What is the worst fandom you've ever been a part of?

Gaming. I've seen it get progressively worse and worse over time. Gamers are some of the most entitled and whiney people I've met.
Game puts out 58fps instead of 60? Trash. Throw it out. Start a media campaign about how shit the devs are at their jobs
Game is only just "fun" and isn't an absolute masterpiece like RDR2? It doesn't matter, since it isn't better than the literal best game ever made it's trash. There is zero middle ground. Burn an effigy!
Game sequel changes anything from the previous? Burn down their offices! Games shouldn't take risks! What do you mean all we have now are boring games from companies afraid to take risks?!
And we haven't even started with the freaking gatekeeping
Now I'm not defending game companies, god knows there's blame over there, but ffs I'm tired of gamers. I've been flamed over having opinions like enjoying a game.
For example. I liked Veilguard. I honestly did. It wasn't a perfect game, it wasn't a RDR2, but I enjoyed it and I found it a good value for the money, and I don't care that it wasn't like Origins. Watch the hate roll in folks.
- 100% This.
  So steam has the little update ribbon for games in your library, and recently one popped up for The Outer Worlds in my feed. I thought it was odd since it's not a new game anymore so I checked it out and it was for some reason just the announcement for Outer Worlds 2. Thought that was odd too since that also happened awhile ago so I went to the discussion thread to see if there was an update to the announcement or something and I got to reading the comments. It was just the most toxic and vile cesspool of comments. Literal mud brained comments like "no woke game, no DEI this time, this game bad because I can't fuck the asexual brown girl and she should be white anyway because that doesn't make sense in outer space" and other vile bigoted shit. Like seriously guys? You hated the game so much that you have to spew your ignorant garbage brained thoughts on an announcement thread for the sequel? Fuck me these people are just the absolute sludge at the bottom of the barrel.
  I'm all for protesting a game because the company is evil (you know which ones are) but holy hell people, the vast majority of the comments were not that at all. Just fucking go play something else. There are a hundred thousand other choices for any respective genre of game. Please just all of you fuck off.
  
  It's just absolute vile, and even if you put aside the pure racism and sexism they have, they still bitch. It leaves me wondering, do they even really like gaming anymore? Really, just truly maybe they don't enjoy it anymore. Then hey, just move on and find a different hobby
  
  I assume they updated the game with an advert banner for the sequel in game if you're curious why it's an update and not announcement.
- Not to mention that gamers tend to have the shittiest politics. Idk what it is man, but over the last decade and a half I've watched Steam Discussions go from a dry and somewhat elitist gamefaqs to one of the worst cesspools on the internet by far, and it has a freakin' swear filter, who tf would even risk their steam account going around talking smack like that I dunno.
  A good community in a game is like finding the fucking higgs boson, you know when mfing warframe, known for having a great community back in the day - so much so it's a selling point brought up by reviewers and it's even basically expected that you will ask randos for help - turns the main chat (region chat) off by default then things are just... Not great.
  
  I think this varies wildly depending on the game. In my experience indie game communities are often pretty chill. (Rock and Stone!)
- Game puts out 58fps instead of 60? Trash. Throw it out. Start a media campaign about how shit the devs are at their jobs
  To be fair, they're not entirely wrong about this one when it comes to current-gen games. They're wrong for their dickish entitled opinions, but they're not about how modern titles are requiring far more resources to run compared to the gains in visual quality.
  And I'm not complaining about that because I think people are entitled to games meeting some bullshit metric like zero-latency with better-than-life quality on 8 year old hardware. For accessibility reasons, I legitimately can't play modern "AAA" games targeting 30 frames per second. It makes me suffer from severe motion sickness, and there's something about newer games that make them a lot worse (frame blending? Bad frame pacing?). The only thing that seems to help is running at a higher framerate, and it's getting increasingly difficult to find big-budget games that don't either rely on using upscaling and frame generation and/or a $1600 graphics card to achieve that.
  That's not to say the developers are bad at their jobs. Rather, the industry trend seems to be that publishers are demanding more content in less time, and games aren't being given the time and budget needed for optimizing them before release.
- I used to play DotA2. Some lobbies were fine. The memorable ones were incredibly toxic. I played for a couple of years, so it must have been fun, but all I remember was the racism, cruelty, and bitchiness in voice chat.
- Starting with games like Rad Racer and RC Pro Am on the NES, I must have put 10s of thousands of hours into hundreds of different racing games over the years. But try to talk to anyone about it, and it's all gatekeeping all the time.
  "Your favorite is too arcade-y for a real fan, noob." "You turn on anti-lock braking? You aren't sophisticated enough to join my clan, peasant." Shit like that. I'm sure lots of other genres have similar fuckwads that think they are the gods of the gaming world.
- Capital G Gamers are the worst! It's fine to not enjoy something, but Gamers seem to spend more time getting upset over literally everything than actually playing video games. They also don't acknowledge that indie games exist. They'll complain every game now has microtransactions but pretend not to see the thousands of indie games that don't have any.
  
