D&D 5E Toxicity in the Fandom

[Vaalingrade]

Right, im not sure if the article was just stating facts or was actively mocking. Probably both, but leaving enough deniability.

Not trying to castigate you, I just hate the highly motivated.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Kind of made me wonder if Gen Z, who by and large refuse to watch 1970s movies in the same way Millennials rarely watch 1950s movies or before, will just lap up a ton of ultra-derivative reuses of 1970s styles/plots.

To some extent a rather lot of pop culture is reworking older works in a way that makes it more engaging with the current watcher. Sometimes people are even aware of it and don't care if its well done, sometimes almost no one notices.

 

[BB Shockwave]

I think it is generally a bad idea to generalize people, and that starts with calling things "toxic", a stupid buzzword invented only recently that really needs to die out soon. Y'd think a DM would know that toxicity primarily is used to describe the potency of the type of poison the traps you place on the map have. Not for some "oh someone hurt my fee-fees" nonsense.

And were you never in ANY fandom before? Why would you assume any fandom is united? Trekkies are divided by TOS fans and those who like TNG and beyond, and then they sometimes agree to hate Enterprise or the new shows together.
Star Wars fans were divided even before the prequels by who accepted what part of the books and other expanded universe.
And Transformers fans (which I have been since I was a kid) were divided on so many fronts - there was cartoon vs comic first, Primus not Quints, then came Beast Wars that was Trukk not Munkey time, then the anime shows happened and it was "Pokeformers" everyone hated, then came the Michael Bay movies bringing in so many new fans who only vaguely recalled the G1 show and thought Bumblebee pissing on people and Optimus Prime chopping off heads was the bee's knees... and so on.
No fandom is united, ever. It's like religion really, there always comes a schizm sooner or later and then people go every which way.
Even so, people in a fandom can still talk to each other in a civilized way and not insult others, and have a normal dialogue. Those who cannot will sooner or later will get themselves banned from everywhere.
But calling everyone who has a differing opinion "toxic" like they were a venom-spewing Yuan-Ti does not help things. It just makes people argue even more.

Now I wear my D&D shirts openly, lol, because more often than not, people will be like "oh yeah, that's that game in Stranger Things, I love that show!".

Pretty sad if that's the only reason people know D&D from. About as sad as all the fake nerds who started collecting Funko Pop after watching Big Bang Theory because they thought that's what nerds do.
And you needed this to be able to wear a D&D shirt openly? I used to go to the university in my Baldur's Gate II shirt, heh. I long ago embraced that I am a nerd, and D&D to me never had any stigma that'd make me afraid to admit I play it.

Toxic fans ... suck. Its unfortunate that they tend to forget the actual people they are hurting.

Simon Pegg: ‘Star Wars’ Fandom Is the ‘Most Toxic at the Moment’ and It’s ‘Really Sad’

Simon Pegg said it's 'really sad' to see 'Star Wars' fans so resistant to diversity.

variety.com

I'd wager Simon Pegg never had to endure harassment since he was a wee lad, dude.
I doubt that he posts on message boards under his own name or that people run into him on the streets and beat him up because they think he did not play Scotty properly in Star Trek. It always amuses me when super rich actors and producers start to talk about these "issues" that they themselves will never, ever experience.
You know who DID experience hatred from pretty much the whole internet - deservedly so? Uwe Boll. And how he did deal with it? Laughed in their faces because he got his money from Germany to make movies, anyway. And he also challenged his critics to a boxing match, and those who naively thought this was just a publicity stunt and showed up, well he beat the **** out of them.
If anyone could write articles about "toxic" fandoms (why not just say, aggressive, hateful, etc? why this stupid need to reinvent the meaning of words) it should be Boll, not Pegg.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Not for some "oh someone hurt my fee-fees" nonsense.

Yeah, no.

Seriously, let's not do this.

 

[payn]

I think it is generally a bad idea to generalize people, and that starts with calling things "toxic", a stupid buzzword invented only recently that really needs to die out soon. Y'd think a DM would know that toxicity primarily is used to describe the potency of the type of poison the traps you place on the map have. Not for some "oh someone hurt my fee-fees" nonsense.

And were you never in ANY fandom before? Why would you assume any fandom is united? Trekkies are divided by TOS fans and those who like TNG and beyond, and then they sometimes agree to hate Enterprise or the new shows together.
Star Wars fans were divided even before the prequels by who accepted what part of the books and other expanded universe.
And Transformers fans (which I have been since I was a kid) were divided on so many fronts - there was cartoon vs comic first, Primus not Quints, then came Beast Wars that was Trukk not Munkey time, then the anime shows happened and it was "Pokeformers" everyone hated, then came the Michael Bay movies bringing in so many new fans who only vaguely recalled the G1 show and thought Bumblebee pissing on people and Optimus Prime chopping off heads was the bee's knees... and so on.
No fandom is united, ever. It's like religion really, there always comes a schizm sooner or later and then people go every which way.
Even so, people in a fandom can still talk to each other in a civilized way and not insult others, and have a normal dialogue. Those who cannot will sooner or later will get themselves banned from everywhere.
But calling everyone who has a differing opinion "toxic" like they were a venom-spewing Yuan-Ti does not help things. It just makes people argue even more.


Pretty sad if that's the only reason people know D&D from. About as sad as all the fake nerds who started collecting Funko Pop after watching Big Bang Theory because they thought that's what nerds do.
And you needed this to be able to wear a D&D shirt openly? I used to go to the university in my Baldur's Gate II shirt, heh. I long ago embraced that I am a nerd, and D&D to me never had any stigma that'd make me afraid to admit I play it.


