Once a Stranger

Thank you for posting, "How Fanfictions makes us Poor." It was very thought-provoking. I am one person who can't seem to take my writing seriously. I enjoy it and would like to become professional - but that's more a matter of lack of confidence in my own abilities, and nothing against a male-dominated publishing world.

I don't think that it's a bad thing to want a non-gendered fandom. I remember when I used to work at a tutoring center, I gave away flowers made of ribbon to the children there on my last day. When the head teacher saw them, she told me she didn't think the boys would want them. I offered them to the boys anyway. Two of them were happy enough to show them off to their parents when they were picked up. ^_^

But perhaps the whole idea of the gendered fandom goes back to childhood, with the whole idea of a "no-girls" boys' only clubhouse, or how girls are expected to play quietly while boys are more active, like in sports, etc. I think exclusivity makes people feel better about themselves in fandom - sort of like how "old" fans look down on "newbies." The gender divide might be something like that.

Of course, certain media are geared toward a certain audience. Things like shojo manga and anime are made for girls in mind. It's also interest though, that calling something "shojo" makes it automatically uncool for a male fan to proclaim himself as one. Perhaps in so-called gendered fandoms, there are a lot of fans of the opposite sex lurking around. I remember a post in one community dominated by women asking that fanboys show themselves, "we don't bite". XD And then the responses came.

As for "fanboy" and "fangirl," I always thought they were used in a joking way. I see no difference in being called a fanboy or fangirl. To me it just means being a very excitable fan who goes crazy over new releases, etc. I call myself a fangirl sometimes, not to bring out the fact that I'm a female, but to make fun of myself when I get starry-eyed over some new fandom thing. (Like someone posting up parts of the movie version of Tokyo Babylon with real actors on You Tube. *shock*) Society has tried to change gendered terms - firemen are now called firefighters, stewardesses are now called flight attendants. However, in some languages, gender is part of the structure. For example "la" and "el" in Spanish both serve as "the" but "la" is considered feminine and "el" is masculine. In Japanese, only girls call themselves "atashi" and get the "-chan" suffix (with a few exceptions).

I think it's hard to have a non-gendered fandom when gender in general seems very important in society. As it is, I'm a cynic. For example, while it's all nice and good to point out a first female politician, astronaut, etc, the fact that it's news just because the person is female (what are her other credentials?) makes it seem like gender is still very much in our minds. And young girls will want to find a woman in a field they want to excel in to take on as their role model. I remember in one interview, one Asian reporter said she felt she could only become one after seeing an female Asian newscaster on television as a child.

Whew. Okay, that's all I have to say. XD