  If an indie game can't rival the best AAA experience for a cost of no greater than free to $5, it's garbage. It also needs to be lengthy to keep me entertaned for an indefinite period but also not too long. And there can't be any DLC or microtransactions, but I need free content updates for at least 10 years.
  If I don't get all of these, I'll give a review of "zero stars, trash game, do not recommend (550 hours played)"
- One thing that's gotten a lot worse is the hate for everything, I've unsubscribed from several of my formerly favourite YouTube gaming channels because they've gotten more and more about just hating on everything. Every game that isn't perfect gets dragged through the dirt and people love it and join in. And comments anywhere on the web about any game are generally 80% hate and pessimism. And if you dare to say you like whatever game the topic is about you'll get down voted and told you're an idiot and/or shill.
  
  Complete same. Everyone I talk to who hates game X seems to have heard it from some shitty youtuber. "Well X person said it's not good and it's shit". Great, have you played it? Steam has a pretty great return policy, go try it for yourself.
  They hardly ever do. They shit on something left and right while never actually trying it, and exactly that. It can be a decent game, but if it's not perfect it's just hot garbage. In another thread literally right now I'm being flamed for liking Veilguard. God forbid someone has an opinion they differ with on something as small as a video game.
- You've obviously never been a part of the stardew valley community. It's incredibly wholesome.
- Gamers have become total suckers as well, and on the whole are not very good with their money. From always pre-ordering to season passes to oceans of memorabilia.
  Hardware has especially suffered. There used to be a time when gaming attracted technical people and there were brilliant forums and in depth review sites for hardware. Now most of those are dead with only a couple good ones left because everyone figured out you can just slap RGB lights on your product and call it a day. Gamers will buy it.
  Prices go up and up, quality goes down, control over the product goes down, improvements per generation go down. But man there's never been more flashy marketing and lights.
  
  Gamers chairs are the best example of that. Some neon pleather on a piece of plywood and they slap $600 pricetag on it. Meanwhile a sturdy $300 mesh office chair will actually support you for hours a day for 10 years, but kids don't think it's cool
- All the Dragon Age games have their own charm, but ultimately it's EA so.. ew.
- I crank up the graphics settings as high as I can get them while getting at least 20fps consistently. I do think some games are just badly optimized though.
  I also liked the original state of Minecraft dungeons and even got the first DLC when it was on sale but then they turned it into a grindy season based thing with subscriptions, yet another program ruined by Microsoft.
  Apart from this I don't really have any strong opinions about games and don't really get why people behave like that.

i used to be a republican so
- 🔥
- Honest curious question: what made you change your mind?
  
  Honest answer? When trump said “Take the guns away first, due process later.” I was a pretty big gun nut at the time and it felt like a slap in the face. Shortly afterwards I encountered a YouTube video that actually explained the science behind climate change in a way that made it obviously true and that I hadn’t encountered before. The conservative worldview is a house of cards, once you take out a couple the whole thing falls apart pretty quickly.
  Now I’m a very progressive atheist and more than a little ashamed of my former self. Still like guns, but I keep that to myself

Probably Anarchy. Like, the political philosophy.
Andrewism on YouTube is doing so much to make a compelling case for it. But it's a real bummer when you get a group of anarchists together and go, 'Damn, hanging out with these people makes me want to implement some rules and structure so we can get things done. This group is totally leaderless and directionless. I'm gonna go see what the socialists are up to.'
It's sad. In my experience, no one ruins anarchism more than anarchists.
- I feel like most self-proclaimed anarchists have very little interest in the political philosophy aspect of it. Which is a shame, because it's really far better than its reputation.
- It honestly feels almost every political community either turns into a charity or legit local non-profit org that does something and maybe even something useful once the narcissists are ousted or a book club/discord server.

Star Wars. No one hates Star Wars more than a Star Wars fan. I actively avoid other Star Wars fans.
- I'd consider myself a Star Wars fan, and one of the things that gets me about the current state of fandom is how opposed to nuance it is. Having measured opinions about things is right out; you need to decide if you're going to LOVE or HATE a thing, and if you don't then you're not welcome.
  
  From what I can tell, you have to love the b Mandolorian and Andor unconditionally, and hate everything else from Disney.
  I personally have enjoyed everything, some more than others. But it was all good.
- I’m a Star Wars fan and enjoy it all. The most disappointing watch for me was Book of Boba Fett because it wasn’t how I thought his character would do things. However, it still entertained me.
  
  It was different from what I imagined too, but I still enjoyed it a lot.

