My anth buddy's suspicion is that this "constant attack" mode of discourse requires an enormous amount of emotional energy, and the people who posses the resources to engage in it are people who are speaking from a position of privilege, wherever that position may fall in the kyriarchy.
This line jumped out at me on friday and repeatedly tickled the back of my brain. Something about it completely jives yet doesn't quite jive with my experiences. It hinges on how how one places meaning on the phrase "position of privilege."
Are folks who disrupt* fandom activities in constant attack mode or are they in constant defense mode and how do we tell they two apart? People whom I have seen in fandom who engage in constant defense mode are not speaking from a position of privs (but saying more isn't ethnically appropriate as a public comment over here).
That said, significant emotional energy is required which only means that their mental model of a cost-benefit analysis of the situation either favors disruptive behavior or disruptive behavior is the primary strategy they know to be effective. In the second case I would doubt disruptors are speaking from a place of priv b/c disruptive behavior is often a last resort tactic when no other successful tools/options exist (and when I think of disruptors in a fandom I am in, a number appear to fall into this category). Basically, disruption is a learned behavior despite it being a last resort tool because lack of privs in the greater world have taught this learned behavior. As for the first idea -- that their mental model of a cost-benefit analysis favoring disruption -- this is different from disruption being a tool of last resort (albeit a learned behavior) and is more likely to be coming from a place of middle-of-the-pack privileges because this reads as a strategic campaign to defend boundaries.
[* I use "disrupt" and "disruptive behavior" rather than "troll" and "trolling" because it isn't clear to me that people in fandom are intentionally shit-stirring for lulz (aka, trolling) and, in fact, many of the people who are doing disruptive things have valid points about classism, ablism, **-phobias, certain brands of feminism, orientalism, etc. Although it is true that some of these cases are a bit ... "Discoursish."]
Still chewing on your ramble
This line jumped out at me on friday and repeatedly tickled the back of my brain. Something about it completely jives yet doesn't quite jive with my experiences. It hinges on how how one places meaning on the phrase "position of privilege."
Are folks who disrupt* fandom activities in constant attack mode or are they in constant defense mode and how do we tell they two apart? People whom I have seen in fandom who engage in constant defense mode are not speaking from a position of privs (but saying more isn't ethnically appropriate as a public comment over here).
That said, significant emotional energy is required which only means that their mental model of a cost-benefit analysis of the situation either favors disruptive behavior or disruptive behavior is the primary strategy they know to be effective. In the second case I would doubt disruptors are speaking from a place of priv b/c disruptive behavior is often a last resort tactic when no other successful tools/options exist (and when I think of disruptors in a fandom I am in, a number appear to fall into this category). Basically, disruption is a learned behavior despite it being a last resort tool because lack of privs in the greater world have taught this learned behavior. As for the first idea -- that their mental model of a cost-benefit analysis favoring disruption -- this is different from disruption being a tool of last resort (albeit a learned behavior) and is more likely to be coming from a place of middle-of-the-pack privileges because this reads as a strategic campaign to defend boundaries.
[* I use "disrupt" and "disruptive behavior" rather than "troll" and "trolling" because it isn't clear to me that people in fandom are intentionally shit-stirring for lulz (aka, trolling) and, in fact, many of the people who are doing disruptive things have valid points about classism, ablism, **-phobias, certain brands of feminism, orientalism, etc. Although it is true that some of these cases are a bit ... "Discoursish."]