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moonwiseSome of this may or may not make sense. I was thinking about this while taking spectra this morning. Again, to spare the innocent, here's the...
The observation has been made that a generous portion of the senseless fic cluttering up FF.net has come from the ubiquitous "fangirl," who seems to fit a stereotypical age group of 12-16 and who spends a lot of time creating Mary Sues or writing fics wherein she and her high school friends visit the world wherein she writes.
Those among us who are old farts (*displays "Old Fart" badge proudly*) view this with a certain amount of exasperation, since we have no connection with that mentality and would rather not be subjected to "Me and my peeps go to Balamb, R+R pleez!"
Ah. But let me point out that it is quite possible that we have no connection to that mentality... any more. I will come back to this point later.
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fireceremony pointed out in an earlier post that she has not seen much worth reading that doesn't come from the age group of 23+. I'll agree that with age comes experience, and with experience comes the presence of mind necessary to flesh out a story and make it real. In addition, especially where the sexual stories are concerned, many underage writers are going from hearsay and their own limited experiences, and the immaturity often shines through.
I have seen good writing from the under-21 set. Felicity Savage, a fantasy author, had two published novels by the time she was 21 and they are surprisingly well-rounded and mature. Isaac Asimov had also published short stories by the time he was 21. Stephen King wrote Carrie when he was 26 and had credits to his name before that. A fanfiction contest run by the Star Wars 'zine Another Sky was won by a 14-year-old boy. Clearly, talent is independent of age, though I admit that these examples are extraordinary.
Let's return to the target age group - the 12-16-year-old girl who writes and publishes the self-insert story. Could there be a reason for the prevalent silliness and self-absorption? I have only my own experiences to go by here, but I know that at that age I had a wild imagination and a predilection for writing Mary Sues (in my head) wherein I interacted with, crossed over, and combined aspects from just about every cartoon show and book I ever read. I never put them down on paper, but if I'd been at that age right about now, perhaps I might have.
When one goes through adolescence, one makes the transition from being in the world of one's parents into the world of one's peers. It's new and exciting and gives a heady sense of freedom. Moreover, you go from your parents' world - where the world revolves necessarily around you - to the outside world, where you are just another person. However, the realization that the world is far more complex than you might have imagined and that it doesn't revolve around you does not sink into the teenage head until the teen years are nearly over. Also, the tendency towards finding and staying in a group of like-minded peers reinforces the belief that you are in on some massive inside joke that everyone else will understand by induction, and the people who don't are either stupid or not worth knowing. Hence, the infuriating behavior of "having all the answers" that drove my mother to throw dishes at me. (Really.)
I'm sure you're all asking, "What the hell is Arafel getting at?" My point is that the writers of the shameless self-insert and the bad poem have no conception that what they are writing makes little if any sense to the readers who are not a part of their own little circle of friends. To those of us who have passed beyond that stage of life, the question is "why are you writing that stuff?" The return question might be, "Why not?"
It wasn't until I forced my mind back into my own teenaged years that I started to understand why these fics are constantly posted; I still think they're dumb, but I realize that I might have been no better at that age. And if I had been a part of, say, a Final Fantasy community of kids that were on the same wavelength, it wouldn't have seemed dumb at all to post my random thoughts. Because my peers would understand, because we would all be having the same random thoughts, and because I would have no conception that no one else would get it, it would go right up with a note begging for reviews.
It doesn't make FF.net any better - rather it reinforces my desire for a filter that would point out the talented, well-plotted fics regardless of age. It is indeed more likely that the older writers would have better stuff, but I think this is due to growing up and finally realizing that your inside jokes are incomprehensible. So, the writers who remain concentrate on truly writing a story.
Two out of three essays. One more still to come at some point.
The observation has been made that a generous portion of the senseless fic cluttering up FF.net has come from the ubiquitous "fangirl," who seems to fit a stereotypical age group of 12-16 and who spends a lot of time creating Mary Sues or writing fics wherein she and her high school friends visit the world wherein she writes.
Those among us who are old farts (*displays "Old Fart" badge proudly*) view this with a certain amount of exasperation, since we have no connection with that mentality and would rather not be subjected to "Me and my peeps go to Balamb, R+R pleez!"
Ah. But let me point out that it is quite possible that we have no connection to that mentality... any more. I will come back to this point later.
fireceremony pointed out in an earlier post that she has not seen much worth reading that doesn't come from the age group of 23+. I'll agree that with age comes experience, and with experience comes the presence of mind necessary to flesh out a story and make it real. In addition, especially where the sexual stories are concerned, many underage writers are going from hearsay and their own limited experiences, and the immaturity often shines through. I have seen good writing from the under-21 set. Felicity Savage, a fantasy author, had two published novels by the time she was 21 and they are surprisingly well-rounded and mature. Isaac Asimov had also published short stories by the time he was 21. Stephen King wrote Carrie when he was 26 and had credits to his name before that. A fanfiction contest run by the Star Wars 'zine Another Sky was won by a 14-year-old boy. Clearly, talent is independent of age, though I admit that these examples are extraordinary.
