#def some poor little meow meowing but its such a weird subset of it that im not sure how to analyze it lmao

[metanarrates]

Out of curiosity since we’re all talking abt tropes and fanfic trends what do you make of whump fic? I know it’s a super broad genre but feels like such an expanded view of like, hurt/comfort… I definitely see the appeal of it more than omegaverse but it’s such a weird little brand of fic that feels almost aligned with like, the poor little meow meow school of thought lol

ehhhhh I don't read that kind of stuff anymore (or much fanfiction at all, honestly,) but I did when I was younger. for me, as a teenager dealing with some pretty heavy issues, it felt like a way to externalize those feelings of pain and helplessness by projecting them onto fictional characters... but it also came with a kind of fixation on those topics that I don't think was exactly good for me. there's a kind of voyeuristic scrutiny on certain types of trauma that I remember existing in that scene, and looking back on it I don't feel quite comfortable with the way abuse was commonly portrayed in those types of stories. I question whether that type of sensationalism, when written by people who haven't been abused, is actually helpful to survivors. I don't consider myself an abuse victim per se but i AM a cult survivor and i remember feeling fairly alienated by the way that some fanfiction writers would handle that topic!

still, i can't deny that a lot of people in that scene were survivors themselves, and that a LOT of people I knew who liked it were also teenagers using it to externalize their own problems. it's honestly a pretty normal developmental stage for teens to fixate on edgy topics! at a certain stage of adolescence, you do gain the ability to really conceptualize topics like death and suffering, and a lot of teens end up processing those new ideas by fixating on them. i mean, the edgy anime oc made by a teenager is a stereotype for a reason, right?

so like idk i don't quite know what my overall commentary is on the topic. compared to something that's gotten as big as omegaverse, it still remains pretty niche, which does mean that it hasn't had quite as much ripple effect on fan communities. I'm sure it's still subject to the same issues of racism and cissexism and ableism etc etc that broader fandom stuff has, but I honestly don't remember my time in that scene well enough to have many coherent takes on it. sorry