'Fandom has toxified the world': Watchmen author Alan Moore
theguardian.com
theguardian.com
I've always liked Nabokov's attitude towards reading:
"A wise reader reads the book of genius not with his heart, not so much with his brain, but with his spine. It is there that occurs the telltale tingle even though we must keep a little aloof, a little detached when reading."
Fandom is the opposite of this where people end up treating their favorite media the way K-Pop fans treat K-Pop idols and it's why fandom driven media just ends up lowbrow and bad.
> https://www.ecosophia.net/the-three-stigmata-of-j-r-r-tolkie...
> . . . It’s occurred to me more than once recently that one of the most distinctive things about the Western cultures of the last century or so is the way it’s become so obsessed with wholly imaginary worlds, as different as possible from the one we actually inhabit. That’s a very odd habit, when you stop and think about it.
This is quite nice, as it allows you to learn a lot about history by reading books from that time. It almost gives you an immersive sense of history, in a way.
Even the oldest legends of Europe -- Arthur, Holger Danske, Orlando Furioso, the 8th century BC Iliad, and I could go on -- ostensibly concerned themselves with the real world. (And, to strengthen Greer's point, often contained noble Saracens and other villains.)
Same goes for Asia, by the way. The great legends of Asia -- from the Three Kingdoms, to the Water Margin, to the Tale of Heike -- were at least nominally "real." Not concerned with imaginary worlds.
The myths we create today are qualitatively different in straightforward and obvious ways.
And in a list I found here, I would say the majority is still quite concerned with the real world:
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/6.Best_Books_of_the_20th...
Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter just replaced the bible in my opinion, but the people in the 19.century had reasons to flee into imaginary worlds as well.
Nonetheless, I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing to have stories set in their own worlds, separated from reality. Maybe it is inevitable. In previous centuries, the world itself was largely unknown. Most people never left the city they were born in until they died. Reading something set in a different real place was in many ways the only way to experience it.
What is the first noteworthy piece of fiction set in a fictional land? "Alice in Wonderland", perhaps? Maybe in a world that was becoming a tad less mysterious (we already had telegraphs, trains, steam ships and so on), some started to look toward fantastical, fictional world to have the illusion of an unknown world.
> What is the first noteworthy piece of fiction set in a fictional land? "Alice in Wonderland", perhaps?
Maybe Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene? Its connection to our real world is tenuous at best, I'd say.
I don't disagree. But in a world where even reality was very much a mystery (so you had myths of ancient lost civilizations, cities of gold, etc and so forth), maybe religion, as literal as it was taken, was enough to satisfy the common people with its otherworldly descriptions of places.
My point is that I think it is natural that as the world becomes less mysterious and religion becomes increasingly seen as allegorical, the craving for fictional worlds where not all is known becomes more appealing.
> Maybe Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene? Its connection to our real world is tenuous at best, I'd say.
Maybe the oldes I can think of is the land of Avalon in Athurian legend? Still would have a tenuous connection to the real world.
Earliest I know of set in an entirely fictional land with no connection to the real world is Flatland by Edwin Abbott Abbott, from 1884.
And of course there's the religious texts. They often have a heavy focus on abstract things like afterlife that are very much detached from our daily life, but they're also very often foreign imports as well. Christianity is popular in Europe but its roots are in the middle east, and buddhism is very popular in east asia but its origins are in south asia. I think a certain desire for escapism is one reason why this is the case.
In fact, one distinctive feature of the last century was that organized religion became less relevant to many western people. Perhaps you could argue that fiction filled the void? Kind of like how the rise of protestantism removed a lot of catholic rites and rituals from northern europe and to fill the void things like freemasonry became really popular.
Really? Which ones?
Whereas fantasy is escapist and constructs alternative worlds, most works of science fiction -- and especially the classical "hard" science fiction of the Golden Age -- present us with a potential human future. Many of these futures, like Clarke's satellites and today's cyberpunk dystopia, quickly came to be realized. Others, like the space elevator, seem like inevitable ideas that will be realized at some point in the future.
There's a lot that can be written about this, but it's definitely something different...
It sort of mirrors children's development, with them gradually considering fairy tale elements as less real and relegating them to stories specifically.
Propaganda would be much less effective if people were able to think rationally.