I was way into Musk when he was the face of Tesla and SpaceX. Less so when he started getting weird. Jumped ship before he started getting real Bond villainy.
- Yeah, I wish he’d go back to being the greenhouse on mars guy

I love Rick and Morty. And to be fair the whole Justin Roland schism got rid of a lot of toxic fans. Just not all.
- This is mine too.
  I disconnected from R&M after the toxic fans went psycho over Schezwan sauce. There was some news blip that happened not long before that intelligent people tend to have a dark sense of humor, and it's like it made the worst of the worst decide that they must be super geniuses if they teabag someone in CS:GO after they kill them.
- I'm not gonna hate on any season. They've all been half filler and half Harmon confessing his sins, and most of them have been roughly entertaining for the most part. Even the meta shit is roughly entertaining.

I'd say anime would get pretty toxic, just the sheer brainrot of moeshit seasonal trash watchers always seemed to burrow it's way into every legitimately normal and civil discussion for a piece of media, everything was simping and shipping and very porn-brained in an extremely off-putting way.
It was all nauseating, I just liked cool weird foreign basket-weaving cartoons man it wasn't this like, lifestyle or something that some people seem to live or a whole personality.
I'll forever remember Juzoboys back in the day on /a/ but I'm so out and never coming back. At least I was there to say NEVER EVER for the last time when the first Kizu movie got announced.
- I like anime, I don't watch it much these days in lieu of manga and Manwha but I am planning to watch a few new titles that I would enjoy, like blue lock
  Nothing ruins anime more than talking to people who enjoy the worst aspects of it, but even then I feel lonely with having no one to discuss with

Warhammer 40k. I'm still a part of it. There are some cool and smart people in it.
But there are also a large group of raceist, misogynist, jerks. Then there are the people who are incredibly annoying to play against because of poor social skills. There is always at least one guy who really needs a shower.

Jesus fandom, Catholic branch. In my defense they enrolled me before I was old enough to say no.

Probably the Roosterteeth community. Their content pretty much defined almost a decade of my life but the community was composed of some of the most toxic people I've ever encountered online.
Also, it's not a fandom but I used to browse an unhealthy amount of 4chan up to ~2017. Very strange crowd there
- Very thankful for the untold number of hours of Funhaus I watched. Very thankful I never got too into the Fandom.
- Tales from the Stinky Dragon is also awesome and a new Roosterteeth endeavor!
  
  I need to catch up on it! I'm like months behind at this point.
  A lot of the old groups are still making content. Shoutouts to Bruce Greene and Lawrence (and KassemG) from Funhaus/Inside Gaming are doing a letsplay channel called BroughtYouThisThing, it's probably the only reason I get on YouTube at all anymore.

Anything Anime. Used to watch a lot of it. Every now and then, when I get a recommendation, I still check some out. But holy hell, I will never again engage with any community. Never seen anything so toxic, standoffish and whiny at the same time.
- The borderline pedophilia in so much anime is what turns me off. So many popular series are lolicon degeneracy but heavens forbid you try to call it out, or the anime fans come out in droves to tell you that you're an unappreciative normie who just doesn't get the themes and how profound they are.
  I still watch some series, but I simply cannot engage with an anime community ever again.
  
  All the over sexualized characters, regardless of age, makes it damn near impossible to recommended much to any one. Even the "clean" shows suffer due to the bad rep. I get Japan is more open about it (ironic considering the censor laws), but some shows definitely cross the wrong side of the "adult" line and need to be publicly rediculed for it.
  Its also good to remember pretty much every western TV show has borderline porn scenes now too. Ever since they moved away from cable regulations, they've been getting bolder.
  If we're gonna normalize one (too late, both are), I'll take the animated one that doesn't involve real people (well the voices actors have to act that shit out, but at least their whole body isn't on full display, ever watch GoT?).
  
  The casual pedophilia is fucked, but I never saw it much unless I was exposed by sheer damn chance from new titles
  I am very critical according to the average weeb, and far too lenient if we go by the standards of average folk
- The Haruhi fandom forums back when season 2 premiered were a shitshow, even before Endless Eight. I tend to avoid anime fans on the internet after that. However, when the new Spice & Wolf season was airing, I ventured into some fan spaces and was surprised at how pleasant it was. Probably helps that the books and show are both pretty wholesome. Didn't even see much lusting after Holo. So it might just depend on the show.
  
  It also depends on the community a lot. The anime community on lemmy (!anime@ani.social, shameless plug) has been super chill overall. I think it's in large part due to the lemmy userbase skewing older than your average social media user.

