#jiang cheng discourse

[sonik-kun]

Jiang Cheng having complicated feelings about the Wen (and by extension, Wei Wuxian's actions and saving the Wen) are kinda valid considering that these people literally MASACCRED his own and many other minor sects, raping and pillaging along the way. They would have decimated every major sect if given the chance and indoctrinated them. It makes sense why JC would have trauma, fear and a hatred for them.

How can you not have this understanding and empathy for JC and the Jiang in general, yet feel sympathy for the Wen when everyone turned on them thereafter? And expect LSZ to get revenge for what happened to his clan?? It's literally the same thing. Both are victims of a massacre. How are you sympathetic over one but not the other?

[marshmallowwitharubberband]

For some reason, my recommendations dash has been filled with Jiang Cheng discourse (both pro and anti) and I found it very weird until I realized it's actually the same two accounts indirectly throwing rocks at each other.

Like,

blog 1: Jiang Cheng has stinky feet

blog 2: so now antis are saying Jiang Cheng has stinky feet, but they forget that...

or

blog 2: Jiang Cheng would donate to rescue shelters

blog 1: I can't stand apologists claiming Jiang Cheng would donate to rescue shelters when he...

And it just keeps going with both talking like they're rebutting to a whole group of people when it's actually just them.

I personally find it very funny and I wonder if it's on purpose to avoid direct confrontation or if they also haven't realized they've been having beef with the same person all this time.

[qiu-yan]

haterisms beneath the cut

this hater poll brought to you by....a series of Bad Mcfucking Takes i had to read with my own eyeballs. seriously did we read the same book or not.

explanations:

"jiang cheng killed wei wuxian": jiang cheng did not kill wei wuxian in any version of the story. in mdzs wei wuxian died from backlash and in cql wei wuxin chose to let go of lan wangji after jiang cheng stabbed the cliff face. you can argue till the cows come home about how responsible jiang cheng is for wei wuxian's demise, but "jiang cheng killed wei wuxian" is just factually incorrect.

"jiang cheng abuses jin ling": jiang cheng does not abuse jin ling. first, the narration goes out of its way to establish that jiang cheng does not hit jin ling, specifically in a setting where hitting children is normalized and expected. in fact, wei wuxian says that jin ling is bratty specifically because he's never been hit. second, jin ling is also clearly comfortable talking back to jiang cheng and needling him in a way jiang cheng definitely was not with his own parents. even when jiang cheng is actively losing it when he captures wei wuxian in qinghe, jin ling remains completely unruffled - which speaks to how much jin ling takes for granted that he is safe with jiang cheng.

"jiang cheng could have easily helped the wen remnants, he just didn't": antis love to act like yunmeng jiang could have easily taken in the wemnants and jiang cheng simply chose not to because he was a hater/super jelly/various synonyms for ontologically evil. which is not the fucking case. learn to read. yunmeng jiang's own position post sunshot was very weak - they were a great sect in name only and were excluded from the alliance tying the three other great sects together - and jiang cheng could not politically afford to protect wei wuxian after wei wuxian alienated lanling jin. that's why jiang cheng says "if you insist on doing this, i can't protect you," and why wei wuxian then tells jiang cheng to let him go. because they both understand this. come on

"jiang cheng forced jiang yanli to marry jin zixuan": jiang yanli as a character makes so many sacrifices for her family and her brothers. her relationship with zixuan is like the one thing she chooses for herself. she loves him!! the tragedy in wei wuxian killing jin zixuan is that yanli genuinely loved zixuan!! ngl i think antis argue this purely to try to exonerate wei wuxian: if jiang yanli didn't love jin zixuan then wei wuxian donutting him isn't a problem anymore, apparently. this is the result of people thinking of jiang yanli as purely a thing for wei wuxian, rather than a human being in her own right.

"jiang cheng should have protected wei wuxian from yu ziyuan": this one is annoying because jiang cheng was also a child. when a child is abused, it is the fault of the abuser, not the fault of another child who is also subject to the whims of the abuser. come on.

[black-n-white-wings]

I don't know what's happening but I hadn't seen them in a while and didn't have to spree-block people in such a long time and now my dash is just .... JC hate. Like... *Everywhere.* Do they emerge with colder temperatures? Did they go dormant in the summer heat and now peak up from under moss patches and clear ponds to spit at the unsuspecting passerby?

so i take it the antis have been particularly loud recently

[acequinz]

I don't know why people are on the opposite spectrum only.

