‘That pony is real sexy’: My Little Pony fans, sexual abjection, and the politics of masculinity online

The cartoon My Little Pony has drawn attention for its audience of young adult men, described as “bronies.” Although popular narratives have emphasized their comparative sexual normalcy, a subset of these fans form communities where enjoyment of pornographic content is normative. Through ethnographic observation of the My Little Pony (/mlp/) discussion board on the website 4chan, we find that these men construct a communal identity around their sexual desires. We argue that, by placing them outside of normative heterosexual desire, this communal sexuality renders these men abject. By sharing and policing these sexual desires, these men build a communal sense of masculine failure and create discursive support for a politics opposed to progressive gender change. We thus suggest an important role that collective sexual desire, especially in online communities, can play in the emergence of reactionary gender politics