Grin and Share It

The internet is frustrating.

I could leave it entirely at that. I could go on, and I will, as clearly something is motivating me to go on if I'm to make a post to begin with, but I can just as easily point back to these introductory four words and use them as my hypothesis, evidence, and closing.

But, like the internet, that would be frustrating, and again play into my thesis, so I won't.

This particular essay comes to you on the thought of the internet's relationship with art. Specifically, and perhaps nichely, cartoons.

While it's not particularly new or exclusive to the internet, there is a maddening community of cartoon fans online who seem to spend most of their time proselytizing and arguing about their opinions--subjectivities painted as objectivities--and slamming and slinging assumptions, rather than actually talking about the cartoon itself.

Likewise, this is not exclusive to cartoons, either. You could substitute cartoons with any other noun and likely come up with the same result.

But to curb my fluffy waffling: I make this post to kvetch about how it doesn't have to be this way.

I think about a certain animation blog I stumbled unto as a teenager which, like it or not, is why I'm coming to you from my own animation blog. It's not as though I didn't learn anything from it--even if I found myself unlearning and fact-checking that information years down the line, realizing these objectivities were again subjectivities and, even so, often blatantly incorrect. The power of thinking and experiencing for yourself, rather than using someone else's thoughts, words, and experiences as a substitute for your own, certainly comes in handy.

This blog taught me a lot, and it taught dozens of other people, too. It still does. I masochistically take a peek on Twitter and instantly recognize the same reactionary opinions and thoughts and mindsets regurgitated from this blog. Often from young, impressionable cartoon fans. Instead of feeling excitement for their stoked passions, I feel wary and pitiful. I find myself hoping that they'll "snap out of it" and experience these cartoons and passions for themselves, rather than filtered through someone else.

I say all of this because this particular influence has sewn a culture of division and vitriol and snark, rather than genuinely upholding a genuine passion. The likes of Huckleberry Hound become a life or death "us vs. them" diaspora. Praise of a certain creator or cartoon or piece of art is usually followed by or in response to putting someone or something else down in the same breath. You can't discuss the artistic genius of 60 year old rubber bath toys without talking about how the libs have ruined toys and cartoons and everything you treasure, so join me in my bunker of cartoon bath ephemera because that's the only way you'll be safe from "them". Who's "them"? Well, you asking that just made you one of them. Congrats, buddy. Now you're an enemy to humanity.

Clearly this is garbled hyperbole and generalization. Perhaps ironic, considering a big goal of this post is to vent my own frustrations against this very phenomenon. But my warped, twisted point is: art is seen as a competition. Fandom is a competition. You have to be the best artist. You have to know the most. You have to watch the most. You have to speak up for this creator the most. You have to come out on top. You have to beat that moron who disagrees with you to the ground. You have to spend hours and hours of your time arguing about cartoons you only ever spent 3 minutes skimming, if even that, because you don't have anyone to argue with or slander and that's boring. Cartoons are only as worthwhile as how much you can argue about them.

This, again, is not unique to cartoons. I'm essentially discussing the entirety of the internet as a whole--but that, too, is a gross generalization, as despite my kvetching I do believe the internet and its people can be good.

A few bad apples spoil the bunch, essentially.

This has accidentally veered into a personal spill-all-your-guts tell-all, but it's the best way I can harken back to my point, so do bear with me. I've been particularly fatigued with this phenomenon as of late and have felt myself more beaten down by it than ever before. These same cartoon fans who I've never once interacted with decry me as a "whiny faggot". Others tell me to die and call me insufferable and "retarded" for expressing my thoughts on--you guessed it--Looney Tunes: Back in Action, the cinematic classic with such beloved lines as "Nerd alert" and "Well that just happened". I attract waves of strangers who also enjoy calling for my head to be on a pike for working on SpongeBob, the show with the unflappably optimistic and kindhearted main character.

The internet will internet. I'm told I shouldn't let it get me down, because that's just how the internet is. And there's certainly a shrapnel of truth to that--I'm much better of focusing on the copius amount of love and support I do receive.

But why? Who says that we have to settle for this because that's the way it is? Why do we have to settle for this? Who is enforcing this?

They say not to worry and to ignore. I understand. But what if I don't want to? I don't expect to go up to every random stranger who has ever said one remotely negative thing in my vicinity, because people are entitled to their opinions. I don't like being called a whiny faggot because of my cartoondom, nor do I agree with it, but that's their opinion, just as it's my opinion that I find it disappointing.

I want to know what compels people to say these things. Nobody came out of the womb talking about how much of a hack Friz Freleng is in comparison to Bob Clampett and that art is dead except for Yogi Bear radio toilet paper dispensers. Likewise, if that's all people were saying, we would be much better off. But they aren't.

