#stop bringing your toxic shit into non fandom spaces.

[entropy-sea-system]

Ppl bringing shipcourse into communities w my identities... Whatever. Get a life lmao.

[mlmarint]

so here’s my thoughts about the “daddy issues” thing with the whole anti tommy shit

you guys are such fucking hypocrites

i would be totally on board with someone bringing that it’s not okay to sexualize someone’s trauma if that was the case. but guess whaaaaaaat???? THATS NOT THE CASE. and it’s not “terrible dialogue” either, there’s so many scenes with terrible dialogue in this show, but some of you should really stop and ask yourselfs WHY you didn’t like this one.

if eddie was the one to make a comment like that some of you’d be OVER THE MOON. i’ve NEVER seen ANYONE in this fandom talk about how a LOT of the buddie explicit fanfics have a daddy kink on it. and before any more comments, i REALLY HATE buddie fics with daddy kink because it always reminds me of christopher and do NOT want to think about christopher in that moment.

“that’s not the problem. the problem is that once again buck it’s with someone who doesn’t care about his trauma” oh grow the fuck up.

tommy LITERALLY decided to not date buck because he thought buck wasn’t ready for it, he gave buck his space, he at first didn’t want to go to maddie and chimney wedding with buck because he thought buck was acting on impulse and wanted him to take his time to be okay with who he is, and after he was sure he tried his best to be on time to his date.

and also!!!! buck is a little “freak” in bed guys, he was a literal sex addict in season 1. every now and then the show reminds us this (like the ring cutter scene), also this is the second buck’s relationship with someone who’s like older than him. i wouldn’t be surprised if buck has a canon daddy kink because GUESS WHAAAAAT some people who have daddy issues??? THEY HAVE DADDY KINKS!!!!!

but you guys wanna know what i truly think?

i think that some of you (these tommy antis) are only here for buddie. you’re not here for the show, you’re here for buck and eddie. you’re not here for all these amazing characters!!! you’re not here for the fact that buck being a bisexual man discovering that side of him in his 30s its one of the most important things that happened in this show when we’re talking about lgbt+ characters and the importance of having something like that to be on media.

you’re not here for bi buck, you’re only here if this means that eddie will be with him. you’ll won’t be here if they decide to give a eddie queer discover story non related to buck on season 8 (and i truly think we’re going that way).

you only liked buck and tommy when you could sexualize two man kissing.

if you want to talk about something that is not okay that tommy did why don’t you rewatch the older episodes he’s in? he wasn’t a nice person back then and honestly i would like for them to bring that up!!! for them to show how a person can change and grow out of their prejudice and realize that they don’t need to be an ass and be okay with who they truly are. in fact why don’t we talk about how they hinted the fact that tommy didn’t like who he was when he was working with gerard? that he doesn’t like gerard and that he was a toxic person and that tommy grow up with a racist, homophobic and sexist dad???? that’s why he wasn’t a nice person back than but he’s different now and he’s a proud gay man and that once again that’s a nice thing to have on media because it shows how it’s NEVER too late to come in terms with who you are and change the way your are for better????

tommy isn’t perfect (and no one that he hurt before seems to actually care about it cause he did truly changed), but that doesn’t mean you need to cancel the guy FOR ONE SINGLE comment!!!! part of the 911 team made fun of buck for being sexually assaulted by his therapist but no one canceled them for it, did they?

honestly i am so fucking tired with fandoms in general.

at this point i hope we don’t get buddie being canon FOR A LONG TIME cause i want you guys to suffer with tommy and buck being in a happy relationship.

just remember: eddies it’s not canonical queer yet, there’s hints of it and they probably are going on that road with the whole thing they’re saying on interviews, BUT buck IS BISEXUAL and HE IS dating TOMMY you like it or not and it’s by far the most healthy relationship he EVER had in this show, can’t you be happy for him????

you can be a buddie shipper and still enjoy bucktommy because what we should truly want more than anything it’s buck and eddie to be happy with who they are.

and I SAY ALL THIS BEING A BUDDIE SHIPPER FOR YEARS

[o-wild-west-wind]

A Biracial Reading of OFMD, ft. Iggy’s Revenge Izcourse

a.k.a. I typed out a sentence that turned into an accidental essay of meta, whoops!

Y’all…I love this fandom to pieces, but I don’t think some of you realize why not all of us love Izzy/may be critiquing him. And major disclaimer—I am in NO WAY telling anyone to stop enjoying him as a character. This is NOT an anti-Izzy post (I will go into more detail on why I in fact encourage you to keep doing so later, and to the people who are sending unsolicited hate mail to Izzy fans & haters alike: please don’t!)—I’m just tired of seeing vitriolic hate against the people writing about him as an antagonist, or critiquing his actions based on canon, or post after post of “why don’t people love Izzy like I do!!” and then aggression when people explain their honest opinions. Look: we all have our skrungly little bad guys. I get it!! I’ve got my own collection!! I too have become a consumer and enjoyer of the Izzy fanon!!! PLEASE don’t take this as an attack—I just want to provide some personal, potentially fresh context from at least one (obviously non-exhaustive) perspective for those who want to know why Izzy isn’t universally adored, and also to make a plea for a safer fandom space where we can talk about our perspectives on these fictional characters without escalating to unnecessary vitriol, especially as s2 be upon ye (bc holy shit fandom is supposed to be fun, we’re having fun and that’s an order 😤)

(Oh, and I know I’m potentially stirring the pot with this post, but this should go without saying: don’t send each other death threats. What the fuck. Nobody do this?!)

So now that the legalize is out of the way: I want to share that the reason I initially imprinted on this show—and on Ed specifically—was because I’d never seen an explicitly biracial character treated with such complexity, nuance, and grace. While our ethnic makeups are vastly different, I too am half-white & half-brown—which means we’re absolutely nothing culturally alike, but our worlds view and treat us as pretty much the same regardless. And like Ed, my dad resents my mom and my racial makeup, and is prone to what I like to call “white violence.” Not going to overshare on the internet, but let’s just say that all this compounded makes Ed feel highly relatable to me (although for legal purposes I promise I have not krakened my dad 🙃).

When I first watched the show (and honestly also until my 3rd or 4th rewatch), Izzy IMMEDIATELY made me think of my dad. He also immediately made me think of Ed’s dad. Their mannerisms, word choices, and tones of voice; the obsessive need for control; the default of violence; the gradual dehumanization until an ultimate kraken-ifying breaking point—it all read to me like an intentional parallel. A shadow of white violence following Ed around that he hasn’t been able to shake, and mirroring to him the things he fears the most, including the things he fears within himself and feels forced to become (he is half-white after all, and this is a whole other post, but tl;dr there can be a lot of baggage that comes with being half-white/half-poc in regards to grappling with your toxic relationship to that white side of yourself, and especially if your white parent was racist and/or violent). And you can claim a different reading of all of this if you want (I genuinely mean that, like I’m in favor of meta & I think it’s great to analyze these things) BUT. that does not change the fact that I felt what I felt as a result of what was portrayed on screen and combined with my lived experience. Because fictional characters are just that—fictional—and are vessels by which you can process the world; we will always bring our personal lived experiences to anything we consume, and that’s okay—that can be the point, even. Art imitates life imitates art. Interpretation is the name of the game!

(more under the cut)

So when I watch this show, it’s a helpful tool for me to process my own feelings of being victimized by the white violence that’s followed me around my whole life, as well as the ways in which I’ve rebelled against it/tried to make peace with a non-toxic version of whiteness (in parallel to the more overt theme of masculinity, which is—ding ding—inexplicably tied to whiteness and western colonialism) via chaos, love, hurt, and sometimes giving up and giving in—and in this process, Izzy is a safe target. And you know why that is? Because he’s FICTIONAL. I can feel rage towards him because he’s NOT REAL. I can better understand and process the pain I’ve felt and rarely seen societally acknowledged by watching it paralleled on screen via actors and writers who have likely also grappled with similar feelings (I mean, I genuinely have made more progress with my personal biracial trauma via this show vs. years of therapy), and if I want to assume the worst of Izzy based on my interpretation of canon to help me through this? That’s fine! Because I can’t hurt his feelings and he can’t hurt mine!! Because he’s not real!!!

And here’s why I still support the Izzy-enjoyment: I am sure that many of the people who love Izzy and defend him to the ends of the earth probably feel a similar way that I do about Ed. It’s why we get all riled up and protective of these characters, why we might take attacks on them as attacks on ourselves; recognition of the self in the form of the other, and all that. Izzy is a vessel by which to safely work through the dark feelings and the pain you’ve bottled up—and he’s a safe way to do that because he’s FICTIONAL. And that’s a beautiful thing imo!! That’s truly the beauty of art—it is what we make of it, and what we make of it helps make ourselves better. It’s good to be open to interpretation.

HOWEVER: that does not give you permission to discount my relationship to this show (as I will not discount yours), and more importantly: that does NOT give you permission to reject the notion that canonically in s1, Izzy is literally and thematically (emphasis on thematically) an antagonist who is purposefully written to cause harm that can be interpreted as a hate crime, especially to those with lived experience of homophobia/racism/ableism/bullying/etc.—and you cannot harass people about this when conversing about theories of canon. If someone sees Izzy’s dialogue as cutting, degrading, and even triggering, that’s extremely fair of them to do so—clearly Ed was written to feel it that way! Con himself has paralleled Izzy with Judas! And can interpret it all differently? Sure! But you CANNOT assume that everyone else will, and then get upset when people don’t. I can’t believe I need to spell this out about an angry white guy in a show about toxic masculinity, but if someone does not like Izzy, it is likely due to a personal history of harassment (or worse) that he is reminiscent of; by making a point to defend him to someone—even if you are well-intentioned—you are very much putting salt in a wound.

