from recent personal experience that there's a giant ocean of substandard fanfic out there, I can only go from secondary sources on that one!

Life's short, why waste it on trash. Most of the original texts that become focal points of the fanfic community are sub-par anyway. Bad TV and book series. Probably it's partly because the ficcers see those texts as in more urgent need of being rescued by reconstruction, as was the original Trek ... and as wasn't the, y'know, James Joyces and Angela Carters of this world.

[alias_sqbr]

Oh, yes, most fanfic is terrible, but that's because there's no proffesional authors between you and it (and look at how badpublished fiction is). On the plus side, even the really amazing stuff which could be published if it was original is 100% free :)

I pretty much only ever read stuff that has been recced to me or was written by someone I trust to be good (and again, only from canons I know and like, though the sheer weight of Stargate stories overwhelms me from time to time)

But to be honest, from what I know of your taste I can't see you liking much of the really good fanfic either, I mean if Lois McMaster Bujold is too girly and light for you... :)

I can't verify from recent personal experience that there's a giant ocean of substandard fanfic out there, I can only go from secondary sources on that one!

I can link you some if you like :D

[penchaft.livejournal.com]

Oh man, people getting into arguments about whether slash writers fetishise homosexual sex and romance or not is hilarious.

(I like only learning about things when it's through wank!)

here from MF...

[dharma-slut.livejournal.com]

and that conversation brings up one knee-jerk response for me, and this is coming from an old queer, gender-challenged woman;

"oh, poor baby!"

If circumstances force you into an outsider's position, you will have to suck it up. it's a plain fact that you will always be the minority. Whining about it won't change it. Nothing, ever, will change it.

I wonder if falling remember what it was like to be the girl in a predominantly male space?

Re: here from MF...

[alias_sqbr]

Hmm. See, I realise it'd be pretty arrogant of me to be all "I, as a straight cisgendered woman understand the pain of the queer and transgendered way more than you queer and transgendered women!!", and that's an aspect of this which has niggled at me. (especially since the stuff I'm talking about is pretty subtle, and open to interpretation) So, this is just my opinion, I'll understand if you disagree.

And I agree that a lot of the men (queer or otherwise) who complain about fandom "oppressing" them are just having trouble getting used to being in the minority.

But...I still think it's wrong to equate fandom, where women happen to be in the majority, with a social setting which is specifically created as a space for women. The two situations have a number of things in common, but they're not the same.

For example: If a whole bunch of men decided to join the What women want party and policy started shifting towards what men wanted...that would be legitimate reason to complain and try to exclude them or something. Similarly, the mods of the deliberately slash-friendly scans_daily had a right to complain when anti-slash guys started joining and trying to change things.

But if, tommorrow, every gay man in the world suddenly decided that slash sounded like fun and joined fandom, do you think it would be reasonable to exclude them? To complain when the general tone of slash went from "From women by women" to "from men by men"? (this is different from expressing nostalgia for the Old Days or forming "old skool, for women" subsets of fandom, both of which I think would be 100% reasonable) I do think it'd be fair to complain if those gay men then, as a community, started picking on or belittling the sort of slash which started things off, which is why I have no problem with the suggested change of OTWs values to talk about fandom's history as a primarily female space.

Re: here from MF...

[dharma-slut.livejournal.com]

And I agree that a lot of the men (queer or otherwise) who complain about fandom "oppressing" them are just having trouble getting used to being in the minority.

yes, and they are so shocked by it!

But...I still think it's wrong to equate fandom, where women happen to be in the majority, with a social setting which is specifically created as a space for women.

OTW does not, IMO, make that equation. Perhaps a change of phrase would make that better-understood, but it seems to me that many people are intent on hating OTW no matter what they do or say.

I do think it'd be fair to complain if those gay men then, as a community, started picking on or belittling the sort of slash which started things off,

Oh, honey, they would and they do. It's not because they are gay or men, it's tribal behavior....

Re: here from MF...

[alias_sqbr]

OTW does not, IMO, make that equation. Perhaps a change of phrase would make that better-understood, but it seems to me that many people are intent on hating OTW no matter what they do or say.

