#multishipping discourse

[mai-komagata]

re: sexy stabbings

im writing this very long meta on how galadriel x sauron and silvergifting dynamics help an audience recognize different forms of seduction in a relatable way (including queer forms of seduction, which audiences are normally blind to), and how recognizing these ships isn't about "crack shipping" but about the text using the language of sexuality/eroticism/seduction to convey concepts that would otherwise be vague and not-understandable like temptation to a metal object or wounds that cannot heal or possession by an alien being as well as concept of "men in a fantasy/magical/superhero setting are not just power levels" -- ie. the strongest man should always win. Galadriel is *integral* to this because most characters in tolkien are male and audiences are pre-disposed to ignoring emotional dynamics in men other than anger and violence -- the contrast with a female romance lets an audience be like "these people, adar, galadriel, celebrimbor are more alike than distinct". (wow maybe i don't need to write it, anymore!). But since that is taking me very long to write and i keep running into queer-erasure every day i'll just say this: the reason we don't see Sauron torture Galadriel in the same way she tortures Celebrimbor is not because his relationship with them is cosmically different (obviously its different bc they are different people). Galadriel is not more "pure" or "loved" than Celebrimbor. Neither is blameless (i.e. both were ambitious) and neither is deserving of torture (nobody deserves that, even Sauron). It's because there is different symbolism to the way they are being hurt. Arrows being used as martyrdom is a millennia old way of showing homosexuality. Stabbing is metaphorical of penetration. He intended to kill both of them for denying them the Nine. Because Sauron is bad at impulse control, he takes and believes he is wiser than he is. If he wants something he will take it and then regret that he broke his favorite thing. (note he doesn't regret killing other people he doesn't twistedly love, like mirdania, or the orcs).

Galadriel had Nenya (i.e. Celebrimbor's magic, untouched by sauron) and Elrond was able to save her (love and light win the day). Celebrimbor died as symbolic for what happened to Eregion (he was alone and eregion fell).

This doesn't mean BOTH scenes aren't meant to be erotic. The stabbing is hot and the caressing of the arrows are hot. But they are hot in a BDSM/noncon way. "Do you understand what it's like to be tortured by a god?" sorta way.

Pragmatically, though, the reason we don't see more graphic galadriel is because it would make audiences uncomfortable. You can be way more graphic with gay shit and people won't be squicked than if you are graphic with m/f abuse. As i said, a good 50-70% of the audience won't even NOTICE the gay shit and think its just standard fantasy violence. The closer you make it to outright rape, the less compelling it is, because Sauron needs to both be APPEALING and EVIL in order to understand why people are drawn to the rings of power and why it is essential to oppose it.

[disclaimer: this is not anti galadriel x sauron, it is just in favor of seeing the ship in a dark way as part of the larger narrative. When I talk about shipping them in a dark way i don't mean simply its my kink, i mean this is a dark seduction story at heart. The actors are very hot, their acting is very sexy, but the function in the larger story is to display the different ways sauron tempts and corrupts people, including galadriel, celebrimbor, adar, and how sauron himself was corrupted by melkor].

[stanlunter]

Being multishipper is cool, until you get hate from both sides and all fans of ships you like

[yourwrong]

“They never even meet in canon” *takes a drag from a cigarette* back in my day we shipped ppl who weren’t even in the same franchise

That was the fun. More than half the time they didn’t have a chance to even be considered to be canon. We shipped things that we didn’t even want to be canon. It fun, silly goofy. Make shipping silly goofy again!

[bluequeerio]

I’m in a weird mood so time to talk abt circus yuri :3

Tbh all the tadc yuri ships r pretty cute like yeah I’m a diehard ragapom shipper but THEYRE ALL SO AAAAAA

I just saw an adorable Zooble x Pomni fanart on Pinterest and I’m like yk what I see u. And not to mention the…interesting to say the least ragaribbons fanart I’ve gotten here on my feed lmao XD I get it tho. I fw multi shipping lowkey 🫢✨

Yk that one joke Michael Kovach made abt the tadc characters being one large polycule? That’s me with the yuri 🫡 except it’s kind of a joke but not really

[twospiritstooprideful]

Hey, you there

Yes, you, person who doesn't like canon ships

It's okay

And, you, person who doesn't like the popular ships

It's okay!

