PSA: Ponified language is RUINING YOUR FANFIC. · 7:05pm May 25th, 2015
Alright, honestly, I love you guys. You write some amazing stuff. But there are certain trends you Fimficcers follow that really grind my gears.
One of them is when people replace "I" with "Ah". (Seriously, don't do that. The accent should come naturally through the mannerisms, not by butchering phonetics.)
But even worse than that? When people "ponify" the ever-loving shit out of everything.
Don't get me wrong. Pony puns and ponified sayings in general aren't bad by their very nature. I mean, hell, the show uses them. They have their place, and some of them are excessively clever.
No, what's bad is that, especially in fanfiction, they're overused to shit, in creatively lazy, unrealistic, stupid-sounding ways that do not fit the universe and completely wreck suspension of disbelief.
Problem #1: Ponified human names
It's almost always a celebrity name of some sort. I guess they're trying to make a reference, and they need it to be obvious. One fic stands as a particularly egregious criminal in this regard: The VinylTavia shipfic, Allegrezza. Specifically, when Octavia and Vinyl are drunk-arguing over which influential musicians are the best. They were throwing around "Iron Mareden" and "Beethoofen" and "Fill Coltins" and "Buck Norris" and shit like that.
Jesus Christ, listen to yourselves. Do you people realize how stupid some of these names sound?
One of the things about My Little Pony that makes the universe so believable is its cultural consistencies, and one of the most consistent patterns is pony names. They are almost always just plain old words (Spike. Rarity. Cloud Chaser. Time Turner. Rainbow Dash), with very few exceptions that almost always belong to exotic people (Pinkamena, Trixie, Sombra, Zecora, Gilda).
The thing about cultural consistencies is that they come to be through generations of tradition. Breaking from that is jarring. Case in point: remember the hippie movement of the 70's, where parents would name their kids things like "Flower Power" and "Rainbow" and "Sunshine"? It was ridiculous, because those were words that you usually did not use as names, ever, and it broke from cultural norm. Hell, they sound like pony names.
Now when you reverse the situation and start taking real Earthling names and dumping them into MLP? It makes absolutely no sense, for exactly the same reason. Not only do they sound incredibly forced, but they don't fit into the universe at all. Note that the show rarely does this, unless it's to make a quick reference or play off a singular joke of some sort, but it most certainly does not come close to being the status quo.
How to fix it:
Seriously, just get creative, it's not that hard to make believable names, they're literally just words. Fallen Star. Hard Boiled. Blackjack. Figments once named a composer "Schaden Freude"--that's hilarious. Hell, the best names usually consist of words that have nothing to do with each other. Meadow Song. Spark Wheel. Velvet Remedy. Anything from Kkat's Fallout: Equestria, really. Oh yeah, and almost the entire Mane Six: "Pinkie" and "Pie"? "Flutter" and "Shy"? "Rainbow" and "Dash"? Literally nothing to do with each other! That's why their names are so iconic, because even though they're just words, they're still a unique enough combination to stand out as names to us.
Do that, and stop trying to force "hoof" and "neigh" and "mare" and "colt" into everything, because that gets old, real fast.
Problem #2: Swears
"Oh my Celestia." "For Celestia's sake." "What in Celestia's name?" I dare you to start using these in real life. You will very quickly learn why no one in their right mind would do so. But okay, let's break it down to the constituent causes.
What do some of the most popular swears in the English language (damn, shit, fuck, tits, ass, bitch) have in common? One syllable. Anything that's more than one syllable? It rhymes, or has some kind of rhyming pattern. Douchecanoe. Chucklefuck. Asshat. Twatwaffle. Thundercunt. Now, what do almost all swears have in common? They roll off the tongue very easily. You can say them fast, in split seconds, because they require minimal tongular gymnastics. This is important in action moments, where the characters do not have a lot of breath to spare.
But "oh my Celestia"? Celestia is four syllables. No one has the breath to waste on a swear that long. If people just walked around saying "oh my Celestia" all the time it would absolutely slaughter you mentally. Maybe it doesn't sound so bad on paper, but hoh my god, if a TV show started using that as one of their safe-for-broadcast Gosh Dang It To Heck swears, I can guarantee you that you would go nuts.
Yes, I get it, Celestia is a god, people say "oh my god", so the first thought is "oh my Celestia". But if that's the first thing that comes to mind, chances are that's because it's a really, really quick and dirty answer, the easy way out. And that's lazy. You can try a little harder than that.
How to fix it:
Tip 1: Write for broadcast TV. Think like someone trying to write a show for a channel that blocks swearing. Dromicosuchus, of Mendacity fame, uses "smelting" as an intensive (i.e. "fucking", "goddamn"). The TV show Firefly uses "gorram", or Mandarin swears, and everyone loves that shit.
Tip 2: Follow the rhyming pattern! ShortSkirtsAndExplosions/Imploding Colon famously uses "Luna poop" in his Austraeoh series, which uses few syllables, rhymes with itself, and rolls off the tongue well, meaning Dash can just bust that one out at random moments and not sound completely unnatural doing so.
Tip 3: This is a high-fantasy world; you can afford to get a little "mystical" or silly with your swears. HamGravy uses "For Sun's sake", which not only sounds far more natural than "For Celestia's sake", but also still acknowledges Celestia as a deity. This is the approach I use myself, and I also created more swears around Luna ("By the Sun and Stars", "Stars guide me", "Sun smite them!" etc.). Not only do these sound appropriately fantasy-esque, they also help reinforce Celestia and Luna's mystique and their role as protectors to Equestria's citizens.