In contrast, when you read The Lord of the Rings, you're reading a pure fantasy, about a world that you're not expected to believe is real in any particular way, and where the reflections on any real world concepts are buried deep in the subtext (unlike, say, a teaching by the Buddha).
How do we know this?
Of course, there would have certainly been people who did not believe in the literal truth of these stories - either as some form of early naturalism, or simply because they believed in other stories (like how devout Christians view the Bible as literal truth, but think the Veddas are just stories, and vice versa).
When people tell their kids about Santa Claus is that because they believe he exists?
There are always credulous people, but even in highly religious communities you will find amazingly large numbers of people only there for the community and just going along with public displays of adherence to whatever the belief system is. “True believer” is a term for a good reason.
Lord of the Rings is a Catholic Christian morality tale set in the third age of our world. We are now in the year 2024 of the seventh age. It is our world and it is no more or less fiction than the Song of Roland is.
I wish more people would read what the authors meant their worlds to be because a lot of what's described as 'merely fiction' is nothing of the sort.
This is contradictory. The Catholic Church has its own history of the world, which is set down in the Bible, and they would consider any alternative history -- such as the one Tolkien wrote about, if you've interpreted it correctly -- to be a heresy. Simple as that.
St. Augustine wrote of Six Ages:
The First "is from the beginning of the human race, that is, from Adam, who was the first man that was made, down to Noah, who constructed the ark at the time of the flood".
The Second "extends from that period on to Abraham, who was called the father indeed of all nations".
The Third "extends from Abraham on to David the king".
The Fourth is "from David on to that captivity whereby the people of God passed over into Babylonia".
The Fifth is "from that transmigration down to the advent of our Lord Jesus Christ"
The Sixth: "With His coming the sixth age has entered on its process."
Not to mention, Tolkien has written quite a bit about the three ages preceding The Third Age (the Dawn Age and the two numbered ages), and there is no mention of Adam, Eve, God, King Solomon, Moses, Noah, the Flood, or any other parts of the Christian mythos of the first few ages. And there are a great many more evil lords, giant spiders, winged eagles, and magical rings then you'll find in any Bible.
I thought I was going into a piece of writing that would be critical of drawing comparisons between fantasy and the real world, but the author did the exact opposite. He drew the comparison between the Ukraine counter-offensive and magic swords, and put those words into NATO's mouth.
As someone who followed all of that quite extensivly, I tend to confirm this. Otherwise that disastrous offensive last year never would have happened at all. As it was quite clear from the beginning, that it was bound to fail - but the imagination that the glorious win of the righteous forces of history is about to happen. So it needed to happen, despite objections from reality seeing people on the ground.
Because the russian minefields and fortifications and russian artillery supperiority turned out to be very real. And they were real before.
They had their reasons or at least rationalizations, though you don't see them and they might not make sense to you.
> They literally are the bad guy.
Maybe. I agree that the invasion was a very grave evil. Even so, it doesn't mean that they're destined to lose, and we shouldn't think that way. Mongols were bad guys but won so much that they got tired of winning.
It's a very grave fallacy to believe that the Good Guys always prevail. And, besides, the Russians you ask would surely say, "Wait, you think those Banderite Ukrainians are the GOOD Guys?! And here I thought we were the Good Guys! Throughout its entire history, Russia has always fought and always conquered evil."
> Of course they say that, otherwise they would be in prison.
You can't seriously believe this. I'd invite you to hang out on the Russian internet (or Russian Telegram) for a different view. Have a look at what they write in their own language, when talking between themselves.
You don't need to say that Putin isn't great to get arrested. Holding up a blank piece of paper is enough.
(There surely are plenty of political prisoners in russia, but I believe they were more vocal and organised in their opposition)
I suppose you can dismiss that because social media posts and having a daughter with a brain and a heart don't count as "verbal", but I don't think that would be very reasonable.
But nevertheless, it is another good example to save, for my debates with certain people of other opinion. (Nato aggression)
I read Putin's rationalization that was published just after the war broke off and retracted soon after but you can still read it.[0] He basically claims that Russia has to be great again and it is his historical role to conquer it so that Ukrainians are his slaves just like Belorussians are.
So yes, they have their reasons and realizations, just like another ruler in 1938 and 1939, the problem is that nobody else agreed with them.
[0] https://web.archive.org/web/20220305153356/https://thefronti...