Ship those characters with whoever you wanna

or don't ship them at all

Who cares!

[pigeonxp]

“can’t handle people multishipping like mature adults”

It’s clear our issue isn’t with multishippers. It’s with people who after barely any screentime and people bent over backwards to put this guest character on a pedestal and scream about how he should be endgame to the point of attacking the main actors of the show, touting headcanons made up by a guest star as canon fact, and generally harassing anyone who doesn’t like their ship. We’re the ones that apparently can’t handle multishippers but time and time again BT shippers have proven they cannot handle people simply not liking their ship - a very normal thing that happens in fandom. There’s a reason for terms like OTP and NOTP. Just because you multiship doesn’t mean one of those ships can’t be my NOTP.

speak on it anon !

on a more serious note tho, i have no problem with multishippers but u cant expect EVERYBODY to be a multishipper yk? like its not a crime to dislike a ship or a character.

[imakatperson22]

PSA to all you Tommy/Lou hating weirdos out there (and the anti buddies too):

If you don’t properly tag your garbage as anti so that my tag filters work as god intended, I will simply resort to blocking your entire account. So now instead of not seeing just your bad takes, I will also not be seeing any good takes you may possibly have as well.

[bibuckaroo]

kinda afraid to step in this discourse, most of all because i didn’t even finish the show yet (but i just finished s2!!!) but i’ve seen a lot of this fandom behavior and fandoms’ behavior in general.

and like i see a lot of bucktommys complaining about the buddie fandom (including in the buddie tag) but i never actually see the buddie fandom doing anything that terrible, like what i saw the most was them stating they don’t like tommy and even the actor that plays him, but they stayed in their lane and didn’t harass anyone?? maybe i’m in a privileged part of the fandom.

also, saw even people who claim to be from the buddie fandom talking about how this behavior is ruining the experience for them?? and i’m like what behavior?? and this is literally how fandoms work!!! there’s always fights!!!

all i’m saying is if it’s bothering you so much, just block these people (i know i did) and if it’s something truly serious, report them!!!

however, if it’s taking the joy out of the experience for you, maybe you’re just not that into it anymore.

[idyllghost]

Gen question cause I was on the clock app last night and I’ve been on the internet and fandom spaces since I was 8; are there people (especially new fandom people) who actually think multi-shipping is bad?

[jacki-daytona]

“Rarepair goes canon and the crowd goes wild!”

In every fandom I’ve been apart of over the many (many…) years, I have always been a multishipper. Give me a pairing and write it well, I’ll ship it! Give me a comfort character and write them into any relationship that supports them and I’ll ship it! Character A looked at Character B’s best friends neighbours boss that one time? I’ll take 30k words of fic please. Give me OTP’s and OT3’s and more please please please!

The fact that a rarepair (quite possibly the rarest of pairs!) that I’ve shipped prior is now canon is quite frankly hilarious to behold and I fucking love it. Buck and Tommy, who knew we’d ever be here 😆?

I totally understand some disappointment here and there, and absolutely get it when it’s a matter of tagging and not tagging content etc.

I guess in this case, we do know that this is a short term thing and I’m getting ready to absolutely lose my shit when Buddie goes canon - as in, check on me cuz I might have died for the delight of seeing it y’know?

In conclusion, tag your spoilers, my ship is not your ship/your ship is not my ship, there’s no betrayal in multishipping, fandom remains a fucking delight and bless this bisexual mess to us all.

Xoxo, from a fandom oldie who just wants everyone to have a nice time :)

[mai-komagata]

addendum: adar

followup to my last post. Adar doesn't die in the same way as celebrimbor and galadriel because Sauron doesn't "love" him anymore. He is over him. That bitch had orcs kill him and turn him into worms *and* he had to restrain himself from killing him once because he was seducing galadriel and she ended up saying NO. What a waste. What fitting end to him to be killed by his own children that Sauron had promised him.

