The generational gap in fandom
17 Mar 2007 11:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kangeikoI've had some thoughts on age and gender relations in fandom percolating in my head for a while now. I've said a few of these things before in relation to other rants, but these are specifically related to the phenomenon of de-aging and age relations. These thoughts - with a bit of enumeration in the vain hope that it'll make them make logical sense - are as follows:
1. In many fandoms, slash occurs.
2. In some of these slashy fandoms, slash occurs between people with an age-gap.
3. In a substantial volume of the fic in such age-gap slashy fandoms, the age-gap is exaggerated to significant proportions by the process of de-aging the younger guy, resulting in what I will call a generational gap.
To illustrate:
Mulder and Skinner (The X-Files) are maybe 10 years apart in age, if that. At the start of the series, I'd mentally peg Skinner at about mid-forties, and Mulder at mid-thirties. Yet, frequently, the relationship is written as crossing an insurmountable gap, and Skinner is 'the man', whereas Mulder is 'the boy'.
Now. There is a legitimate power imbalance in this set-up: Skinner is Mulder's superior, and he had a welath of experience (e.g. Vietnam) that Mulder does not have. However, Mulder is in his 30s, and a successful agent in a immensely competitive environment. He is accomplished, and has several degrees. He is no way, shape or form, a 'boy' who is incapable of reacting to gunfire with anything other that fear, or to having sex without birsting into tears. Yet he is written as such.
There might be several reasons for this:
1. Authorial shortcuts.
It's difficult to write same-sex sex scenes without wanting to beat your head against the wall at the veritable plethora of pronouns that suddenly take up space in your head. 'He did this' and 'he did this' make for quite difficult reading, which is why writers starting out in slash frequently grope for adjectives and other ways of describing their objets d'amour. Thus:
"The blond gasped."
"The dark-haired man grinned."
"The technician smiled."
"The older man sighed."
"The boy frowned."
All of these various descriptions result in an orgy, of course, and reading fic where the writer has some peculiar ideas about the physical apperance of their characters is very confusing. (For instance: brown hair? Does not mean that someone is blonde. No, not even a little bit. Not even if they're having sex with a dark-haired person.)
This, however, does not explain the other characteristics of the generational gap, which is to de-age the mental acumen and emotional maturity of the younger man in addition to describing him as a boy.
*
2. Mental shortcuts
Here's where we get to the meat of my argument. I believe - and feel free of disagree - that all too often the creation of the man / boy binary in the slash pairing (even in cases where such an age difference is trivial) maps across several sets of other binaries:
Older / younger
Powerful / powerless
Active / passive
Masculine / feminine
Male / female
By 'map across' I do not mean that they are directly equivalent to each of the above binary sets, but merely that there is a link between them that allows a certain amount of translation to occur. Take the popularity of teacher/student relationships in het porn, for instance: this is a classic case where porn exaggerates the societal roles mapped out above, where the male teacher - older, with all of the power - cavorts with his young, female student who is entirely at his mercy. Even when the student is male, keeping everything else the same, he is put in the feminine, traditionally female position of helpless passivity.
*
My argument is two-fold:
1. That writers use mental short-cuts of older/younger (with a generational gap) to write slash because it gives them access to societal codes that transmit a great deal of social information regarding the relationship. There is a familiar, worn-down path for the story/romance to follow, as it is the 'traditional' romance.
For instance:
a) Mulder is attracted to Skinner, yet is intimidated by Skinner's height/broadness/power.
b) Mulder is injured/threatened in some way that forces him to rely on Skinner's help.
c) Skinner saves Mulder, instantly forging a bond between them.
d) Mulder is ill and needs to be naked, or he has to sleep in the same bed as Skinner.
e) They have sex.
f) Mulder freaks out.
g) Skinner comes through and is reliable and dependable and all the rest of it.
h) They live happily ever after.