Tip 4: Do what the show does! We hear swears in the show all the time--"horseapples!", "hayseed!", "ponyfeathers", "I don't give a flying feather", etc. These all roll off the tongue super well, but more importantly they match the universe. "Flying feather" is clever because you use feathers to fly, unlike the swear it's trying to emulate ("flying fuck", which, when you really think about it, makes no sense"). If you're trying to keep your story E or T, this is a great approach.
Tip 5: Countryisms. Basically entire phrases, like "butter my biscuit". Applejack does this a lot. Here's a list of swears from Fallout: Equestria. Your mileage may vary, but some gems include: "Sit on my horn and spin", "Celestia's solar-flaring mareheat!", and "Luna's lacy lingerie". These are great when your character's just sitting in awe of something and has the time to say something super-lengthy and poignant that informs the reader how truly fucked-up the situation is.
k I'm done ranting. I was gonna do a section on city names too, but that'll most likely be a repeat of Problem #1, so whatever.
Just never use Neighpon again. Anything else will do. Nipponi. Or Neipon. Or Japony. Or something. If you're going to use the actual Japanese name for Japan, at least stick to Japanese phonetics, FFS!
Peace and chicken grease.
Heehee. This blog post makes me laugh, instead of sad.
I think you meant the late 60s, early 70s, when the whole hippie 'flower power' scene was in its prime. By the time the 80s came around, the children who were named those idiotic names, gave their kids real names.
I guess I'm guilty of that myself, though I was already starting to regret it.
Pretty sure that was the 60's.
Joe, as in Donut Joe. Also, Trixie is an actual Earthling name, if currently out of fashion.
Alas, he's also a major perpetrator of the ponified celebrity name meme.
Family Guy reference.
Just putting this here for you to remember when writing future chapters... that is all.
Can't see why people don't just use "Oh my Goddess"
Is it really that hard?
The only thing I got from this was that I must write a one-shot where Treehugger raises a colt named John Smith.
Meh. TL;DR.
Also, Coco Pommel.
3096932 At least Coco is an actual word.
Spike says "Sweet Celestia" in the show.
Get rekt, scrub lord.
Those ridiculous swears are one of the reasons the story is such a drag to read :/
3096798 Pony Joe works alright because "Joe" is synonymous with coffee. Trixie was listed as an example of one case where the show broke its own rule, and it still works alright because it's a stage-name meant to be exotic and unique.
As with any art, rules are also made to be broken, including all the ones I listed, as long as you have a good reason. If you're intentionally breaking a rule to establish a particular tone (as is the case with plenty of comedies on the site where suspension of disbelief is not a priority), then that's entirely in service to your story and wholly encouraged. Also applies if you're writing show-style Pinkie Pie, because it's motherfuckin' Pinkie Pie, she ain't gotta explain shit.
Name gags are a huge component of a lot of Short Skirts' surreal comedy, so if it's part of the point, it's perfectly acceptable. For example, in something like Austraeoh, it'd feel right at home, because that series is almost literally "Name Gags: The Duodecalogy". In something like End of Ponies, on the other hand, it'd stick out like a sore thumb.
And I'm pretty sure "grind your gears" existed long before Family Guy.
3097046 That's fine, because that's based on swears like "Sweet mother of Jesus!" Long swears exist (I'd file them under "countryisms" because of their analogical properties), and there's a time and a place for them. "All the time" is not one of them. Unless you're writing an Apple. (Break rules within reason!)
3097052 Yeah, like I said, YMMV. Some are great, some are awful.
3097391
You know, I would have thought so too. The phrase certainly did long exist as a reference to the act of physically grinding the gears in a transmission by a bad gear shift, but as a euphemism for something that pisses you off? I actually did a search, and everything kept pointing back to Family Guy. Take it for what it's worth.
Also: Gilda. Admittedly not a pony name. And I see you changed never ever to rarely, so I'll shut up about it.
I have a bone to pick with this one.
It's actually an extremely modern thing - back in the day, people preferentially swore on the names of Saints, or used euphemisms derived from religious terms (God's Blood was a very common swear at one point.)
3098401 She's a gryphon, mate
Dangit, stop criticizing things that I do!
Or, you know, used to do, and then slowly weaned myself off of it once the novelty wore off, but it's still there and now you're drawing attention to it. Consarn it.
3097391
Also, pretty sure
Trixie ~= Tricks
Still kindof sortof works. It's a bit tricksy of them.
This alone seriously made me question why I wasn't following you yet.
3104876
I have been saying this since I joined the fracking website. People who butcher their words butcher the accent and butcher me, my eyes, and my soul to bits.
And also agreed. I heart you, Swan Song. I heart you so hard.
3116642 fc00.deviantart.net/fs70/i/2013/224/4/6/blushing_sweetie_by_deathnyan-d6hguoj.png
Well, I certainly wasn't expecting a well-thought out, in-depth analysis of using swears in pony fanfiction when I clicked on this article, but I can't say I'm disappointed. I'll actually have to keep this in mind.
Rarity did say "As Celestia is my witness" once. Which is normally used with "God", no?
edit: And I'm sure I've heard her or others say "Sweet Celestia!" in shock/surprise.
first comment of 2019 on this specific blog post.