A Criticism of Fandom

[unspeakablehorror]

I think one reason I don't participate in fandom as an activity as much, besides my extreme introversion, is that I feel like a lot of fandom culture has become (or was always?) predicated on a person's *usefulness* to other people and not on relating to people as another human being.  Like I kind of get the impression that a lot of current fandom culture is oriented around the idea that if a fan doesn't provide fanart, fanfic, reviews, or a personal publicist to other people in the fandom they're not worth being around.  Like those things are the only thing their worth as a person seems to be based on sometimes. It just seems to me to be a very dehumanizing and ableist mindset to view people only through that sort of lens.