Re: Religious weirdness in fandom Every time I've brought up, in a public meta-discussion, that "this aspect that's being discussed has great religious meaning to me," it's been either ignored or mocked.
That's really really really unfortunate. But is it really an acafan versus non-acafan thing? Because I'd quite frankly be surprised if most non-acafen would respond any more positively than the acafen. (Or is it possibly that the subject is more likely to come up when communicating with the acafen?)
And it was a bit of a shock finding out that wasn't true. That Christian and similar-to-Christian religions got a handwaving acceptance, and any level of agnosticism or atheism is acceptable, but other forms of spirituality are suspect... and mention them as directly connecting to one's fannish identity, and be shunned.
Ah. That's a very valid complaint. My own religious orientation, at least during my early years in fandom, was Buddhist (I have since ceased to consider myself one and am now agnostic, I guess), but while I don't believe it counts as "similar-to-Christian", I do think it is also deemed "acceptable" in a way that your religion is not. However, back a few years ago when I was struggling internally about whether I could legitimately continue to consider myself Buddhist, I actually occasionally used fanfic and fandom meta discussions as methods of thinking through religious issues, without necessarily overtly saying that that was what I was doing. I have no idea how people would have reacted had I done so, though!
I'm only 1/3 through your extremely thought-provoking comment, but it's getting late. I will come back tomorrow!