Oh, no, I didn't mean to imply that OTW were being anti-trans or whatever, just that the discussions about OTW have brought other general fandomy-people's dodgy opinions. I think my post was a bit ambiguous, sorry.

And I agree that people are being disproportionately negative about OTW, I mean I don't like everything about them, but they obviously mean well and are still figuring things out so I think they deserve a lot more benefit of the doubt than they're getting.

[dr-jekyl.livejournal.com]

I have to agree with you. As a ficcer, and one who's witness a number of ham-fisted attempts by TPTB to stop fanworks, I love and support OTW for the archive and history project's sakes. But, at the same time, I have serious reservations about the way they're approaching the gender issue. It doesn't help that the fandom where I'm currently most active - comics - is dominated by men, and that the commentary I read is written by women who are analysing the ways comicdom intentionally and unintentionally excludes women.

In fandoms where women are the majority group, and, indeed, fandom as a whole, I don’t think we should be turning around and doing exactly the sorts of things we’ve been lambasting men in male dominated fandoms (or, for that matter, in larger society) for doing. I can’t even being to imagine the kind of uproar that would occur if, say, Dan Didio (head of DC Comics) said that he valued comic fandom as a predominantly male space, because it would tantamount to him telling all his female readers to take a hike. There seems to be a nasty undercurrent of ‘let’s see how you men like being the minority’ in the OTW support base. It’s hypocritical at best.

I'd be really interested to see where and when most of the board came into fandom, because I think that has a strong bearing on how aware they are of the true gender spectrum of fandom. A couple of them seem to be straight out of Harry Potter, and that's a 99% female fandom. Do we have any trekkies? Any anime-nuts? Much higher female/male ratio in those two. Any vidders? Artists? Modders? Traditionally, you'll find more men producing those sorts of works.

[alias_sqbr]

Mm. It would be great if there was a metafandom type place which covered all such fandomy stuff (or at least the ones I care about :D) but I feel reasonably certain that the different groups would Not Play Nice. *insert the parable of scans_daily*

I think the "Boys are icky, and so is everything they like" attitude comes from a mix of an understandable siege mentality and the general human tendency to demonise the Other. It does make it annoying for girls like us who like "boys stuff" as well as "girls stuff".

That said, we live in a sexist society with a long history of women being marginalised. So a "women's space" really isn't the same as a "men's space", and imo can sometimes be a good thing. I personally think it's great that women can express themselves in fanfic etc in ways they generally can't in the wider world. But that doesn't give us lisence to be prats about it.

I have this metaphor about slashers being like drag queens, but it's probably best left in my head :)

I can't speak for the rest of the board, but have you met Cathy Cupitt? She's quite a local SMOF and a staple at Swancon, so I can't see her being unaware of the male aspects of fandom. But afaict all she writes is slash. Naomi Novik does vids, too, but not AMVs (which are where the men come into it in a big way afaict)

[dr-jekyl.livejournal.com]

I totally hear you on the Not Playing Nice part. It's worse than herding cats.

Which brings me to what, on reflection, I think my fundamental problem with the gendered language is: I don't actually see fandom as a female space. It's far too big and diverse to be laid claim to by any one faction. There are women here. There are men, too. There are also people who identify as neither. We all have space under the fandom umbrella. Sometimes the spaces overlap; sometimes they don't. Basically, I see I see fandom as a neutral space, and also I think any organisation that purports to try to support fandom should try to preserve that neutrality.

I've met Cathy, but only in her capacity as a SMOF. I think I gave her some of my Contreau as a bribe at a fan olympics a couple of swancons ago. I would like to know more about the board's fandom credentials - what their gateway fandom was, what they're currently active in, what do they produce now, what have the produced in the past... Get an idea of where they're actually coming from in relation to my own experiences.

