Wherein Cam is amused at fic descriptions and ponders OTPs

[misscam]

So, a friend passed on a link and rather amusingly, I found various fics of mine rec'ed and described as "good but too old school, not in line with current producers' vision of D/R. Not shippy enough" and "Definitely of the brand of Doctor/Rose fic coming from the Old Skool, which tends not to see D/R as an OTP by any stretch. Which always makes for very, very *interesting* fic, if unsatisfying and occassionally annoying."

So after I stopped being amused being classified old school when I can count on one hand the number of classic episodes I've seen and having not been in fandom even a year, I got to thinking about OTP. And the thing is, I'm not sure I believe in OTP at all.

Yes, I believe in love. And I believe sometimes you find someone who seems ideally suited for you and it is genuine, heartfelt, I'd-die-for-you kind of love. However, under different circumstances and at a different time in your life when perhaps you never met that first ideal match, I think it's possible to meet someone else you might feel genuine, heartfelt, I'd-die-for-you kind of love for. Humans - or Time Lords, for that matter - adapt and change with the people we love. I don't think there's just one shot at love out there. However, once you found one of them, it could be the right one for the rest of your life and you don't need any others.

Rose meets the Doctor. In doing so, she changes. Later, he changes. I choose to see their relationship as love. But if they had never met, do I think they wouldn't ever have loved anyone else? No, I don't. In fact, I don't think Rose is the first one the Doctor has loved or will love. It doesn't demean their relationship to me, really. Just like it doesn't demean my love for my father that I also love my brother, you know? Love isn't a restricted quality.

Of course, you can have conflict with loving more than one and fidelity tends to be a good idea. Nothing's perfect. Certainly not love, which fucks you over and comes for repeats when it feels like. But it's still fascinating and human and neccessary. And sometimes, when you've found and lost it, the really brilliant thing is that you might get another shot.

So, I don't really believe in the soulmate OTP part. But I do believe in love. Quite a lot, actually.

Maybe that makes me another sort of old school.

Comments

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

I think it might come down to the fact that while I will read, discuss, meta and even (very rarely write) for a whole lot of different ships, I don't consider myself a shipper at all. I am just a person who happens to like certain ships. I know it isn't the common use, but I classify people like you as someone who likes a certain ship as, you know, someone who likes a ship, and shippers as being only those who tend towards OTPing (ie. Liking the ship to the exclusion of other factors)

It's probably a stupid way of expressing myself, and has got me in trouble at times, but it's just a weird quirk of my reactions to fandom. Possibly highly biased by f_w, of course. I always associate "shippers" as being the crazy ones. Other people who like the ship are just... people who like the ship, if you get what I mean.

[misscam.livejournal.com]

I get what you mean. It's just not the usage I'm used to, you know? I guess I tend to use the phrase "rabid shippers" about those quite, quite OTP about it all. Shippers are those who like the ship, as opposed to the more gen-minded.

Funny how words can vary so in definition by who's using them, huh?