Constructed languages. I rarely see this sentiment expressed even though it was voiced by the very guy who popularized it as a pastime. It’s such a lonely and melancholy hobby. The whole point of a language is to communicate, but we spend our time making languages that will never be used to communicate.
And it’s not like art or music or cooking, where it produces a product that people who aren’t artists or musicians or chefs can enjoy. You pretty much have to know linguistics to appreciate anything other than how the language sounds (phonology and phonetactics) or how it’s written, assuming the creator bothered to make a writing system, which many don’t. So my siblings who were into Irish dancing or marching band got all the attention because people “got” what they were doing and could enjoy it without devoting considerable time to understanding the underlying mechanics of it all, while I toiled away in obscurity digging up scholarly articles on proto indo-european verb conjugations and Austronesian morphosyntactic alignment.
“But early_riser,” I hear you cry, “Lots of people want to learn Klingon or Na’vi or Sindarin. You just have to write stories about your languages and their world that people can enjoy.” But I suck at writing, and it’s not as fun as making languages.
Horus did nothing wrong
Heresy! *BLAM!*
I don’t really have a fandom… It’s just a never-ending string of temporary hyperfixations, although some of them do get reruns.
But hmm, what about:
- Synthesis is the best Mass Effect ending, or
- Chloe Decker is the worst character in Lucifer, and there is zero chemistry in Deckerstar, or
- Dragon Age 2 is the best DA game.
Not exactly a fandom but more of a sub/counterculture identity- the punk movement. It’s not a monolith, it’s not dogmatic, but it is pretty well defined that it’s a leftist movement. Some punks express that through solidarity and unity with other likeminded and values holding individuals that share beliefs but don’t consider themselves personally to be punk, some are utter anarchists to the point their self-expression is self-destruction, some enjoy the music and ideals but don’t commit to it as if it’s a full lifestyle and not appreciating the art of artists’ whose style and message they enjoy.
It’s also fueled by youth and living in the present, not forgetting the fights that came before but confronting the wrongs of society right now, as they are. There’s always been older folks in the scene, even in the early years, but now it’s a 50yr old counterculture with folks who grew up after it began, have lived through a couple of cycles of relevancy, and have children they raised in it when they themselves found it as a source of teenage rejection of their parents.
We have a problem of revisionist history. Punk and feminism and Pride have always gone hand in hand, but it wasn’t always a perfect road. We’ve had predators, “gay is okay but be gay over there”, and it’s been a fairly white, male dominated scene, especially the most successful and influential. Some of the earliest founders wore swastikas for shock value, and while that got nixed pretty quick, it’s still an example of “we’ve made some poor decisions for the sake of rebellion”. Which is fine, it doesn’t mean sweep it under the rug or pretend like those times didn’t happen, it means reflect on the who/what/when/where/why and decide from the actions of that person then and going forward after being confronted about it- did they make a choice to do better and move on in a better way.
Punk seems to blossom when the youth born on the cusp of a “generation” come into their teens, Gen Jones fueled 1st wave, Xennials are the Warped Generation, Zillenials are American Idiots, and Zalphas who’ve basically grown up under this regime are showing up in increasing numbers. Each comes with a different perspective even if we tend to agree on the bigger picture, but we also have gatekeepers who have forgotten nothing lasts forever and it wasn’t always “better back in the day”, and youth who, while fighting the fight as best they can, try and fight a certain fight we’ve tried before and lost because that method doesn’t win, or the win is temporary and the system will adapt before we can lock in the change. We’re also not fighting Regan/Thatcher/W type conservatives who want to maintain the system anymore, we’re up against regressives that are breaking it to achieve something far worse. We might have been calling them Nazis for the past five decades but they were Diet Fascism. Here’s the real deal, and I’m sorry we couldn’t stop it, kid, but we’re still around and we got your back as best we can.
Biggest hot-take on the scene- battlejackets don’t have to be bands only, and they don’t have to be the most obscure bands to be legit. It what you like, and if it’s a bunch of handmade slogans and virtue signaling, so what. As long as the wearer lives the slogans they’re fronting and strives to make the virtue they signal a reality, who gives a shit. The act of constructing your jacket is your dedication. Giving feedback on construction and suggestions on design are fine if they ask, not everyone has been taught how to sew or knows how to paint/dye fabric. But unless they’re bigots appropriating the style or bought all their patches off Temu… eh, we all had a hodgepodge of statements and opinions when we were 15 and figuring ourselves out. And it’s not like those of us over 40 have our shit together or without slip-ups and skeletons, hopefully we’ve amended and strive to do better.
and it’s been a fairly white, male dominated scene
It’s weird to me that such a progressive movement has not progressed much in this regard…
Been going to shows since the early 90s and as a visible minority, i still stick out like a sore thumb at punk shows in 2026
and to be clear i’m not accusing anyone of racism or whatever. Clearly the music promotes anti-racism, anti-facism, etc… so what is it about the scene that makes it so unappealing to some of the marginalized groups that the scene seeks to defend? It’s baffled me for years
Just my thoughts as someone who came of age in the 90s era as well. Punk has long relied on the idea of violence and aggression, antagonism and “fuck authority” as a mindset. It’s not always as violent as it talks, but it is also far more violent physically than average social norms and is fueled by adolescent male machismo, rule breaking, and recklessness. It’s got codes, social etiquette, unspoken rules, and a message, but since most youth coming into punk, particularly in the 90s, are not emotionally and mentally adults, it’s kind of a wild and dangerous environment sometimes. Plus there’s alcohol, drugs, bad actors, and real violence. Some times it’s idealistic, sometimes it’s edgy, sometimes it’s legit.