I want to take this opportunity to further emphasize some tenets of fandom in general:

you can like characters who do horrible things without needing to jump hoops to argue their morals as pure 👏

conversely, you can critique their actions and still like them (encouraged, even) 👏

you can like characters who do horrible things simply because they’re cool and hot and interesting—don’t worry, we know it’s not the same as liking people like them irl 👏

your liking a villain archetype says nothing about your own moral virtue 👏

you can like horrible characters and see reasons for why they are the way they are/view them as tragic/note sympathetic dimensions of their personality/root for them to have redemption arcs while acknowledging that said redemption arc may not have happened in canon yet and that these are implicit, not explicit, readings of canon 👏

and you can also reimagine canon and change their contexts in fan works so that they ARE morally virtuous 👏 but PLEASE just be mindful and accountable when you do this in a context where not everyone will see a character the same way as you, and where multiple of people of marginalized identities have spoken out about the harm not doing so can cause. Just be honest, sincere, and kind, listen and learn, and don’t harass people for understandably needing space from a character that symbolizes something different to them than it does to you.

Also: blocking tags or people just because they have character opinions different than yours is totally okay and does not mean anything other than “I am curating my online space to have a better time,” it’s NOT personal

And most importantly: FANDOM IS FOR FUN! This isn’t our day job! We come to fandom to decompress. Don’t ruin people’s safe spaces!!!

Like I said, I’ve grown to enjoy Izzy over time thanks to fandom and fanon, and I think it’s fantastic that fandom can have such diversity in the way it interprets canon. I can’t wait for his probable redemption arc (it will likely be a healing thing to witness for many of us) and I’m truly glad that we can all have different relationships to the same characters. But please—when some of us need Izzy to be a punching bag, just let him be a punching bag. No, it’s not homophobic and DEFINTELY not misogynistic to view him as an obstacle in Ed and Stede’s relationship (baffled by the amount of times I’ve seen this take—it’s a funny joke but if you actually think Izzy is treated the way female characters related to other mlm ships have been treated, the point is very much going whoosh). You don’t have to engage; it’s not personal. It’s not about YOUR relationship with him—it’s about MINE. Please let me feel and even discuss rage towards him when I think about episode 10. Please let me throw as many sandwiches at his head as I need to. Because I PROMISE, it won’t hurt him—because he, and none of these characters, are real; and yet we, the fans, very much are.

[shimmershae]

Just a few random thoughts and observations about Daryl’s Origins episode.

Basically my stream of consciousness bullshit brought over from Twitter, lol.  I almost didn’t watch the episode after seeing all the drama over there, but ultimately I decided to because frankly?  I don’t trust certain fans’ perceptions of events.  For reasons.  It’s best, I feel, to always watch with your own eyes and form your own independent opinions because this fandom is teeming with people that delight in tormenting other fans by being very selective and oftentimes downright misrepresentative about what they pass along.  

More under the cut because this is random and all over the place and basically excerpts of my live blogging while watching the special.  Did I mention it’s random?  

You know.  It sure would be nice not going into one of these things so apprehensive.  Maybe one day, hmm?  

First things first.  From the very beginning of this Origins episode, I’m reminded of two things:  1).  Our introduction to Daryl, his colorful Dixonese, and his particular brand of humor certainly stands out as one of show's more memorable introductions.  2).  TWD certainly regressed on the deer front. I mean.  Daryl's deer>Richonne's deer.

I’m never going to get over "On Golden Pond."  Never ever and look.  I actually liked Dale but Daryl spitting those words at him still makes me laugh until I'm weak.

Daryl's still searching all these years later.  Or is he?  Really?  Seems to me the man's found exactly what he's been looking for and he's been chasing it since he came back from those woods:  a future with his soulmate.  The one that happens to be his best friend.  OFC, I’m talking about Carol. Who else?  

How pretty and soft are baby Daryl and Carol?  Too pretty and soft for this tired heart to withstand.  Like I love all versions of them, but baby Daryl and Carol just hit different.  

My immediate thought re: the Beth comment-- Misreads the situation?  WTF?  Whoever wrote this script just had to re-inject some eww into the narrative didn't they?  All those damn dirty spoons.  Ever think about how much it probably reeks in that office space?

Moving along, though.  Here’s some real facts.  Carol is so intrinsically woven into the fabric of Daryl's story, the only way she can be removed is if they are literally both destroyed and cease to exist.  Something happens to Carol?  The man is going to be a reanimated body without a heartbeat.  Basically a Walker.

 An aside, I know they're not making me rewatch a scene I haven't watched since the first time it aired.  The way Negan's head bashing tendencies had me seeing red and wanting that barbed wire bat shoved up his ass every time I saw his face.  My JDM love really took a serious hit for awhile.  I'm never going to forgive the character that hateful act.  I just can't.

Somehow I wasn't expecting this to be a teleprompter-fest.  Like who wrote this script?  Hmm.   Sorry.  Don't mind me.  Lost in my thoughts per usual. You know.  It still strikes me as hella insensitive that Rick had Daryl leading the Sanctuary community knowing what he suffered there.  There's no way Daryl would have returned that kind of favor.  

Yep.  Leah still feels tacked on last minute.  A means to an end.  Sigh.   They completely glossed her over here.  Too bad they had that lapse in judgment with some other toxic waste.  I cannot believe they touched that with a ten foot pole.  It's just cringe-worthy and wrong.

"Daryl can't say no to Carol."  They say those words and I’m like “Join the club, my dude.  Join the club, lol.”  

You know.  All the Carol-related moments in this Daryl Dixon recap speak for themselves.  She's his person, dammit.

Okay though.  That reunion in the tall grass with the sun shining on them all golden and picturesque, after Alpha’s taken Daryl to show him her horde?  That's some romance novel shit right there.  "Look at me.  Just look at me."   I'm never going to recover from that moment or the discovery of Sophia.  They break my heart so.  

This recap is literally 2/3's Carol and the other 1/3 Rick and everybody else.  I mean.  It's so obvious.  Utterly and completely misrepresented by some agenda-driven folks.  

"We have a future."   Oh.  Just some pretty, meaningless words you say everyday to all your friends, lol.   Just friends my whole entire ass.  

"I'm never gonna hate you."  Okay, AMC.  Back up all the talk with some action that even the most willfully blind cannot deny, m'kay?  Because they're not going to buy it until you're explicit about it.  Just saying.

The amount of times "Carol" has left this man's mouth during this recap, lol, and some people keep wanting to ignore it. 

Aww.  Guess who they showed when Daryl mentioned family?  How sweet.  And when they mentioned purpose in connection with C0nnie, it was not any indication of romance, IMHO.  

Let me explain.  

By the time C0nnie is lost,  Daryl’s floundering because he feels he hasn’t been able to help Carol despite giving it all and pushing back his previously established comfort zone(s).  Enter these pair of sisters.  And they put him in mind of the good parts of him and Merle.  Probably they make him remember  the Greene girls when things were good and hopeful before they went sideways.  In some small way, he’s probably reminded of other family units like Rick and Carl and Lori and Carol and Sophia and later Henry.  And all of those people have something in common.  Well, besides being people Daryl has known and cared for.  They’ve seen their family units fractured and/or destroyed by tragedies wrought by the world they live in.   They made a point and emphasized that Daryl’s a searcher and also that family matters to him.  In some way or form he’s been doing his best to help repair or reunite all these different family members since the beginning and ultimately he’s failed to succeed each time.  So yeah.  He’s been given a purpose in a time of uncertainty again with her because this time he’s determined to get it right.  This time he wants to bring the two sisters back together the way he couldn’t do for the Greene girls.  Like I did not, do not read anything romantic at all into that comment. Just my take on things.  Obviously, everyone else’s mileage may vary.  I’ll step off my soapbox now.  Hopefully, maybe these words might comfort.  

So relax, lovelies.  It wasn't as bad as I feared.  Sure, they could have left that one icky comment out but they didn't and honestly?  I don't think it's a positive for that particular 'relationship' because it's something that's brought up to show just how messed up Daryl was.  Because grown men that have their heads on straight don't usually have those type of misreads.  They know they are inappropriate.  Like I'm not putting Daryl into the pedo category because I don't feel like he belongs there.  But I can see how him being so emotionally stunted and naive so far as interpersonal relationships and the nuances of friendship and non-toxic family could lend itself to him maybe reading more into those moments than were really there and not really knowing how to deal.  

Whoever wrote that teleprompter script though?  That particular asshole is probably grinning like a donkey with a mouth full of briars at all the unnecessary drama they stirred up yet again. Like newsflash, goober.  There are better ways to foster interest in your show.

They should hire a team of fans to do the promotion.  Fans that represent all factions of this fractured fandom so the promotion is well-rounded and not so heavily slanted toward any one of them but the diverse fandom as a whole.

Stop fanning the stupid ship wars and just celebrate the damn characters and the overall story.   Nothing new or groundbreaking to see on this first Origins story but hey.  Who doesn't mind a decent recap now and then?  That said, don't sweat not having AMC+ or feel like you missed all that much because you didn't.

I do have to say.  Them pretending B3th was the first girl to be nice to Daryl really had me going WTF.  

I mean, there’s this little exchange from Carol, the first woman to be nice to Daryl, probably the first person from the group--

"You're every bit as good as them.  Every bit."   

  AMC?  TWD?  Do you even watch your own show?  

There you have it.  My bullshit stream of consciousness, originally posted over on Twitter as I liveblogged the show.  Hope you got something helpful or of entertainment value from this.  

Goodnight, lovelies.  

Until next time.  

[dystopiandilfs]

I am never been so close to anti-stan then I am right now. Dreams Twitter fanbase started the biggest hate train on him because they themselves:

1. Took his inital tweet with the drugs comment as a race issue, like it was obvious that was not the intent or even the focus.

2. Got mad at his completely rational reply to a toxic Stan that used both white and adhd as an isult - the toxic Stan was saying his fanbase will dogpile them, well if you didn’t phrase your concerns in a toxic way in a public place maybe you wouldn’t be concerned about it. Like he empasised he had no intent to relate it to rap - and they see him say rap and fucking ran with it.

3. Got mad at him for disagreeing with someone generalizing his 23 million fans as anti-black, like even his stance on stans is entirely anti-generalizing, he literally denounced any that are in the same comment.