[alias_sqbr]

See, I think parts of fandom can be called a "female space", if only in a descriptive sense. And if you use the word "fandom" to just mean these spaces, and everyone knows that's what you mean, then that's ok (in the same way that people here sometimes use "fandom" to mean "Perth fandom" when it's clear from context). The problem is when it's not clear from context what "fandom" means, which is the case with OTW.

Mm, I understand the "Who are these people?" reaction, I'm lucky in that I know Cathy's lj nick and broad fandom history from cons, and came across an lj-comment where Naomi Novik was "outed" as another very involved fanficcy person (I don't feel comfy revealing this stuff myself since they obviously don't want that done publically). The (possibly not representative) impression I get from them and other people I've seen be involved is a lot of acafans into typical stuff like Supernatural, Buffy etc as well as actorfic etc and some vidding. Some of the board members give fairly specific info on their bios.

[dr-jekyl.livejournal.com]

Oh, I agree. Parts of fandom are female space, but if you're going to talk about the parts of fandom that are female, you've got to attach some sort of modifier to the term 'fandom' so, as you say, everyone knows what you mean. That context is missing here. On one hand, they talk about valuing all fans and fanworks (Fandom as a vast, sprawling whole), on the other they're obviously talking about a specific subgroup (subset fandom) and seemingly assigning priority to it. They're trying to be all-inclusive while actively privileging the experiences of one group, and that sort of thing usually doesn't work.

I think knowledge of where they're coming from is fairly important considering that, as Cathy said, they're basing OTW's aims and ideology on where the board members and immediate supporters are coming from - their history and their experiences, which is not necessarily the experience of you or me or any other fan picked at random. I realise that OTW was born out of some very specific incidents (fanlib, strikethrough, boldthrough, etc) but the number of people aware of and deeply affected by those incidents (strikethrough and boldthrough in particular) are fairly likely in the minority of fans when Fandom is viewed as a whole.

What's interesting to me now is that they've just brought on someone who is a comics buff. A woman in comic fandom can not be unaware of the gender imbalance present there, and the problems that creates. Comics fan hubs also tend to be primarily found off lj and on creator or news boards.

[alias_sqbr]

Good points all, though I think things like strikethrough and boldthrough are symptomatic of the precarious place fanfic holds in general and the unreliability of corporate "public spaces", and countermeasures like the archive will be generally useful (if only for the specifically designed opensource software used to run it)

You might be interested to read cupids_bow's official response to my question, it looks like they are going to address some of this stuff soon, which is good.

[dr-jekyl.livejournal.com]

Tthe strikethrough and boldthrough incidents are definitely symptomatic of the unreliability of our current content hosters, but, as incidents go, they only directly impacted on a few people. In addition to the small scale, I think parts of the incidents in question are actually rather divisive, which makes using them to gather support - and good publicity - somewhat problematic.

Good to see that there's a faq on the way. Oh, and I got an e-mail with the beta TOS in it for review the other day. At first glance it's looking fairly good.

[alias_sqbr]

True. I think it's good as an inspiration to the founders of the org (which it was), but poor as a generic rallying point.

Good to hear.

Sorry to lose this in my inbox for so long, but on the plus side since more than a week has passed they've actually started doing some of this stuff now :) (Or at least making official statements about the fact that they're going to be doing this stuff, and that maybe they've been a bit ambiguous in their language. Which is a start)

[elaran.livejournal.com]

What dr_jekyl said.

[alias_sqbr]

-what I said to her- :)

[kyuuketsukirui.livejournal.com]

Excellent post. Thank you. :)

[alias_sqbr]

You and alchemia's posts and comments did a lot to help me understand this stuff, so thank you :)

[kyuuketsukirui.livejournal.com]

You're much more coherent than I have been! I find I'm either enraged (such as with jassanja's post) or mostly just unable to gather my thoughts well enough to get across what I want to say. But now you've said it for me! :)

[alias_sqbr]

I find it's a lot easier to stay calm and wait until you have your thoughts in order when it's someone else's oppression :/

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

*friending*

[alias_sqbr]

Cool! Be warned, I post a lot of weird random crap :)

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

So does most of my flist :)

[dkompare.livejournal.com]

This is the best read on the "predominantly female space" bit that I've yet seen in all the OTW chatter of the past few weeks. I find I can't resolve my feelings on it as well.

