Fanworks fandom is for many women(*) a way to create a space where we can express ourselves freely and escape the oppressive sexist heteronormativity of mainstream fiction. (If that's not how it works for you, you may not get much out of this post)
There is to some extent a division between those who find their joy through m/m, and those through female protagonists. These aren't neat divisions and there's people who do neither or both (I've written male protagonist m/m, m/m/f and gen myself) but to some extent they're mutually exclusive approaches.
Sadly, the women of both groups are inclined to get into "All het is heteronormative and sexist" vs "All m/m is mysogynist and sexist" arguments, which, beyond ignoring femslash, as
Hoo boy, thoughts on yaoi (let me tell you them) points out isn't helpful or accurate. That is
definitely not what I'm trying to get into here.
What I'd like to express, because it's been niggling at me ever since I first encountered m/m fanfic nearly a decade ago, is the way that while m/m slash fandom clearly acts as a feminist self expression thing for it's fans, and I realise it isn't
actually just an extension of the Patriarchy and it's hatred of female characters, that is how it feels to me a lot of the time. And I'm not sure what if anything can be done about it (mainly I just needed to get this out of my head).
My brain's a bit mushy today, I apologise in advance for any giant holes in my argument, feel free to poke at them though I may take a while to reply.
Also: I am not accusing m/m slashers generally of sexist
intent. I mean I think some of them are being sexist, but they're no worse than anyone else on the whole imo and my m/m slashy friends are all awesome feministy people. This is about the
effect of m/m fandom on me as someone outside it.
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