[bluemagi]

Re. Jumping ship and multishipping

I've been thinking a lot about this these past few weeks, since a certain hot pilot swooped in and stole my heart. I've seen people giving other people shit for "giving up" and jumping ship, for multishipping or even just for liking and enjoying a character. And it's just weird to me how people are so obsessed with controlling other people's behaviors. Just the other day I saw a TikTok where the creator was saying that people who "jumped ship" to Bucktommy were just fetishising because they want to see two guys kissing. Which is just... a terrible take on so many levels.

I was a Buddie shipper too. I enjoyed their on-screen relationship, I saw the signs that there might be more than friendship, and I hoped that something might happen. But I have also been in fandoms for at least 20 years by now. I've been through queerbaiting, I have been through shipbaiting, I have been through relationships I previously loved being destroyed by what happens on screen. I know that nothing is promised and that we have to have realistic expectations. Our interpretations of things are usually not what the writers/actors/directors/editors intend, and so we can always hope, but we have to know that we probably won't get what we want.

I think I grew a bit bored with the Buddie ship around season 5. I was watching queer representation in other shows, like Tarlos in Lone Star, and I couldn't see 911 ever go there, especially as time went on and nothing happened, there were no obvious signs. I didn't think they would ever make Buck or Eddie queer. I still enjoyed the show for what it was and would watch when I had the time, but I wasn't obsessing over it anymore. I would watch the show and hope that either one of them would get an interesting love interest (I actually sort of liked Natalia at the end of season 6), and until that happened, I would just enjoy Buddie outside of that, in fan fictions and Tumblr discourse.

So imagine my surprise when they finally did it, when they actually made Bi Buck canon. Since Tommy had been on the show before, we already knew a lot about him, and we could also read into the difference between s2 Tommy and s7 Tommy and see that there had been a lot of development there. So yeah, I was immediately interested. The more I saw, the more interested I became. So while I can still love and appreciate Buddie, it is far more interesting to me to have actual substance with an on-screen relationship, rather than having to try to interpret and read into every interaction to see if it can relate to Buddie.

But, back to jumping ship and multishipping. I've been thinking back through my fandom history, and I realized that this is something I have gone through several times before, in one way or another. I started out with soap operas, and in those, everyone cheats and nobody is ever happy for long, so jumping ship back and forth happens. Suddenly a character is killed, only to come back to life several years later. They completely change personalities, they change faces (new actors), so things change a lot. I suppose that might be why multishipping and jumping ship is not really an issue for me. It just make sense that you can change your mind about something when more content comes out. It's sort of like a relationship. You can be happy and in love for a while, or for a long time, but things change, people grow, and suddenly that relationship is not right for you anymore.

So I was thinking back on my previous experiences with jumping ship and multishipping, and I just scribbled down some thoughts on them. Starting with....

As The World Turns - Nuke vs. LuRe

I think one of the first times I jumped ship, was from Noah/Luke to Luke/Reid in As The World Turns. An American soap that ended in like 2011. Nuke were one of the first gay male couples on American day time TV, and if you have the time, please go read about them on Wikipedia, because their story is absolutely ridiculous and overdramatic, as most soap couples are. And since this was in the 00s / early 10s, they barely shared any kisses or intimacy. At certain points we were counting the days between their on-screen kisses, and I think we went 200 days without an on-screen kiss while they were in a romantic relationship on the show, and the first time they had sex, I think they just kissed and fucking jumped on the bed or something. It was just ridiculous. But it was representation, which there was not a lot of back in those days.

Then, my beloved Reid Oliver came into the picture. He was out and proud, he was confident, successful, unapologetic, he was just very interesting. Luke/Noah was young love, riddled with insecurity and drama. Luke/Reid was more confident, more adult. And also, it was an option! Back in those days, there were barely any queer characters on TV, and now there were three guys in one show. At the point when Reid came on to the show, I was already finding myself growing tired and annoyed with Nuke, and Noah specifically. So when he showed an interest in Luke and they began their relationship, I happily jumped over.

I was then punished by the show's cancellation and that fucking train, but that's beside the point.... Moving on!

Days of Our Lives - Will, Sonny and Paul

Now this was a fun one! I remember watching Days back when I was in elementary school. My friend and I would go home together from school and watch it before doing home work. I was better in English and in reading than her, so I would be reading the subtitles out loud to her so she could keep up with what was happening. I think Days actually helped me to learn English much better. So I remembered all the drama with Sami, Carrie, Lucas and Austin, and with baby Will. And it was a bit shocking to me when suddenly baby Will was an adult (or I guess in his late teens) and was coming out of the closet. This was around the same time as ATWT, I believe, around 2010, so again, there wasn't a lot of representation on TV.

