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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 9113004" data-attributes="member: 42582">Yes, people want different things. But getting what you want isn't a synonym for exercising agency.I work as an academic. I read a lot. I write a lot. When I read, I am not exercising agency over the content of what I read. I am learning what someone else wrote. When I write, I am exercising agency (typically, at least - perhaps not much agency if it's something like a reply to a student about a cookie-cutter extension request). Those who read what I write are not exercising agency over the content of what they read.The fact that I sometimes enjoy what I'm reading doesn't change any of the above. The fact that I often find writing a challenge doesn't change any of the above either.In the sports case, a spectator exercises almost no agency over what happens in play - perhaps their cheers and groans have some modest effect on the morale and effort of the players, but that's it. I've watched other groups play RPG sessions. I wasn't exercising any agency over the content of their shared fiction. I've watched the odd snippet of RPG play on youtube now and then. I wasn't exercising any agency over the content of those shared fictions - that content was fully established in the course of recording it, all of which happened prior to my learning of it and watching it.Agency is a fundamentally causal notion - "action or intervention producing a particular effect" is what Google gives me this morning, which seems good enough to go on with - and the fact that A and B are both interested in a thing, or pleased by a thing, doesn't mean that they are in the same sort of causal relation to it, let alone that they exert the same degree of causal influence over it.</blockquote>

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