Let them enjoy some degree of relative freedom on Telegram channels where they still can. I honestly doubt it will last for long.
Yeah, I'm sure that's exactly why. WW3 happened for no reason at all.
Second, they had very clear reasons: Putin always considered Ukraine his property and when he realized he can lose it, he decided to use force. He elaborated on it in a longer piece[0] and in the Carlson show.
https://web.archive.org/web/20220305153356/https://thefronti...
Of course it is.
I did not see that. I did see the opinion, that they do not represent the ultimate evil, like the orcs do.
The russian soldiers also largely don't think they represent evil, they think they defend russia, that is the point being made - and if this already qualifies to you as saying they are not the bad guys, then I recommend reading a bit more carefully, as it is exactly this black and white thinking, that is in the realm of fantasy.
This is a very bold claim, can you back this up?
Because we won't see massive lines of Russian men trying to join the army to defend the homeland. In fact, the moment a general mobilization was announced you had hundreds of thousands (if not million+?) fleeing Russia.
The main motivations we've seen for the Russians joining are:
- entrepreneurship - going to war became an entrepreneurial endeavor to get paid a large sum of money (if I recall correctly Russians are now being paid more than US soldiers if you factor in their sign-in bonus);
- getting out of jail - to the point of seeing violent criminals commit crimes again;
I'm not saying they see themselves as representations of evil; I'm saying they don't seem to care whether they represent it or not.
And as far as I know, defending mother russia from NATO aggression is a major motivator, as well as money is.
But also the Nazis did not view themself as evil - but rather as powerful because of lack of restraint. And protecting the poor suppressed aryan people.
So my point was not at all, that the russian soldiers are somehow nice - just that the world is not as black and white as fantasy often is - but people like the fantasy approach of black and white - and the proplem starts when they apply this thinking to the real world.
> And as far as I know, defending mother russia from NATO aggression is a major motivator, as well as money is.
This is very confusing, and a lot of Russians are also confused by this by the way: what NATO aggression are you talking about?
> just that the world is not as black and white as fantasy often is
The Nazis crafted a narrative to start WW2 at a time when information didn't have the same freedom. This narrative seem to have heavily inspired the Russian regime: "ethnic russians are under threat in Ukraine!" instead of "ethnic Germans are under threat in Poland".
So the whole casus beli does seem to be a dark fantasy, and people are aware of this, to the point of completely dismissing that reality.
That's why I don't understand your point, nor do I see the logic of it.
It is not my point of view, I am not a fan of empires in general, but the "NATO aggression" is obviously the expansion of the NATO to the east ..
And from the point of view of empire logic - it is aggression. The old empire was shrinking and in decline - Ukraine, which was formerly completely integrated in the empire, now on the brink of switching sides and aligning with the west.
It is the logic of power.
And I doubt you can find many russians living in russia who are confused by this. They understand. Luckily not everyone shares that logic(way too many do), but they do understand it.
I mean, it is your point of view, which is shared by the Russian regime narrative as you know, hence why it's confusing.
Once again when you say "the expansion of the NATO" you're framing it like an army marched into the east seizing territory and enforcing themselves onto sovereign states that wanted nothing to do with NATO. Or that NATO threatened countries to join them "or else" like Russia does.
And my question is why are you framing it like that?
Because NATO is a defensive alliance, which countries can apply to join. No nation was threatened into joining NATO.
In case you didn't know both USSR and Russia signed agreements, memorandums and charters that stated Sovereign countries are entitled to choose their own economic and defensive alliances - ALL SOVEREIGN COUNTRIES, no exceptions here.
By your logic, the WTC is an imperialist project, which is nonsense. Or agreements Russia had with Western countries, would be once again "imperialist western expansion"... very confusing and illogical stuff.
Gorbachev himself clearly stated so, when he said that there was NO such thing as promises of non-NATO integration of eastern countries (which the Russian regime continues to try to spin these lies when the man himself denied any such promise).
And by the way, former soviet states applied to join NATO when the world witnessed Russia restarting expansionism through war in case you didn't know.
So once again, it isn't very clear.
> And I doubt you can find many russians living in russia who are confused by this. They understand.
Clearly, they don't understand, why do you think hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of young and educated Russians fled Russia when the war started?
Well, not in my world ...
