Fandom Closet
| Synonyms: | |
| See also: | Real Life, Real Name, Outing |
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Fandom Closet is a term used by fans regarding the visibility of their fannish participation, interests, and creations.
This may be in respect to all fannish activities, or it may be used or referred to for certain types of fandom, such as those to do with a sexual focus.
Fans and Closets
Being in the fannish closet means keeping ones fannish life and activities a secret from non-fans.
The reasons for remaining "in the closet" or "coming out of the closet" vary. They are very personal and mostly deal with privacy, shame, the lack of desire to explain fandom to non-fans, freedom, and more. In 1990, a fan wrote:
... my husband, thinks K/S is warped, and I'm warped, too. He tolerates it, though. Even helped me on a plot, once. I devoutly hope the kids don't know. (None of their business, damn it!) Some of the people in my writer's workshop know, but they're a strange bunch, anyway. I do feel rather torn and defensive. I refuse to be ashamed of K/S, yet I work and go to church with people who would be horrified by it. [1]
Fandoms and Closets
The term can also be used to describe fandoms and their visibility. A fan in 2007 said: "There was a drawback to the movies, though. ST fandom started coming out of the closet, becoming a bit too mainstream for my taste. I like my fandoms underground." [2]
Criticism of the Term
Some fans are critical of the term and say it appropriates the language of the "gay movement" in a frivolous way.
Fan Comments
1992
How do you broach the topic of Slash to friends? What kind of reactions have you gotten? What about family? Do you hide your zines and/or artwork when certain people are coming over? (I've got a Blake/Avon illo I hide from my mother...but I did leave the Rolling Stone Red Hot Chili Peppers cover up on the bathroom wall last time she was here...she thought that was just fine.) [3]
1996
I do not want my family to find out I read and write slash - I love my parents dearly and they would be both shocked and disappointed at my interest in what would be to both of them, mere porn.
My sisters (who I also love dearly) would never let me live it down - they have tongues like razors and minds like steel traps and I couldn't stand the razzing.
Sorry for the cowardice but there you go. [4]
... I was talked into revealing a little bit of K/S to my mother.
[...]
"Oh," one of [my friends] said, "you should show [your fanart] to her. You've got nothing to be ashamed of." So I marched on over to my mother's house and bolstered my courage while I showed her some really normal, ordinary, fully-clothed Kirks and Spocks. Then I whipped out the old naked Kirk and Spock embracing. "So," I said after the long, painful pause. "This shows deep feeling."
[...]
"No," my mother said as she turned and walked up the stairs. "That's homosexual."
She never mentioned it again. I sure didn't. [5]
1998
... keeping K/S in a secret place close to [my] heart. That’s exactly how I also would like it — and how it usually is — if it were not for my husband who keeps wanting to out me.Don’t get me wrong, he is certainly not without his prejudices of K/S, as I believe most men are by nature (I did say most, not all) but he tells me that I shouldn’t be ashamed of K/S. I may agree with that in principal, but try having a nice straight couple over for dinner and having your husband merrily announce that he wants to show them photographs of Star Trek artwork that his wife does. (Can you feel the blood draining from my face?)
So of course my protestations are met with, “Oh come on! We’d love to see them!” They think I’m just being modest. So I go do the dishes or something.
Believe me, I would much rather keep K/S in that secret place close to my heart and it is completely a secret with my family (who only know “Star Trek drawings” and they really don’t know what Star Trek is) and the entire rest of the world except my printer who doesn’t say anything about it and neither do I. [6]
2023
... my little sister recently sent me a different YouTube video about that writeup (I think it was a dramatic reading or something) [on YouTube], having no idea it was written by me. She was like “haha, remember when you used to be really into Harry Potter? At least you weren’t as obsessed as these people!” And I just had to sit there and be like “lol, yeah, that’s so weird” as if my grown adult self didn’t spend an inordinate amount of time writing the original snapewives post. I felt like I was losing my mind. [7]
Meta
- Memories, Friends, and 8 x 10's: Harrison Ford Fandom, Observations from a Late Bloomer! (1983)
- The View from Down Here: A Look at Fans (1983)
- Fandom Closets - watch for falling shoes, Archived version by eibii at fanthropology (2005)
References
- ^ from The LOC Connection #22
- ^ Legacy Interview with Suzan Lovett
- ^ quoted anonymously with permission from Virgule-L (Nov 2, 1992)
- ^ quoted anonymously from Virgule-L (Nov 23, 1996)
- ^ from Come Together #29
- ^ from a 1998 issue of The K/S Press
- ^ r/Hobby Drama; archive link, comment by iwasonceafangirl (February 2023)