How Fandom Endangers Female Musicians

[Stephen 29,392]

"I was once chased by a full grown man after a show as he shouted 'I would never chase you.'"

Be grateful. Don't be a diva. Appreciate the attention. These are sentiments female musicians often hear. The logic goes: Your fans gave you your fame, so you should give them your love. But this kind of toxic entitlement is dangerous; particularly for women artists, it can warp into harmful experiences, often connected with the artists' pre-existing socialized, gendered guilt. 

"Part of the reason the ecosystem of fandom works is because there are boundaries, because people can imagine the life of someone they adore without having an intimate place in that person's life," cultural critic Hanif Abdurraqib explained to NYLON.  Music critic Sasha Geffen called this phenomenon "asymmetrical intimacy," where the musician has no idea who you are, but you're already in on their life. It's easy to build a fiction in your head where you guys are best buds, even if you've never met before."

As much as we may want to call excessive fandom—to the point of online harassment or in-person stalking—a phenomenon, that belittles its intensity and frequency. Women and queer people across the independent music scene are particularly vulnerable to these instances. Georgia "Maq" McDonald, the lead singer and guitarist for Camp Cope, has had fans cross the line, both physically and emotionally, asking her "****ed-up things about the content of my songs, because instead of my songs being allowed to be a song, people think it's this big insight into my life and they can figure me out." She added: "Sometimes I feel like people see me as public property rather than a person like anybody else."

McDonald pointed out to me that it takes a lot of emotional labor to have these conversations about assault, safety, and boundaries—conversations male artists rarely have—wherein female musicians want to explain how they feel unsafe without isolating harmless, loving fans.

"I don't want to be called a diva, I don't people to be intimidated by me, but I also don't want to be walked over and used like a commodity. I want to be as gracious and open as possible, and that ability changes all the time," Dacus said. "I am really grateful people care, I still don't get how that happened, but I want listeners to remember that everyone, including myself, is subject to change. I'll probably be different from the time I answer this question to the time it will be published."

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These are just some excerpts I pulled, read the full article: https://nylon.com/fandom-danger-female-musicians