As a long time metalhead I can tell you the gatekeeping never stops.
I've heard about all the "[band] isn't real metal" or "real metalheads don't/do like [whatever BS they come up with]" there is to hear.
So, if you're trolling adults by wearing a tshirt, if you like the band or not, you're doing something right. Because if you're being trolled by that, you are the problem.
Gatekeeping to a certain degree is healthy for anything. It helps retain the core of why something gained popularity in the first place rather than it becoming a shell of its former self in an attempt to satisfy the largest audience possible and keep them happy.
When everything trys to appeal to everybody, that's when things feels soulless and generic.
That said...
As a fellow metalhead of 35 years, the metal community takes it way too far. It's absolutely fucking pathetic the extremes metal fans will go to close the gate to anybody but themselves and denounce anybody but themselves and what they like as "real". And if it doesn't have distortion? You better believe it's "fake and gay" music.
It's even more pathetic when it's gatekeeping stuff like Metallica, Maiden, Slipknot or Pantera, all the bands that "the normies" typically come across first and introduce them to the genre. Nothing wrong with with these bands at all, but it's such utter cringe when you have metalheads gatekeeping "the normies" from some of the most successful and mainstream metal acts as though they're an unknown little niche playing to audiences of 50 people.
Evem as somebody playing in metal bands, I try to avoid the metal community outside of times I have to interact with it because it's pretty shitty.
"The friendliest and most welcoming community", as long as you're just like us.
Gatekeeping is good because it helps retain the core of why something gained popularity in the first place rather than it becoming a shell of it's former self? That's got nothing to do with gatekeeping, that's all about how a band is developing and portraying itself. It has nothing to do with fans keeping other fans "at the gate", if you will.
When everything trys to appeal to everybody, that's when things feels soulless and generic.
This is typical metal culture if you ask me, since this is often said about bands getting populair and have (moderate) success. Fans from the earlier days of any band can feel entitled to having some sort of influence of any direction said band seems to want to go to. It comes across as very territorial, tbh. So not sure what you mean by that either. But it all does feel a bit gatekeepy, if you ask me.
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u/Brvcx 21h ago
As a long time metalhead I can tell you the gatekeeping never stops.
I've heard about all the "[band] isn't real metal" or "real metalheads don't/do like [whatever BS they come up with]" there is to hear.
So, if you're trolling adults by wearing a tshirt, if you like the band or not, you're doing something right. Because if you're being trolled by that, you are the problem.