4. Bullied him into unprivating his account because they can’t share screenshots apparently.

5. Got mad a him for tweeting a fucking heart.

Then they turn around and blame the entire thing on the antis, like no. You blew it out of proportion and reacted like shit to everything he did. You are the problem. All the responses to his last tweet are “educate yourself and reflect” and “come back with a better apology” like no. He apologized when he shouldn’t have and you cyber bullied him. They are bloody proud of theirselves for “holding him accountable“ for something they misconstrued.

He needs to delete that stan video because they aren’t worth it.

First thing i want to say is that this post is going to be joint answered as evangeline is white so this is going to be answered by her and me as im half african half american. Normally evanageline would be voicing her opinions and adding ours in if we had any but as its a racism issue she didnt feel comfortable to voice only her opinions. However shes the one writing the post apart from this bit to keep up the consistentcy of the blog page. -Trinity (Basically Trin gave her thoughts using a voice note and I slightly edited it so the sentences were a bit more coherent and added both mine and the other admins opinions as Trin doesn't really use twitter unless it's through my priv account - Evangeline)

I will say that a lot of the fan drama that you see are a smaller group that is known to attack and harass Dream and anyone who disagrees with anything. Eventhough they are a small group they mass reply to everything and make themselves look bigger than they are. Not only that but the only thing they end up doing is overshadowing the original issue at hand which is fans harassing and being racist to eachother. So a lot of what I'm about to say is mainly what this group is doing and isn't at all a reflection of a lot of fans but it is something that needs to be talked about especially since a bunch of this groups members are either white or white passing but get mad on black people's behalf and is basically setting them up.

I don't mean to be rude or dismissive but a lot of people used this as an opportunity to trauma dump. Like I know going into horrible details about what you have to deal with is the only way to get the point across sometimes however harassing Dream and spamming him with stuff like "I was harassed because I'm gay" "I was doxxed because I was Asian" is lowkey weird. Like why are you telling this random guy on the internet that you were doxxed? What is he going to be able to do about it? Also not to defend Dream but how are you going to sit there and break one of his few boundaries whilst trying to educate him.

On top of that the issue was originally how racist some of the fandom are to black people but then other minority groups started talking about how they were also being stereotyped and attacked but all this is doing is talking over other minorities. For example a large group of fans started off talking about how they were being attacked by other stans because of their skin colour but then immediately started to harass and threaten others. Like some were clearly not being serious but dming people and update accounts to retweet and spread awareness isn't the move you think it is. Obviously a lot of them were genuinely trying to spread awareness and were trying to get the respect and treatment they deserve but all of that was being overshadowed by the few that were attacking and harassing creators and fans. Then a lot of it turned into minorites fighting each other over who was more oppressed which just makes the whole thing seem like petty drama.

I will say a lot of them were lovely. I am pretty uneducated on race based issues and how certain things effect people and can be racist so I was asking a lot of questions and most of them were nice. However I also got a lot of snarky ones like "google it" to questions that weren't general like "Is it mocking to call white people crackers and token white boy if you are a white person" or "is ______ considered micro aggressions"

However as usual it went from trying to educate your creators to who is the most oppressed and who can bring up more past drama that has already been addressed multiple times. I'm not being funny but the fact that some well known Dream antis were defending Dream and shitting on stans should really tell you how non productive this is. It went from "Hey Dream this comment is a bit weird can you delete it please" to "Dream you should stop being friends with this person and you should follow this person otherwise your racist" Like that's not helping anyone. The only thing that it's doing is breaking Dreams boundaries, setting Dream up and making stans look bad.

Like people were @ing Sapnap and George telling them to "collect the racist friend" like how is that spreading awareness. The whole thing went from being a good chance to educate to a big fucking joke that just made a lot of people upset and anxious.

Honestly the whole thing was pretty fucking hypocritical like you can't talk about being harassed whilst harassing people into hearing you out. A lot of the issues seemed really gatekeepy to me as well. One that I saw constantly get brought up was that the only people allowed to say dy*e were black lesbians as they created the word. Like a big topic was a misuse of aave but not a single person actual explained what it was or gave examples all I saw was "mcyttwt needs to stop using aave language it's offensive" like you can't claim to be educating people if you don't explain. Not everyone can access websites and caards that get linked because of regions or web rescrictions so they're not helpful either.

HOWEVER I will agree that a lot of their points were completely valid like the whole thing of "Feral Feb" over shadowing BHM and whenever Dream listens to rap people complain and call it bad music are two really good examples. I listened to a few twitter spaces to learn a bit more and things that were said in there was all good info that would be genuinely helpful to know and it really did help edcuate me however not a single tweet said any of it and that's why people don't understand what they're doing is wrong because nobody explains it.

A lot of the issues that people had with Dream were so weird as well like a lot of them were self oppression and turning normal things into racism. A lot of the issues had the same energy as the 404twt fans who were genuinely mad at Dream for having a colour that George couldn't see and they were harassing him and claiming that he was purposely excluding diasbilities.

Usually we would add more but Trinity got a bit upset and stressed so she had to stop answering various asks and the other admins are all white or white passing and don't feel like it's our place to put our own opinions. We will try to answer other asks with similar thoughts later - Evangeline

[rainbowsky]

I would like to rent my thoughts if you don’t mind... I’ve seen a lots of anons (not necessarily on your blog) complaining about delulu shippers, so I would like to add my view to that. I should probably start with this - I don’t ship xz and wyb, I really don’t see any deeper connection between them beyond friendship (I am sorry) but still, I only follow bxg blogs.. It pains me everytime I come across xz/wyb’s solo stans. There is so much hatred, especially from xz international solo stans. The’ve been slandering wyb non-stop. As a long time k-pop fan, and an EXO-L, I’ve been put through a lot of shit and called many names for being a fan of EXO. It has never bothered me though, because as long as those haters weren’t slandering EXO members, I, honestly, didn’t take their harsh words to heart. (Fan wars between EXO-L and ARMYs are just hilarious tbh.) What hurts me, though, is that I had thought the k-pop fandom was a mess, because of those fanwars, but I was literally slapped in the face when I realized it’s not much better in the c-ent fandom. It is one thing if there is a fanwar between mtjj and xfx, but another thing is when said artists are dragged in to this. My heart breaks everytime I see xfx harassing and slandering wyb, or mtjj attacking xz. With all the negativity and bad things happening in the world, being in a fandom should be a pleasant experience, but it is not. I was very reluctant at first to follow any bjyx accounts, because many things that some of the accounts posted made me really uncomfortable (such as speculating about certain personal stuff, sex-related stuff, etc.) but later on I realized bjyx is actually my only safe place. I can enjoy fangirling over both artists without having anyone costantly jumping on my back and calling me a traitor for supporting a said artistist who “hurt” their precious gg so much. (Sometimes I wonder if they realize they are doing the same thing they hate the other party for...) I would like to say that it is 100% better to deal with delulu people with no ill intentions than with evil people. I am even sure, though I have no proof for it, that xz/wyb are rather fine being shipped than seeing their fans fighting each other. With all being said, I hope their friendship overcame the difficulties 2020 brought upon them (even though I am not sure we will ever know) and will be both happy in upcoming years. I also pray for people being f* stupid and hateful. Enjoy things you like and ignore those you don’t. May 2021 bring the best for the whole world.

(PS: sorry, I know my English is not the best)

(PS2: I know not every solo stan is a douchebag but there are many of them, more than you think)

Your English is excellent, Anon.

It was interesting reading your thoughts. You are not the first non-CP fan to tell me they are more comfortable in BXG-land than in solo fan land. There are even solo fans who only like one of the boys, who are uncomfortable enough with the fan wars that they hang out a lot in BXG spaces to avoid hearing hate being spewed about other idols.

We may all be a bunch of clowns, but we are generally very friendly clowns who truly love both GG and DD, and that’s reflected in the tone of our communities. I often find it jarring when I go into solo fan spaces, just how toxic some of it can be. Not that we don’t have our share of drama here, but it’s fairly rare and tends to be resolved amicably for the most part.

I strongly believe that fan wars don’t serve anyone but the antis. An attack on one of them hurts them both. People who think they are supporting one idol by attacking the other are misguided. They are hurting their idol too.

And I don’t care whether a fan supports GG or DD, if they are spreading hate in their name, neither GG or DD would approve of that behavior.

[thewickedbohemian]

That autistic feel when despite not (or at least 99% of the time not) ever doing it for Harry Potter, you feel the same sort of “I’m afraid to like this or especially engage in any fanwork making or self-insertion [because I wouldn’t feel comfortable to have a me existing in a problematic world unless the problematicness was something she could Watsonianly change] because of [problematic thing x, y or z] unless I was somehow given full enough creative control of the work/series/whatever to retcon out the problematic bits in a way that makes sense for universe setup or just reboot it enough years down the line or the fandom was able to pressure someone into doing that through petitions and social media” a lot of people feel for Harry Potter for other fandoms when someone brings up how they’re supposedly problematic even if you enjoy those fandoms up to that point. Some examples (that aren’t stuff like Overwatch I’ve talked about on other posts) are

I was afraid to be an MCU fan or even write potential future films for it in ways I’d want because I saw some post saying that some people-voted acting award shouldn’t go to Elizabeth Olsen for WandaVision because despite knocking it out of the park as Wanda she was still not Wanda’s same ethnicities

Now that the upcoming show has put The School For Good And Evil back in the limelight I was too scared to check if there was a “new official” Ever or Never quiz or even retake the old one because of what someone said about the series being problematic because there were no non-toxic same-sex relationships so for some reason I especially as a wlw “didn’t think I belonged in that world”

Once I saw magicalgirlagency has a specific Hero Hangover Project dedicated to “rehabbing” (in the same way her WBMR stuff does for characters) BNHA characters because the creator seems to want to sacrifice them for misery or whatever, I felt like (even though even if I were Japanese and in the equivalent of my same life situation, there’d still be next to nil chance of an OC getting in at any point) I couldn’t make stuff featuring my BNHAsona Illustrator (so named because she can turn written words (within reason, only words for animals or objects) into what they represent) anymore (though I didn’t feel forced to HHP her) and also I felt like I had to return the BNHA manga volumes I own back to the store they came from as if that world is problematic enough that magicalgirlagency Ba-Sing-Se-d the series into being referred to as short-lived...

