Dysfunctional Family of Choice

[davidschroth]

I had, for the most part, a pretty good time at Noreascon 4. Since I felt that I owed Sharon Sbarsky and Elaine Brennan big time for bailing me out at Minicon 39, I volunteered to work registration. Which was a good fit for me - I got to act silly and help people out at the same time (I don't want to hear from anyone who wants to let me know that acting silly is not part of working registration). So I worked way too much in Laura Jean's opinion, and went to parties, and actually hit a couple of interesting panels, and totally hit the wall Sunday night at the Masquerade.

But I was having a good time.

And then, because I owe gerisullivan even more big time for all she's done over the years, I worked the Dead Dog Party, hosted by Minneapolis in '73.

And for the most part, that was good, too.

But there was a part that wasn't good, and it's partly my fault, for not being more assertive.

But it's a real reflection that a large number of the members of my family of choice (fandom) are rude, boorish, and insensitive jerks.

One of the things I did for the party was set food out (in the hope that it would get eaten up). So I was doing this, and I set some food out on a table where a large number of fen were sitting (including Minneapolis fan Clay Harris). They roundly rebuked me for attempting to put food on their table, where they were planning to play games. They also requested, after I forebore from putting food on the table, that I bring them some dip for the one bowl of chips that was being kept by one person.

I did this, although I shouldn't have.

I should have told them You appear to be operating under the impression that this is the con suite. It's not, the con suite closed several hours ago. This is the Dead Dog Party. I'm one of the hosts. It's okay if you play games at one of our tables, as long as you don't interfere with my desire to get food set out and eaten. If you don't want to have food set at the table because you want to play games at the table, I suggest that you take yourself to some other location and play games there.

In the future, I'm going to try to be somewhat more choosy about which pieces of fandom I associate with.

Comments

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

A number ("large" is subjective) of members of every family are rude, boorish, and insensitive jerks. Few humans, I suspect, have never been any of the above. No matter how choosey you are, rudeness, boorishness, insensitivity, and jerk-ness can show up unexpectedly.

Even if that had been the con suite, it wouldn't have been OK for them to commandeer a food table for their private gaming. Since they didn't know it was a food table until you started putting food on it, their initial action of sitting down, planning to game there, was unobjectionable. However, things clearly went downhill rapidly from there.

It's tough to spend your time and energy trying to do things for people, only to have them not only reject what you're doing but chide you for doing it. Been there, done that. On the other hand, people are not always grateful when someone takes away something that they want (or even think that they already have) on the grounds that the person has a better plan. Been there, done that too.

Not That It Matters That Much...

[davidschroth.livejournal.com]

...but there was food on the table before they commandeered it. Food which they were removing as I was attempting to place new food out.

I think, at some level, that I'm too tolerant of rude, etc., behavior. Which works out most of the time - I just don't get too worked up over such things. Unfortunately, when I do get annoyed by this kind of thing, I get really annoyed by it. Counterproductive kind of annoyed. Annoyed enough to be boorish/rude/jerky in return. Which really isn't a good response, but there you have it.

Re: Not That It Matters That Much...

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

It does matter. Dead dog, consuite, private party, makes no difference: commandeering space that clearly has a purpose, without checking with the host, is rude. They were rude from the get-go.

One of my kids may be like you: Let things go, let things go, let things go, explode. It seems to me that it means that things are bothering the person all along. YMMV.