“Don’t Let Them Change Us: A Bad Buddy Fanzine for Palestine” is OUT!

Don’t Let Them Change Us is a digital Bad Buddy fanzine raising money and awareness for Palestinian liberation. Check out our statement of solidarity with Palestinian liberation and actions you can take for Palestine to learn more about why we created this zine.

All zine proceeds go to We Are Not Numbers (WANN), a youth-led organization in Gaza that shares the stories behind the numbers and fights for Palestinians’ human rights, or to direct aid for their writers and their families who are suffering under Israel’s genocide. 

The digital fanzine, which is now out, is a full-color PDF with 244 pages and alt text for all images, and includes:

Our sixteen contributors have been absolutely fantastic! We’ve been spotlighting each of them in our #contributor spotlights tag, but if you missed those, here they all are:

We’re also thrilled to share that, just through pre-orders, we’ve already raised $1,969.50 USD for WANN and direct aid for WANN writers! This fandom has come through big for WANN, allowing us to meet our stretch goal, which means we’ll be raffling off two print copies of the zine among everyone who pre-ordered. We’ll continue taking zine orders indefinitely (please read this post for an update).

We also hope that as you’re enjoying the zine, you’ll also keep letting folks know about it if they have not ordered themselves, and also sharing your reactions and feedback with our contributors! If you are so inclined, you can post or tweet about your reactions to the different works in the zine, which we can then share with the contributors:

Thank you again to everyone who made this happen! We are so, so grateful for everyone’s support and collaboration, and we hope that you will continue fighting for Palestine both in fandom and in all the other parts of your lives. 

From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!

Your zine mods, @fiercynn and @sciencebluefeelings

BBS fans, we wanted to share some closing thoughts on this zine now that it has been out for a few months! We're so so thrilled by and grateful for the support that this zine received, from our amazing contributors to everyone who donated to purchase the zine. In total we have raised over $2,200 USD for We Are Not Numbers and their writers!

When we decided to put together this zine, we knew that there would be a good response, but we honestly didn't expect this, as you can tell by the fact that we set our stretch goal at $1200 USD and then actually beat it by a thousand dollars more! Thank you so much to everyone who was a part of this.

Since this is a digital zine, we're going to keep orders open indefinitely, but we won't be checking the submission form quite as frequently. If you do want to purchase a copy of the zine and you don't receive a response to your order for more than a week, please do email us at BadBuddyFanzine@gmail.com to let us know.

We don't currently have specific plans to do another zine, but we're definitely not closing the door on it, since unfortunately the need in Palestine is greater than ever during this horrific genocide and ongoing nakba. But do keep following this account in case that changes.

Again, thank you all so much!

- fiercynn and science

just a few more days until zine publication!

We have officially spotlighted all of our sixteen amazing zine contributors! If you missed any of them, you can find them at #contributor spotlights.

We have just a few days to go until the zine is published next Tuesday, April 16 - but the fun is not over yet! We are so thrilled by the donations we've raised already, but we're certain that there are still more people in the fandom who have not heard about our zine and may be interested.

So from Friday through Monday, many contributors will be sharing short previews of our work! We'll be reblogging them here and encouraging folks to pre-order by 11:59pm U.S. Pacific Time on Monday, April 15 (here's a countdown clock). If you pre-order, you will be entered into a raffle to win one of two print copies of the zine!

Also, since we have already raised more than $1,200 USD for We Are Not Numbers, we are now encouraging folks to donate directly to writers and others in the WANN community who need help with food, medical treatment, surviving and rebuilding in Gaza, or escaping Gaza entirely. You can find more at How To Order Your Zine, including the page at WANN's website where you can check out the individual campaigns.

Please keep sharing, especially to folks you know that may not be as active in the online fandom anymore but might still enjoy this zine! And thank you all for your support so far.

