How to be a better fan

You couldn't tell by looking, but humans are very supportive creatures. So supportive, in fact, that we always sometimes go overboard with our overbearing love. This is especially the case when people are ardent fans of any artist/personality/series.

Today we're going to look at some of the ways most diehard fans could be less crazy. If you start to recognise yourself in some of these descriptions, you could try to change yourself for the better. Or you could send a strongly worded email to [email protected]

DON'T HATE ON NEW FANS

Music fans are often guilty of this: in most fanbases there is an unspoken hierarchy that rears its ugly head when there are new members. That's when you realise it's less of a community and more of a guild.

There are the Peasants - ones who have only listened to a few songs. You have your Apprentices, listeners of all the albums. Then there are the Lieutenants, who have bought every article of merchandise ever released. Finally, you have the Guild Masters - the real OG's, who were fans since they were in the womb. They have a shrine dedicated to the artist, and regularly break into the artists' houses to collect more trinkets for their shrines, only because they love them, of course.

If you're one of these people, maybe you could try to not judge the strength of someone's love for the artist based on how long they've been a fan. Not only will this encourage more people to try out the artists' work, but someone you've encouraged could end up becoming the next Guild Master.

INSULTS AHOY

Toxic fans have the habit of believing the thing they support is better than all its contemporaries, especially in the case of football clubs and movie/comic franchises. That's fine, since everyone has a preference. The problem starts when you start defending your franchise of choice by insulting the other franchises.

Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against roasting your opponents. It's incredibly fun to watch the life drain out of someone's eyes when you deliver a particularly devastating burn.

However, for some fans, this is all they can do. Their supported franchises rarely have any boast-worthy features, so they get off on insulting other franchises. At one point, you can predict what they'll say.

Instead of being this predictable, how about you learn to not let your self-esteem determine how you respond to criticism? You could start by realising not everyone will have the same preferences as you, instead of turning every conversation into a verbal Mexican standoff. The best thing for everyone would be if you learned to take criticism on the chin and move on.

TO BE FAIR

You have to have a very high IQ to understand my articles. The humour is extremely subtle, and without a solid grasp of memes most of the jokes will go over a typical reader's head. There's also this nihilistic outlook, which is deftly woven into my characterisation – my personal philosophy draws heavily from Stephanie Meyer's literature, for instance. The fans understand this stuff; they have the intellectual capacity to truly appreciate the depths of these jokes, to realise that they're not just funny, they say something deep about life.

As a consequence people who dislike me truly are idiots - of course they wouldn't appreciate, for instance, the humour in his existential catchphrase "Skrattar Du, Forlorar Du" which itself is a cryptic reference to the Swedish philosopher Felix Kjellberg. I'm smirking just imagining one of those addlepated simpletons scratching their heads in confusion as my genius wit unfolds itself on the newspaper.

This is an example of an elitist (or your everyday Richard and Mortimer fan). Annoying, right?

Don't be this guy. That's all folks.