Every time I hear someone talk about how Steven Universe “glorified space fascism” because Steven didn’t kill what were essentially his aunts and instead was able to “make them nice teaching us we can just hug it out with real fascists and everything will be fine and they’ll stop being fascists”, I feel like I have to abandon my gemsona Sodalite and not even listen to any Steven Universe songs or put them on any showtune fanmixes for other characters

Hetalia makes me extremely conflicted as not only is there the angle of the writers supposedly (as A. one can never tell on Tumblr and B. if they are I don’t see it in their work) being Japanese nationalists but there is the issue of whether or not the series is anti-semitic which makes me feel guilty (especially now given the shit going down with Israel) for having created an Israel OC back when I first got into Hetalia who was somewhat of an antagonistic figure but A. eventually gets better and B. it’s only in the sense of why bullying victims turn to bullying others (and was also, good or bad, an Overwatch-esque genius-scientist-who-could-also-completely-beat-your-tuches-in-a-physical-fight)

[angryschnauzer]

Hi! *waves*

So some of you may have seen a somewhat change in direction (fandom wise) on my blog over the last few days, and for others i’m the new kid on the block stepping a toe into your fandom, and i wanted to explain but also say hi to all the new followers i’ve had over the last couple of days.

So, I’m Simone, but yeah everyone on here just tends to call me Schnauz (or when i do something really naughty; ANGRYSCHNAUZER in call caps). I live in England with my Husband and my Son (Little Dude). I’m a content creator (fanfic writer), i also fill my blog with pretty things, whether they be pretty men, landscapes, cartoons, anything i like.  I have no filter - i’m a smut writer and advocate expressing yourself however you see fit on your blog, so if a dude turns me on, i will say so (this can be when people shout at me in all caps). I am about to hit 40 (yes i’m an OLD person), but my inbox and message box is always open, and can give advice on anything you feel you can’t ask or tell other people (messaging is kept private, asks are non anon and will be posted), this includes sexual or gross body stuff!

I started on tumblr almost 7 years ago (yes i’m a relic), and was first of all in the Tom Hiddleston fandom, then after a couple of years i swayed into Sebastian Stan/Chris Evans fandom when the Hiddleston fandom went through a rough time and things got a bit hostile.  Well, that brings me to now, and i find myself wanting to find a new fandom, in part to escape some of the toxicity that has appeared in the Evanstan fandom in recent months. I’ve unfollowed a lot of people that would cause drama or were just bullies, although i know a very large portion of people are absolutely wonderful, i need to distance myself a little bit at the moment. Its ilke this;

Imagine over time you have tended to this field and its become a beautiful meadow, its diverse and everything works well together. And then someone lets their dog shit in the meadow. At first the people who tended the meadow clean it up, but then more people let their dogs shit in the meadow, it becomes an unpleasant place to be, it stinks. You do what you can to get people to clear up their own mess, but eventually you need to step back and let the people realise that they are shitting on their own beautiful place, and only they can put a stop to it. 

I still long for that meadow, i will whistfully remember the good times, know that there were many hundreds of people that helped create the beautiful space, and now i tend new plants to transplant into it once its cleaned up again, but in the meantime i find myself in need of a new field, a new meadow, where hopefully my spieces of plants (fics) will be welcome, without upsetting the balance. 

[thatonemsft15]

Knbvdaychallenge2020

Day 3 - Flowers/You’re beautiful, you know that?

Summary: Riko has self-doubts. There’s nothing Hyuuga has ever doubted about her (besides her cooking).

Relationship: Aida Riko/Hyuuga Junpei

Author’s Note: I know I’m late, but my fics wanted to cause trouble and end up longer than I intended, so I’m hecticly trying to get through them. This is the first one I was able to finish, and my first time ever posting a fic for Kuroko no Basket. Hope you guys like it!

Prompts by @vanilla-daydreams and @theuglycrybaby. Thank you guys so much for this little fandom boost!

Read it on AO3

Hyuuga is worried.

It’s not a particularly new feeling. He was worried when Kiyoshi got injured. He was worried they wouldn’t get any new recruits when their second year started. He’s been in a non-stop state of worry over losing his damn mind since they did get new recruits, and they all turned out to be little shits he regularly wants to beat the crap out of.

He’s never been worried about Aida Riko.

The toxic waste she calls food, yes, (Kagami’s been helping in that regard, so maybe he won’t have to risk dying just to spare her feelings anymore) but never Riko herself. Riko has only ever been strong, it’s one thing he’s always been able to count on, but earlier today she looked…frail.

Not pale, not ill, not malnourished. Hyuuga has seen her be all of those things at one point or another, but her resolve never once wavered. The strength of her mind, her character, everything that makes up the Riko he fears, admires, and lo—respects, seemed to have vanished. The Riko of today looked as if saying one wrong thing to her could shatter her into pieces.

So yeah, he’s worried. Even more so when he walks into their fifth class—ten minutes late because he had to speak with another teacher about a failed assignment—to find her usual seat empty. He gets scolded by their English teacher, and informed of what pages of grammar exercises to complete for the first half of class, before taking his usual seat by Koganei and Mitobe.

“Where’s Riko?” Hyuuga asks gruffly.

Koganei shrugs, brows furrowed in concentration. English has always been his worst subject.

Hyuuga clenches his jaw. He doesn’t know how to deal with things like this. It’s one of those situations that makes him wish he were more like Kiyoshi.

Kiyoshi’s an instigating bastard that likes to pretend he’s an airhead, but he always seems to know what people need. Hyuuga has never been good with other people—he’s not even sure how he’s managed to keep Izuki as a friend for so many years. He doesn’t even know how to ask someone what’s wrong without sounding like a dick.

Kiyoshi does.

Should he make an excuse to leave class and go find her?

Kiyoshi would.

What does Riko do when she’s upset? Where would she go?

Kiyoshi probably knows stuff like that.

He’s spent so much time trying to avoid certain aspects of his relationship with Riko that he’s realizing he may have neglected some very important other ones.

Koganei’s distraught voice breaks him out of his downward spiral.

“Rinn, for the last time, I don’t need your help. I’m gonna figure it—what?” Hyuuga leans over, catching Mitobe as he cuts Koga off with a serious of flustered gestures and a melancholy expression. “Oh.Oh.”

Koganei turns to him then, eyes somber.

Hyuuga feels a twinge of panic crawl up his spine. “What?”

“Mitobe says he might know where Riko is.”

He gives Koganei a ‘go on’ look, but the cat-mouthed boy just looks uncomfortable, shifting in his seat. Hyuuga promptly loses his patience.

“Am I gonna have to beat it out of you?”

He can tell Koganei wants to roll his eyes, but meets him with a serious expression instead.

“He said she’s probably at her mom’s grave.”

Hyuuga is silent and still for what feels like an impossibly long time. “Her mom’s…dead?”

Koganei turns to Mitobe, translating his ‘sign language’. “Yeah, a few years ago today.”

Hyuuga…doesn’t understand. Why wouldn’t he know something like this?

“She told you this?”

“No, he was looking up Kagetora-san and found articles from that year.”

Hyuuga leans back in his seat, mind wandering. He hasn’t opened his workbook, hasn’t even unzipped his bag.

He’s never asked Riko about her family. They’ve talked about her dad, of course, ever since Hyuuga found out who he was, but she’s never mentioned her mother.

Kiyoshi would know about Riko’s mom, because he would have asked. He’d know where to find her. He’d know how to console her.

“Fuck,” he curses under his breath, quickly gathering his bag. Mitobe and Koganei peer up at him, startled.

He ignores them, and their teacher’s disgruntled call of “Hyuuga-san!”, rushing out of the classroom. He doesn’t stop for anyone who calls out to him on his way out of the building, his thoughts swirling around and taunting him.

If Kiyoshi were here, he wouldn’t have let her out of his sight until he figured out the problem, and tried one of his patented Kiyoshi fix-it disasters that somehow always end up working.

If Kiyoshi were here, she wouldn’t have had to deal with this on her own.

If Kiyoshi were here…Hyuuga clenches his fists.

Sometimes, he feels like he’s the one who should’ve gone to America.

Sometimes, he wishes Kiyoshi was the one in love with Riko.

*****

“Romantic feelings toward Riko? Oh no, not at all. Don’t get me wrong, I love her. I love you. You guys are my best friends.”

“Oh. Thanks, I guess?”

“Also, I’m very gay.”

Hyuuga spits out his drink. Kiyoshi just laughs, clapping him on the back and handing him a napkin.

*****

Hyuuga finds her fairly easily. He always does.

It took less five minutes to find an article that mentioned which cemetery Riko’s mom is buried in, and with only one stop on the way, the trip was only about forty minutes in total. Upon arriving to the ornate cemetery gates, he’d spotted a head of short, caramel colored hair and their school uniform almost immediately, way up on one of the highest points of the lot.

He scales the hill, approaching a large, grey marble headstone cautiously, making just enough noise to alert Riko of his presence. He stops a few feet away from where she’s sitting with her knees hugged to her chest.

She doesn’t turn to face him, but addresses him all the same. “Hi Hyuuga.”

“How’d you know it was me?” He responds, softly for once.

“I saw you walking up to the gate.” Riko’s voice sounds thick with emotion. Grief.

He nods. Without another word, he bends down to gingerly place the bundle of flowers against the stone. He sits himself down down by Riko, close enough for comfort, but far enough not to crowd her space.

“Lilies?”

“For remembrance.”

“Ah. Thank you.”

Hyuuga shakes his head. “I’m sorry I didn’t know.”

Riko laughs weakly. “How could you have? It’s not like I go around broadcasting it.”

He wants to argue that he could’ve paid better attention, even done the slightest bit of research on her father like Mitobe apparently did, but this isn’t about him.

“She was a beautiful woman.” He acknowledges the photo resting against the stone. It’s of Riko’s father and a short-haired woman smiling with a smaller Riko in her arms.

“She was, wasn’t she? She was an amazing mom. Always there for me, encouraging me to do or be whatever made me feel best. Driven, too. She was well on her way to becoming one of the best family lawyers in Tokyo. My dad was obsessed with her.” Riko laughs. Hyuuga can definitely imagine that. “It was always such a nice thing to witness, two people loving each other as much as they did.”

They sit in silence for a few moments. There’s a gentle breeze in the air, and the wafting smell of the lilies he brought permeates the air around them.

“Sometimes I think I’ll never have what they had.”

“Why not?”

“Most guys are afraid of girls like me, like my mom. Ones who are intelligent, ambitious, headstrong,” Riko plucks at her t-shirt. “Who look like thirteen year old boys without a skirt and hair clip. And the boys who aren’t afraid of girls like me are usually weirdos like my dad.” She shivers, wrapping her arms around her legs again.

Hyuuga gazes at her side profile. There’s so many things he wants to say, but he’s not sure if he should say any of them at all, if he even can.

He thinks about how they met. How she helped them form the team that changed all of their lives for the better. He thinks of Saturday afternoons spent shopping, after school study sessions, her father’s knowing glare.

How she trusts him to cut her hair.

Of ordering food and knowing each other’s preferences.

Shared smiles, lingering eye contact, brief touches.

He thinks of everything he knows about her, everything he doesn’t, and how he’s going to bring that gap. He thinks and thinks and thinks, but he isn’t saying anything, and he knows that he has to say something.

His heart races. “I’m not afraid of you.”

Riko scoffs. “Are too.”

Hyuuga nods, because yeah, he is, but that’s not what he meant. “Well yeah, obviously I’m afraid of you. You’re a scary ass coach, but,” He takes a deep, shaky breath, and decides to follow through. “I’m more afraid of losing you as a friend than anything else. Any guy worth a damn would feel the same.”

Riko looks at him then, really looks at him. As if she’s doing one of her scans. He tries not to swallow nervously. He’s getting closer and closer to confession territory. After a painfully long and intense stare down, she gives him a small, barely there smile.

“You don’t have to be afraid of that.” Riko stands, brushing the dirt and grass off of her knee high socks and skirt. “Thank you, for bringing the flowers. And for being here.”

There’s no place I’d rather be.

“No problem.”

On the walk home, there’s a river bank with stone ledges. Riko trots ahead of him, climbing up on the ledge to walk across like a tightrope.

The sun is setting, and it casts a brilliant light around them, dancing off of the water. Riko leans her head back as she walks, smiling softly with the sunlight shining behind her like a halo. Hyuuga blushes.

He isn’t Kiyoshi. He never will be, doesn’t want to be, but there are certain things he can appreciate about the sneaky bastard.

Kiyoshi would tell her how he feels.

“For the record, I don’t think you look like a thirteen year old boy, ever.” He’s ashamed to say he mumbles the last part, cheeks flaming and facing away from Riko. “I think you’re beautiful.”

It’s still not a confession, but it’s about as much as he can take for the day, and piggybacking off of her feelings over her deceased mother just feels wrong. It’s enough for him to try and assuage any lingering doubts she has about herself.

When he finally works up the courage to face her again, Riko is peering at him with a curious expression. He’s more interested in the tinted color of her cheeks, though, and how her eyes seem to say what neither of them could probably ever manage.

But when she hops down from the ledge, fitting herself into his personal space and letting their hands graze each other lightly, he knows that nothing really needs to be said.

(Except maybe a thank you to Kiyoshi, for entangling himself into Hyuuga’s life so thoroughly that he can use him as a comforting standard, but he’ll die before ever letting Kiyoshi know about that.)

[secondfromtheright]

Fandom Racism

I’m not active on social media. But though I don’t use it, I do have this. I’m a terrible, unreliable tumblr user and I apologise for that (it took me way too many password tries to get back on here). I’d rather have been able to post something on my AO3 to any and all of my readers but my option is here instead.

I’m not a good person for this message – I am white, and I am not American. Seek black voices on this subject, please. I’m not tagging this because it’s really just aimed to anybody who already may still follow me on here. To use, but not overstep my lone social media platform. Because I can’t say nothing. I just can’t. You’ve all been so supportive and lovely to me in response to my fics and I’d like to think you’re all as decent in life to understand there are many things that we as white people do not and cannot understand regarding racism and that we need to do better.

So, this is aimed directly to my fandom readers – white fandom readers. From a white fandom writer. Some racism in fandom that I’m aware of, and I implore you all to become aware of too, if you aren’t already.

And again, please research black and brown voices on this matter. Voices that can speak to this so much more than mine, that can give better understanding, that can correct where I’m wrong, that can fill in what I’ve missed, that can communicate pain and hurt that I cannot know.

I get ‘ship and let ship’ and all, but there are major, glaring red flags that scream both personal and structural racism, conscious and unconscious, in fandom and ship conversation that should make you stop arguing, sit up and think about the shit you’re saying or reading.

This goes ten-fold for any fandom you are involved in that has a black love interest in canon that your ship and/or your fandom dismisses.

“They don’t have chemistry.”

Old ass racist trope that is about erasing romantic roles of people of colour. It perpetuates the idea that POC are not loveable, or desirable, especially to white people and especially in relationships (rather than just sex).

Anything that talks of black male characters as “evil” or “creepy” or “untrustworthy” or “weird” or “intimidating” or “aggressive” or “there’s just something I don’t like.”

It is continuing the 400+ year old bullshit premise that black men are dangerous – the ultimate justifying-white-fear-excuse to target and kill black man, then and now, because ‘they were a threat’.

When most of the ship verses ship debate is talk of tearing down a character of colour.

If someone is so confident in their white ship, why the need to tear down and hate another character? Keep it to your ship and only your ship. If the COC is a canonical love interest, especially one that existed before you started shipping your ship, question yourself and/or those shipping.

 Black female characters criticised as “irrational” or “angry” or “manly” or “slut.” Or, consistently praised only as “badass” or “fierce” or “strong” or “sassy.”

These are all major examples of misogynoir tropes that strip black women of their humanity, boxing them into one of numerous roles that do not allow them to be multifaceted, feeling people.

 ANY negative shit about black hair, especially natural, and especially of black female characters. 

Just fucking don’t. Don’t say it, don’t encourage it, seriously side-eye anyone doing it. Whites have no idea what that experience is, nor the effects of generations of products that only appeal to white consumerism and define whiteness as the definition of ‘beauty’. It a low, racist belittling of someone.

 When a character of colour has an insulting nickname within a fandom.

It dehumanises them. Actively and purposely. That simple. If you’ve never been involved or really aware of BLM protests or movement before, you must at least now recognise the chants of “Say their name.” Someone’s name matters, especially with history of slavery. Do not remove a black character’s name because you feel they threaten your ship. It reinforces white supremacy in even the most basic of society.

Any kind of discussion or mention that hopes for or encourages violence and hurt against black characters, including rooting for their death. Especially anything with a group, anything that involves dogs, anything that involves white people in power.

It’s the history of racism, it is about maintaining a white supremacist society and it retraumatises black audiences.

 If you or a fandom member have multiple ships but not a one of them includes someone of colour.

Question that shit. Seriously. If there’s a banner on a tumblr or a YouTube with loads of videos that has a bunch of only white characters, ask yourself why. What are you watching? What are you reading? Are there leading black and brown characters, black and brown voices, in what you’re consuming?

Don’t let yourself fall into thinking white people get to decide the definition of racism. Don’t let yourself think you know everything, even if you know the full dysfunctional and dramatic history of your fandom.

Understand that words and phrasing used has a whole history, and context. All of it. Microaggressions, tropes, coded language, connotations, dog whistles. Understand that just because you may not have known the history, it is no less relevant, or prevalent in the real lives of people of colour. More so, the fact that you can go about your life ignorant to it is evidence of your – our – privilege. And on this one I’ll add, especially if you’re not American. Learn real history – both American and your own country’s part in racism and slavery. Fandoms are global – recognise who you are interacting with.

Fandoms are tricky, often toxic as shit on a multiple fronts, I get it. Not everything within fandoms with characters of colour is simplistically only about race, but a lot of it is and none of us live in a vacuum. Don’t act like we do. Everything we say and do has a whole load of history and context behind it and we don’t get to cherry-pick.

If you say (or want to say) any response to the noted conversational points that sounds like

“So I can’t have an opinion now?” “I’m not racist but…” “I know black people and they said something else.” “I don’t care about/see skin colour.” “I didn’t say anything about race.” “Why are you bringing race into it?” “It’s just hating white people.” “That’s just how the character is written.”

Stop.

And seriously challenge yourself to be better, to listen more, to question and learn the origins and hurt behind such phrasing and what you may really be putting out, even if you didn’t realise it.

Because all that instinct that makes you want to push back, that has you wanting to dismiss the criticism and shut down a conversation that makes you uncomfortable and drives you to defend yourself – that is your privilege screaming because suddenly you are not the centre of everything. White discomfort. You have to recognise that instinct, and move past it. It takes continuous work. You don’t have to be perfect on racial understanding overnight – and please don’t get so terrified at such a prospect to the point of closing up and shutting down and doing nothing – but we do all need understand more and do more than we currently think we do and are.

I’m not trying to shame people, or even guilt people (not yet, anyway). But as a white person, you – we – need to start taking more responsibility for what we involve ourselves in, and what we don’t stand against.

I don’t care how good you believe you are (and maybe you are) or how many people of colour are in your life. If you are a white, you have a privilege – we - have a privilege. And whether you seek it or not, whether you’re conscious of it or not, you – we – benefit from that privilege because it is embedded in every part of society that we live day to day. And we do so at the expense of black lives.

I encourage everyone to be as involved in the movement as possible, but if you can’t attend protests, if there are COVID 19 concerns, if you don’t have the resources to donate or be in physical presence, and if you are not in a position to call out your friends and family, please, for the love of god please, at least do it in fandom. It’s a social circle that as we know, can take up a lot of our lives and our interactions. Challenge your friends in fandom – challenge yourself, if any of those phrases are in a space in which you inhabit.

