Response Dissonance: A Discussion on Anon · 8:41pm Jan 6th, 2018
Hello to you all, my fine gentlemen and lovely ladies, on this cool winter evening. I hope to find you well.
Recently, I have found myself reading a few Anon fics. A bad habit to get into, to be sure, and certainly not something I'd recommend. It is not good for one's mental health. The sad fact remains, however: Anon is now so prolific, he effectively forms his own sub-genre on site. He has his own tag, his own fans, and he just won't die.
I have, however, reached some conclusions.
First, let us talk about badfics in general. There are several key indicators that you are dealing with a stinker, the work of an author who has no clue what they are doing. A reliable one is a phenomenon I like to call "response dissonance." To illustrate this, consider the following passage:
“Pray tell, what are you laughing at?” Rarity asked the cloaked figure.
“I'm laughing because it's funny. Friendship is Magic... it's a joke.”
“Really? I find it disgusting... Friendship only causes pain... The greater the bond, the more one will suffer...” The cloaked figure spoke in a tone that was filled with dread while looking down at the table.
Allow me to set the scene. Rarity is getting married, to Blueblood. She has just kissed the groom, and is at the reception, where she encounters an aggressive, uninvited weirdo in a thick black cloak, who proceeds to rant about how friendship is horrible. I will give you a moment, my good ladies and gentlemen, to consider the response of an in character Rarity:
...
Done? Good. This is Rarity's actual response in fic:
At that moment, Rarity felt this unknown being's pain. Every word he spoke, she felt it. This male has been through a lot. This pushed her to speak.
“I'm not sure who you encountered to make you feel such a way, but those people who made you think this way are certainly no friends to be had. They don't deserve to have such a title.”
That jarring "what the fuck did I just read" sensation? That: "Hang on, that's not right, at all" thought you just had? The immediate: "There's just no way she would say, think or do that" which followed?
That is response dissonance.
It is a phenomenon that is very common in bad story telling in general, and bad fanfics in particular.
Think back to every time Fluttershy (or the author's pony waifu of choice) tells Aggressive Sulking Edgelord No. 265 that she just loves him for "who he is," despite the fact that "who he is" is a whiny little child. Despite the fact their relationship is more maternal than romantic. Despite the fact that he's awful to her and everything she loves. Even as he's sulking in his sulk corner at that very moment. Remember those occasions? That is response dissonance.
It's at it's most powerful when an author is either inserting him or herself into a story, or else has a clear pet character, as was the case with Spike in the fic quoted above. In such cases interactions between other characters and the insert will be warped in such a way that it always (one way or another) benefits the insert. Even if this is wildly, obviously out of line with how that character should respond, if they were remotely in character.
The immediate effect is to jerk the readers out of their immersion, as they call bullshit on what they're reading. I'm pretty sure everyone reading this could name a few examples.
Let us return to the example of Anon. Anon, you see, runs on response dissonance.
To illustrate this, let's consider the character tropes associated with Anon: the most common variants are pretty much uniformly foul-mouthed, dimwitted, lazy jerkarses. Anon is the sort of chap who fancies himself a great wit, even as his witticisms rarely venture beyond the level of the schoolyard. He is most often to be found on his lazy rear, issuing foul-mouthed dismissals to anyone who interacts with him.
He is basically an internet shitlord.
He never grows, he never learns, he never improves himself. And despite his many and obvious shortcomings, he never wants for female company; indeed: mares are just falling over themselves to interact with him, even as he swears at and belittles them. Just as Anon is almost always a lazy foul-mouthed jerk, his female company are almost always besotted with him. As far a Anon is concerned, girlfriends are something that just happen to him, as a reward for existing.
If that sounds like blatant wish fulfilment, well, it is. But that's not all it is. In general, how Anon talks and behaves, and how others respond to him, compared to how common sense (and a basic understanding of characterization) dictates they should be responding to him, are extremely dissonant with one another. Grievously OOC behaviour is the norm around Anon, not the exception.
This is most clear with the popular pairing of Anon and the Royal Sisters. The common Anon will afford them no respect whatsoever; he will swear at and talk down to them just like he does to everyone else. Despite this behaviour, and his obvious disdain for them, they will insist on inflicting their company upon him, most usually in the form of physical contact.
Needless to say, the sisters are completely OOC in such interactions, to the point of being unrecognisable as themselves but for the author's insistence on the matter. And that is rather the point.
To his fans, Anon works on two levels, the basic and the sophisticated. On a basic level, Anon functions as a self insertion mechanism: he speaks and behaves in a manner that the readers would desire to, and allows them to put themselves in his shoes as the centre of attention, exercising their inter Id with no negative consequences.
Want to imagine yourself surrounded by fawning girlfriends without having to make even the most rudimentary of effort? Anon is there for you. Want to be a shitlord to everyone around you and get away with it? Anon has your back.
To such fans, the comedy of Anon is that of the shitposter.
To the more "sophisticated" (for a given value of sophisticated), the very dissonance I have outlined here is the attraction. To such readers, Anon stories are funny because of outlandish and unlikely way everyone around Anon behaves, compared to how they ought to be behaving. To them, the image of Anon telling "Sunbutt" to fuck off as she mindlessly tries to hug him is inherently funny.
Even this "sophisticated" reading is, of course, still an appeal to the lowest common denominator. It is the humour of the likes of Teen Titans Go, and aggravates fans of MLP for the same reasons that show aggravates fans of the Teen Titans.
