How does one redress wrongs to fan culture?

[neadods]

xposted to fanthropology

This last weekend has witnessed two really boneheaded maneuvers in my area of fan culture. Not just your average "I'm right/you're wrong/tastes great/less filling" drama, but a serious attempt to gain attention by spitting on the sensibilities of the greater fan culture.

Now I'm watching the two men involved try to get back in the good graces of their friends, and it's making me think about how one goes about that.

The first took place in public - at FilkOntario to be exact - and so I'm going to name names and be specific. I got a horrified email from a friend in the Boogie Knights that Tom Smith had marked the death of the Pope with a parody of "Dead Puppies." Even though my informant was a lapsed Catholic who dearly loves a good parody, she and several other members of the Knights were shocked to the core, and circumstances show they were far from alone.

Just now, Tom Smith has posted a public apology on his LJ under a cut tag. He doesn't specifically name what he did, but it sounds to me like he's referring to "Dead Pope-ies." Comments are disabled, so I don't know what reaction it is getting.

The other took place in private email, so I will not name names or go into specifics. Basically, on April 1, one person sent out a frantic mass email to his friends saying that his teenaged child had run away and they were desperate, please help. This was followed half the day later with a "ha, ha, April Fool, can't believe so many of you fell for that" message.

Quite a few people have replied to the same mass email list with their responses. None of them are along the lines of "ha, ha, fooled me." The kindest read like "how dare you cry wolf, you moron!" and the most furious were along the lines of "I had a lawyer lined up for you and was contacting my associates in law enforcement on your behalf, you asshole. Now I look like an idiot and you look like scum. Oh, and take me off your email list forever!"

The original poster has begun defending himself - don't we know he wouldn't mean to hurt us, don't we know how good his kids are and how impossible the scenario was, don't be so mad, please, I've learned my lesson, I'll go away now, let's move forward and get past this, kthnksbye.

This hasn't gone over well either. Boy, howdy, has it not. So far, the only response to this was a beautifully written essay on fan culture as a tribe and how his actions have hurt the entire tribe. One post was eloquent on how this action showed that the original poster didn't value the support system of his fannish tribe, so he shouldn't be surprised that the tribe was rejecting him. (I have asked permission to quote this without the names of those involved but not yet heard back.) ETA - I have permission to post it - it's long - and put it under a cut tag in the copy of this in Fanthropology

Fandom is a tribe. The cultures aren't exactly the same for all fandoms, we certainly have our holy wars over OTP & RPF & x/x & a variety of other acronyms, and like England, our basic Constitution is unwritten. But still, we have a discernable, distinct tribe and a sense of connection to our fellow fans through our mutual membership in the tribe.

So I'm left with the question. When one member's actions show great disrespect for the rest of the tribe, what does the tribe do? What "punishment" is correct, and how can the transgressor get back into the culture's good graces - and is that even possible?

Comments

[jeff-morris.livejournal.com]

I can handle the first situation; given that my own sense of humor came up with an item in my own LiveJournal along with a proposed new TV series called "Survivor: Vatican" (where 24 cardinals compete in St. Peter's Basilica until one is crowned Pope), people handle stress and dramatic events in odd ways.

The second instance, however, requires rapid and repeated applications of a baseball bat to the transgressor's head to knock the stupidity out.

For the last two years, my fellow moderators and I have had an "April Fools" prank where we change the banner heading our message board to something silly. Someone complained this year that "it wasn't a very good prank", to which I replied, "There are two types of April Fools jokes: the first is obviously, blindingly silly and just there for a chuckle; the other is a deliberate attempt to mislead and can result in hurt feelings, flame wars, and the repeated application of a baseball bat to the transgressor's head to knock the stupidity out."

JSM

[neadods.livejournal.com]

with a proposed new TV series called "Survivor: Vatican"

*snerk!* Okay, that's funny. But that's also more about the culture in and out of the Vatican than it is making fun of a single death. I was pretty amused by Pontiff's Silver Hammer too... but there's a line between that and Tom Smith's song that I'm not sure I could even define. But I think it's there.

[jeff-morris.livejournal.com]

Well, the "Dead Pope-ies" is pretty much splat, there it is, in your face and out in the open. There's a much more subtle distinction in the other song.

I think it's going to be interesting watching the selection of the next Pontiff. With the advent of CNN, Faux News and the internet, it's probably going to get a more intense scrutiny than the last time. I remember when John Paul II was announced--I was working at the campus radio station and the AP teletype let off with seven dings.

And we read it, and someone said (I swear to God on this), "Oh my God, they elected a Polack."

And someone replied, "If you want to get into heaven, better make that 'Pole' from now on."

JSM