Fan groups exist as "organizations" or "societies" that have multi-faceted effects on the growth of young people. One of the most direct effects is the socialization process. When participating in the organization's work, one must interact with people, both acquaintances and strangers, subordinates and superiors. In the process of working with people of different identities, you can strengthen your social skills and accumulate social experience to prepare for your future work in society. At the same time, there will also be organizational coordination and teamwork. Arranging collective activities can improve one's communication skills. Even the lowest level of ordinary members need to work together with others to complete their work. All this will be used again in the future, especially in work. Apart from that, the existence of such organizations can enhance the sense of responsibility and confidence of teenagers. When young people consider themselves to be a part of a team, contribute to the team, and see concrete results from their contribution, they will realize their achievement and appreciate it.
In January and February of 2020, when the Wuhan epidemic was at its worst, fan groups donated medical supplies to support Wuhan and its people's fighting against the virus. This shows that, in addition to supporting their idols on Weibo, fan groups can also contribute to social welfare and donate materials is part of it. Leaving aside the phenomenon of "cyber cursing," this kind of group, although originally established for entertainment-related concerns, can also contribute to society.
However, the far-reaching influence of the fan group culture itself has also led to some problems. I used to reckon that these problems are limited to the following scenarios: some teenagers appear to be "victimizers" in the fans groups, hurting the rest of the "victims" with verbal abuse and attacks. However, the actual results of the interviews were a great shock to my research team: among the 30 respondents who participated in the interviews, only two unilaterally accepted online violence and verbal abuse but did not help escalating the conflict. The rest were all more or less involved in the act of online name-calling. In one of the fan groups of Chinese star Wang Yibo (158 people, 123 of whom gave replies), each fan spends an average of 1.36 hours per day on repetitive and tedious tasks such as "comment controls" and "anti-stigmatization." To our group's surprise, there are many junior and senior students in the group. Apparently, the people who filled out the survey were not clearly aware of the unreasonableness of vilifying the fans of other stars. What's worse, they were easily hurt by other's attacks. According to our research results, 101 respondents (82.1%) admitted to having experienced negative emotions that significantly affected their lives after a cursing battle with their opponents. When mentioning their past experiences with verbal abuse, Lemon said, "Weibo is a platform that makes me speechless and angry." Bunny, another interviewee, said that she "will be upset and angry when she sees her idol being vilified online, and will scold her back," believing that those who publish personal attacks are "deliberately picking on people."
After the interview, the team realizes that the boundary between victimizing and being victimized is very blurred. Teens who engage in online violence often experience it on their own.
The drawbacks of the fan groups can also be reflected in the role of "fan leader": the leading fan who guides the others' practices in the fan groups. Some of the interviewees told the team that they were labeled as "free-rider fans" by such leaders because they could not afford the price of the idol's albums. Sometimes they are even expelled from the fan group. One interviewee told my group that although the opinion of forcing the fans to buy the album is very perverse, it is "habitually led along by the leading fans, and one will not realize the absurdity of this sort of behavior until he or she discovers the loss of pocket money. Interviewee Lantern had this to say. "I just saw some leading fans out there advertising that 'you don't deserve to be a fan if you don't buy ten albums, and I posted below that 'it shouldn't be so. Anyone who appreciates the work should be respected.' And then I got kicked out of that fan group." The phenomenon Lantern points out is absurd, but it is indeed the typical case that most "leaders" use to incite fans to spend money to make the star more financially valuable. And once again, contrary to the team's expectations, such leaders are also teenagers of the same age: Mai, a leading fan, told the team, "I've bought more than 10,000 for my idol, how can people like them who have only bought a few albums be considered real fans?" Perceiving the astonishment of the interviewer, she replied frankly again, "I am a big fan. I call on everyone to contribute to the idol. No one dares to scold on me." Leaders like Mai often exaggerate the role of sales or fans for a star, constantly emphasizing the collective mission of the fans, organizing and calling on obedient students to go to riots, and reporting fans who spend little or no money. Lantern help my team deconstruct the thinking of these leaders: leading fans to quantify their love for a star in terms of cash or power in fan scolding, and compare themselves to other group members. In a society governed by the rule of law, it is almost impossible to imagine how one can deprive other’s right to be fond of a particular idol.
So why are these well-off teenagers to be manipulated and exploited by others? Eve and Dream, two of our interviewees, both told our group that fan groups could slowly push one into something wrong by manipulating the words. Once utilized by social power and condensed into a spear, the rather emotional nature of the teenagers can have irreversible consequences. This coincides with the thesis of the book Media Manipulation and Disinformation Online: intentional misguiding and pushing finally lead to the tragedy.
Reference:
- Marwick, Alice, and Rebecca Lewis. "Media manipulation and disinformation online." New York: Data & Society Research Institute (2017).