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I think I have this figured out now.
In 1990, someone wrote a Real Ghostbusters fan fiction called "Breathless Anticipation", in which Peter is hospitalized and hooked up to a breathing machine because he's cursed by a ghost that steals his breath. This triggered the feels of other ladies who, at the time, were in their 30s, and so THEY glomped onto this story and started writing their own tearjerker stories where Peter is hospitalized and injured and sick. They weren't fans of the source material (a few of them I've talked to refuse to touch the show itself), they were only fans of THAT FIC. The story could have been about the Sentinel, or Star Trek, or My Little Pony or the Muppet Babies, and the result would have been the same. Only these ladies insist on calling themselves a "fandom" of Real Ghostbusters.
Uh, no. Refusing the canon material, refusing to watch the show, eschewing how the characters were intended to be, acknowledging fan fiction only, and reimagining things from the ground up to tailor to your ideas isn't being a fan of something. I'm not exactly sure WHAT'S that called, but it sure as heck isn't fandom.
But that's just me. What do you guys think? What, to you, defines being a fan of something?
In 1990, someone wrote a Real Ghostbusters fan fiction called "Breathless Anticipation", in which Peter is hospitalized and hooked up to a breathing machine because he's cursed by a ghost that steals his breath. This triggered the feels of other ladies who, at the time, were in their 30s, and so THEY glomped onto this story and started writing their own tearjerker stories where Peter is hospitalized and injured and sick. They weren't fans of the source material (a few of them I've talked to refuse to touch the show itself), they were only fans of THAT FIC. The story could have been about the Sentinel, or Star Trek, or My Little Pony or the Muppet Babies, and the result would have been the same. Only these ladies insist on calling themselves a "fandom" of Real Ghostbusters.
Uh, no. Refusing the canon material, refusing to watch the show, eschewing how the characters were intended to be, acknowledging fan fiction only, and reimagining things from the ground up to tailor to your ideas isn't being a fan of something. I'm not exactly sure WHAT'S that called, but it sure as heck isn't fandom.
But that's just me. What do you guys think? What, to you, defines being a fan of something?
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Date: 2014-08-10 04:08 am (UTC)From: