Tradition and fanon
May. 31st, 2006 08:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
matrilSo my husband just finished The Da Vinci Code, having read it mainly because his mother lent it to him and raved about how great it was. Overall, he found it pretty laughably bad - mildly entertaining, if you have nothing else to read, but full of ridiculous hack writer tactics (something we've dubbed "hacktics") like ending every single chapter on a lame cliffhanger, and otherwise altogether quite predictable. Something else he noted was the confused ideas about organized religion's supposed oppression of the worship of the Sacred Female, or some weird thing like that. Apparently even Walt Disney was in on it. ????
In any case, during the course of discussing Brown's bizarre version of religious history, it occurred to us that there are a number of long-standing, totally unfounded traditions within Christianity that have been around so long they carry credence with most people. And yet there is positively nothing in the Bible to indicate their existence. For example, Mary Magdelene as a prostitute - it's just not there. Or being the wife of Christ, for that matter. Other things, not quite as widespread, like Pilate converting to Christianity. There's nothing directly contradicting them, but nothing at all to lend them credence either. Yet they've been passed around the Christian community for so many hundreds of years that they're almost taken for granted. And then my brain abruptly made a connection - this is just like fanon! Fandom canon, theories or character details that don't occur in canon, that have no real proof one way or the other, and yet so common that people seem to forget they have no basis in the actual text. It's amazing, and a little frightening, how fans begin to lose track of what they've read or seen in the actual creator's work, and what they've encountered in fan fic or discussion. If they see it frequently enough, it seems that it's embedded in their minds as canon.
Well, after all, it's just fandom. So maybe they'll yell at the author for not keeping in line with a theory they've absolutely, positively convinced themselves to be true. Their loss. But it seems that the Internet offers a sort of microcosm of the real world, sped up thanks to the instant transmission of information, so that we can see, on a smaller scale, the way that humans tend to behave. And if they can get this weird and self-deluded about mere fandom, no wonder they've invented all sorts of stories, fan fiction-esque, about the Bible, and the stories have gained credence simply from being around long enough. Unfortunately, they won't do so well to be yelling at the Author of the world, when their theories don't work out like they imagined. Heh. Hmm...maybe if the Internet speeds up the course of human interactions that much, it can give us insights into the future of these traditions as well as the past. Now that's getting really weird...
In any case, during the course of discussing Brown's bizarre version of religious history, it occurred to us that there are a number of long-standing, totally unfounded traditions within Christianity that have been around so long they carry credence with most people. And yet there is positively nothing in the Bible to indicate their existence. For example, Mary Magdelene as a prostitute - it's just not there. Or being the wife of Christ, for that matter. Other things, not quite as widespread, like Pilate converting to Christianity. There's nothing directly contradicting them, but nothing at all to lend them credence either. Yet they've been passed around the Christian community for so many hundreds of years that they're almost taken for granted. And then my brain abruptly made a connection - this is just like fanon! Fandom canon, theories or character details that don't occur in canon, that have no real proof one way or the other, and yet so common that people seem to forget they have no basis in the actual text. It's amazing, and a little frightening, how fans begin to lose track of what they've read or seen in the actual creator's work, and what they've encountered in fan fic or discussion. If they see it frequently enough, it seems that it's embedded in their minds as canon.
Well, after all, it's just fandom. So maybe they'll yell at the author for not keeping in line with a theory they've absolutely, positively convinced themselves to be true. Their loss. But it seems that the Internet offers a sort of microcosm of the real world, sped up thanks to the instant transmission of information, so that we can see, on a smaller scale, the way that humans tend to behave. And if they can get this weird and self-deluded about mere fandom, no wonder they've invented all sorts of stories, fan fiction-esque, about the Bible, and the stories have gained credence simply from being around long enough. Unfortunately, they won't do so well to be yelling at the Author of the world, when their theories don't work out like they imagined. Heh. Hmm...maybe if the Internet speeds up the course of human interactions that much, it can give us insights into the future of these traditions as well as the past. Now that's getting really weird...
no subject
Date: 2006-06-02 09:36 pm (UTC)Gospel of Judas? They had baddie-glorifying fanboys in the 3d century, too, then. (See Draco Malfoy fans)
Jesus/Madalene? Oh, and they had Harry/Hermione shippers too.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-02 10:46 pm (UTC)