The moment I watched JMo’s interview with Digitalspy knew we’re going to see the next useless and all wrong “shoitstorm” on Social Web. I have seen bad shipping wars inside Xena fandom, the love square of Xena, Gabrielle, Ares and Joxer, not to mention the tough fights about Gab and Xena being friends or lovers – it put me really off from getting more involved, though I kept track on things. The easy modern Social web makes it only a lot more visible and accessible for more people – before it happened on usenet, later as well the first forums, and on conventions mainly. What was even less noticed in public, because it was back in the days even less visible than wars between fans (letters to the showmakers were seldom published), are that in extreme it is not “just” about fans getting at each other throats but also at the throats of the showrunners, writers and actors. Due to Social Web that is something that now is becoming a lot more visible as it has become in a way easier to have (seemingly) better access to the folks making the shows. By now I sometimes wonder, when we would have to meet regularly in real life at theaters to watch our weekly dosage of fantasy, if it might get into the direction of what one can observe happening in the football (soccer for you Northamericans) fandoms – the main difference is, beside that to satisfy our passion we don’t have to meet in person that much so less chance to get into direct physical fights, that football fandoms are a especially masculine shaped subcultures with competition at their very core. It’s interesting though, how in TV fandoms people can get competitive about romantic pairings, as romances and relationship are seen kind of as an area of female expertise (I don’t think that women are any less competitive than men though, they just do it in a different way and maybe about different things).
It is simplifying to say, those are just some extreme individuals, that ignores social and group dynamics. Those extreme voices feel more entitled to get heard the more they have the impression they are voicing something that enough people share and support. They are very often wrong with what they like to claim,, that a majority or significant number of people does fully share their views, but they don’t act in total vacuum either. We act differently in groups than on our own, working each other up eventually. Moods can spread, even virtually (just recently a study was published about it).
Would take some of the attacks with a grain of caution, because trolls love these kinds of dynamics, it’s troll feeding ground. The more opposite views are the easier it is to rile up people. But sadly enough, some are definitely people who call themselves fans of the show.
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