You can replace the above names with Blake and Avon(Blake's 7) Jack and Daniel (SG-1), or even (in some terrifying cases) Angel and Spike(Buffyverse). Or - here's the money-shot - with Annabelle and Count Vittorio, read the next thrilling installment of Barbara Cartland's 'Most Pointless Romance!'.
This 'romance novel' plot requires two social types of character: the tall, older, powerful man, and the young, small, willowy, innocent girl.
But why would a writer use a romance novel plot that requires such mangling of characterisation?
-----
2. The characterisation in slash pairings depends partly upon the age and social background of the fandom writers. This is hardly news, of course. However, some fandoms where the younger guy has a higher-than-average chance of being feminised include:
1. Man from UNCLE (1960s)
2. Blake's 7 (1980s)
3. X-Files (1990s)
OK, but what does that tell us? Let's add another one:
4. Star Trek (1960s)
BUT only for the first twenty years or so of fandom.
The same applies for the above listed fandoms: the earlier stuff has a much greater number of feminised younger men than the later stuff. Perhaps I shouldn't be surprised at this, as all writers work with what they have, and the writers back then didn't exactly have a visible model of same-sex relationships to base their work on.
-----
3. Throw in some speculation on the age of the fandom writers as well, why not?
a) I'd speculate that the earlier writers in the above fandoms were primarily aged 35 - 60. Some limited empirical evidence bears this out.
b) The new writers that sprang up since the shows were first screened are thus a mixture of second generation fans, who grew up with a wider range of social models, and the older, more mature writers of yesteryear.
c) The third generation of internet-savvy fans (moving on from fanzines into lj and the like) have become younger and younger, through the introduction of DVDs. Their writing may not be as technically proficient, but their social modelling is a lot more advanced.
The three generations mingle, and positive externalities - in the form of improved writing - is the result. I'd say that the above is the case with Star Trek, where I have been reading the earliest fanzines, the middling years of mailing lists, and the new, instant- gratification of online fic. Some of it is dross, true, but an increasing amount is tackling interesting issues. Fandom is evolving.
The above model doesn't work in the case of a fandom like Buffy. Why not? We still see Spike being written as a boy, after all. In the case of new fandoms, I'd speculate that the model is mostly based around c), the internet-savvy fans, with these sub-sets:
i) older writers from other fandoms
ii) young teens cutting their writing teeth (who tend to start out in het canon relationships as a general rule)
iii) young professionals dabbling in a bit of counter-culture.
Oddly enough, it is this third option - the 20-50 age group - that seems to encompass most of the writers in fandom today. It's not that the other writers stopped writing, necessarily, it's that the internet allowed a whole bunch of people that wouldn't necessarily be writing to make their work accessible. The fandom base of writers has thus expanded exponentially. These new writers tend to be (I'm running out of bullet formats!!):
A. educated to a high level (degree level or above)
B. have spending money (enough to source copies of the fandom, rather than relying on memory)
C. be tech-savvy (again, to source, or to communicate).
That, to me, reads as an entirely different social group than the writers of yesteryear.
----
4. So. Some conclusions:
a) there is still a significant hold-over of the use of age as a feminising technique in slash. This is a result of the lingering influence of these earlier writers, who pioneered the earliest fandom work and the concept of slash fiction. I'm not saying that this influence is necessarily conscious, but this is what you'll find if you search for these fics as background reading. In some cases, it's all you'll find, so how can we blame new writers for emulating the classic fics out there?
b) while this age-gap mental short-cut is on its way out, it's still lingering in fandoms where it was once particularly strong as a writing technique. In the newer fandoms, it is more rarely introduced, and then it is by less experienced writers who tend to more beyond it relatively quickly.
c) Yet, this has not resulted in an examination of the age-gaps and how they inform character relationships. The power difference is looked at, of course, but the experience and knowledge is rarely taken into account. Further, it is always assumed that the older person is automatically the more powerful one, but there are cases where this might not be true. One example of a transgressive relationship that doesn't receive nearly as much attention as it should is Buffy/Giles, which takes the established rules and turns them on their head.