I'm a het male who's been interested (and at times, fairly active) in several media fandoms for over twenty years. Most of them have been predominantly female-led, some of them have been predominantly male-led, some of them have been both (e.g., Doctor Who fandom in North America vs. Doctor Who fandom in the UK), and all of them have had an often prickly relationship with TPTB (e.g., remember Creation Cons back in the 90s?).

I'm also, these days, about 70% "aca" and 30% "fan" when it comes to fan studies, with a personal and professional investment in understanding fan cultures and asserting their practices. As a feminist, I absolutely get where the OTW organizers are coming from wrt the idea of a "female space," (and full disclosure, I'm on the editorial board of the journal), but as a media and cultural scholar who's studied and participated in loads of subcultures since the 80s, I'm wondering how that's going to jibe with the more universal claims of championing "transformative" works.

Anyway, this is all an ongoing discussion (all of it, that is; everything in your entire life), and I look forward to supporting the mission of the OTW as this discussion continues.

[alias_sqbr]

Mm, oh yes I like most of what OTW is working towards (I've yet to hear a single compelling argument against the archive), and I agree that there's something really nice about the way fanfic/media fandom works vs a lot of other fandoms which is probably not coincidental to the gender balance, but they have some way to go before I feel comfortable with how they express themselves.

As someone on the journal: are you expecting there to be many articles on non-female communities like machina and AMVs?

[dkompare.livejournal.com]

Frankly, I'm not sure what to expect! I'm guessing that most of the initial wave of submissions will come from acafen on and around LJ, but I do know that the editors have indicated that they're interested in material that ventures further afield.

My own academic kink is for pieces that look at the cultural politics of transformative works in an institutional way (i.e., economic, legal, etc.). I'd love to see stuff on copyright and fair use applied to specific instances, whether fanfic, machinima, or (say) DJs crafting mash-ups.

[alias_sqbr]

Sounds good!

I must admit, reading academic papers makes my brain hurt (how I got through my Phd I don't know, though at least with maths you can skip to the equations) so I probably won't be reading any of them, but it's cool to know they're being written :) (and then I can read the for-dummies versions on metafandom)

[dkompare.livejournal.com]

Yes, and that's exactly how we'll post it: "Acafenwank For Dummies"! ;)

Seriously, though, it's a great idea in principle, and I hope that we can persuade submitters to do up 50-200 word abstracts (in plain English) that can then lead to ongoing discussions threaded under each article online. Kind of like Flow (http://www.flowtv.org).

[alias_sqbr]

*had never heard of flow except as a conference*
*reads numerous articles when I have better things to do*

Yes, like that. Sounds good :)

[paradox-dragon.livejournal.com]

I have been known to insist on fanfic fandom as a community of women. Not exclusively that, and not necessarily that for all eternity, but I think it's a relevant distinction. I haven't really been following the OTW debate, but I was paying attention back when the focus was on Fanlib and the exploitation of fandom, and in that case it made a lot of sense to acknowledge the parallels between the aforementioned exploitation of fandom and the historical exploitation of women and marginalization and discrediting of women writers.

I have to admit, I get really fed up with the double standard applied when association with women seems to automatically devalue a genre (I would include fanfic in this, but for a "real world" example, take romance writing), but any insistence on a genre being "women's space" is seen as exclusive and inflammatory when it is used in a positive way or brought up by the women themselves.

I by no means think that men or anyone who steps outside the traditional definitions and roles of gender should be excluded from fandom, provided they don't go about swirling a metaphorical cloak of patriarchy and privilege behind them, in which case I think they should be excluded because they're dicks, not because they aren't women. On the other hand, I don't see how calling fanfic fandom a primarily female space excludes men (marginalizes them, maybe, but I think it's more a matter of acknowledging their conspicuous absence and the reasons for that) or that there's any giant female conspiracy to boycott guys in fandom.

