#god help me if this shows up in their ship tag because the shippers are rabid

[runawaymun]

if you don't mind me asking, what's wrong with kataang? i haven't watched avatar but i know the plot through osmosis, and wanted to hear your thoughts on that

Ah okay! Let me try to explain...

Caveat 1: this will probably be a bit rambly Caveat 2: it has been a long time since I watched either At:LA or TLoK, but I have watched it both as a kid (teenager, really) and as an adult multiple times.

My problems with kataang is kind of split into two categories: problems with the ship based off of who they are as characters from a writing/themes/narrative arc/messaging standpoint, and problems presented by how the creators of At:LA and TLoK - Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konieztko (not Aaron Ehasz you're doing amazing sweetie) treat the characters and seem to think about the characters, based off of choices that they made in the telling of the story, especially how the characters are treated in their endgame scenario in TLoK (which, notably, Aaron Ehasz didn't write for due to creative differences).

TLDR: IMO Kataang ruins the character arcs, they're bad for each other, and the writers did a disservice to Katara in favorite of their pet meow meow -- which hurt both character arcs and legacies, ultimately.

My chief issue is that Katara and Aang are bad for each other, romantically. They bring out the worst in each other. They're bad at holding healthy boundaries, bad at communicating, and the ship itself is very unbalanced. And I wouldn't have a problem with this if it was recognized by the narrative or the shippers, but the narrative treats them as a great love story when really it's anything but. I won't get into age differences -- because by the time they marry a two-year age difference is very negligible and I don't really think it's a good argument against the ship (even if I do think that shipping a 12 year old boy with a 14 year old girl is insane like what 14 year old girl WANTS to date a 12 year old boy. 12 year old boys are gross haha <3) -- but let's talk about it from a thematic and character growth standpoint.

Aang's arc is fundamentally about not running away from his problems, and learning to step into his role as the Avatar. He struggles with responsibility, struggles with emotional regulation, and struggles in the tension between being very much a 12-13yo kid, and being the Avatar, who has to save the world. His arc is beautiful. It's done SO WELL. And he manages to stay true to himself and I love that for him.

Katara's arc IMO is fundamentally about learning to fight for herself, and not just for others. Katara is very maternal. She has had to grow up extremely quickly in the face of losing both parents at a young age, and understanding that she has to live in constant fear of being murdered for her waterbending abilities. She constantly has to stand up for herself, and has a bad habit of suppressing difficult feelings in lieu of helping others work through theirs. This culminates in Katara taking several seasons (iirc) to actually properly talk to someone about her grief and the burden she is carrying, and to learn to set healthy boundaries -- to help her friends and to grow into a strong warrior and work on herself.

The problem here is that the narrative, over and over, forces Katara to emotionally regulate Aang, and this is never really addressed. They have really poor boundaries and she's always mothering him -- Aang is not a partner for her. He doesn't often reciprocate the same level of support that she gives to him -- mostly because he is twelve. Katara, narratively, acts like a crutch for Aang to lean on. Aang actively holds Katara back from setting healthy boundaries and growing into her own person.

They have an emotionally imbalanced relationship, and again -- Michael and Bryan really don't ever try to rectify this, and I think also they're just really bad at writing romance idk. Because over and over Aang makes passes at Katara, and Katara never really expresses interest. That could be down to Katara being bad at expressing her emotions, but it really doesn't feel like it. The last straw for me -- from a narrative standpoint, is the episode where Aang confesses his feelings to Katara, Katara literally says "I don't know how to feel. I'm confused." And Aang, without asking, decides that this is the perfect moment to kiss her.

Which, fine. They're kids. Kids make mistakes. They don't do things perfectly. I'm fine with characters making mistakes. But for a kids' show that's pretty intent on helping us all learn good life lessons -- this is never addressed. Katara is never given the chance to say "Hey, I didn't appreciate that." Aang never is made to apologize for crossing a boundary. It's treated as just a big stepping stone toward their incredibly forced romantic arc. And I hate hate hate when stories tell boys that the appropriate response to a girl asking for space to sort out her feelings/being unsure is to oh, just kiss her, to help her figure it out! instead of, I don't know, let her make up her own mind and give her space. "I don't know" is not fucking consent, and they shouldn't treat it like it is. Especially not in a kids' show.

Which-- yeah, that kind of leads well into my second problem with Kataang - which is how the creators of the show treat it. To them, Kataang is endgame, it is in the "DNA of the show" as one put it. Which is very weird to me because it is so, so poorly done, and the writers really seem to care so little for Katara. Why do I think this? Because of how they choose to treat Katara in TLoK.

Katara, in her 80s in TLoK, is relegated to a healer and teacher. She's insignificant to the story when characters like Zuko and Toph get much cooler entrances and scenes. She's stuck being a passive bystander to a war (Katara would never.) She's stuck being a healer (Which, sure, she is. But so much of At:LA she chafed at being put in that box! She's also a fighter, goddamnit!) -- and some people have tried to say "well what do you want an 80 year woman to do?" and I don't! fucking! buy it! Characters in At:LA were badass fighters well into their 80s, like Hama (the fearsome bloodbender), Pakku (the Waterbender), Iroh (y'know...), and most notably, Bumi, who is 112 fucking years old. Don't give me "80 year old Katara sits on her ass at home while the men go out and do things and Zuko, at the same age, is literally riding around the world on fucking dragonback." I won't have it. It's Katara slander, I tell you! Let that old woman be a badass!!!

And the writers even go so far as to erase her from her kids' lives! They never talk about her!!! It is always about Aang! Always Aang! And you just get the impression that Katara dropped absolutely everything to be "The Avatar's wife" and SHE DESERVED BETTER RAUDGAHSGH

She doesn't! even! get! an honorary statue! On the very island on which she should! be a war hero! Aang does! Toph does! Zuko does! EVEN SOKKA DOES. The ENTIRE Gaang gets a statue, except Katara. That is a deliberate art choice! WHY did they leave her out?

They absolutely destroyed her ENTIRE At:LA arc in TLoK, and I am honestly not even surprised because the writers have said outright that Aang is a self insert character, and that Kataang is "that childhood romance that we both wanted as kids". Katara, in their brains -- and idk maybe this is unjust-- but she seems to be just the amalgamation of those 14 year old girls that wouldn't give them the time of day when they were snotty twelve year olds, except they're writing the story so of course Aang gets the girl.

Anyway, this doesn't even go into how there are infinitely better choices for Katara, and how Aang's arc is worsened by having a romantic subplot, and etc. etc. I could go on forever about how much I dislike Kataang from a narrative standpoint.

Literally my first thought when I heard they left the Netflix show "due to creative differences" was: "Oh my god, is it because there's no kataang???" and now that there's confirmed to be no kataang and that they may be going a zutara route instead, I'm convinced that's why.

Because it's "in the DNA of the show, you see" they have broken with cocreators before over their pet self insert ship and the narrative treatment of Katara (Aaron Ehasz), and I don't see any reason why they'd change.

alkdasdlkgh anyway. God. Thanks for the ask! Sorry about the really long anti kataang rant aslkdgh. This got kind of aggressive but I do feel very strongly about the treatment of Katara. My girl deserved so much better.

[victimsofyaoipoll]

Round 2

Propaganda Under Cut

Gwen Cooper

she literally did nothing worse than the rest of the team yet so many people hate her guts and there is a literal gwen bashing tag for her on ao3. just cause she's a complicated character and confident and assertive and oh yeah she had sexual tension with jack harkness who ended up w ianto in the end. god forbid.

fans think she "gets in the way" of the canon m/m pairing of the series just because she has straightbait scenes with one of the two guys. when in reality she literally has a husband and has been nothing but supportive of her friends and their relationship 😭 she tends to be written as like super insensitive and spoiled and its unbearable 

An amazing, badass woman who has a complicated relationship with Jack Harkness, 1/2 of “Janto,” the ship she “gets in the way of.” People use this slight complication to decide they HATE HER and turn her into this vile, evil, vindictive person. She often tries killing Ianto (other half of “Janto”) in many poorly-written fics, simply so that everyone can realise how badly they treat poor, poor Ianto. This makes Jack fall harder in love with Ianto xoxo Mwuah Mwuah and Gwen is hated and killed. This occurrence is so common that it has its own tag on AO3: “Gwen Bashing.” The writing, again, is always very bad, and solely created to make people hate Gwen. She’s chill in the actual show though. Very supportive of the two men and their relationship, and is literally happily married. She is not at all like what people make her out to be.

Kairi

kairi is the third protagonist of the kingdom hearts series and the third member of the destiny trio, alongside fan favorites sora and riku. sora/riku shippers HATE kairi, and will go out of their way to discount her at every turn. the hate for her ranges from typical "she's a boring bitch" to fans of soriku making five-hour long video essays reassuring their fellow shippers that the big bad kairi won't show up in the next installment – to quote one video, "she's in a box. she's on the shelf. four walls, no door." kairi is the greatest bogeyman the soriku fandom has ever known, to the point where most of said video essays and fanon meta posts focus not on why sora and riku should get together, but rather on why they don't like kairi.

Literally has a 100+ page Google doc fan theory writing her out of the narrative and putting all of her (few) canonical accomplishments onto half of the popular m/m ship (soriku). Don't even get me started on how her memory was completely written out of the canon plot of re:coded. KH is a nightmare to explain so dude trust me she is THE victim of yaoi

She is so fundamental to the plot and themes and narratives of game and yet it is near impossible to find anything about her thats not ship bashing pre-mlm with the other two characters. I dont even care if she ends up with one of the main characters i just want fans to see her as a cool character to love or like, anything other than “annoying comphet girl.” You can write your mlm but pleaae stop inventing comphet where it doesnt exist. She does not even get to spend time with sora ever?? Why does everyone see her as a threat and a thing to destroy?? Let her have friends so help me

[where-theres-smoak-2]

You still have to admire how crazy some pro Lokius are... I'm still stunned.

https://www.tumblr.com/darklinaforever/734355929616842752/everybody-lies

I do think they are living a bit in denial but I wish I could say this surprises me, but its not new, they've always taken sylki moments and tried to warp them into being l*kius moments. The 'its about who scene' although it is about the whole gang collectively it was confirmed that Sylvie was the last trigger that helped him control his time-slipping, when asked very explicitly if that line was about a specific person or the group as a whole the response the head writer said was it was both, meaning it was specifically directed and about Sylvie but also encompassed the rest of the group who were his found family, so you could argue that scene is a sylki scene but they always use it as 'proof' that L*kius is canon. Other scenes they use in this way are the 'for you' scene which as many have pointed out is a throwback to thor when he said the same thing. Again others have pointed this out but the structure of the original line was the 'for you' was directed at a singular person, his father, the 'for all of us' was to include thor and the people of asgard. Seeing as this line is a mirror of the original it makes sense that the 'for you' is directed at a singular person. It also makes sense with everything we've seen in the show, the fact that its the canon ship, that this 'for you' is directed at Sylvie. Especially as the line just before it is him saying 'I know what I want, I know what kind of god I need to be' which are continuations of conversations Loki had with Sylvie alone, the one in the bar where she asks him what he wants, and the one where he visits her to tell her about the loom being a failsafe and him possibly having to kill her and she says he'd be taking everyone's free will from them and asks him if that is the kind of god he wants to be. I'm not going to say this line is one hundred percent definitely directed at Sylvie alone, we'd need confirmation from a writer, producer or tom who improvised the line, for that. But logic tells me its most likely directed at her. But again any time a sylki makes a post about that scene you'll have l*kius shippers jumping in to scream that mobius was there too. Well thor was there too in the original scene but nobody will deny that the 'for you' was directed at only Odin. Sylvie was the more prominent figure in that scene, she was (literally) front and centre.

Then there is the scene you've mentioned here, with that final look loki gives over his shoulder, which honestly that look gave me goosebumbs. But as you pointed out Sylvie was the one they focus on the most in this moment, her reaction. But they edited her out completely in that gif set, though to be fair to the op of that gif set they have tagged it correctly so its up to them if they want to edit her out, shippers are going to ship. But what I love about that scene was how it parallels the one in 1x5 when they are facing alioth and Loki decides to be the distraction so Sylvie can enchant it, she shakes her head at him the same way because she doesn't want him to sacrifice himself, she doesn't want to lose him but he goes anyway because he knows there is a greater purpose and lives to save. To me the culmination of Loki's arc, of him making this sacrifice, comes back to that line in 1x6, he just wants Sylvie to be ok, this sacrifice is how he ensures that happens.

