kalpurna

You know what I need? I need an icon of boobs. Also, one of girls kissing. And maybe one that says LESBIANS! Anyone got any hot tips?

So here's the thing about Due South fandom. Interacting with people in it? Almost inevitably makes me feel better. Happier, more excited, more up. And a huge part of that is the way we talk to each other, the way we frame things; people in DS fandom (and I'm thinking specifically here of people like brooklinegirl and estrella30 and joandarck, but it really is all over) GO OUT OF THEIR WAY to make posts and comments that are friendly and self-deprecating. I have seen brooklinegirl respond to totally wacko comments from random people just as cheerfully and encouragingly as she does to, well, her friends. (This is a little embarassing to admit, but when I first started getting comments in my lj, I actually went over to her lj to try and figure out how to answer them.) If we have any doubt about a correction we're pointing out in the comments for a fic, or we don't know the author very well, or whatever, we specifically frame it in a way that's very:

I loved this! It was fantastic and creative and [this line] blew me away. One thing: this might just be my [wacky British spelling/ lack of grammar skills/ general cluelessness], but I think there's an error [here].

Which, Jesus. SUCH a difference from some comments I've seen in SGA and HP fandom, where people will jump down your fucking throat at the slightest provocation. It makes me so fucking tense to interact with most of those people (and, God, disclaimercakes: there are totally rational awesome people in EVERY fandom. I generalize like whoa.) But most of the time, I come away from conversations in other fandoms with tension in my neck and shoulders. I had a totally casual, normal conversation with an HP fan I'd never talked to today, and it just completely burned me out.

Anyway, there's obviously many reasons those fandoms are wankier than DS is, but I think that at least a certain amount of it comes from a carelessness with language.

The language geek part of me is really intrigued by what DS fandom does linguistically; there's a ton of markers that we put onto our LJ writing to convey a certain amiability and openness. I mean, I've been IMing and writing emails since I was a wee thing, and I can't even count the number of times I've inadvertently started a fight or taken offense at stuff that would never have been a problem in real life, because of the lack of a million verbal and physical clues we use to add subtlety to our everyday conversation. But online, that's all missing. So the fact that I am really, really rarely offended or hurt or put off by something a DS fan has written? Is pretty fucking impressive. (I tried to make a list of markers once, but then I looked down at my paper, which had this written on it:

\o/
CAPS
pretty

And, uhm, I stopped.

And there was going to be more on this post about our general assumptions about people, and our attitude towards newbies, and comments, and the whole Canada fangirling thing, and some other stuff, but I am tired and the language thing kind of burned me out. SO. That was me being off-topic.

Yeah, I fangirl fandoms.