I haven’t written about OFMD in a while, but some events that transpired recently have come to my attention and left me completely disgusted with the fandom right now (on Twitter, at least). It is for these reasons that I felt the need to write this post.
(CW: Mention of rape/sexual assault ahead.)
For those who don’t know what happened, the basic gist is that Steve Wrigley--a friend of Rhys Darby and his wife, Rosie Carnahan--wrote a tweet about finding RPFs and wanting to read them out loud on a livestream. Rosie responded to the tweet expressing her discomfort at the idea, and then responded a second time, in which she described RPF as being “creepy and rapey”:
While Rosie did follow up with another tweet saying that RPF “doesn’t really bother” her (seemingly contradicting her previous statement), the floodgates were already open. Almost immediately, the anti-RPF crowd seized on this, removing Rosie’s words from any discernible context and using them as a cudgel to attack, harass, and belittle RPF writers and readers.
As the tweet has passed through various fandom channels, one of the chief complaints that I’ve seen is someone “showed” Rosie RPF, the implication being that it was an RPF author who sent one of their works to her. In actuality, as we see above, it was this “friend” (who is really no friend at all if they would do something like this, IMO) who mentioned RPF and brought it to Rosie’s attention, not the fic writers. Logically, this makes sense, because no RPF writer (insofar as I know) wants their work shared with the person it’s about or their family members.
I briefly touched on this in this post from the other day, about the abhorrent RPF-themed TV show being developed by Channel 4, but I actually had this happen to me ten or so years ago, when I was in another fandom. One of my fics was stolen and shared with the people it was about, without my permission or knowledge. So to see this Steve guy attempt to mock RPF, use as it entertainment, and--possibly worst of all--to make people deliberately uncomfortable with it is despicable, and unfortunately, this was further compounded by Rosie’s comment.
Calling RPF “rapey” is completely inappropriate and honestly a slap in the face, both to victims/survivors of sexual assault, and fic writers. Rosie’s feelings of discomfort are absolutely valid, and while I do understand that she was perhaps attempting to convey the sense of violation that the fics make her feel, equating a piece of fiction with one of the worst ordeals that a human being can go through is appalling. To me, it minimizes the experience of victims/survivors, both by the context of the statement and the flippant wording itself. And there is nothing that justifies or excuses that.
In addition, Rosie’s follow-up comment made mention of “thinking about the children” who might find RPF online. This is an old argument that seems to resurface again every few years, and while I understand the concern, it is actually quite difficult to find RPF on AO3 without going through several different pages, filters, etc. to get there. Authors of RPF (myself included) also place multiple warnings, disclaimers, and tags on the fics as an additional safeguard...but beyond that, it is ultimately the responsibility of parents to monitor what their kids are looking at online.
Another thing that has truly bothered me about all this is that some fans are using Rosie’s comments to paint all RPF with the same brush. It’s not “OFMD RPF is bad,” it’s “All RPF is bad, it makes all of the actors uncomfortable,” etc., fully failing to take into account that this is not necessarily the case.
I am mainly part of the Good Omens fandom, so the RPF I’ve written is for that. For those unfamiliar, we are talking about a fandom in which one of the actors (Michael Sheen) has vehemently defended fanfic, has most likely read RPF, possibly written it, and probably gotten off on it. He also said this when talking about fanfic on the Graham Norton Show last December:
Even with all of this being the case, I will again emphasize that my number one cardinal rule of writing RPF is to never send it or show it to the people it’s about. Michael might be wildly enthusiastic when it come to fic, but the same goes for him, because that is crossing a line. And if he wants to read RPF, he very obviously knows where and how to find it, bless him.
Fandoms are what fandoms are, and I have seen this happen time and again. But the folks attacking and clutching metaphorical pearls over RPF do not have the moral high ground they think they do. In all of this, I have seen the rush to agree with Rosie and lambaste RPF and RPF authors...but curiously, what I haven’t seen is anyone mention how Rhys (or Taika) feels about RPF. Not once. And I just find it strange that that seems to be so absent from the conversation.
