Some further ruminations
Oct. 27th, 2006 09:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hrjThis is more of the philosophical thoughts kicking around in my head on some of the topics buzzing around the filk community, but there's some cross-pollination with SCA angles, so it may be of interest to a larger percentage of my readership. Preface: A year and a half ago, I made a pledge to myself to give up recreational wallowing in nobody-loves-me-land. Yesterday I fell off the wagon in pursuit of an apology for something that happened a decade and a half ago and this post is by way of a penance.
I accept that I have become one of the cool kids. And I believe that being one of the "cool kids" gives me obligations to the community to look beyond my own personal goals and pleasures. (Oh cripes, now someone is going to take that as a personal attack on them. Tough luck -- this entry is all about me me me.) I don't often feel like one of the "cool kids" but the evidence is pretty unmistakable and I accept it. In a lot of ways, it's easier to deal with this issue in the SCA. There are a lot of different types of "cool kids" in the SCA but one of the obvious categories is the peerage. And unlike the concept of BNF (Big Name Fan/Filker for the non-fans reading along), membership in the SCA peerage not only has a clear demarcation and relatively well-specified community responsibilities, it also comes (at least these days) with an opt-out option. If you don't want to commit to the responsibilities, you can decline the honor. You may then be in a different category of SCA cool kid, but you aren't bound by the expectations of that specific one.
In filkdom, the rites of passage are more diffuse and subjective, but let's get real on one point: given that I have been a toastmistress, Interfilk guest, guest-of-honor, con chair, recording artist, and publisher, it would be really self-delusional to sit here and make a bald-faced claim that I am not a "cool kid of filk", no matter what sort of definition you put on that label. And just as being an SCA "cool kid" means that I have obligations -- both overt and implicit -- to hold to a personal standard of behavior, courtesy, hospitality, service, and role-modelship that is not required of everyone, I believe that being a filk "cool kid" means that I have an implicit contract with the community. To me, that contract includes things like the following:
Doing my best to be aware of people who are less sure of themselves than I ought to be (never mind whether I am) and doing what I can to encourage them. This might mean striking up a conversation with a complete stranger. It might mean asking someone who, like me, is standing in the coffee shop line alone whether they'd like to share a table. It might even mean listening appreciatively to performances that aren't to my personal taste on occasion.
Using my hard-won social skills (to say nothing of the annoying analytical skills) to support an atmosphere of inclusion rather than exclusion. This might mean not getting so lost in my own conversations that I lose track of other people who want to talk. It might mean (as discussed in a previous entry) using body-language to help balance out interactional dynamics. It might mean being a bit more pushy than I enjoy in helping manage room-layout dynamics at a filk. It might simply mean working on being polite to everyone, even people whose company I don't actively enjoy.
Identifying ways in which I, as a private individual, can contribute to the diversity of the available filking experience at a con. This typically means starting or joining a new circle in an underutilized room (especially early in the con), even if I might be missing something interesting elsewhere. It definitely means thinking about how to encourage and support filking diversity and offering my thoughts to those who are designing filk experiences. It means encouraging types of filk experiences that I may not personally enjoy in addition to the ones I do.
It isn't about martyrdom -- it's about recognizing that the filk community is a community, and communities aren't an emergent property from a random collection of self-interests. They are living organisms that evolve and mutate in response to forces in their environment. As a "filk cool kid" I am by definition one of the larger-than-average forces in that environment (whether it feels like it or not) and with larger-than-average force comes larger-than-average responsibility in considering how it is applied. I came to this conclusion intellectually long before I accepted it emotionally. I don't claim that I'm good at dealing with this responsibility, and I don't claim that I'm effective at it. But I do accept it as part of the package -- even if it's a package I never signed for.
