Mt TL;DR response pt 2
Another layer bundled into some of these posts seems to be an old debate about the primacy of the author's intent over the reader's perception, especially in the earliest anti-acafan post I ran across. Some anti-acafan posts privlege authorial intent, while some pro-acafan posts strongly favor reader's perception. It is extremely arrogant (and ironically, illogical) to go and tell an author what his/her intent was when writing a story or script, to say that you know better than them what emotions or what conclusions the author intended to bring out of the reader at certain points. The author will always be the best judge of authorial intent. But sometimes the author is the worst judge of reader perception, especially if their authorial intent is poorly realized (i.e. most readers experience different emotions or reach different conclusions than the author intended.) And I take it as a truism that reader's perceptions are going to differ between readers. So at one level, the acafan debate is also about specific bodies of readers with a well defined SHARED context which informs their understanding of fic and media. It doesn't seem any more acceptable to tell an acafan that they're wrong looking at things their way than it is to tell the bloc of gay readers or the bloc of straight readers, or the bloc of conservative readers or the bloc or liberal readers that their way of reading and interacting with the text represents a problem to the fan community. (Which I will stipulate I have certainly seen the first two in fandom, and would be surprised if the second two didn't occur).
Also bundled in are resentments about value judgments within fandom. Unlike many posters on this issue, I'm not going to argue that acafan don't make value judgments, because they clearly do. I will offer that many times they aren't on the level that is being claimed; but rather their context is more deliberately restricted. Less "your thoughts on this motif are wrong" and more " this is a lit crit discussion, and your terminology is inappropriate" (unfortunately the other type is demonstrably around too). What I am going to point out is I see this type of value judgment floating around in a lot of camps out there. It seems to be part of human nature- see final comment point.
And on a higher level is the validation of knowledge conflict also bundled into the acafan issue. In the past 50 to 100 years, our culture has used analytical argument, specifically logical constructs, as the accepted basis of knowledge validation- the scientific method specifically. "Truth" is verifiable and theories are falsifiable. It's very difficult to hold beliefs, emotions, and opinions to this standard though.
And on the highest level yet are the human factors: the need to be right, to be acknowledged to be right, and the fear that if more people following a competing model, then yours will not only not be acknowledged as right but will be judged wrong. And the surety that any view point posted, even if it is that Harry Potter's hair looks stupid, is going to generate posts both for and against, as people want their thoughts on the matter known. None of us would be posting anything if we didn't want to get our thoughts out there. And chances are good that we threw it out there to see if there are other people who agree with us, and maybe to see some conflicting viewpoints and try them out so to speak. To see if maybe we are wearing blinders. And this ties back into complaints about value judgments. They're coming from both sides of this conflict, not just one.
So, bottom line, I guess I'm suggesting that the issue isn't simply "Is acafan good or bad?" Different posters are bundling complex combinations of issues together in different ways. I don't really expect to see this ever resolved, but I would suggest no one is going to make much headway unless we can talk about the specific characteristics folks object to. My gut take on this is most of the dislike and discomfort with acafan revolves less around analysis and more around rude behavior and value judgments, where higher level value judgments also represent rude behavior.