Also, side note, this was before streaming was a thing, and I lived in Norway, so we didn't even have access to everything. I had to buy DVDs to watch stuff like Queer as Folk and The L Word.

Anyways, Will and Sonny became a couple, and with that, the first male same sex couple on the show. It was the only real option, so of course I shipped it. I am again reading the Wikipedia page for this couple, and their story is quite insane. They recast the role of Will at one point, and I didn't love how the character changed after the actor was changed. So when Paul came on the show, I was immediately drawn to him. His back story was interesting and the actor had amazing chemistry with everyone. So I shipped him with both Will and Sonny (and both versions of Will, tbh). And again, you simply must read the Wikipedia article about this. It was just pure insanity.

Supernatural – Dean, Cas, Benny

We cannot talk about shipping without talking about Destiel. It is simply not possible. I'm not even going to explain anything, because we're on Tumblr, everyone knows Destiel. So unsurprisingly, I am a Destiel shipper. I can't remember when I first started shipping them, but it must have been quite early. Probably not in season 4 when Cas first arrived, but probably in season 5.

So Destiel is an example where I haven't jumped ship, but instead, I have multishipped. Cas has unfortunately not really had any real love interest outside of Dean. I honestly can't even think of any, apart from that random woman he married when he had amnesia, which... just no, dude. But Dean however, he has had some options, and I haven't hated them.

Lisa, I loved her back in the early seasons. And when he went to live with her after season 5, I didn't hate it. I knew the chances of Destiel ever happening were slim to none, so I could enjoy Dean and Lisa together on screen while enjoying Dean and Cas in fan fictions.

Later, we met Benny. And I immediately loved him. He was so interesting, he had such an interesting relationship with Dean, and I was so mad when he died. Again, Dean was never shown to be anything but straight, so again, chances of anything happening here was also slim to none. But I could happily enjoy fan fictions and content on them, alongside with Destiel.

Other honorable mentions:

I was considering writing a whole section about Robron from Emmerdale, but I realized that I am still so pissed off about that whole thing, so I don't think I'd be able to articulate anything good from that. So instead I will just use this as an example of an on-screen couple that I absolutely loved, but that I ended up hating and abandoning due to what happened on screen. I jumped that ship straight into the ocean, and swam far far far away.

Klaine! The couple that got me into Tumblr in the first place! I loved Kurt from the first season, and I was so intrigued when Blaine came into the show (I was also a huge AVPM fan, so that just made it all the better). And I really enjoyed them together for the first couple of seasons. But thinking back, I think I fell out of love with them quite early on. Their stories didn't hit the same, it got boring. I was actually more interested in Karofsky by the time I stopped watching the show, which was probably part of the reason why I stopped watching. It was quite the unpopular opinion back then. Maybe still? I have no idea.

Gallavich! I loved Shameless back in the day, and Mickey and Ian were among my favorites. But at a certain point, I got fed up with it all and stopped watching. The on-and-off stuff got boring, important things got swept under the rug, and I didn't like the treatment of Mickey. Anyway, I gave up and stopped watching. It was only years later when the show was ending that I caught up and found out they actually ended up together. Which was amazing, but still left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth.

Anyways, my point is that there seems to be this opinion now that if you ship a couple, you are stuck with them for life. Jumping ship, or even multishipping, is seen as a betrayal, as something horrible. Shipping Buck and Tommy apparantly means that we hate Eddie, and that we don't care about the beautiful friendship and relationship Buck and Eddie have. But that is simply not the truth. At least not for me, or for most people I have seen discussing this.

At this point in time, I am going to enjoy the beautiful on-screen relationship that is Buck and Tommy, and I am excited to see where it goes. If that relationship ends, and somewhere down the line, Buck and Eddie finally end up together, I will probably be happy (as long as it is done right, like Oliver Stark himself has said).

[leandra-kinard]

Now why we can’t defend ourselves while buddies are here wishing us harm? Sometimes we don’t want to turn the other cheek…..