Other links that might be helpful:

From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free! 🇵🇸 🇵🇸 🇵🇸 🇵🇸 🇵🇸 

Artist Spotlight: Cinnamon Seadragon

Tumblr: @cinnamonseadragon

Type of Fanworks: Illustration and spot illustrations for two fics

Tell us a little about yourself!

30's, nonbinary, they/them, currently living in the Southern US. I first got into Bad Buddy in early spring 2022 after seeing gifsets on tumblr.

Have you ever created, contributed to, or otherwise participated in a fanzine before?

Yes, but this is my first time for Bad Buddy!

Why did you want to participate in a fanzine raising money and awareness for Palestinian liberation?

I think it's a great way to raise money and awareness, by spreading the word through fandom outlets and providing new fics and art for anyone who can donate to the cause. I'm hoping the zine sparks a new wave of awareness and donations, and I'm very honored to participate!

Can you give us a quick description of your piece in the zine?

Art of Pat and Pran supporting Palestine, art of Ink and Pa holding hands, and spot illustrations of Pat and Pran at the Gardens by the Bay/SuperTrees in Singapore for the fic by @faillen.

What are some of your favorites of the Bad Buddy fanworks you’ve created in the past?

Here are my top 5 favorite Bad Buddy fics I've written:

and I love drawing Nong Nao :)

Where else online can we find you and your fanworks?

twitter: cinnamoncdragon

ao3: Cinnamon Seadragon/katherine1753

Writer Spotlight: Faillen

Tumblr: @faillen

Type of Fanwork: Fic

Tell us a little about yourself!

She/her. Behold, one of my first tweets about Bad Buddy:

Oh, how far we've come.

Have you ever created, contributed to, or otherwise participated in a fanzine before?

Nope!

Why did you want to participate in a fanzine raising money and awareness for Palestinian liberation?

If there's one thing fandom has, it's organizing power. Fandom-in-itself is not activism, but I wanted to contribute to something that harnessed that organizing power to support those affected by the atrocities occurring in Palestine.

Can you give us a quick description of your piece in the zine?

This is a timestamp set in the last two months of the Singapore era, and in particular, the last night of one of Pat's rare visits to Singapore. Neither him nor Pran can sleep—for a few reasons—and they wind up going on a midnight excursion to (absolutely gorgeous) Gardens by the Bay.

What are some of your favorites of the Bad Buddy fanworks you’ve created in the past?

Where else online can we find you and your fanworks?

Really just AO3 these days, unless you want to sign up for 'Fai's Fixation of the Week' in which case, you can follow me on Tumblr @faillen :)

Artist Spotlight: Tasha

Tumblr: @sadfishkid

Type of Fanwork: Illustration

Tell us a little about yourself!

Hi! I'm Tasha, your average queer millennial (Eastern European flavour) and a freelance artist. One day on November 26, 2021 someone I follow reblogged a whole bunch of episode 5 gifsets and meta posts in a row and they piqued my interest. I decided to check it out and ended up absolutely loving this series. It was my introduction to the world of Thai QL shows, and although since then I've watched a lot of them and many have become my comfort shows, Bad Buddy will always have a special place in my heart.

Have you ever created, contributed to, or otherwise participated in a fanzine before?

I have, in several! You can check which ones here: #zine tag 

Why did you want to participate in a fanzine raising money and awareness for Palestinian liberation?

I love that you get to contribute to a very good cause and also create something you're fond of in the process. The project receiving your donations for this zine is dedicated to uplifting individual Palestinian voices and giving them a chance to be more than just statistics listed in the news headlines, to share their own stories. I'm doing my small part in bringing attention to it and I hope you support it too!

Can you give us a quick description of your piece in the zine?

Speaking of telling stories: photos do that as well, and that's why I decided to draw Ink and her love of photography. There's a bunch of guest appearances in the illustration – see if you can recognize them all :)

Where else online can we find you and your fanworks?

I'm afraid these days I'm exclusively a Tumblr dweller! I do have a Twitter under the same username, but I'm not sure when or if I'll ever be active there again.