Lately, I've been noticing my father isn't too keen on me being a brony. That made me think about why haters detest and belittle us. I have come to the following conclusion: Either: A) They think that by challenging gender roles, we are harming society in some vague manner, or; B) They think we all clop. What do you think makes haters hate on us? Sent from my SCH-S720C using Tapatalk 2
Haters gotta hate, if it wasn't Bronies it would be some other poor schmucks. So Bronies do society a service by being a lightning rod of haters so other people don't have to feel those flames.
That, and like most other fandoms, Bronies too have those stupid, yet vocal minority of people whose stupidity is the constant focus of attention, so other stupid people outside of the fandom tend to latch onto it. It's pretty much the same old thing since the beginning of... well... humanity itself, basically. *shrugs*
Because bronies consider themselves to be above every other thing on the internet, tend to be self-righteous fools, a few of the big names in the fandom are associated with or are paedophiles, (superpsyguy for example) and, of course, most of them are extremely uptight. Also, can't forget about those bronies that are into body pillows, BD pony stuff, and other things. (Personally, I think that people are into what they're into. There's a lot worse off stuff than that. But people see it as you wanting to sleep with your pony waifu, so you know.) It goes a bit too far when you get threads like 'I'm in love with Twilight Sparkle' or 'Man wants to marry Rainbow Dash' in an unironic manner, no? A lot of bronies are immature fedora-tippers. That's why they're hated.
Haters gon' hate. There's really no universal reason to it. Some do it because they're angry, some because they're sad, and some just do it because they're bored. There's a plathora of other reasons too, listing them all would require going through each and every person, and frankly that's more than I could care. Sent from my SM-P600 using Tapatalk
The standard gender roles are so ingrained into society that people think defying them is wrong and against nature itself. To them, we're so bizarre and unnatural that there absolutely must be something wrong with us. It couldn't possibly be because the world is changing and those ancient expectations are simply being evolved from.
There are all kinds of reasons people in general will antagonize people of a given group and it depends on the individual. If you want to generalize, here are my observations. They may need to be corrected. I can only report on what I've seen. Misconception The thing about groups is that once they get sufficiently large, the most disliked traits of that group will overshadow the liked traits, regardless of whether those disliked traits belong to a minority. This is because bad people make a lot more noise than good people and get much more attention, both from individuals and from the media. You don't hear the news announce that someone didn't murder somebody today, after all. So basically, if you have a thousand morons and ten or twenty thousand great, normal folks, everyone is going to think of your group like all 21,000 of you are those 1,000 idiots, because those idiots are way way louder than you are and nobody likes to hear good news. Once it takes hold, this false image causes good, fairly shy people to be ashamed to be part of such an obnoxious fandom, thus they do not speak up and drop even further out of the public ear. This setup makes enemies for everybody in your fandom, even if only a very small portion of you deserve it. There's only one thing you can do about this: ensure that if only one good person is left in the world, it's you. Do not let other people's perceptions color what you believe is the right way to carry yourself, and do not put extra effort into rebelling against their hatred of you. You can do no more than that. Fear of Change Everyone has an idea in their head of How Things Should Be - a tradition - and there's always someone else rebelling against it, either because they honest to goodness are not compatible with the system, or just because they hate having to follow rules. Whatever the case it doesn't matter: if there's a rule or a tradition, someone is going to break it. There is nothing someone fears more than major changes, even pretend ones in their head. Unspoken rules are more dangerous than ones written down, because they are held onto far more tightly. Traditions are the true laws of cultures. One reason that pony's brother toyline GI Joe is doing so poorly - and a huge hurdle when it was first conceived - is the long-standing tradition that boys do not play with dolls, because they're girly. My Little Pony is THE girliest possible doll toyline there is, with only Barbie possibly beating it out, and an interest in the show is not difficult to infer as an interest in the dolls (and indeed most bronies I've seen are quite willing to purchase some or another of the dolls.) Ergo, a man's interest in the show (seemingly) conflicts sharply with conversatives' views of how men should behave and conduct themselves. This creates a fear of change, and as Yoda tells us in the only good line from that crappy prequel