Let's suppose this is true (I'm not convinced, in practice most of them are fighting because they don't have choice, so what they think doesn't matter that much anyway). How do they explain the cognitive dissonance that instead of defending Russia they are actively attacking Ukraine? It makes no sense at all.
If you say that they believe that Russia should be great again, and Ukrainians should be its subjects just like Belorussians, this makes much more sense, and there is support for this kind of thinking in the population. But let's not pretend they're good guys then.
I did not.
"> The russian soldiers also largely don't think they represent evil, they think they defend russia
Let's suppose this is true (I'm not convinced, in practice most of them are fighting because they don't have choice, so what they think doesn't matter that much anyway"
And are you aware, allmost no russian conscripts are involved in fighting?
It is a voluntarily army. Econonic reasons do play a role, especially for people from asian backwater provinces - but all in all they do fight, because they choose to.
So back to the main story - it is not just evil overlord Putin, that is the problem.
Actually I didn't know that, the reports from the beginning of the war stated otherwise. In any case, last time I read they said they managed to mobilize 300 000 people[0]. So what happened to them? It makes no sense to mobilize soldiers during the war and not send them to war.
Not the ones I read.
"It makes no sense to mobilize soldiers during the war and not send them to war."
They can guard other borders (russia has lots of them) and replace the professional soldiers there, who then can be send instead to Ukraine.
And 140 000 of those 300 000 you cite seem to be Ukrainians. And they do have to fight indeed.
But russia really avoided forcefully drafting ethnic russians and sending them into the war zone - the few times it did - it created too much unrest.
Replace 'Russia' with 'USA', and 'Ukraine' with 'Iraq'. There are lots of other examples that could be used as well. I am firmly in the camp that believe Russia is in the wrong here and also that the US was wrong to invade Iraq. But that doesn't change the fact that its easy to create a strong rational-sounding argument about how an offense is really a defense. It happens all the time. There is no dissonance. They believe that the attack is the defense.
This is actually an excellent example because it's clear that invasion was as wrong as the other one. When Bush designed his mad plan to attack Afghanistan and Iraq, he faced enormous outcry from his allies. In Europe, there were the biggest anti-war protests in the modern history of the continent (I believe in Rome it was 5 million people). It made no sense then, it made no sense during the war, and it makes no sense now.
The only "positive" aspect of that war is that the USA is now much more careful when considering its options as it's clear that starting the war is relatively easy and having a positive outcome (so-called "winning") are two different things. Russia is only learning this now.
Putin et al truly believe in a "Greater Russia" and that Ukraine is part of that.
First (2014) they wanted agricultural resources, better sea access, etc. and they took Crimea.
That provided some reason for a more recent invasion, after almost a decade of blocked water supply Russia needed a land corridor and a secure water supply o/wise Crimea was a hollow gain.
Still not going well with that: https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukraine-dam-blast-could...
Next to grain and water the other complaints seem small petty namecalling with little justification.
No, they already had it de facto, just not de jure. But with the shift in power in Kiew they were afraid of loosing it.
Members acts as if the fiction was real. They have to or are labeled traitors, non team players etc. Those who get it either play along or stay silent.
Imagine Germans believing lies that hurt themselves.
And the opinion in germany is mixed about the incident, only very few believe it was Putin.
Some say, who cares for russian gas anyway, good that it ended - others are indeed very pissed about the whole thing (Scholz does not seem to like Selensky).
Or maybe not, since these things are done on decades scale, people / institutions change, circumstances change and there is no emotional weightage to the memory of wrong doing since its the people who hold such weightage.
Or maybe, it's all "priced in".
https://collider.com/survivor-villains-ranked/
The defining villain of Survivor during its late 2000s and early 2010s seasons, Russell Hantz's chaotic and destructive style of gameplay revolutionized and changed the way Survivor would be played going forward. His gameplay style is very fast-paced and aggressive in style, focusing on deliberately creating as much mischief and nightmare conditions at camp, in order to control and manipulate those around him. At the same time, he would constantly search for idols without any clues, using them to continue his life in the game while seemingly at the bottom.
It's hard to deny just how impactful Russell's game plan was in his early seasons, as his style of complete villainy had never been seen on Survivor before, and it completely took control of his first season, Survivor: Samoa. Through brute force and complete chaos, he was able to flip around an 8-4 disadvantage at the merge, leaving his enemies destroyed for even thinking they could stand up to his strategic wit. He had a similar reign in his second time around in Heroes vs Villains, once again taking control and using his chaotic prowess to make it to the final three. However, while Russell can find ways to make it to the final three back-to-back, his failed social game has made him one of the strongest Survivor players to never win the game.
