Reblogged
if this is your first rpf ship here are my personal rules for doing rpf ethically:
- accept that rpf occupies an ethical gray area. rpf can be super fun and joyful, but it involves working with (the public images of) real people. therefore you as an rpf shipper have more responsibility than fans of a traditional media property to behave well and model good behavior for other fans. the onus is on YOU and other shippers to respect boundaries and maintain clear lines, NOT on the celebrity, who is simply a person living their life.
- don't ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever interact with the actors or creators or public figures on any social media platform, or with anyone connected to them (friends, family, makeup artists, etc.). never. don't show them art, don't show them fic, don't ask them about your ship, don't ask them about the person you ship them with, don't don't don't. just don't.
- keep your rpf fic locked. keep your rpf twitter private. understand the risks of engaging in rpf on platforms that use algorithms to serve fandom content to people outside of fandom circles (tiktok, twitter, insta). personally i think we should NOT be doing rpf at all on those platforms but i accept that there are thriving rpf communities there. (thriving rpf communities that often have terrible boundaries!!)
- remember it is not real. It Is Never Ever EVER Real. the more invested you are in a ship the more intense your feelings will be about their fictional romance and the more you are at risk of convincing yourself to believe in the fictional stories you and your friends are constructing. you must remember that it is not real. they are not actually dating, fucking, yearning for each other, whatever in real life. and if they WERE doing any of those things they clearly don't want YOU to know about it, so you should continue to operate under the ironclad belief that your ship is not real. you are playing with characters based on real people, not the real people themselves. you might know a lot about the characters you have invented but you know NOTHING about the real people. and that is how it should be!