I'll admit I've never quite seen this amount of denial from a fandom before, like I've seen people ship non canon ships before, I've shipped plenty of non canon ships before myself, but usually the fandom will enjoy the ships scenes and content but still recognise that the ship isn't canon. Having antis try and gaslight me into believing that I misinterpreted the canon ship is also a new experience for me but, all of this being said, if they are keeping it in their own tag and not harassing sylki shippers, then I just leave them to it, if that's what makes them happy, why should I worry about what they ship or post? I find I am happier just enjoying the content from my ship and trying to ignore any negativity, though I appreciate that is sometimes hard to do especially when it features prominently in the main loki tag and some of the takes are, at best, really bizarre or, at worst, very insulting to sylki shippers.

[stormblessed95]

I have been supporting Jikook since the beginning of this year when I got back to loving Bts again and started noticing a lot of chemistry between them. Now, after a while of watching videos,edits,etc,I get suspicious about the relationship between them. They have moments where i think: “yeah, there is no way they are not together like it’s not possible. There is so many things that can confirm that (gcf Tokyo for example)” and then I have other moments where I think: “nah they’re just friends. I do alot of these things with my bsf and close friends who I have known for years.” So that has been really on my mind and I wanted to know your opinion on this. Obviously the only we can know if they’re together is if they confirm it themselves but I still think about this often, it reminds me a lot of when I was a fan of one direction and the whole “larry stylinson” was a big thing.

Hi 🥰 i don't know if you are new to my blog or not. I've sort-of discussed similar topics though, so im just going to link you to that post as a starting point for you if that's okay in hopes they help! Starting with this one which I think fits your comment about acting like this with your friends at stuff at times.

And because at the end here you brought up Larry (😭😭 God the way shippers treated those boys was horrible) I'll also link this post. Which is where I talk about what shipping is and what the difference is between that and just genuinely noticing and thinking someone might be together snd choosing to support them, together and individually

People who shipped, or still do ship, Larry... generally tend to fall into the same type of shipping most taekookers do. And that's generally not okay and does cross boundaries you should have as a fan. I do bring up those similarities in a post as well, which is here:

And if you are new to my blog and want more posts over jikook, my masterlist is very long and extensive. Lol it's pinned to the top of my page. But here is the jikook portion of it. Or at least the MAIN section of the jikook portion. They show up a lot under important posts too 🥰

Hope that helps some!! And feel free to send another ask or DM if it doesn't or you have any other questions! And enjoy some baby yoonmin while you are here too 🥰

I love them 🥰

[esperanta-dragon]

I am blocked on this blog, because it's Sylvanas stan blog and I am posting a lot about how Blizzard screwed up her character and lore was sacrificed for her redemption arc and her fans are not helping it, so I can't reblog but I can at least reply to you, @fakedoomslayer

I wish all Sylvanas stans (they would be less creepy and would seem more reasonable) were like this and were actually accepting the character as it is without having to break it or make it act OOC to like her. Bless all Sylvanas fans who like her because she is cunning, gray, manipulative, and dark. Bless you. I don't hate you. I am just allergic to people who are breaking her character and writing her OOC because they can't like her as she is.

I am so happy I am not the only one who is bothered by this. "Blizzard did not do Sylvanas justice." "I can write her better." "I love Sylvanas, she is my favorite character." And the same person sits down and writes 1578th fic with her acting OOC as hell.

If you have to alter characters and write them OOC, do you actually still love them as they are? Or do you love the illusion and your version? Then you don't love the character, you created your own.

Maybe that's why I hate Sylvanas so much, because every time I browse into tags with Sylvanas, there are like 100 versions of her, the majority of it OOC, but people keep saying they love her, including: "She is a cute little elf, I love her so much." ignoring she is a genocidal maniac. I had to block Sylvanas tags because it stresses me so much about what fandom is doing with her and it's a constant reminder of what was sacrificed for Sylvanas.

And her ships? Same issue. Oh yeah sure, she would be hitting on both Tyrande and Jaina at the same time and Tyrande wouldn't want to kill her (not kidding, found some tag where these have a threesome and according to the OP, they would not have an issue with that). Jaina too actually. Oh yes, and Anduin, the biggest pacifist on Azeroth, would definitely date her because deep down she is soooo caring and there is a lot of love she can give!" There is no shame in ship but seriously wtf is wrong with you Sylvuin shippers. The only way you can make this work is not to only screw up and totally disjoint one character, you have to do it to both of them and write them OOC, ignore their beliefs, traumas, everything, and create different characters. But you keep saying you know both and love both characters so why not? I tell you why not. If you ship these two, then you DON'T know, you have no clue about the characters. You just wish they were completely different and in that case, you don't truly love them. Then please go and create some OCs instead because you do it anyways.

By the Light, I am so sick of this. Yes, we all started somewhere when we started with writing, but at least do not say that Blizzard fucked up your character and then you proceed to do it on your own in 12 different ways.

That stresses me out. That's why I hate Sylvanas so much and it's the fault of her fandom and Blizzard too for the past 4-5 years. Not only did Blizzard have no clue how to write her but like 10 different people wrote her and you had no clue how she should work because she didn't make any sense for so long thanks to this. Her fandom is an amazing display of people who say they love the character and then they show you they would actually hate her if they would have to accept who she is. And they would not survive it, so they live in their illusion of a nice cute little elf and undead mommy, like victims with Stockholm syndrome, and continue to screw up the character. And this is not only Sylvanas. This is most of the villains, anti-heroes, or grey characters. "But they are good inside, I know it! They are loving and sweet!" Yeah because that's easier to do and break the character because without breaking it you won't be able to ship them with your OC (god bless I am out of this phase of my life) or with another lore character which is completely incompatible. Loving bad guys because they are bad is fine and it doesn't make you a bad person. Don't do this to the characters. They don't deserve it. Or write it if it's your safe space but then do not cry that Blizzard screwed up your favorite character and then you do ten times worse thing to them.

Sometimes I am really happy I love side characters. But last time I was browsing Darion Mograine tag on AO3, I was recovering for a really long time. So I don't want to read anything with Darion, except people I know what to expect, he is really so unlucky to not have an established ship because, boy, when they ship him with so many random characters... boy, ugh, people, stop.

Rant over.

[akitaauthority]

TFP If You Ship...

Ultra Magnus

I would also like to warn yall, I do roast the shit outta these ships and you. Some of y'all are nasty and need to be told/reminded, and some of you need to stay far the fuck away from me. Aight? Aight lets begin.

MagOp/OpMag/Magnimus/ Ultra Magnus x Optimus Prime: You pretentious bitch. You absolute fucking- I have no fucking words to describe how beige you are. You 're personality is plain oatmeal. Message me. I want to beat your ass. You prolly like them for the fact that they can relate to each other, and because of their importance to the war. But I hate you cause you also have more content. Fuck you. May your cereal turn soggy before you can eat that shit, may your drawing tablet get so hot in that one corner that you can fry bacon on that bitch. Fuck you.

MagMeg/Magatron(ew)/ Ultra Magnus x Megatron: you eat mayonnaise with a fucking spoon. Y'all saw that one scene with them on Darkmount and was just like "hm, but what if fuck?" and ran with it. You went to Ao3 expecting kinky shit, but all you got was stuff for IDW Megs and Mags and honestly baby, its gon' be okay.

Matchet/Ragus?/ Ultra Magnus x Ratchet: Yes we get it, the old man can dom now shut the fuck up. If taking your S/O to the nursing home as a date was a ship it'd be these old crotchety ass bitches. But, but, on a more serious note this ship can be so therapeutic for both mechs. These two were there way before the start of the war, they lived through it, and they knew Optimus all throughout. I imagine Ratchet would tell Magnus about Orion before his ascension to the primacy. I ain't ever been more depressed scrolling through a tag though, y'all broke bitches need whatever the fuck UltraScreen is having.

Magbee/Ultra Bumble/Ultra Magnus x Bee: I ain't ever seen two same heighted Cybertronians in a relationship, always one of'em gotta be spike suckin' height.

UltraJack/ Ultra Magnus x Wheeljack: Listen, listen, both these mechs love their solitary time and it can create so much angst, SO MUCH. Magnus feeling he must uphold his duties and Wheeljack having a mindset similar to a pirate. His spark belongs to the stars AND Magnus, but the stars will always come first. But bitch this is Ultra Magnus. We horny. We know Wheeljack is a fucking brat, and Ultra Magnus is his Dom.... baby we nasty. We nasty and there is no fucking denying that shit my GOD.

Ultrabulk/ Ultra Magnus x Bulkhead: Listen man as crazy as this might sound, I think this could work. Just like any other ship with Bulkhead you are fucking STRUGGLING though dude, you got like 5 fics you keep coming back to. You cry at night, knowing, and praying, that the gods will smile upon you and bless you with an update. You know you struggling when you only got three fics that have this ship as the focus. If y'all ban together I'm sure you can scrounge together like three pieces of fanart and a lint roller between the four of you.

UltraScream/ Ultra Magnus x Starscream: I don't see how anyone could hate this ship. Like, they literally work as really good foils to each other. You've got Magnus who is loyal as fuck, very militaristic??? And very much involved with the safety of his team. He's described as recklessly brave. Starscream on the other hand has a lot of character to work on and Magnus could help him along with that, and he can teach Magnus self preser- fucking-vation because Mr. "gets fucking chomped by a predacon for another bitchass Autobot" needs it. You're fuckass wants someone to save you, or you want to go absolutely apeshit. You are the mom friend everyone is worried about.

Ultracee/ Ultra Magnus x Arcee: Huh?? I mean like....Okaaaayy?? I mean good for you. This ship makes me feel the way that you feel when someone offers you candy you don't like, but you wouldn't mind eating it so you do. To be honest the people who ship this definitely see diamonds in places others wouldn't expect, but like you're so fucking unnessecary oh my god. Like you prolly add weird ass comments to other peoples statements, ain't nobody out here asking for an echo. Sit down.

UltraShock: ya like'em thicc don't you commanding officer Ultra Magnus? Anyway maybe y'all could team up with UltraBulk shippers and add a pile of used soda cans to the pile. Y'all are ghosts, do you even exist on this plane. My guesstimate on how many people actually ship this forreal is like 5.

Ultrawave/MagnusSound/Magnus x Soundwave: Listen if the Ultrabulk shippers are starving y'all ain't even corporeal. I show up to this ship with a fucking ghost talk box and some heat sensors, and like one boombox tryna see if GHOSTS even inhabit this bitch. Y'all aight? Are y'all good?? HELLO IN THERE (hello in there) (hello in there). Yall really go all out for the goth shit. Prolly hidin' in the shadows of my house waiting to strike.

Ultrascreen:

You, and I mean this in the most (derogatory) way possible, are a fucking

HOE

Literally looked on AO3 saw nearly NOTHING BUT kinky MF PORN. The oooonly plot y'all got is exactly how long Ultra Magnus can deny Smokescreen an overload. Why every time it comes to Magnus people make this by the books vanilla bitch the kinkiest one. YES I love subverting expectations but can I PLEASE get one fic where he sputters because his partner says a bad word. These two are the main ones who get this treatment, and baby I ain't complaining, but please. Please just- please sir I-I a-ah!

Ultradown: The UltraBulk, and UltraWave shippers come here every year, at the exact same location, at the exact same time, all for this ritual. The UltraWave shippers take out a boombox, some energon candies, and a supersized Cybertronian false spike. The UltraBulkers begin to sing the incantation to summon their fallen comrade: https://youtu.be/m9We2XsVZfc. They must do this once every year, they must battle the UltraDown shippers, though most would say they are a myth, the UltraShock and UltraWave shippers know better.

MagnusOut/KnockMagnusOut?/Ultra Knockout: Listen its not as horny as Smokescreen but the constant tension is definitely there. Knockout is just as horny as the depressed, RE-pressed ass Magnus fans and can you really blame him? Boyfriend? Dead. Magnus? kinky. Hotel? California.

/If I missed any let my gay ass know. Sorry if this ones lackluster, but some of these ships don't even really seem to have a fanbase?? Remember that these are TFP ships y'all.

Also I better see more Bulkhead content after this. Do you all have a problem with truly thicc bootyful babes or what?

[miraculouscontent]

Alright, so apparently certain love square shippers felt the need to go into the Lukanette tag to celebrate/mock that Lukanette is “over” (Marinette broke up with him to keep him safe but go off I guess) and that officially crosses all my lines of not dealing with the fandom’s garbage.

The sheer pettiness is astounding to me, to take joy in the end of what was a lot of people’s comfort ship (people don’t choose comfort ships, by the way) because of “toxic Luka/Lukanette stans,” essentially lumping chunks of the fandom together and letting the opinion of those fans shape their own opinion on a character/ship. The sheer sensitivity on display to have so much spite and disdain for a ship that appeared in less than 10% of all episodes in the show. The sheer vindictiveness to feel smug and self-righteous while also being panicked over a non-endgame ship that’s as temporary as their claim of positivity and condemning of salt until they’re presented with something they don’t like.

