Ponies Take Over The Internet

Let’s talk ponies. Specifically, My Little Pony. I’m sure you heard of it, though you probably only have a vague idea about what it is. You probably think it’s a cartoon about colorful ponies, created by Hasbro primarily to sell toys, which is true. You probably also think it’s crap only little girls are supposed to watch, and about two years ago you’d be right. But now? Not so much.

If you spend a lot of time on the internet, you might have noticed the pony phenomenon spreading. Pictures of ponies, complete with witty captions, have been showing up on every forum, every social networking site, and every online photo album. People chat about characters with names like Twilight Sparkle and Fluttershy, and gush about how much they love the show. And most bewildering, these pony-loving weirdoes proclaim themselves to be heterosexual males, usually in their early twenties or so, and proudly don the moniker “brony”, shorthand for a male MLP fan.

So what’s up with bronies? It’s just a big troll, right? Some giant prank that we just haven’t quite gotten? Not quite. It turns out, about two years ago, animation juggernaut and nerd goddess Lauren Faust, who previously worked on Powerpuff Girls and Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends, was handed the job of making the fourth generation of My Little Pony. After communing with whatever esoteric cartoon god she serves, she emerged from her temple of wonder and handed Hasbro the script to My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. Despite the unbearably girly name, MLP: FiM was designed to appeal to all age groups and genders, so that even though it’s primary target was the little girly girls, it was equally enjoyable by… well, just about anyone, really. Men included.

This unlikely trend got started in an even more unlikely venue: a forum known as 4Chan, the internet’s infamous dumping ground. Some enterprising soul who frequented the /b/ subforum watched the show, and somehow convinced several of his fellow forum-goers to watch it as well. While they’re enjoyment was likely ironic at first, it developed into a genuine liking for the show, untainted by 4Chan’s usual foulness. Taking on the name brony (/b/ + pony, though it later evolved into a more general meaning of bro + pony), these brave trailblazers spread their love of pony, overrunning a good portion of 4Chan before the mods, seeking to avert Internet War, banned all pony discussion and told the bronies to move out.

Well, move out they did, away from their ignoble origins and into the internet at large. They began invading other forums and popular websites; Memebase, for example, created an entire portion of their website to house pony memes. When these websites began to reach their pony limit, the bronies went further, creating their own websites, like the celebrated pony news blog Equestria Daily, which recently reached more then 200,000,000 views (not kidding), or FiM Fiction, the simply massive fanfiction database devoted to MLP fanfiction in all its forms.

Somehow, this cutesy kids’ cartoon has grown a fan community more massive and tightly-knit then anything we’ve seen before. To say being a brony is part fandom, part way of life is both cliche and kind of creepy, but its also accurate – the show’s message of friendship and the bronies’ own creed of “Love and Tolerate” has created a portion of the internet where trolls (or ‘parasprites’) are simply ignored, and people are genuinely friendly and helpful. More then one brony has claimed that MLP has improved his life, and even more say that the community has improved his opinion on humanity. Many bronies openly admit to enjoying interacting with the community more then watching the show itself, though the show remains the primary focus.

While I’m talking about bronies, however, I have to mention the community’s dark side. Aside from normal internet idiots who corrupt all they touch, ponydom has a pair of closely related negative sides that creeps out the non-bronies and normal bronies alike. The first of these is something bronies call ‘clop’, or pony porn. Disturbing, no? And yet it seems to sneak its way in to all to many pony-related sites. Hard to tell if its the work of trolls, or if there are people out there who really get off on it, or both, but all the same it’s impossible to get rid of. The second half of MLP’s seedy underbelly is Grimdark, the scourge of all fandoms, which seeps into the brony community primarily through fanfiction and fanart. Grimdark refers to the excessive use of gore and dark themes in a work, and some sickos delight in inviting this darkness over to Equestria. The best and arguably first example of this in ponies is the terrifying fanfiction Cupcakes (DON’T GOOGLE IT! THIS IS FOR YOUR OWN SAFETY), in which the normally good-natured and cheerful Pinkie Pie does some pretty horrible and brutal stuff to her closest friend Rainbow Dash.

Despite the occasional sanity-destroying fanfiction like Cupcakes, the brony community is for the most part a wholesome, welcoming community that remains mostly undeterred in the face of ignorance, mocking, and the usual internet stupidity. They remain resolute in their appreciation for a show the world perceives as being meant for a different audience, insisting that the show’s quality outweighs anything petty like target audiences or gender roles. Are they right? That’s difficult to say. Many who give the show a shot end up enjoying it greatly, but nothing can be for everyone. The best way to determine the show’s quality would be to bite the bullet and watch it. Worst case scenario, you lose 25-30 minutes of your life; best case, you discover a wonderful new show and receive an open invitation to one of the most welcoming, accepting communities the internet has to offer.

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