Discussion of TV Tropes

Salix Babylonika · 2012-01-18 22:13:55

Of course it's authoritarian. Whether or not it's authoritarian has nothing to do with it, it's entirely possible to be a good kind of authoritarian and I think that by and large Eddie is that kind, but his paranoia about the site being raided impedes his judgment in some cases and it's detrimental.

It occurs to me that there's literally no reason for me to be arguing about this, I'm banned now.

This is really taking quite awhile to sink in.

Anonus · 2012-01-18 22:15:31

There's not much of a reason for me to care about this thread or BTL and the like, but I do anyway.

Salix Babylonika · 2012-01-18 22:17:29

I don't care about BTL.

Anne is....well we have disagreements. Large ones, about how criticism should be given, and what constitutes constructive criticism as opposed to banal mocking. We don't really get along anymore, suffice it to say, and I'm pretty sure I'd be instabanned if I ever showed up there again.

Tnu1138 · 2012-01-18 22:21:17

That's ludicrous Superglobe. The notion that there is a good kind of authoritarian?

Princess Alice · 2012-01-18 22:22:17

There's not much of a reason for me to care about this thread or BTL and the like, but I do anyway.

That's pretty much how I feel, too, for some reason. I've pretty much left TVT and I have no reason to care about it anymore and yet I can't look away.

Salix Babylonika · 2012-01-18 22:25:08

A fellow SmackJeever gave me some good advice, re: leaving TVTropes.

To me it sounds like you figured you wanted a changed and decided to drop the old stuff all at once to make a clean break. You lack direction, and thinking about those forums makes you think about all the enjoyment you had there.

I recommend trying to pick up those forums again if possible, and easing out from there. However, instead of letting them take up all your time, ease out of them, and find other things you like. Try to make amends with those you wronged, or at least apoligise to them. That way you and they will get some closure.
-corruption

I think it's good advice anyway. I'm not sure how to act on it, though.

Anonus · 2012-01-18 22:27:06

If this is too personal, tell me:

It's weird, the effect the site has on people. People are right about its addicting qualities; I'm pretty much done with the site and here I am, posting this on a forum that spun off from it. And participating on at least two others.

It's still a hot topic to me and it's weird. The affairs of the higher-ups interest me a little, even though I play no part in them.

Tnu1138 · 2012-01-18 22:27:50

It doesn't seem possible.

Salix Babylonika · 2012-01-18 22:29:42

That's not weird.

Say what you will about TVT, it is certainly unique, and it will continue to be unique until the day the last Troper reluctantly closes the last trope page he's reading for the final time and the sole remaining server shuts off and starts gathering dust. Should such a day ever come.

Tnu1138 · 2012-01-18 22:31:46

Superglobe is right TV Tropes was an animal in and of itself. That's why I don't get people saying "move on. It's not hing special" They obviously don't knwo what they're talking about.

Tachyon · 2012-01-18 22:34:48

It's unique, or at least unusual, in its positive respects. It's very good if you want to find out stuff about popular fiction that you might have overlooked, the trends and the allusions and so on.

In its negative aspects, it's far from unique.

Princess Alice · 2012-01-18 22:35:33

It's interesting. For some reason I still feel attached to the site, but not enough to let myself get drawn back in.

I figure if I ever do go back it will be to talk with the few people I'll miss, and I'll steer clear of most of the more problematic areas of the site.

Anonus · 2012-01-18 22:36:42

I wouldn't say it's "nothing special", it's just not my thing anymore.

Tnu1138 · 2012-01-18 22:36:50

I don't know how you lot can be so strong about just leaving the site.

Anonus · 2012-01-18 22:37:45

Things have changed, Tnu. Enough for my attachment to it to lessen.

Tnu1138 · 2012-01-18 22:40:05

I can understand that. I'm sure everybody here knows how conservative I am when it comes to TV Tropes. I've seen everythign die. The wiki being eviscerated. Fast Eddie going against his claimed doctrin. But I have to do something about it because to me the Wiki is osmethign special. Something precious.

Anonus · 2012-01-18 22:45:37

My reasons are kinda silly; the chief one is "Yack Fest is boring now".

