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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 7895274" data-attributes="member: 4937">Well, yes, actually I would. I think the real question is why would you even want to say you were a soccer fan if your only engagement was with the World Cup final every four years? I don't claim to be a football (the American sort) fan, and I watch football matches more often than that. (Speaking of, Geaux Tigers.)Well, yes, actually I would. And I would cite the fact that you don't know whether or not that is a thing as proof of the fact. The real question is why would want to say that you were a fan of my favorite team if that was your only engagement with the team? Why couldn't you just be honest and admit that you weren't a fan (that is to say, a fanatic, because that is what 'fan' means)? Why do you need to be dishonest with yourself and with me and misrepresent yourself as a fan?Why doesn't it? Why would you have an emotional need to identify yourself as a fan and claim your fandom is valid if you barely cared about the thing you were pretending to care deeply about? Couldn't you at least qualify your claim by saying, &quot;I'm only casual fan.&quot; or &quot;Actually, I haven't really paid much attention to the team.&quot; or &quot;I'm not much of a fan.&quot; or &quot;I'm not nearly the fan you are.&quot; or whatever.I think what is going on here is a deep seated and very human fear of rejection that is making people irrational.You see here is the problem - why is it wrong to say, &quot;You're fake fan of the Columbus Crew, unless relevant stats for all of the players for the last however many years.&quot;? This is why it is such an utterly craptastic way to talk about the actual problem through this weird word &quot;gatekeeping&quot;. The real issue isn't whether the club has standards. Isn't the real issue something like, &quot;No girls allowed!&quot; or something like that, and that rather than honestly admitting that is the standard, people have hid their crappy opinions behind, &quot;You aren't a real nerd unless you can quote verbatim from the monster manual?&quot; The real problem with a community isn't that it has minimum standards.&nbsp;&nbsp; The real problem with a community is if it is sexist, or racist, or whatever.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 7895274, member: 4937"] Well, yes, actually I would. I think the real question is why would you even want to say you were a soccer fan if your only engagement was with the World Cup final every four years? I don't claim to be a football (the American sort) fan, and I watch football matches more often than that. (Speaking of, Geaux Tigers.) Well, yes, actually I would. And I would cite the fact that you don't know whether or not that is a thing as proof of the fact. The real question is why would want to say that you were a fan of my favorite team if that was your only engagement with the team? Why couldn't you just be honest and admit that you weren't a fan (that is to say, a fanatic, because that is what 'fan' means)? Why do you need to be dishonest with yourself and with me and misrepresent yourself as a fan? Why doesn't it? Why would you have an emotional need to identify yourself as a fan and claim your fandom is valid if you barely cared about the thing you were pretending to care deeply about? Couldn't you at least qualify your claim by saying, "I'm only casual fan." or "Actually, I haven't really paid much attention to the team." or "I'm not much of a fan." or "I'm not nearly the fan you are." or whatever. I think what is going on here is a deep seated and very human fear of rejection that is making people irrational. You see here is the problem - why is it wrong to say, "You're fake fan of the Columbus Crew, unless relevant stats for all of the players for the last however many years."? This is why it is such an utterly craptastic way to talk about the actual problem through this weird word "gatekeeping". The real issue isn't whether the club has standards. Isn't the real issue something like, "No girls allowed!" or something like that, and that rather than honestly admitting that is the standard, people have hid their crappy opinions behind, "You aren't a real nerd unless you can quote verbatim from the monster manual?" The real problem with a community isn't that it has minimum standards. The real problem with a community is if it is sexist, or racist, or whatever. [/QUOTE]

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