Terrible Rick and Morty Fans Demonstrate How Not to Be a Fan
Why does everyone hate Rick and Morty fans? This question spawned two huge threads on Rick and Morty ‘s fan site known as Reddit. A Twitter search for “Rick and Morty fans” reveals that yes, many people hate them, calling them disgusting and elitist.
There are two answers:
- Some of Rick and Morty’s fans are annoying.
- Some of Rick and Morty’s fans are violent.
None of these issues are unique to Rick & Morty . And it might even be easy not to be a fan of both. Here’s what to avoid.
Do not bother
To some extent, any fan of something popular will be a little annoying to a non-fan. If you don’t watch Game of Thrones or Arrested Development , or listen to One Direction or Beyoncé, or read David Foster Wallace or Harry Potter , you will understand. But in all these cases, it is the extreme fans who really spoil everyone else’s life.
If you are a good fan, you want everyone to like what you like. (If you don’t, then more on you below.) So, here are some tips on how to behave in public so as not to drive everyone else away.
- Don’t act like your fandom object is better than Shakespeare. Damn it maybe! A Midsummer Night’s Dream is overrated. But you are setting an impossible bar for achieving this goal, and when someone finally tries it, they will be disappointed. This is why they don’t want to listen to you – they know that you put this thing too high, which is why you destroyed your credibility.
- Don’t focus your entire life on one cultural subject until your identity becomes indistinguishable from it. Think twice before making characters your avatar and pseudonym, or comparing absolutely everything to this single cultural element. Love it, recommend it, point out all the virtues, but don’t let it take over. Because what is left of you when this thing is gone? What kind of life is consumption? If you have invested too much in your loved one, you value it more than other people, and you will start doing abusive behavior in the second half of this post.
- Think critically about which character you are comparing yourself to. Do other characters think this character is a jerk? Are you trying to imitate even their shortcomings? Do you think you “love” this character more than the creator? These are all red flags!
- Cunning phrases are sometimes food. You don’t need to shout “Pickle Riiik!” in YouTube comments like football chants; you don’t need to wedge it into every remote conversation. It’s like setting your favorite song as your morning alarm; it destroys magic. Wed “Cake is a lie”, “I raised the arrow to my knee” and ending the sentences with the words “… bitch!”
- Don’t yell at people for not liking what you like. Don’t tell them that they are too stupid to like it. It’s the fandom equivalent of “You’re just jealous!”
Don’t be offensive
Much worse than annoying fans, although they often oppose them, elite fans. They also love their favorites too much, but instead of sending this love to as many people as possible, they try to hoard it for themselves, insisting that other people, including those who make it, don’t deserve to join the fandom. …
While the above conversation was likely fictional (to impress who?), Fans often “test” other fans, and this is in the vast majority of cases male assault on a woman. Baseball fan Megan Brown once famously scolded some dick from a dating app who wanted to see if a woman could really be a fan of sports, my God.
It is no coincidence that this behavior is mainly committed by men in relation to women. Why would you choose women to “test” if you don’t believe that women are inherently less capable of enjoying things? And why do you believe this if you do not believe that women are less human ?
The most despicable is that the behavior reminiscent of sexist and stupid violence against actress “Breaking Bad” Anna Gunn , some fans’ Rick and Morty “haunted-writers women’s series, threatening them personally, accusing them of being” spoiled ” show. Things got so bad that the Reddit moderator who worked on the show went public about it in detail .
The moderator was greeted by many decent fans. As with most fandoms, the overwhelming majority of Rick and Morty viewers are decent people, pissed off that some moron makes them all look bad.
Dan Harmon, one of the show’s creators, also drew attention to the offending fans :
These are pens that want to protect the content they think they own and somehow combine that with their need to be proud of what they have, which is often just their race or gender. As someone who was born male and white and still works harder than them, it’s insulting that there is some white male [fan] who is trying to promote some creepy agenda by “defending” my work. I did not hide the fact that I hate these people. It sucks.
He noted that not only was it “disgusting”, it was also stupid: fans thought that if a writer was credited with creating a series, then somehow she was the only one working on it. But Harmon says, “I want to yell into my computer, ‘You idiots, we’re all writing the show together ! “”
Don’t be that guy. Don’t be overwhelmed because you like something, as if you think it belongs to you. You do not do; the person who made it owns it, and when they see that you are trying to accumulate the pleasure that is theirs to bestow upon them, they will slay you with fierce revenge. They will point you in front of everyone and show you how little you really know what you “defended.”
When you cringe at pesky fans, don’t overuse them. Calmly ignore them or direct them towards the light. Work under the assumption that they really enjoy the show and just don’t realize how deep the conversation can be. Treat them as your allies. But remember, they probably don’t want to be “educated.” After all, if any of the above describes you, you really hated this little lecture, didn’t you?