Epic epic fantasy wank
My first time. Be gentle.

The wank has been on a back burner for a while, I'd say -- it started in February, but has, as of August 31, become a matter of "I'm not playing anymore, so there."

(WARNING: These links are definitely gonna be borderline tl;dr for some.)

It starts out as a fairly erudite exploration of high fantasy, (or "fat fantasy" in the OP's terminology), calling it inherently "conservative" (the word "authoritarian" comes up as well, later) and explaining why. Unfortunately, the OP steps on a few toes while doing so.

In Full:
The Aesthetics of Fantasy: One
The Aesthetics of Fantasy: Two (Scott Bakker shows up!)
part three
part four, and good-bye

He begins citing, as cut-and-dry & obvious examples, works he is not entirely familiar with. He is called on it. Aaaaaaand...everything swiftly devolves into a G.R.R.Martin debate.

"So [...] there is a well travelled path to decent fantasy that isn't all about traditional genre staples[....] I tend to forget this in my haste to spit bile at the likes of Robert Jordan and George R. R. Martin and their legions of passive, sheep-like fans. So point well taken[...]"

Martin readers take issue with being compared to ovines. Much debate of Martin's politics ensues. Surprisingly it takes a good while for the ire to manifest...

'But [...] your problem seems to be that you want the genre to be something that you enjoy, and that anything that doesn't conform to this is immediately derivative and not worth reading, whose followers are mindless sheep [...]'

Nuh-uh
Yeah-huh
It's not FOR you

And we end it all with a bona-fide "You were all mean to me, so I'm going home forever." In fancy language. (But why can't I spew bile unscathed on the Internets? No fair. Your fault.)
The Commonwealth of Fantasy and Why I No Longer Belong to It.

Highlights:

Martin fans are worse than LK Hamilton fans:
" ...while GRRM fans might consider themselves a cut above the average fantasy fan, I can, from experience, state categorically that they're more tribal, closed minded and vindictive than people who read stories about A Mary Sue that fucks vampires and werewolves."

Damn.

And in response to "Don't call me a sheep because I like fantasy":
"I did no such thing. I called fantasy fans, as a demographic, passive and sheep like because they are. I made no inferences from the group to the individual. [...] Similarly one can talk about Americans being fat and religious as a group without necessarily speaking about any particular American. [...] The former is akin to sociology, the latter is racism.

(Er...I think we've got that last one a bit backwards. Isn't it more questionable to make the generalization than to point out observable characteristics in a particular individual? Gotta admire the wiggle-room, though. Not to mention the funky math... *draws Venn diagrams* If all squares are rectangles, and you are a square..)

And to conclude! The drive-by lulz:
lol I dont read Fantasy at all and just randomly stumbled on this site and its pretty clear that you got owned and are in fact retarded.

Comments are closed. (No baleetion, though.) Sad thing is, the guy did have a salient point about some mass market fantasy. But nobody listens to you if you call them names. Human Nature 101.