Excuse me! My fanfic is like Jesus!

[lesbiassparrow]

In that it heals the sick and raises the dead. And then people fight long, bloody, and pointless wars about it for millennia.

Via misscam, why fanfic is like same-sex marriage and interracial marriage

So, don't be a hater: support fanfic and OTW. Otherwise you're....something really, really bad.*

PS. Fanfic has not been written since people first began telling stories. Fanfic is a product of a post-copyright era in which people believe in authorial ownership of certain narratives and hence differentiate between the originating story and derivatives from it (often via long, bloody, and pointless internet wars). Telling a story from a common pool of myths and tales in ye olden tymes back when the Greeks were still wondering how much fun democracy might be is not the same thing as writing about TV characters doing it while they save the world/fight evil/oppress the poor/repair washing machines.

Which is not the same thing as saying it's crap or not fun to read or write, but it's not the same thing as Virgil's Aeneid. For one thing Aeneas doesn't have violet eyes. And he doesn't sleep with all of his crew. But he does emo deliciously.

*ETA: I am almost (only almost) delighted with OTW for providing me with so much delicious entertainment and self-righteous comments on the value of writing fanfic. Sadly, it will all end in tears and law-suits.

Comments

[calixa.livejournal.com]

If fanfic was ever taken away from me I WOULD CRY.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

Sometimes fanfic makes me cry. Often not for the reasons its writers desired.

[calixa.livejournal.com]

Ever since I realised Love Is Never Wrong, nothing can traumatize me anymore.

[raincitygirl.livejournal.com]

Aeneas doesn't have violet eyes?

Damnit, at least tell me he wears leather pants and quotes Buffy.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

To make matters worse, his father actually loves him. His mother is a bit of a cow, though. And I'm pretty sure she sleeps around. I bet he has a lot of issues because of that. And the time she said she didn't care if he died.

*cries for poor Aeneas' mighty woez*

[nolivingman.livejournal.com]

I alternate between finding OTW hysterically amusing, and wanting them and their detractors to just shut the fuck up.

I am now imagining fanfic about Aeneas and his long-lost really hot brother. I feel like it would get more comments than any other Ancient Greek fanfic ever.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

For ages and ages I had no idea what OTW was. I thought it was OPW, the office of public works, for ages and wondered why fanficcers were getting so excited about road repairs and building projects.

My epic tale of Aeneas emotasically sleeping his way around his crew only and his strangely inappropriate relationship with his hot brother will become internet legent. PEOPLE WILL WEEP WHEN THEY READ IT. And then I'll defend myself by saying things like 'People in Rome did that sort of stuff all the time!'

[sucrelefey.livejournal.com]

I'm not thrilled with the anthropology cultural history supports fanfic argument myself. It smells of the B*S* side of liberal arts degrees. I want to see OTW burned to the ground and the earth salted for this nonsense.

[raincitygirl.livejournal.com]

All this argey-bargey for what feels like months, several people on my flist heavily involved in it, and I still have yet to figure out what the fuck OTW actually is. At first I thought it was just a central archive, which seemed like a very cool idea, but then all this philosophy started bubbling up like sulphur.

I still think a fan-run central archive is a cool idea, but I don't think coupling it with a big sign saying, "Hey, look at us. We're over here with our archive, just spoiling for a test case, so bring on the injunctions, baby" is the wisest move ever.

[sucrelefey.livejournal.com]

That is the problem. They have put this gospel that fanfic is fair use and they will defend that into their mission statement. They believe it should be permitted under copyright law but rather than pulling up the balls to challenge directly in a court or congress they are trying the back door approach of conversion to this religion and daring rights holders to pick on fandom. It is a game of legal & publicity chicken.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

I am wondering how long before they get do get sued. Because you know someone isn't going to pick a nice parody as their test case: they'll go right for under-age deflowering and inappropriate hi-jinks right off the bat.

[sucrelefey.livejournal.com]

That will work so well in a nation that has Presidential candidates that want to change the constitution to match the bible.

[lage-nom-ai.livejournal.com]

You are SO WRONG.
Canterbury Tales? FANFIC
Paradise Lost? FANFIC
"The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd"? FANFIC
"Dean and Sam Winchester Fight Demon, Fuck A Lot, and Meet Buffy Summers"? TOTALLY THE SAME AS THE OTHER FANFICS THROUGH ALL TIME.

Aahahahahahahahahaha. God, watching the academic BNFs go off on justifying fanfic makes me so peeved.

[baleanoptera.livejournal.com]

Paradise Lost? FANFIC
"The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd"? FANFIC
"Dean and Sam Winchester Fight Demon, Fuck A Lot, and Meet Buffy Summers"? TOTALLY THE SAME AS THE OTHER FANFICS THROUGH ALL TIME.

Have I mentioned lately that I worship you? Like a lot? And this only justifies my belief. ;)

[lage-nom-ai.livejournal.com]

Heeee! Thank you! :P And I love your new LOTM icon--I'll have to upload all the ones I stole so we can match.

[queenofthorns.livejournal.com]

HA! Years and years and years ago, I got into an argument on TWOP with someone about whether The Divine Comedy was fanfic (it's even RPF, because there's Virgil leading Dante into the underworld and all those actual Florentines that Dante was settling scores with by putting them in hell.)

watching the academic BNFs go off on justifying fanfic makes me so peeved

You're just jealous :P

[lage-nom-ai.livejournal.com]

Heeee. Oh yes, I always forget about The Divine Comedy. To say nothing of THE BIBLE!

It's that the aca-fen are so earnest and wanky and jargony, you know? UGH. And man, I like my work and play to stay farther apart, for the most part. :P

[queenofthorns.livejournal.com]

It's that the aca-fen are so earnest and wanky and jargony, you know?

Hee! So, so true - I think it's the need to justify a) being devoted to some tv shows that are actually kind of awful; b) writing pr0n about a). So if you call it a "transformative work" and place yourself in the tradition of Dante, Milton and Shakespeare, you can feel like all that time you spend thinking about McShep is totally artistic and creative. (And by "you", I mean, of course, "one.")

[lage-nom-ai.livejournal.com]

(And by "you", I mean, of course, "one.")

Heee! And yes--I hang out with the visiting film studies prof here, and yesterday we we had a blast discussing Stargate... and both of us were all, "this show is horrible, but let's look at how it casts black people." (And you can all thank me for not super-earnestly Blogging About Racism in my LJ). First you've got to admit that it's ok to like stuff that's not very good, rather than pretend it's something it's not!

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

Academics are so sniffy about their likes: it's not enough to enjoy something, you must insist to everyone else that it is a work of amazing genius.

But I've just read a review by a friend of a book on the film Troy where academics keep going on about how the film is not crap to justify writing about it, where he not only says that the film is utter rubbish but he writes that he cannot take seriously a contributer who refuses to recognize 'Legally Blonde II as a work of transcendent genius embodying all that is right, beautiful, and true.' Truer words were never written.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

I am driven insane by the jargon that gets thrown by these people. Especially as you want to ask 'so what connects a Greek bard singing of the gods with you typing about twincest on the internet?'

NOTHING except for the fact that you both use words and are (presumably) human. Not all writing is the same! Historical specificity does sometimes matter!