So those are my thoughts on the situation. The discourse around RPF has reached a fever pitch, between the Channel 4 show and now this incident. I just hope from here on out we can stop policing the fandom experiences of others and remember that we are all fans of the same show, co-captains of the same vessel, and that the more we fight each other, the more likely it is that ship will sink and take us down with it.
44 notes
·
View notes
I forgot the name, but the fic where Graham is dancing with his mom?
The last notes of the song reverberated in the throne room rafters. The whirling crowd stopped to applaud the music. The bards, tucked into the benches usually meant for the royal counsellors during the sessions, licked their fingers and flipped through sheet music, or snuck a draught of wine before the next set. But Rosie Cracker didn’t let go of her boy, and he didn’t even break eye contact when the music stopped. Their feet went on dancing – just shuffling, really – through into the next song.
Something tickled the corners of her eyes. She blinked it away fiercely before she could even tell if it were tears, and if so happy or sad. Neither suited tonight. They’d only concern Graham and make him stop dancing. Nothing was going to cut short her dance with the king.
“You could live here, you know.”
“Live here?” It took Rosie a moment to get her mind’s feet planted back on the ground and process what he said. “What, in the palace?” She smiled and shook her head. “No, no. I remember what it’s like setting up house the first time. You don’t want your old mom looking over your shoulder the whole time you’re trying to rule.”
Graham lifted his hand to send her for a turn. “I don’t see a problem.”
Rosie considered as she passed under the arch of his arm. She knew his smiles too well. This was the lopsided one with the faraway eyes. It meant something bigger than he was giving voice to, something he’d turned over too many times, most likely, and struck himself self conscious about saying more. Hereward had the exact same tell, right down to the tiniest crook of the mouth. (How did that work? Graham barely even remembered his father.) “Go on,” she said, closing the turn and wrapping her hand round his shoulder again.
As always, “go on” had the power to open the floodgates. The farawayness replaced itself with an eager light. “See, I was thinking, there’s this enormous royal suite on the second floor. Like, at least a dozen bedrooms. Some of the old kings of Daventry had huge families, I guess. And this gigantic, enchanted bathtub sunk into the floor, with a crystal ceiling that looks up into the firefly shelter. But anyway, I was thinking about you and the girls – and I guess Ginger would want Peter to come, obviously.”
Graham’s dancing sped up. She doubted he realized it. “So, I went in there with a measuring tape one day,” he continued, “and I kind of had to eyeball some things, and work from memory for the comparison, but. But. I think that if you put together the master bedroom, three of the other bedrooms, and the sunroom, you’d have around the floorspace of our house back home in Llewdor. And, oh,” he floundered, then caught the thread of it again. “This is dumb, but hear me out. If you knocked out a bunch of the walls and put a few new ones in, and brought in a lot of stones for the hearth, and tore out the marble floor at one end and replaced it all with wood slats, you could, um, make a pretty good recreation of the farmhouse. And I mean, you made half our furniture yourself. We have some good carpenters in Daventry. You could just tell them how to make the furniture and, and…” The excitement trailed off, replaced by awkwardness. Graham turned red as his cloak in a single moment. “A bit much, right?”
Could your heart both sink and jump at the same time? Rosie cleared her throat. “Graham,” she said. “Did you already start knocking out those walls?”
“Just one,” he said at half volume. “Things got slowed down because of the coronation.”
“Oh, sweetie.” She laughed and stopped dancing, pulling him into a hug. “Were you hoping to get it all done before we came?”
“It seemed like a good idea until about a minute ago.” Graham muttered, stepping back out of the hug and looking at the floor. “Now I say it out loud… I mean, I have had to say it out loud a lot. It just didn’t quite sound this way when I told Number One to give the orders. He knew it was a bit much. I should have listened.”
The band struck up a popular folk dance – the bell dance, Rosie thought it was called – and somehow there was both an exodus and a rush for the dance floor simultaneously. Graham offered his arm to escort her back to her seat, prodding uncomfortably at his crown with the other hand.
