Your Vagina is a Bigot; My Vagina is a Saint

Your Vagina is a Bigot; My Vagina is a Saint is a 16,000-word meta essay by Franzeska that was posted to the AO3 under archive-lock in 2016.
It sparked an extensive debate and also received a great deal of criticism from fans over the way it appeared to dismiss concerns about fandom racism and sexism, its defence of slash fans' white character-centric shipping choices, characterisation of the act of writing characters of colour as "joyless", the insistence that concerns over a perceived lack of femslash were unfounded because femslash was heavily present in certain fandoms, its framing of fandom history, and much more.
Author's Summary: Bullying and the Co-opting of Social Justice Activism in Fandom: A discussion of bias in fannish meta, m/m vs. other pairings, shipping of POC, vidding characters of color, what it means to ship, and problems in Stormpilot fandom.
It is quoted here on Fanlore with permission from its creator.
For additional context, see Timeline of Slash Meta and Slash Meta.
==Some Topics Discussed==
* the perceived trend in bullying and dumping on slash fans
* warnings and triggers
* Stormpilot, Miami Vice, Starsky & Hutch, Kylux, Kirk/Spock, Avengers, Once Upon a Time, many other fandoms
* vidding and the difficulty in finding source material, technical quality of source material
* gender and race are not the same
* Archive of Our Own, Media Miner, Fanfiction.net, Wattpad
* social justice and social justice warriors
* dogpiling, shaming, and bullying
* "Cinnamon Rolls" vs. "Trash"
* fandom and racism, fandom and sexism
* whitecock and sausagefests
* the role of source material content, popular culture, and expectations
* fandom as a mirror of society
* the queerness of fandom
* boring fic and dutyfic
* Centrumlumina's article Why M/M?
* fandom statistics
* meta
* femslash
* shipping
==Chapters/Sections==
* Fandom Will Eat Itself
* Why Write This Essay?
* Why Gender and Race are Not the Same
* Won't Somebody Think of the Het?
* Who Started A03?
* Why are All of the Slashers Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?
* Life Outside of AO3
* Ye Olden Dayes When Fandom was K/S
* But Why is there No Femslash?
* Race and Shipping
* Background Radiation Racism
* How White is Fandom?
* How American is Fandom?
* How White are AO3 Ships?
* What's the Goal Here?
* Holding Out For A Megafandom
* The Little Red Hen
* Festivids: A Case Study in Diversity in Fanworks
* How to Vid More POC
* Srs Bzns Vids
* The Problem of Clint/Coulson
* If You Don't Ship Tony/Rhodey, You're a Racist!
* Why POCs are Hard to Write
* Fuck Cinnamon Rolls! Vodka for Breakfast! - Why Kylux is More Popular than Stormpilot
* Indoctrinating Your Vagina
==Excerpts==
==Fan Comments==
The meta itself hosted a lot of the discussion around the meta. As of February 2020, there are 426 comments on the work at Archive of Our Own. You need to log in to be able to read them.
The Vagina Meta was posted around the same time as two other pieces of meta that raised similar questions about popularity of the Stormpilot pairing.
The first meta essay was written by destinationtoast and was titled So What's Been Going On In Star Wars Fandom Lately? dated April 26, 2016 and posted to tumblr.
The second meta essay, also written by Franzeska, Why Isn't Stormpilot Remaining Popular, was dated April 27, 2016 and was posted to AO3.
Because the topics and discussions were so similar, and the fandom reactions ranged over multiple platforms (Tumblr, Twitter, AO3, and Dreamwidth), it became increasingly difficult for the participants to accurately track who they were responding to. Communication grew garbled and on several occasions, people became confused and the essays as well as fan identities were conflated with one another.
As a result, there may be significant errors below in terms of attributing quotations as well as attributing identities. In addition, some of the comments below are presented anonymously. If the owners of the comments wish to have themselves identified, please leave the information on the talk page.
===An Early Series of Conversations Between Fans===
destinationtoast:
destinationtoast again:
anarfea:
stitchmediamix:
destinationtoast in response to stitchmediamix:
destinationtoast in response to stitchmediamix:
destinationtoast in response to stitchmediamix:
stitchmediamix in response to destinationtoast:
stitchmediamix in response to destinationtoast:
destinationtoast:
cupidsbower in response to stitchmediamix:
===The Use Of Statistics===
stitchmediamix expressed her unhappiness that statistics are being used to discuss racism and bias:
She was not alone. ad0rableedgel0rd said:
From timdrakedotcom:
One FFA nonny tried to analyze the statistics on her own and realized that due to the number of possible pairings, the statistics were meaningless:
===Ownership of Social Justice Terminology===
jawnbaeyega on who owns the language of social justice activism:
===Fandom Safe Spaces (Many Definitions)===
For some fans, a safe space is one where they feel empowered to write their favorite pairings, without bullying. From downthepub:
For others, a safe space is one where they are not confronted with the racism and sexism in fannish works. From thekinkawakens:
FFA in response to Anhamirak claiming that fans should make fandom a safe space:
jawnbaeyega, a Tumblr fan, decided to set up a forum as a safe space only for black fans. Answering an anon ask:
FFA nonny:
===Whose History?===
One of the issues that was mentioned frequently after the Vagina Meta was posted was whether it included what many fans felt were key fandom events in discussions of racism, sexism, and homophobia. Some fans pointed out that because fandom stretches across decades and geography, not all fans experienced fandom and the resulting conversations in the same way at the same time. Others disagreed and pointed out the essay's short-comings.