It's always either Jiang Cheng did nothing wrong or Jiang Cheng did everything wrong.

Did Jiang Cheng love Wei Wuxian? Yes.

Did he also in a way abandon Wei Wuxian? Yes.

Would Jiang Cheng die for Wei Wuxian? Yes.

Would Jiang Cheng prioritise something over Wei Wuxian? Also yes.

Why are people acting like him being angry and/or upset Wei Wuxian about literally anything he has done(and he has done a lot) negates the love he has for him?

Also about Wei Wuxian's morality, the author has said that Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji are morally good people, this does not mean they can't do something wrong. And having made a mistake doesn't make them bad people either, it's just that morally speaking Wei Wuxian was in the right to defend the Wens. But life doesn't fucking work on morals.

Hell Wei Wuxian holds too many regrets that even he won't admit that he's a perfect person because there're too many things he would want to do differently. But under no circumstances can you question his morals because they have always been in the right place. All his acts of purposeful cruelty were against people who hurt him first.

Jiang Cheng being unable to stand up with Wei Wuxian during the Wen situation is because he's young and has no support but it's still disappointing because Jiang Yanli still managed to stand with Wei Wuxian in a way and then we see Jiang Cheng be unable to, it's also because the scale is different and he prioritised his sect over Wei Wuxian.

Then the other part of Jiang Cheng lashing out on Jin Ling physically that I see many screenshots of it and it's always when Jiang Cheng is under high emotional distress situations. Which is not to say it's okay and should be allowed. But the world setting and situation also matters.

But guess what that also does not take away from the love Jiang Cheng has for Jin Ling.

There's too many connections in the story itself especially around Jin Ling and his uncle's.

Now of course a relationship can have all the love but unless it has active care and affection it means nothing.

Which is why Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng fall apart. They have the love, they even have the care but because they just can't share affection they fall apart immediately after Jiang Yanli because before she had been the bridge of affection between them.

With the final bridge down, their relationship could not stay afloat and just sank.

[twilightarc-gm]

✊ Proud "villainfucker"

Given some recent posts about (gag) morality and antagonist vs. villain --I'd like to reference this good post with my new favorite meme quadrant.

The post seen here also comes with someone's added quadrant which I will now use to full effect to make my stance clear--if it wasn't already.

Images are donghua, but I am basing my assessment off the translated novels.

while i am saying this in a humorous way, I am not joking.

[lgbtlunaverse]

heads- up: someone is taking jc-centric fics and turning them into jc-bashing wangxian fics

I don't usually like to bring twitter drama over to tumblr but since the perpetrator in this case explicitly said they do this ON TUMBLR I felt it was pertinent to do so.

Today user DyuaLan on twitter, aka @jiaoji on tumblr, publically bragged about finding chengxian, xicheng, and zhanzheng fics and changing the names to make them wangxian fics with jiang cheng bashing.

When authors (understandably) reacted to this by blocking them, they boasted about still having 15 stolen fics in their drafts on top of the ones they've already posted.

And that they do all of this stuff on tumblr anyway, not twitter

If you have written any kind of Jiang Cheng ships, or Jiang Cheng-centric fic in general, and are not a fan of your work being stolen, it's in your best interest to block them.

They also said that they block everyone they steal from. Though if you go to the blog now and are blocked, please don't panic, that might just be for fanwar reasons.

Here's proof that DyuaLan is in fact the same person as Jiaoji:

(@jiaoji and @jiaoji2 lead to the same blog, it was probably called this because they at some point lost access/moved from their previous blog @jiao-ji)

And here jiaoji is bragging on their tumblr about feeling too lazy to even rewrite someone else's work

Their ao3 is "Jiao_ji" where they have 16 works total, most of which are in portuguese, making it harder to verify which ones are stolen, as a lot of their "sources" are probably in english. (Most of the fics they have written on tumblr itself are also in english) They also have a wattpad account with the url "Dilf_ji"

As a bonus here they are 2 years ago whining about zhancheng authors blocking them because it means they can no longer steal their fics, this has been going on for a while.