“Graham,” said Rosie, pushing the arm away and ducking her head about to try to meet his gaze. “You wanted to make us comfortable. Your first days on the throne, and you use it to try to be sure we feel at home? That says a lot about you. I’d guess everyone does something outlandish the moment they get a smidgen of power, and if this is what you do, fair.”
Graham looked up again, still blushing profusely but clearing up a little.
“Do you want to keep dancing?”
“Um, Number Three ran out of time to practice with me before I could get my head around the steps of this one. How about going up to the gallery? There are seats up there.”
They wormed their way through the crowd at the periphery and up a curlicue staircase. Rosie noticed a guard in formal regalia with a hurricane of a hairdo falling in step behind them. Rosie had to stop herself from shooing her off. But of course it had to be this way. From now on her son would seldom be alone. She hoped it wouldn’t drive him mad. But then again, he’d always been more on the people-loving end than she. Maybe he’d thrive. Maybe it’d be the guard who’d be driven mad, she thought fondly.
The gallery ran the length of the throne room wall, but was so narrow Rosie didn’t like to think how inconvenient it would be to have people sitting along the equally long bench. Imagine being stuck at the end near the wall, and having to get up and climb over everyone’s legs for about a mile! She and Graham didn’t sit, however. They leaned their elbows against the stone railing and looked down at the rows of dancers.
“It doesn’t look as crowded from up here, does it?” said Rosie.
Graham shook his head. “There were a lot of no-shows.”
“One day they’ll all be flocking here like chickens when they see you’ve got a corncob.”
He smiled. “It feels so normal to have you here. When you came to visit me at the Academy, that felt weird. It was great. But it felt like worlds overlapping. But I could imagine you belonging here, Mom.”
Rosie stared across the way at the decorations. Over the purple glowing mirror hung a tapestry worked in yellow and brown, festooned with funeral lilies. But the rest of the hall was decked out in the newly royal scarlet and blue. How funny that colours she’d picked out for her son’s clothes a few years ago had become his official crest colours. At the ceremony earlier the head acolyte had read aloud a piece about the symbolism of the colours. Red for magnificence and sacrifice. Blue for constancy and wisdom. She hadn’t laughed. She knew Graham would live up to every one of them. But it had been a different story when she’d pulled together those trousers he’d come to the tournament in, and whipped up that cape with scissors and a bit of thread. Red because it had been a bargain. Blue because she knew the dyer and trusted her. All glory grew from something homey.
Graham sighed. “I could imagine all of you belonging here. Even without the whole farmhouse thing. You could live anywhere you liked. Even in the town, or up on the mountain pass.”
Rosie turned on one elbow to face him. “Well, it would be wonderful to be close to you, of course. Tell me, Graham. Is this something important to you?”
“I don’t know. I mean, my family is important to me.”
“But us being right here on your doorstep? Is that for us or for you?”
At last he looked directly at her. “I don’t want to abandon – no. Abandon’s not the right word.” He paused, clearly sifting through half a dozen possible next sentences. Rosie pushed away the ever-present urge to interrupt. “Now that I’m king, I can do so much more than send you a few scraps of gold now and then. Ever since we set a date for the coronation, it’s like I’ve had a magic wish burning in my back pocket. Or more like I’m a wish granter, I guess. A genie, or something. I need to do something for you and the girls. If you were here I could snap my fingers and give you whatever you liked.”
Something that sounded like a pointed throat-clearing was heard. Graham and Rosie both turned to look, but the frizzy guard was standing perfectly to attention with her back to them. Graham rolled his eyes, and leant back over the balcony.
“But you’re in Llewdor,” he said, “and my commands can’t do much for you. It’s driving me crazy. You’ve done so much for me, and now when I want to –“
“Provide? Protect?”
“Yeah – when I want to, I can’t.”
Rosie put an encouraging hand on his back. “You’re not feeling guilty over it, are you? You know you don’t owe us anything?”
“No,” said Graham, “But I want to.”
Rosie let the silence hang a moment, just in case he needed to say more. Although, who was she kidding? When she wanted to talk, a single second felt like ten minutes. “Remember when Anisette ran away to sea?”