(That said, Buffy is exempt from the normal societal morality rules by virtue of her extra-human status. She is, however, still figured as the social feminine, particularly through her numerous deaths, so there is something to this.)
I can't think of a particular 'ship where the age-gap rules are turned on their head in any significant volume within the fandom. Oh, you find the odd 'Harry has the power, Remus doesn't' fic but, generally, if there's an older and a younger person, the older one is somehow seems as more powerful and in charge.
d) Given the above, chan, in my head at least, figures as the ultimate passive feminine.
*
Thoughts? Comments? Kitchen utensils?
1. In many fandoms, slash occurs.
2. In some of these slashy fandoms, slash occurs between people with an age-gap.
3. In a substantial volume of the fic in such age-gap slashy fandoms, the age-gap is exaggerated to significant proportions by the process of de-aging the younger guy, resulting in what I will call a generational gap.
To illustrate:
Mulder and Skinner (The X-Files) are maybe 10 years apart in age, if that. At the start of the series, I'd mentally peg Skinner at about mid-forties, and Mulder at mid-thirties. Yet, frequently, the relationship is written as crossing an insurmountable gap, and Skinner is 'the man', whereas Mulder is 'the boy'.
Now. There is a legitimate power imbalance in this set-up: Skinner is Mulder's superior, and he had a welath of experience (e.g. Vietnam) that Mulder does not have. However, Mulder is in his 30s, and a successful agent in a immensely competitive environment. He is accomplished, and has several degrees. He is no way, shape or form, a 'boy' who is incapable of reacting to gunfire with anything other that fear, or to having sex without birsting into tears. Yet he is written as such.
There might be several reasons for this:
1. Authorial shortcuts.
It's difficult to write same-sex sex scenes without wanting to beat your head against the wall at the veritable plethora of pronouns that suddenly take up space in your head. 'He did this' and 'he did this' make for quite difficult reading, which is why writers starting out in slash frequently grope for adjectives and other ways of describing their objets d'amour. Thus:
"The blond gasped."
"The dark-haired man grinned."
"The technician smiled."
"The older man sighed."
"The boy frowned."
All of these various descriptions result in an orgy, of course, and reading fic where the writer has some peculiar ideas about the physical apperance of their characters is very confusing. (For instance: brown hair? Does not mean that someone is blonde. No, not even a little bit. Not even if they're having sex with a dark-haired person.)
This, however, does not explain the other characteristics of the generational gap, which is to de-age the mental acumen and emotional maturity of the younger man in addition to describing him as a boy.
*
2. Mental shortcuts
Here's where we get to the meat of my argument. I believe - and feel free of disagree - that all too often the creation of the man / boy binary in the slash pairing (even in cases where such an age difference is trivial) maps across several sets of other binaries:
Older / younger
Powerful / powerless
Active / passive
Masculine / feminine
Male / female
By 'map across' I do not mean that they are directly equivalent to each of the above binary sets, but merely that there is a link between them that allows a certain amount of translation to occur. Take the popularity of teacher/student relationships in het porn, for instance: this is a classic case where porn exaggerates the societal roles mapped out above, where the male teacher - older, with all of the power - cavorts with his young, female student who is entirely at his mercy. Even when the student is male, keeping everything else the same, he is put in the feminine, traditionally female position of helpless passivity.
*
My argument is two-fold:
1. That writers use mental short-cuts of older/younger (with a generational gap) to write slash because it gives them access to societal codes that transmit a great deal of social information regarding the relationship. There is a familiar, worn-down path for the story/romance to follow, as it is the 'traditional' romance.
For instance:
a) Mulder is attracted to Skinner, yet is intimidated by Skinner's height/broadness/power.
b) Mulder is injured/threatened in some way that forces him to rely on Skinner's help.
c) Skinner saves Mulder, instantly forging a bond between them.
d) Mulder is ill and needs to be naked, or he has to sleep in the same bed as Skinner.
e) They have sex.
f) Mulder freaks out.
g) Skinner comes through and is reliable and dependable and all the rest of it.
h) They live happily ever after.