And talking a bit more about stealing from chengxian and zhancheng authors:

While I haven't written any jiang cheng ships, I am a fic writer, and I know the work that goes into it. I can work on a single oneshot for months on end. So this kind of attitude, where if you hate a ship the author's work is just free for the taking, is appaling to me. Inspiration is normal, fandom is inherently transformative. Hell, ao3 has a "works inspired by" function for exactly that. But wholesale lifting someone's else's writing, only changing the ship and adding salt about a character you hate? Yeah, no. "Character bashing" fics aren't my cup of tea in the first place, but if you're going to do it, at least have the decency to write the damn things yourself.

I don't like doing callouts, so while I know that I can't really control anyone else's actions, I want to say for my own peace of mind... please just block this person. I don't wanna cause even more discourse. Remember: you don't feed trolls. I posted this because i think writers deserve to be warned when someone is maliciously stealing and editing their work, not to instigate harassment.

[local-limebug]

wanna get back into mdzs but you are all so goddamn weird about jiang cheng

(i don't wanna retype my tags but read them pls... if you are both a wwx and jc enjoyer interact with this post please)

[crimmsonflower]

did not realise how much hate JC gets

From what I've seen it's not an unreasonable thing to think, like that's totally a way of viewing JC, it just feels like they're martyring WWX in the process. We're going to admit to JC's faults but we're not going to talk about how WWX's actions impacted everyone else (negatively). That makes WWX a wayyy less interesting character, honest to god. My little hater isn't getting the same empathy that WWX is getting :CCC

it's kind of funny but it also makes me a bit sad/angry. Idk I'm biased cause JC is my favourite MDZS character and I relate to him hard so like eh

[sonik-kun]

Jiang Cheng's achievements are so overshadowed and overlooked in this fandom, especially by JC antis.

Like them calling him a miserable, pathetic loser who's not good at anything is both a lie and a cope because:

He literally built his sect up virtually on his own with little to no experience thanks to his neglectful father

He was able to keep up with WWX in training and ability, despite the former being a child prodigy

He is one of the strongest swimmers in his sect, hence why WWX suggested JC dived first in the turtle cave to look for a safe exit for everyone

He is a hard worker who is politically adept, who scarily predicts outcomes correctly and can read the room *cough* unlike WWX

He was a renowned hero during the sunshot campaign, so much so, it earned him the title of the three poisons

He recruited new disciples pretty much on his own, all whilst searching for WWX

He travelled for days without rest or any food and water just to rescue WWX (and LWJ) from the turtle cave. He still didn't receive any thanks for this

His sect not only bounced back, but also became a political powerhouse, rich enough to completely do up Lotus Pier which WWX remarks as being gaudy now

He is able to provide JL with dozens of nets to help him on his night hunts and have his disciples assist him

He was able to counteract JGY's attack at Guanyin temple. He only failed in stopping him because he was forced to defend WWX

He did all these achievements, building up his sect and apprehending DCs all whilst helping to raise JL despite not being required to

There could be more I'm missing out on here. But it's such a shame he's a slept on as a character because JC antis have a shallow interpretation and understanding of him and can't get over their weird hate boner for him to admit that actually, he is a strong, capable and competent man. And that actually, he is a much more successful leader than WWX. 🤷‍♀️

[tea-cat-arts]

Sometimes I wonder what Jiang Cheng could've become if his parents didn't instill a mix of "crippling fear of failure" and "impossibly high standards" in him. Cuz like, his dad was holding him to the vague standard of being as good as wwx, his mom yelling at him whenever he goofed around like wwx, and then both of them expressed disappointment when he's less successful than wwx. The thing both of them seem to ignore though is that wwx got where he is entirely because he had the freedom to fuck around and find out- he trained tirelessly because he made training fun for himself, he was innovative as a cultivators because he experimented and persisted through failures, and he was able to act in line with the Jiang clan moto because his actions had less political pull than members of the main family. Jiang Cheng on the other hand- if he fucked around he got told to "stop stooping to the level of servants." If his achievements were lesser than wwx's, he got either dismissed by his dad or yelled at by his mom to try harder. And if he picked fights with the Wens, they'd have an excuse to destroy his clan. Like ya- no shit that'd create an adult who's terrified of failure.

The kite game serves as such a good metaphor/embodiment of this set back- with Jiang Cheng never being able to shoot as far as Wei Wuxian because he pulls back and shoots closer the second he misses.

