Remember when we were a small community united by a message of friendship?

[Cinnamon bun 26]

Well, Pepper Ridge farm remembers,

 

I'd like to take you back to 2011, when a courageous few decided to step up for what they loved and created forums like this one. This was motivated by the message present in the show, itself. The first wave of bronies were people that discovered something more than just a cool show, they had discovered something that challenged the way they perceived life and relationships (not necessarily romantic). This wasn't a fad, but a genuine interest in changing your way of thinking and living  into something more fulfilling. This show, managed to inculcate life lessons in a way that wasn't lame or moralizing. (I'm looking at you, G.I. Joe...) Therefore, people could actually relate to these messages in a personal way.

 

It was a time when not many people would have considered it "cool" and you wouldn't have found a pony shirt at Hot Topic. The idea behind the community was to share your new life findings with other people that experienced them and discuss how they had lead your life in a happier direction. People came here looking for acceptance and understanding. People that didn't have many friends, or none because the social norm had prevented them from finding others capable of forgoing prejudice and cynicism.

 

This made the community flourish with with positive and creative energy. leading the way, little by little, to a greater recognition and notoriety. As the popularity came, people that just thought it was "a cool show" started to pop-up. Now that it had become socially acceptable to like MLP: FiM just for the heck of it it, it had become -ok- for people who didn't care for the message at all, to like the show.

 

I'm not saying there is anything wrong with "just" liking the show. Nevertheless I find that the bulk of the community has become scattered and we're at a point where I think it might be important to dissociate bronies into two categories :

 

-Soul Bronies : Touched by the series message and trying to apply it's teaching to their daily life.

 

-Fan Bronies : who are simply interested in the community, as a shared interest, like collecting stamps.

 

I get the feeling that the second category seems to be the subject of complaint, when it comes to discussing more idealistic matters. Whereas the Soul bronies tend to have pretty broad minds and argue in a civilized way, some Fan bronies have been plaguing the climate of harmony that used to be predominating.

 

My wishes for the community is to be able to accept others opinions and keep arguing to constructive criticism. If you couldn't tell by my words, I'm the first kind of Brony and this show has even taught me how to relate to my wife better, at age 25. I am happy that some of you have found comfort and solace in this community and wish you all a happy life.

 

CB

 

So what do you think of this?

Do you notice those two kinds of Bronies?

Do you consider the community homogenous?

What are your thoughts on the community in respect to when you joined the fandom?

[Jessper 735]

Well, what I would disagree with is that it's now "socially acceptable" and cool to watch MLP. I honestly don't see any change in that area from the very start, except for maybe some of the more notorious trolls got bored over the long time period.

 

But yes, there sure are more ... invested fans, who often take the show and the fandom overall very seriously for various reasons and fans who simply watch the show because it's, well, a good show.

Now I don't see anything necessarily wrong with either group, even tho I can see why there could be some hostility. The original and/or more serious fans will always feel like their heritage is being stolen from them and made into something they never intended, causing frustration, while the new fans feel like the older ones are acting smug and plainly dislike them.

 

You know, the grand example of what's happening are older fandom than ours. Like Star Wars - It's there for a few decades already and you can see the same thing. There are those older, die-hard fans who love the original series and barely tolerate the new ones and then there are the new fans who are like " I really love Star Wars! It's so great. Except for the old ones are kinda lame...". *Warning. Warning. War incoming.*

I guess it's just a normal progress as fandoms get bigger. I can't say if it's a bad or a good thing overall.

 

But I've gotta admit, I kinda miss the time where there was no real hostility or flaming and the little fandom was pretty tight, everyone was kind of like instant best friend (and I'm not being sarcastic). At least that's how it worked where I was hanging out in the 2011. On the other hand, now there are many more discussions to be had, irritating as they sometimes may be. I'm trying to be neutral, tho I sometimes miss the times when noone was telling me to not take the show for little girls so seriously even inside the fandom and clopping wasn't a big whoopity-doo deal. Heh.

Edited March 1, 2013 by Jessper

[Princess_Molestia 1,460]

no, I don't know and I didn't like them

by and large they still bother me with how series some take the show

it is a TV show, I find it funny, I have a bunch of the brushables because I am weird and like to brush girly ponies.

I don't go on about it to everyone (my friends don't care for it, some downright hate it, they watched MLP in gen 1 so think the whole brony thing is insane)

I never took anything away from it, it doesn't make me like anyone anymore, i just like a tv show. I don't deserve a title for it and I don't think most anyone does.

I like a lot of TV shows and have just as much stuff as I do ponies, why don't I get a title for that?!

I don't understand this whole "we gotta unite the fandom" junk, this isn't a religion, its a bunch of people who like a show.

Stop trying to make it into something huge and make it seem like people have to spread some sort of weird message.

