User blog comment:Freelance Grammar Nazi/World Cup?/@comment-1271618-20100713225555

Anon: I'd say at least keep some faith in the group of people that still haven't lost their minds over things like the Cup. I'm hoping this is just a very vocal (and dumb) minority, 'cause thankfully I'm not seeing too much on the LJ community about this. Vocal minorities can be very loud and annoying though, ugh.

But the overall fandom with the most vocal people...yeah. It's not just more people flooding in either, but the more popular a series gets, the louder and more obnoxious some people can get! General stupidity, insensitivity, utilizing broad racism or sexism in character hate (quite worse because they're not really human characters, but based off of countries), etc.

I browsed the Hetalia TVTropes character sheet earlier today and had to facepalm at some edits made to Romano's section, though I don't have the nerve to try and edit there. One fan wrote that he was a sympathetic character but kind of over-emphasized certain things, while another replied and ranted about how Romano fangirls loathe Veneziano and make him into a monster and Romano into a Sue and how dare they harm poor Veneziano like that.

I can agree with the sentiment because I've seen and heard of that stuff where writers make Veneziano into the "evil" one who kills, sexually abuses or torments his poor put-upon brother, but they're forgetting that the reverse happens too: There are Veneziano fangirls that loathe Romano for being a jerk and/or hating Germany and well...guess who becomes the evil brother then? I'm hoping that trend doesn't grow too much as with the America and Canada fan-rivalry, otherwise I guess that people who like both Italy brothers just don't plain exist to these types of fans.