Everybody’s run afoul of an overzealous fandom at one point or another. Whether it’s aggressively dancing Fortnite players, pontificating Pod Save Americans, or misogynistic Rick and Morty fans, the dark side of a pop culture cult can cast a pall on the whole group.
Twitter user Michelle Spies created a delightfully difficult bracket of the nastiest fanbases, which she shared with the world in a casual Late Friday Tweet.
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She’s going to run a whole tournament, but we couldn’t resist making our own picks in advance. The task of ranking Elon Musk fanboys against The Simpsons loyalists seemed nearly impossible. But we did it. It should be noted that these rankings have nothing to do with the quality of the person or product being stanned—just the insufferable ways by which people go about loving them.
ROUND 1
The hardest one here was Hamilton vs Disney, because both fanbases are annoying in the same exact way. We decided that Hamilton fans are probably older and should know better. Honorable mentions go to Arrested Development vs Minecraft and Call of Duty vs Dr. Who. The easiest decision was Beyoncé vs The Bachelor[ette]; we don’t want to get murdered in our sleep.
ROUND 2
Harry Potter vs EDM was surprisingly tough, as were Kardashians vs Dr. Who and Kanye vs Tim Burton. Kanye won out because at this point it would be punching down to trash Burtonites. Kardashian Up-Keepers are more self-aware than Whoovians. And the Harry Potter Content Industrial Complex is far more pervasive and frightening than EDM.
ROUND 3
We enlisted Noisey editor-in-chief Eric Sunderman to sort out whether Phish or Tarantino fans are more insufferable. He told us, “Phish sucks.” Go find him on Twitter.
ROUND 4
Phish phans dodged a bullet; it’s going to be a while before Rick and Morty fans live down the harassment of their own beloved show’s female writers. Woody Allen vs Elon Musk was surprisingly contentious. Musk fans’ impact on our late-capitalist dystopia is probably more substantial than Allen fans’, but their fandom doesn’t involve defending a man accused of child molestation.
ROUND 5
Even deep into its zombie seasons, fans of The Simpsons can’t take criticism. At least Radiohead developed a sense of humor about their mystique. And who even stans PewDiePie’s dumb Nazi schtick?
FINAL ROUND
“But his movies,” IS NOT AN EXCUSE.
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