idk. out of shippers who write fanfic and tweet it at them, and most of us, who think they are together, Dan, at least, has made it very very clear who he prefers.
I think rpf ships can definitely have the potential to be creepy, and I also agree that as long as people don't tweet the people fanfics, it's okay. But, with Dan and Phil specifically, I think shipping them is totally fine (shipping as in writing fanfiction, making fanart, ect), mostly because the creepiest thing in rpf is that it seems very non consensual. But if the people involved give their permission, I think it's fair game.
With the phandom, I think the people who ship them and write phanfic are usually very young kids, who are exploring creative writing, and are not old enough to be able to think of them as actual people, which Dan and Phil know. And, as Dan has said, he actually likes that kids are writing and is fine with them using him as a tool to do it.
I just want to make it clear that I'm not justifying this person's methods at all. They seem to be just as immature as the young people they are criticizing. Getting into flame wares with teenagers in the Freebatch tag seems like such a waste of time to me.
I do believe there is a learning curve on the internet about what is acceptable or not acceptable to put out there. Even as a young teenager, however, I don't think I would ever have had the barefaced cheek to post my (not even scandalous) Ryden fanfiction in a platform where Brendon Urie or Ryan Ross might have been able to see it.
The very thought would have mortified me. And I'm pretty sure even the youngest members of the Phandom know that they frequently use Tumblr/check their own tags.
Can I ask what makes you uncomfortable about the bolded sentence? Because honestly, the entertainment industry has been turning real people and their real life events into fictionalized entertainment since... well, since the beginning of the entertainment industry. No one looks at historical fiction novels and says 'creepy and uncomfortable.' No one thinks twice about biopics or 'based on a true story' movies. The Social Network was a huge blockbuster that was a fictionalized version of Mark Zuckerberg's life, including taking license with his relationships. Is it creepy and uncomfortable because fanfic is written online by women just for fun, but okay when it's primarily men and they get money for it? I mean, Hamilton is the biggest play on Broadway right now and it turns the founding fathers of the United States into fictionalized versions of themselves and no one says Lin-Manuel Miranda is creepy for writing it. I could keep going indefinitely listing examples, but you get my point. The argument that rpf is creepy never sits well with me but in this case it especially doesn't because, as jhamba said, Dan and Phil themselves have never expressed any disapproval over fanfic about them.
You do make a good and intelligent point here. In my opinion, however, I think that a distinction can still be made between the kind of 'fanfiction' along the lines of biopics/historical fiction etc. and rpf. The former tends to keep the boundaries separated between fiction and reality a bit better than the latter, and the people who watch the film/read the book/consumer whatever form of media it is know this. For instance,
The Social Network is based off of a biography of Mark Zuckerberg's life, but neither the writer of the biography or the makers/producers of the film claim that any of it is particularly truthful. It's pure Hollywood sensationalism, but the viewers don't care, and they understand this. I'm not saying that rpf claims to represent relationships or sex accurately (lol), but it does tend to influence younger, more impressionable fans to cross certain personal boundaries, because of the 'anything goes' mentality of spectacularly creepy fanfiction on Tumblr. I'm only talking about less than 1 percent of the Phandom here, like people who post 'PHAN IS REAL' on all their Instagram pictures. I'm also saying this as someone who has spent a shameful year or two being one of these creepy people in different fandoms, so I can look back at myself and cringe.
JK, I'm still creepy. I'm on this forum with my fellow middle-aged female nose perverts aren't I
I'm sorry if this is just a big ramble, I'm not feeling very articulate today.
(Or an image of a name to a name, in some cases.
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