About enemyofperfect

[enemyofperfect]

Hello there! I'm enemyofperfect, variously called enemy and E by my friends. (I'm a very friendly enemy, I promise.)

I've been at least vaguely active on Dreamwidth for nearly eight years, although I think I lurked in fannish spaces for another four or so years before that, and the internet has been a huge part of my life since... 1996? -Ish? It's been a long time.

The other main places you can find me are enemyofperfect for fanworks and enemyofperfect for general assorted nonsense, but at the moment, I'm most active here.

Some basic demographic info for those interested in such things:

• in my 30s
• very definitely Not Cis
• much clearer on what my gender isn't than what it is
• they/them pronouns please
• white and making an effort to educate myself about my privilege
• US American and trying to be less of an oblivious jerk about it
• unemployed and living with my parents
• able-bodied as yet
• depressed, anxious, and OCD-ridden to varying degrees
• happily taking escitalopram (aka generic lexapro) to medicate the above
• possibly autistic? in this way where I thought that was just the rest of my family until it dawned on me that it would kind of explain a lot?
• raised Christian and personally atheist but thrilled to realize that not all religion is Like That
• mostly monolingual pero hablo un poquito de español

I'm also vegan (but don't proselytize), kind of a social sciences geek (with an emphasis on psychology and linguistics), fond of the MBTI (in much the same way some people are fond of Hogwarts Houses); and pretty much always interested in ethics. I write intermittently, draw occasionally, read constantly, watch television slowly, and play mostly the kind of indie computer games I find online for free, plus D&D once a week.

Speaking of writing and ethics: I guess I'm what you could call an anti-anti inasmuch as I think it's perfectly all right -- and sometimes very valuable -- to write about terrible things. (In fannish communities, we often label the content of such writing for readers' benefit, whether with particular warnings or simply with choose not to warn. I think this practice is very valuable, too, and I've been happy to see it spread.) At the same time, I don't believe that anything goes in fiction, or that there are no conversations to be had about the moral messages of stories. And I don't really believe in being mean to antis, either; from what I can tell, a lot of them are just scared kids.

So what do I believe? Sometimes stories carry messed up, harmful messages -- either ones their authors don't even know they're putting in there, or ones they think are okay but really aren't. I think it's important to have conversations about this, both with respect to stories written outside of fandom and about the stories we write as fans ourselves. But to be absolutely clear, when I say conversations, I don't mean spamming people with hostile messages or telling anyone to kill themself or any kind of harassment like that. I just mean that it's good to talk honestly, and perhaps with curiosity, about the things that matter to us and other people.

Whew, that's not the most fun disclaimer I've ever written. Never a dull minute on the internet, I guess. But anyway!

Anyone is welcome to subscribe or unsubscribe to this journal at any point, with or without greeting or explanation, as you prefer! I don't make a practice of locking posts, but I do grant access to people who've given it to me, because I find symmetry aesthetically pleasing.

I love hearing from people in the comments, whether briefly or at length, on new posts or old, and if you ever feel the need to tell me that I've done something hurtful, I'll do my best to listen. In general, if you ever need me to do something differently, please feel free to ask -- no request too large, small, or idiosyncratic.

Comments

[scytale]

Hey! I've really enjoyed reading your Snowflake posts and poking through some of your older posts. I subscribed. :)

I think you make a good point about antis being scared kids -- I think as a society, we are all still trying to figure out the rules for this new social media world we live in and seeing all the fallout, and it's definitely going to be harder for teens. And the media we have isn't really conducive to conversation and listening and empathy these days, unfortunately.

[enemyofperfect]

I think as a society, we are all still trying to figure out the rules for this new social media world we live in and seeing all the fallout, and it's definitely going to be harder for teens. And the media we have isn't really conducive to conversation and listening and empathy these days, unfortunately.

Oof, so much this. The basics of online etiquette and safety are still being actively hammered out, and it's pretty much just chaos out there. Which doesn't make it okay to lash out at people, but if everyone's feeling spooked to begin with, it's a little bit easier to see how it happens.

And hey, I'm glad to have you around and will be subscribing back as soon as I hit post comment! In addition to the shared fandoms you've already noticed, I realized yesterday that I actually played a route of SLBP a while back. I love that it's got you reading haiku and really thinking about it in depth -- it might not be a game that drew me in fannishly, but it's always great to see other people's enthusiasm for stories that speak to them!

[scytale]

Oof, so much this. The basics of online etiquette and safety are still being actively hammered out, and it's pretty much just chaos out there. Which doesn't make it okay to lash out at people, but if everyone's feeling spooked to begin with, it's a little bit easier to see how it happens.

Yeah. And it seems like this kind of behavior has been normalized.

I've been thinking about your post a bit more. I've volunteered a bit as a mentor for kids before, and the volunteer org gave us some tips: consistency, modeling positive behavior, and asking kids to work at understanding their own perspectives and other people's. We wouldn't tell them "your teacher is upset about X", we'd ask them to do the work themselves.

And all of those strategies seem much harder to apply on the Internet, and I think they rely on more of a personal connection that we lack over text.

Same with the "we don't do that here" strategy that I might use at a workplace or a club; there isn't really a "here" on something like Tumblr.

I'm glad to be around as well! :D It's nice to read them and have stories to apply them to -- those interests were originally separate but then I found a couple of poems that resonated with me a lot better once I had stories to apply them to.

[enemyofperfect]

Oh, thank you for sharing your perspective as someone who's done mentoring, that's really interesting! It also makes me wonder what less antagonistic strategies Generation Z might develop to regulate their online experience as they have a chance to grow into themselves. Maybe with any luck, they'll have better ideas on how to help the kids growing up after them?

Same with the "we don't do that here" strategy that I might use at a workplace or a club; there isn't really a "here" on something like Tumblr.

Or if there is a "here", it's the entire site, and no one person or even community can moderate the entirety of that! I guess it's not a surprise if it's a constant brawl of people trying to enforce conflicting community norms on each other.

And yeah, on a more cheerful note, it's always great to find a way two interests connect with each other, isn't it?