You can replace the above names with Blake and Avon(Blake's 7) Jack and Daniel (SG-1), or even (in some terrifying cases) Angel and Spike(Buffyverse). Or - here's the money-shot - with Annabelle and Count Vittorio, read the next thrilling installment of Barbara Cartland's 'Most Pointless Romance!'.
This 'romance novel' plot requires two social types of character: the tall, older, powerful man, and the young, small, willowy, innocent girl.
But why would a writer use a romance novel plot that requires such mangling of characterisation?
-----
2. The characterisation in slash pairings depends partly upon the age and social background of the fandom writers. This is hardly news, of course. However, some fandoms where the younger guy has a higher-than-average chance of being feminised include:
1. Man from UNCLE (1960s)
2. Blake's 7 (1980s)
3. X-Files (1990s)
OK, but what does that tell us? Let's add another one:
4. Star Trek (1960s)
BUT only for the first twenty years or so of fandom.
The same applies for the above listed fandoms: the earlier stuff has a much greater number of feminised younger men than the later stuff. Perhaps I shouldn't be surprised at this, as all writers work with what they have, and the writers back then didn't exactly have a visible model of same-sex relationships to base their work on.
-----
3. Throw in some speculation on the age of the fandom writers as well, why not?
a) I'd speculate that the earlier writers in the above fandoms were primarily aged 35 - 60. Some limited empirical evidence bears this out.
b) The new writers that sprang up since the shows were first screened are thus a mixture of second generation fans, who grew up with a wider range of social models, and the older, more mature writers of yesteryear.
c) The third generation of internet-savvy fans (moving on from fanzines into lj and the like) have become younger and younger, through the introduction of DVDs. Their writing may not be as technically proficient, but their social modelling is a lot more advanced.
The three generations mingle, and positive externalities - in the form of improved writing - is the result. I'd say that the above is the case with Star Trek, where I have been reading the earliest fanzines, the middling years of mailing lists, and the new, instant- gratification of online fic. Some of it is dross, true, but an increasing amount is tackling interesting issues. Fandom is evolving.
The above model doesn't work in the case of a fandom like Buffy. Why not? We still see Spike being written as a boy, after all. In the case of new fandoms, I'd speculate that the model is mostly based around c), the internet-savvy fans, with these sub-sets:
i) older writers from other fandoms
ii) young teens cutting their writing teeth (who tend to start out in het canon relationships as a general rule)
iii) young professionals dabbling in a bit of counter-culture.
Oddly enough, it is this third option - the 20-50 age group - that seems to encompass most of the writers in fandom today. It's not that the other writers stopped writing, necessarily, it's that the internet allowed a whole bunch of people that wouldn't necessarily be writing to make their work accessible. The fandom base of writers has thus expanded exponentially. These new writers tend to be (I'm running out of bullet formats!!):
A. educated to a high level (degree level or above)
B. have spending money (enough to source copies of the fandom, rather than relying on memory)
C. be tech-savvy (again, to source, or to communicate).
That, to me, reads as an entirely different social group than the writers of yesteryear.
----
4. So. Some conclusions:
a) there is still a significant hold-over of the use of age as a feminising technique in slash. This is a result of the lingering influence of these earlier writers, who pioneered the earliest fandom work and the concept of slash fiction. I'm not saying that this influence is necessarily conscious, but this is what you'll find if you search for these fics as background reading. In some cases, it's all you'll find, so how can we blame new writers for emulating the classic fics out there?
b) while this age-gap mental short-cut is on its way out, it's still lingering in fandoms where it was once particularly strong as a writing technique. In the newer fandoms, it is more rarely introduced, and then it is by less experienced writers who tend to more beyond it relatively quickly.
c) Yet, this has not resulted in an examination of the age-gaps and how they inform character relationships. The power difference is looked at, of course, but the experience and knowledge is rarely taken into account. Further, it is always assumed that the older person is automatically the more powerful one, but there are cases where this might not be true. One example of a transgressive relationship that doesn't receive nearly as much attention as it should is Buffy/Giles, which takes the established rules and turns them on their head.
