Fandom's Come Knocking

[branchifer]

Okay, did you guys know people in this world make stuff of some of us? Apparently the yetis make toys of us on their own if none exist but also imitate ones that do exist if kids want them.

[Branch is hopping along a table of merch that is meant to mimic exactly the merch of him in stores. A lot of it is actually bigger than he is. He shows off the dolls with his tiny little wrist comm. They look even weirder at that perspective.]

Now that I know they're not ritual effigies, the toy thing is kind of funny. Weird, but funny.

Look at this. Look.

[He holds up his comm so the camera picks up some absolutely hideous toys.]

Like, who is this guy? I wouldn't even know who this was if it wasn't labeled with my name. Like, some random guy from the village maybe. I've never dressed like that in my life.

[He points the camera at another.]

This one is the closest to actually looking like me and it still has the random skull symbol hair thing. What's up with that? [A pause as his face comes back in view. It screws up in thought.] ...Okay, actually I don't hate it.

[Because even though he's a much happier person than he once was, he's still slightly an edgelord. Just slightly.]

[He looks upward and similar skull designs suddenly appear in his own hair, thanks to his ability to change its color. Maybe that explains why some of the dolls have black hair and some have blue (if manufacturing inconsistencies aren't to blame).]

[(It's actually not but he's not about to explain the subtleties of troll coloration when it comes to emotional state.)]

Seriously, you should check it out, and see if the yetis made stuff based on you. It's hilarious.

[ooc: If none exists IRL, people can make up imaginary merch, though all merch at the Pole would be for kids or teens. The stuff made purely by the yetis would largely be decent-looking and accurate, uglier stuff would be based on designs existing in the game world because well, that's what the kid pointed at in the store. Googling themselves would produce other merch for other demographics, as well as let people find out about any internet fandom. People can feel free to thread hop a lot because the point of this is probably going to be a lot of pointing and laughing.]

Comments

[millenyal_pink]

[Elle cocks her head.]

No, no I'm pretty sure he's got plenty of those. He's just old, cranky, and unfamiliar with the depravity of teenagers on the internet.

[bestbrotherever]

Teenagers of today are no more depraved than mortals of the past.

[millenyal_pink]

Duh, but the internet is just there for anyone to stumble across. It's an accessibility thing.

["Humans have always been horny" isn't exactly a novel statement.]

[bestbrotherever]

Do you not think humans should have easy access to information?

[He grew up as a prince of an advanced civilization. Having that level of accessibility to knowledge is normal to him.]

[millenyal_pink]

[Elle narrows her eyes.]

Yeah, that's not at all what I said.

You proposed that people today aren't any more depraved than they were in the past. I agree. My point wasn't to make a value judgement about the internet, it was about the accessibility to that depravity for someone who isn't actively seeking it out.

[bestbrotherever]

[He shrugs]

Others on Asgard would say that no other race deserves anything that might equal or surpass the library Asgard enjoys. I have seen other mortals say claim "the internet was a mistake", though I presume that is less of a serious sentiment.

I did not think it was that much harder in the past to find evidence of mortal depravity in their stories. Their imaginings of the doings of the gods were full of it, and are those stories not ones that the common man are most likely to come upon?

[millenyal_pink]

It's never been hard to find it when you try, but now I would propose that it's far easier to stumble upon them. In a library, one would hope things are sorted in some way where you can find what you're looking for. Obviously that sorting has changed over time and across cultures, but there is some order. The internet can lack that for various reasons.

I understand that your personal experience and circumstances are unique in this regard, but not everyone is used to being the focus of any kind of story, much less an explicit one. Those who are used to it are used to it in the way that fame and notoriety breeds stories. They're not talking about you, just their idea of you based on hearsay and third-hand accounts. That's different from people being familiar with the explicit details of your life and inner world and making decisions about how you would act based on their interpretation of your core self. That's a level of... intimacy that can feel exploitative in a way rumors and speculation, simply aren't.

[Boy, this is a whole lot of stuff that Elle had put time into deliberately Not Thinking About! But now she's talking about which means she'll have to eventually process how she feels about it all, and she already knows what the answer is: not great. She had been hoping to put off this particular confrontation with reality for a little while longer. ]