“Uh huh.”
“I don’t know how well you remember, but I had Father Oates write her that letter of introduction to the captain of the Quicksilver. He was certain she’d get a position onboard if he recommended her. What did she do with that letter?”
“She tore it up and threw it in the ocean,” said Graham mechanically. He knew the story too well. It was pulled out at every holiday and gathering with friends.
Rosie pressed on. “Why did she do that?”
“She wanted to make her own way.”
“And when you broke your training blade at the Academy, and you entered that competition to win the mayor’s golden sword instead? You nearly lost both your hands to that ghoul. Why didn’t you just let me buy you a new sword when I offered?”
Graham smiled at her sidewise. “I wanted to see if I could win it.”
“On your own merit. Anyway, you know all the stories. You and your sisters always insist on earning your own happy endings. Not because you’re proud, but because you love it. Where do you think you got that?” She nudged him in the side before he could reply. “ I’ll give you a hint – it wasn’t from your dad. He was a can-do sort, but acts of service was his love language, and that man would melt if anyone even hinted they wanted to do him a favour.”
“Point taken.” Graham took a deep breath, and looked on the verge of letting his own words start spilling again. Instead he swallowed, and said, “Go on.”
“You parrot, you learn too well,” laughed Rosie. “Graham, our farm is my adventure. We washed up in Llewdor with nothing, and we carved out a home. And I’m not done with it. You don’t know half of the things I’m going to get up to now that we’ve got Ginger married off and you, er, kinged off, and Anisette pirated off-”
“Pretty sure Guy would say she’s not technically a pirate,” Graham interjected.
“Whatever.” She permitted her mischievous grin to escape. “Maddie and I have got schemes now that you’ve all cleared out. That house is my legacy. You know how important that is to me, legacy.”
“I know.”
“And if you sweep in with that big generous heart of yours and make it all easy,” said Rosie, letting her words slow for emphasis, “it won’t be the same. I love that it’s your first impulse. But you want to protect me? Protect my chance to see this adventure through myself. And your sisters – ask them, if you like. But we’re all cut from the same cloth, and I can guess what they’ll say. We’ve got hope and gumption to spare, lad. And this Daventry you’ve been given… doesn’t. Not enough anyhow. It needs yours. Don’t make me a house. Make your subjects a proper kingdom.”
The bards below struck up a wild waltz, almost too fast to dance to unless you threw technique to the wind. In the midst of the dance floor, Rosie could pick out Madeline spinning about like a windmill, arms over her head, careening about dizzily. Graham seemed to have spotted her too, as he pointed a finger and chuckled.
“I’ll ask them, then,” he said. “But that actually clears up a lot. And maybe gives me something to do with these wishes burning a hole in my pocket.”
“Good,” said Rosie.
“Do you want to go down and dance some more?”
Rosie shook her head. “Give Maddie a turn. She looks like she’s dying to dance this one, and I don’t have the wind I used to. Here – wait.” She caught his arm before he could make to descend. “Just to be clear, Graham. If there’s more to it than what you’ve told me, I’m your mother. I’m here for you. I don’t want to overstep your life, but – is any part of it because you’re homesick?”
Ah – there was the smile she was waiting for. The “we’ve had a talk and now all is well” smile. “I miss you all. Of course I do. But looking at it from all angles, I think we’d all get more out of me sneaking off to visit you all once in a while than uprooting you and plunking you down here.”
Rosie nodded. “Good. And you know if you ever need me, I’ll come.”
Graham rubbed his hands. “Right. Sure hope Maddie isn’t out of breath from all that spinning. I begin o the right foot for the waltz, right, Roberta?”
The guard with her back to them glanced over her shoulder. “The left, sire. The gentleman always starts on the left if the dance has a ballroom hold.”
“Got it.” Graham grinned and turned to descend the steps. “You coming, Mom?”
“I want to watch you dance from up here.”
The formal regalia and friendship between Guybrush and Graham are @captmickey's.
7 notes
·
View notes