Goliath really be beating up on David over here because he's bigger and thinks his opinion is more valid. For the record, no, opinions are not more valid due to shipping an endgame ship or presenting oneself as a beacon of positivity.

And it just goes to show how ship-blind these people are, to care about nothing more than the fact that Lukanette has broken up. I’m not exaggerating when I say that I’ve seen people who openly admit to caring more about the love square’s security than Marinette’s happiness, which is just part of the issue here.

These people did not care how Lukanette broke up, only that it happened. Marinette’s crush backpedaling (because of the show feeling the need to cater to these exact people, who are so worried about their obviously endgame ship being “in danger”) and Marinette ending the episode in literal tears because she wanted to date Luka but couldn’t are both things that didn’t matter to them because it’s all about their ship in the end. Marinette’s life has been made more and more miserable due to her crush on Adrien while straining her relationships with various characters (see: Alya’s claim of jealousy as a reason for why Marinette “must be lying” about Lila), but so long as these people feel secure in their endgame ship, that’s all that matters.

They didn’t care if it was a clean break where both sides came out satisfied (or at least content). If anything, they wanted Lukanette to end as shoddily/dirtily as possible with zero care into how it affected Marinette, whether because they just don’t like the ship or because they actively desire for the suffering of the people who found comfort/happiness in the ship. Adrien had literally nothing to do with the break-up itself and him being mentioned served nothing for the story, but it’ll be completely overlooked or outright praised because god forbid Marinette spend an episode not talking about Adrien since that would imply that her life doesn’t revolve around him and that would be an apparent detriment to the love square.

By the way, newsflash: Luka was not an obstacle to the love square. He sent Marinette away in “Frozer” to go talk to Adrien. He told her that there was no pressure and that he’d be happy for her no matter what. Had Luka not existed, the love square would still be as stagnant as it is now, and it’s pathetic to complain about Marinette liking/dating another boy when she’s not only allowed to do so, but when “Oblivio” and “Chat Blanc” both exist as little more than tools to hold the supposedly “starved” love square shippers over.

These are the same people who will say they dislike/hate Luka, then do a 180 and claim that they “just feel so bad for him” and how he “deserves better than Marinette” (the sudden sympathy of which conveniently serves to hate on a ship that interferes with their own, further proven by equally convenient and appreciation/liking of Luka when he’s not a “threat” to the love square) while simultaneously shipping her with their sunshine boy because Ladybug is who Adrien wants and what Adrien wants is what matters.

These are the same people who will say that Luka is unnecessary and unneeded, then use him as a prop and stepping stone for love square fanfics and fanart, or suggest that Kagami is fine because she makes Adrien feel good about himself (when Luka does the same for Marinette but sure).

These are the same people who say that “Marinette can’t date Luka because she’s busy with hero stuff” while making fics about the love square getting together mid-”hero stuff” and then giving complete radio silence during “Chat Blanc” outside of how good they thought the episode was.

These are the same people who will tell others not to denounce Adrien for “a few mistakes” and then preemptively denounce Luka’s behavior based on a written synopsis for an episode that hadn’t even come out yet (and also after complaining that Luka was “too perfect,” I might add).

These are the same people who will say that Luka/Lukanette makes them feel “uncomfortable” (usually without offering any tangible reasons or being vague about Luka giving off “bad vibes” when he’s done nothing less than support and respect Marinette's agency) while the show’s endgame ship features the “m’lady” hand kissing Chat Noir who Ladybug has pulled away from multiple times yet he keeps persisting (which is apparently considered okay because Adrien is Chat Noir as if that discredits her discomfort/disdain for the gestures).

These are the same people who will say that Luka is “barely there” or “hardly exists” and then complain about how much screentime is dedicated to Lukanette, the utter greed on display going right over their heads when they have the actual endgame ship.

These are the same people who will absolutely reach for anything about Luka to complain about (again, after saying that he’s “too perfect,” then claiming he “tricked” Marinette into kissing him, claiming that he tried to force her into telling him her secret, or criticizing him for teasing her for her stuttering despite him immediately apologizing) and then either defend or turn a blind eye to Chat Noir (who tried to kiss her mid-battle instead of helping, made Ladybug feel bad for keeping secrets that weren’t hers to tell plus threatening his kwami that he’d quit if he didn’t get let in on said secrets, and mocked her instead of apologizing when she told him to stop calling her by a nickname she doesn’t like and has told him before to stop calling her) at every opportunity.

These are the same people who will say that Lukanette is “forced,” then proceed to ship Luka (regardless of if they like him or not) with literally anyone else for the sake of taking him out of the romance equation (because he has to be taken out via already dating as they couldn’t come up with a legitimate reason for Marinette to not want him otherwise), and the only requirement for this person he’s shipped with is that they breathe and aren’t Marinette.

These are the same people who act bothered by Marinette “””treating Luka poorly””” because of her crush on Adrien (by the by, Adrien’s crush on Ladybug has hurt Kagami as well), inadvertently admitting that Marinette’s crush is a problem, then continue shipping her with Adrien in its canon form anyway.

These are the same people who will say that they hate salt fics (specifically ones that target Adrien) and how they “bash characters,” then write fanfics or draw fanart that intentionally make Luka out of character for the sake of having him look bad or giving Marinette an excuse to run to Adrien (because Luka apparently needs to be made worse so that Adrien can look good instead of Adrien being able to stand on his own merits as a good love interest for Marinette).

These are the same people who will slam Luka when he’s Marinette’s support, then go off and ship him with other characters so that he can support them instead (fun fact that this is usually either Adrien - thus leaving Marinette completely alone and miserable when Luka canonically likes her - or characters that Marinette is actively against, such as Chloe or Lila).

These are the same people who will complain about how salty the fandom is (even when the salt is for catharsis/getting out anger from an episode in a productive way) and then laugh when a simple side ship ends because they’ve been letting said ship live rent free in their heads and couldn’t stop anticipating the episode that declares them “over.”

These are the same people who tell or suggest that people should “just leave” if they don’t like the main ship, unapologetically implying that the main ship is either all the show is about, all that they personally care about (bringing us right back to that little “not caring how torn apart Marinette is about the break-up” thing), or that people aren’t allowed to watch/like the show for other reasons (like Marinette herself, the miraculouses, other characters who may appear intermittently but nevertheless bring them joy to see, etcetera).

These are the same people who get on other people’s case for being spiteful while they themselves ride their high horse into the sunset, playing victim when people call them out for intentionally provoking others or purposefully mistagging to avoid people’s blacklist (tagging is not for the comfort of the tagger so they can “””avoid the toxic stans,””” for the record; it’s for the comfort of the people who don’t want to see that content).

And these are the same people who will go on and on about the toxicity of the stans who ship something they don’t like and then either ignore or downplay the stans who ship what they do like because they personally don’t have to experience it. This isn’t even about ship wars, it’s about the hypocrisy and lack of self-awareness.

I don’t want to hear it. I don’t want to hear about how cruel the Luka fans or Lukanette shippers are when these people are celebrating Marinette’s misery because it means the end of a ship that they don’t like and certain people find comfort in. I don’t want to hear about people cross-tagging/mistagging when the Luka/Lukanette tag has been flooded with people who talk trash about the ship without any additional tags to filter it away, getting so bad to the point where some Luka/Lukanette fans had to find workarounds and/or avoid the tag entirely. I don’t want to hear about how certain shippers are worse because [x] [y] [z] when everyone has different experiences, showing a severe case of close-mindedness or at least ignorance on these people’s parts.

And, with how this season is heading, if something bad happens to the love square by the end of Season 4, I most definitely do not want to hear these same people decry the people who will do the exact thing that they’re doing now.

[chainofclovers]

Ted Lasso 2x8 thoughts

I am so lucky that the creators of Ted Lasso decided to make this entire show specifically for me. #blessed

If last week felt like a bit of breathing room (albeit tense, poignant, character-progressing breathing room) with distinct narrative lines, this week’s episode was a chaotic yet tightly-written swirl of pain and hope and sadness! No neat subject headers for this one, y’all. Just my brain and heart in the inadequate form of a bulleted list. It is the medium available to me at this time.

I am going to remember the moment when Ted calls Sharon and tells her his father killed himself for the rest of my life.

(I could say a bunch of stuff about his face and what he says and how he tries to hide his tears from Beard right after and how insanely much I adore this character and ahhhhhhhh but I’m just going to leave that scene there in our collective memories.)

Jamie. JAMIE. Higgins has given some great advice about love on this show, but his musings about his up-and-down relationship with his own father were not helpful in the context of Jamie’s dad, who is an abusive piece of shit. I really adore that all of the main AFC Richmond staff members are realistically a bit hit-or-miss with their advice and life philosophies (some are mostly miss this season, of course).

And I am completely in awe of the moment when Jamie punches his father. The way he just stands there after Beard kicks his dad out of the locker room. The way you can hear a pin drop. And Roy—Roy who is learning in so many areas of his life about his influence on people, learning that the things he needs aren’t necessarily the same as the things other people need—is the one to cross the room and hug him. Hold him, really, with the tenderness Ted used when he hugged Rebecca outside the gala in 1x4. God.

I’ve thought a lot about how s1 was about giving people a soft place to land. There’s always an angel there when you need one. There’s always an opportunity to be kind. If you look for someone, you find them. If you look for the good in someone, you find the good. And as everyone works through their individual journeys in s2, that can’t always be the case anymore. But there are still so many moments of angels on this show, and it’s not about chance and serendipity and fate [not that it was about that in s1] but about the effort it takes to become someone who can be there for someone else. Or who can be there for yourself. I’m so proud of Jamie for physically fighting back against his father. I’m so proud of Roy for being the one who recognized what Jamie needed.

I have every feeling in the world about how Ted is almost totally frozen both times (s1 and s2) he witnesses Jamie’s father abusing him. In s1, he was still there for Jamie after, and I have every reason to believe he’ll be there for Jamie after this incident as well, but that frozen stance HURTS. He’s in so deep with his pain about his own father that it’s like he physically cannot snap out of it to act in the moment. It seems entirely outside of his control, and it breaks my heart, because Ted wants so badly to be a good father, a good coach, a good friend, a good partner, a good patient. He’s there for people in all kinds of ways, even in his current less-than-capable state. He takes care of Sharon post-concussion and even gets her a new bike! During the disastrous match at Wembley his coaching is ineffectual and everything is chaos but he’s the last one standing on the pitch! But this really awful thing keeps happening to Jamie and Ted is just…frozen in the face of it. Like one of those nightmares where you’re running in place.

The frozen-in-place nightmare also kind of applies to the way the total separation between Ted and Rebecca feels, too. I have never for a moment doubted the writers’ intentions in setting these characters up as soulmates on parallel journeys, and I’m actually really digging (on a story level) how disconnected they are right now. It is IMPRESSIVE that their absence in each other’s lives feels like such a glaring loss, one we cannot forget even as there are so many other things happening onscreen. It is 100% not just shipper goggles making me process information about Ted while thinking about Rebecca and information about Rebecca while thinking about Ted. I know there are a lot of really angry and frustrated people in the fandom right now (both T/R shippers and T/R antis and non-shipping fans who don’t get why s2 is different from s1) and while I understand being frustrated by choices characters make, and frustrated by the feelings the show makes us feel that we just want to feel more of or less of, I continue to agree with pretty much every narrative choice happening right now.

Agreeing with the narrative like this?! This is such a unique experience for me as a viewer—to feel like I’m on a ride that is at once absolutely wild and incredibly sensible and well-crafted, and to feel simultaneously completely invested and anticipatory and speculative but also totally willing to trust where it goes. I long for Ted and Beard to really talk. I long for Ted and Rebecca to stop missing each other. I long for Roy to have a serious conversation with Ted about what’s happening with him. I long for Keeley to find a vocation, something that drives her beyond her projects. I long for so many things! But I wouldn’t long for them if this show was less good. If the show was less good, I wouldn’t have a wish list a mile long because I wouldn’t be so attuned to the details and potential lurking in every scene. THIS IS SUCH A GOOD SHOW, I CANNOT HANDLE IT, I LOVE IT SO MUCH.

