Talk:Ironic Distance

I don't think the warm fuzzy vs cold prickly debate is at all the same thing as ironic distance? --Kyuuketsukirui 20:36, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

I just read it, and I don't think so, either. I don't see anything ironic or distanced about it. --Arduinna 20:47, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Then we should remove the links to Coming Home and Take Clothes Off As Directed, because the mention of "ironic distance" in the Coming Home article is, I believe, what sparked the creation of this page in the first place. I added the link to Julad's meta as a convenient explanation for what I believe ironic distance means in that context.--Sinead 20:52, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Better phrasing--Julad's meta illustrates what I think is meant by the use of "ironic distance" in the Coming Home article. If we decide to remove the mentions of Coming Home and Julad's meta from this page, someone should probably also edit out the ironic distance wikilink on the Coming Home page as well, or possibly change the phrase to something else. --Sinead 21:00, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

I freely admit I have no clue what "ironic distance" actually means, but I don't see how "self-mockery" and "preferring understated emotions" are equivalent things, and I didn't get any sense at all from Julad's post that she was mocking herself or anyone else. If they are equivalent in some way, I think it needs to be explained more, because right now the connection isn't there. (Or if "ironic distance" is being used not as one specific thing but as an umbrella term to cover x, y, and maybe z, that should be clearer, too.) I never read either of the stories you mentioned -- all I'm going by here is what's on this page. --Arduinna 21:06, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Google to the rescue! I think this page actually sums it up quite well. Ironic distance is, in non-fandom terms, what makes a hipster a hipster. In fandom terms, I think ironic distance is most often seen with crackfic. Contrast stories from old school fandoms like the Pros, where ridiculous tropes are used completely and utterly in earnest, with the way such tropes are often used humorously now. --Kyuuketsukirui 21:20, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, THAT! Speaking as the person who contributed that part (it was a bit of a collaboration even before it hit the wiki), this is exactly what I was thinking of. Or to quote from the site you linked: Ironic distance is the device we use to appreciate something on an ironic level without really attaching ourselves to it. Your translation into fandom terms is very much what I had in mind and I thought it was obvious from the context (and because I've seen the phrase "ironic distance" several times in relation to crackfic): In fandom terms, I think ironic distance is most often seen with crackfic. Contrast stories from old school fandoms like the Pros, where ridiculous tropes are used completely and utterly in earnest, with the way such tropes are often used humorously now. "Coming Home" is very old skool in this regard. It actually has a whole page of author's notes that could be summarized as "I'm going there, okay? I'm really, really going there. Seriously. I'm going there!" The fact that these author's notes are even necessary shows how much the opposite approach is the norm by now. However, I have honestly no idea why "Take Clothes Off" or some of the other stuff is linked here and I'm not sure what the style debate has supposed to do with it (except for both most likely originating in popslash?). I mean, I can kind of see how the page titles in popslash might fit into this, but the rest? Um, if you think so... o_O --Doro 09:01, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Right. Xanthe's fics are absolutely the opposite of ironic distance, fully embracing those old school tropes for themselves. I think where people were getting confused is that they were thinking if Coming Home is not ironic distance, and Take Clothes Off is the opposite of Coming Home, then Take Clothes Off must be ironic distance. (But it's not. It's an entirely different sort of story altogether.) I assumed from comments here that that's what the Coming Home article was saying, since I did not go back to the article and see where it was used there. But looking at it now, it's obviously not being used in contrast with Take Clothes Off, but just about Coming Home vs fandom in general, so I don't see where it got so tangled up. D: --Kyuuketsukirui 09:25, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

They aren't equivalent. For fans, the term seems to have different meanings in different contexts, much like "fannish drift", or some of the other terms in the glossary. That's why I was careful to note that the term "ironic distance" is used by some fans to characterize a certain kind of writing, and that Julad herself didn't use the term, although her meta does, I think, explain what those fans mean by the term in that context. As I said, the explanation in this paragraph springs from the wikilink in the Coming Home article, and is simply to provide some context for that reference. If others don't think that this definition of "ironic distance" is an accurate one (I actually don't think it is, going by the dictionary or literary critical theory, but it seems to be a definition that has meaning for some fans, so perhaps this is a wiki admin sort of call), then it should be removed, along with the relevant links I noted above. I leave it in others' capable hands. *g* --Sinead 21:28, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

I think Sinead is right, the way we are using the term ironic distance is closer to what Julad talks about than it is the hipster concept that was mentioned. Some Fannish Drift has happened here, with the original meaning of the term being applied by a group of people to a particular type of writing (possibly their own), and other people not seeing what they meant and taking the term to mean something else. --rache 21:59, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Could a clearer explanation be added, then? (Or not, if no one else is bothered -- it could just be me, totally failing to get this.) To me, the sort of writing Julad is describing is the sort of thing that Dorinda writes -- very true to canonical interactions, but with an explicit slash bent that's loaded with emotional subtext for readers to latch onto -- and Dorinda is the least ironic, least distanced writer I know of. She's deeply rooted in her canon sources, and very sincere in her writing. So I'm seriously confused, here. Would something like The Buried Treasure Racket or Nom de Coeur be considered "ironic distance" stories? --Arduinna 22:22, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm. I see your point. Just muttering aloud a moment, my question is "How do Puppies In A Box, Lord King Bad, and "Take Clothes Off..." all related in a way that Xanthe's story lacks"? The Solution that Sinead proposed was "Xanthe's story is a warm fuzzy, and Helen's is a cold prickly", which is an explaination that makes sense to me, but if you throw in Dorinda's story as a cold prickly, it does not. Dorinda's story does lack ironic distance, however, which is part of the marker of "old school slash". So, yeah, what's going on here? Anyone got a clue? Is is just that "old school slash" isn't hip? --rache 22:33, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't see anything ironic or distanced about Take Clothes Off as Directed, either. (Can't speak for the fuzzy vs prickly thing, as I no matter how many times I read that essay, I utterly fail to get it. I think I just don't read either type of fic, so I have nothing to use for myself as examples.) --Kyuuketsukirui 22:42, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