(That said, Buffy is exempt from the normal societal morality rules by virtue of her extra-human status. She is, however, still figured as the social feminine, particularly through her numerous deaths, so there is something to this.)
I can't think of a particular 'ship where the age-gap rules are turned on their head in any significant volume within the fandom. Oh, you find the odd 'Harry has the power, Remus doesn't' fic but, generally, if there's an older and a younger person, the older one is somehow seems as more powerful and in charge.
d) Given the above, chan, in my head at least, figures as the ultimate passive feminine.
*
Thoughts? Comments? Kitchen utensils?
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-03-18 01:00 am (UTC)Also, some characters just read as older or younger than their years. There are a lot of reasons why Simon is addressed as "son" or described as "boy," and they don't always redound to his credit. In some ways, innocence is good but being not-quite-grownup isn't.
BTW, although I certainly don't believe that Age of Actor = Age of Character, I'm pretty sure that Avon is a few years older than Blake. In fact I think he's probably the oldest person in the Liberator crew and a lot of the dynamics of the Scorpio crew are inter-generational.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-25 11:37 am (UTC)Which is interesting, really, because in many cases, it's not the age difference that's the major difference in the dynamic or (I'd argue) why they were draw to the pairing in the first place. I was interested in the Skinner/Mulder dynamic because of the power imbalance, and because of Skinner's torn loyalties - not because he was older. It just seems to me to be manufacturing differences, which I... don't understand, really.
BTW, although I certainly don't believe that Age of Actor = Age of Character, I'm pretty sure that Avon is a few years older than Blake. In fact I think he's probably the oldest person in the Liberator crew and a lot of the dynamics of the Scorpio crew are inter-generational.
Yeah, I was fangirly and imdb-ed Paul Darrow. He's a good 5 years older than the next oldest on the ship.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-18 05:24 am (UTC)a) Taming of the Shrew (aka the bodice ripper - that would be Blake/Avon, of course, with Avon coded as the younger, slender, to-be-tamed etc.)
b) Gothic Romance (aka the crazy Gothic hero and the heroine trapped in his castle, bringing sanity through her love - that's Avon/Vila in the later seasons; in this variation, Avon is the older, stronger, etc., and Vila the smaller, more fragile etc, which is especially funny because as E. said the actors are the same size).
Speciak kicker, because it flies directly into the face of the "slash came because it pairs equals in a way het can't" theories in this particular fandom: Avon/Servalan, which is both popular and, um, canon (in later seasons), lives entirely without the de-aging and prettifying in fanfic.
(Avon - Blake, too, but not to the same extent - so often gets a) put through weight loss to achieve a perfect ephebe figure and b) called beautiful in fanfic that it's glaringly obvious the description owes more to an archetype in the mind of the writer than the actual on screen image.)
Mulder/Skinner is a good example; my own would have been Duncan/Methos from Highlander, in fact Methos/Everyone. Now, Peter Wingfield, who plays Methos, is actually skinny, so no magic weight loss in fanfic. But he's also canonically the oldest person on the show. (5000 years.) Naturally, this doesn't phase fanfic writers: he regularly gets described as looking like a boy, whereas Duncan, you guessed it. I think the point where I laughed out loud was when I read a story in which fellow Amanda (think Catwoman if you never saw Highlander) huges Methos and thinks he looks young enough to be her son. The actors are, of course, of an age, and definitely look it.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-18 12:16 pm (UTC)That essay you mention is S. Thompson's "Romancing the Slash," and it's great, it makes a lot of helpful points about fandom in general.
Awww, I think Paul Darrow can be beautiful (see shimere277's extensive screencap galleries if you don't believe me) and it's more exciting if someone doesn't just look the same all the time.
