Warning: Far too many words on cartoon pony fans:
Unfortunately, I have to partially agree with Asymptotically fat. I was a Brony at some point when I just took it to mean “person who likes the show”. I’m sure I was a little annoying about it because there definitely were people who attacked anyone who liked the show merely because it was breaking gender roles, but otherwise the first two seasons were decent cartoons. That’s not too surprising since we’re in pretty much a golden age of animation at the moment, FLM is above mediocre, but not the best around right now.
I had to distance myself from Brony pretty hard when it started becoming clear the kind of community it was cementing itself as. There are a lot of perfectly decent people who are really into the show, people who do charity work and are kind, and enjoy the friendship message of the show. I’ve met them, and they exist male or female. I still think the first two seasons are entertaining if not particularly complex television, and some of the music is good, even some fan remixes and art.
Unfortunately, the fandom is almost characterized on the internet at large at this point by the… uh… deviants. If someone actually identifies as a Brony I have to seriously question them, because to me Bronyism goes well beyond simply kind of liking a silly cartoon pony show and into a weird culture that often flat out devolves into the worst excesses of any community that ultimately stems from 4chan.
That doesn’t mean that if you identify as a Brony, you’re necessarily bad, but it is enough that I have to stop and wonder. The community at large has become so toxic in a broad sense that it carries a sort of unfortunate guilt by association at this point. It’s a sort of identity that just goes beyond “Whovian” or Harry Potter nerds.
In some ways, it really does mirror the whole reason furries became anathema. There wasn’t anything wrong in a general sense with people who were really into shows with anthropomorphic animals for whatever reason, but a shift happened where an incredibly notable, visible section of the community became so bad and creepy (read the link) that it begins to become questionable when people don’t make efforts to distance themselves from the whole thing.
Unfortunately, I have to come down on the side of condemning BPC’s hobby. It’s always difficult to shut down peoples interests or say something they like is wrong. In fact, in an absolute moral sense I don’t think BPC is doing anything wrong unless he’s trying to get Tara Strong to read his fanfics or something. However, I do think that contributing to this sort of thing is also directly contributing to the incredibly bizarre, insular, strange community that Bronies have become.
I was happy at one point that the following of MLP showed an advance in “shows for girls” being taken as seriously from a design, marketing, and acceptance standpoint as shows for boys have been for over a decade now. That MLP could have just a serious peripheral following as Transformers or Adventure Time (or course, Adventure Time is a post-hoc example since it’s a newer show) or whatever else. But all the weird sexualization and memetic bullshit warps it to the point that I think the community is actively harming the cause of gender equality in viewership. There are shows that are relatively gender neutral, and shows that are action focused – both get some amount of respect and girls and boys can watch both (but not too equal :rolleyes:), but once it comes to a show that is actively girly it gets shoved into this little corner with a GIRLS ONLY sign. All this weirdness around the show that started breaking those barriers projects an image that this is what happens when you dare to make a show aimed at girls that boys and adults can like too.
That may be a tad melodramatic, but time and time again I see Bronies reinforcing every bad or weird stereotype about the community, and othering themselves. Othering themselves makes for a great clubhouse, but reinforces that liking shows for girls is somehow “weird” in a society where we’re struggling to break those prejudices. Not only that, it directly goes against the inclusive message of the show. The community in many ways feels like a case study on how the Five Geek Social Fallacies make being overly permissive into something decidedly uninclusive.
I’m not going to condemn BPC as a pedophile or a misogynist or any other mean nasty word, but I think the hobby in and of itself contributes to A Problem™, and I really don’t think being open about it is doing him any favors.