I think that they don't all relate, which is why I think that there a couple of different definitions for this term, fannishly speaking. To put it very broadly, the popslash website titles and Lord King Bad (and crackfic, etc.) all relate, to a certain extent, in the way Cimness talks about in the first footnote--as kitsch, as ironic self-awareness, etc. The style differences between Take Clothes Off... and Coming Home are a completely different kettle of "ironic distance"--one that only has meaning for the fans who use the term in that specific way, to describe what they see as a certain fictional style. I'm not one of those fans, so I can't justify that use. I'm only trying to provide an explanation for what the style is. --Sinead 22:56, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Seperis is the one who wrote the page about Coming Home, so maybe we should ask her rather than flailing about ourselves trying to guess what she meant? XD --Kyuuketsukirui 23:02, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Well, yes, but I collaborated with someone else. The bulk of it was written and sent to me for editing, since the writer wasn't entirely sure about her language skills, so I edited it and posted it, then went back a couple of times to fix for language. I can tell you why I left it there and agreed, though, if its still needed, and I do think it needs the wikilink on Xanthe's page. --Seperis 18:49, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Nope, Doro clarified. (And had I gone back to read the article myself instead of relying on what people were saying here about it, I wouldn't have been confused in the first place. *sigh* Coming Home is perfectly clear and I agree wholeheartedly with the usage there. --Kyuuketsukirui 20:56, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Okay, I took out the entire reference to the cold fuzzy vs warm prickly debate, as that seems completely irrelevant, both from discussion here and from going to read the Coming Home page again myself, which clearly I should have done before. Also took out reference to Take Clothes Off, as it has nothing to do with ironic distance. I left in the link to Coming Home for the moment, but I'm not sure we need individual fics in the "see also" section. (For one thing, they make it kind of crowded up there.) --Kyuuketsukirui 09:29, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Okay, since the definition of ironic distance that we have no longer seems to have any relevance to the reference in the Coming Home article, I've removed its link, and also the wikilink to this page that was there. --Sinead 16:07, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't get it. The definition of ironic distance now has more to do with the reference in the Coming Home article than before. Why remove it?--Doro 17:59, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Essentially, there are two types of ironic distance in fandom, and it was the second definition that applied to Coming Home. When that definition was removed, this entry was no longer pertinent. --rache 18:10, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Um, the part that was removed was the style discussion and *that* didn't have anything to do with the Coming Home article. See my comment above, where I reply to Kyuuketsukirui. --Doro 18:14, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Oh, I saw. I just didn't agree. The style part was a piece of why the fandom blew up around the two stories, and without that as a part of the context of ironic distance, the term just doesn't apply. --rache 18:18, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

The style part was a piece of why the fandom blew up around the two stories, That might be, but I wasn't talking about the other story or comparing them or whatever when I used the phrase "ironic distance", I was talking about "Coming Home". The part where I said Going against a trend sometimes described as "ironic distance" in fanfiction didn't have *anything* to do with "Take Clothing Off", it was about the story that won in the romance category of the Stargate Fan Awards and I was giving some context as to what the appeal might be.--Doro 18:31, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Okay, now that confuses me. I don't know what this discussion has to do with the romance category of the Stargate Fan Awards, as what I have been talking about has to do with the comparison/contrast discussion between "take clothes off..." and "coming home." So it sounds like we're coming at this from two different perspectives, which, again, leads me to thing there are two different definitions. One is the more classic definition currently on the page, and one is a fannish shorthand for the stylistic differences between the two stories. --rache 18:42, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

I think what she means is: she was talking *strictly* about "Coming Home" -- not about the other story, ever, in any way, just about "Coming Home", which *on its own*, when it was written, was bucking the trend of ironic distance, in that the story was utterly sincere in its embrace of its tropes, and specifically not trying to be ironic about it. From what I understand, Doro is absolutely using the "self-mockery" definition of "ironic distance" throughout this conversation. The problem is that somewhere along the line, the "Take Clothing Off" story got brought into the mix by someone, which had absolutely nothing to do with what Doro was saying. The discussion has nothing to do with the romance awards per se; she mentioned that just to try to emphasize that she was simply and solely talking about "Coming Home" and its non-ironic tropes. --Arduinna 18:59, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

YES, thank you. :) --Doro 19:04, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Ah, I see. Then I am the person that went off on the tangent, as all I know about ironic tropes I learned from Helenish and popslash, famous for Ironic Distance. Which then leads me to "take clothes off as directed," and the confusion about if that phrase was then a reference to the other story and how that might work. So all of this discussion is just a result of my oddly wired brain, and really, I'm sorry about that. --rache 19:05, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

some 2023 thoughts

This page reads like a jargon-laden, private conversation among BNF SGA fans. It needs more context and broader relevance. MPH 19:58, 27 June 2023 (UTC)

It needs some examples. It needs some dates and context. The first sentence is very confusing. MPH 12:12, 28 June 2023 (UTC)