Although perhaps there's a special fandom thermodynamics where characters expand to fit the role involved...
no subject
Date: 2007-03-18 01:49 pm (UTC)Oh, I think he can be madly attractive as Avon (and was, too, when playing Sam Vimes on stage a few years ago), but I think part of the compellingness as Avon is that he's not, say, Jude Law type beautiful. Anyone on the Liberator looks as if you could actually meet them on the street. Yay for British tv!
no subject
Date: 2007-03-18 01:55 pm (UTC)But, but, I'm shallow, and I'm sure that one reason I continue to enjoy the handful of Firefly episodes that are all that were given to us, is because of the sheer eye-candy factor.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-25 11:41 am (UTC)(Avon - Blake, too, but not to the same extent - so often gets a) put through weight loss to achieve a perfect ephebe figure and b) called beautiful in fanfic that it's glaringly obvious the description owes more to an archetype in the mind of the writer than the actual on screen image.)
Yes. What I find odd is that the 'beautiful image' the male character is amde to conform to is society's image of the female ideal of beauty - i.e. slim, clear skin, young, beautiful hair. The male ideal - the strong, rugged type - is put on the 'stronger' male.
Which is all kinds of weird, I suppose. Especially now that the male ideal of beauty covers both the traditional view of the rugged man, and the more willowy effeminate look.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-25 01:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-25 01:42 pm (UTC)Long rant short: I think that many people are turned on by a relationship with big differences between the partners, so this interest will lead to viewing both partners in a ship as beautiful, but also to putting one into a masculine ideal of beauty and the other into a feminine ideal of beauty.
here from metafandom
Date: 2007-03-19 02:05 pm (UTC)*g* I wrote a fic in which there was a 10 year age gap between the slash partners, and I did it because there is a 10 year age gap between the actors who played those characters, so it seemed accurate but largely irrelevant to me (there's not a big difference in maturity between a 26 year old and a 36 year old, in my opinion) but people reacted as though I'd done something interesting and vaguely risque.
My FL, who reacted this way, are mostly professional women in their 30s and women in higher education. So I am inclined to think that it's not a function of social awareness, but is probably just an enduring kink like many other slash tropes.
Re: here from metafandom
Date: 2007-03-25 11:45 am (UTC)Having a kink for powerplay and ageplay and all the rest of it is, I'd argue, not brought about by some innate urge but, rather, by the power imbalances (so often linked to age differentials) we see in society. The same goes with genderplay and genderfuck fic, which turns those imbalances on their head.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-20 10:30 pm (UTC)Mostly I just want to say "yes, exactly!"
Some of the most ridiculous examples of this that I've seen are in "Sentinel" fanfic. It doesn't help that the actors physical types and ages actually feed into this (Jim=mid to late 30's, tall, built, short haircut, cop; Blair=shortish, long hair, late 20's, student) but fanfic writers tend to exaggerate those differences even farther. It gets to the point where people start describing Blair, who though younger and shorter is still definitely male and an adult, with words like "delicate," "boyish," "tiny," and Jim is apparently able to sweep him into his arms bride-over-the-threshold style (they guy may only be 5'8" but I doubt he weighs less than 170). The age gap gets exaggerated as well. There's a lot of AU's that play this out by keeping Jim the same age but cutting anywhere from 10-20 years off of Blair (although when they go that far they don't usually put them in a sexual relationship - though they do sometimes and that is a whole other discussion...)
There's a related phenomenon, where any older male character gets turned into a father figure. There was a fashion there for a while for Mulder/Scully romance in which Skinner and Mrs. Scully also got together - making Skinner Mulder's actual or figurative father-in-law - with nary a mention of the fact that Margaret Scully was probably a good 15-25 years older than Skinner. The bizarre thing is that in order to do that one needed to both exaggerate the age difference in one relationship (Skinner to M/S) and eliminate it in the other (Skinner to Mrs. S). I haven't seen as much of this lately, though the fandoms I'm reading fic in these days tend not to lend themselves to this sort of thing (or already have it built into cannon).
