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META: In Defense of Feels
I've seen, in a variety of places, decrying of what's sometimes called "Tumblr-speak," especially targeted toward the term "feels." "You should just say you feel something, not this ridiculous 'I have feels' thing," the argument goes. But today I wish to step up to the plate and give a light-hearted defense of "feels" for a moment--bear with me!
My main argument is that "feels" are actually qualitatively different from "feelings," and "having feels" is different from "having feelings" or "feeling something." "Feels" is actually a
"Feels" is a handy shorthand that serves to delineate a specific kind of emotional experience: one marked by intensity and purity that transcends "day to day" emotions of happiness and sorrow (with their often-muddied, contradictory undertones).
It's also a tongue-in-cheek way to downplay those emotions, to ironically distance yourself from them a little bit and make clear you don't take them that seriously. They're not feelings, they're feels. It's actually an incredibly useful and complex term, one that serves to mark a very specific kind of experience and to simultaneously elevate and disparage it. Feels are overwhelming, they blot out everything in a rush of emotion, either good or bad.
Feels are something to be savored and--at a certain level--enjoyed, even when they're negative. Sad feelings are awful; but watching something that gives you sad feels has a certain hyper-real pleasure to it (obviously, or certain creators wouldn't have such huge followings!)
The term is, far from being a corruption of the language, an elegantly precise word that serves a very useful function. So next time you feel reluctant to say something "hit you right in the feels" or to cry out "ow, my feels!" embrace your inner fan, let go of your inner grammarian, and go for it!
And with that, I humbly take my leave of you. Thank you for your consideration! Perhaps next year I shall try to parse and defend "I have lost my ability to can."
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"oh okay one last thing before I get off the internet—
I’ve been thinking lately about tumblr, and how its mostly-female users appeal to over-the-top emotional language (e.g., my feels, i can’t, cries, ARGH, and variants thereof.)
And it’s interesting, because most of us exist in societies that see excessive emotion as worthy of ridicule, an indication of irrationality, and “hysteric.” Feelings have become feminized, and what is feminine is deviant, Other, lesser. Pathos used to be a valid argumentative strategy—now, an argument rooted in emotion isn’t just bad, it’s invalid. And what is invalid can be dismissed without thought. (It’s unworthy of thought.)
But on tumblr, emotion is linked to power. Explicitly so. Feels can kill, feels can hurt, feels drive the creation of graphics/meta/fic and fierce battles over canonicity or interpretations. Feels are the currency with which you buy your right to fannishness.
Our reaction to a society that dismisses emotion as baseless is to crank that shit up to eleven and make it the gate through which you must pass to enter the community.
we’ve weaponized emotion.
how cool is that?"
glymr here again. That post triggered a lot of thoughts, especially the commentary on how we've come to regard arguments based in emotion as invalid. And yet, there are some arguments which are based in emotion which are entirely valid: "That makes me uncomfortable, that makes me feel like you don't respect my gender/race/sexuality/etc" but which people will often respond to with "logic": "You shouldn't feel that way BECAUSE..." This is only tangentially related to your original (fascinating) discussion, but I was glad you reminded me of it and thought I'd share.
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And yeah, there are definitely times when the emotion is its own evidence, and is sufficient evidence! That makes for a really interesting parallel...
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