(To that end, a great deal of the Ted Lasso tag and so many Twitter reactions reactions to the show feel super stressful right now and I am kind of just trying not to look?! I love this fandom so much because of the amazing conversations that happen and because of brilliant fic and because there are some awesome people I never would have encountered were it not for this show. That little bubble is wonderful and I’d stay in this fandom no matter what in order to keep experiencing those things. But fans’ catastrophic reactions to every little thing that happens, every little choice a character makes that isn’t the “perfect” choice? The takeaway that the writers—on this show of all shows—wake up in the morning ready for another day of torturing shippers rather than another day of writing a beautiful story they genuinely want to write? I do not enjoy those parts at all. I would like to opt out of those parts. I’m having such a magical experience watching this show and talking about this show and listening about this show and writing about this show with a variety of people who feel all kinds of ways. I truly wish I could somehow transfer the energy of this experience onto all the people who are hating it right now. I don’t mind at all that people are having vastly different reactions to this show and are sharing their honest feelings, including the really angry ones (I can appreciate something and disagree with it!), and I get that sometimes the language of fannish reactions is intentionally, ironically hyperbolic. But there feels like this very serious trend of people legitimately thinking writers on this show are targeting shippers and have lost respect for their characters, and I just feel like an alien from another planet when I see that stuff. I guess I just feel like people make art because they want their art to be visible to other people and to themselves, but that doesn’t typically involve specifically catering to or torturing a subset of that audience?)

I am more fascinated by Sharon Fieldstone than ever before. I have been running through every single action with her and Ted so many times. The confirmation that she’s living in club-provided housing (that could not look more different from Ted’s club-provided flat). Ted clearly noticing the many bottles. Sharon’s face while she tries to casually recycle them. (Sharon could legitimately have a more problematic relationship with alcohol than Ted does, and I find that extremely interesting and am very curious to find out what happens there.) Sharon leaving him voice notes while she’s concussed, probably because she’d been thinking about him shortly before the accident. The way Ted calls her and does all the funny voices and it’s not frustrating like all the times he uses his silliness and allusions to deflect during their prior conversations because this time, those behaviors are just a part of him showing care for another person. The way they stretch each other, and Ted is still wrong about the things he’s been wrong about, but they both grow all the same.

While it is pretty much impossible for me to imagine that this show would include an actual romantic relationship between Ted and Sharon (it would be beyond unethical even if they could write it well, and Sharon in particular is so professional and committed to her work, and it would erase so much of the powerful message about the importance of seeking therapy from a professional who is not your friend or partner, and I would totally hate it), watching this episode was the first moment I had this queasy little feeling that it’s possible that Ted could end up developing really complicated feelings about Sharon since, at this point, he’s been honest with her about things he’s hardly spoken about before and you can really form an attachment to people you feel safe with in a new way. (I mean, I’m sure Michelle knows what happened with Ted’s father, but I’m not even certain if Beard does.) He’s so broken right now, and Sharon is such a great person and so different from anyone else in his life (even though Rebecca is also different, and Beard is also different, and Roy is also different, and so on), that I could see things getting really fuzzy for him. I continue to have faith in the way the storylines on this show are handled. I’m just. Putting this here.

(In saying that, though, I also wanna make it really clear that I don’t just automatically assume anytime a new female character is introduced that they’re going to end up becoming a romantic complication. Like, Phoebe is allowed to have a teacher who is an attractive woman and AFC Richmond is allowed to have a sports psychologist who is an attractive woman and Keeley is allowed to talk to Jamie Tartt without it threatening what she has with Roy and all these people can exist as human beings without the introduction of romantic drama.)

Isaac gives every player one haircut per season, OH MY GOD. The JOY during the haircut scene. YES.

KEELEY AND REBECCA. Their text thread. The affirming video call right before Rebecca goes into the restaurant. The way Keeley sits all snuggled up against Rebecca in her office.

I was pretty thoroughly spoiled for the Sam and Rebecca plot through 2x8, and I was bracing for something far more problematic and tortured than what happens in this episode. The words I would use to describe their scenes: awkward, cute, cringy, and understandable. There are a million reasons why this relationship isn’t sustainable, but I felt completely understanding of both their choices here. This show has a lot of thesis statements, but I keep going back to the idea from 2x1 that there are people who enter your life to help you get to the next point, and I think it’s entirely possible that Sam and Rebecca will mutually be that for each other.

I find comparisons between Rupert and Rebecca super upsetting. There are absolutely meaningful things to say about the irony of ending up in a situation with an uncomfortable resemblance to certain taboo elements of an ex’s situation. But that ex is abusive and manipulative and cruel and Rebecca has exhibited NONE of those behaviors, and it makes me really sad to think that people feel that the writers on this show have betrayed Rebecca in giving her this storyline.

As always, I reserve the right to keep blathering about this show. I’ve had a headache for a couple of days, but my head is also so full of 2x8 thoughts that I couldn’t keep them in even if the circumstances for writing this were not ideal. I kind of hate that I’ve included frustrated fandom thoughts within the analysis of what I felt was an absolutely gorgeous, complicated, heartbreaking, near-perfect episode of television, but if ya can’t be a little dramatic on your own tumblr while you’re feeling raw and under the weather, where can ya?

[marunalu]

It’s most definitely not an enemy to lover! If it was it would probably be better written. Thank you so much I have never felt such disdain before but it isn’t like me to be critical or spiteful. It’s just not in my nature but this ship and Bakugou REALLY push it. It likely it only got like this because of the fact Bakugou keeps some how reaching number 1. Not helped that I noticed many of the BakuDeku fans fell off the series wagon or are only anime. Mostly consuming media so most of their Bakugou love isn’t actually canon. The most damning thing about Bakugou is that he be better as a antagonist to Izuku not this protagonist. If they worked that angle it be so much better but also thank god during that ‘apology’ Izuku rejected being on first name basis with him. At least Horikoshi was able to keep him from actually forgiving despite the apology. Don’t know where people got the whole he forgives him he only accepted the apology. Accepting isn’t forgiving and Bakugou risking his life once is a start but doesn’t make up for everything. It’s a start of a conversation not a true redemption until Bakugou actually starts trying to be a better person! But status quo and all that ruining a good thing ugh. Like at least Endeavor dealing with consequences where Bakugou consequences!?!? (Thank you for letting me vent I really appreciate it.)

Yeah a lot of bakugou stans and bkdk shippers dont even follow the manga, or just read the chapters in which bakugou shows up, because they hope for bkdk crumps they can spam the main tag with it. There is a reason why the old bnha leaker always had to put the "no bakugou in this chapter" warning every fucking time in the leaks, so the stans wouldnt rant over what a waste of time the chapter was!

I disagree with izuku accepting bakugkus apology! He neither accepted it nor did he say one word about forgiving bakugou later after he returned to ua. Izuku still hasnt said anything regarding the apology, didnt even reacted to it, because he was simply in no right mental condition to process what bakugou said! He was tired, he was hurt and hungry, he was sad and angry he was absolutely not in the right mind! Bakugou choose the moment for his apology in which izuku was not mentally ready to react properly to it. Lost his consciousness the very next moment! The apology was not for izukus sake, it was for bakugous! If it had been for his sake, bakugou would have choosen a privat moment under 4 eyes after izuku was mentally stable enough again to react properly to it and not under the eyes and ears of their whole class, who have no idea what actually happened between the two! For gods sake they all think what bakugou did to izuku was giving him mean names, not one of them has any idea HOW BAD it was and HOW LONG the abuse lasted! A WHOLE DECADE! The same length as shotos abuse from his father! But hey only one of this things is a crime, not the other, because of bakugous age! Sorry to tell his stans that, but with 15/16 you are old enough to get the difference between right and wrong! And he needed over 10 years for an "apology" that at the end was only done out of his selfpity! Because he felt bad for HIMSELF, not for his victim! He wanted it to be done and move on and he was most likely sure izuku will think the same way, because thats how izuku always was! But fact is izuku neither accepted the "apology" nor has he forgiven bakugou yet! The question is more if hori will go deeper with it, or if he just wanted the apology to be done to please bakugou haters, but choose to do it in the most terrible and disrespectful way possible!

When it comes to endeavors arc Im more neutral. Im by no means an endeavor fan, but I can see that he is at least really trying to be a better hero and more important to be a better father. Unlike bakugou stans who will attack his haters, I would never attack endeavor haters, simply because I respect their opinion and view, even if I may not completly agree with them! What both endeavor and bakugou did is for many people very personal. Its absolutely disrespectful to say what happened to shoto was more terrible then what happened to izuku! Shoto was abused by his father, while izuku was abused by bakugou, bullied by his whole class and even the teachers and shunned out by society for being born different then the rest! Both is EQUALLY terrible! Both izuku and shoto were almost still babys when the abuse startet and both had to live a whole decade with it!

And yes at least endeavor in facing the full consequences of his actions! Some people will say its not enough, but at least there is something! We bakugou haters have to live with the possebility that bakugou will never have to face anything, simply because of his crazy fanbase!

[matan4il]

I have always been a reluctant Buddie shipper because they are canon straight and the universe hates me lol. So it was frustrating that Ryan and Oliver had all that chemistry, and the show baited in an extreme manner to think seriously this isnt happening? But this season changed when they had Eddie dump Anna, in the most awkward way ever lol. But I keep thinking like it has to happen in 5B because why change their dynamics you know.

Buck and Eddie work has like Iron Man and Captain America vibes. You could technically give them girls on the side we rarely see and still let them be the dynamic duo you know with the money action shots everyone loves. Instead they give them angst and have Eddie leaving.

And TBH I dont think Ryan will be thrilled to not to not do the action stuff. He as an actor I dont think wants to be sidelined to the 911 call room. Of course I have been seriously underwhelmed by the first half of the season. I guess I'm screaming into the void because I'm praying 5B actually is meaty and addresses issues and their relationship. And just once have Eddie frantic over Buck. Just once writers!!! I will send you cookies!!

Hi Nonnie! Thank you for sharing your thoughts!

Oh, I feel you, it's always 'risky' to like a non-canon same-sex ship where at least one of the characters isn't canonically queer. That said, don't forget neither guy has been explicitly confirmed as straight, they've only been confirmed as having been meaningfully involved with women. It's true that our collective (as a society) default is to take that as straight, but I feel like without an explicit definition, that leaves the show more room to uncover a different sexual identity than expected, such as bisexual. I've seen it before, it can happen again. ;) It's rare, true, but it does happen!

And I agree so much. With all that build up towards Eddie dating Ana, and then doing nothing with it other than have him break up with her... it's gotta be a part of some bigger arc for Eddie. That decision to leave def fits in, and what ever comes out of it, it's bound to unravel, at least in part, in 5b!

YES! It's not just that they're fighting fires together while having random female LIs, it's also that Buddie have every meaningful emotional thing that happens to either one, be shared between the two of them rather than with their supposed romantic partners.

And God yes, I think we all need Eddie to be frantic over Buck, as I mentioned here. And for them to help each other heal. I just... I'm also astounded by the fact that 911 has built an arc where only Eddie and Buck truly get what the other one is going through and can truly give him what he needs.

Thank you so much again and I hope you're having a great day! xoxox

To anyone else who sent me an ask, I am going through all of them, thank you so much for your patience! If you wanna check whether I've replied to yours yet, you can have a look at my ask tag. xoxox

[firelxdykatara]

Katara x Aang :3c

are you trying to get me in trouble

-cough-

no but in all honesty, my genuine feelings about kataang boil down to three major points: 1. it's boring, and does not jive thematically with either of their character arcs, to the point of, 2. actively hampering character development on both sides, and 3. katara deserved better.

points expanded under the cut. (please, if you're a kataang shipper and you see this, just keep scrolling. i've tagged it appropriately and put the bulk under a cut and at this point that's literally all i can do lmfao.)

send me a ship and get my (brutally) honest opinion!

1. It's Boring: This is the most subjective point on the list (I mean, in fairness, it's all subjective, but I have evidence from the show and post-canonical materials to support my other points; this one is just preference), but there's just... nothing to kataang. It's cute (when it's not actively aggravating), and... that's about it. It's not even that I dislike friends-to-lovers as a shipping trope (though it's not my overall preference), because there are a lot of friends-to-lovers couples that I do ship (kanej comes to mind, also will/elizabeth from potc, karolsen from supergirl, romione and hinny from hp, among others), but one thing that I think all of those couples have that kataang doesn't is that both sides of the pairing are teens or adults when they get together, with teen/adult dynamics and issues and stories to deal with, rather than one half being a teenager and the other being literally prepubescent.

And don't get me wrong, I have no problem with age gap ships in general. And as far as atla goes, Katara, at 14, has the same age difference from Zuko (16) as Aang has from her, and it's never stopped me--because both Katara and Zuko are well into puberty when they meet and I have no problem picturing them being into one another and growing together as they enter adulthood. Aang, on the other hand, is a child. And he acts like it. Which wouldn't be a problem, if the show weren't expecting me to believe he is a) ready for a romantic relationship, and b) ready for one specifically with Katara, who is not only older and far more mature but is specifically cast as his caretaker in a very maternal role for the entire show's run.