I accept that I have become one of the cool kids. And I believe that being one of the "cool kids" gives me obligations to the community to look beyond my own personal goals and pleasures. (Oh cripes, now someone is going to take that as a personal attack on them. Tough luck -- this entry is all about me me me.) I don't often feel like one of the "cool kids" but the evidence is pretty unmistakable and I accept it. In a lot of ways, it's easier to deal with this issue in the SCA. There are a lot of different types of "cool kids" in the SCA but one of the obvious categories is the peerage. And unlike the concept of BNF (Big Name Fan/Filker for the non-fans reading along), membership in the SCA peerage not only has a clear demarcation and relatively well-specified community responsibilities, it also comes (at least these days) with an opt-out option. If you don't want to commit to the responsibilities, you can decline the honor. You may then be in a different category of SCA cool kid, but you aren't bound by the expectations of that specific one.
In filkdom, the rites of passage are more diffuse and subjective, but let's get real on one point: given that I have been a toastmistress, Interfilk guest, guest-of-honor, con chair, recording artist, and publisher, it would be really self-delusional to sit here and make a bald-faced claim that I am not a "cool kid of filk", no matter what sort of definition you put on that label. And just as being an SCA "cool kid" means that I have obligations -- both overt and implicit -- to hold to a personal standard of behavior, courtesy, hospitality, service, and role-modelship that is not required of everyone, I believe that being a filk "cool kid" means that I have an implicit contract with the community. To me, that contract includes things like the following:
Doing my best to be aware of people who are less sure of themselves than I ought to be (never mind whether I am) and doing what I can to encourage them. This might mean striking up a conversation with a complete stranger. It might mean asking someone who, like me, is standing in the coffee shop line alone whether they'd like to share a table. It might even mean listening appreciatively to performances that aren't to my personal taste on occasion.
Using my hard-won social skills (to say nothing of the annoying analytical skills) to support an atmosphere of inclusion rather than exclusion. This might mean not getting so lost in my own conversations that I lose track of other people who want to talk. It might mean (as discussed in a previous entry) using body-language to help balance out interactional dynamics. It might mean being a bit more pushy than I enjoy in helping manage room-layout dynamics at a filk. It might simply mean working on being polite to everyone, even people whose company I don't actively enjoy.
Identifying ways in which I, as a private individual, can contribute to the diversity of the available filking experience at a con. This typically means starting or joining a new circle in an underutilized room (especially early in the con), even if I might be missing something interesting elsewhere. It definitely means thinking about how to encourage and support filking diversity and offering my thoughts to those who are designing filk experiences. It means encouraging types of filk experiences that I may not personally enjoy in addition to the ones I do.
It isn't about martyrdom -- it's about recognizing that the filk community is a community, and communities aren't an emergent property from a random collection of self-interests. They are living organisms that evolve and mutate in response to forces in their environment. As a "filk cool kid" I am by definition one of the larger-than-average forces in that environment (whether it feels like it or not) and with larger-than-average force comes larger-than-average responsibility in considering how it is applied. I came to this conclusion intellectually long before I accepted it emotionally. I don't claim that I'm good at dealing with this responsibility, and I don't claim that I'm effective at it. But I do accept it as part of the package -- even if it's a package I never signed for.
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no subject
Date: 2006-10-28 10:00 am (UTC)And your posts made me realise that maybe I should re-examine some of _my_ inbuilt assumptions re: whether people will want to know me.
I learnt some of my social skills the hard way, backpacking alone around Australia, and if I hadn't striken up conversations back then, I would have had no-one to talk to for eight weeks; but I also realise I have some way yet to go.
That social awareness you mentioned yesterday is still a complete mystery at times.
no subject
Date: 2006-10-28 07:09 pm (UTC)I think that's why it's such a fun challenge to figure out of there are ways it can be taught. I think that because social stuff doesn't come naturally to me, it's so much more interesting to analyze how it works. When teaching crafts and the like, I have an impossible time trying to figure out how to teach beginners the stuff that comes naturally to me. But if I worked my way in tooth and nail from the outside, then I know how I got there.