charleshooper2020-blog

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Fan Activism

This post (and the posts that follow) is about “Fan Activism” and the examples that I have found while surfing the internet. I would like to start off by defining fan activism. Fan activism can be defined as as a form of civil engagement and political participation that emerges from the passions of fandoms and fan culture. According to John Sullivan, in his text “Media Audiences”, he says “Fan related activities are built largely around a close affiliation with the popular texts at the center of the enthusiasm.” With the examples to follow you will see how these fans use their favorite media to make a difference in their community. Fans can be moved to press producers and media corporations for change (or to prevent change). A big reason for these organizations becoming popular is the emergence of social media and its power to connect those around you.  My blog is focused on fan activism from the “civil engagement” standpoint which means these activists are working to make a difference in the civic life of our communities and developing the combination of knowledge, skills, values and motivation to make that difference. They can do this through fun raisers for different charities or looking for better representation for people of a different race, gender, or sexual orientation. I will go further in to fan activism using the examples; The Harry Potter Alliance, 501st Legion - Vader’s Fist, The NerdFighters, and The Glee Equality Project.

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The Harry Potter Alliance

The first example I have a fan activism is The Harry Potter Alliance or HPA for short. The HPA began in 2005 with the mission to tackle many of the problems many people face in society everyday. Their reach ranges from LGBTQIA+ equality, gender equality, youth advocacy, racial injustice, education and libraries, media reform, climate change, and much much more. When it comes to racial injustice and gender equality, we can see it when we are looking at legacy television. According to Dr. Stacy L. Smith, Marc Choueiti, Dr. Katherine Pieper, Ariana Case, & Angel Choi in Inequality in 1,100 Popular Films: Examining Portrayals of Gender, Race/Ethnicity, LGBT & Disability from 2007 to 2017,  “A total of 4,454 speaking characters appeared across the 100 top films of 2017, with 68.2% male and 31.8% female, this translates into an on screen gender ratio of 2.15 males to every one female.” and when it comes to race;  “Of characters with an ascertainable race/ethnicity, 70.7% were white, 12.1% Black, 4.8% Asian, 6.2% Hispanic/Latino, 1.7% Middle Eastern, <1% American Indian/Alaskan Native, <1% Native Hawaiian, and 3.9% Mixed Race or Other.” Now this is just one example from so many others that I could have chose just to show how much injustice is in the world. Their mission statement is as follows; “Our mission is to empower our members to act like the heroes that they love by acting for a better world. Our goal is to make civic engagement exciting by channeling the entertainment-saturated facets of our culture toward mobilization for deep and lasting social change.” On the HPA website you can join and be apart of a mailing list, you can donate online, and even find a volunteering job that has to do with HPA near you. Some of the achievements from HPA are gaining donations of over 250,000 books across the world through HPA’s Accio Books campaign, raising over $123,000 for Partners In Health and sending five cargo planes of life-saving supplies to Haiti, and establishing a partnership with Public Knowledge that brought over 20,000 fans and online video creators together for Net Neutrality. A lot of people are Harry Potter fans and HPA is a great way to emerse oneself into the subculture that is the “Wizarding World” while also giving back to the community in a multiple ways. HPA is a wonderful example of fan activism and getting engaged with the community to built a better future for many people in need.

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501st Legion - Vader’s Fist

My next example is the 501st Legion - Vader’s Fist founded in 1997, which is another fan activist group that takes their subculture from the popular Star Wars films and translate it over to the real world by also doing community out reach. The mission statement for the organization is; "The Legion is an all-volunteer organization formed for the express purpose of bringing together costume enthusiasts under a collective identity within which to operate. The Legion seeks to promote interest in Star Wars through the building and wearing of quality costumes, and to facilitate the use of these costumes for Star Wars-related events as well as contributions to the local community through costumed charity and volunteer work.” The 501st Legion has three missions, 1) To promote interest in Star Wars, While a growing number of people are experiencing a reawakening of their Star Wars fandom, new generations are seeking ways to celebrate their passion for George Lucas's modern mythology. The 501st Legion brings these fans together, reinforcing the enduring longevity of the Star Wars saga. 2) To facilitate the use of costumes, nothing professes your passion quite like building your own detailed costume replica of a classic Star Wars villain, and there's nothing quite like the feeling that comes from bringing the characters of Star Wars into the real world and sharing it with those in the community. The third and most important mission… 3) To contribute, While our organization was founded to simply provide a collective identity for costuming fans with similar interests, the 501st is proud to put its resources to good use through fundraising, charity work, and volunteering. On the website for the 501st Legion they have a way for you to donate to the Make A Wish Foundation and they also have statistics on how many hours they volunteered, dollars donated and how many people are enlisted in the 501st Legion. The 501st Legion uses the “dark side” and evil to do good in the community today.