movie, fear leads to anger, and anger leads to hatred. In my experience, the most conservative-minded people are older men, because it's easily far more difficult to be a "RAH RAH REAL MAN" than to be a "lady" and they don't want decades of hard work and unhappiness to have been completely pointless. This is why fathers are so harsh towards their "gay" sons. Invasion As I said before, there are bad people in any subculture, and they don't have to be anywhere close to a majority to hijack the image of that subculture. Well, one of the worst and most legitimately offensive things that bad fans can do for everyone involved is take over other interests. This hurts the fans of both fandoms, and the object of the invading fandom. Bad bronies (and furries, but story for another day) are a massive culprit of this. Team Fortress 2 is an excellent example, because it's a wildly popular game, and it automatically downloads custom content to your client because everyone has to be synchronized. The only way to avoid pony content (or any unwanted content) is to completely disable custom content of any kind, including tag sprays. This causes the object of that fandom (ponies) to become an invasive, threatening, enemy concept that demands attention - you have us or you have nothing - and thus rapidly turns off people from giving them a chance. To someone whose interests have been swallowed up by obsessive bronies, allowing ponies into your life is giving an all-consuming blight an extra foot in the door, and that's just not acceptable to most people. The really tragic part is that perhaps these haters would have liked ponies just fine, if the worst our fandom had to offer had not turned them into a hostile force before they had the chance. Note that Steam Workshop in and of itself isn't "invade-able" by bronies or any other fandom, because it's entirely opt-in; Team Fortress 2, however, automatically downloads custom content to the client upon connecting to a server, and loads of servers are ponified, so you absolutely cannot avoid it over a longterm period unless you only play one or two private servers ever. Fan-Quality Product Alot of fans who are doing fan work are quite young and inexperienced. The better their skills, the more likely they will go professional. Since you can't go making large amounts of money off of other people's work, these fans' volume of fan work will drop sharply after they make their talents their career (but not necessarily vanish.) This means that, to be frank, an overwhelming portion of fan-made material isn't very good, or is even just plain horrible. Being untalented by itself isn't a reason to hate somebody, but in combination with the above, it has a synergistic effect because the offensive-anyway material is now even more unpleasant to look at. You know those Source model ponies used in gMod and TF2? To people outside of the fandom, and many of us in the fandom, they are incredibly, horrifyingly ugly, and they are about as common as that Krystal model was a few years ago. It's not a good image at all.
Well, after reading this thread, I can easily say that by hating on the haters with something else, they take a step back and think about what they did. For example, my brother came up to me the other day and asked me if I'm a brony, because that's what everyone else was saying. I confirmed this, and he stood back saying things like "you need jesus" and "god bless your soul". So I took a moment to think and essentially told him that he can judge me for being a brony as much as he wants, but not to go crying when I put him down for being gay. Now, I'm not homophobic at all, I was just proving a point, and sure enough, he hasn't said a word to me since. win.
I don't see how that would be a win, wouldn't it be better to behave like an adult and simple ignore him?
Well, there is more than one kind of hater, like Minter said. One kind is like my brother. He hates the show, and ponies in general, but he doesn't hate bronies. So he'll complain when ponies 'invade' something he likes or if he sees something with ponies in it, but not really otherwise, and he doesn't bully. Another kind is one you frequently find on the internet who just randomly flame people for being bronies. They either have had a bad experience with a brony and now apply that brony's traits to every brony (like clopping, etc), or they think there is something wrong with people who like ponies (like clopping, etc), or they are your typical bully who is insecure and needs to put other people down to feel good, or they are just trolls. In the first two examples, it's more likely because they didn't take the time to get to know the less weird bronies, and in the last two they just enjoy human suffering. Like Minty said, there are tons of different reasons, those are just a few of the major reasons I've found that people hate. I would know, I'm surrounded by people who hate the show.
Sure, but he probably just considers that a win because of the sheer amount of perspective that must have slammed into his brother when he thought about how someone who was traditionally discriminated against for religious reasons based on old values used the same cultural justification to put down someone else.