This show asks me to believe that a teenage girl well into adolescence is going to be attracted to and develop romantic feelings for a pre-adolescent child--and it asks me to believe this while showing us otherwise that Katara's type is actually older boys with fabulous hair and angsty pasts in all of her other potential romantic dalliances--and then enter into a relationship with him, all while ignoring the elephant in the room that is the fact that she was basically acting like his mother for the entire series to that point. (Something that is heavily lampshaded earlier in the very same season.) That just stretches the bounds of credulity way too far for me, especially when there's no evidence that Katara herself would get anything out of their romantic relationship.

There's nothing there for me to sink my teeth into. No delicious development, no parallels where they help each other grow, no internal conflicts that they have to work through together, nothing. Certainly no reason for me to actually believe Katara feels (or would grow to feel) anything for him other than the platonic affection of a caretaker. I can easily believe she loves him dearly, as a friend and quasi-little-brother, but I just can't see that developing naturally into romantic love--not the way it's presented in the show.

And even if they did manage to at least make the development of Katara's feelings believable, unless they changed something fundamental about the nature of their relationship, it'd still be boring, so.

2. It Actively Hampers Their Character Development--On Both Sides: I've written before (extensively lol im so sorry) about how kataang is actively detrimental to Katara and to Aang. In short (because ye gods this post is already getting long enough), Katara is narratively harmed by being shoved into a relationship that completely ignores her stated feelings--a relationship that had been presented as a one-sided puppylove crush for the vast majority of the series--and it inhibits her growth as a character in ways that become far more obvious in the comics and lok, where the very same creative forces that lead to her beginning a relationship with Aang in the first place reduce her to 'the Avatar's girl' and very little else, all the way through to the end of LoK (where she is a Healer and the Avatar's wife and, again, very little else).

As for Aang:

As to how this relationship is detrimental to Aang (other than the comics and LoK nonsense)? Just take a look at book 2, when he’s trying to learn Earthbending from Toph. Katara constantly coddles him. Much of the time, she’s afraid to be anything other than gentle and understanding with Aang--partly because of her fear that if she pushes him too far, he’ll run away. (Which he does, several times.) But sometimes, what Aang needs to grow is a sharp kick in the slats, which Toph was more than willing to provide--and which worked. Katara was great for teaching Aang to waterbend, but he needed more than that to grow as a person. And he can’t get that while he’s in a relationship with someone who will apologize for getting upset when he was very explicitly neglecting her.

In addition, it is pointed out by Guru Pathik at the end of Book 2 that one of Aang's chakras is blocked by his attachment to Katara. Aang takes this to mean (incorrectly) that he has to stop loving her in order to become fully realized as an Avatar, but this is actually part of the problem--because the issue isn't that he is in love with Katara, it's that he's possessively attached to her. He believes himself entitled to her love in return, rather than selflessly loving someone regardless of whether or not they return that affection. (This is obvious come the EIP episode, where Aang demands to know why he and Katara aren't in a relationship already--because he kissed her without asking [or even checking to see if she'd be ok with kissing him], which he phrases as mutual even though it very much was not, and he gets angry and violates her boundaries when she says that she is confused and doesn't want to think about it right then.)

It is his attachment to Katara--the need for her to return his love, the belief that she will and it is only a matter of time before he gets what he wants--that he was supposed to let go of, not his feelings for her in general. Unfortunately, while he pays lipservice to doing this (far too late for it to be useful--if he'd stayed with the Guru for five more minutes and unlocked his chakra there, that battle would've gone very differently), he almost immediately backtracks on that development come book 3, and there isn't another single whisper of Aang maybe growing up and moving past his one-sided and possessive crush and realizing that even if Katara doesn't feel the same way, it doesn't mean she loves him less or that their friendship is less important.

What really needed to happen, for Aang to grow as a person and become fully realized as an Avatar, was for him to grow up. To realize that his feelings were not of paramount importance, and that even if he was in love with Katara, he was not entitled to her love in return. He should have been able to move past his need for her to love him back, in order to get past that stumbling block, unlock his chakras, and regain the Avatar State in time to face the Firelord. But he didn't. As a result, they had to find some other way to just give him the Avatar State (a well-placed rock) and the means to defeat Ozai without killing him (the deus ex lionturtle) and his entire character arc just fell apart in the third act rather than reaching a satisfying conclusion.

3. Katara Deserved Better: This really ties into how her romantic relationship with Aang hampered her own development, but I'm still bitter enough about it that it gets its own bullet-point. And the biggest single reason I could never ship kataang--the thing that would've turned me off even if there were substance and a halfway decent storyline for them--is the fact that Aang kisses her without her consent (for the second time) in Ember Island Players, Katara gets angry at him and storms off, and then..... she walks out onto the balcony to make out with him.

With nothing to bridge that gap.

It's bad enough that a show aimed at children had a scene where the child protagonist kissed the object of his affections without her consent when she didn't want him to (made explicit by her angry reaction)--and this is absolutely an issue when the show is aimed at children and it may well be the first experience they've had with consent issues portrayed in media--but this moment is never addressed again. Katara just decides--completely off-screen--that she does love him Really and walks out to make out with him in the epilogue. There's no conversation, no apology for violating her boundaries, no discussion of why that was wrong or any indication that Aang understands what he did and why it upset her. They don't have a single one-on-one interaction between that kiss and the epilogue, and the only other time they are on screen together, Aang yells at her and storms off.

So, even leaving the comics and lok aside, Katara deserved much better from her own romantic plotline. In fact, she deserved to have one, rather than simply being the oblivious object of Aang's affections, given a couple moments where she blushes but otherwise remains completely ignorant of his feelings (she looks shocked and upset when he kisses her prior to the invasion, and then she completely forgets that even happened because she's confused as to what Aang is even talking about during EIP until he brings it up; that's not the behavior of a fourteen-year-old girl who was kissed by someone she was developing romantic feelings for), before the epilogue where it becomes clear that she figured all of that out off-screen and had feelings for him after all.

She's a main character, not a side-character written in solely to give one of the mains a love interest. She deserved a romantic plotline of her own. (She could have had one with someone else, with very few changes made to what was actually on-screen prior to the epilogue, but that's another conversation entirely.) She deserved to have her feelings considered at all important by the person she was going to be paired with in the end, rather than having him just assume she felt the same way and then get mad at her for never giving any indication of it when he'd never asked about her feelings to begin with. She deseserved agency in her own romantic narrative, and she just didn't get that with Aang.

So yeah, at the end of the day, my biggest issue with kataang is that it involved doing Katara dirty, and she's my favorite character and she deserved so much better damnit.

[nny11writes]

12, 14, shera. 13 entrapta (because this would be funny to see). 13 catra also. 15 shera. 15 star wars. listen. just tell me your unpopular opinions on everything please

For the salty fandom ask game, which tumblr is not letting me link to but oh well I guess??? SHE RA

12. Is there an unpopular arc that you like that the fandom doesn’t? Why?

This is a hard one because the fandom at large likes every arc, it just evens out across the encampments of shippers lol. I feel like the most unpopular arc is probably Glimmer's descent in season 4 which I enjoyed a lot because, I mean, c'mon, getting to see Glimmer not fight with herself and instead just selfishly choose things was fantastic. She really just started doing what she wanted without actually considering anyone else or any other options, and it was so fascinating to watch her go for it after several seasons of this side of her being hinted at.

14. Unpopular opinion about your fandom?

We can WAAAAAY too much about shipping and want to make it everyone's problem.

"That isn't canon!" "I don't think there was enough subtext!" Blah blah blah, and?????? Shut the fuck up my dude.

Stop tagging your anti-whatever shit with shipping tags, block that tag on your side and move along. I don't care why you think C/A is abusive, I don't care why you think A/G is abusive, seriously shut up or keep it in your corner of the fandom.

I've been in fandoms that break down into smaller fandoms (star wars is by era ususally, zelda is by game, etc) and every fandom I've been in has done a good job of keeping their negative opinions contained to spaces where it's others who share it. She Ra is the first fandom I've been in, and I've been doing this 20 years now, where people really couldn't live and let live because they like this ship and if you don't then you're an awful abusive asshole to fit their narrative of victimhood.

I'm sick of that shit. To death.

You want to know what one of my favorite rarepair crackships is? Catra/Bow. But if I dared to explore it at all, in any fashion, I'd be murdered. The only fic I've ever taken down due to harassment after posting what an explicit Catra/Bow/Glimmer fic where they, as two consenting adults in a poly relationship, agreed to have sex with one another in large part to turn on their girlfriend Glimmer for her birthday. TERFs found that and gave me hell.

Like, you could probably find some of the really awful and explicit shit I posted when I was 13 and had no fucking business writing explicit fic or posting it, but now I'm locked out of my old accounts and can't actually remove them. But no, let's go wild over the C/B/G fic instead!

Ooooooo, you can probably tell that this pisses me off just because I keep rambling on, but god I'm tired. I'm a multi-shipper, ship what you want to, tag it appropriately and post in appropriate spaces kind of person. Don't like, don't read, and fuck off with your purity bullshit.

...This is pervasive enough that I'm actually fully expecting some people will unfollow me for that answer lol.

13. Unpopular opinion about XXX character? (Entrapta and Catra)

I feel like I don't have any unpopular opinions about Entrapta over all? Probably the most controversial thing is that I like that the Princess Alliance was shown mistreating her by leashing her. It's very much portrayed for laughs, but whether they meant to or not think it helped set up another difference between the alliance and the horde. Yeah, at first she's chained up in the Horde as a prisoner and we see how long that lasted, but she is literally given more trust and freedom with the horde. Where's Entrapta? Who knows! As long as she shows up again at some point we don't care. Is she distracted by tech again? Annoying, but alright she IS the tech person. Then Entrapta goes back to the alliance and once again they are just trying to control parts of her because they don't understand. IDK, I like the contrast of it, so even though it wasn't put in respectfully it gets a weird pass from me.

Unpopular but not in the circles I run? Catra did more than enough for a "redemption" on the show. It is amazing how many people hate that take.

Unpopular within the circles I run? Not sure this counts or not, but Catra really is a lot like Shadow Weaver/Light Spinner, and I don't think we lean into that nearly enough (either in the show or fandom tbh). Light Spinner especially really reminds me of Catra in early seasons, and seeing S5 Catra by the end is like seeing what Light Spinner could've been under different circumstances. But Catra is also a lot like Shadow Weaver, she is not wrong or lying when she says she sees herself in Catra. I think we spend too much time trying to justify why Catra is nothing like her, when they are really very similar. And I think that's a big disservice to the narrative of abuse in the show. No one wakes up one day saying, "Well gee golly, today I think I'm going to start being an abuser!" They slide into it and eventually start making justifications to themself for why it's okay/they're allowed/whatever to do what they do. Catra could've been the next Shadow Weaver easily, pretending otherwise lessens the impact of her choices to try and change her own behaviors and thoughts.

15. Unpopular opinion about the manga/show?

The best friend squad is boring. Sorry y'all, S1 and S2 of the BFS are really not that interesting to me. It feels super basic, and the conflict has to be shoved onto them from other sources to have their dynamic work. I think there should've been more infighting and especially with Glimmer jealousy issues. Like, you don't have to go wild with it or anything, but they only start to become interesting to me in S3 when Shadow Weaver starts fucking shit up in the background.

They are cute and fun and I enjoyed their stuff! They just! Are also! Really boring!

(I used to actively filter out any fic that was too focused on the BFS, Glimmer, or Bow. At times I even blocked Adora because I live for the personal conflict drama and that was only even explored with Catra during S1-2)

STAR WARS

15.Unpopular opinion about the manga/show?

I like that TCW never really talks about the way the clones are treated. TCW is mostly set from the perspective of the Jedi Order in some way, and I wish there had actually been more jokes made in show about it to be honest. The way clones are treated is horrifying, objectifying, and disgusting. I wish we could've seen more of how awful they were treated side by side with how no one seems to care.

Yes, the Jedi care about the clones, but they are so busy trying to survive themselves that there's nothing left in the tank to try and help them out in a meaningful way. Some members of the Senate care about the clones, but they are either focused on other peoples lives or are too afraid of losing their army to do anything. I love that. I love how fucked up that is, and I love that there are so many times in TCW that something horrible happens to a clone but then gets overshadowed by something else.