snarlfurillo critiqued the meta and its framing of fandom history and the OTW:
spaceoperafeerie wondered why her fandom experiences are not universal and acknowledged:
Some of the author's peers disagreed with the meta's premise that slash fans had been oppressed within fandom. From sol_se:
Other peers took a different approach and referred back to similar posts they had made during RaceFail '09. From stewardess:
===Is This A Shipwar In Disguise?===
On Fail_Fandomanon, a nonny argued that in many cases shipwars are masquerading as social justice:
Others pointed out that ship wars can never be compared to the insidious impact of racism. From stitchmediamix:
From zorana:
In a possibly related tumblr post, one fan, perksofbeingawaifu, attempted to offer some humour:
The conflation of social justice discussions with shipping wars was not unique to Star Wars fandom. Six months earlier, an anime fan, lady-minerva-orland, posted the following:
===Does Age Play A Role In Fan Reactions?===
There were some comments about the difference between people who liked the meta vs. people who hated it. Age was brought up. Tumblr user uncontinuous believed that social media has emboldened the voices of marginalized fans:
From out-there-on-the-maroon:
===Fandom Has Not Changed===
phoenix-ace:
FFA nonny:
===Fandom Has Changed - But It Needs To Keep Changing===
FFA talked about how fandom has changed over the years. And how much more it has to change:
FFA talked about the Vagina Meta's concluding comments:
impostoradult wrote about how fandom must choose to make the world a better place:
cupidsbower:
===Defining Racism===
A few fans on FFA wanted to know more about the racism in The Force Awakens:
On tumblr, diversehighfantasy offered some specific examples:
In the weeks before the Vagina Meta was written, several fans discussed a prompt that had appeared in The Force Awakes kinkmeme.
imburningstar141:
See also by stopreylo2k4ever (April 30, 2016)
===The Interplay Between Fandom and Mainstream Media===
cupidsbower:
mayidrawyourattentionto:
===Positive Comments About The Essay===
this-is-myomancy:
mcbangle:
aprillikesthings:
cupidsbower:
bettydays:
saiditallbefore:
solarcat:
===Comments Critical of the Essay===
solacekames had a problem with the title of the meta essay:
thisisevenharderthannamingablog:
sophia-helix:
zorana:
===Middle of the Road Responses===
cupidsbower:
viggorlijah:
ladyjanelly:
aralias:
unsentimental's comment responded to aralias:
ironmyownpants offered middle of the road response on the Vagina Meta that she won't read:
cupidsbower:
===Sample Textual Analysis===
extra-penguin:
===Confronting One's Own Racism===
gilajames:
FFA wrestled with its own 'isms:
===Gamergate, Racefail 09, and Racist Grandmothers===
In the AO3 comments, one fan compared the writer of the Vagina Meta to Gamergate. This provoked several responses.
Nonny in the FFA thread, in response to a commentator claiming that the writer of the meta was no better than Gamergate:
FFA in response to the Gamergate accusation:
Comparisons were also made to racist grandmothers. From anhamirak:
More Racefail 09 mentions. From snarlfurillo:
Even fans who had not read the meta were critical, using the wave of anger to criticise the OTW and AO3 where the meta was posted. From an FFA nonny:
===Klandom and Degrees of Racism===
During the course of the discussion, the Klandom tag became popular among many dissenting voices on tumblr. One FFA nonny evaluated the essay's level of racism:
An FFA nonny reported on other tags appearing on the "This Meta Is Awful" reblogs:
=== Character Complexity Issues===
===Femslash===
While the bulk of the discussion centered on racism, a few fans discussed the chapters that focused on femslash.
From an FFA nonny:
Another(?) FFA nonny:
cupidsbower on tumblr:
sapphoshands on tumblr:
See also stopthatimp's post quoting and remarking on sections of the essay that address femslash.
===Discussions of Racism In Vidding===
Like with femslash, most fans did not comment on the Vagina Meta's discussion of race in vidding. However, cupidsbower did note:
From strix-alba:
=== Futility of Badgering/Call Outs===
FFA anon about the need to learn to ask ourselves whether something needs to be said before we say it:
solarcat in response to mamajuicebox:
FFA Nonnies talk about the futility of badgering:
FFA nonny says that fandom is best when everyone can practice it the way they want:
FFA Nonny wants to know how to tell fellow fans they're just into having fun without offending:
FFA anon:
myrandomthoughtsokay:
smol-hux answering an anon ask on tumblr:
themardia:
hansbekhart:
==In Fan Studies==
Your Vagina is a Bigot; My Vagina is a Saint and the resulting imbroglio was critically referenced in Rukmini Pande's thesis on race and fandom: Squee from the Margins: Investigating the Operations of Racial/Cultural/Ethnic Identity in Media Fandom, in a section titled: ""But what if it's not about Race?" - Ancient fandom proverb." Pande provides an expository view of the essay (and the preceding statistical analysis by destinationtoast) and then argues that the fandom imagined by Franzeska Dickson is an example of whiteness as "the unexamined structuring force within discussions of the workings of media fandom communities."Squee from the Margins: Investigating the Operations of Racial/Cultural/Ethnic Identity in Media Fandom, page 22.
An excerpt:
==Links to Further Reading/Meta==
* at fail_fandomanon (2016-04-29)
* at fail_fandomanon (2016-05-03)
* , rukminipande
* Looking back on a decade in online fandom social justice: unexpurgated version by sqbr (May 2016)
* Fansplaining: Race and Fandom Part 1 and 2 by Fansplaining (May 18, 2016)
==References==
Category:Slash Meta
Category:Fanfiction Meta
Category:Star Wars Meta
Category:Femslash Meta‎
Category:2016 Meta
Category:Meta on AO3
Category:2020 Featured Articles
Category:Race & Fandom