When 90s punk hit the mainstream it found its way into suburbia, where, like gangster rap, people singing about inner city violence were now talking to white picket fence kids who’d by and large never seen such violence. But it pissed their parents off and the flocked to Warped Tour in droves. This is where punk split into “listening to the message” and “here for the summer” crowds. The jocks and preppies that popped in a tourists were still assholes, and going to a show where you’d expect the crowd to be welcoming based off the band’s message but find trust funders still spouting their dad’s bigotry and treating a circle pit like football practice; I can see why minorities, women, and LGBTQ found it not as safe as it presents itself.
It wasn’t just the poseurs either. Justin Geever did incredible damage to the credibility of the scene by spending decades singing about respect for women while using his reputation to rape fans. He’s among the worst, but the “16 is old enough” attitude was prevalent at Warped and is the reason a lot of the early 00s emo/pop punk bands are never going to make a comeback. Homophobia was also at a crux. There were a lot of us who loved and embraced our queer friends, didn’t care, but still joked and made snarky comments, we appreciated them but we hadn’t come to appreciate our manner of interacting was residue from our parents’ lessons and basically we were dicks. Not a lot of 90s punks grew up with punk parents, we had the opposite, so our adolescence was a constant struggle of figuring out what we were unwittingly holding on to that was shit lessons from our childhood and how to actually be the people we wanted to be. If I were a minority I can see why punk has failed to produce a multiethnic tossed salad instead of white, male dominated. I can see why women don’t entirely trust the scene.
I do think one of the biggest changes in the past decade or so is open LGBTQ representation in the scene. My best friend came out quietly and privately in the 90s, but the nature of society at that point meant he wasn’t comfortable being totally out. I have know for decades I’m bi but didn’t come out until my late 30s, and still I don’t talk about it irl much. Both of us were still advocating for years. Now it’s paid off. Queer youth seem to be less cautious about being open about who they are when they come out in public, and I’m glad we were a part of the history of the scene that made it possible.
There’s also demographics. I grew up in state that is incredibly white majority, Hispanic our second largest, and almost no percentage of everything else. We were consistently 70% white, 30% Hispanic, and Ghost, the one black dude, and Ninja, the one Asian dude (side note, we called him Ninja because he literally dressed like a ninja at every show and hid in the shadows to film everything). I’ve noticed that legacy acts still tend to be the old mix, but bands with members half my age draw far more diverse crowds. There’s some good up and comers but nobody of this gen has become the new Bad Religion, NOFX, Dropkick, Bouncing Souls, or Green Day, so punk is still a bit dependent on nostalgia (which would appear to still be relevant to youth audiences) and while it’s resurging, hasn’t yet hit the apex we got in our youth.
When 90s punk hit the mainstream it found its way into suburbia, where, like gangster rap, people singing about inner city violence were now talking to white picket fence kids who’d by and large never seen such violence.
i feel personally attacked lol
Thank you for your long form deep dive… i think your points about the machismo make sense and lack of emotional maturity really hits home for me
The jocks and preppies that popped in a tourists were still assholes, and going to a show where you’d expect the crowd to be welcoming based off the band’s message
definitely saw the jocks and rich kids but overall i never felt unwelcomed at shows… and in hindsight, we shouldnt be judging them as tourists and assholes… we all just immature kids looking for a place to belong.
A lot to digest. Thanks again
Not really a “fandom”, but Science Fiction. My two most controversial takes:
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In Alien 3, Hicks and Newt had to die in order to thematically be an Alien film. Alien (the original trilogy) was always Ripley’s story; a woman who has had everything taken away from her and ends up an outsider where the only real touchstone left to her is the very xenomorph that she battles. In Alien, she’s an outcast among the crew. In Aliens, she’s a civilian amongst a bunch of mega-macho mercenaries. In Alien 3, she’s a female among male prisoners. Thematically, Ripley simply can’t have an ensemble cast around her at the beginning or the end of each film. Fincher understood that.
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In Blade Runner (before future movies retconned it), not only is Deckard a replicant, he’s a very specific replicant. Gaff was the original Blade Runner on the case, and he got wounded in the leg during the escaped Replicant’s first attempt at getting into the Tyrell Corporation. Supposedly one of them got fried going through an electric fence, but in reality, that replicant was captured and reprogrammed with Gaff’s life; Gaff’s memories in order to continue the investigation. Meanwhile, Gaff himself is forced to babysit this “replacement” that everyone else thinks can do just a good a job as he can, and so he’s bitter about it through the whole film and taunts the replicant with cryptic hints about his memories.