In my point of view, fanfic fandom is a tiny female-dominated space in a ginormous male-dominated space called Earth. I don't think the women of fandom go around hunting for males to identify and then exclude. I think that issues of gender in fandom get brought up mainly when there are issues of oppression and privilege (i.e. Fanlib) that disadvantage those women and are perpetuated mainly by men (not even male fans, but often outsiders). I see the definition of fandom as women's space as being more about preventing male intrusion (from the larger world, where men are hugely privileged and prone to act that out when stepping into communities that don't grant them that privilege) than male participation (and yes, I do think a male fan is being intrusive if he demands that fandom change to suit his tastes; if he doesn't make such demands, I think he'll be largely gender-invisible). No one's stopping fanboys from writing what they want and posting it, but if they are upset that female fans are not interested in reading what they're interested in writing . . . well, I don't care, frankly. Tough shit. Also, yes, some of those men are oppressed in other ways (i.e. queer), but that doesn't negate their male privilege.

This all makes me sound far more confrontational than I actually am, and I'm not writing this to argue with you, or to talk about how women are pure and good and inclusive and men are intrusive brutes. In short, I think that gender is largely a particularly nasty sort of fiction, but it's a fiction with great significance in the world in which we live. I don't think that the risk of men feeling excluded outweighs the need to analyze and challenge the ways in which women and their work are perceived, commodified, marginalized, and degraded.

I take your point, however, about how "transformative work" is not limited to fanfic, and I do believe that presents a problem. However, I think that consideration of the role that Fanlib played in the creation of the OTW sheds light on that; I do not know enough about the continuing debate to say whether or not gender is a consideration that should be reduced as the organization broadens its focus.

[alias_sqbr]

I have to admit, I get really fed up with the double standard applied when association with women seems to automatically devalue a genre (I would include fanfic in this, but for a "real world" example, take romance writing), but any insistence on a genre being "women's space" is seen as exclusive and inflammatory when it is used in a positive way or brought up by the women themselves.

Same. In fact I think we agree on a lot of things. We may even agree on pretty much everything and be shouting past each other :)

And as I said in my post, I'm definitely not objecting to fandom being called a "primarily female space" (well, except with the fact that this gets a bit ambiguous when we're talking about OTW, but I think we agree there)

I'm not entirely objecting to it being labeled a "female space" (which is different), though I'm still figuring out quite how I feel about that. I've seen lots of people who see it as a female space express themselves in very inclusive ways which affirm the role of women without trying to belittle or marginalise not-women, and I'm sure you do it that way too. I certainly enjoy having a female dominated nerdy place to hang out from time to time after the fierce maleness of nerd circles in general, and see how precious and rare that is and why people want to protect it.

What I'm objecting to is the minority of women who do define fandom as a "female space" in an exclusionary way and who automatically pigeonhole anyone who doesn't 100% fit their idea of "female fanficcer " as male/part of the patriarchy and thus the bad guy (heck, this has happened to me as a gen fan)

The world may "belong to men". But it belongs, specifically, to straight cisgendered men, and gay/trans/genderqueer etc "men" don't tend to get the full force of male privilege. And a man who is being all obnoxious and priviligey doesn't deserve our time..but that doesn't describe all not-women with a dissenting voice.

Look, I agree that people whose taste doesn't match that of the majority of fandom (and this includes myself) have to just put up with it. But if it's not a matter of taste but of heterosexism or whatever then I think people have a right to speak up and rock the boat, even if they are male.

To give an example: I think gay men and transpeople etc have a right to express an opinion about how the group they're a part of is presented in fanfiction in the same way that women have a right to express an opinion on how they're presented in fiction aimed at men, especially since it's not like there's a subgenre of fanfiction aimed at gay men or whatever that they can go read instead.
That said, I think presenting it as a simple case of straight people fetishising homosexuality is as wrong as seeing it as a simple case of men putting down women's writing. I'm not saying we have to agree with their opinions, just that they have a right to express them without being shouted down or ignored, and this doesn't always happen.