It looks more a leftist who is mad that their realist socialist fiction didn't become popular and influential and instead the "conservative" fantasy of good and evil somehow came to define Western Liberal thinking, nevermind the sheer diversity of works that do confront moral grayness, or that cultures outside of the West (including Russia) do very much enjoy Fantasy as well.
(note the praise for the virtuously conservative Tolkien and Herbert at the beginning)
> the author is obviously a conservative!
Why not just say he's the villain of the story you are in?
that's not sarcasm, I mean that literally: they are pulling out all of the stops and abusing the hell out of GPT. Like, they used to have a 50 person team pushing JFK, Area 51, and Moon landing conspiracies, and that was in the 90s.
Wouldn't surprise me, but do you have more background on this "team"?
That we found this out in a small scale conflict is a blessing - our forefathers found it out in 1914 in a very unpleasant way across 1000km of trenches.
This is not a permanent state of affairs - a tank will be invented and it will break the stale mate in months.
In fact, I'm disappointed about hiatus of HxH manga because I want to see more of Dark Continent. Gigantic animals, extinction level threats, etc. - it's super interesting!
I feel like humans have this interest for discovering the unknown, solving mysteries, seeing things never seen before. What's not to like about it? That's the same exact reason why I like Astronomy and quantum physics - I'm interested in things that are on the edge of what we know.
Whoever thinks creating imaginary worlds is weird must be fun at parties.
Although, I will say, more to the specific quote, we have told stories of fantastical worlds for centuries. Tolkien is inspired by elven worlds mirroring ours, tales of expenses underneath the Earth, talks of star people and sky cities. So much wholly imaginary worlds have existed in many cultures, and frankly the solely Western perspective feels rather tiny when you consider that this is a global phenomenon and has consumed far more than just America or NATO.
As communication technology improves, we get better at making copies of and making searchable the most resonating works. This means that new creators face bigger and bigger barriers to resonating. Most people give up.
To adapt, People have become critics rather than creators - consumers rather than producers. This has a deep effect on our culture.
This might explain the malaise of inaction - that we don’t feel we can accomplish much and that we’ll more readily point out the flaws in an action than encourage the action in others.
As alluded to in the article, it also might increase the tribalism wherein we have one super-creator and their followers.
The act of creation also deepens understanding. The creation process creates a more thoughtful person as much as it creates the work itself.
How do we bring back a culture of creation?
I don't know if there ever was a culture of creation (have you any examples?) but I wouldn't say that there's any lack of opportunity for people today to create for themselves and their friends. Even the super-creators spin off their own opportunities for subdemiurges: recall Bowsette.
Lagniappe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-FDFsHA20w
It's true that now more than ever, niche super creators have found an audience. I think the paradox here is, because of specifically this, not so gifted people have less incentive to create.
30 years ago, there simply was no spreading of media that wasn't so mainstream. So there was no medium for a lot of niches. Without the medium, people felt rewarded in their local community for showing something interesting that had no mainstream analog.
In a sense, the niche creators that were great were more effectively broadcast leaving less audience for worse niche creators. This, over time, meant that less people tried to create and switched to critique.
I'm not convinced of that — I suspect that in earlier times, there were just as few creators, but we didn't get exposed to all* the critiques. (for instance, if I were to make this argument I'd have to go back much earlier than 30 years, because 30 years ago people were already putting their S&M Barbies up on the web; we were already on the second generation of browsers:
https://www.jwz.org/blog/2024/10/mosaic-netscape-0-9-was-released-30-years-ago-today/ )
EDIT: * eg, the other day on Zhihu I saw someone asking "What is even the point of Joker 2?" Nowadays we can see criticism from 5 billion people without even scrolling down.
so it doesn't look like that some productions getting better and better leads others to give up. the improvement of quality just seems to go along with the access to better tools.
the relaxed stance of the star trek owners may have something to do with it. even the clarification of rules a few years ago didn't do anything to reduce the activity. it may have even increased it because now the rules are clearly spelled out where as previously only those that were im contact with CBS/Paramount knew if they overstepped any limits.
there is literally a new release every day. (i have verified this. i have watched almost every video posted on startrekreviewed.com and since the last year or two i am watching one new video per day, and i haven't run out yet. and that's not even counting audiodrama, comics or stories)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3FF_vBwftw
Why The "Toxic Fandom" Excuse Stopped Working - Critical Drinker After Hours
https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=tQBnhFCVcl4
In summary, blaming “Toxic Fandoms” is a convenient way for Hollywood to divert blame for the garbage movies they roll out and demand the audiences love. “Oh you hate our movies? It’s definitely not our fault, it must be because you’re just a hater and a toxic fan.”
