I think the saving grace for me is that vintage still excites me. I have a hard time allowing myself to even buy modern cards because they have no emotional element to them. I tend to just not be enthusiastic about what 90% of people are most of the time though.
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Iām glad you brought this up, I think of that post by skinst often, as well as a few backlash messages I received when I told another member to avoid using language which could be perceived as anti-LGBT. The boyās club perception can only change when people in the minority have more visibility which signals to others to come forward as well, although Iām not sure exactly how to do this. Itās also difficult because many people donāt like change or people who they deem as other or different.
You mentioned about slowly shifting demographics, and I have noticed that there are some active discord participants that fall under the āgirls and gaysā category, but they donāt seem to post much in the actual forum, and I genuinely wonder why that may be.
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Another thing Iāll add to my previous sentiment. How you know I am a weirdo:
I enjoy things more when they are worthless monetarily. I enjoyed my collection more when it was worthless, I enjoyed my singles more when they were obtained at a fraction of what they are worth now, and I enjoy the cards I get in the last 4-5 years a lot less than the ones I got for dirt cheap. That is, the ones that are expensive, Iāll say $50+ in value. There are plenty of amazing vintage Iāve gotten from ex era in the last few years for 2016 and earlier wotc prices that Iām like fuck yeah about. Back in 2012 (i cannot believe this was 13 years ago), a card was insanely expensive if it was $50. For a mint shadowless zard, I paid that much and it hurt my soul at the time. People tend to be like āi paid $xxxxx dollars for thisā, to a crowd of oohs and ahhs. I tend to say, i got this record in the $1 bin and i love it so much, to a friend that says hell yeah man thats sick.
A notable exception would be a quasi trophy like fan club porygon, which I immensely enjoy. Granted, i think I would enjoy it a tad more if it had been like $800 or something. Paid the most ive ever paid for a card, and it hurt. But itās my grail and itās special so it justified it and it feels good. Wonāt feel that same for that final card coming up which is similarly priced and is just to finish this one pageā¦ ugh. Gotta catch em all amirite? 
Pokemon is the only truly outright frivolous hobby I have. My music, film, video gamesā¦ sure they are pastimes, but their physicality provides something more than just something I look at and find joy in. Even yugioh i actually play with my friend. Pokemon is just for sitting there and being an apple of my eye. So it feels a lot better when its cheap. I miss when it wasnāt so popular frankly. But unlike many here, I donāt engage with 90% of the hobby like others do, so aside from value, I do always enjoy my ephemera. That wonāt change. Finding this forum because of 2020 and my immersion with internet interaction was a major positive. No one in my physical world shares this with me, I get major satisfaction in seeing my friends collections, and even when there is someone who has one so different from my sensibilities that I can still appreciate seeing, especially if there is passion. For I am a passionate person and othersā passion resonates with me.
If it werenāt for the forum, my activity with buying would wane like it had in many periods from 2014-2020. Plus, id have been done with my collection entirely. Itās only because of the forum and the people here that I got into ex era and beyond, and Iām very thankful for my eyes being opened like that. I donāt enjoy modern anywhere near as much as vintage for many reasons (namely my view that it is better aethetically and art styles in wide scope), but I still do very much enjoy it. And buying those 5 cent singles on tcgplayer is my way of feeling those 10 years ago times in a way, even if it isnāt the excitment of vintage.
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Tbf, and this doesnāt apply to me, but if you arenāt enjoying the hobby at all anymore, instead of changing why not just leave it and see how you feel after time? World is pretty full of cool things
I think there is probably too much negativity around simply moving on from things
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I can understand the sentiment;
I have been in and out of collecting many times and Iām currently on hiatus.
I still go to my local stores every now and then, Iāve made some acquaintances in there but I have not expanded my collection in a while.
I still have not opened booster packs I was given for Christmas and I got a backlog of cards to organize since maybe September last year.
I donāt think I ever felt truly bad for not finding enjoyment in collecting at times, I think the moment it started feeling like a chore I simply walked away to do other things that may or may not be directly related to collecting.
I would later come back with a clear goal or objective, work towards that sometimes to completion and then I would define some other goal.
The original idea behind collecting Pokemon cards was to feel something close to what I felt when I completed the Pokemon Sticker album I had in the 90s back in my home country; I donāt even like card games, in fact I actively avoid them but this was a way of connecting with others and to that old feeling, albeit in a roundabout way.
Walking away is a valid way of changing your position towards it, it doesnāt necessarily mean quitting.