The sad fact is, all the reasons that critics would give as to why Anon is garbage: the shitty characterization, the cookie cutter laziness, the blatant wish fulfilment, the obvious self-insertion, the general awfulness of Anon himself; these are the very things that make it popular.
Anon is a shit sandwich. And he, or things like him, will always be popular, because some people just love themselves a good shit sandwich.
And then there are the stories like Not The Hero that portray Anon as the cosmic horror he is when you get right down to it. This living character distortion, this singularity of disproportionate plot importance, is downright terrifying when considered from an objective, in-universe standpoint.
There aren't many of them, but I do appreciate them.
4768327
One of my all-time favourite fics, that. I didn't mention it here, as I've recommended it so many times already and I don't think I have a single follower who doesn't know about it.
That said, the thoroughness with with which AlaraJRogers deconstructs Anon (and everything that would have to happen to the world to allow Anon to be a thing) is pure genius.
I wanted to do a fic where my OC kills anon.
Should I?
It's also worth noting that Anon behaves like a cishet white dude.
4768334
Your call on that one. Read the above mentioned Not the Hero for inspiration. You may need a little more than OC turns up and kills Anon, though. Might be worth going through some of Elric of Melnipony's fics as well.
I recall Scarlet Weather also had a blog post about Anon, and the comments section below came to the conclusion that Anon’s appeal is that he’s wish-fulfillment with plausible deniability built in. If Billy-Joe-Jim-Bob writes a story where his self-insert OC sexually harasses Rainbow Dash, someone out there might ask uncomfortable questions about why Billy’s choosing to represent himself as such a creep. But if Billy writes about Anon doing the same thing, then on the off-chance that someone tries to call him out, Billy has an automatic defense: “But that’s Anon, not me. Haven’t you read any other Anon stories? He’s always a creep like that.” An individual author can indulge his own id, then use Anon’s nature as a shared character to wash his hands of Anon’s actions.
4768360
An excellent point, that. I must seek out and read that thread.
4768361
Found it!
4768363
Thank you, my good Sir or Madam
4768363
Took a look at that thread. An excellent essay, as one would expect, and a good discussion afterwards. A good thread all told. I have shared horizon's comment, as it was particularly insightful.
There are a ton of terrible Anon fics, but I have read some good ones. (The author Get Me Outta Here is the best example that comes to mind). Good and bad Anon stories all start with Anon the typical internet shitlord -that's a great description of him, by the way- stuck in Equestria. The difference is, in good Anon stories, Anon changes and grows, in response to the actions and friendship of ponies. The stories are always about a emotional conflict between Anon and the ponies, and in decent Anon stories, the ponies always win by showing Anon friendship.
The real core message of Anon fics is that friendship is so powerful, it can reach even a despicable anti-social mess like Anon. It's ultimately supposed to be a testament to the strength of Friendship is Magic, similar to those religious conversion stories that get told sometimes about how terrible criminals become pillars of their communities when they find God.
The best Anon fic I read so far didn't have much of that stuff above. Yes, all the six girls wanted him, but it had build-up with each. And yes, he was sometimes clueless, but he was also really well-meaning and hardly ever rude. And when all six wanted to entice him to take them to the Gala, he tried finding a date for each of them so he wouldn't have to choose and hurt anyone's feelings.
It went badly.
And they were furious about it. As one might expect. Sure they made up, but not before telling him how much he messed up and he felt like total crap about it.
4768408
I have a soft spot for Anon stories, truth be told. It's the ones were Anon is deserving of company at all that I like, however. The ones where he might be an idiot, but he's nice. Clueless, bit big-hearted, that's the kind of Anon I like. More often than not, those also tend to feel less like self-inserts but actual characters.
4768338
First, thank you for the vote of confidence. My idea was a tad more complex tan just a one charactar shot where my OC headshots him: some sort of Tom Clancy-ish political thriller, or a murder mystery, or such, have no fear.
ABOUT THE FICS WHERE A MANE SIX/AUTHOR THING HAPPEN:
I was going to invert this recently, whee my OC has sex with the mane six, and most are hurt while others are embarrassed.
Zeba.Pony sex is basically ths fandom's repurchasing and repacking of an old fetish, namely Black/White porn, and you have watched popular interracial porn videos, the white women say the N-word a lot.
Similarly Zebra/ony fics have racial tension. I'm settinng up a lovely vignette where Rarity calls my be-dicked Zebra mare a zig, and my OC merely wants to know if this is because Rarity has been watching zebra/pony movie.
I intended my story to follow a similar trajectory but half the Six hate zigs. They can't STAND my character!
Meanwhile, the OCs of my friends will be breaking the fourth screen and say things lke, "Alsvid, trying to get Rainbow Dash to suck you is the dumbest thing I have heard of."
And my character will be all like, "I'm gonna teach her a lesson anyway."
The stories will be stupid. Basically an episode of bkacksonblondes wtih pones.
And anon is forced to watch Futa Alsvid and hr male Zebra son fuck everyoen's waifus with big black zebra dick.
In a nutshell, this fic humliates Anon AND satifies my kink. it also outlines how dumb these people who write about the mane six wanting him sexually are.
4768425
In all the good Anon stories I know Anon ends up like that. If he starts out as a jerk and it's not a bad story, it's usually a story about ponies redeeming him and teaching him to get along with others, a pretty core value of FiM in general.
4768372
D'aw, thanks!
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