nike_victory Being an asexual slasher. I identify as asexual, and I do know for a fact that I'm not the only asexual slasher out there. As asexual, I don't find myself sexually attracted to anyone. Asexuals can be physically or romantically attracted. Indeed, I identify as hetero-attracted and aromantic - in other words, I prefer men to women when it comes to physical aesthetics and tend to crush on men (which tends to be an intellectual attraction), and I'm not any more interested in a romantic relationship than I am attracted to anyone of any sex.

sexonastick Untitled The word "femmeslash" is fucking ridiculous. Absolutely fucking ridiculous. It is "femslash" meaning female slash, meaning slash without dicks. It is not "femmeslash" meaning necessarily femme, or feminine slash. I don't write particularly feminine slash, okay? I don't know a lot of people who do. If you do, that's fine, and you can even call it that, but most fic with chicks hooking up (or even lusting from afar or just eyeing each other, whatever) doesn't fit into that incredibly narrow category.

viciouswishes My Giant Vagina Hates You - Once again, we have Why (M/M) Slash is superior with all its brilliant writers. This is the second time in four months that I've read this argument, and this time, it was posted in a community, so fair game.

junediamanti A Brief History of Fandom Wankage - Older than you think - Long, long ago, the planet cooled, clouds formed and oceans were created. In fact there was one big primeval ocean. Into this early biological soup life came, mostly in the form of single-celled organisms.
There was a fandom, believe it or not; it was called the Single-celled Organism fandom (inventive names was not their long suit), sometimes erroneously referred to as the Amoeba fandom by fandom historians...

xochiquetzl - Canon Ship vs. Slash Wars The argument seems to me to be about the very definition of shipping, and the relationship fans should have to canon. Does "ship" mean "a pairing I like to read and write," or does it mean "a pairing supported by the canon that I hope someday to see validated in canon"?

shiv5468 Fandom Multiculturalism Just because you like blonds, it doesn’t mean your friend has to like brunets, and vice versa. After all, some blonds are plug ugly, and some brunets are a bit smelly. Who amongst us hasn’t got a bit of a straying eye for a top class piece of totty that happens to be of the wrong hair colour from time to time – why can’t we get together in a spirit of fandom love and all perve on arses?

Specific Fandom Meta

lunacy [woeeee...! or, H/D ITSELF IS NOT CRACK!!1] Crackfic or not, I just don't want the fanon bits to feel... desultory, like tossed-off little pseudo-reasons for things. Like, insane things (Draco sprouts wings!) are actually much more acceptable to me than too-sudden mundane things (Draco's suddenly become a much better wizard than Harry!)

liviapenn Stop knocking down Phoebe You know what paragraph I'm kind of tired of?
The "knocking down Phoebe" paragraph. IE, the totally unnecessary paragraph in the story where the POV character thinks about all the other characters that the author doesn't want to pair him with, and one by one lists all the reasons why they're completely unsuitable.

On Reading and Writing

expositionary why are you in fandom? I've noticed that a lot of fic writers don't [write original fiction], and that puzzles me a little. Original fiction has always been it, for me; ever since I was young I've wanted to write for a living. Fic is a side project, something that hones my writing skills. I'm of the opinion that one can learn almost all -- if not all, but that's an issue for another time -- aspects of writing by writing fic; but fic is unpublishable, unless you happen to enjoy expensive lawsuits, so eventually my plan is to move on to creating my own worlds.

pinkdormouse Writing Sex and Relationships I tried reading outside my usual comfort zones a few times recently and found a few things that irked me, and a few that impressed me. That got me thinking, and so I thought I'd share my thoughts with the floor. Thus, my rules for writing sex and, following on from that, relationships in general: either PWPs/vignettes or pivotal scenes within a longer story.

gwendolen present-past What is it with fanfic and present tense?
I used to write everything in past tense, I felt most comfortable with that tense, but lately I'm catching myself more and more tinkering around with present tense. While it's never wrong to experiment with new styles and forms I wonder where it comes from.

mechaieh - .02 on authorial (and authoritarial) respect Although I am myself a writer, I confess to being baffled by those insist that original authorial intent is paramount and must be treated as sacred at all times. Some creators themselves subscribe to this approach (i.e., there is only one way this story should be told, and there is only one correct way to read it), and I've sometimes felt their pain (readers who automatically equate narrative with autobiography are my particular bane), but I ultimately regard this worldview as somewhat humorless and naive.

sparkly_stuff - Canon Ships & Authorial Intent So the big fandom argument is, who is RIGHT, and who is WRONG? The only answer: JKR is right. It's her world, she created it. The rest of us are just making shit up to suit our fancies.