I admit it. I like supernatural genre TV and movies. I’m arguably more of a fake geek girl than a geek per se—I wasn’t a big fantasy reader or comic book collector as a kid, and I will never catch up there or be able rattle off comic book citations chapter and verse, so to speak. But I do enjoy fantasy, whether in the form of video games, the occasional fantasy or science fiction novel, or supernatural and sometimes trashy genre TV. I’m even getting into table top role playing games these days. I’m currently part of a Blades in the Dark group, but I’m also playing catch-up here, as I never got to play Dungeons & Dragons as a kid—which is why it surprised (and amused) me to learn that some people in my social media communities initially thought the title of this newsletter, The Bugbear Dispatch, was a D&D reference!
I think there are a number of reasons it’s valid to engage in fantasy and imaginative play in one way or another. And, while I honestly doubt that fantasy is ever only escapism—complex human phenomena can rarely, if ever, be reduced to a single cause or motive—it seems to me that it’s fine to indulge in some escapism, given the difficulties of human life even in the best of times and circumstances. (For those keeping score, the best times and circumstances are very much not the times and circumstances of contemporary America). But in addition to providing an escape from “the real world” and an outlet for vicarious experiences or to let off some steam, role play, gaming, and “low” genre art and literature can sometimes act as a mirror, providing us with insights into ourselves or pointing out the flaws of our societies.
I suppose I always had a vague sense that not everyone approves of indulging the imagination in this way. I began to chafe at evangelical anti-intellectualism and high-control tactics when I was in middle school, but it was as a sophomore in high school that I recall becoming acutely aware that certain individuals—not even Christians or evangelicals per se, but simply a certain kind of broadly conservative reader invested in their sense of sophistication—simply do not approve of fantasy or of genre literature writ large. (I’m pretty sure these are the same people who dogmatically see no value in superhero movies, no matter how well-made the particular movie in question.)
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