I don't want to do anything, I won't do anything, and you can't make me do or think anything.

I watch a TV show about ponies, I am not gonna change how I think, act or treat others because some think there is some dumb mantra attached to watching this show

 

btw, already explained

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OV-OF9wZWDs

[khaine21x3 789]

I guess I'm one of them soul bronies since the show and community has changed my life a lot and I can see it affecting my future in a large degree.

[Zacharias 191]

I might be very stupid, but what I got out of this was a message that I should like MLP more than I do, because I can't be taken seriously by those who are more into it than me. Well, ever heard of the closet? I'm already investing way too much time into VERY long term projects, I'm just simply not talking about them, not to end up like Fighting is Magic by accident.

 

Also, this seems to apply greatly to my country...there seems to be more and more bronies who are spoiled 10-14 year olds and only decided to watch it to make them "cooler" somehow. Yes, I'm gonna go out and say that a lot of Hungarian bronies are indeed very stupid, and should not have ever touched anything MLP related. It's just a means of trolling for them and nothing else. I'd rather there were only a few hundred of us over here. (Still, I've never seen anyone wearing T-shirts here and such)

 

As for the fandom around the time I joined...well I turned November 2011 and I hadn't got into any communities for almost a year, so I really have no idea how it worked back then. But I'm pretty sure there were no such things as the Derpy drama and the Twilicorn thing. Sometimes I just feel there are people who are living a life that's too lacking in problems, so they decide to create problems for themselves.

[Limey 524]

Wait, I'd consider myself a soul brony (I actually take some meaning from the show for example, it greatly affected the way I conduct myself on the internet), but I only joined the fandom in early 2012, and only very recently began actually talking to other bronies.

 

I don't believe that people join the fandom just because its considered cool. Ho boy. No matter how big this fandom gets, I can never see being a brony 'cool' in mainstream society. As much as it pains me to say it, I do see a lot more douchbags than actual nice, accepting people IRL (when it comes to teens anyway).

Edited March 1, 2013 by Spess

[Cinnamon bun 26]

I don't deserve a title for it and I don't think most anyone does. I like a lot of TV shows and have just as much stuff as I do ponies, why don't I get a title for that?!

I don't understand this whole "we gotta unite the fandom" junk

, this isn't a religion, its a bunch of people who like a show.

Stop trying to make it into something huge and make it seem like people have to spread some sort of weird message... ...I am not gonna change how I think, act or treat others because some think there is some dumb mantra attached to watching this show.

Not sure if troll so I'll just respond seriously.

 

I'll start by saying that you are right on the fact you don't deserve a title for it, if you don't desire it. When it comes to saying that you don't think anyone does, that is your opinion and I will disagree. I think we chose our title because we are proud of it. You have the right to simply like the show.

What I strongly disagree with is you flinging words like "junk", "weird" and "dumb", despite the fact that I specified I wanted this to remain considerate of others. If others see something more valuable in this show, it should not be looked down upon.

[~Vallo~ 409]

It's definitely a more "powerful" fandom than many, but that's what makes it so unique. 

 

But I don't think we should split everybody into groups.

Edited August 8, 2013 by ~Vallo~

[VelvetDivan 96]

I don't see any reason to cause division within the community by posting something like this.  Labels are poisonous, when people are flinging them back and forth at one another.

 

Just enjoy what you enjoy, let everyone play as they will.  

 

If you do embrace the message of the show your best shot at convincing others to share your feelings is to simply act in line with the show's lessons.  

 

Would any of the mane 6 draw a line through a party, shoving newcomers who they felt weren't as 'serious' and dedicated to the party to one side, reserving the other side for guests who'd shown up earlier?

[Harmonic Revelations 8,833]

Writers, musicians, artists, regular old bronies. Long ago, these four types of bronies lived together in peace and harmony.

 

That all changed when the Fire Nation attacked.

 

Only the OP, master of making dramatic speeches about unity could stop them.

Edited March 1, 2013 by ☣Harmonic Revelations☣

[Cinnamon bun 26]

I don't see any reason to cause division within the community by posting something like this.  Labels are poisonous, when people are flinging them back and forth at one another.

Who is "flinging" labels? My aim is to discuss this phenomenon and in order to talk about something one must first define what one is talking about.

If you do embrace the message of the show your best shot at convincing others to share your feelings is to simply act in line with the show's lessons.  

I quite agree.

Would any of the mane 6 draw a line through a party, shoving newcomers who they felt weren't as 'serious' and dedicated to the party to one side, reserving the other side for guests who'd shown up earlier?

I am not bashing on newcomers at all. My only regret is for people who behave on this forum, in a far less civilized way, hurting the feelings of others. the Mane 6 don't just "tolerate" bullying or Chaos.

[khaine21x3 789]

United forever in friendship and labor, Our mighty fandom will ever endure.