Tnu1138 · 2012-01-18 22:46:29

I miss Yack Fest. I miss my friends. I miss Savage Heathen and Aondeug.

Obā-san · 2012-01-18 22:49:26

Wasn't Savage Heathen banned?

Tnu1138 · 2012-01-18 22:51:13

Of co urese. Anyone who dares to question the establishment gets that sort of shit thrown at them.

Imipolex G · 2012-01-18 22:51:24

I still like the wiki and browse it/edit it now and then. I've been limiting my forum presence for two reasons: it ate up too much of my time, and there's too much freakin' drama nowadays.

But, I can certainly agree that it's a difficult site to completely give up on.

lee4hmz · 2012-01-18 22:51:37

Apparently not; I saw him posting in OTC when I was reading it earlier today.

Tachyon · 2012-01-18 22:52:38

Savage Heathen has been warned (not banned yet), not for "daring to question the establishment" but for advocating violence.

Tnu1138 · 2012-01-18 22:54:28

lee4hmz: Was that shot you took at me a few pages ago really warrented?

Justice4243 · 2012-01-18 22:54:46

He's been pretty hostile to other tropers, it's not too surprising that he'd at least get a warning for it.

Salix Babylonika · 2012-01-18 23:01:03

Would anyone terribly mind if I wrote up a quick mini-essay on how TVTropes has improved my life? Or would that be selfish/unwarranted?

Because--weirdly enough--I was thinking about it just now as I was taking out the trash. XD

Tachyon · 2012-01-18 23:01:24

Actually, I misremembered. He was banned at one point, temporarily.

Either way, he's on his last chance.

^ I don't mind. (I'm curious.)

Salix Babylonika · 2012-01-18 23:15:25

Okay, then.

Well basically, before I came to TVTropes--and during a good deal of my time on it--I was basically a misanthrope. Not in the "I hate everyone but me, I want them all to fucking die" sense, but in the Holden Caulfield style "I'm the only real person in the world, everyone else is a fake, only I know real pain" etc. sense. Of course, this is supremely ironic given that one of the first things I decided to do on the fora was feign mental illness and having abusive parents. To this day, I cannot give you a good reason as to why I did that other than for attention.

Before I joined TVTropes I had--not an exaggeration--zero friends. None. Not a one. Online or off. It didn't strike me as unusual at the time that I didn't, but after joining TVT and making friends with Katrika (among others, but Katrika remains the biggest influence during this period, no offense), I realized that I kind of liked having friends, and I didn't want to lose them. So of course, I tried to make myself seem alternately pitiable and cool ("and what epitomizes both better than schizophrenia?" Thought I.) You all know where this led, I started feeling guilty about it, and after having long passed the point of reason with a number of sockpuppet accounts (notably my "sister" and Electric Bug, the annoying friend), I confessed. I lost a couple friends--most temporarily, one or two permanently.

I resolved to shape up, and of course didn't. I continued lying about little things here and there to make myself seem more special or whatever, I think at some point right around when Katrika and I had a falling out, I realized I really ought to stop, After that, I actually did, for the most part. It did remain a more minor problem until recently though (I had a bit of an identity crisis over it, but I hope I'm not jumping the gun when I say the issue's finally resolved).

That problem of mine? The TVT community helped me solve it. It's true I might have anyway without that community, but I'm not so sure. I may have been friendless to this very day without you.

That's not the only thing TVT's helped me with, in general, the community there garnered the strongest emotional reactions out of me I ever gave to anyone up until that point. I can make a very good case that Lockonlockon (who had a similar problem with lying to my own) is my best friend. Period. And I don't think I need to name some of the people I've spent time despising there.

My point? TVTropes is not really about the tropes, at least not for me. It's about the people behind them, and I think it made my life significantly better.

Just my two cents.

Anonus · 2012-01-18 23:22:19

Well that's good that we did that for you.

I think pissing away time at IJBM1 made my anger issues go away (they were driven by a belief that anger felt good.).

