Reddit can be a fantastic resource for music fans to connect with like-minded people and fellow lovers of the same artists (and even find and share cool rarities), but it can very quickly turn toxic when fans take love for an artist too far into into entitlement, possession, and competition. That’s exactly what happened with the Car Seat Headrest subreddit (r/CarSeatHR), causing the band themselves to step in and have the forum temporarily suspended.
Whatever the issue was (the site is currently inaccessible to anyone other than moderators), it apparently got out of hand, putting the band’s frontman Will Toledo in a very uncomfortable place. He took to his Twitter after requesting for the takedown to request fans “chill the f*ck out” and just “enjoy the music.”
https://twitter.com/carseatheadrest/status/968614699733417984
“Hi everyone. I make music,” he wrote. “To ‘be a fan’ of Car Seat Headrest, literally all you have to do is listen to and enjoy the music. If you feel compelled to show your fanship in additional ways, all I ask is that you ask yourself WHY and whether it would be a Good or Bad thing to do. e.g. making fan art? Good! searching for defunct myspace pages to find pictures of me at age 13 to share with a network of strangers? Not good.”
https://twitter.com/carseatheadrest/status/968614773716697088
https://twitter.com/carseatheadrest/status/968614856994709506
He advised his fans to take a break after whatever unfolded in the forum escalated into an all-out flame war, complete with members impersonating Toledo himself. “Pretending to be me to post my old private music on bandcamp? Not good. Pretending to be me to threaten the guy posting my music on bandcamp? Not good.”
“My advice is to chill the f*ck out, don’t talk to strangers online, and make a minimal effort to be a decent human being,” he cautioned. “I was ignoring it when the insult was only to me, but it recently escalated to open warfare between community members who hated each other. This is not a ‘good community.’ Take a break.”
https://twitter.com/carseatheadrest/status/968615624669892608
While it’s impossible to see just what went down, the site currently shows the below message. Also, the full Twitter messages can be seen below.
https://twitter.com/carseatheadrest/status/968614699733417984
https://twitter.com/carseatheadrest/status/968614773716697088
https://twitter.com/carseatheadrest/status/968614856994709506
https://twitter.com/carseatheadrest/status/968615291512066048
https://twitter.com/carseatheadrest/status/968615345408888833
https://twitter.com/carseatheadrest/status/968615582496100352
https://twitter.com/carseatheadrest/status/968615624669892608
https://twitter.com/carseatheadrest/status/968620360458366978