The great bronydom will live through the ages.

The dream of the people their ponies secure.

 

CHORUS: Long live our Equine Brotherhood, built by the fandom's mighty hand.

Long live our People, united and free. Strong in our friendship tried by fire.

Long may our Equine flag inspire, Shining in glory for all men to see. 

Through days dark and stormy where Great Luna led us Our eyes saw the bright sun of freedom above and Celestia our Leader with faith in the People, Inspired us to build up the land that we love

[Starflower 323]

To be honest, I don't like seeing the brony community as "separate groups". It makes me think that it's a fandom within a fandom. A brony community that's separated in different communities. I see the brony community as one large community, where I can easily get along with anyone, no matter how old they are or where they come from, or what they do to contribute to the community. So far during my time as a brony/pegasister, I've met all kinds of bronies: artists, writers, twitter bronies, tumblr bronies, etc. Each of them are my best friends.

 

However, I do apply the show to real life, as it has indeed changed me during the past two years. Most of the episodes were about my past self, or my current self that needs improvement for the future. So, indeed I do consider myself a soul brony.

[Twilight Sparkle ✨ 8,520]

 am not bashing on newcomers at all. My only regret is for people who behave on this forum, in a far less civilized way, hurting the feelings of others. the Mane 6 don't just "tolerate" bullying or Chaos.

 

I'd like to reply directly to this to clarify that we don't tolerate abusive behaviour here on MLP Forums, and crack down on every instance of it we're aware of. If you see anyone hurting feelings or being a prick, please report them to the moderation team.

 

MLP Forums started out as a tight little spinoff from two gaming forums, but we can't proactively catch everything anymore now that we're the world's largest brony forum. Doing your part (and this goes for everyone - nothing personal, Cinammon Bun ) by reporting negative behaviour goes a long way toward upholding a constructive and supportive community atmosphere.

[Harmonic Revelations 8,833]

I'd like to reply directly to this to clarify that we don't tolerate abusive behaviour here on MLP Forums, and crack down on every instance of it we're aware of. If you see anyone hurting feelings or being a prick, please report them to the moderation team.

 

MLP Forums started out as a tight little spinoff from two gaming forums, but we can't proactively catch everything anymore now that we're the world's largest brony forum. Doing your part (and this goes for everyone - nothing personal, Cinammon Bun ) by reporting negative behaviour goes a long way toward upholding a constructive and supportive community atmosphere.

I wrote a poem about reporting people.

 

We used to be a tight-knit group

a merrily band, a small teeny troop

but we grew, and grew, and grew some more

moderating the site became a big chore

 

Feld0 sat up and proclaimed very clear

"A solution to our problems will soon be near"

He set off to work, on the report system we know

Making sure moderators were there and we were good to go

 

Too bad users neglect the system, too bad for it

it makes the friendliness of the site take a major hit

so if you see someone being a prick

not reporting them makes you just as much of a dick

[kirbyboi 587]

Well, I agree and disagree. 

 

I don't mind seeing shirts and merchandise at Hot Topic. I think it's great, since I can finally go to a store and get them without waiting for a shirt to be shipped to me. But what I don't like it how some people wear these shirts and aren't even bronies, and are just doing it for the sake of pop culture. 
 

 But having more members in our brony community is a good thing, but there are some bad sides to it. It's good because we have more bronies to hang out and watch the show with! Bad, because sometimes the new people who join are a bit too young, or don't understand the brony concept/community well, ect. This I agree,  And let me just say, the number of overpowered alicorn OCs is too damn high.

 

But I don't think our community is falling or becoming worse. If anything, I think it has flourished and become much stronger, both in quality and quantity. Of course, with a wider audience, there's gonna more different age groups and types joining.  But we just gotta deal with it. The brony community is still as great as it ever was.

[khaine21x3 789]

@@Feld0,

 

Gaming forum huh? strange how it became a brony forum eventually

 

So the original founders of this site are all gamers and the site was used to discuss video games?

[Scootalove 10,684]

Well, all things start out small and then become big as time goes by. Like, Bill Gates created Microsoft when he was a kid, and it turned into a global phenomenon of epic proportions. Meaning, we were all united by friendship but we are still one. Staying together as one community might take time, but we can work together.

[Twilight Sparkle ✨ 8,520]

@@Feld0,

 

Gaming forum huh? strange how it became a brony forum eventually

 

So the original founders of this site are all gamers and the site was used to discuss video games?

 

Oh, no. MLP Forums has always been a brony forum. What I meant was that most of this site's very earliest members were bronies who hung out in the MLP megathreads on two gaming forums. Talk of setting up a dedicated forum where we can have more organized discussion than a megathread came up, and two of us - Kurtiss and I - made it happen.

