The Controversies of Fanfiction: Research Based Argument

Morality of Fanfiction

In recent years, fanfiction has been rising in popularity among fandoms— groups of people who are all devoted to one canon— which could be a book, movie, tv show, band or celebrity. With this, however, fanfiction is also becoming popular in the publishing industry. According to copyright laws, it is permissible to write about someone else's intellectual property so long as the writer doesn't make money off of it. This law is based off of moral principles which seem simple in theory, but which become more difficult to comprehend once applied to the real world. This is especially the case when there are different types of fanfiction which each can create a whole new set of problems. Take "real-person fanfiction," for example. If someone writes a fictional story about a real person, depicting made-up traits about him or her, could this be considered libel? Is it still libel if the celebrity's name is changed, but the audience still knows the story is about him or her? And if all names are changed in a work of fanfiction so it no longer resembles its original canon, and is now legally allowed to be published, is this ethical?

Fanfiction, in principle, has been going on for much longer than most people know. When the original author of Don Quixote never produced the sequel he promised, another author of roughly the same time period wrote it instead (Miller). Today fanfiction appears mostly on websites such as Wattpad, a free website where people can share and read other people's work. As it turns out, most of the fanfiction being recently written and read is about real people. This means there is a whole new set of ethical implications surrounding real-person fanfiction in regards to how it is affecting the publishing world. Much of the general public also seems to view fanfiction writers as copycats or lazy, but the fact is that fanfiction is now being re-written and reformed into actual novels for publishing. Despite these negative social stigmas there seems to be about fanfiction, there are many benefits to it for young writers. However, moderation needs to be employed because fanfiction is also being taken too far in some respects.

People don't seem to understand the extent to which fanfiction is affecting today's world either. There are multiple places for fanfiction to be published for free on the internet, such as Fanfiction.net, ArchiveofOurOwn, Tumblr, and many more. Each site operates differently and has more or less of different types of fanfiction. I originally learned about fanfiction when I joined a website called Wattpad, which is for writers to share their work, be it fanfiction or not, with other writers or readers for free. After a few months of being on this site, I was sucked into a subculture I previously didn't know existed. When most people think of fanfiction, they think of Star Wars and Star Trek, but, at least on Wattpad, neither of these canons crack the top fifteen most written about. The top three most written about canons are actually One Direction, 5 Seconds of Summer, and YouTube/Viners in that order. This means that we should perhaps be more concerned at this point with (though not limited to) the ethical implications surrounding real-person fanfiction in regards to publishing. I am only emphasizing this because, so far, most academic writing about fanfiction seems to be more concerned with fanfiction based off of books and movies. As one might assume, after hearing that fanfiction is now most commonly being written and read about boy bands such as One Direction, most fanfiction is being read and written by teenage girls. Because of this, people have begun to discuss fanfiction writers with underlying misogynistic undertones, hence the term "fangirl" (Narayanan). However, instead of stereotyping the fangirl into a ditsy schoolgirl who wastes her time on things that don't really matter, the public must understand that fanfiction writers can reach massive audiences. And if a writer can reach massive audiences, she is also likely able to make a big impact on the publishing world if she is given the chance.

Many academics seem to believe writing and reading fanfiction are wasteful ways for adolescents to spend their time, and that doing so suppresses creativity. However, Catherine Tosenberger, who has been an esteemed professor at the University of Winnipeg since 2008 and who is a member of the board for the Organization of Transformative Works, in Children's Literature Association Quarterly argues that fanfiction gives young writers a voice in the publishing world. Also, sometimes young writers don't know where to start. Coming up with plot, character development, and voice can sometimes be intimidating for an adolescent who is just starting their journey as a writer. Starting out with fanfiction checks at least one of those off the list. And fanfiction also reaches out to youths who aren't necessarily trying to become writers, but are just trying to be a part of something they care a lot about. Once a writer becomes famous on the internet, it can make it easier to become published. E. L. James originally published 50 Shades of Grey as a Twilight fanfiction on the internet, and after it gained attention there, she changed all the names and had it published as a real novel. This is just one example of many authors, who may or may not have started out with fanfiction, who became semi-famous on the internet before they became famous in real life. However, even if an adolescent doesn't have any intentions of becoming a famous writer, he or she can still use fanfiction as a means to explore themselves. A movie called /Slash/ about an adolescent writing erotic homosexual fanfiction is in the process of being made. The movie's page states that the movie tells the story of a "young man struggling to understand his place in the world, both socially and sexually, and both the stories he writes and the community he finds through sharing his work are an important part of his journey" (Boyle). Fanfiction can be a safe place for people to explore themselves emotionally and sexually in a safe place, so long as they don't take it too far.