I was going to leave comments in the tags, but I decided this was important enough to put on main.
In college, my friend group collectively got into the SCA - Society for Creative Anachronism. They're the people who get really into medieval reenactment, the fighting and crafts and cooking, they have kings and queens and knights and events and a good percentage of them (but not all!) work or have worked at Ren Faires.
I am forever grateful my friends dragged me into that, because it was my first introduction to fandom in older adults. Middle-aged dorks. Elderly nerds. Absolutely as intense and weird and hilarious and fun as any fan in their teens or 20s. I started getting into fandom already knowing there was a road ahead for me as I got older, full of handmade costumes and late night movies and shelves of pewter dragon goblets and mixed-aged road trips to meet ups and conventions.
And it kills me that so many people don't know that sort of community even exists. On both sides, even! I went to Philcon a few years ago, which tends towards older fans, and an older woman I was talking to sadly told me that she thought fandom was dying out, because she never saw younger fans any more.
Over the past decade, there's been a really toxic movement towards keeping different ages strictly separated, both in and outside of fandom. There's this strong implication that if an older person wants to interact with a younger person, there is something inherently predatory about that.
Yeah, that attitude sucks. That drive towards separation and puritanism sucks. Declaring that younger people should have nothing to look forward to and that older people should stay separated and lonely sucks. It sucks and we are all worse for it.
Don't fear age. Don't put an age limit on having fun. Give yourself a damn future.
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