Truthfully, I hate the constant fighting. The immaturity. The unwillingness to have civil discussions about something as frivolous as art and entertainment. The misplaced anger over the careers of people we don't even know. There's so many times where I just want to log off and never come back.
 

I genuinely feel that it is in the best interest of my mental and emotional health to not have to interact with some of the toxicity that runs rampant on this site.
 

And yet for some godforsaken reason I just can't. I wanted to evaluate why some of you think that is?

 

Despite the site's errors, flaws, ingrates, chaos, and faults — what keeps you coming back to ATRL?

The messiness that are the Taylor threads. 

Edited June 1, 20242 yr by Josh

There are many annoying things about ATRL (the dated topics, the anger, the bigotry), but when it's fun, it's REALLY FUN.

 

Plus, it's a place with its own "culture", so to speak. We're like a big (and extremely dysfunctional) family. Reddit or Stan Twitter can't compare in that respect.

Edited June 1, 20242 yr by Virgos Groove

Instant pop culture news compiled and delivered in a familiar format that I've gotten used to

Plus some sane users who stan the same things/people I do

Nostalgia

What keeps me here is the general well awareness by the community of things here being not all too serious and willing to have a kii over it (eg Nicki & Cardi)
 

What frustrates me is the flip side - when parts of fan bases play victim or can't take critique towards their fave… so I just try to stay away from those convos when they go south (Eg Taylor, Christina)

Edited June 2, 20242 yr by ImpressMeMuch

What keeps me here are the friendships I’ve established with members and the mod team. As dysfunctional of a place as we are, this has been a home for many of us for years. 

Boredom. 

I only discovered this site a few months ago and immediately proceeded to sign up because I felt like "these are my people." It's hard to find people with such extensive knowledge of pop music and culture in real life.  I like that I can make up an incredibly random thread about some flop single from 16 years ago and have several people take the bait.  Like who else in the real world would be able to hold an intelligent, nuanced conversation with me about the musical genius that is Vanessa Hudgens' Sneakernight? Not many people, unfortunately!  I also think a lot of us probably live in towns and regions where access to queer culture isn't as available, so we turn to online spaces like this in order to live out our best queer fantasies.

 

I think a lot of times people take stan wars too seriously, but when I participate in them, it's mostly in jest, as i'm sure it is for most people.  At the end of the day, I don't really care if any one of you tasteless cretins hates Carly Rae Jepsen.  That's your prerogative and I won't lose sleep over it.  I think most of us are just here for the kiis and we aren't as invested in the popgirlies as we really seem.  In fact, I don't even really listen to the current popgirlies that much anymore, as their music has been trash since the mid-2010s and my tastes have evolved beyond them.

The camaraderie and spirit of kindness 

 

It's a good source of information about upcoming releases. 

female pop music, basically 

The last part of the 3 part series of Dua Lipa flopping era 

The Kpop base thread and just good source of information for pop music overall 

Rate threads 

All the rates I've participated in have been legendaric

 

I'm so glad I registered when I did because the Utada discog rate came soon after; I'd never done anything like that before and it was so much fun

Being surrounded by boring str8 ppl all day. I need an escape.

This is like a mental institution for me, being with lots of unhinged people of my kind 

 

Also, as some said, this place has its own culture, references, jokes and all of that. There's always going to be some random situation that gives you a good laugh.

 

Compared to Twitter and Reddit, this is a way more organized place and moderators do the best they can to keep trolls/bots away, making the experience better.

 

And of course, all of the information you can get about your fave's latest releases 

The banner. 

Honestly, I waited so long for the mods to open membership again that I stay to make the wait feel worth it lol.

my opps 

People and the fact that you can use gifs as avis because not every forum has that.

YTT 

 

Plus it will be 17 years being a active user here in august and it's hard to let go. As I don't like change 

the messy Lounge or The Roof threads

The occasional "discussion"-tagged thread that I end up binge-reading and gaining tons of information from 

The users I like, although a lot of them are inactive on here now and moved to RYM, and I got banned from Reddit so until I stop being lazy and make another account