Fandoms: A way to express identities
Being a fan can be looked at as something positive or as something negative, and there are many layers to fandoms.
Fandoms can range from expressing identities to having obsessions.
If you consider yourself a fan, are you a person who tunes in to the new episode of your favorite show every Sunday night? Or are you a person who takes more steps to make yourself feel like part of the culture? And if you are, how far do you go?
Not everyone is an extreme fan of something that takes their obsession to another level. But some people are.
This seems to be true for a 23-year-old Ukrainian woman, Anastasiya Shpagina, who is known for looking like a real life anime character.
Her Facebook Fan Page has more than 60,000 “likes” and her YouTube Channel has more than one million subscribers. Her obsession led her to producing media content that has become very popular among some people.
And it doesn’t end there.
Shpagina befriended the “real life Barbie,” Valeria Lukyanova, who has more than one million “likes” on her Facebook Fan Page and more than 300,000 Instagram followers. The 31-year-old model has gone to the extreme by undergoing surgeries to help her achieve her Barbie look.
The two doll-like women have made their characters part of their identity. But have their obsessions gone too far?
I understand the culture of fandom and how people engage in these subcultures to find a sense of belonging. People can become fans for various reasons including for joining a community, for knowledge, and just for pure fun.
Fandoms can be a way for people to express themselves who might not identify with the social norms.
An example of this is the Furry Fandom, which is a subculture of people who dress up as fictional animal characters. There are Furry conventions that gather thousands of people who share the same interests.
The majority of Furries are either not heterosexual or religious or sometimes both. This shows that Furries have more in common than just dressing up as fictional animal characters.
A lot of them have the same values and beliefs, so partaking in these activities and joining these conventions can be a big part of these people’s lives.
But the Fury Fandom has had a bad image.
Some people use their Fury identity as a form of sexual expression. And for some people, being a Fury is a fetish.
But the majority of Furries do not use this fandom for these purposes.
According to a Salon article by Paula Young Lee, “…becoming a Fury offers a safe and liberating way to explore sexual identities, especially for marginalized individuals who might be sexually confused, neuro-atypical, physically disabled, or simply uncomfortable in their own skin.”
But overall, the Fury Fandom challenges social norms.
People like the Human Barbie and the Anime Girl are different kinds of fans compared to Furries, but both parties are different from typical western culture and challenge hegemonic ideologies.
A lot of people stereotype these kinds of people as “social misfits” and “intellectually immature,” but if this is what makes people happy, society should be accepting and not demeaning.
Just because someone is not like you, does not mean they are any less of a person.
Of course there are some health concerns with people like the Human Barbie, but this is an extreme example of fandom.
For people who are Twilight, Harry Potter and Hunger Games fans, it can be a fun and a healthy form of expression.
Being a fan can help people who have a difficult time finding a sense of belonging in the judgmental world that we live in.