[paradox-dragon.livejournal.com]

What I'm objecting to is the minority of women who do define fandom as a "female space" in an exclusionary way and who automatically pigeonhole anyone who doesn't 100% fit their idea of "female fanficcer " as male/part of the patriarchy and thus the bad guy (heck, this has happened to me as a gen fan)

Oh, yeah, wow. No, I don't advocate that at all. I find the designation of female space valuable in an analytic way, not as a way of policing who can and cannot be in fandom.

The world may "belong to men". But it belongs, specifically, to straight cisgendered men, and gay/trans/genderqueer etc "men" don't tend to get the full force of male privilege. And a man who is being all obnoxious and priviligey doesn't deserve our time..but that doesn't describe all not-women with a dissenting voice.

Definitely, 100% agreed. I mean, I think the intersection of privilege can be really complicated, and I definitely didn't mean to imply that just being a man prevents you from ever experiencing oppression or something (I mean, I'm a queer woman, but I'm white, and I'm USAmerican and middle class and cisgendered, so I am not really at the bottom of the privilege barrel, you know?). And abso-fucking-lutely, I think genderqueer and trans folks and pretty much everyone has the right to advocate for themselves in fandom, and I would not consider a them sexist for doing so.

When I said that experiencing some other type of oppression doesn't negate male privilege, I meant only that one can't assume that, say, a gay man is going to be completely not sexist because he knows what it's like to experience heterosexism, anymore than I'm going to avoid unintentional racism 100% of the time just because I know what it's like to experience sexism or homophobia. So, being gay or genderqueer or whatever isn't a defense against sexism, but neither is being male an automatic indicator of it (except in the way that all human beings sort of suck, and we all screw up, and deliberately or not we're on going to stomp all over someone whom we have privilege over at some point).

Also, for the record, I read a lot of gen and femmeslash and slash and het and various combinations of those, as well as tons of different fandoms and communities and authors whom I'll follow even into fandoms I don't know. I mention this because I have not seen much of such exclusionary talk about not-women in fandom, and I was wondering if the people saying it were focused in one particular area, and I've just missed them, or if they are particularly affiliated with OTW (in which case I'm freaked out), or what. The poster you linked to in your original post (the dodgy one) creeped me out, and I assumed that such opinions were pretty rare and that most of the "exclusion" of men in fandom was actually the result of privileged over-reaction the legitimate criticisms of sexism by women (this is what I've mainly seen before now, and that was the premise I was writing from when I made my first comment, which was ill-considered).

[alias_sqbr]

Heh, yeah, I think we both pretty much agree on everything :) (well everything relevant) And yes, totally, gay men can be misogynistic and I understand people being on the lookout for that.

First off: this is DEFINITELY not an OTW thing, it's just that the OTW has prompted discussions of fandom as a female space and that stirs up all this other stuff.

Second: I'm in a somewhat odd position in fandom since I'm not really "in" any specific fandoms, I pretty much just read fanfic and metafandom and the ljs of various people I know and like (often for non-fandomy reasons or because they lead me to the good fanfic) So my experience may not be very representative. Also the fact that I see my geeky "home" as male dominated science fiction fandom rather than female dominated fanfic fandom probably affects my judgement.

That said....

The thing with the exclusionary talk: it's generally pretty subtle,a subtext implied during discussions about other things, such as fandom as a female space. I'm not saying there's people loudly proclaiming that we should kick all the transexuals out of fandom or anything. It's rather like the subtle "lies of omission" racism I've seen in feminism: a group of (mostly) well meaning, pro inclusiveness people are not going to be deliberately oppressive or spout a bunch of politically incorrect insults or anything, but we're not immune to simply not noticing how our behaviour affects other people and then getting defensive when called on it.

Since I'm a straight cisgendered woman I'm not the best person to notice these negative effects myself, but I have noticed the knee-jerk defensiveness and refusal to even stop and listen and try to figure out if anything bad is happening when gay men etc complain. Given that most men who complain about fandom are unjustified misogynists I realise that this defensiveness makes a lot of sense, but I still think we have to be more careful.