Learn.

It is not the responsibility of people of colour to educate whites who suddenly realise the extent of racism, or worse, that there’s structural racism at all. But you can educate yourself, and you need to. Read black and brown experiences, listen to black and brown activists and academics. Hell, even read white antiracist voices as well if that helps you understand. If numbers are better communicators for you, look at data, whether on wealth disparity, environmental disparity, health disparity, educational disparity, justice disparity. Listen, absorb, push past your white privilege instinct that makes you uncomfortable, be driven by empathy and compassion and instead learn.

Learn history, learn data, learn what a black family has to talk about that you don’t. Learn about white fear and white grievance and white comfort and white discomfort and why they cannot be placated to. Learn to understand many forms of racism, systemic and institutional, overt and casual, personal and interpersonal. Learn to understand what privilege looks in real life, from a missed job opportunity to fear of a whole community every time they leave the house. Learn the extreme examples as well as the subtle, daily embedded. Learn to recognise the tropes and language. Learn about collective grief and trauma. Learn the psychology of looting from generationally oppressed view. Learn about the generations of violence against non-violent protest. Learn their names.

And act.

As a white person, you – we – can never really understand, but we can do a lot to try to. And we can be part of changing things. And frankly, we have to be. Racism is a white people problem; one that projects onto people of colour.

And especially to those who consider themselves any kind of liberal, those who think they can recognise misogyny or ageism or homophobia and problematic behaviour elsewhere – you have to step up on racism. And you can’t stop at the examples of obvious lack of humanity that are impossible to miss - go deeper.

And I’m asking you to not dismiss any racist language and behaviour within fandom on the basis of “It’s just a character, it’s not real.” Media and the depiction of black and brown lives is too often the only real relation to black and brown lives that a white someone has. It is a huge part of reinforcing white supremacy in society – it always has been.

If fans of colour in your fandom are telling you something is offensive, something is hurtful, something is racist, listen to them. Allow yourself to be challenged, uncomfortable and corrected. Because Black Lives Matter.

Black Lives Matter.

[dotthings]

Okay, about this “g*ncest” thing that just cropped up which makes me feel like I splintered back to the year 2006 and aren’t we over this by now...what that is is a bona fide example of toxic masculinity attitudes at work and being valorized by a small number of fans, mostly female.

First off, as far as I’m concerned, you are free to enjoy or write any type of fic you want, I don’t care. I’m not judging your fic tastes. I won’t insult you as a human being, attack you, send anon hate, or put this post on your tags or even any shared tags. Which is more than antis have done to respect my shipping but whatever. 

However I disagree with the idea that there can be no discussion when fandom reinforces certain biases or ideas and tries to normalize them, without realizing how they’re reinforcing some real world level stuff that needs to be questioned. The discussion itself is valuable if you aren’t being a dick about it. 

So you know how D*stiel fans get accused all the freakin’ time, endlessly, ad nauseam “you don’t respect male friendships! male friendships are rare and precious commodities in the media! why do you have to ruin it by making it gay!” (Sorry I need a moment to stop laughing). When the fact is D*stiel fans openly own their slash and own the gay and fling glitter, they don’t tend to apologize for it, instead of trying to mask the fact that it’s slash. Nobody is denying that close platonic male friendships can exist, either. But guess what, it is outright not toxic masculinity to see past heteronormative defaults to see how shipping two male friends together and seeing the potential for romance instead of by default ruling it out just because people are the same gender. It’s just not. It gets concerned trolled into the freakin’ ground as reinforcing toxic masculinity. It isn’t.

Which brings us to this g*ncest thing which, I stfg I thought we’d left behind in 2006. It’s an old fandom term that has outlived its need and outlived the context of the mores in fandom and society at the time that created it, like its related fic label concept, “smarm.”

“Smarm” isn’t the same definition as “smarmy.” The fandom definition of smarm is fic that depicts two people of the same gender being emotionally and physically close who are not in love and the intent is not romantic and not slash.

In other words, gen fic.

It depicts a platonic friendship or sibling bond.

It’s..gen fic. But for some reason, some felt they had to call it “smarm” because either it’s difficult to grasp that two men can be physically or emotionally close without it being slashy, or, fans who wanted to slash but self-shamed for it. They wouldn’t just call it a slash fic. Just like, it’s not w*ncest it’s g*ncest!!! Which somehow seems to assume itself a fest safe for anyone who isn’t into incest and just wants to celebrate the platonic sibling bond and...no, really, no. Probably be smarter to just host a Sam and Dean Gen Fic fest, which I’m sure exists, and hey, something for everyone, I’m not saying the g*ncest fest shouldn’t be allowed to continue, just pointing out why some people are bothered by it for reasons other than “you are ship shaming meanies!!”

There’s a big aspect of shame in smarm, and I’m arguing, to g*ncest. 

The recent uptick of intensity in SPN fandom where w*incest fandom stans determinedly turn every single canon Sam and Dean moment into incest, and insist every story, every fic, every image, every concept about Sam & Dean’s bond is emotional w*incest is part of this toxic masculinity thing, the g*ncest issue, the smarm issue. A Sam and Dean image, boom, incest! The brothers are so in love! D*stiel fans are considered horrible for, y’know, reading romance into a shit-ton of usage of romantic tropes, canon pining, plot and dialogue and long arcs that map to romantic tropes, even overt shout-outs from other characters to the idea that Dean and Cas are a thing, but if Sam and Dean so much as stand next to each other it’s incest ftw.

There is such a thing as pre-slash and I find it a whole lot less squicky than smarm or g*ncest. I kind of like pre-slash because it owns the fact that romantic relationships don’t always have to manifest as sexy times, but why did we even call it pre-slash, why not just slash at a G or PG rating? I think this is becoming more of the norm, with slash shippers unapologetically posting slash fic at a G or PG rating. Readers are free to read into whatever they want into a gen fic, but if the author ships it and intends to put romance into it, but it isn’t about how the characters have sex or even kiss, they’re still romantically in love and they’re going to label it slash or pre-slash. I don’t see the need for the “pre” in that any more. No they aren’t kissing yet, no they aren’t having sex yet, but they are in love nonetheless. 

Let go of the idea that a kiss or having sex is the only way to verify characters being in love. 

Toxic masculinity isn’t the removal of heteronormative goggles that were probably fused to our faces from birth because that’s how our society is and being capable of imagining that two male friends in a story can fall in love the same way we imagine a man and woman can. 

Toxic masculinity is when you are so determined that men--be it friends or siblings--cannot be close and it be, in fact, friendship or sibling love. It’s the equating of all male intimacy with a sexual and/or romantic bond. And I feel that a false narrative’s been allowed to prevail in SPN fandom that D*stiel fandom is deeply guilty of this when it’s not, while other groups that are doing this chronically, get a free pass.

I’d say it’s a pretty major example of toxic masculinity to insist that platonic w*incest is a thing, instead of just, y’know, Sam & Dean loving each other as siblings without hints of a romantic or sexual element. It’s toxic masculinity to slap the -cest slapping on every-freakin’-thing and then claim you’re being ship-shamed because you actually gate-keeped against fans who really just appreciate the sibling bond and don’t need any -cest to appreciate how close Sam and Dean are and appreciate that bond, and it’s pretty toxic to keep flinging a trigger in people’s faces every five minutes, openly, as if you own the entire fandom, and insist canon backs you up when in fact it’s gently shut you down on multiple occasions, and then expect absolutely nobody to be upset at you ever, and if anyone gets upset they’re ship-shaming you. That’s quite a big amount of entitlement, to assume that people aren’t allowed to be uncomfortable with something like incest.

Especially when you try to force LGBT ships that are non-trigger into the same mode, force a false equivalency, thus fetishizing the LGBT ships, and get offended if someone points out why a differentiation is sensible and necessary.

If you’re into Dean and Cas’s friendship and don’t see any romantic element, that’s gen. No really. It’s friendship fic. That’s not pre-slash. That’s not platonic D*stiel. You see a friendship. There is no such thing as platonic Destiel. Now, this gets tricky, because while that is 100% valid to feel that way, D*stiel is reaching a stage where not-shipping it is cool and all that, but if you vehemently deny there is any reason for other people to see more to it, you’re kind of having to ignore a hella lot of canon to keep those heteronormative goggles fused to your face, and no I am not accusing people who don’t ship it of being homophobic. Or of unconscious biases of being homophobic. We all have them. Talk about it, don’t insult people or shame them, sometimes it just takes a little bit to get people to understand. Others will never get there no matter what. Depends on the person. 

There’s any number of het ships where I have eyes, I can see canon intent, I see they’re into each other, but I don’t care and I don’t ship it and I might enjoy genfic about that relationship or have them wind up as friends, I don’t ship it. There’s non-canon popular slash fics I don’t feel it or see it. I don’t yell down its shippers though. Its that simple. My advice is just don’t go screaming down D*stiel shippers with why must you ruin their friendship or claiming it’s toxic masculinity and going on about the sanctity of platonic male friendship which is just such a rare and precious flower in the media (sorry. pausing to lmfao again). 

I also literally do not care how you see Sam and Dean’s relationship or if you ship that. I honestly do not care and I don’t make assumptions about you as a person (your fandom behavior over your ship might make me decide things about you). But...it’s still incest. I’m not ship-shaming. It’s incest. Why does this have to be explained over and over. You can ship whatever you want and should be allowed to have safe spaces for it but this assumption that everyone has to be 100% cool with such an obvious trigger and societal taboo or they’re hypocrites who don’t really believe in the “ship and let ship” they believe in...come on. “Ship and let ship” doesn’t mean be inconsiderate and it doesn’t mean you have to be comfortable with every ship in the fleet.

