alias_sqbr

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.