And its sad too because he's shown to be pretty brilliant when he's in "fuck it, we ball" mode. Like, when he's not freezing up, he manages to pull off things like rebuilding his entire clan from the ground up, leading armies and taking back territories from the Wens, and I'm fairly sure he's the only character we see counter the Lan music cultivation techniques (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong on that last one. Also feel free to add any of the other cool shit he did that I'm blanking on at the moment, cuz I know I'm forgetting something).

That being said- even with his anxiety, he's still one of the top cultivators. Imagine what a force of nature he'd be if he could sustain "fuck it we ball" mode

[randomness-is-my-order]

this phenomenon when antagonistic or abusive or shitty characters in books are hated by the original reading audience because writers don’t generally, continuously wax poetic about these character’s looks (unless them being beautiful/handsome is part of their narrative) but once these books are adapted, all these characters suddenly have a legion of defenders and since we know visual media is still horribly stuck catering to beauty standards of whichever entertainment industry the adaptation is made in, pretty privilege strikes in and sympathy is given to characters all of a sudden, characters who based on their book portrayal would never get it, because deny it or not, while reading the focus is automatically far more on what a character does or says than their appearance, which is not the case for shows or movies where looking good is basically a necessity. and it is a generalisation i know because some adaptations do make these characters lose their rough edges but when you go fandom hopping and see this kind of stuff every single time, it really makes you wonder. to speak nothing of anime/manga fandoms where cool designs of characters will automatically make them a fandom favourite, even if they are objectively poorly written or just terrible ass people as long as they have some significance in the narrative and say some cool shit every now and then.

[qiu-yan]

what kind of stan is entirely up to you

keep in mind that the jiang cheng stans won the horniest stan poll

[unreliable-narratoe]

Accidentally went on MDZS twt and saw a "wwx was SO affected by classism" (valid by itself) take and the subsequent "yzy and jc called him the son of a servant all the time!" (Former did, latter literally says "what kind of servant has their master peeling Lotus roots for them?" He is still classist but I think it's pretty clear wwx is Family to him) takes. For good measure, JGY's name was also thrown around a bit "I don't know how anyone can sympathize with him, classism or poverty or not..." well.

There was also an LQR picked on wwx because he was a servant explanation that got quite a few likes... And I was just... Blocking people left and right for my peace of mind. I was so glad for a second that I've built my own bubble here.

[lavender-phoenix-flames]

"Jc AnTI's are so jobless the are so obsessed with jc, they should cope"

Says the ppl who rewrote the whole novel and made up stuff with no proof or evidence just to 'like' their fave. Constantly harassing and discoursing with people if they disagree with their deluded opinions calling them 'anti'.

Babying a whole ass adult man and "wwx is an unreliable narrator aksually you should look at both sides" while they parade jc's words like it's the ultimate truth. Making up millions of excuses for his abusive and toxic behavior that harms jin ling and people around him. Undermining the effects of the abuse that jl goes through and blaming wwx for shit he didn't do. Holding wwx responsible for deaths of jiangs and yanli even when they know he wasn't at fault here. And worst of all saying "mxtx doesn't understand her own characters" like be for fucking real. In jc stans minds everything jc does is justified they will not show any proof for thier arguments but seethes at the facts we dared to point it out to them.

If engaging in fandom discussions makes someone jobless than every fricking person on tumblr is unemployed lmao.

Now they wanna barge in on canon jc tag and say "this is slander and bashing of my lil meow meow tsundere angry grape, you anti!!!😡" meanwhile the text itself presents and highlights jc's behavior in a negative light. Ask them to present proof of 'jc good natured behavior' and they are blank or they would post/take shit completely out of context.

In conclusion there is no point in arguing with jc stans who have completely and willingly let go of any kind of sensibility, logic, and chose to accept their delusions. Also canon jc fans and "jc antis" y'all are doing great, mxtx is proud of us. Keep discussing canon jc more so than ever. We don't need to make another tag, let's protect this one.

[acequinz]

It's so funny seeing people who get mad JC getting along with juniors headcanons. (Specifically the JC getting along with Sizhui headcanons)

Who then later turn around and headcanon Jin Ling getting along with either Wei Wuxian or Lan Wangji.

Not that it's wrong or bad or whatever but like... The Hypocrisy is Hypocrisy-ing.

Enjoy all the dynamics you like but don't bitch about it when others do it.