Talk:Fan Theory

It'd be useful to include a longer list of theories, even if they don't yet have pages on Fanlore. Would it be a good idea to (eventually) start a Fan Theories category or do they not fall under Fanlore's scope? -- Baycitybomber (talk) 19:22, 15 February 2018 (UTC)

I'd think they certainly do, and a fan theories category/subcategory would be a good addition. In the meantime, I added a few more to the list of examples. - Fandomgeographies (talk) 19:36, 3 June 2018 (UTC)

So, I started a section for responses to fan theories from creators & critics, added some info re: the Westworld season 2 Reddit "spoiler" video...and it got kind of long! I'm thinking that'll need its own page, but I'm going to leave the info here for now and work on a new page soon. If anyone feels up to moving it sooner, go for it! - Fandomgeographies (talk) 19:36, 3 June 2018 (UTC)

Problem?

Problem: Currently this page suggests that a tinhat theory is not a fan theory, but all the Larry Is Real pages refer to larrie theories as fan theories, and the Fan Theories category includes several larrie pages: 369, Babygate, Larry Is Real, Rainbow Bondage Bear. Also the general pages Tinhat and Tinhats and the Fourth Wall. I think this is actually a problem with whether the term fan theories can be owned by FPF fandoms or can include RPF: "theories" in RPF fandoms are speculation about the real world, whereas "theories" in FPF fandoms are usually a kind of literary criticism where there is no wrong answer. With the notable exception of The Johnlock Conspiracy, a theory about an FPF canon creator's intentions and actions. There's an unanswered question on Category talk:Fan Theories about whether RPF should be included.--aethel (talk) 14:59, 26 December 2021 (UTC)

I always considered a fan theory to be a theory created by fans, and IMO theories about real life people can be a sub-section of that. Is the issue here that people who are non-believers use the term tinhat, but people engaged with "tinhat conspiracies" use the term fan theory? If fan theory is the term employed by the people engaging in these activities then I do think the pages for specific tinhat theories belong in Category:Fan Theory - because that is the term used by the fans. But if that is the case, this page and the tinhat page should be fleshed out to make it clear that one fan's tinhat conspiracy can another fan's fan theory. I'm just not 100% sure if that is the case... --Auntags (talk) 23:28, 27 December 2021 (UTC)

It's specifically larries who don't use the word tinhat; tinhats in other fandoms don't seem to have the same talking points about it being offensive. For example, Word of Honor tinhats apparently call(ed) themselves tinhats. I think fan theory is just a descriptive substitution that larries who edit Fanlore made. I've seen larries talk about "theories", but I've never seen the term "fan theory" when I was researching 1D fanlore pages. I searched twitter just now, and I did get some results for "larry" + "fan theories", but most of those tweets are by non-larries or non-fans. I don't think it's the most common way to describe them. "Larry theories" or "Larrie theories" seems more common.--aethel (talk) 20:02, 21 November 2022 (UTC)