implicated2 (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
implicated2) wrote2019-01-06 02:44 pm
implicated2) wrote2019-01-06 02:44 pm
Entry tags:
Snowflake Challenge Day 6
I'm skipping ahead to Day 6 of Snowflake Challenge: In your own space, create a list of at least three fannish things you'd love to receive, something you've wanted but were afraid to ask for - a fannish wish-list of sorts.
1) Comprehensive "starter guides" for getting into a new piece of media
I am TERRIBLE at trying new things. But I would like to have more good media in my life. I would love suggestions for new things to try that handhold me through the process. What is this thing? What do you like about it? What might I like about it? How do I access it? Where should I start? When should I expect it to get good?
2) Content (not necessarily fannish) on the intersections of asexuality and kink
I've identified as kinky for a zillion years but only in the past year or two started tentatively identifying as somewhere on the asexual spectrum. I haven't found a lot of spaces where people are talking about the intersections between kinky and asexual identities and would love to find more.
3) Adventure Zone fan activity on Dreamwidth
The Adventure Zone podcast has been a happy place for me this past year, but I think it is one of those fandoms that mostly exists on Tumblr? Or maybe Reddit? I really only know How to Fandom on Dreamwidth (and also am less likely to feel like The Awkwardly Oldest Person in the Room here). Have I missed a comm? Should I Be the Change I Want to See in the World? Find a different fandom? Are there Way Too Many Capital Letters in This Wishlist Item?
4) Directly related to #3: suggestions for feeling less shame around liking things
Wow, #3 felt super shameful to ask for. I guess it is vulnerable to like things and also we cannot control the assumptions people make about us for liking what we like? But there's also this weird sticky bind of like, shame about being Too Old to like a thing but then shame about not being able to Hang with the Kids on whatever cool kid platforms there are and, yeesh. Suggestions for how to manage this knot of feelings would also be most welcome. :)
1) Comprehensive "starter guides" for getting into a new piece of media
I am TERRIBLE at trying new things. But I would like to have more good media in my life. I would love suggestions for new things to try that handhold me through the process. What is this thing? What do you like about it? What might I like about it? How do I access it? Where should I start? When should I expect it to get good?
2) Content (not necessarily fannish) on the intersections of asexuality and kink
I've identified as kinky for a zillion years but only in the past year or two started tentatively identifying as somewhere on the asexual spectrum. I haven't found a lot of spaces where people are talking about the intersections between kinky and asexual identities and would love to find more.
3) Adventure Zone fan activity on Dreamwidth
The Adventure Zone podcast has been a happy place for me this past year, but I think it is one of those fandoms that mostly exists on Tumblr? Or maybe Reddit? I really only know How to Fandom on Dreamwidth (and also am less likely to feel like The Awkwardly Oldest Person in the Room here). Have I missed a comm? Should I Be the Change I Want to See in the World? Find a different fandom? Are there Way Too Many Capital Letters in This Wishlist Item?
4) Directly related to #3: suggestions for feeling less shame around liking things
Wow, #3 felt super shameful to ask for. I guess it is vulnerable to like things and also we cannot control the assumptions people make about us for liking what we like? But there's also this weird sticky bind of like, shame about being Too Old to like a thing but then shame about not being able to Hang with the Kids on whatever cool kid platforms there are and, yeesh. Suggestions for how to manage this knot of feelings would also be most welcome. :)
no subject
re: #1, sometimes the Rec Center tinyletter has some Fandom Explainer things that talk about why someone loves a particular fandom and gives recs for fanworks to help get folk into it more. Not quite the same thing, since it doesn't tend to focus on the media itself so much as the fandom around it, but similar!
no subject
Re: #2, it's funny, I think I would have approached it from the other direction--it's hard to find anything about asexuality that... acknowledges? makes spaces for? encompasses? kink. But they're probably two ways of saying very similar things.
How do you work it into things you write?
no subject
No, that makes sense. I think I look at it from the other direction purely because I didn't yet have a good handle on the formal terms of asexuality? So I was looking for stuff that was about kink but that didn't involve sex. Which is a fairly minor distinction, but also informs search terms and how you think about it.
I'll write it while thinking about relationships with D/s dynamics, and also just with sensation play -- the things that have always been most compelling for me, and which work their way into any relationship stuff I write at some level. It's kind of just... awareness/attentiveness? Framing? But at the same time, when I'm explicitly trying to write about asexual kink, I think I've mostly ended up writing about sexual/asexual relationships at the same time.
I dunno, it's been a while since I've actively thought about some of this. Kink as separate from sex while also being an important and valuable intimacy is just something I think of as an obvious part of life, right now. Obviously that's situational, but it means that I think I'd need to spend a lot more time thinking about and writing about exactly what's in my head that I want to articulate about sex and kink and their relationship to me.
no subject
Yeah, I'm still figuring out how to put a bunch of this into words myself, which is why I'm interested in finding places where other people are discussing these topics. Nice to know I'm not alone :)
no subject
Same! It's nice talking about it, and now that you've gotten me thinking about it again I might try and write up some thoughts in the near-ish future. :)
no subject
no subject
Also, hullo! I came here by way of a comment you made on
no subject
I ran across someone's dating profile recently, and in the space where you are asked to list your media preferences, they had written something along the lines of, as a librarian, I've learned that what you enjoy indicates almost nothing about you. Only they phrased it in a much more uplifting "it's all good" way that I can't quite replicate. It made me tear up. And you know, that is kind of the the thing about fandom. In some ways the canon matters, and in some ways the canon is just our excuse to gather together and do things. *shrug*
no subject
Personally, one way I've found to erase the shame around things is to disconnect myself from the origin of the stigma. For example, as a black American woman, there's shame around how what we like. we talk. It's either "Why do you like anime? That's for white people," or "Why do you like rap music? It's so derogatory." Once I realized that this is all a game from the white, heteronormative patriarchy, I decided to stop feeling shame around it.