I'd wager Simon Pegg never had to endure harassment since he was a wee lad, dude.
I doubt that he posts on message boards under his own name or that people run into him on the streets and beat him up because they think he did not play Scotty properly in Star Trek. It always amuses me when super rich actors and producers start to talk about these "issues" that they themselves will never, ever experience.
You know who DID experience hatred from pretty much the whole internet - deservedly so? Uwe Boll. And how he did deal with it? Laughed in their faces because he got his money from Germany to make movies, anyway. And he also challenged his critics to a boxing match, and those who naively thought this was just a publicity stunt and showed up, well he beat the **** out of them.
If anyone could write articles about "toxic" fandoms (why not just say, aggressive, hateful, etc? why this stupid need to reinvent the meaning of words) it should be Boll, not Pegg.

Yes this is discussing what I have been talking about. Toxic isn't a community, its a behavior. Certain communities might promote or accept toxic behavior, but its still the behavior and not the people. The context matters and toxic on many occasions gets bandied about to stop discussion without regards to context. So, I don't think the idea of toxic is a poor one, I think it needs to be better understood in how it is applied. However, social media is a very low context communication form, and so you get unfortunate outcomes like this.

 

[mythago]

But calling everyone who has a differing opinion "toxic" like they were a venom-spewing Yuan-Ti does not help things. It just makes people argue even more.

So.... your point is that infighting, gatekeeping, and "oh you say you're a fan of X? Name three Y" performative one-upping in a hobby is good, actually, and the real problem is calling it "toxic"?

 

[Cadence]

Being an Avengers comic book fan since 1981, there have been two big fan blow-ups/divides I can remember - and how they played out in an Avengers discussion board and FB group.

Bendis taking over in the mid 2000s as the writer caused a divide and brought up the issues of: what makes a long term franchise, how quickly can you change something and keep it being the same thing, how much can a writer poke the long term fans (or at least tropes and established continuity) in the eye with quips and digs before it seems like they are trying to be spiteful instead of telling a good franchise story, how much do the long-term fans look back at things with really powerful rose-colored glasses, and what's the difference in perspective for those who have no experience with the older versions and those who do.

Jane becoming Thor (and lots of other character changes) in the mid 2010s. When a bunch of people exploded before the books even came out, exploded without reading them, and/or picked reasons detached from comic history for not liking the changes. It feels odd when someone says "they're just changing the character to change them" and ignores the groundwork leading up to it and especially when they ignored the previous times the character was someone else, usurped by a horse faced alien, or was a frog. (If there are a bunch of folks complaining about diversity and you want to jump in and complain about story quality and not be lumped with them, maybe don't use a a lead in related to diversity that ignores the history of the franchise?).

 

[AnotherGuy]

Bendis taking over in the mid 2000s as the writer caused a divide and brought up the issues of: what makes a long term franchise, how quickly can you change something and keep it being the same thing, how much can a writer poke the long term fans (or at least tropes and established continuity) in the eye with quips and digs before it seems like they are trying to be spiteful instead of telling a good franchise story, how much do the long-term fans look back at things with really powerful rose-colored glasses, and what's the difference in perspective for those who have no experience with the older versions and those who do.

Sorry this is a little off-topic, just curious because I only have two runs of Bendis and I rate him pretty highly due to those two storylines (admittedly last I was into comics was years ago due to the forex). Did they not like Bendis? And did he really poke fun at the long term fans?

 

[BB Shockwave]

Look at the treatment of Wil Wheaton. Some teenage kid goes to conventions where people are proudly displaying Kill Wesley Crusher buttons. Or the treatment of that kid who played Anakin in the first prequel. On and on and on.

That existed well before TNG. Jim Davis was often harassed on the streets by little old ladies who thought he was a merciless evil bastard because, well, he played Jock Ewing on Dallas who was an evil bastard.
And speaking as a Transformers fan, I absolutely hated Wheelie and his rhyming nonsense, or stupid Daniel whom every Autobot had to babysit and who always messed up everything.
But only very, very stupid people hate the actors for the portrayal of a character. Smart people hate the writer/director. But even so, civilized people will not send in death threats. They might rant about how the show could be done better on the internet, or starts a petition, or anything that is more constructive.
Sadly, even if you do that, the people who use the "toxic" buzzword a lot will lump you in with the death threat sending misogynists and racists because to them, there can be only 2 sides, theirs and everyone else who they deem is in the wrong.

I never hated Rey, or the 4 ladies in Ghostbusters 2016. They were actors doing a job, and they did it to the best of their abilities. It was the writing that was atrocious. You could give the whole stagnant, already super powerful without any flaws character traits of Rey to a male actor he would be just as big of a Gary Stu as she was a Mary Sue.

 

[Celebrim]

So.... your point is that infighting, gatekeeping, and "oh you say you're a fan of X? Name three Y" performative one-upping in a hobby is good, actually, and the real problem is calling it "toxic"?

No it's pretty obviously not his point. HIs point was that people in a fandom can and should still talk to each other respectfully despite having quasi-religious schisms. I think however your response illustrates his point perfectfully, because you immediately leaped to an ad hominem attack that took what he said in the worst possible light and even went so far as to twist it. He never defended any of those behaviors. The whole passive aggressive asking him that question is rude in the exact same what that "oh you say you are a fan? Prove it.".

He's clearly opposed to aggressive and hateful behavior. Why isn't your post treated as such?