Bronies? Pegasisters? Mares?

[RuqyoHighsong]

Eh, personally, I've never even liked the term 'brony', not even for myself, a male of this fandom. I just like 'ponies'. I'm a pony, you're a pony, we're all ponies!

[Northern Lights]

I don't like the idea of a new, seperate term for female pony fans if only because many of the other female fans I know were around before brony became the term for male fans. Now we need a new term for female fans? Huh?

[ObsidianOrange]

Talking about it being similar to 'dude' makes me want to rewatch 'Dude Where's My Car' and actually giggle this time!

I see no reason it can't be unisex, myself.

[Dessa]

Brony is used generally to refer to any gender, but as a humorless feminist™, I find it odd that the default term is male. That's how a patriarchy works, I suppose, but with the show being based on a matriarchy, it just stands out more to me.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not like frothing or anything, I just find it a bit mystifying.

[accountdeleted]

I always thought that 'brony' was derived from 'bro' and 'pony', therefore making it masculine.

I also thought that the correct term for a female fan was pegasister. Do I really care what female fans are called? No, whatever makes them happy makes me happy.

[kal413]

I have a fondness for pegasister, though it is a stumbling word when you actually say it out loud.

I get called a brony all the time by my fb friends, and while I'm okay with it, I guess I would prefer a feminine turn. If the sense of it being on par with 'dude' is correct, there is always the optional 'dudette'....'Bronette?' naw, sounds too much like a BRUnette....*shrug* does it matter? Everypony's just a pony under neath all the gender definity. It just saddens the deeply buried equal-rights activist within me that there cannot be a unisex term. Bro refers to male. To say that 'Brony' refers to all fans as male is unjust. I suppose it's just like the term 'mankind'--it refers to women, too, but because of the simple fact that we live in a male-empowered society, women are listed as a category underneath or sympatico with man.

Oh, well.

You're definitely right.

But as time goes on, the word usage becomes more and more universal, as mentioned by your example of "mankind." Sure the origin of the word and many other umbrella terms for people have all been based on gender roles, the only thing that matters is how we perceive it today. Trying to create a new one would be redundant and may be counter-intuitive.

So, I don't mind using the term "brony" because it has been established as the universal term.

[weesh]

...pegasister...

I think the issue is that "brony" is an amazing word. It sums it up, it rolls off the tongue, has a certain rainbow dash flair, and is a nearly seamless portmanteau. As such, coming up with ANOTHER word that fits as beautifully is difficult. I feel like anything else you could select would be clunky and forced. Like how the above, at the very minimum, excludes a lot of ponies in the show. Until I hear the absolute perfect word.

So do you, as a female fan, want to use the cool word that isn't quite accurate, or a gender-accurate word without the same vibe?

If I were you, I would look to RD for the answer.

[Dessa]

You're definitely right.

But as time goes on, the word usage becomes more and more universal, as mentioned by your example of "mankind." Sure the origin of the word and many other umbrella terms for people have all been based on gender roles, the only thing that matters is how we perceive it today. Trying to create a new one would be redundant and may be counter-intuitive.

So, I don't mind using the term "brony" because it has been established as the universal term.

It's been fairly well established that when the word "mankind" is used, that the image it evokes is of men. That is, if you ask people to draw a "dude" or "mankind" or a "bro" or "brony," they will draw male figures. Only if given context to suggest a female subject/subject do people assume female. In this way, women are marginalized or "othered" by language like this.

I don't generally get all upset about this, because I believe language follows attitude, and there are better ways to pursue true equality without getting all huffy about something so ubiquitous and resistant to change.

Brony I feel slightly better about because I'll be darned if it doesn't have a good ring to it.

[accountdeleted]

So do you, as a female fan, want to use the cool word that isn't quite accurate, or a gender-accurate word without the same vibe?

If I were you, I would look to RD for the answer.

If I was a mare, I doubt that I would care. Having a specific word for a female fan would be cool, but not necessary.

The word brony is awesome, but I still think that the pegasister is a cool word. I do not understand all the hate that the word gets.

[weesh]

Looking at Dessa's title, I discover with some amusement that a female at the 500-999 post level is a Bronita on these boards. I don't think that title is right or wrong; I just like the carved into...carbon paper feel of a title on this site.

[Dessa]

My title is unusual, actually. This site assigns "brony" to that post number, but previously, the side was on the phBB bulletin board system, where you could set your own titles. I set Bronita because I thought it ironic and funny that the word was both masculine (bro) and a mutation of the spanish feminine word for "pretty" (bonita). At the same time, it barely has any resemblance to "pony." Thus lulz.

[brianblackberry]

I don't use the term bronies for multiple reasons. For several people I know, including friends, "bronies"conjures up images of fanatical fans attempting to forcefully push FiM on them, which I despise as a person and a dedicated FiM fan. Also a few feminist friends object to being called "bronies" because it implies male as the default. As such I use "pony fans" or "FiM fans" myself.

