I have seen a lot of discussion from some people about the lack of representation for marginalized communities on major servers like Hermitcraft and the Life Series. Which I don't mind, I agree that major servers having more marginalized people on them is good.
However. I don't want an over fixation on these large servers to take away from fandom responsibility either.
You want more women and trans people in Hermitcraft, which is great, but do you watch Gem? Or Pearl? Cleo? False? Extending this to the Life Series, do you watch Lizzie? Hell, lets expand to poc, disabled people, and other queer people too. Do you watch BigB? Bdubs? Do you watch Scott, and Martyn, and Scar?
If you do watch them, how do you treat them? Are Lizzie and BigB perpetual side characters? Are Gem, Cleo, and Scott just Too Meann for you? Do you even know Martyn's queer? Do you treat Scar as much like a competent adult as you do his peers?
Expanding the scope, lets talk about Smps that do have more women and trans people on them. When Vampires Smp was airing, who did you watch? Who did you perceive as the 'main characters'? Now watching Bannerfall Smp, whose storylines are most important to you? Do you value canon wlw relationships as much as you do fanon mlm ones?
And furthermore, I fear some fans put the responsibility for 'creating representation' entirely on large Smps to take the responsibility for supporting marginalized creators off of themselves. Large Smps should take note of who they're platforming and why, and if they are primarily made up of abled cishet white men it's a good thing to check unconscious community biases on who gets cast in what servers. But if you don't watch any marginalized creators, I'd argue putting the onus entirely on large servers to platform them for you instead of seeking them out is only avoiding a very important conversation you should have with yourself.
None of this is saying we shouldn't talk about bias within the streaming/youtube space itself, obviously, or that large servers shouldn't examine why they tend to favor certain additions over others. But an equally important conversation needs to be had within the fandom, because I and many other people I know have noticed how the mcyt fandom behaves regarding marginalized creators and their characters.
(this is largely focused on hermitcraft, the life series, and a bit of pow creations, because those are the fandoms i'm most active in. other parts of the mcyt fandom feel free to weigh in with how you've noticed marginalized people in the servers you watch are treated by the fandom)
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