YMMV / Aristasia

• Audience-Alienating Premise:
  • Aristasia has never been terribly popular online, and never really caught on the way other subcultures (like otherkin, multiples, or soulbonders) did. Why? Well, think about it. An all-female world would appeal primarily to lesbians. Lesbians, though, are often quite liberal, and would shy away from the idea of a world trapped in a pre-1960s reality.
  • The pre-Bridgehead subculture's emphasis on corporal punishment also alienated some people: on the surface, it makes the whole thing seem like a subset of the BDSM community, like Gor for the Lipstick Lesbian set. But the leaders of the movement had insisted that it was all about spiritual rather than sexual discipline, and showed a sexual conservatism that didn't gel with the kink community. (Of course, that's assuming that a lot of them were just hiding that they were into it sexually. As this Tumblr user put it:
  # ARISTASIA WAS ONE OF THOSE THINGS WHERE I WAS LIKE ‘IF YOU’D JUST ADMIT THIS IS A KINK THING’ # 'I STILL WOULDN’T BE INTO IT BUT I COULD RESPECT IT MORE’ # BUT A LOT OF THE LANGUAGE I ENCOUNTERED WHEN I STUMBLED UPON IT WAS VERY ‘THIS IS SUPERIOR TO MODERN/REAL-WORLD VALUES # WHICH LIKE # ADMIT THAT THE IDEA OF SPANKING YOUR SUBMISSIVE FEMININE 50S HOUSEWIFE BUT MAKE IT GAY TURNS YOU ON AND GO
• Confirmation Bias: Though initially what was or wasn't alright in Aristasia was pretty straightforward, as the group began to expand onto the internet, the lines got blurry, and people began to look for ways to assume their own pre-existing beliefs were Aristasian. As an example, there was an exchange on an Aristasian forum about abortion. One girl said that abortion is abhorrent to Aristasia and always has been, while three or four others had gotten the exact opposite impression from Aristasia.
• Contested Sequel: This sums up how many people feel about Aristasia post-Bridgehead. Bridgehead was designed to make Aristasia more accessible and less problematic for most people, doing away with the discipline and relaxing standards of dress, as well as moving to Second Life as a venue. This alienated a lot of the so-called Old Guard Aristasians, a dispute that continues today, though the Bridgehead people have completely rebranded.
• Continuity Lock-Out: Before Operation Bridgehead, it was rather difficult for a new girl to get involved in Aristasia because, as everything was very spread out over many websites, it was hard to learn all the customs and mannerisms that make an Aristasian persona believable.
• Epileptic Trees: Because Aristasia lacks an ultimate authority despite certain facts being well-accepted, fan theories of how things work can get pretty nuts. For years, nobody could agree on what kinds of clothes were worn in Novaria, and people would post images of supposedly Novarian dress ranging from 1960s haute fashion to Victorian garb to the sort of thing Princess Peach wears. Ditto for the question of how Aristasians exactly reproduce. Some of these theories gradually became canon, however.
• Everyone Is Jesus in Purgatory: In theory, the "meaning" of Aristasia should be fairly clear-cut - they are essentialists, after all. Alas, it isn't so, and hours can be spent puzzling over the real meaning of this or that fact of Aristasian life.
• Fandom Heresy: The nearly-complete consensus among post-Bridgehead Aristasians is that discipline of the sort practiced by Miss Martindale has no place in modern Aristasia. Girls who disagree have allegedly been forced out of the community.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not Political?: For many years, Aristasia WAS very political, with Miss Martindale weighing in on everything from sexual morality to British politics. Since Bridgehead, though, Aristasians have sought to avoid this. People still look for political meanings in Aristasian literature and practices, however, and usually conclude that Aristasia is in line with whatever they personally believe.

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