documenting the joe hills difference

Cleo: (reading chat) "Have I, have you two met in person?" No, we've not. We are, we are, you know, we are (pause) face to face virgins, as it were. That's how you get fanfic! (laughs) (reading chat) "What do you class as creepy ones?" The people that ask me about it personally or leave me tweets about it, that's creepy. Uhm. (pause) It's basically, do I want to play into their version, their fantasy version of me. (pause) I, I, I don't. Just don't tell me about it. I don't care what you say or what you do, particularly, just just don't tell me about it. (pause) I'll read some of them because it entertains me, but some of them, you know. It'll only be things that I've chosen to read. I, I won't read people go, would you read my fanfic? Nooo.

Cleo: Don't tell me about your fanfic is what I'm saying. (reading chat) "There's really fanfic of Hermitcraft?" No, those aren't memes, socks, there are people who have fanficced Hermitcraft. Which isn't bad, which is perfectly fine and valid, and if that's what they want to do with their lives, that's fine. Uhm, so long as they recognize that their fanfics aren't reality, that's -- I don't care about that. You know, I'm, I'm fairly, I'm fairly chill about (pause) Cause people aren't writing about me at that point, they're writing about, umh, their, their headcanon of me effectively, which, you know, doesn't matter.

Cleo: (reading chat) "What isn't their fanfic [about]" Right?! Fanfic is, is, you know, it's pretty universal, so… (aside) Yeah, we're not gonna talk about that, Cam. (reading chat) "But what if you direct the boring global reality and working hard to substitute our own" I mean (pause) I don't know what that was in reference to, but, uhm, you're allowed to do that, but you don't have to involve me in your reality. You know, that's the thing. (reading chat) "Didn't Joe write Hermitcraft [fanfiction]?" I feel like Joe writing Hermitcraft fanfic is different. For a start, Joe knows the people he would be writing about. And two, he wouldn't really be disrespectful.

Cleo: You know, if you, if you need, if you need to write about Hermitcraft fanfics, that's fine. Just be respectful about it. It's like, it's not hard, people. (pause) It's not hard. (pause) I mean, like I say, it's like at a certain point, the fanfic stops being about us and starts being about (pause) people. I mean, (pause) Joe fanfic is hilarious because it is not Joe. It's what people think Joe is, which is not what Joe is. They think Joe is an, a timid little (pause) person who doesn't really, you know, speak up for himself. And I can, I think we can all, particularly Joe's stream -- we all know that's not Joe. Joe, Joe stands up for everything he believes is --

Cleo: (reads chat) Yeah, timid. He's always, he's always fake stuttering in, in fanfic, and you know, it's like… (reading chat) "Joe has a spine" Joe is, is -- one thing I don't consider Joe is, is timid. They, they do know he's a very good friend, but they don't, they don't see Joe as, as, as who Joe is, they see Joe as this kind of… (sigh) They, they see Joe as a sidekick, and I think we all can agree here Joe is not a sidekick to anyone, so … you know how it goes. (reading chat) "It isn't as recognizable as him at all." No, it's not, and it's very, very weird.

Cleo: (reading chat) "Joe's not a sidekick, he's his own storyline." He's his own blooming story. I, I think people just enjoy, uhm, well, they don't enjoy Joe for who Joe is. They enjoy Joe for who they think he is, which is ridiculous because, you know. It's Joe. (pause) Joe is definitely the main character in his own story. Never gonna deny that.

Cleo: (reading chat) "I'd have rated Joe as someone to follow if the path is confusing." I mean, they have him as kind of this wise mentor role. Which I can see! But it's, it's a case of, no, Joe, Joe is, you know, no.

Cleo: Speaking as someone who, who is quite fond of Joe. Allegedly. Uhm. No. It's just not who he is.

Cleo: (reading chat) "There is no way to just --" Well, no, that's because Joe isn't a character. So, you know, there's no way to describe Joe adequately because he defies definition.

Joe: Hey Cleo, I'm back.

Cleo: You're welcome. We were just discussing how much like the characters in fanfic you were, when they write you. Everyone has decided that they can't write Joe.

Joe: Uh, no. And I think that that makes a lot of sense to me.

Cleo: Uh-huh. Any reason why?

Joe: Uhm. Yeah because what they're working off of, it's a Plato's cave situation. (Cleo: Uh-huh.) They don't necessarily know what is bubbling under -- well no let's keep the metaphor. Uhm, they don't know what's casting the shadow, they just see certain patterns in the shadows. (Cleo: Yeah!) Uhm and so when I do things they can feel very consistently like a Joe Hills thing even if they're very different from a shadow that I've ever cast before. (Cleo: Yeah!) But when fanfiction writers try to extrapolate, uhm, they don't necessarily understand, since they don't have that three-dimensional map. You know, I feel like --

Cloe: Yeah that makes sense.

Joe: They end up copying some of the patterns but in ways that don't actually line up.

Cleo: Yeah that works for me, as a theory.