Minecraft community. Love the game. Community turned into a bunch of toxic self-righteous a-holes. I had the displeasure of hosting a pvp server. Most people were alright but it only took a charismatic unemployed 20+ year old to rally half the server against the owner because we wouldn't ban their enemies from the server.
And the wider community that just whine that not every update is the Nether Update or Caves and Cliffs. Mojang messed up with 1.19, but it's not that big of a deal and they seemed to have learned their lesson. (except for chat reports... Eugh) The Minecraft movie actually looks fun, just had a bad first trailer. So what if it fails. It won't impact my enjoyment of the game. You can't really add too much onto Minecraft because you can easily screw up the game. For example, using fireworks to boost elytra was a small feature in a pretty minor update, but I think it was one of the worse decisions, as it ruined any incentive for transport infrastructure.
- The Modded Minecraft community is a lot friendlier.
  
  This was a modded server

Everyone here is talking about fandoms they left because the fans were toxic, but the worst fandom I've been in is that because I can't even think about it anymore without cringing: Channel Awesome. Just knowing what was going on behind the scenes makes me I wish I could refund the hours I spent watching the Nostalgia Critic.
- Do you have a tl;Dr?
  
  Channel Awesome was run by a guy named Mike Michaud, who was a really shit boss. Pretty much anything you expect HR to do is something he neglects. Harassment was rampant, contributors were scripted into situations that they weren't comfortable with, nobody was notified about massive changes to the site, the works. Some stayed quiet because they feared retribution from man child Mike, others were either fired or quit in protest. This all bubbled up for years until a 70 Google doc detailing every single instance of neglect and hostility that went on behind the scenes was published, at which point CA collapsed like cheap cardboard. The document is freely available online, but since you're looking for a short version, I'll just summarize thusly:
  Mike Michaud is a parasite that feeds on content creators and gives nothing in return. Also, his stench attracts roaches.
- I hadn't thought about fandom's based around people rather than properties (ex. Movie/game series). I imagine a lot of people feel that way about late Rooster Teeth.
- Don't worry. He remembers it, so you don't have to.

Roblox. Easiet pick of my life, Gods save us all

When I was smaller, I was in a group that larped as nations, generally ww2 to copy hoi4 in Roblox
The issue was that it was extremely toxic and competitive when it was literally played as if it was multiplayer DND roleplaying
Because it was Roblox, it had a fuck load of underage people, racists, pedophiles, man children, doxxers, script kiddies and an extremely toxic community
I never interacted too close to it and instead stuck around the more educational parts where people discussed history itself, and I eventually got into discord nation roleplaying by creating my own server with people I knew
If you are curious, look up World Conquest in Roblox and browse the discord

Reddit

Doctor Who. It's a television show, you dorks. Stop making television shows part of your personality.

Every sport I like

I'd want to say Gay Creepypasta fanfiction, but that one was surprisingly chill in hindsight. So I'll go with my current problematic fave, dunking on Amberlynn Reid Fandom. It's... not much better than the Chris Chan Fandom, but it's very entertaining.

Capitalism.

Lemmy. There's some good stuff here and also people who think you should die in a fire for being straight and white.
- Its very unfortunate how judgmental and toxic the loud voices have become. I could see one responding to you "How dare you betray your people, you're not one of us, die die die"
  Making threats just because someone doesn't check all the same boxes is insanity. I believe the whole point was to not have any box, yet here we are with new boxes to keep track of every week.
  
  Well, you're obviously just a bigot since you call yourself bi. Real progressives don't use hateful terms like that. /s
  (Note that I've actually seen people say stuff like this unironically).
- Have you tried not being white, vanilla face?
- I haven't seen that here yet but I don't dicuss those things much so maybe that's why.

Pro wrestling

I got way way too into fantasy football. I didn't have a dangerous amount of money invested in it (this was before DraftKings and the rise of addictive gambling apps), but I had like 5 teams and spent endless amounts of time trying to predict who would score points every week, reading stats and articles, and would watch football all day Sunday, and Monday and Thursday nights, as well as highlight shows and analysis.
At some point I just said "What am I doing?" and reclaimed my time. It felt great. No regerts. I don't even watch football anymore.

Anime.

The office stans are bat shit annoying same with Harry potter

Online Manchester United fans. I’ve never seen such a set of ignorant, fickle, judgmental pricks anywhere else.

Ohio State football fans are notoriously whiny, spoiled assholes.

/r/opieandanthony
It was a comedic toxic shithole. RIP
- I was peripheral to it as a Ron and Fez fan. Good lord that place was awful. Rest in piss.
  
  No place made me laugh as audibly.
  Just mean for almost no reason, making references to shows 12 years ago while trolling these c to d list celebrities. Total cesspit
  Loved Ron and fez too.
  Member that time they tricked news outlets during the nice terror attack?

An invitation for a free lunch that turned out to be a multi level marketing presentation for timeshares.

Take your pick. All of them have been pretty bad. Worst though might go to Star Wars, Star Trek, Matrix fandoms.

Sonic the Hedgehog fanboy over here. However I don't follow the fandom. Those guys are animals.
- Sonic the Hedgehog
  Those guys are animals.
  Literally!

supernatural, on Tumblr.

All of them.