He's taking about how the culture of >fandom< itself is toxic to a society - among other reasons, because it creates unhealthy habits that spread beyond media consumption (he's naming politics specifically)
I honestly think he's onto something, even though I also agree with critical thinkers point that the fans aren't particularly toxic, the recent productions are just shit or at least shouldn't be associated with the IPs they're being associated with
They're movies. Anyone spewing toxicity over them needs therapy.
It's kinda feels like a "you reap what you sow" situation in the context of media.
But if it rationalizes such behavior in other areas such as politics (which I think he's right on), then it really does become a much bigger issue for our society in general
Also his masterclass on writing was great to listen to, and I'm not interested in writing. His ideas about writing/creation = magic have stuck with me.
He's always lucid, and clear, and has a stark sense of observation.
One of my favorites: https://alanmooreworld.blogspot.com/2019/11/moore-on-jerusal...
Here's an excerpt:
----
What was the impact of popular heroes comic books in our culture? Why are people fascinated by alternative realities?
I think the impact of superheroes on popular culture is both tremendously embarrassing and not a little worrying. While these characters were originally perfectly suited to stimulating the imaginations of their twelve or thirteen year-old audience, today’s franchised übermenschen, aimed at a supposedly adult audience, seem to be serving some kind of different function, and fulfilling different needs. Primarily, mass-market superhero movies seem to be abetting an audience who do not wish to relinquish their grip on (a) their relatively reassuring childhoods, or (b) the relatively reassuring 20th century. The continuing popularity of these movies to me suggests some kind of deliberate, self-imposed state of emotional arrest, combined with an numbing condition of cultural stasis that can be witnessed in comics, movies, popular music and, indeed, right across the cultural spectrum. The superheroes themselves – largely written and drawn by creators who have never stood up for their own rights against the companies that employ them, much less the rights of a Jack Kirby or Jerry Siegel or Joe Schuster – would seem to be largely employed as cowardice compensators, perhaps a bit like the handgun on the nightstand. I would also remark that save for a smattering of non-white characters (and non-white creators) these books and these iconic characters are still very much white supremacist dreams of the master race. In fact, I think that a good argument can be made for D.W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation as the first American superhero movie, and the point of origin for all those capes and masks.
----
Though, if we're being honest, I like the critique of the immaturity of genre fiction more when Moore makes it. That might just be because I think Moore is the better writer, but I haven't read nearly as much Moorcock so it isn't exactly fair.
> “…liking something is OK. You don’t need the machete or the megaphone.”
I feel this very strongly in terms of BIG (work) TRUCKS not used for work. Those big trucks with Marvel’s The Punisher themed graphics, flat/matte paints, military-inspired details (I’m thinking of a particular bumper style), and most of all comic inspired details: blacked out windows—so much easier to draw, so much the worse for actual driving. Main character syndrome in the worst way. Just go for a walk or bicycle ride or ride your motorcycle on a Saturday in the greater NYC area and you’ll know exactly how I feel ...
He rails against the interactions of fans and large conglomerates but he was happy to cash checks anytime his work went up for sale
Remember his big publicity stunt of declining his name to appear on the Watchmen movie credits? Yet he had no issue taking the payday from DC that started it all
I've read everything he has written including his novels...but, shut up Alan
Because back then Comics book industry was not the same, he sold his story and rights to DC and the contract specified that if DC stopped selling the book after a period of time, the rights would revert back to him. Alas, he wrote Watchmen, it's never been out of print he has not been allowed to reclaim his own work.
A lot of his complaining about Movie/Comic book companies comes from the perspectivie of a creator who has lost control of his creations, and is doing what he can to protest that.
You thinking he should behave a certain way in response to your appreciation is more or less exactly what he thinks is ridiculous!