But SPN fandom has this lingering thing it can’t seem to let go of where systemically, it thinks incest and an LGBT ship should be treated exactly alike, and it has this thing where incest is being intrusively slapped onto every-freakin’-thing about Sam & Dean in spaces where fans can’t avoid it and it’s not behind a cut tag it’s not labeled, and if you aren’t into it you get mocked, and if you don’t watch only for the brother bond you get mocked, and this is coming from many of the same people who think an LGBT ship is identical to incest and from many of the same people who get offended if you point out why an LGBT ship isn’t like incest, and who get offended people ship that LGBT ship as well as from generalized anti-shippers who treat being a non-shipper like a superior badge of honor and who reinforce the gatekeeping that virulent incest shippers aim at D*stiel shippers while valorizing an incest ship, but this breed of anti-shippers are in total denial about doing it. (Note the distinction between anti-shipper and non-shipper).

But taking what is actually just gen fic about Sam & Dean being emotionally intimate or showing physical affection and insisting it needs a -cest on the end instead of just, y’know, being about a sibling bond...that’s where toxic masculinity comes in. Isn’t one of the whole major points of SPN’s narrative to deconstruct these perceptions of masculinity? To debunk the idea that men can’t be emotionally intimate? And please miss me with the idea that shipping D*stiel is somehow contrary to this. D*stiel is a part of that debunking because neither Dean nor Cas act like the media stereotypes of what bi (or ace or pan or whatever Dean and Cas might be) looks like. They started as friends, and became emotionally close before SPN canon got into the zone where it seems a lot more serious about possibly openly vocalizing or consummating the subtextual pining. Friends-to-lovers isn’t insisting all friends must be lovers. It’s fans identifying something in this particular pair of friends and in the narrative, in the canon, and don’t discard it just because of a heteronormative default that buys a slow burn will-they-won’t-they for m/f but sneers that same-gender potential romance is delusional.

Likewise if it’s Dean and Cas and someone slaps some form of slash label on it while refusing to own that they ship it and refusing to own there could be sexual attraction, instead of simply saying “it’s a gen fic I love their friendship” would also an example of toxic masculinity ideas and probably a lot of self-shaming about seeing and enjoying the slash in the first place. Dean and Cas friendship enthusiasts and Dean and Cas shippers actually get along pretty well (assuming no one is acting like a dick) and that, I think, is because there is such a powerful emotional component to the ship, and Dean and Cas friendship enthusiasts tend to be non-virulent and tend to be open-minded about why the shippers see more in it even if they don’t.

This should be also true of w*ncest fans and enthusiasts of the sibling bond because again, massive emotional component as common ground, but I feel like what’s happening is the more intense and virulent w*ncest fans are trying to draw such a hard line that if you aren’t into incest, there’s no space for you. This goes hand in hand with the virulently pro-codependency fans, who romanticize mental illness and then can’t seem to figure out why anyone is upset with them, and who think that anyone who isn’t into romanticizing mental illness hates the bro bond so they’ve swept out plenty fans who adore the sibling bond with their virulence.

Personally I find uncomfortable when fans insist that gen fic about two dudes being close needs to be some kind of pick-your-fighter-label form of slash instead of just owning it’s a celebration of close male friendship. Bromance is a stupid term and IMO part of toxic masculinity too. 

There’s also the erasure of the fact that D*estiel is one of the least smut-driven ships. A recent study of ships with the highest smut content found w*ncest at the top and D*stiel barely even rated, and here’s the ironic part: virulently anti-destiel w*ncest fans and ship shamey non-shippers slapped D*stiel with a default assumption that it’s all about fapping material and two dudes getting it on and you just want to make spn into a porno and accuses D*stiel fandom of fetishizing m/m relationships when w*ncest is at the top of the smut pile. No I am not shaming you for enjoying smut. No I am not saying that a ship is superior for being less smutty. I’m very clearly objecting to the shaming and misconceptions of D*stiel fandom, which are often willfully perpetuated. 

This misconception has stubbornly stuck in spn fandom and it’s incredibly annoying. Please join us in the year 2018. When so much of D*stiel is Dean and Cas not having sex but just being ridiculous and making heart-eyes and in denial and trying to figure this out and maybe they brush hands and blush, it’s almost Victorian. (Y’know, like the canon ha ha. Oh wait that’s not funny I’m serious). A lot of D*stiel fans write slash fic so they can get them to talk honestly with each other. 

So sure, have your ficfests how you like, but I think it’s worth at least pointing out that this fixation with slapping the -cest label on everything is an example of toxic masculinity concepts at work, is normalizing incest to a ridiculous degree, is de-normalizing fans who really just appreciate a sibling bond, what with the stans insisting that w*ncest is just another term for their close emotional bond, *splutter* I don’t watch SPN for ships how dare you instead of, y’know, having the balls to own the fact that they’re intrigued by the incest ship. They shove it everywhere and disown it all in the same breath.

[freckliedan]

can u please explain what an phanti//anti is (like moree specifically)? ive only really ever seen ppl talk about dan & phil from the perspective of they’re (prob) together or they don’t feel comfortable with speculation/don’t care either way

oh my god anon i’m so glad that things have changed so much that this is the culture now. oh my god i’m so glad you don’t know what a phanti is

i think in the most basic sense of the word, a phanti is someone who believes that dan and phil are heterosexual, and that they’re just friends, and that shippers are super disrespectful/being bad people for forcing the idea that the two of them might be together on them & in their faces. phantis tend to think we’re seeing things that aren’t there/making things up, and they’re really, really shitty in the ways they aggressively will argue with people about it. they have blinders on, essentially, when it comes to the ways dan and phil have been subtly coming out for the past few years.

and an anti is someone who’s opposed to a ship? so like ok cool, that’s a fair word to have made up, but most of the time that you see that being used on tumblr, i’d be wary. a lot of people who talk about antis in general on tumblr are complaining about being criticized for fetishizing mlm or shipping unhealthy ships, and i’m going to go into more detail about that under the cut but i’m gonna put a few trigger warnings first bc it’s some potentially triggering reasons that people get criticized and then pull out the word anti.

the overall point about the general word anti is: it means someone who’s against a ship, but usually if people are making posts about how antis suck and you shouldn’t police other’s enjoyment of fandom, be wary/check out OP’s blog before reblogging because it might be someone defending a really shitty stance.

(for under the cut: csa tw/, pedophilia tw/, incest tw/, rape tw/; i’m having a serious discussion of toxic parts of fandom under the cut so please take my trigger warnings seriously and gauge your comfort level/whether it’s healthy for you to click to the read more. i don’t want to feel responsible for causing hurt, and the discussion under the cut doesn’t have any information that’s not explained in broad strokes in the main body of my post.)

oftentimes people who use the word anti are adults who shipping an adult character with a minor & not listening when people tell them that doing so supports pedophilic attitudes & contributes to societal grooming of minors to be abused by predatory adults; this is the most common original poster of things about how antis need to stop policing others’ enjoyment of fandom, and i’ve seen a number of people who describe themselves as fandom moms who also behave in this way. typically the antis in this specific scenario are minors who are saying that the adult’s actions are making them uncomfortable, and the adult will mobilize their larger follower base against the minor who spoke up about their discomfort. 

and i’m not talking like, an 18/19 year old who’s shipping two characters of a similar age to themself together when one is still like 16/17; that’s different; i’m talking like. someone who’s 20+, usually mid twenties or older, who describes themself as a fandom mom and who will not listen to criticism or people who tell them that they’ve been made uncomfortable. i’m not saying that all fandom moms are like this, i’m just saying that i’ve seen it enough times that i get wary when i see someone constantly and proudly self defining as a fandom mom.

other times the unhealthy ship will be incest, or will be focused on dub con/non con. and there’s a place for that in fandom; i know that there’s a lot of people who process traumas through writing fic about characters that they relate deeply to, and rape survivors and survivors of incest should have a space in which to do that, too. i’m not talking about that kind of fan content though; there’s people who get pissed about being criticized for eroticizing rape, incest, and dub con, and for romanticizing abusive, unhealthy relationships, and when they get pissed for the valid criticisms people are bringing up, they roll out the word anti and start getting self righteous. 

fandom is a really wonderful place for the most part, but a lof of minors get exposed to extremely toxic ideas by adults and those ideas get normalized through the constant repitition. that normalization can leave a kid vulnerable to manipulation by predatory adults, or lead to the adoption of unhealthy behaviors or a kid being put into unsafe situations. this especially happens due to the way that sex is discussed in fan spaces without regard to age a lot of the time. 

i really want all minors to be safe, and i think talking about this is important, because none of the adults i was following when i was a minor were discussing this even though it should be the adult’s responsibility to protect minors and make sure they’re not interacting sexually with young people, even when it’s about a fandom, not about people’s personal sex lives. this is a hill that i’m willing to die on, and although i turned out okay and didn’t end up in any bad situations, i know that i was exposed to some super toxic ideas through fandom when i was growing up and i did internalize a fair amount of shit. 

so. yeah. beware people who use the word anti and if you’re an adult reading this, don’t behave sexually with minors on the internet. nobody tells us that it’s our responsibility to protect minors on the internet, but it is, and this is me telling you that if you’ve not already realized it yourself.

[opxngravxs-archive]

1, 6, 23, 30!

Mun Asks: RP Edition

1. What was your first impression of the roleplay community on Tumblr? And what’s your impression of it now? 

When I first joined the community back in 2012/2013, I was super intimidated because this was my first time ever RPing, but everyone I encountered was super nice and helpful and civil and over all it left a fairly good impression on me.

Now I realize that everything is just a hot mess hell hole shit show and a whole lot of yinz need to learn to chill out. There are some really genuinely good people in here, don’t get me wrong, but the entire vibe makes me feel like I’m walking through a toxic wasteland. I do have to say, though, that there is a significant difference between fandom and non-fandom spaces. On my fandomless OC blog I follow mainly other non-fandom OCs, and things are a lot more chill than it is over in fandom spaces.

6. What are your thoughts on the current roleplay trends on here right now?

For the love of all that is good and vitreous can we please stop making themes with 0.001 font with navigation schemes that are like trying to find the spot that marks the treasure on a centuries old decaying map. Can accessibility be the new cool trend? Please?

