If you were to think of the term “fandom,” you would probably think of screaming teenage girls at a One Direction concert or the online communities on social media platforms, such as Twitter or Tumblr, that only discuss their favorite musicians and shows. Maybe, you even think about fans of Frank Sinatra and the Beatles, who, despite being from the previous century, tend to be compared similarly to modern-day fandoms.
Unsurprisingly to many, I have to disagree.
On Sunday, Feb. 13, we were gifted with Super Bowl LVI. I hoped Joe Burrow would pull through, but the Cincinnati Bengals sadly lost in the last few minutes of the game, letting the Los Angeles Rams take the ring. It seems like everyone and their mom turned on the television to watch this game, with a total viewership of 100.21 million viewers over-the-air on NBC and Telemundo, and that number doesn’t even include the other streaming platforms across the Internet.
Peoples’ devotion to this event, or even just this sport in general, is some of the craziest fanatics one will ever see. Fans will douse themselves in paint, decorating every part of their body in the colors of their team. On a basic level, almost every sports fan owns at least one way to represent their team at any point in time, including myself — my old Matt Hasselbeck jersey is sitting in storage back at my house, and I have at least three Navy Football hoodies in my closet right now.
So, what does this have to do with the way we view fandoms today? Well, in late 2021, BTS took the stage at SoFi stadium in Inglewood, California — the same place where Super Bowl LVI took place. However, instead of numerous football fanatics decked out in gear supporting the two teams, it was filled with screaming fans.
One of these events got supported by the media. The other got pushed aside, cast away by society as a fleeting trend. Want to take a guess at which is which?
The true difference here is the gender of the fans.
Football fans have always been predominantly men, or, at least, that’s who the NFL has been targeting all these years. Fans of boy groups, such as BTS and One Direction, have been known to be mostly young women.
What I’m hearing is that this kind of reckless, obsessive behavior is only okay when a man does it, right?
As a young woman who has contributed to many fandoms in my life, I’m tired of being told that it’s embarrassing or unnecessary, but then being forced to watch as my father and his friends get away with the same stuff, just in the context of sports. It’s disrespectful, it’s annoying and, quite frankly, it’s incredibly sexist.
Young women bring in so much money for the entertainment industry as consumers, but their contributions are pushed aside, claiming that the “crazy girls” aren’t worth being taken seriously as a target audience. This mentality, in turn, damages the reputation of the group they’re “fangirling” over.
You don’t see Tom Brady getting shunned from the world because a bunch of men cried over his retirement, but how is that any different than when One Direction broke up? It’s essentially the same thing. People just don’t want to admit the truth: women, especially teenage girls, are unfairly targeted in a multitude of industries due to the continuous sexism in our culture.
I love football. I always have and I always will. But it is so frustrating to only have my love for sports be supported, but the minute I want to go to a concert, I fear being targeted by the media for my love of this music.
When society can finally stop harassing young women for acting the same way as grown men, then we might finally be able to appreciate the concept of fandoms.
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