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The Nerdfighters

The next example are “The Nerdfighters” which is a community subculture, based mainly online. It began in 2007, when the VlogBrothers (John and Hank Green) rose to prominence in the Youtube community. Hank Green describes it as "a community that sprung up around our videos, and basically we just get together and try to do awesome things and have a good time and fight against world suck". A part of their mission statement is as follows; “Nerdfighters are people who, instead of being made up of cells and organs, are made up of pure awesome. Do your part to fight all the things in the world that sucks.” Common causes taken up by the “Nerdfighters” include World Vision, Save the Children, and The Uncultured Project. Also, once a year, nerds band together to participate in the annual Project For Awesome, which contributes to hundreds of charities. Online is a “step by step” process on how to become a “Nerdfighter” and these steps include watching John and Hanks videos, buying “Nerdfighter” merch (proceeds go to a variety of charities), connect with other “Nerdfighters” online, and basically stay involved. In order to stay up to date on what the “Nerdfighters” are doing in the community and how you can help, you must regularly check their Vlogs and posts on their Tumblr to see the charities they are currently involved with and where they are going next to do more community service.

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GleeEqualityProject/Conclusion

The last and final example for how fans become activist and try and instill good fortune and change among their communities is The Glee Equality Project which started back in 2013. In their mission statement that was published in 2012 they said; “What we’re looking for is expressions of affection, moments of privacy and intimacy, and important conversations to happen between the young gay and lesbian couples in the same way that they happen for the straight young couples. What we’re looking for is simple. It’s not more than any of the straight couples get. It’s just the same treatment. It’s equality.” On The Glee Equality Project website, members of the board sometimes post things online about each episode that have to do with depiction of LGBTQ characters, relationships and what they think Glee as a whole could improve on when it comes to representation on the TV series. Basically what they want fans of the TV show to do is when they see something that they think it is not right or if they think their is little representation, they should write or call FOX (company that airs the show) with any issues they may have with the show. The website also works somewhat like a Tumblr page and people can comment or post things from episodes that they watched while also giving ideas on what they think Glee could improve on when it comes to LGBT representation. Not only does The Glee Equality Project touch base on important LGBT representation issues, it also set the foundation for other people to become involved and press the same issue on other TV shows that are not Glee.  

Fan activism is done through all types of fan based media and people are able to create this sort of “subculture” out of it and from this subculture people are able to make a difference in their community if they wanted to. Something that all of these activist programs have in common is that they all have a big online presence and that the way they communicate with those who are interested in getting involved is through online interactions. According to David Croteau and William Hoynes on “Social Media Logic and Algorithmic Power,” in Media and Society, they say, “One of the most popular elements of the internet is social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Such sites blend elements of interpersonal digital communication with traditional media forms, enabling users to create, share, and respond to content.” Because of social media, all of these organizations are able to mass a huge following and they are also able to share their mission and why they are getting involved while portraying and using their favorite media texts (Harry Potter or Star Wars for example). Because of the emergence of fan activism people are able to give back to their community in a multiple of ways while also staying true to their own subculture of media.

References: 

Smith, S. L., Choueiti, M., Pieper, K., Case, A. & Choi, A. (2018). Inequality in 1,100 popular films: Examining portyals of genderm, race/ethnicity, LGBT, and disability from 2007-2017. 1-43. Retrieved from: http://assets.uscannenberg.org/docs/inequality-in-1100-popular-films.pdf

Croteau, D. & Hoynes W. (2019). Media and society: Technology, industries, content, and users. London, United Kingdom: SAGE publication

Sullivan, J. L. (2013). Media audiences. Thousand Oaks, California: SAGE Publications