satans-tiddies:

It’s not surprising that you had that impression, given that western fans keep trying to change the meanings of foreign fandom words, but that definition is incorrect.

@himedanshi has helpfully provided a masterpost explaining the origins and meaning of the term 腐女子 (fujoshi), but the gist of it is: it was coined on 2channel by sexists and homophobes in the early 2000′s, as an insult to women who were fans of M/M content, be it original or fan-made. They were 腐ってる (rotten/spoiled/ruined) because they dared to read gayness into the source material, or into any relationship between characters of the same gender; among other things.

The term was reclaimed by female Japanese M/M fans as a humorously self-deprecating identifier, and disseminated to other Asian fandoms. There has been a sizable established 腐 culture for many years, both in real life and online spaces, and “fujoshi” has lost its power as an insult by being used with positive or neutral connotations by the people previously targeted by it.

Eventually, it made its way to the west, but being removed from its original context, the meaning got twisted. In the same way that yaoi or hentai aren’t and were never used in Japan the way they are used in the west, fujoshi isn’t used by Asian fans the way western discoursers are using it.

In my opinion, the appropriation of fujoshi is way worse than that of yaoi or hentai. Yaoi has largely fallen out of use (proper yaoi doujinshi aren’t really made anymore), and hentai has never described any genre of fiction (pornographic manga and anime are called “ero manga/anime” there), so its inappropriate use affects mostly the westerners who misuse it.

But fujoshi and its regional equivalents are still very much in use in Asian fandoms, and western fans tacking onto it various negative meanings is creating real conflicts. That’s why you can’t use the argument that “the meanings of words change over time/between different places”: this word is still being used in its proper meaning, and its proper meaning has been shared with western fans countless times.

But we refuse to listen to Asian fans, and think it’s appropriate to assign the word of a language we don’t speak, from a culture we aren’t part of and fandoms we don’t participate in, a different, made-up meaning that suits the particular fandom-policing agenda of the moment.

Imagine how confused Asian fans become when they see that an innocent fandom term of theirs has acquired this whole twisted meaning overseas, rather recently and without their knowledge!

Western discoursers can’t even agree on the meaning of fujoshi between themselves. You say it’s “female M/M fans who bash others for not liking their ship and objectify gay men”. I’ve personally seen:

• Female M/M fans who are homophobic in real life
  
• Straight girls who views gay men as sexual objects
  
• A fan of “yaoi” who objectifies real MLM
  
• M/M fans who dislike M/F or F/F pairings
  
• Straight girls pretending to be gay men (← this one in reference to gay trans men, which I found especially horrendous)
  

And any fun combination of the above.

I say we just stick to the proper meaning: female fan of M/M media.  腐男子 (fudanshi) for its male equivalent, and tentatively 腐人 (fujin) for a gender-neutral version.

Anon, if you or anyone has further doubts about fujoshi, BL and other Japanese fandom terminology, I recommend looking through @rottenboysclub ‘s blog. He’s been in the BL debate way longer than me, doing a lot of research, and his Japanese is significantly better than mine.