I think the problem is that there are several types of people calling themselves "bronies" which is why people have conflicting opinions about them. It depends on which "bronies" you personally have encountered.
There are the "good" bronies, the guys (or girls who use the name) who like FiM (and possibly earlier ponies) simply because they enjoy the show/toys.
Then you get what I call "brony lemmings" who've followed their friends/peers into the "cult" because it's "cool" to be a G4 pony fan.
And then there are the "bad apple bronies" who are spoiling it for the rest of them, writing sickening fanfiction and making references to it where kids are likely to see it, declaring "Faust is our goddess" and screaming at Hasbro whenever anything is not to their liking (Comic Con Pony announcement on Facebook, anyone?), and shouting and swearing at everyone as we MUST have the same opinion as them (even though they claim to "love and tolerate" everyone).
Let me get this out in the open; I have NO problem with people preferring one generation over another. To me these new "bronies" are no different to collectors we've known for years who collect only their favourite generation(s). I respect the fact that we all have different opinions and would never try to enforce mine on someone, and I think that's been the general feeling throughout the pony community for years. Has a G3-only collector ever come up to you and said
"GET RID OF YOUR G1s BECAUSE I HATE THEM SO YOU SHOULD TOO!"? Thought not. But the "bad apple bronies" are different. They write hate mail.
Yes,
hate mail. It seems to have become the "thing" to write threatening messages to people who have said positive things about G1/G3 movies on Youtube. I get people responding to comments I wrote FOUR YEARS ago telling me that they hope I "die of cancer" because I liked G3 Pinkie Pie! WTH?
And then my friend, who worked on a pre-G4 show, has had it worse than me. The worst thing is that he was in a serious car accident a few months ago, sustained a serious head injury and has been left with frequent headaches and a paralysed arm. He's had depression issues for years, and he's going through an awful lot right now. And yet, the "bad apple bronies" found his e-mail address. I presume they work in a gang, circulating it amongst themselves and he woke up to an inbox full of it. They've been writing a ton of hate mail to him, everything from the pure ridiculous,
"Pinkie Pie should turn you into a cupcake" and
"Discord is rubbing his hands together thinking of all the terrible things he could do to such a little person" (a nasty jibe as my friend is quite self conscious about his height) to the evil talk about cancer and, worst of all, "we hope you get into a car accident". That hurt even me. I can't imagine how he feels. Of course, they have no way of knowing he's already been in an accident but it's nasty all the same. Why the heck should he receive death wishes just because he worked on a kids' cartoon years ago? Anyone would think he was a serial killer!
Last night, his cousin (who has written kind things about him on the net in the past) had her e-mail address hacked. I'm just wondering if I'm going to be next...
A voice actress I know who was in the G3 movies has told me she receives "abusive letters from men who like the new MLP" too. She's not given me details, but said it was "all very strange".
I've actually lost the plot as to whether these "bronies" are even FiM fans or people just looking for an excuse to fight and bully people...
So yeah, I rambled far too much there but I think those are the kinds of "bronies" that make people wary. As I say, I'm sure they are a small percentage in the scheme of things, it's just that the "bad apple bronies" are far more vocal than the rest, at least in my case.
Hopefully that made some kind of sense anyway!