Sometimes like mentioned way in the beginning thereās too much noise around you to be able to hear your own thoughts.
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I feel like one good way to enjoy the hobby though is to just stick with it and try and collect a set or something that is a kind of unrealistic goal like with my eevee collection My Eevee Collection
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What things would make it more enjoyable?
Better community? I.e events at LCSā etc?
Absolutely agree on the chore aspect.
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I have not stopped collecting old school and obscure/rare items. I donāt feel the slightest need to collect modern which is maybe whatās killing the vibe for most of you guys. I also enjoy finding new ways to protect and display my items thatās always fun. Finding perfect fit cases for everything is one of my favorite things to do. I was one of those guys that kept everything in a box and forgot about the stuff but now I find myself having a coffee and really taking the time to enjoy my cards, whether slabs or binders; almost like reading a book. Another thing Iāve recently gotten into is slabbing my own cards which is surprisingly a ton of fun:
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I agree, itās a double edged sword though for women & minorities. Weāre here and love to participate but often a very small minority just makes it not worth the effort. I will say this is most notably online.
Iāve been a member of a few PokĆ©mon related discords, groups etc and from my experience 90% of people are fine (though I make an effort to appear male or gender neutral) but there is a small minority that make it exhausting. Behaviour Iāve experienced in the past include:
-Not being taken seriously. Assuming I need everything explained to be despite being decades into the hobby.
-Standoffish or aggressive messages - these will occur is people know youāre a woman, hence concealing yourself is preferable. Women in online gaming have used voice changers to participate in the past.
-bombarded with unwanted advances. I often disable direct messages if possible.
I could go on but this is what pops off the top of my head so far, so feel free to add or comment. I feel this is a larger issue with online communities not just pokemon or this forum. People really stop being excellent to each other when itās just words on a screen.
I will end on a positive note though. IRL interactions with the community have been unanimously positive and Iāve made plenty of friends along the way. Itās a big part of why I continue to collect - Iād have taken a bigger step back at this point without it.
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If thereās one thing that keeps me going, itās reorganising my binders in dozens of different ways. One month I feel like by type, another month by set and a month after by PokĆ©dex. I even sorted by weight once. When I finally finish my eseries binder, I already know I want to reorganise all the cards by artist. This helps me with appreciating my collection and enjoying the process.
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Well, if sticking with it rain, snow or shine works for you then it works for you.
I collect 
master sets one very unrealistic, herculean, time-and-space consuming neverending collection objective.
Like I mentioned, I loved collecting my stickers back then so I take the time to keep a well organized, catalogued and cohesive-looking collection on my shelves.
Now, I go back into my beloved hiatus.
Cheers!
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As is noted by my monumental frustration and meltdown seen recently, it was the final nail in the coffin for me to take a look at what Iām doing with my life in general. This was once very chill, enjoyable, and was my escape from stress, but now its become an added source of stress instead of an outlet for it.
So Iāve switched gears, and Iām feeling a bit better. I have plenty of other things that I enjoy and I am always eager to try new things too.
I will point out there is a very real situation where actual fans are leaving due to the amount of outsiders who see it all as just a means of making easy money, and definitely just straight up theft. My local game store told me recently that they had around $4000 in theft in the last month of just pokemon cards.
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I had never seen that sort of fustration from you before, thatās when i knew something was up.
I donāt like much of this hobby anymore, the only person I really watch is chrispytcg (I donāt have enough paitence to sit through a smpratte video yet, Tiktok finally got me) and I usually just stay in this inner forum. Besides new announcements Iāve mostly been focusing on this rayquaza collection and my side hobby of selling cards. Itās not fun how everything is money oriented, but thatās really the way it goes nowadays.
Best of luck with your recovery!
the money isnāt as easy as most people think. in the long run I bet half the people hoarding stuff sell at the wrong time and lose money because they have no actual clue what they are doing
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I think the saddest thing Iāve seen in my local store was a kid running in (followed by their parent) and asking which was the most expensive card in the set that was out at that time, may be some time around June last year.
There was another time something similar happened, where a kid was asking for a very expensive card not because they actually liked it but because of the price tag attached to it.
As adults we have better access to other people that can give us different perspectives on the hyper monetization of a hobby-- or any hobby at that, it seems everything needs to be making money these days.
Pokemon cards as a hobby have definitely experienced a pretty disgusting shift in tone; the likeliness of finding someone that cares about price tags more than anything else is way higher than ever.
