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Jul. 10th, 2007 07:35 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wook77I've been reading a few discussions about spoilers on various people's journals. There are those that are leaving until a month after the book. There are those reading on filters and then there are those that aren't changing their habits. I'm in the third camp and I admit to having a few thoughts about the first two.
Warning: Usage of current canon in the guise of fake spoilers. I can promise, out of respect for those that do not wish to be spoiled, that you will not find any real spoilers for DH here. Then again, if you don't know that Hermione is supposed to have bushy hair, then, well, you just might be out of luck.
First – I find real life to be even more cruel about spoilers than the online fandom culture. I'm not a huge fan of the Simpson's so I'll admit that my judgment is skewed on this but – my favorite episode is the one where Homer comes out of the theater at the end of Empire Strikes Back and, in front of the entire line of people waiting to see it for the first time, incredulously announces that Darth Vader is Luke's father. It's a pivotal moment in the movie and one that would be a spoiler to those that hadn't seen it.
Sure, the Simpson's is a cartoon but it's based on countless experiences that happen in real life. Whether it's the morning dj greeting you with the news that Hermione has bushy hair or the nightly news on your local channel discussing the various current spoilers (which shall not be discussed here), it's going to happen. Getting offline isn't going to limit your contact with these insidious spoilers. How is leaving LJ going to protect you from that?
On a personal note, I like the idea of having a culture here that understands and commiserates about being greeted with spoilers IRL. We sympathize, we support and we communicate.
Second – There's the whole idea that the entire experience will be ruined by being "spoiled". Aren't we all here for more than the ending? If we were all here just to find out who lives and who dies, we'd just wait until the reactions showed up and read about it then. We're here for the experience, for the enjoyment of the words (let's not debate whether JKR can really write or not, yeah?) and for the community.
If someone tells me that Boba Fett makes it out of the Sarlacc Pit and lives a long fruitful life, I'm still going to wonder "how does he do it? How long of a life? What does he do with it?" It's about the story, not just the ending.
Quoting from a Time magazine, "The idea that someone could ruin a novel by revealing its ending is like saying you could ruin the Mona Lisa by revealing that it's a picture of a woman with a center part. Spoilers are a myth: they don't spoil. No elaborate secrecy campaign is going to make [DH] better than it already is and no website could possibly make it useless and boring." (Time, July 9, 2007)
My point is the spoilers only ruin the experience if you let them. It's your journal, do what you want. I'm here for the long haul. I'm not reading on filters and I'm going to enjoy the book just as much as I've enjoyed every single other one of them, regardless of whether I know that Peeves and Filch argue about bubblegum or Moaning Myrtle moans in the loo.
As I will be at work until later with no access to LJ, comments are screened until I get home.
Warning: Usage of current canon in the guise of fake spoilers. I can promise, out of respect for those that do not wish to be spoiled, that you will not find any real spoilers for DH here. Then again, if you don't know that Hermione is supposed to have bushy hair, then, well, you just might be out of luck.
First – I find real life to be even more cruel about spoilers than the online fandom culture. I'm not a huge fan of the Simpson's so I'll admit that my judgment is skewed on this but – my favorite episode is the one where Homer comes out of the theater at the end of Empire Strikes Back and, in front of the entire line of people waiting to see it for the first time, incredulously announces that Darth Vader is Luke's father. It's a pivotal moment in the movie and one that would be a spoiler to those that hadn't seen it.
Sure, the Simpson's is a cartoon but it's based on countless experiences that happen in real life. Whether it's the morning dj greeting you with the news that Hermione has bushy hair or the nightly news on your local channel discussing the various current spoilers (which shall not be discussed here), it's going to happen. Getting offline isn't going to limit your contact with these insidious spoilers. How is leaving LJ going to protect you from that?
On a personal note, I like the idea of having a culture here that understands and commiserates about being greeted with spoilers IRL. We sympathize, we support and we communicate.
Second – There's the whole idea that the entire experience will be ruined by being "spoiled". Aren't we all here for more than the ending? If we were all here just to find out who lives and who dies, we'd just wait until the reactions showed up and read about it then. We're here for the experience, for the enjoyment of the words (let's not debate whether JKR can really write or not, yeah?) and for the community.
If someone tells me that Boba Fett makes it out of the Sarlacc Pit and lives a long fruitful life, I'm still going to wonder "how does he do it? How long of a life? What does he do with it?" It's about the story, not just the ending.
Quoting from a Time magazine, "The idea that someone could ruin a novel by revealing its ending is like saying you could ruin the Mona Lisa by revealing that it's a picture of a woman with a center part. Spoilers are a myth: they don't spoil. No elaborate secrecy campaign is going to make [DH] better than it already is and no website could possibly make it useless and boring." (Time, July 9, 2007)
My point is the spoilers only ruin the experience if you let them. It's your journal, do what you want. I'm here for the long haul. I'm not reading on filters and I'm going to enjoy the book just as much as I've enjoyed every single other one of them, regardless of whether I know that Peeves and Filch argue about bubblegum or Moaning Myrtle moans in the loo.
As I will be at work until later with no access to LJ, comments are screened until I get home.
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Date: 2007-07-14 12:30 am (UTC)As for spoilers being not true, I can see that for Harry Potter, but outside of that, there's really not a culture where people are making up fake spoilers, so there's no reason for me to think, say, that people have been lying all these years about the plot of the Crying Game. :p
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Date: 2007-07-14 12:38 am (UTC)I think there is a culture for making up spoilers. People do it to be assholes. IE - Howard Stern, around the time of Sixth Sense, made up a bunch of spoilers and put the real spoiler in there as well. People are dicks and they make things up to torque people. Heck, I know I've made up fake spoilers for the Dresden Files books that my family are currently devouring our way through. I do it to piss my sister off. Thankfully, she knows they're fake so she won't get mad at me. (We had this conversation awhile back about spoilers and she's definitely in the "spoilers spoil" camp.)
I have to admit to not seeing the Crying Game and, other than hearing about the andogynous dude that was also in Stargate, haven't really heard much about it so I can't say for sure on that one Got any for me? *winks*
But seriously - I see how spoilers have the ability to spoil, I just don't see how leaving LJ can stop the spoilers.