[paradox-dragon.livejournal.com]

I think we are definitely in agreement, and I will be keeping a closer eye on myself and my fannish (and "real life" for that matter) interactions in the future, because the last thing I want to do is heap yet more shit onto the already large pile that gets dumped on anyone not heterosexual, cisgendered, etc. Thank you for taking the time to discuss this with me!

[alias_sqbr]

Hey, you're welcome, the only reason I noticed this stuff is due to generally getting involved in discussions about gender, race etc and having my brain opened up everytime I say something wrong and someone politely points out my assumptions. Pay it forward and all that :)

[moon-very-thin.livejournal.com]

"Similarly, gay men and trans or genderqueer people are often excluded from fandom-y things along with the straight cisgendered men, with the argument that fandom is a women's space and they are not women, so they should shut up. I've seen it happen a bunch of time, and I don't like it. "

I'm curious. Do you (or anyone else here)have linkable examples of this phenomenon? It's just that in my own experiences of various fandoms over the last decade I have never seen it arise, and I'd like to educate myself.

It may be that my female privilege in fandom space makes me blind to it. Heaven knows, I'm aware enough of the frustration of male friends not *getting* how exclusionary so many spaces can be to a woman on the basis of gender.

I respect OTW's acknowledgement of the feminine-nature of fandom because things like FanLib and the official BSG vidding challenge etc have so frustratingly ignored the experiences of the feminine majority by super-imposing a masculine-centric view of fandom.

However, in those cases it's a case of foreign affairs rather than domestic - dealing with non-fannish organisations who have certain ill-informed assumptions about the gendered nature of many aspects of fandom. I'd be very grateful if I could hear the opinions of men in media fandom who feel unfairly excluded.

[alias_sqbr]

Well, I'm a woman too so am not the best person to ask :) (I actually feel a bit weird answering the question for this reason, so anyone with a better grasp of this stuff is free to correct me)

The perception has been growing for a while, to be honest I first noticed the "the only people who aren't women who like what I like are male chauvinist pigs" attitude when it was (indirectly) used against me (as a woman who likes plotty gen and science and other boyish things), and this meant that when people like alchemia complained about this sort of attitude marginalising them I had a certain base sympathy, and I started to think about what fandom would look like from a gay male/transgendered/genderqueer perspective. (For example, telling someone who was born a woman and has gone through hell and high water to gain any acceptance as a man that they're an "honorary woman" for liking fanfic and not being a misogynist is kind of rude..)

The only ones I have an actual link to are the rant I linked to above, and the comment that sparked this rant, where a (I think) FTM transexual was talking about feeling marginalised and was told that "being a dude in fandom is kind of like being a straight ally at a queer social event" (which I won't link to since I think the person who posted it feels a bit embarrassed about it now in retrospect :))

In general women are a lot less directly aggressive than men, so it's more subtle than the open misogyny you get in male spaces. But there have been several times I've seen gay men or trans people say that they're not comfortable with the way their group is portrayed by slash and they got an immediate reaction of "This is by women for women, if you don't like it then sod off" and "It's impossible for me to be prejudiced against gay men because I'm a lesbian" without any attempt to look at whether or not slash perpetuates homophobic/transphobic etc attitudes. I mean there is also a lot of very intelligent discussion about the gender/sexuality etc issues in fanfic, but that doesn't negate the bad stuff.

[dkompare.livejournal.com]

Through all of these discussions, there's a fascinating conflation of things like genre, affect, narrative, and style with gender and/or sexuality. That seems to be how our culture is encoded (I'm not gonna say "hard-wired," because much of that line of thought is BS). Thus, for example, not only is the idea of fanfic constructed very differently from "outside" and "inside" fandom (speaking very broadly), each construction immediately implies particular codes about gender and/or sexuality.

Like you, I'm a gen fan, for the most part. I totally get slash, and value it as a mode of culture, but it just doesn't do anything for me. More or less the same for shipping (to an extent). I find myself wondering if that's because of my gender and sexuality, or if that's because of my taste formation (not high or low, but relative to all sorts of stuff in culture), or something else, and I'm not sure.