I think there's something in the uneven power relationship that appeals to people, both in and out of the context of a sexual relationship. I like your theory about the breakdown of social role coding and the generation gap among writers. It may also just be lazy writing - exaggerating the power dynamic as a shortcut to creating dramatic tension. Or it could be a deeper seated kink, as
no subject
Date: 2007-03-25 11:47 am (UTC)Here via the Daily Snitch
Date: 2007-03-20 11:29 pm (UTC)I've found this to be very common in the Harry/Draco parts of the Harry Potter fandom as well, despite the two characters being virtually the same age. We've even found out now that Draco is older than Harry by a few months, which has lead to writers exaggerating physical differences instead. (Before that, writers tended to have Draco being born as late as possible in the year.) I consider this a similar mental shortcut. Ironically, Harry describes Draco as "tall" in HBP, making descriptions of him as short, willowy and fragile completely uncanonical, but there you are.
Interestingly, the situation among some of the very young, or very new writers seem to be the opposite: here Harry is the damsel and Draco the romance novel hero.
Among the very best writers in fandom though, the willowy, fragile, and passive Draco fanon characterisation has somehow become the accepted canon for him, which is sad for me who isn't very fond of that sort of power imbalance, heh.
Re: Here via the Daily Snitch
Date: 2007-03-21 04:02 am (UTC)Harry and Draco have long been rivals specifically because they are very nearly equals in a number of ways. It's unfortunate when the struggle and shifting power dynamics between them are downplayed, because that's what makes them a truly interesting pairing to explore. Granted, I tend to prefer Slytherin/Gryffindor pairings in general, because I love to play with that 'opposite but equal' sort of alignment.
Re: Here via the Daily Snitch
Date: 2007-03-21 06:17 pm (UTC)I tend to like the sort of relationships with the dynamics/potential dynamics Harry and Draco have. They could be both rivals and best friends (and/or lovers), and that's what I'd like to see.
(I'm not sure I'd put Slytherin and Gryffindor as opposites though - I'd say Hufflepuff is more of an opposite to Slytherin.)
Re: Here via the Daily Snitch
Date: 2007-03-25 11:49 am (UTC)Among the very best writers in fandom though, the willowy, fragile, and passive Draco fanon characterisation has somehow become the accepted canon for him, which is sad for me who isn't very fond of that sort of power imbalance, heh.
*flails* But, but, but - he isn't!! In relation to Harry, is this? What canon are these people reading??
Re: Here via the Daily Snitch
Date: 2007-03-25 07:09 pm (UTC)Reading exclusively H/D (my interest in other pairings gradually waned) has made me sensitive enough about this particular stereotype that I immediately hit the back buttong at the mention of such a small thing as Harry being taller than Draco. I've learned where it usually leads... *sigh*
Here Via Daily Snitch
Date: 2007-03-21 03:53 am (UTC)Re: Here Via Daily Snitch
Date: 2007-03-25 11:54 am (UTC)Huh. I thought I'd read a fair amount of Snarry fic, but I haven't been around fandom for the last year or so... is this a recent development? I don't really remember it that way from way back when the 'ship started, but it could be because Harry was still fighting dragons in The Goblet of Fire at that point... Although there were a fair few of the 'Harry grows up and doms Snape' fics, to be fair.
With the HP fandom, it's a little different, I think, because - even if you're not writing chan - the younger gen are very clearly still developing mentally. So, a ten year difference there is huge, IMO, because it means the difference between a life with no experience, and a life with war experience (Bill and Ginny, in my head at least, are so different in their relative understanding of the world that they might as well be a hundred years apart as ten). So, it's not so much the age that's the issue, but each individual character's background and the amount of time they've had in the 'real' world...
Re: Here Via Daily Snitch
Date: 2007-03-25 05:58 pm (UTC)Yeah, you're right about the difference in age also marking a major difference in experience for characters in HP. However, the younger generation is now getting a taste of what the older generation went through previously, and it's opening up a lot of possibilities for fic in which everyone is equal, and the age gap is emphasized much less. Or so it seems from where I'm sitting. ;)
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Date: 2007-03-21 11:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-25 11:56 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-26 12:45 am (UTC)