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Furry. As for how controversial this is, I couldn’t give a definitive answer, but if you are fursuiting, do your best within your limits to always keep your head on, regardless of the situation. At the very least keep that head on when in a furry con and don’t ever take it off unless it’s an emergency, you are in the headless lounge, or are somewhere where it doesn’t matter if you ruin the magic, like a hotel room or somewhere outside the con. The head is the bare minimum you should be wearing of a suit. And I don’t see a fursuit as a status symbol but more of a fandom obligation to adhere to that type of usage.
Otherwise, it’s either that, or that people need to stop buying things like those cheap Halloween animal masks and sprucing them up because that signals to greedy corporations that they can waltz in here and start stealing the jobs of fursuit creators. How? By eventually just cutting the middle man and stealing their designs and printing cheap copies that the younglings will have their parents buy instead of originals, pushing creators to charge more. It’s a vicious cycle I don’t wanna see happen, like we have been seeing for regular fursuits.
Not to get too Matt Damon or anything, but I’m an unapologetic Weezer fan. And I’ll say that I think they released their strongest album after Blue 20 years into their career with Everything Will be Alright in the End.
As a 50 year old, Pinkerton has become so cringy and uncomfortable to listen to. I won’t say it isn’t still a great album, but ugh.
Bionicle!
My most controversial take is that the story makes no sense and clearly was not really planned out. The ending basically sucks. A reboot could do wonders (unfortunately, not the reboot that we got though). (Probably not that controversial really).
Non-controversialy, the premise of tiny robots fighting a cancer to save a giant body is amazing, the ideas and concepts unique and delightfully alien in a similar way to Morrowind in how the world is so bizarre yet grounded enough that it can really pull you in!
Robotech / Macross
Both the original Japanese edition and the American adaptation are equally good.
Doctor Who - Peter Capaldi’s era was awful. Just really, really bad. I think he’s a good actor, but the show was garbage during his tenure.
He was more Rick Sanchez than Doctor but people complain more about Chris Chibnal’s era when in my mind that was actually pretty decent.
Yeah. I liked his character better when he was cursing every five seconds on screen.
Isn’t that generally agreed on? Maybe the extent of HOW bad is debated, but generally the fandom agrees it was a low point despite he himself being a good actor?
I’m a mountain biker and judging by my exposure to other mountain bikers I’d say many of them would claim that I ride the wrong kind of bike (e-assist FatBike) and I wear the wrong kind of gear (hiking clothes, combat boots and a heavy backpack)
Fun story; I wrote one about Ace Attorney, in relation to its premise of “If there’s a mystery with a big reveal, we build it up and resolve it in one game before the credits roll.” Instead, it made me realize I had a lot to say about Half-Life.
The series has built up a following around mysterious figures and theories. While the games themselves are fantastic, I should’ve had the confidence as a writer years ago to say no one, even at Valve, has any idea what’s going on in their stories. They very likely have no specific, well-formed plans about answering “who is the G-man”, and a certain dramatic event late in Episode 2 was very lazily shoe-horned to try to manufacture stakes, as made evident…
Half-Life: Alyx (VR game)
…from them using time travel to retcon that event
It’s tricky because I still love HL2 for its good, snappy character writing, use of advanced facial tech, the way it never removes the player’s presence for the sake of cutscenes, etc. But they likely shouldn’t be used as reference for overall story direction.
I love Sailor Moon. I know that it is an important franchise for the LGBTQ community. But I disagree with the popular takes that claim that all the seshis are bisexual/pansexual. I won’t hate on anyone’s ship either, but seeing every hug of two characters as proof that there is romantic/sexual chemistry between them is not only tiring but puts it into a light where any kind of physical touch or emotional connection between two people has to be romantic or sexual and cannot be platonic, friendship based, or simple kindness. It has an “oh look Timmy is hugging Susie he must have a crush on her haha!” energy that tainted tons of friendships in my youth.
I think part of that annoyance comes with the fact that there are canonically very gay characters in the franchise already. Two senshis are literally lesbians. They include a third one (non sexually tho) in a rainbow family construct to raise a reborn senshi. You have gender switching senshis. It is quite versatile as it is. For what it’s worth, I am talking about characters who canonically have straight love interests in the main story or in some side story.
But that being said, if you find strength, support, or comfort in your headcanon and interpretation of any fictional character being a closeted gay, that’s obviously great and more power to you. If this is what you need in your life that’s absolutely fine.
40k I approve of female Space Marines.
there are female chapters and male chapters. Idk why people feel the need to debate this
What about male Sisters of Battle?
Well technically there are male SoB’s, they represent the ecclesiarchy, inquisition and other Imperial agents who connection in the codex depends on GWs given mood at time of writing.
One thing your insincere gotcha does get tho is that 40k used to be a game designed by the players; the openness, breadth and ambiguity of the lore was meant as an open invitation for players to add their own details, every players 40k was, in this way, unique, so you could have male SoBs just as easily as female Space Marines, it’s only been since wround the 2010s, when GeeDubs started tightening the leash on the hobby and its players that this aspect of the lore has become an issue.
And if you have a problem with it you can take it up with my Drag themed Orks.
I would gladly take it from your drag themed orks.
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Homestuck. 'Nuff said.
