What Does RPS (Real Person Slash) Mean?
Fic TypeThe slash subset of real person fiction: fic pairing real people in same-gender romantic or sexual relationships. The term dates from eras when slash was labeled separately from other fic.
RPS (Real Person Slash) in Practice
RPS emerged as its own label when fandom taxonomies carefully separated slash from gen and het, and it became the dominant mode of several huge fandoms — boy band fandom, actor pairings from popular shows, and later K-pop fandom, where shipping real groupmates produces some of AO3's largest ship tags. The genre inherits RPF's fourth-wall ethics with extra intensity, since speculating about real people's orientations adds stakes fiction-based fandom never faces; this is also where tinhatting — earnestly believing the ship is secretly real — draws the sharpest community criticism. As terminology, RPS is gradually being absorbed into the umbrella RPF plus standard category labels, but the acronym remains widely understood.
Example usage
"The RPS juggernaut from that band has more fics than most entire television fandoms."
Related Terms
RPF (Real Person Fiction)
Fanfiction about real people — musicians, actors, athletes, streamers — rather than fictional characters. RPF is a major, long-established wing of fandom with its own norms and debates.
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Slash
Fanfiction centering a same-gender pairing, historically male/male — named for the literal '/' in 'Kirk/Spock.' One of fandom's oldest and most culturally significant genres.
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Tinhatting
Believing — earnestly, against denials and evidence — that a real-person ship is secretly together, and that signs of the hidden relationship are everywhere. Named for the tinfoil hat of conspiracy thinking.
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Fourth Wall (Fandom)
The norm of keeping fanworks — especially RPF and shipping content — out of the view of the celebrities and creators they depict. 'Breaking the fourth wall' means fan content reaching its subjects, usually to fandom's horror.
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