Let's return to the target age group - the 12-16-year-old girl who writes and publishes the self-insert story. Could there be a reason for the prevalent silliness and self-absorption? I have only my own experiences to go by here, but I know that at that age I had a wild imagination and a predilection for writing Mary Sues (in my head) wherein I interacted with, crossed over, and combined aspects from just about every cartoon show and book I ever read. I never put them down on paper, but if I'd been at that age right about now, perhaps I might have.
When one goes through adolescence, one makes the transition from being in the world of one's parents into the world of one's peers. It's new and exciting and gives a heady sense of freedom. Moreover, you go from your parents' world - where the world revolves necessarily around you - to the outside world, where you are just another person. However, the realization that the world is far more complex than you might have imagined and that it doesn't revolve around you does not sink into the teenage head until the teen years are nearly over. Also, the tendency towards finding and staying in a group of like-minded peers reinforces the belief that you are in on some massive inside joke that everyone else will understand by induction, and the people who don't are either stupid or not worth knowing. Hence, the infuriating behavior of "having all the answers" that drove my mother to throw dishes at me. (Really.)
I'm sure you're all asking, "What the hell is Arafel getting at?" My point is that the writers of the shameless self-insert and the bad poem have no conception that what they are writing makes little if any sense to the readers who are not a part of their own little circle of friends. To those of us who have passed beyond that stage of life, the question is "why are you writing that stuff?" The return question might be, "Why not?"
It wasn't until I forced my mind back into my own teenaged years that I started to understand why these fics are constantly posted; I still think they're dumb, but I realize that I might have been no better at that age. And if I had been a part of, say, a Final Fantasy community of kids that were on the same wavelength, it wouldn't have seemed dumb at all to post my random thoughts. Because my peers would understand, because we would all be having the same random thoughts, and because I would have no conception that no one else would get it, it would go right up with a note begging for reviews.
It doesn't make FF.net any better - rather it reinforces my desire for a filter that would point out the talented, well-plotted fics regardless of age. It is indeed more likely that the older writers would have better stuff, but I think this is due to growing up and finally realizing that your inside jokes are incomprehensible. So, the writers who remain concentrate on truly writing a story.
Two out of three essays. One more still to come at some point.
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no subject
Date: 2002-03-15 11:48 am (UTC)I agree. I think the bad stories from teenages ppl we see are very natural teenage behavior and I too think that if I were 16 my writing would have been just as boring and silly looking for the 23+ age set as what I see on ff.net is to me now. Heck I even think that my writing at 22 probably was worse than some 22 year olds' stories I've seen around.
I don't think teenagers can be expected to write anything else than what we see on ff.net, something else is rare, it would indicate great talent, but in one way, it wouldn't be "normal". I've often thought that is someone said they were 17 and had written this really good, mature story I would be tempted to think it was either stolen or depending on how the story was, that person didn't have a good life as teenager and had matured before his/her time due to (perhaps) unfortunate circumstances.
Vice versa, my stories must look incredibly boring and slow to a teenager (we know what they want) and I would probably have thought the same when if I had been 16.
But that's another reason why I had expected ff.net to put in an age filter at some point, to cater to all age groups and acknowledge that different age groups have different reading preferences. I guess I should write some of the staff on ff.net an e-mail pestering them about it, just to indicate that there are some who think this should be implemented, not that I think they'd ever do that kind of filtering.
no subject
Date: 2002-03-15 02:12 pm (UTC)"Me and my peeps go to Balamb, R+R pleez!"
...in part because whenever people refer to their friends as their peeps, I always think of Peeps, as in the little sugar-coated marshmellows in the shapes of bunnies and duckies.
Ages 12-16...those are some very self-absorbed years for most people, I'd say. In fact, I'd say it's rare that a teenager has any real perspective on life. (I know I sure as hell didn't, though I thought I was pretty wise). That combined with this...
Also, the tendency towards finding and staying in a group of like-minded peers reinforces the belief that you are in on some massive inside joke that everyone else will understand by induction, and the people who don't are either stupid or not worth knowing.
...is extremely irritating. This latter behavior is very annoying in all age groups, as I can tell you from experience in my own lab. It's not so much that these people feel they're in on a joke... they believe they are somehow right/superior and everyone else is wrong/inferior. They then avoid and mock the wrong/inferior people, and continuously reinforce each other's hare-brained ideas...love that mob mentality.
Anyway, the filter sounds like a great idea. It will be quite a challenge to implement, but once the wrinkles are ironed out, I'm sure the payoff will be immense!