John: “I don’t ship anything I’m 28 lol”

A platoon of 28+ y/o white “fandom moms” on social media: *proceed to make his point for him*

Don’t get me wrong, I and other adult fans may like certain ships, but that’s it. We just like them. But there are ppl who base huge chunks of their life around ships. It’s not good at any age, but it gets less good the older you get. I beg yall to learn to just *like* things.

Like look, it’s ok and fine and good to like fiction and stuff a lot and to spend time talking about why and how much you like it with other people who feel the same way, but that’s not what fandom is anymore, if it ever was. It’s become a substitute for people’s social life, a

substitute for their *identity*. Not only is that unhealthy, it’s just plain childish. When you’re a kid (let’s say 12 like John mentioned, but this applies to older teens and young adults too), you’re still learning how to be a person. You’re learning what you like and how to

like it, you’re learning how you like spending your free time, and you’re building your identity. It’s easy for people in that stage of life latch onto fandom obsessions bc they’re essentially trying stuff out, seeing what kind of things they like to *choose* to do as they slowly

become adults and gain independence. If you really really like something, like a ship, it’s easy to make it part of your identity when you’re in the “try before you buy” stage of psychosocial development. It’s probably not healthy, depending on how involved you get, but it’s how

you learn, it’s how you grow. But people aren’t growing. They’re staying in this stage where they act like they have no identity, no life outside this little cyber bubble for too long after they should have some kind of life put together outside of fandom. There’s a certain point

where even if you don’t *know* who you are, you at least have your own little niche carved out in the world. Maybe it’s where you work, maybe you do theater as a hobby, maybe you’re active in local charities, maybe you go out with friends a lot, maybe you like spending time with

family, and probably any combination of the above and so, so much more. But if you’re an adult sitting online all the time, harassing real people and spamming companies and making internet spaces unbearable for people who happen to like or be involved in the same thing as you,

it’s not okay. Again, if you choose to spend a lot of time talking about fiction because it’s one of the things you like, but you’re able to distance yourself from it and you don’t spend your time in harassment campaigns and making gross, disturbing content, that’s fine. The

problem is when you become obsessed with arguing and harassing people in the name of a ship, a piece of fiction, and it gets to be a bigger problem the older and farther from your “try before you buy” identity stage you get.