#that BNF shit is still irritating me | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

chatonnoir · 2 years

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It’s just very funny (derogatory) to me how fandom will dehumanize you and how people you disagree with will readily victimize themselves when they perceive you to be a “big blog” (whatever arbitrary follower threshold that is)

Someone made a post saying they envy the platform fanartists have while saying carelessly hurtful things about artists who write fanfic, implying that people only supported their fanfic because of their art, that their writing would never be the same “quality” as longtime fanfic writers, etc. People, especially fanartists who write, were naturally upset by the elitism and gatekeeping and general mean-spirited tone of the post and replied with their disagreements. Suddenly that person switches gears and starts talking about their age, even though the “““big blog”““ who replied to them was the same age. Suddenly they’re talking about how they're a “small blog” with only a few hundred followers (as if having over 500 people following you is a small amount). Suddenly they’re talking about how it was just a poorly-thought-out rant post that wasn’t supposed to be seen (as if they didn’t self-reblog it seeking validation and stating that they were “correct”) and basically insinuating that it was morally wrong of the people they’ve decided are “BNFs” to reply in disagreement with that post for those reasons. Suddenly follower counts are being brought up in every response more than the actual content of the arguments themselves, because y’all love to categorize people as just “big blog” or “small blog” and the things we do are interpreted in completely different ways based on which of those two camps you fall in to.

Just .... the irony and the cognitive dissonance in doubling down and insisting that the platform these artists have has given them an unfair advantage because of “advertising power” and saying that they wish they had that platform, while simultaneously not being able to handle the smallest amount of attention that was anything other than praise. Not to mention making a post ABOUT a specific group of people and complaining about how their popularity isn’t fair, and then self-victimizing and acting like its wrong for those very people respond to it....

And somehow it doesn’t occur to these people that if they had the kind of platform that we do that they so covet and make these posts about, they'd get even MORE backlash for making these “poorly-thought-out rant posts” on main??? Not just one but at least a DOZEN hateful anons in their inbox???? Not to mention people acting towards them the way they acted towards us in this situation, basically dehumanizing them and telling them that they can't be upset and respond to someone else's ignorant/hurtful post even if it was clearly about them/their friends/people like them because they’re a """BNF"""" and the person they’re upset with is a """"small blog uwu"""" who they’re """dogpiling""" on. You don’t GET to have a bad day and make a poorly-thought-out mean-spirited rant post and get away scot-free when you’re a ~BNF~. If you can’t handle being watched and scrutinized by thousands of people and getting even the smallest bit of negative attention for a post then ... no, you DON’T actually want our “advertising power.” Sorry to tell y’all that having a few thousand followers comes with a cost and is not just a free faceless reblog/kudos/praise farm to feed your ego.

Nevermind the way some of y’all talk like a follower base/reblogs/likes/kudos are things you’re Owed for the “quality” of your work rather than, idk, real individual people who follow creators whose creations and personalities they Personally like? Creators are not Granted followers as payment for their fanworks. Artists did not start out with a Booster Pack of 10000 followers “simply by virtue of being artists” (to quote the fun words from people complaining about this). People follow creators when they want to see more of what they post. Fandom is social, not a competition based on merit and not a business. I know some of y’all seem to think it is based on the uses of “advertising power” and “stats” I’ve been seeing, but this isn’t some pay disparity in a workplace or a competition where someone got a gold trophy and you got a bronze one because they were friends with the judges. Fandom is a community experience of sharing things with other people who you’ve found who like that thing. It’s not some grand injustice that engagement with fanfic doesn’t directly correlate to technical skill because art is so incredibly subjective. It’s entirely based on personal preferences, on what people like, on who people are friends with and who they follow because people are more inclined to read something by someone who they already know and who they know has similar tastes as them, rather than something by a random self-proclaimed “quality” fic writer whom they don’t know just bc they have “””higher quality”””” writing.

“I wish fic writers got more engagement” was just fine on its own without tacking on “it’s not fair that artists get more engagement.” When it turns in to “this person shouldn’t get more attention than me,” it’s jealousy. You can phrase it in any pretty way you want and try to spin it as an injustice but what y’all are really doing is dressing up jealousy towards artists as a hot take, comparing the engagement of two Completely different art forms, and treating fic engagement and followers as something that artists with a bigger following haven’t “earned” and that you are owed instead

#that BNF shit is still irritating me #'all the blogs that reblogged this are semi-BNFs' as if a point was made with this statement #the funniest part being that the ''''bnf artist''''' who responded was someone who we all followed because we loved her ///////fics///////#and before any geniuses try to discredit my opinions bc i'm a ~bnf artist~ like the op of that post did -#worsties i've BEEN the non-artist fic writer back when i didn't know anything abt digital art #& I've also been the artist who only got a few notes/followers bc I was drawing for dead or dying fandoms and unpopular blorbos <3 #So yes I DO know what it's like to be on the other side #and I sure didn't act like this lol

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