So, then, as someone who considers himself a fan, but isn't into slash or shipping, I've had a difficult go of it on LJ. I'm not going to "pass" as someone who is into it, but I am familiarizing myself with more concepts and issues, because I am very interested in the broader endeavor of fandom, or, to be more precise, if less proper, "fannishness."

To flip this on its head, one of my former students (now getting her PhD in Communication Studies) is a het female whose fannish passion is professional male sports. Not in a sexual mode (that's secondary, according to her), but as sports, i.e., as a "guy" would typically do. She's found it incredibly difficult to find a place in this world, as male privilege locks out or shuts down women's perspectives, and dominant discourses of femininity (and feminism) tell her she's either supposed to only be in it for the "hot guys" or reject it altogether. The upside is that she's found it an incredibly fertile ground for exploring issues of gender, passion, expertise, and marketing in contemporary culture!

Anyway, I think I'd like to see more discussion (in general; this particular discussion is very engaging!) about what makes some artifact or practice "male" or "female" or "gay" or "straight," and what about the folks who say "none of the above, thank you"? I'd like to do this without dismissing the problem of the very, very real politics of gender bias and male privilege in the world overall, but still get at the "stuff" that makes stuff gendered in the first place.

[alias_sqbr]

Mm, good points all. I think it's very easy for "girly" women to justify the exclusion of "boyish" women (or "girly" men etc) with the argument that the wider society constantly promotes the masculine to the detriment of the feminine, without realising that this is only true for "boyish" men, and that it's actually pretty tough for "boyish" women. (I say as a woman with a Phd in maths who likes hard sf)

But at the same time...someone has to defend girly things.

I'm glad you student was able to turn her experiences into a learning experience :)

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

Some examples are just not worth anyone bookmarking- one sentence, buried in a lengthy thread on some other topic.

The good thing about the rant alias_sqbr linked to is that it wasn't deleted (unfortunately, all the replies from wonderful fen pointing out how offensive it was were deleted). Often times, the entire post is deleted/locked, so that we can't point back to it and say, see, this happens (Example, someone involved with slash fics made a homophobic post, and when confronted about that, locked the post. The only proof it happened is that someone else wrote about it (http://mawaridi.livejournal.com/507339.html) in their own lj.)

Sometimes entire journals are deleted, because the fan is tired of the wank and disrespect of their identity. Usually this is a man or transman who presents in ways that others read as too feminine are accused of "really being women" who deliberately trying to deceive fandom. There's a post in response to this here (http://pauraque.livejournal.com/239554.html).

[alias_sqbr]

Oh good, I was hoping someone like you with more personal experience would answer this question!

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

FWIW, I just stumbled over this googling for something else... i hate linking to FW, but the original stuff was deleted. link (http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:mT9lSja9-FcJ:www.journalfen.net/community/fwgreatesthits/20236.html+alchemia%40livejournal.com&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=8&gl=us&client=firefox-a) Someone posts about a disagreement about switchknife's gende between me and someone else because they thought switch was another person in fandom that had wank about their gender.

Someone points out that switch at one time id'd one way and later changed- therefore we were both "right"- which is basically denying the identity of a trans person by saying that they are "still" their birth sex- thus they can never be the "real" man or "real" woman that they id as / transitioned too, and that its everyone's right to drag out the trans person's past to "reveal" what they "really" are. :-/ (that said, i've no idea if switch was trans or not, i just know they were going by genderless pronouns for a long time before they left)

I didn't know the other person (Cravache), or what actually happened with that situation, but I think that wank, among a couple other incidents, caused an increase in paranoia in this part of fandom re gender. It was shortly after that, a person on my flist left because people said he was really a girl because he wrote too much like one in their opinion (and i think that is who pauraque was thinking of in the post I linked to above)

[parthenia14.livejournal.com]

I think this is the most interesting and calm discussion I've seen of this issue. You all rock.

[alias_sqbr]

Why thankyou :)