I won't say that it was easy. I still feel the shame, but I am working on noticing the shame, feeling it, and then casting it aside.
I read a Tumblr post - I'll link you if I find it - where someone said that they were 21, which was too old to read NSFW fics and, as such, needed to get off the internet. I think this shame comes from the patriarchy demonizing everything that (traditionally) women and girls love. No one is out here telling dudes to grow out of liking Star Wars or dumb action films or sports because that's "manly." But let anyone over 18 mention fandom and it's all "Aren't you a little too old for that?" As Tumblr told that 21 year old up there, we Fandom Olds are the backbone of this community. I'm only 27 and I still remember the days of fanzines and mailing lists. Without us, who would have created the AO3? Or Fanlore? Or any of the other resources to document our history? I hope that helps!
no subject
I just took a look at the article you linked and wow, it's like it knows me. I'm going to be sitting with many of those ideas for a long time.
One of the points in the article that stuck out to me is the idea that one's own judgments can also be about shame and separating oneself from others. This feels like it's helpful both in the sense of noticing when my own judgments are doing exactly that, and also in the point you made about thinking about the source of the stigma. Sometimes the source of the stigma is oppression, but sometimes for me it comes from what feels like the other direction--like taking pleasure in a piece of media created by (for example) four cishet white dudes is Insufficiently Radical. But I think that latter can also be an oppressive dynamic, and can also come from shame--like the idea that one can only take pleasure in something that is Ideologically Unimpeachable is... not realistic, and maybe that judgment is also coming from its own place of shame.
I'm still thinking this through, as is probably clear from the stream-of-consciousness above, but seriously, thank you for this!
no subject
JK. I'm glad the post helped you. Good luck!
no subject
no subject
Thanks for pointing this out. It hits home for me. (Also I'm a trans guy and sometimes that gives me complicated feelings about some of my media tastes that formed when I was socialized as a girl and with girls, which I think is a side-branch of the point you're making.)
Wish granted!
Schrodinger's Heroes (science fiction about multiracial and multigender folks saving the world from alternate dimensions)
Torn World (science fantasy about the hazards of temporal technology and also giant unicorns)
Asexuality and kink:
"To Lose Yourself in the Service" -- nonsexual service kink
"By Any Stretch" -- human and alien engaged in biologically necessary kink which is not erotic or romantic but includes various forms of release
"Boundaries and Determinations" (Part 1, Part 2) -- there's always that one starship who turns out to be kinky as fuck
"The Sharpest Dose of Reality" -- impromptu superpower kinkplay leading to a very pleasant, extremely disconcerting sensory overload
Hardcore superpower kinkplay that goes very wrong at the end, and this does NOT get blown off, but actually dealt with:
"Something Dark in Me"
"When We Feel Flayed"
"Willing to Share in the Scary Stuff"
Also if you want more, drop by my blog during any open prompt call and ask. I'm happy to write asexual, kink, or combinations of the two. Next up will be the Poetry Fishbowl on Tuesday, January 8 with a theme of "That's not a mistake!"
How to Feel Less Shame
Re: Wish granted!
no subject
It's about ghosts and true crime, with optional RPF.
no subject
no subject
no subject
(If not-especially-ace-but-nonsexual-pet-play is up your alley, though, let me know and I'll provide links)
no subject
no subject
Good Boy for Transylvania 6-5000, same deal-- neither character is ace, but it is about Jack's realization that he's feeling something powerful but non-sexual about his partner that he's not used to, and trying to figure out what it is (even if Gil rejects the kink label at this stage, he leans way into the pet thing)
no subject
I guess that's not really a tip on how to manage it. I have tried immersing myself in communities of likeminded people, but even there I often struggle.
Maybe my suggestion would be to try being aggressively not-shamed. Kind of a fake it til you make it thing? I think I'm going to try that myself.
no subject
Fake it till you make it actually makes sense. And sounds terrifying. But maybe worth trying.
(Sorry to hear you're also struggling with this. And I'm dying to know how one makes a business out of mermaid-play because that sounds AMAZING.)
no subject
2) I still want to talk more about this with you. It's been stewing in the back of my mind ever since you emailed me about it (which I realize was a long time ago, but you know how that goes with me).
4) Meeeee tooooo.
no subject
Would love to talk about #2 with you any time. Now that Dreamwidth seems busier, I'm thinking about trying this as a venue for more conversations about it too.
I've said this a couple of times above, but I'm genuinely surprised to find I'm not alone in feeling shame about liking things, in FANDOM of all places. It sucks that any of us feels this way, but also, it's nice to not feel alone. So, thanks for that :/
no subject
3) Man, I want to know if you do find Adventure Zone activity! I don't think you've missed a comm, but if you make one, I would join it. I love TAZ, and I think that would be something lots of folks would like.
no subject
Nice to know I'm not alone in #3! I sadly don't have the capacity or skills for managing a comm at the moment, but maybe there are small things I could do at my own journal? Hmmmmmm....
no subject