Possibly NSFW discussion of a term that gets on my nerves

[avevale_intelligencer]

I wondered how long it would be before someone brought in the masturbation metaphor to describe our discussions on Doctor Who...does anyone ever talk about "football wank" or "political wank" or "real ale wank," or is it just sf fans who get that? And is it possible, in these relatively enlightened days, that masturbation still carries in some quarters the "unnatural act/sin against the Holy Ghost/self-pollution" stigma that's implied by the comparison?

Because it is implied, let's make no mistake about that. When people talk about "fandom wank" they are not describing people indulging in a harmless and pleasurable act which is practiced by (I would imagine) the vast majority of human beings at some point in their lives. They mean to belittle us. They mean to insult us. They mean to be offensive, and they succeed. They mean to turn the passion that we bestow upon our hobbies into something squalid, something dirty, something to which no decent human being would ever stoop.

Our language is rich in words and phrases to describe what happens when people let their passions run away with them, when they lose perspective in focussing on a single issue, when tempers run high and things are said that should not have been said. This happens in all areas and walks of life, to all manner of people. Why should it be that one particular group of people, whose attention is given to particular forms of literature and drama, when they fall into this error or even when they do not, should be smeared with a playground epithet from the sucking pit of Victorian sexual repression?

I suppose it's all part of the standard bigoted view of fans as spotty unhygienic teenage boys who spend too much time reading books and not enough time getting drunk in gangs and bashing members of the minority of their choice. But it seems a little...disappointing, shall we say...when other fans support and sustain the stereotype by using terms such as this to describe each other.

Comments

Here from metafandom

[melaniedavidson.livejournal.com]

does anyone ever talk about "football wank" or "political wank" or "real ale wank," or is it just sf fans who get that?
I suppose it's all part of the standard bigoted view of fans as spotty unhygienic teenage boys who spend too much time reading books and not enough time getting drunk in gangs and bashing members of the minority of their choice.

Non-fannish stuff gets it too (http://www.journalfen.net/userinfo.bml?user=otf_wank). And fannish stuff does include (though more rarely than otherwise) non f/sf stuff, like the Celebrities (Non RPF-related) (http://www.journalfen.net/tools/memories.bml?user=fandom_wank&keyword=Celebrities+%28Non+RPF-related%29&filter=all), Pop Fandom (http://www.journalfen.net/tools/memories.bml?user=fandom_wank&keyword=Pop+Fandom&filter=all), and wrestling (http://www.journalfen.net/tools/memories.bml?user=fandom_wank&keyword=Wrestling&filter=all) categories. If that's any consolation....

I think it started as a handy metaphor and expanded to include other things, so that now the newer usage has only a passing connection to masturbation--there when someone wants to make a joke about chafing etc., but hardly present otherwise. For a more wtf-worthy (in my opinion) example of usage shift, look at #3 for "shit" (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=shit) (waaaay down there). (And I also agree with mamadeb up there--when you adapt a foreign piece of slang, you don't necessarily pcik up all the associations that come with it. I think it tends more to come as just the basic definition and maybe a vague idea of whether it's rude, formal, etc., and if it enters into general usage it'll pick up a new set of associations for the new group that's using it. I always thought "wank" was a fairly light word--dismissive, but not, "omething squalid, something dirty, something to which no decent human being would ever stoop," and fairly low on the... vulgarity hierarchy. But it looks like that's not entirely the case.)

Re: Here from metafandom

[melaniedavidson.livejournal.com]

(Oh, and when I say "common usage", I don't mean for the entire society, necessarily. Just for any group that's picked it up. I don't think "wank" is commonly used in the US as a whole.)