[Ginger Mint]

hi hi

In my mind, brony is a unisex term. Its origins include the male word bro, but it was also spawned from the /b/ in 4-chan. I didn't like the term brony at first because of its 4-chan origins because that was something I didn't want to be associated with, but over time it took on a life definition of its own and I don't really mind it anymore.

Pegasisters has too many syllables. Its a neat word, but nicknames never catch on with more than two syllables. Its like the old saying, if you give your kid 3 syllables or more, you're just inviting their friends to invent a nickname for them. Having people shorten Pegasisters to Peggies would be even worse in my book than Bronies because it sounds diminutive.

(The relationship between words and their meanings is one of inter-subjectivity. The male empowering attitude defines the word and the word in turn supports that attitude. The word doesn't have to support that attitude if people didn't choose it to. Just like how in other cultures, the work that is considered "man's work," can be the complete opposite, but whatever it is a man does, that is what's considered important. Like how in India its the man of the house that's supposed to cook and clean.)

Coming up with some different ones off the top of my head which will undoubtedly never catch on:

• Geequines - would have been a neat play on Geeks and equines, but its too long and isn't clear enough.

• Geeqs - the shortening of the above is too far removed.

• Vaqueros - would have been historically amusing, but wouldn't have appealed to the english speaking majority.

• Draftees - would have been a neat play on draft horses, but its unfortunately shared with people conscripted into military service.

• Knights of the Round Stable - Too long.

• Pacers - already an NBA basketball team

• Gaiters - too close to alligators

• Canters - not too bad actually, but can we or cant we? I guess we cant. (if you catch my meaning)

• Maneiacs - are we that crazy? Maybe.

• Celest's - if only it rolled off the tongue, it'd be hilarious.

• Nags - only those of us who bug people into watching the show.

[Tempest Rime]

Lets just call everypony 'ponies' and be done with it.

[Kilmarnock]

I used to hate the term 'brony', taking a while to warm up to it. Aside from that, I always just let people call themselves whatever the heck they wanted. To me, the definition of a furry is somebody who calls themselves a furry. Same goes for bronies, pegasisters, whatever. If you wanna be called that, that's what you are!

[Lyricality]

The equestriamlp community on livejournal recently had a bit of a meltdown over the term "brony," and quite a few active members left the community as a result. The whole debacle was instigated by a post--by one of the mods, unfortunately--ranting about the term and demanding that no one use it in the subject line of posts. The whole thing spiralled out of control and eventually ended up on sf_drama.

I admit that I can't quite understand the need for a fandom name. I've never been involved in a fandom that had a name, honestly--I've been an HP fan and now I'm primarily a Transformers fan, and there was no specific terminology for either one. *shrug*

[brianblackberry]

The equestriamlp community on livejournal recently had a bit of a meltdown over the term "brony," and quite a few active members left the community as a result. The whole debacle was instigated by a post--by one of the mods, unfortunately--ranting about the term and demanding that no one use it in the subject line of posts. The whole thing spiralled out of control and eventually ended up on sf_drama.

I admit that I can't quite understand the need for a fandom name. I've never been involved in a fandom that had a name, honestly--I've been an HP fan and now I'm primarily a Transformers fan, and there was no specific terminology for either one. *shrug*

LOL Livejournal.

I don't care for the term personally that much, but if someone called me that to simply denote I am a FiM fan, fine, whatever. As long as they are willing to judge me by my actions and not those of others.

Why was the term so forbidden by the mods there?

[Tempest Rime]

Livejournal still exists?

Anyway, plenty of other fandoms have names for members. Trekkies, Whovians, X-Philes, etc. Trying to popularize a second term never worked for the Trekkies when they wanted to be known as "Trekkers." Just use whatever terms you want, but recognize that Brony is the one that stuck.

[Lyricality]

Why was the term so forbidden by the mods there?

It was only one active mod who disliked the term, and from what I understand (which is not all that much), it was mostly a case of poor judgement. What really should have been a rant posted to a personal journal was posted to the community. That particular mod didn't like the term, and the post turned into a community-wide argument rather than an airing of a pet peeve. The whole kerfluffle kind of blindsided everyone. I think the original post was eventually deleted.

[Dessa]

Wow, banning the use of the word? That's a bit much.

Also "Trekkers," LOL.

[Tempest Rime]

It's true, there were tons of arguments over 'Trekkies' vs. 'Trekkers,' but nobody outside that fandom ever used 'Trekkers.' Even Gene Roddenbury called them Trekkies.

My point is, you can call yourself whatever you want, but you can't really control what catches on. 'Brony' is just the term that's sticking, largely because males are the demographic that are most surprising. Look at all the media coverage: they always focus on the fact that it's adult men enjoying the show, even though the fandom counts plenty of women among its numbers.

If you really want a term specifically for female fans, it should be something catchy with less than 4 syllables. No one is going to ever say pegasister. It's clever, but it's not catchy. It's just too long.