I never said anything about not defending yourselves. Gosh, some of you really are set to view and interpret everything in the worst way possible. And also so plainly wrong.

What's definitely NOT "defending" anyone is constantly posting negative stuff and making fun of even the harmless, perfectly benign aspects of the buddie fandom. That's stupid. It's so fucking stupid, why don't you see that?

It'll cause the perfectly normal, harmless buddie fans to be pissed off at Bucktommy shippers too (and rightfully so, in that instance). It's the same bullshit toxic attitude that we want to defend ourselves against.

You DO see how that is entirely counter-productive, immature, stupid and petty, right? Good.

Speak for yourself. I don't hate buddie shippers. I, and most Bucktommy shippers I know and frequently converse with, can't stand that there is a type of Buddie shippers (hence the name BoBs to distinguish them) that are toxic and vile.

If you actually hate all buddie shippers, you need to check your attitude, mate!

See, these are the types I'm talking about. The ones who can't even see that I spoke out of appreciation for and defense of buddie (even if platonically but with mention of non-platonic buddie shippers as NOT generally the enemy).

Just for you, anon, I'm gonna tag this buddie :-)

[wastelandroses]

Even though I’m a multishipper most of the time, I wouldn’t be fine if MiIeven was canon after the events of ST4, vol. 2 more specifically, and how the love triangle was handled overall. The sentence “I don’t care which one will be canon as long as all of them are happy” has been very common around circles that love both couples, MiIeven and Byler, but I can’t bring myself to agree.

I wouldn’t be fine if MiIeven was endgame after Will’s feelings were used as a prop to mend it. El should have herself told Mike how greatly she feels about him, or Will shouldn’t have to urge Mike to say “I love you” if the relationship was to be fixed. (However, I think they are doing this for a reason, but this is beside the point.)

Will is a gay boy in the 80’s, lives in a small conservative town that already hates his family. On top of that, he is terrified of coming out. Amongst everything else he has gone through, he does not need a storyline where his romantic love for his childhood best friend is neglected, turned into a plot device in favor of restoring a hetero relationship.

If they wanted to make Byler as an example of a tragic unrequited love, there are other ways to do it that doesn’t reek homophobia (and queerbait). The love triangle is not just a mindless fandom battle between who is better for Mike (or who he “actually loves”) like any other heterosexual love triangle in media. There is a difference between the two outcomes. One of them being filled with homophobic and disgusting writing choices that led to cause more unnecessary pain and trauma for a queer character and the other is a hopeful, refreshing ending along with another step forward in queer representation that the mainstream media lacks.

insp.

[ourlastbastion]

I will never understand people who act offended and pretend to be confused over how people can dare to ship something non-canon.

No, it doesn't mean we don't like the canon ship. There are a plethora of reasons why noncanon shit gets shipped. Such as:

Want to explore the dynamic this other pair provides

The ship is absolute nonsense and that's what makes it fun.

Saw a piece of fanart/fic about them and got hooked.

Them being together in any way would be the most mutually toxic thing on Earth and that makes it compelling.

Point is, shipping is about having fun exploring different relationship dynamics. It doesn't mean you think the ship should have been canon or that you wanted them to be making out on page/screen.

It's even more frustrating when the people going "How can you ship that? They're NOT in love / already have canon love interests!" despite their very public OTPS in other fandoms being, you guessed it, non-canon ships, some having other love interests in canon. Makes it more obvious that their 'confusion' is really just a thinly veiled excuse to complain about people shipping ships they don't like.

[daniclaytcn]

your multishipping post is so real. how is it that their arguments are always "this part of the fandom is so young", "this is probably their first fandom" (or the worst one i've seen "they're too puritan for it")... like no, i'm a fandom old who multiship in a lot of shows, i'm just not into this specific pairing 🤷🏼‍♀️

(the worst thing is that i don't even /hate/ them, i watch their scenes like i watched his scenes with his other LI -not excited about them but also not disinterested because it's part of his story-, and when i didn't post about him and his other LI that was okay but now it means i don't know how to fandom lol)

it's literally SO odd!! no one was saying this about, like bucktalia or even bucktaylor lmao. i need everyone to get a grip real quick because this is just very bizarre behavior.