The citadel, of course comes to mind. I really love that there were troopers who died horrifying deaths during that rescue, who's bodies are left behind, who are quickly mourned through a wince and then abandoned. Then a Jedi dies and "Well hang on now, we gotta carry his body and give him a proper farewell!".

It's messed up, and I love it.

[musette22]

Hi Minnie! Hope you can help me settle an argument my brother and I are having about EG!Steve. I'd love to hear your thoughts about this with shipping goggles off, looking at it purely in terms of characterization, narrative, and good writing. Better hang on though, it's going to be a long ask! (sorry in advance for spamming you!) 1/7

So my brother and I were watching FatWS and once again got into a debate about whether Steve's last actions were a disservice or in line with his characterization and narrative, given that the Russos confirmed (and therefore it's Word of God/canon, even if it did sound reactionary to the immediate backlash after EG) that Steve created an alternate reality when he went back, and didn't just live in hiding in the past of the OG timeline. 2/7

Because of this, my bro argued that: 1) the total character assassination that is the idea of Steve just sitting back and letting all the shit happen happen is no longer a problem - for all we know, the alternate reality oldman!Steve came from might have become utopic already due to his presence and foresight. He played coy when talking to Sam so we don't know for certain he didn't save Bucky, get rid of Hydra, and enact social reform when he had the chance. 3/7

Likewise, 2) the accusation that Steve would rob Peggy of her husband and children is a non-issue as Steve went back to a time before Peggy and Daniel got together - I argued here that it was still wrong for him to do given that he KNEW for a fact that Peggy lived a happy life, whereas it was a gamble if he could give her the same. My bro shot back when you truly loved someone, you want them to be happy and to have what's best for them. 4/7

So if Steve chose to go back to Peggy, he had to have believed that he could give her the best life. That Steve based that decision purely on his own assessment is pretty in character (e.g. pushing to become a soldier because he thought that was how he could do his part, even though at the time, he'd have just been a danger to himself and other soldiers; not signing the Accords because he believed in his team's judgment in crises above gov't oversight that might be influenced by politics). 5/7

And lastly 3) he might have settled into the past and started to move on, but what was wrong with him choosing to be selfish and going to the past when given a chance? Why was it wrong for him to go back to a time he knew, where he was beloved by both Peggy and the public, and when he could also save Bucky early? In terms of character growth, wouldn't it be fair for him to finally learn he could be a bit selfish and choose happiness, after a lifetime of nearly suicidal selflessness? 6/7

Our debate was based on confirmed canon with shipping put aside. So I put forth the sin of leaving a traumatized Bucky, Sam, and world behind, that Steve's actions were surely the result of a man broken by grief again and again, and that choosing the past was him running away - which, I argued, was a horrible way to end his character arc. But my brother asked me why I thought so, because wasn't this the so-called 'soft epilogue' that Steve deserved, one that was most in line with canon? 7/7

***************

Hey love! Very interesting argument you and your brother are having here… I’m sure he’s a great guy but I have to say that I vehemently disagree with him (as you probably already guessed lol). Soooo many people have done an excellent job at explaining why, shipping aside, Steve’s ending in EG was absolute bollocks, and I’m certain I could never argue this case as well as all of them have. Nevertheless, I’ll do my best to explain why, in my opinion, your brother is wrong :p I’m going to put my reply under the keep reading tag, because it is long.

1.      The Russos and Markus & McFeely (the writers) never managed to agree on whether Steve really did go back to an alternate timeline, and if so, how that would have worked, exactly. When they were asked, after EG had been released, about whether Steve would have just sat back and let everything he knew was happening/going to happen in the decades to come, both to Bucky and to the world at large, they came up with this ‘alternate timeline’ solution, but they kept contradicting each other on the logistics and technicalities of it (like how would old man Steve suddenly be able to jump timelines to come back to give Sam the shield in EG? And how did EG Steve attend Peggy’s funeral, like they also suggested, which would technically have been in a different timeline?). Which makes it pretty clear that this wasn’t something they’d considered beforehand or even all agree on afterwards, and therefore it can’t technically allowed to play a role in judging the rightness of Steve’s ending in EG if we’re looking at it from a ‘the creator’s word is law’ perspective. Moreover, there is nothing to indicate in EG itself that Steve knew he’d be able to create alternate timelines, so that would’ve been a crazy gamble on his part. Also, him ‘playing coy’ in that final scene with Sam really isn’t a convincing indication that he was actually, canonically, talking about anything besides marrying Peggy.

2.      Which bring us to point two: Peggy had literally told Steve she’d lived a happy life with her family, and told him in no uncertain terms to move on. If Steve really loved her, he would have accepted her wishes and allowed her the dignity of her choice (something Peggy herself, in CA:TFA, had told Steve was important to do when you care about someone) to move on from him once she believed him dead. Steve deciding that he would be better for Peggy because he believed was a better man than the person she ended up marrying originally would be the most un-like Steve thing to do, ever. Steve has never once shown that he thinks of himself as the hero or better than other people – he simply wants to do the best he can to help make the world a better place. He would never say “Peggy deserves the best and I believe I am the best, therefore she will have me, regardless of what she thinks or wants.” Steve drinks respect women juice, that’s clear from all of his movies, and deciding the course of her entire life for her, taking away her agency, whether in his own timeline or another, would be utterly disrespectful to Peggy.

3.      As for the next point: of course there’s nothing wrong with Steve being selfish for once – Steve is human, and all humans are selfish sometimes, and that’s okay. But, as Chris Evans already explained multiple times prior to Endgame, Steve had already made selfish decisions in the past, namely when it came to getting Bucky back and keeping him safe. Shipping aside, Bucky was presented in all the Cap movies as Steve’s very best friend, and was even called his ‘soulmate’ (platonically or otherwise) by M&M (the writers). So when, in Civil War, Steve was presented with a choice between duty/what was expected of him by the government versus saving Bucky/keeping Bucky safe, Steve was selfish and chose Bucky. That, canonically, made sense. Peggy being presented as the ultimate love of Steve’s life, who he loved and valued more than anyone or anything else in the world (which is what happened in EG), canonically does not make sense. 

In CA:TWS, Peggy told Steve to move on. When Peggy died, Steve buried her and mourned her, and then not long after, he canonically kissed Peggy’s niece. Then, in Infinity War, Steve saw Bucky turn to dust before his very eyes in the “Blip” (a conscious decision on the writers’/directors’ part to show how Steve once again lost what was most important to him while helplessly standing by) – and the next thing we know, Steve is leading a support group for other people who lost loved ones in the Blip, and starts talking about losing… Peggy? Huh. Also, Steve going back to a time which your brother calls “a time when he was beloved the public” doesn’t add up, either: technically, Steve went back to a time where people loved an idea of him, but also believed him to be dead. So either he would have had to have found a way to convincingly stage his own resurrection (meanwhile possibly leaving the other version to vegetate in the ice..? depending on how this timeline malarkey was supposed to work), or he would have lived his whole life hidden behind some fake persona – which does not sound like Steve at all, does it?

4.      Finally, let’s talk about Bucky some more, because I think we need to to be able to assess the situation properly. I understand that your brother may believe that shippers are often delusional and only see what they want to see etc, but there is ample evidence, canonically, of Bucky being the most important person in Steve’s life – the person he would give up the shield for, the person he would give up his other friendships for, the person he would give up his life for. Peggy may have been a recurring character in character in the three Cap movies, but she was never presented as the principal motivator of his actions, or as the love of Steve’s life. You know who was? Bucky. Sure, that love wasn’t canonically romantic in nature, but there can’t be any doubt that Bucky meant more than anything to Steve. Therefore, Steve choosing to have a ‘soft epilogue’ that entails him spending the rest of his life without Bucky – and, more importantly, Bucky to spend the rest of his life without Steve – contradicts everything we’ve learned about their relationship (platonic or otherwise) in the rest of the movies, does it not? 

Also, the Russos have said something to the effect that Bucky and Steve were now both mentally ‘well enough’ to not ‘need’ each other anymore (because as we all know, that’s exactly how friendships work…), but it’s pretty clear from EG that Steve was still traumatized by everything he’d been through, and going back to the 50s would have meant he would never be able to get proper help with that and in fact could only talk about any of it with Peggy and Peggy alone. Moreover, M&M have literally said in interviews that Bucky wasn’t all that well yet, mentally, and TFAWTS also shows convincingly that Bucky was not actually in a good place when Steve left him. So that would have meant that Steve either did not see this (unlikely, given how close they were) or did not care (unlikely, given how close they were). 

It would have meant that for the first time in all these movies, Steve decided “to hell with Bucky’s needs, I’m gonna just be selfish because I’ve earned it and claim my trophy wife because actually I am the best man for her, despite the fact that she’s already lived a happy life that I will be negating against her wishes, but that’s fine because maybe I’ll be able to create a different timeline, and maybe I’ll be able to save Bucky from all his trauma anyway, but then again maybe not, but that brings me back to my first point of to hell with Bucky’s needs” - which does not make a lot of sense to me, personally. Not to mention that, in exchange for his ‘soft epilogue’, Steve would also leave the world to sort out the post-Blip mess without him, and leave all the other friends he still had left and clearly cared about a lot to boot. I would not call that character growth, I would call that character disintegration. If your brother insists on taking the creator’s word as gospel and that we have to accept that Steve really did do what he did at the end of Endgame, and that wasn’t just a case of bad, lazy writing fuelled by greed, then to make a decision like this, Steve would have been either an asshole in disguise all along, or mentally extremely unstable.

There you have it, my two cents! I hope this helps a little in settling the argument with your brother, anon! Lots of love ❤️

[incarnateirony]

An anti dressed up as a shipper, an idiot, and a terf all walk into the same bar.

It’s the same picture person.

A lesson.

Warning: if the title doesn’t give it away, queerphobic content comes up in this from the other party being documented.

So, some of you may have watched a twitter exercise yesterday.

It started simple: concern trolling white knight “for the writers” comes in to angrily declare fans doing something tagged in support of them about Destiel was “out of line.” She claimed things like “Misha was gaslit into supporting Destiel”, and pulled all kinds of stunts.

She immediately got on a soap box yelling “I HAVE A LIT CRIT DEGREE, I KNOW AUTHOR INTENT” of course implying she knew better than EVERYONE around her how to read text. She then pulled, of all things, @chill-legilimens​​ ‘ article about the network gods gutting the show out of the internet, and somehow misread it SO FUCKING BADLY -- SO FUCKING BADLY -- she thought it aligned with HER. She argued that fans influenced the writers, essentially, and basically pulled the exact opposite of the very clearly delivered message there out. When it was pointed out we know this author and even sometimes help edit their pieces, and she was, flat out misreading it while bragging about how good she is at deciphering text, it turned into a SHITSHOW.

I had watched her give a large group of queer people 2 days of runaround, while they tried to be polite, and similarly tried to prove everything while she proved nothing. Just preached. After 2 days of them exhausting themselves on her, I came in doing my blunt & savage thing, because fuck civility culture when it’s used by oppressors. Of course, she immediately started tone policing, while herself being an arrogant shitbrick the whole way.

She continued to preach author intent and talk down about “headcanons.” You see, she knew the authors very well. Berens’ name was mentioned in passing, and she came back with. “Who’s Berens? Is that the author of the article?” after Deirdre’s name had been directly cited in associated with it about 15 times.

(credit: @judgehangman​ )

But it gets better. She started pulling the “authors have said Dean is straight.” line. Now, at this point, we had already sourced her at least four pieces of information (quite formally too: SPN Official DVD Collection Season 8 episode 13 creative commentary, Edlund and Sgriccia; Dissent Magazine The Attack Queers Bob Berens review; the books in the office with screenshots, and more.) So we issued one simple request: Okay. Source.

For the next-- I shit you not-- 10 hours she bricked the thread to death, finding any and EVERY rabbit hole she could try to venture down. For the first hour or two a few of us tried to actually debate her newly raised points, but still gave reminder that we were waiting for her source. Every tweet was an opportunity for her to drop a 15 tweet thread trying to derail onto a new topic, and often clarifying she had no idea about any of it (Edlund, Sgriccia, Berens, Dabb--who she couldn’t spell the name of--and Deirdre all became an amorpheous blob in her retelling that she swore she looked at sources and wasn’t convinced, while she crossed all the data and comments about the sources). She tried to challenge that anyone could know all the writers and episodes just because she proved she couldn’t, even when multiple people expressed it to her extremely rapidly with not just author and director listings, but cross references on when they overlapped and major elements (like the 15.20 shot 19 tree being the Kim Manners memorial tree). She randomly babbled about Kripke once. Lied her way through and claimed those sources were vague. Etc.