It's us vs. them. Even in cartoon discussion. Combatism is incentivized. You have to stick it to the man, you have to be reactionary, you have to win this battle, you have to have the correct--or loudest--take, you have to pledge your allegiance the most to your false idols. It's a constant mad dash to the top.

And what's the prize for winning? For winning that argument? For getting that person to block you? For calling someone the most slurs? For having the most reactionary rhetoric? For licking boots the most thoroughly?

Well, uh... uh... um... y'see--well, my prize is better than your prize, that's for certain. Now go stick a fork in the toaster for even thinking to ask me that. 

TL;DR: It would be lovely to share art for the sake of art again. I'm not saying everyone has to have the same, harmonious opinions and get along. I'm not saying there can't be disagreements, and I'm not saying you have to befriend your enemies. But why do we have to have enemies in the first place? Why is it seemingly so "radical" to say that I wish we could talk about the things we like and learn from each other and share our interests and thoughts and feelings civilly? Why can't we discuss art for the sake of art, rather than for who wins the most internet points for snarkiest comeback or most flippant comment?

I really am not trying to make a sob story about oh, woe is me, someone I don't know said mean things about me. Get in line.  But that's the thing! Why does the line have to exist? What are we doing? Likewise, I'm not saying that this sort of behavior is warranted in any situation, but it's particularly absurd in the context of cartoons, wouldn't you agree? (And if not, that's fine too! Just be light on your death threats about this permissible disagreement!)

Nevertheless, all of this has taken a considerable damper on me. I find myself struggling about how to share and even engage with the shows and shorts and films and art and characters and creatives that once gave me so much zest and passion--something that was so secondhand. Likewise, it's not as easy as "just ignore them" as I'd like it to be. Again, I can ignore them, but that doesn't detract from the bewilderment and outrage and grief I feel at this having to be the case. Why do I have to stand for this? Who decided this is our fate?

I still love cartoons, deeply. I have no choice. But I'm angry, and I'm frustrated, and I'm heartbroken at how they've been turned into a crushing obligation and even a moral quandry for me, lest I say something that warrants another person to tell me to die over my very important Looney Tunes opinions, which are very, very important. 

But most of all, I think I'm determined.

It doesn't have to be this way. I don't want it to be this way. It won't have to be this way.

Be the change you want to see. Share art because it speaks to you and makes you happy, not because of the brownie points you hope to earn or to shove it in that rando who said something mildly disagreeable in your mentions last Wednesday. Have a conversation. Be open. Actually listen, rather than hear. Don't be afraid to disengage if the discussion isn't serving you. You don't have to befriend your enemies. But the concept of enemies existing at all, especially in relation to cartoondom, is a little ridiculous.

Do you talk about cartoons and art because you enjoy it? Or because you want to be praised or tested as the True Enjoyer of what it is you're talking about, all while spending way more time focusing on the internet points you'll score and neglecting the subject itself?

I'm upset that vitriol and outrage and dissent is so incentivized. But I'm also upset to even be typing that, because I don't think it has to be like this. I think there are plenty of good and well adjusted people online who do exactly what I'm pining for, day in and day out--we just don't hear about them because that's boring, unlike good ol' interesting outrage.

I enjoy art. I love art. I am art. Art is my life. Which is why I'm so ferocious in my laments. I've been particularly despondent and frazzled as my one true passion instead fills me with dread and fatigue and exhaust, eliciting physical reactions out of me. Talking about what once was second nature is now a chore. I've begun to even feel pangs of nausea just looking at screenshots of cartoons. While multiple factors are at play, there is a reason why I changed most of my social media profile pictures away from Daffy.

But it doesn't have to be this way and it won't be this way. You can be the change you want to see. I want to share the things I love. I want to get closer with the things other people love. I want to have discussions, I want to listen and I want to respond rather than react. I want to be exposed to worldviews and thoughts and feelings foreign from my own. I want to have the privilege of sharing the things that make me happy without getting insulted in return.

So I will. And perhaps I can motivate the next person who feels similarly. And then the next person, and then the next, and the next...

While not at all unique to discussions of cartoons and animation and art as a whole, some prominent figureheads in these communities have incentivized a culture of reactionaries and an attitude of every man for himself. I'm right, you're wrong. Likewise, it would be a simpler world if it started and ended with cartoons, but bigotry of all forms is likewise abound. I've been dealt an abundance of sexism for the crime of being a woman in the cartoon community alone. It comes with the culture. See the figureheads and how they talk about the women in their own lives.

It really, doesn't have to be like this. Nor does "it doesn't have to be like this" just be a fluffy, gusty phrase of wishful thinking. It can, it should, and if I have anything to say about it, will be a reality.

But it's a group effort. Hence the post.