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Lord King Bad Vid: The Backlash Edition
Aug. 22nd, 2006 11:33 amOkay, so part of me can just realize that yesterday? Was a bad day to be in fandom and not reflective of us as a whole, thank god. Another part of me knows that I have to be at work in an hour and I really don't have time for this. Another part of me thinks I need to respond to comments or work on a con report if I am gonna sit around typing and another part of me thinks that all of this is ridiculous and I need to go take a walk and chill.
Of course I will ignore all good sense and post this now. God.
So, I understand that there are people in fandom who possibly resent the phrase Lord King Bad Vid. Okay. I understand. I resent a lot of things. I resent the existence of lima beans.
Here is the thing - I won't cook lima beans and NO ONE says you have to participate, enjoy or embrace the label LKBV. Now here is where it gets tricky: If I see someone else enjoying a dish of lima beans - no matter how distasteful and gross I might find it? I am gonna refrain from raining on their lima bean parade. It is just the type of person I am, I believe we all deserve the right to eat or not eat lima beans in peace even though I personally think they are Satan's legume. Same with LKBV. Seriously, it is.
The vidder gets to make the call that she is making a Lord King Bad Vid. That is the only person, you guys. And some LKBVs are freaking brilliant and we love them and don't find anything bad about them at all. YAY! We love vids! Again I say YAY! This is a *good* thing and if you are taking it as a larger fandom indictment on your personal taste because this vid carries a label of LKBV and you love it? You, my friend, are a wee bit on the sensitive side, aren't you? Get over yourself and learn to love, man.
Are you a vidder and feel the term LKBV is being applied to your vids unfairly? Or you fear that it will? Do you secretly suspect that all you make are cheesy vids with poor musical choices and clumsily applied filters? Well, dude. Welcome to vidding. I'd say about 97% of us feel this way about *all* of our vids, one time or the other. Vidding is hard. You are laying open a part of yourself and it is all in visual form and so it is very very easy to take it and yourself too seriously.
Actually, I think that is what the LKBV does for me - it frees me from worrying about taking myself too seriously. I can expose my fluffy insides and do it in an extremely freeing way. I do resent the terminology that the label "Lord King Bad Vid" is a distancing tool we use - that we do it to preserve our cool for our "serious" projects: "Just because I am making this over the top vid to a George Michael song that made me weep when I was 13 does not mean I really mean it." Well, fuck that. If you don't MEAN every single bit of your LKBV then I want nothing to do with it. The vid itself is about admitting, "Hey, so not cool! Look, me - over here! I am crying right now!"
"So, Liz," you ask, "if we are not at least partially ashamed of the Lord King Bad Vids we make then why do we even have to label them? Why not just put them out as any other vid and revel in them that way?"
Well, doofus, because it is FUN. Also - take a vidder's self proclaimed LKBV and take another vid she has done and then another vid she has done and then another vid she has done. Line them up in a grid. Now, remember when we were kids and Sesame Street would sing that song "One of these things is not like the other, one of these things just doesn't belong. Can you guess which thing is not like the other?" Cause it will be different. It will want to hang out with its people and be in a show and make people laugh! It has to sing! It has to dance! It has to be SPARKLEY! Your vid is Broadway bound (or the nearest dinner theater bound) and nothing you can do will stop that.
Now, as far as the idea that LKBV is a label we give less sophisticated vid or poorly edited vids? I call bullshit on that. Have you seen the LKBVs from this year's show?? Cause, boy howdy - those are some good vids.
Of course I will ignore all good sense and post this now. God.
So, I understand that there are people in fandom who possibly resent the phrase Lord King Bad Vid. Okay. I understand. I resent a lot of things. I resent the existence of lima beans.
Here is the thing - I won't cook lima beans and NO ONE says you have to participate, enjoy or embrace the label LKBV. Now here is where it gets tricky: If I see someone else enjoying a dish of lima beans - no matter how distasteful and gross I might find it? I am gonna refrain from raining on their lima bean parade. It is just the type of person I am, I believe we all deserve the right to eat or not eat lima beans in peace even though I personally think they are Satan's legume. Same with LKBV. Seriously, it is.
The vidder gets to make the call that she is making a Lord King Bad Vid. That is the only person, you guys. And some LKBVs are freaking brilliant and we love them and don't find anything bad about them at all. YAY! We love vids! Again I say YAY! This is a *good* thing and if you are taking it as a larger fandom indictment on your personal taste because this vid carries a label of LKBV and you love it? You, my friend, are a wee bit on the sensitive side, aren't you? Get over yourself and learn to love, man.
Are you a vidder and feel the term LKBV is being applied to your vids unfairly? Or you fear that it will? Do you secretly suspect that all you make are cheesy vids with poor musical choices and clumsily applied filters? Well, dude. Welcome to vidding. I'd say about 97% of us feel this way about *all* of our vids, one time or the other. Vidding is hard. You are laying open a part of yourself and it is all in visual form and so it is very very easy to take it and yourself too seriously.
Actually, I think that is what the LKBV does for me - it frees me from worrying about taking myself too seriously. I can expose my fluffy insides and do it in an extremely freeing way. I do resent the terminology that the label "Lord King Bad Vid" is a distancing tool we use - that we do it to preserve our cool for our "serious" projects: "Just because I am making this over the top vid to a George Michael song that made me weep when I was 13 does not mean I really mean it." Well, fuck that. If you don't MEAN every single bit of your LKBV then I want nothing to do with it. The vid itself is about admitting, "Hey, so not cool! Look, me - over here! I am crying right now!"
"So, Liz," you ask, "if we are not at least partially ashamed of the Lord King Bad Vids we make then why do we even have to label them? Why not just put them out as any other vid and revel in them that way?"
Well, doofus, because it is FUN. Also - take a vidder's self proclaimed LKBV and take another vid she has done and then another vid she has done and then another vid she has done. Line them up in a grid. Now, remember when we were kids and Sesame Street would sing that song "One of these things is not like the other, one of these things just doesn't belong. Can you guess which thing is not like the other?" Cause it will be different. It will want to hang out with its people and be in a show and make people laugh! It has to sing! It has to dance! It has to be SPARKLEY! Your vid is Broadway bound (or the nearest dinner theater bound) and nothing you can do will stop that.
Now, as far as the idea that LKBV is a label we give less sophisticated vid or poorly edited vids? I call bullshit on that. Have you seen the LKBVs from this year's show?? Cause, boy howdy - those are some good vids.