 

I don't mean to take this thread off-topic, so if you're interested in more of MLPF's history, I wrote it up in my celebratory post for the site's first anniversary. Have a link: http://mlpforums.com/topic/34978-mlp-forums-turns-1-year-old/

[Fhaolan 4,468]

Oh dear.

 

The fascinating thing is that the Brony fandom seems to be progressing through fandom stages *very* fast. I didn't expect this conversation for a few more years.

 

What you are starting to experience, other fandoms went through as well. I'll use another pariah fandom as the example: Furries.

 

Furries went through this exact thing, subdividing the fandom between the 'lifestylers' on one side and the 'anthros' on the other who were into the literature and art side. The war was massive (relatively), and a lot of pain was felt on both sides. It drove away a lot of members of that fandom, and many people refuse to call themselves furries now simply because of the conflict itself. (One of the big sources of the conflict was where the yiffers (the clopper equivalents) landed. Many lifestylers *and* anthros didn't want to be associated with them.)

 

Is there a resolution? Is it even necessary to make the distinction? Well, furries took a lot of damage from the conflict, to the point that they've never really recovered from it. Given MLP's emphasis on friendship and the like, I would hope that Bronies can find a way to at least not be quite as vicious about it.

[Archi the Atmomancer 564]

Is it really necessary to divide the fandom into two groups? Hell, one even SOUNDS better than the other (come one, Soul Brony is inherently superior to Fan Brony in terms of wording)

 

Anyhoo, I have to say I'm a fan brony, while I would love to be able to take the show's lesson to heart I find it incredibly difficult to overcome this black cloud of cynicism that follows me everywhere and never stick to the lessons long enough for them to affect me.Plus I mainly watch the show because it's, well, a good show Although I have to say since I've started watching MLP I think I've become less cynical overall so that's a good sign.

[VelvetDivan 96]

@Fhaolan is touching on exactly what I'm talking about.  Do you see how many labels were used in their post?  How many divisions furries split themselves into?  These days there's more peace in the community because labels like that have largely fallen out of use.  A few remain and still cause problems.

 

Even if the OP isn't flinging labels personally, they are proposing labels, which will be flung by others.  That is my point.

 

Everyone knows (or ought to by now) that this, and any fandom is composed of a great variety of people who like the subject matter for different reasons, and celebrate it in different ways.  Even the brony documentary, which I'm sure tried to force the community into as inoffensive a set of categories as possible, probably annoyed people with their chosen terms.  It's best to try and keep the community unified, and deal with troublemakers on a case-by-case basis, instead of conjuring up some demographic a few folks have a problem with and applying a label to them.  Does the demographic exist?  Sure.  Are they annoying?  They might be.  They certainly won't grow less-so if they're ostracized by being bundled into a group formally and shunned by 'true' bronies.

[Midnight Seeker 302]

The whole Soul Brony/Fan Brony labels seem weird and a bit elitist to me. It's like devoted vs casual and I think it would lead to a slippery slope. I'm pretty much a Goth before anything else, and I can assure you that no one really plans to set up cliques, but they do happen and tend to isolate others (which so called Soul Bronies are meant to be against).

That said, I feel that the Come Meet the Bronies video sums us up perfectly, as it divides us into different, but complementary groups.

Moderate Bronies, Hoooooooooooooooooooooo!

[Cinnamon bun 26]

@VelvetDivan

 

That's why I made sure to put the word "brony" in both terms. I still think we are all Bronies and that there are just a few changellings undercover among us

I wanted to make an homage to the humble beginnings of the community and put it in perspective. (I'm glad to see the merch at hot topic too^^)

[Zygen 6,065]

Idk, I just want people to inhabit the forum in harmony, no trying to separate people into groups, I understand that some newer people can be jerks, but that makes alot of the people who are newer who aren't jerks offended a bit really.

 

I think that MLP has affected everyone in some way though, I don't think you can say that there are any bronies who haven't been affected at all in some way by the show, heck I bet if you compare anyone from when they didn't watch the show to now you'll notice plenty of differences, expecially if you are a part of a forum like this one.

 

It can do all kinds of things, from minior to major, it might simply make you more happy, more accepting, maybe just a kinder individual, or it could be something more significant like reducing your depression, giving you a passion, maybe even saving you from suicide.

 

I just don't believe how anyone could not be affected in some way by the show, especially if your apart of a forum like this, whether you like it or not the fandom rubs off on you and so does the show. Just some more major ways and some more minor ways.

 

Thats my opinions on it though, I also just want the fandom to stay accepting of each others opinions and even if there are debates they should be civil intellectual discussions. I don't want this forum to see the fire of flame wars from user to user, sometimes its just better to agree to disagree.

 

I hope that the magic of that never vanishes from these forums, its one of the qualities that makes these forums, or even the fandom in general special. Along with how helpful and caring the majority of people are to each other.

 

I just deeply hope that never ceases to exist.