Itās up to each of us to hold ourselves and others accountable and decide what to deal with and what not to deal with.
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I was actually at my LGS at one point and a kid who looked like they were around 8 came up to me and asked if we could trade so I said sure and then they pull out tcg player and start checking prices on my cards I think okay thatās kinda normal for here as kids donāt want to get scammed. Iām not really seeing much I like so I pull out a arven out of their bulk which at the time was around 2.50 and he pulled out the silver tempest gardevoir trainer gallery which at the time was around 1.50 and a bulk ex (also why did the gardevoir explode all of sudden this was a couple weeks ago and now itās 5). Trying to be nice because I was pretty sure they pulled this out of a pack and shoved it into their bulk never to be seen again I offer the gardevoir and the bulk ex for the arven. But they looked at me offended like I had commited the worst sin and refused it saying that we were off by a little (honestly when I was a kid if someone offered me a card like that for a 50 bulk cards that all are compatibly viable which would have been a big chunk of my collection I would have accepted in a heartbeat so I thought I was being nice) then he askes for the silver tempest melotic trainer gallery and I just shut him down and pulled a reverse by offering him an earthen vessel for the arven, he said no and Iām fine with that I just hope they donāt grow up to be a stonk bro
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And insiders! I guess thatās one of the elephants in the room. We go hard on the phrase ā#forthepc/personal collectionā but the fact is that the phrase has an almost unique relevance in the hahbee. āOOoOoh this card is nice, just received a 400 lot of it, the art is great, into tcgplayer inventory it goes!ā
Iāve never been into anything else where you have to guess whether participants are actually participants or not. āGenuineā and āorganicā ad infinitum.
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Seen something similar to that, min-maxing their price matching and being extremely distrustful of gestures in good faith; my husband and I went to a trade day and we were okay trading for āless valueā the amount of weird or bewildered looks were funny.
My husband decided to help kick-start another kidās base set collection in exchange of almost nothing, because to his eyes it was nice to see a kid starting a collection so easily but got refused a bunch of times; in the kidās eyes, he wasnāt trading enough value for the amount of cards he was getting.
Sometimes the value is not just in the cards, we can only hope they learn that
trading as purely business and no relationship or community building whatsoever can come at a very high price in the long run.
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Like most people, when I started collecting cards at a young age, I did it because of the joy it brought my friends and I. It does feel to me, that a large majority of people that are entering the hobby or taking up lots of space within the hobby, arenāt participating in it with joy or passion at the forefront. I find new collectors are quick to focus more on profit, growth and bragging, instead of collecting what they love. Even if collectors re-entering the hobby loved the cards, just like I did some 20 some years ago, the pressures of making more money and the glorification of side hustles has stripped that joy from them, at least to some extent.
Sometimes I tell folks at work that I collect Pokemon cards. The majority of responses are āWow, thereās big money in thatā, or āWow, how much is your collection worth?ā I work as a Nurse, and Iāll be honest, this doesnāt bring me (Nurse) Joy. Collectrs App, which has become wildly popular, presents itself as a āNext Generation Portfolio Manager.ā It is so funny to think of myself opening packs 20 years ago, and viewing them as additions to my Portfolio. Itās just so far off what my feeling towards the cards and games were growing up.
Iām not naive enough to think that money, and growth and selling cards for a profit has no place in Pokemon. It absolutely does. It just felt like for the majority of people within the hobby, those things were secondary to the joy of collecting, at least for the folks I knew. (I grew up in a smaller town in Canada so take that for what itās worth!)
What has brought me joy within the world of Pokemon has been ever-changing, but despite all those changes, I have been able to find the love of the hobby as of late. Joining E4 and getting to see long time collectors talk about the hobby and share their knowledge and love of the cards has been an absolute blast. I wish I had engaged with this more years ago. All of your collections and insight has brought me joy. Researching and learning more about the history of Pokemon Cards, as well as its artists, in the few moments of downtime I have, has brought me joy. Turning off most of the noise and not worrying about my āPortfoliosā Growth gives me joy.
Most importantly, my Partnerās child and I have bonded over Pokemon cards the past few years. This is something I will be forever grateful for. The first time I met him, I was terribly nervous, and I arrived with a handful of cards so that we could play with them at the beach. Itās almost two years later, and watching him slide a common card he loves, into a binder, while accidentally bending the heck out of itā¦ you guessed it, gives me Joy.
The Joy is still out there, it always has been,
It just looks a bit different now.
-Jimmerr
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