thedamageofherdays:

Sending Hate Hurts Fandom

I don’t really care if you like me or not. I don’t care if you think others are better than me. You are entitled to your feelings. And while I think there’s a better use of your time than sending me (and others) hate and bullying people, that’s not why getting hate infuriates me so much.

When you send hate you actively make fandom an unsafer place for everyone. Not just for me. For everyone.

Every new writer, every new artist, every lurker, every reader, every shy person and everyone who doesn’t feel secure is going to see the words you say. Those words make it sound like this is what this fandom is like. People are going to take your words to heart. People will leave fandom. And you are responsible for that.

You may be jealous or insecure yourself. Or have something else happening that causes you to lash out. But this is not the way to deal with that. All you achieve is making this fandom into an unsafe space for people where they feel only a certain group of people and only certain kinds of people can belong in fandom. And that’s going to hurt fandom. So maybe reconsider what you are trying to achieve here. If you want more praise, keep in mind at some point there will be no one left to praise you. If you want to see more fics and more art, make sure people will continue to want to make art. And not just the people you have deemed worthy.