For the First Time Ever, I'm Immensely Sorry I'm a Lurker

[litotease]

Except for the abject moral rage and deep community sorrow I was feeling, the Great LiveJournal Strikeout 2007 itself didn't affect me at all; I've never followed HP fandom at all, so I'd never heard of pornish_pixies (and see how pretty that name looks today, without all of those ugly dashes through it!), and I've never read any of the other journals involved. 

However, for the past year, I've mostly been reading in & about Supernatural -- you know, that show that's sparked the terms wincest, and wee!cest. Incest.  Underage.  Two of the keywords that were getting people banned, banned, banned from their community.  As far as I know, no one in the Supernatural fandom had their account suspended (which, given how random the suspensions seemed, must be sheer, blind luck).  Still, many, many of the fans in this fandom responded with reasonable, rational, absolutely justifiable paranoia.

So it wasn't the Strikeout itself that got me where I live.  It was the Great LiveJournal Lockdown that followed it.   Because there is a group of women out there who, on a daily basis, make me think, smile, laugh out loud.  Some days, they make my heart ache; others, they make my panties damp.  (Occasionally -- damn you all, you good writers, you -- they do both at the same time.)  On the really bad days, sometimes checking in with them gives me pretty much all I have to look forward to.  And for a brief period of time, I was flocked out.

Because not a one of them knows who I am.

For I am a lurker.  I have one of those creepy lurker journals.  I don't produce (fiction, commentary, artwork, recs, personal nattering); I have nothing to post.  I don't use LiveJournal's "friends list" function.  Most of the time, I don't even log into LJ, because I've got everything and everybody I'm interested in bookmarked.

Yesterday, my fannish silence?  Bit. Me. On. The. Ass.

Hard.

Because my silence means that I have no fan cred.  None, nada, zero, zip.  Zilch. 

In the middle of a witch hunt, when no one is certain where the enemy is getting their information, how far they've infiltrated, and how far they're willing to go -- this is not the right time to approach a stranger:  "Oh, Hi!  You have absolutely no idea who I am, and I have absolutely nothing to show you, but I like your work about this subject that's getting people kicked off of LiveJournal left and right, so would you blindly put me on the list of people you trust not to report you to the wrong authorities, please?"  Yeah.  I wouldn't, either.

This time, so far, the problem seems to have mostly gone away (most people are unlocking their fiction and meta, others are planning to unlock once they've reorganized and split-off anything personally identifiable).  This time, only one of my fandoms (the one nearest and dearest to my heart, granted) was threatened.

I'm still leery.  With this attack coming so close on the heels of the FanLib debacle, public attention has been drawn to fanfic.  I think it's possible (not probable, but possible) that fans will have to find a new safe place.  If that's so, well.  Wither thou goest. 

I just don't want to be left behind. 

So, hi, y'all!  *waves shyly, uncertain of reception*   You rock my world.

Any other lurkers out there feeling the pinch?

Comments

[lily-liedtome.livejournal.com]

*hugs* Hi! Here via metafandom


You know, I was actually thinking about this earlier today - I lurked for a long time (multiple years) before ever interacting with fandom on any level other than reading, and had this happened a year ago, I would completely have been locked out as well. I am so glad I made the decision to get a little bit more involved (although it was an ultimately selfish venture, as I needed a searchable place to archive all my recs), but god, it took me forever. And it wasn't even nervousness, really, although certainly a little bit was, but mostly I just never wanted to do anything but read. So I completely understand where you are coming from on this.

There is hardly ever mention of the 'lurker' phenomenon in fandom, but it is by no means rare, and I think that, despite the obvious contradiction in terms, it would be great to have someone sitting on the sidelines saying 'hey, remember the lurkers..." so that no one forgets y'all are out there.

[gracecourage.livejournal.com]

In large part, reading really is all I want to do. It's my quiet place, my recharge place. I love to read, I'm never more content than when I'm reading. And in fandom, I've found better writers and better writing than I get between the pages of most mass-market novels being published these days.

It took my breath away -- and not in a good way -- to suddenly be cut off from all of that.

I think that there are far more lurkers than anyone would guess, and I've said elsewhere in this thread that I think we're vital to fandom because we're vital to the shows -- buzz, dollars, Nielsen numbers -- so it's important that we not get lost.

So, I'm thinking, I'm thinking. I personally would be quite happy to jump in every now and then to remind people we're here. It's not enough. In paranoid times, if there isn't some record of exactly who we are, why should anyone trust us? I mean -- "I'm a lurker, trust me, let me in" is one of the tacts I'd expect an agent of entrapment to use, y'know?

(Really, I was ready to send my employer's name and my social security number to a few of the fans I fangirl so they could check me out. And then I was wondering if that would be enough, or if that, too, could be used as a trap if, in fact, traps were being set. I'm pretty sad.)

Anyway, I've heard from several former lurkers, and it's good to know that the transition is possible. And I've heard from several current lurkers, and it's good for all of us to be reminded that we're not alone.

It's also nice to know that someone else was thinking about us at the time, too. Thank you.