Imipolex G · 2012-01-18 23:25:44

I became significantly less misanthropic as a result of the YF crowd. Prior to joining TVT (before the summer of '09) I was in a definite Humans Are Bastards sort of thought mode. Somehow or other, the TVT fora caused me to rethink that.

Obā-san · 2012-01-18 23:30:18

TVT....

Well I got Bunny out of it, so time well spent. ^w^

Tnu1138 · 2012-01-18 23:32:06

Bunny?

Obā-san · 2012-01-18 23:33:00

Deathonabun, my boyfriend/Master.

millercross · 2012-01-18 23:33:33

I met wonderful people because of TvT. I wouldn't defend the forums because of it, though.

lee4hmz · 2012-01-18 23:33:56

I already mentioned what the site did for me, but I think the most important thing is that it's meant that I have actual friends again. Before mid-2008, I had maybe one good friend at all, and a few acquaintances I'd BS around with on IRC but weren't that close. Now I can talk to several different people about quite a bit, a situation I've not really had since 1999 or so.

And then there's Freezair. I don't think I've had so many false starts with someone, like, ever, but it's gotten to the point where we're finally comfortable being friends. And I'm glad for that, because I've liked her pretty much right from the start.

Salix Babylonika · 2012-01-18 23:35:40

I met wonderful people because of TvT. I wouldn't defend the forums because of it, though.

I'm not defending the forums, where'd you get that impression?

Now certainly, I will defend some of the people on them. In theory, but I wasn't even doing that.

Anonus · 2012-01-18 23:36:23

Without TVT I wouldn't have CA or lee or Bobby or you guys.

Salix Babylonika · 2012-01-18 23:37:25

We love you too, Anonus. :P

Justice4243 · 2012-01-18 23:37:51

millercross · 2012-01-18 23:39:18

I'm not defending the forums, where'd you get that impression?

Or the community or however you wanna call it. --shrug--

Salix Babylonika · 2012-01-18 23:40:52

I will certainly defend the community in relation to my interactions with it.

That is to say, the people I am fond of.

I have little to say in the defense of--as an example--OTC.

Misery · 2012-01-18 23:42:56

I'm not going to defend the site but I met a few people I like.

Tnu1138 · 2012-01-19 00:05:20

I'll defend the site fully. It has too many good memories for me and helped me when I was really in a dark place. I am a Troper. It's part of my identity at this point really. Freezair was pretty cool I remember having a friend there that I would PM a lot she ws rweally cool

Unknown · 2012-01-19 00:07:59

The user and all related content has been deleted.

Tnu1138 · 2012-01-19 00:09:02

I met some o ne on TVT once that I used to PM on a somewhat regular basis. She was really cool and I can't for the life of me remember her username.

Princess Alice · 2012-01-19 00:22:30

Before TVTropes I had no friends. So I am thankful I participated in the forums when I did, because otherwise I wouldn't have found Anonus, who was my first friend and the only person I've ever met who seems to truly understand how I think.

Not to mention all the other friends I made on the site (most of whom are here now).

I think pissing away time at IJBM1 made my anger issues go away (they were driven by a belief that anger felt good.).

You know what? Pretty much the same thing happened to me. I think the Trash Heap helped, too, because you and I grew to become friends and I found that talking over my interests with someone like-minded felt much better than being angry all the time.

I am a troper, but I am also a coper, a soaper, an interloper, a little bit of a hoper, sometimes a roper, if in the right mood a noper, and perhaps in the future an eloper!! ;D

But are you a joker, and a smoker, and a midnight toker?

Anonus · 2012-01-19 00:24:39

And do you play your music in the sun?

Tachyon · 2012-01-19 00:26:17

I'm really glad to hear that y'all got positive things out of the site.

Even if the community that y'all are thinking of probably isn't exactly the same one I'm thinking of when I look back, since I spent a lot of time in OTC and very little in Media.

I don't know whether TVT was a net positive or a net negative for me. I'm glad of the people I've met there, though.

Unknown · 2012-01-19 00:27:42

The user and all related content has been deleted.

Unknown · 2012-01-19 00:28:41

The user and all related content has been deleted.

Discussion of TV Tropes

Comments

Howdy, Stranger!

Categories