But at some point, I decided, we’re not playing this distraction game. You wanted a debate, you claim you have a lit crit degree, and thus know the entire art is Argumentation. A source, if you’re declaring knowing author intent. One source. Any time she dropped a distraction tweet, I replied to her thread with things like a list of our sources vs her lack of any and a reminder. I installed a counter ticker. How many times had she been asked to either recant her point or give a single source?

Someone made a list of the logical fallacies she used in the argument. It was two tweets long and still missed several obvious ones. That didn’t stop her. Neither did the dozens of requests for a source or a recant. Onwards, she marched, derailing time and again. She brought in a buddy to try to distract, but he fell out real quick when he realized “the burden of proof lies on the arguer” shot him and her both in the feet in record time and he ducked out. 

Other greatest hits came out like “Dubs (Dabb’s) fanfic books”, and calling the ability to list authors and episodes “headcanons.”

Over time, the dialogue shifted: see, she came in trying the snide “enjoy your headcanons” downtalk, but as time and time again she was pulverized on every point about the show, or the authors, or anything else while STILL never even giving a single source to even her FIRST POINT and running distractions, it became a reality-- she was told, “We’ll enjoy our canon and author intent. You can enjoy your headcanon of... Dabb’s fanfic books and Lord Barons and the writers being collective hallucinations and whatever else in your hot takes about the show content itself” and she FLIPPED SHIT. 

As the ticker for sources approached 100, she started becoming flustered. Before that, even, she started repetitively misgendering Ezra (no tumblr to link in), and Ezra screenshot their bio of they/them and asked them to adjust. Ignored. Ezra linked this request and asked it to be addressed again, and again, and again. 13 times. Ezra linked it 13 times. She even replied to several of them. No avail. No change. Not until literally any and every tweet in her vicinity either had “source?” or “address gender?” for her to reply to did she flee there, and write some giant write-around of “oh, I didn’t see this, sorry” but still refused to actually use it. Or “I’ll use the right one now.” No, just completely strickened pronouns from her vocabulary with Ezra moving forward, after not one mistake, not two, not five, but 13 answers.

At this point, I notice a trend: throughout the entire conversation, she had flip flopped on my pronouns, clearly confused as to what to call me. As I generally don’t care (honestly I prefer he but meh), it didn’t ping me as something to react to while she switched religiously between “he” and “she”. But I realized now, despite all of that confusion: she never once thought to use “they.” Also earlier we found tweets of hers that, while now declaring herself bisexual, she used troublesome wording in the past to blur the line on if she was an ally or, as she phrased it “maybe less than 100% straight in the bell curve” in other conversations.

I mutter about this on the side to Ezra and some friends, but continue on towards the 100 ticker that was the goal to show people in this digital terrarium how disingenuous most people you argue with are -- an exhibit for the class. They know they’re lying and have been caught, but will not cede to admit “oops, I guess I was wrong.” but rather stick, unironically, to their own headcanons about things. After all, they vaguely sorta apologized even if suddenly just refusing to use any pronouns at all on Ezra after that. And she’s so quick to disappear into 15 tweet bombs of distraction trying to play victim for being held accountable at this point, we just didn’t jump to a conclusion on that, alarming as it is.

So. You know. Source.

At this point, she RANDOMLY starts evoking the fact that like, How Dare, She Watched Gay Men Die To AIDS, She Is A Great Philanthropist How Dare How Dare. 

I’m sorry, did you just evoke the blood of our dead to run away from the most basic scrap of accountability in what is literally the first wave of a lit debate because for the last 10 hours you have refused to take the necessary steps to move on to the next point? Did you... just... evoke the ghosts of gay men that were genocided to, essentially, pull up a smokescreen and run away from being party to queer erasure? Or even just? Giving a source? or admitting you were wrong on one point in a debate? Wow, you really just did that. 

Naturally, people involved got pissed. Her Sources ticker hit 100, but at this point, all that haunted her was how completely fucking vile and inappropriate that was in this discussion. 

She got blocked. She then tried to glom onto anyone that hadn’t blocked or muted her and run the same argumentation points she had earlier been decimated in the argument with, while yelling “I ship Destiel too! I wanted them to have sex too! Why does this make me the bad guy?” around the block and hoping nobody actually read the thread. She tried to pitch the “headcanons” point of view again, hoping a new audience would lick her boots. She was, largely, ignored; given a few more comments about her leaving the conversation losing all points and only covered in the blood of our dead she was so proud of; blocked by a few more. (unsurprisingly, if you check her actual tweet history, she seems more invested in Megstiel but)

This is when CommaSameleon -- a professor with two lit degrees and a primary focus in teaching the art of Argumentation -- literally -- stepped in. She initially tried to engage the fact that, well, this woman not only can’t argue out of a paper sack but wasn’t even arguing, she was just running in circles and distracting from all the points and hadn’t addressed a single lit point directly while preaching down at people. But Sam, also, noticed something. This woman kept changing things like “queerphobia” to “homophobia.” Sam mentioned this kinda puts off TERF vibes (I think Sam picked up on the gendering thing herself too.)

Her response? Which she deleted since? But Discord’s embed helpfully saved?

Her inacted non-apologies remain weak, especially in any form of debate be it lit or now queer topics.

Oh I’m sorry, let’s recap her viewpoints: TERF is a slur. “They” is made up and should be avoided at all costs. The blood of dead gay men are a token to use in a lit debate you’re avoiding responsibility in. After this, “authors are headcanons” is suddenly not your worst take, but fascinating that you 13 times didn’t even read the blatant ass screenshot. And I mean, these weren’t subtle or easy to miss these 13 times.

100. She had 100 chances, literally, on a timer, to give a source or shut up with her platforming until she had one. Instead, she chose every rabbit hole she could manifest to disappear into, only to be met by another request for a source, and not moving on until we address the first points. We’ve given ours, now you give yours. Instead, you choose this. This is the hill you choose to die on, rather than admitting, “Sorry, I guess I was wrong” or “I guess I heard that somewhere, my bad.” 100 chances. 13 direct QT requests to address gender which she replied to but didn’t reply to until cornered (and still didn’t, truly, reply to), and “TERF is a slur.” Oh, and after waving around the dead men’s blood she also suddenly Can’t Be A Terf Because She Adopted Two Trans Kids. Lord help those children. Or, you know, the more realistic thing is she’s just manifesting all kinds of bullshit at this point to save face, which is probably why she deleted all the related tweets that show she’s a giant-ass TERF.

So anyway, this is very much a lesson on:

Paying attention to how people manipulate conversation to erase genuine discussion and debate.

Paying attention to WHY they do it. Motivation on methods and tactics will clear up a lot.

Figuring out HOW they try to sound woke about shit and when it’s entirely fucking vile and inappropriate to pull

And by all above points, figuring out that these people are among us, and how NOT to let them influence your conversations.

I don’t care if it’s about a discussion on a ship or show or anything else. People do this. A lot. Extremely dedicatedly, if the 100 asks doesn’t make that clear. 

Stop letting people railroad your conversations with disingenuous bullshit.

So anyway in honor of this I made everyone a gif

Use at will. It’s tagged anti-terf if you want to use the search feature on it.

UPDATE: 

Just went and checked. She went and deleted literally her entire side of the conversation, hundreds if not thousands of tweets. Luckily, Ezra mentioned repeatedly -- and I do trust them inherently -- that they were saving the entire conversation, so that zip file exists somewhere. How fascinating, after she accused us that we would want to delete tweets. Someone realized they had a bad look and giant failure all around.

Also, a related anon that links to an earlier part of this conversation I didn’t even document where she was crying about “cis erasure” [x] This shit went on so long I legit forgot about that.

[jaggedwolf]

air support, we need you (or: tscosi 2x09)

some bomb dropping, ofc, spoilers below duh

same game, top three things i had feelings ‘bout in reverse order

3. time skip time! Everyone could use a bit of a breather, even if it can’t live up to Arkady’s goat farm dreams

I thought all the planet assignments made sense, even if the completionist in me wanted it to differ more from the split that had already happened this season

ok ok the shipper in me was 50-50 but we’ll address that later

2. my man park!! is back!!! 

Showing up with an anti-aircraft missile launcher as a wedding gift. I kept joking that Park would keep up his finale trend of showing up as a surprise being cool (as cool as Park can be anw), and thought it wouldn’t happen till it did!

and him also quietly saying the defector wasn’t Shelly....Park...are you going to talk about this...

narrowly avoided extended crew singing for the third time, will he keep up this success rate?

I would take a mini-episode that just followed Park in the second half of the season (Park: I am an independent man who needs no crew)

1. Arkady attacking Krejjh because she thinks they’re an enemy, AND then McCabe pulling a gun on her to make sure she didn’t run away. Bro. Bro, that shit was a direct hit to the id. Do I even have words for how good that was

Knowing what was about to happen as soon as Arkady said “You” in that tone of voice, ugh

Krejjh saying Arkady instead of First Mate Patel in desperation, and then brushing it off with a :D after

But god, McCabe. They’ve been so compelling this season, and yeah, maybe they’re approaching everything like a nail with the hammer they’ve got that shoots bullets, but the point is, it fuckin works 

Arkady buys the threat (the promise of her crew’s safety?) more than she buys Krejjh’s reassurances 

(though reading the transcript, Krejjh specifically telling Arkady “Science Officer Liu will never forgive you”, not “forgive us”, is excellent too)

“the only authority figures yet to disappoint me” / “I’m not an authority figure” / “you don’t get to decide that” is just like. embedded in my mind. just McCabe going no, you don’t get to run verbally either.

Do you ever think about how Arkady and McCabe had like, different kinds of fucked up childhoods compared to the rest of the crew. Like obviously McCabe ending up an agent so young and the stuff about their family suggests a pretty secure background, but it feels like the IGR and Dwarnian war starting when they were 12 gives them a kind of cynicism that meshes well with Arkady’s, in a way that’s distinct from how Arkady and Violet’s morbidness mesh, or Arkady and Sana’s pragmatism

ok more character feels under the cut

don’t scandalize the grandparents

A married man! 

Impressed he made it through the season with no baddies wrecking his oxygen

Always ready to point out that Arkady is actually as much of a nerd as he is

AKA I didn’t realize it was a Mozart reference till he said so. Arkady defies the jock-nerd chart

okay who of Arkady or Krejjh is gonna tell him about MMA fight outside, or did they do a whole team debrief. For Arkady’s sake I’m hoping not the latter, though I guess everyone else would like an explanation for McCabe’s gun-pointing??

likes solving problems without guns, would prefer solving them by FLYING SPACESHIPS 

Krejjh watches McCabe’s gun strategy work on Arkady and goes “do you folks really live like this?? why???”

I do love that their first thought on what to do next is to run a bunch of supplies around, probably between human populations that are going to be a wary at seeing a dwarnian show up. (Eat it, Eejjhgreb)

Kinda wonder if their feelings about getting choked out by their buddy are in fact more complicated than “it’s chill dude, please don’t do something stupid”

The cutest vow

who needs to calm down your crewmates with annoying words when you can just point a gun at them

Seriously where is the human-dwarnian war AU where it lasts longer or happens later where McCabe is the baby sniper posted to Arkady’s unit and they squabble a bunch (and perhaps kiss? When I wrote my third ever ficlet for this fandom never did I anticipate actually being interested in that)

what % of their Mirzakhani choice was thinking “what if Arkady tries to run from the goat farm and no one’s around to point a gun at her” jk jk

Their exclusion of Park from authority figures that didn’t disappoint them is fascinating. Is it that he left hoping for Shelly when it probably wasn’t her, or that he isn’t an authority figure anymore, a combination there of?

Or worst of all, is it that when he didn’t kill Krejjh back in 1x10, that really was a disappointment, no matter how much it might’ve been mixed with relief, and you can’t undo that moment?

What if they and Park talked. But I don’t think Park is going to goat planet, so that seems unlikely.

Their apology to Sana for heightened Martineau security! And Sana reiterating the profound gratefulness bit, gah

mostly read other people’s words and yet sparked consideration of two different OT3s, her power.

you know what, everyone deciding Sana is the best person to read words makes complete sense

There was one specific moment this episode that sent my mind into a tizzy about V/A/S, and it was Arkady going FINE GO ASK THE CAPTAIN THEN at how firm Violet was that Tripathi would be the one driving her, not Arkady.

I need you to understand that my V/A/S OT3 opinions are such that my shipping feels were more set off by that than Sana and Violet telling Arkady they were proud of her for choosing goat planet or whatever, like I don’t even know what dynamic was so captured by that argument, rip at Arkady having to be systems apart from them again

Though ofc my heart was buoyed by Sana’s earnest “Kady, you do more than that”, I want these two to go do a job together again, I miss that

To shift gears, I cannot believe “Lenny” started out as Sana being absolutely furious at the people threatening her crew and has ended up a teasing in-joke between her and Park, my Sana/Park shipping feels were very content. (When does Sana learn that Park didn’t get to hear the long list of fake crimes the Rumor crew specifically confessed to Lenny? This must be fixed. Tell him about the diamonds!)

Campbell said “Park, let me show you where we’ve been sleeping.” and my brain went. Wait. This is actually a good OT3?? Park is already unnerved by Sana’s earnest captaining, he should get unnerved by Campbell’s default magnanimity, please consider this

this is also where I point out that all these major characters have very convenient names for indicating ships solely via letters. V/A! B/K! S/P/C! This may solve my ot3 tagging problem...

get off that cotton candy boat, vi

Haha I loved that line from Doc Robinson she’s so no-nonsense, love Violet agreeing to work with her

Doc also said menders and I thought about this post again and also the team split and ahhh

But no, I very much liked Violet gently crushing Arkady’s goat farm dreams, and the two of them awkwardly discussing the very awkward stage things are at while still getting a feel for how the other operates

These nerds are trying and I’m still fond of them

at some point I was gonna make fun of Vi for not being able to drive before realising 1. she probably didn’t want to deprive the others of a vehicle 2. that would be incredibly hypocritical of me

wait does the igr have excellent public transport when they aren’t bombing it i take back every bad thing i’ve said abou-

*ahem* same question about the MMA fight debrief I had for Brian, it would be so funny if the situation was so rushed that like, Arkady+McCabe explain to Brian on the farm and Krejjh has to tackle everyone else

tick, tock, walking bomb, when it stops, nobody knows

arkady is so whumpable, and this show knows it

Redundant, but love how terrified of herself she is after hurting Krejjh and how strangely reassured she is by McCabe’s gun antics. And how she doesn’t like thinking of herself as an authority figure on the ship even though she literally is as First Mate

is ready to monologue about all major life events and the crew frickin knows it

is trying to help herself and stuff, still grumbling about it. in worse shape this season than last - probably all the constant discussion of the inevitable war just kept building stuff up and she kept ignoring it because haha who wants to deal with this prickly mess of a person haha

did i mention she’s the best

hope she gets her full goat farm dream one day, even if it’s not on actual goat farm

[janiedean]

I feel bad for all the nice J*nsa shippers who like their ship for whatever reasons (tropes, pretty art, aesthetic appeal, whatever) and know it's not canon but get associated with the misogynistic Dany hating crowd who act like Jon being attracted to Ygritte is J*nsa foreshadowing because red hair (I guess Jon should fuck Edmure Tully too? Omg give me Dark!Jon getting revenge on Catelyn by seducing her brother!) Tell me something. I'm new to the fandom but was J*nsa popular before the show? And I've heard something about the OG J*nsa shippers being alienated by the new shippers who insisted it had to be canon and acted like the series is called, "A song of J*nsa #danysux." I don't find that hard to believe because I know people who are now ashamed of calling themselves J*nsa shippers. Like, at this point, it's not only rival shippers who hate it. Even Gendrya/Braime/Jon stans/etc have started disliking that ship. You know your fandom is a problem when people who have nothing to do with Jnsa have a problem with it.

me: reads this ask

me: iwastheregandalf.gif which I can't find now but

okay anon buckle up because I am sadly well-equipped to answer this ask but before I do lemme tell you dark jon seducing edmure to take revenge on cat is LITERALLY THE BEST THING I'VE EVER HEARD but *clears throat* ALL RIGHT THEN.

disclaimer: as anon says I have no issue with like the shippers mentioned by anon in the beginning and ngl I agree, I have ABSOLUTELY ZERO FUCKING STAKES in the j*nsa vs j*nerys war and the only het jon ship I gaf about is jon/ygritte and we all know where that ended up I just... have been here since 2011/adwd was over and all the fic around was just for the books under secret lj communities and asoiaf qualified for yuletide and I have... seen... things.... and I actually have like uh had... beef... with some people in there and I know things bc ppl who hated those others told me stuff so anyway *sigh* buckle up anon I'mma tell you the story of jon shipwars through the years

in order, the old gods help me here, under the cut bc this is long as fuck

when I got into fandom also given what numbers were on ao3 one ship was popular and it was sansan. no like sansan was lit. the only asoiaf ship on ao3 with more than 200 fics. jb had twenty when i checked first. jc had like around 100-ish because of the show but sansan dwarfed anything. I posted the first jon/ygritte fic on the ao3 tag and the fourth throbb fic and like the others were all reposts from lj kinkmemes. nothing was popular before the show except for sansan when it comes to huge numbers bc grrm doesn't like fic and it was all hush hush until the show made it impossible to control and that ship was the one with a huge enough fanbase it actually had numbers, so like... j*nsa wasn't popular in the way nothing else was popular until it got screentime on the show

now, that stated, j*nsa had a... fair amount of fic for a rareship which was mostly book-based and from og shippers that were there from before the show and liked it for what it was but literally none of them thought it was gonna be canon, like it wasn't huge or anything but it had a small but dedicated fanbase who did their own thing and thought it was fun/liked the idea but that was it

that fandom had their own niche of hcs that they cultivated and shit except that like... at the end of S5/beginning of S6 there was a surge in shipping for... well obvious reasons bc it was obv sansa was getting to the wall and that would have been all nice and good but a) it was the time puritanical shipping was starting to take root and the 'shipping sansa with sandor or tyrion is hella problematic' rhetoric had started to circle coming from sans*ery shippers mostly but I'mma not open that fucking can of worms here, b) while the ending of S5 had more of a theon/sansa spike, the j*nsa stuff started getting big

now here we have to mention my villain origin story ie: j*nsa fandom had this one stan whose name I won't make because honestly it's been years and if she's still around I don't want her to remember I exist who was a bnf, wrote for... the website that created the whole larry/carol thing etc who was really fixed on this thing that j*nsa was actually canon and started writing extremely popular meta about it. now you're gonna ask how do you know, I know because this person once wrote a meta named 'why robb stark is a dick' and I told her that it was really fucking bad meta and she took it so badly she kept on trash talking me on her blog/her podcast (I was apparently the insane robb stark fangirl l m a o good lord) and like that was when some sane ppl who argued with her informed me in pvt that she was basically harping on the CANON thing when they'd have been okay with like... it being crackshipping and that she was basically cultivating a hoarde of followers who were harping on them/the ogs and basically ostracizing them;

I would like to add that this person - before her tumblr got 'accidentally deleted' and remade it therefore deleted most receipts for, er, her so-called meta which included stuff like ned and cat raised sansa as a sexual object and only wanted to sell her like cattle - had at some point started a round robin fic thing where... some of the characters mocked openly said stuff that some of the og fans had said specifically targeting them and people in that side basically went harassing anyone who didn't agree with that specific notion

now never mind that this person basically coined an entire term to describe ppl who liked white guys and excused all their wrongdoings out of my conversation re robb basically lying about everything I said as if I didn't have the receipts and tried to sell shirts with it and it didn't work and like then she got kicked out of her own website because she was telling her commenters disagreeing pretty shitty insults (considering I was called psychotic for disagreeing with her that time I don't doubt it) I think at some point she stepped back from fandom bc idk wtf she's up to these days and I don't want to, but basically at that point the dam was broken and there was a bunch of puritanical shippers harping on anyone who didn't agree with j*nsa is canon endgame stuff

this also includes an incident when those ppl were like... passing themselves as throbb shippers and ended up trying to tell t*hramsay shippers off the theon tag based on moral reasons and I ended up arguing with all of them (and they were all from that crowd) which in turn landed me in contact with other og j*nsa shippers who were like detached from that fandom bc those same people harassed them away as well ssooooo fun

anyway when S6 happened everyone was high on it and whatnot but I wasn't gonna begrudge them that I mean... you shipped it for years, canon is delivering you, good for you, but then j*nerys happened

god j*nerys happened

aaand basically...... I mean personally I was there like are y'all seriously arguing about the best incest jon ship out there but like basically the j*nsa endgame side was like AH JON IS PLAYING DANY SEE IF IT DOESN'T HAPPEN, the j*nerys obv got defensive af and both sides were sort of alternatively shitting on jon/ygritte anyway and depicting any other romantic rship jon could have as abusive™ and during S8 it just got worse and like I tried to stay out of it but basically from what I'm seeing now idk how the j*neryses are doing but on the j*nsa one it's ah jon's gonna play dany anyway and she's going to go insane like in the show so SHOW TRUTHING EVERY OTHER WAY and like again denying that sandor exists or that tyrion exists and like I barely touch my corner (sansan) but I ended up arguing with j*nsa/th*nsa people on twitter who were antis and is2g it was white-hair inducing and I know for sure the sansa/tyrion shippers were harassed to hell and back throughout so FUN

and even if the show didn't go there now since everyone there banked on the jnsa endgame thing and admitting you're wrong is like... not a thing, they still haven't let go of it and attach to that ship any shred of evidence which honestly is grasping at straws half of the time (like... the sansa/alysanne parallels like guys please no) and which is why every other ship is starting to get fed up, attaching canon proof of stuff from other ships onto theirs see that batb argument and jb is platonic but jonsa is not nvm taking all the sansan stuff and throwing it on j*nsa but then denying that sansan has canon evidence (like guys I had to read sansa touching his shoulder when saying gregor wasn't a true knight wasn't meaningful and we were seeing things please) and blah blah blah

this also goes hand in hand with the fixation on like... villanizing dany at all costs and like is2g I have zero investment in dany or her storyline I don't even remember it and I don't particularly care abt her either way and sure af I'm not for j*nerys endgame but like.... some stuff I read is completely excessive esp when fixing on how she's a completely mad tyrant who's gonna have to be put down and like... guys no

(also there's some srs stannis hate in that corner which I honestly don't get why they even care abt stannis but I had to read stuff like ppl don't recognize that dany and stannis are the real villains in this saga and like........ idek)

I think most of the og shippers are gone or don't ship it openly bc they don't want to be attached to the drama but like I also think they're pissing off everyone else bc like... I mean a bunch of them also were down with sansa being paired with other ppl as long as it meant a good ending for her except those ppl were... like everyone but the ppl she has actual contact with in canon which meant that at some point sansa/gendry was a thing and like.... you can imagine why arya/gendry shippers & arya stans were fed up, and there's also this tendency to behave like sansa is the center of the entire saga which like these books is named a song of jon snow basically can we pls make peace with it and personally I've had it with both j*nsa and j*nerys people since they started with that dumbass JON/YGRITTE WAS AN ABUSIVE RELATIONSHIP rhetoric but I'm also fed up with the total ignoring that sandor exists/depicting us as delusional and honestly I also was by proxy fed up from the harassing of the sansa/tyrion shippers soooooooooooo

there were also instances of 'well theon is an acceptable choice other than jon bc he can't threaten her' which... i mean we all know what that meant and I'm not even commenting it bc it's one AM and I have no force to but I don't have to explain why it's not a progressive take now do I

there were also metas about how cousin incest being legal in half of the world means that jondany is a worse incest and j*nsa doesn't count as such and I was basically there like guys please just fucking own up to it but honestly I chose to forgot where I read that and I couldn't find the link if I tried

tldr: no one wants to admit that it's not gonna be endgame which considering the amount of fic they have on ao3 is imvho useless bc they have more content than like.. anything I ship that's not jb or that's actually like canon *cries in joncon/rhaegar but I mean renly/loras is canon and has less fic than them* so idk what's the problem with enjoying that instead of insisting it's gonna be canon when not even the show validated it while show truthing anyway when the only show truthing that can be truthed is the small council made of minorities and possibly jon eventually fucking off with the wildlings but not like that but like most people who thought it wasn't gonna be endgame had left/were made to leave by the time S7 rolled by and at this point since wow isn't out yet everyone is fandom-grasping at straws to find stuff to discourse on and we're here beating dead horses *shrug*

so that's... how it is but I would again like to point out that I don't judge ppl on their shipping, I don't particularly care about this entire feud bc I only ship jon with ppl he's not related to in whichever way and I try to stay out of this mess bc I don't really care to argue with ppl who have already decided to bend canon to whatever they want and will have to realize that it's not what grrm wrote at some point but like I have a very good memory and the above rant is as objective as possible also bc again I don't literally have a stake in that race I just think romantic/endgame j*nsa is not a thing and that ppl should stay in their lane and not harping on other ppl who ship whatever in general but especially when their ship is the most popular thing in fandom in the first place /two cents