23. What’s the one thing you dislike about the roleplaying community on Tumblr?

Yinz all like to make things way deeper than they really are. You don’t like a ship? Cool, I don’t fucking care don’t make your entire personality out of it. You don’t like a character. Cool. I don’t fucking care don’t make your entire personality out of it. You don’t like a certain person. Cool. I don’t fucking care don’t make your entire personality out of it. I am a 23 year-old grown ass adult. I do not care about your drama. I don’t care about your dumb ass “hot take”. Calm down. Go outside. Pet a dog.

30. Other than roleplaying, what’s your favorite hobby?

I recently got into painting miniatures! Right now I’m painting some figures for my fiance’s Warhammer Age of Sigmar Nighhaunt army. I might start playing Sigmar myself, but really I’m a lot more interested in just painting the figures. It’s a really great distraction from everything else going on in my life right now, and I very much enjoy putting colour schemes together and bringing the figures to life. Besides the Nighhaunts, I have also painted a few little DnD figures.

[monkeymindscream]

For the fandom + ships thing—SRMTHFG? The question didn’t specify but I’m interested in both your romantic + platonic/familial ships!

God bless you my dude you rock. :D 

True to form I rambled way more than Ineeded to here, and… I’m sorry for that. I love ships, what can I say?

PLATONIC

The entire Hyperforce as a whole, obvs, but I’ll throw outsome faves for the sake of specificity:

Sprx & Gibson – I’m a sucker for pals who’ll rib on eachother endlessly but who unfailingly have each other’s backs.

Nova & Otto – Because they’re fuckin’ CUTIES.

Gibson & Otto – Their friendship probably has the bestdevelopment out of any in the series fight me.

Chiro & Sprx – The protective older bro dynamic Sprx haswith this kid more like TAKE MY LIFE.

Sprx & Nova – I ship them to heaven and back, AND THEIRFRIENDSHIP IS A BIG REASON WHY.

And of course, Chiro & Antauri – If I have to sayanything here you clearly haven’t watched the show.

I also adore any and all platonic/familial relations betweenthe monkeys and Mandarin (to no one’s surprise) whether it be past-tense or anAU. Antauri & Mandarin in particular, but I talk about those two a lot as it is.

Moving away from the Team (and into some definitely non-canon, AU-ish waters):

Chiro & Mandarin – If anyone could get this jerk tochill it’d be this kid. And I’m not just referring to the original here. This kid is also the only one who has even the tiniest hope of looking at Mandy and the team’s situation with eventhe smallest amount of objectiveness (I mean obviously he’d start with some biasin his friends favor, but I trust this kid’s ability to go “waaaait a sec” andcall out both parties if necessary, I believe in him).

Valina & Nova – This is mostly just because neither ofthem have very good anger management, and honestly I think they’re interactionswould be to die for. Valina would be an absolutely appalling influence, but mayhaps we could also flip it and say thatNova would be a good influence?

Sakko & Jin May – We don’t see all that much of Sakko,but I’ve always imagined him as a vessel of limitless cynicism and bitternesswhen he’s not intentionally trying to be cutesy. Pair that up with Jin May and you’ve got instant hilarity.Also their loose history means there’s already tooth to gain traction on whenimagining scenarios.

Valina & Skelemandarin – Look I know, I know that literally all these two didwhenever they shared a screen together was spew venom at each other. I know. And I kind of wouldn’t changethat, to be honest, because I kind of love that about their relationship. The.They verbal sniping, anyway. The physical stuff Valina does could. Y’know. Stop, maybe. At the same time I can’timagine either of them ever actually had a healthy, friendly relationshipwith anyone (actually, I don’t imagine Valinaever had a healthy friendly relationship; I know Mandy II hasn’t, since he’s a clone and all). And… what’s the quote? “Necessity breedsingenuity”? Kinda like that, but maybe more like “desperation to have asingular sorry outlet of affection or even stable interaction in general breedstolerance and with luck and a bit of pixie dust, eventual companionship.” Plus I getthe feeling they would gossip/talk shit about other people to eachother endlessly if they ever actuallystarted getting along, which is almost kind of cute, in my opinion.

And then for the last platonic before I move on, SK/Alchemist& the monkeys + Cap’n Shuggazoom. The fam that started it all.

ROMANTIC

There’s a lot of overlap between my platonic and romanticships, so I’ll try not to repeat myself too much:

Sprx/Nova – The classic. I love these guys. Good banter withlots of cute moments to show they care in between. Good chemistry.

Gibson/Otto – They balance eachother out, but not necessarily in the ways that would be expected. It’s not “Gibson’s smart and Otto’s dumb” or “Gibson’s Serious and Otto isSilly.” They both have their moments of seriousness and silliness, and theformer is just blatantly wrong. To me it’s more like “Gibson thinks with hishead and Otto thinks with his heart, and together they help each other fill inthe spaces between.”

Mandarin/Antauri – You bet your whole entire ASS I ship thisromantically as well as platonically!! Mix in everything that’s good about thembeing friends with them being awkward and nervous because “how do romance??what???” Because oi Xan was a douchenozzle, look me in the eye and tell me you can’tpicture him going “romantic attachment bars the path totrue enlightenment, you’ll never become true masters of the Power Primate byindulging in such. Also if you so much as THINK about kissing you’ll probably catchan STD and then die. ABSTINENCE,” to two smol impressionable monkey students. Mandarin goes and files any kind of affection under the heading of “waste of time” andAntauri tries to detach himself from everyone. For this to work they’d have to first acknowledge how lonely this thinking leaves them and then work through these issues  t o g e t h e r  aaaahh. Also. Either after everything goes to shit or before theyget to the cute awkward parts: foe-yay. Mother of God, foe-yay. I have literallypicked up a book series (which was kind of crap, honestly) and LOVED it solelybecause it gave me my fix of foe-yay. Mix that in to something I already loveand I’m weak I’M WEAK.

Valina/Skelemandarin – Same as above, combine everything I said Iloved about them being friends, and mix it in with some cute shit. I know this onecomes with some hurdles (Valina kinda has the hots for their boss and is thenkinda dead, their relationship ishorribly toxic, they’re completely different species, etc.) but lord knows I’vebeen running this course so long I could jump ‘em blindfolded: Obviously thisis a ship for an AU of sorts, either one where Valina manages to stick aroundto pester Mandy after her death or one where she never died in the first place.Next, half the fun of ships (for meanyway) is looking at how the one person could trigger development in theother, and then the journey they go on together to bring about that developmentand grow closer (i.e. give me enough time in a fic and I can drainthe toxicity out of this bitch of a ship). Finally… Valina’s a witch, and this is a cartoon.Bullshit some magic or shapeshift the desired party into a species to match theother one. There you go. Hurdles cleared.

These are all I can think of for now. These are all of the BIGones, at least. If anyone shares any of these and wants to bullshit about themfor a while hit me up.

[icantlose]

The very concept of a “good idea” is objective; just because you don’t think something is a good idea does not mean it is a bad idea. Fans have different perspectives and these are usually based on different life experiences. But frankly, multiple members of the community don’t believe that your ideas are very good: particularly the one of yours where you infantize Krystal. It’s fuckin’ gross and creepy and minimizes the character more than the fandom already does.

People are judgmental of you because it is natural human defense mechanism. You have come out of nowhere to criticize people and their ideas based off of canon story, which you have violently rejected on multiple occasions. You have a long history of attacking people unfairly for writing fiction based within the margins of established Star Fox canon. Of course people are going to be judgmental of you, because you’re the villain in this situation: they did not ask for your opinion and you never fail to deliver your opinion in a very rude, insulting and frankly non-constructive manner. You get what you give, Jacob. 

Nobody cares that you don’t like Krystal being on Star Wolf.

You’re not being called out for “simply” disliking something. You’re being called out for all the hateful messages you keep sending multiple people across multiple platforms. Don’t mix things up, sweetheart. 

Acting like a martyr, acting like you are the only one who has ever suffered through hardship is the fastest way to alienate yourself. People don’t want to befriend someone who weaponizes their hardships in the way that you do. It makes you come across as very hard to approach, very judgmental--there’s that word again--and like no matter what, the person trying to get to know you can’t win because you, yourself, are going though “absolute HELL.” 

Speaking of going through “absolute HELL”, so are many of us in this community but I’ve yet to see you reach out and actually give a shit.

You have not been trying to “play nice”. You’ve been trying to duck under the radar and avoid accountability. There is a major difference.

If something as simple as the idea of a video game you’re not forced to play pisses you off, it’s time to get off the computer, bud.

I’ve referred to you as a “white knight” because you’re coming to the defense of a character that nobody hates here in this particular community. In fact, in recent years Krystal has been widely celebrated and widely adored ESPECIALLY with the unofficial release of Dinosaur Planet. You’ve created a problem there isn’t one; any idea that you disagree with regarding Krystal and her character has been met with an onslaught of HATE MESSAGES from YOU, JACOB. You’ve expressed extreme reactions to multiple attempts across several platforms by several different people to give Krystal a dynamic character and award more than Nintendo has given her: Nintendo themselves has admitted to wanting to use her as a sex-symbol and you’ve done nothing but kick and scream any time someone presents her as less than perfect in your ideal. That is not fair. 

Nobody here has depicted her in a negative light and it’s very sad and very insulting of you to suggest that her being a part of Star Wolf, a squadron of anti-heroes (anti-hero: n. a central character in a story, movie, or drama who lacks conventional heroic attributes but whom cannot be identified as a villain) is somehow a negative depiction.

No one considers that Krystal isn’t the only character that you think of when you think of Star Fox because you’ve shown us that it she is the only character you think of UNLESS you are confronted with the fact that you don’t think of anyone else except Krystal. You told @blackarwing​ that you have a “crush” on every female character in the Star Fox roster. That is extremely discomforting and hard to take seriously because this is an extreme opinion was only admitted once you were confronted with the fact that you only seem to be obsessed with Krystal. You NEVER talk about Fox, or James, even; you have never expressed opinions of Slippy, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you mention talk of Peppy or Pepper or Beltino. You FREQUENTLY villainize Wolf even though in-game he has proven he’s not a bad guy, you shit on Panther and you have attacked Leon. But we sure do know how you feel about fuckin’ Krystal.

You’re not sorry.

Just as most of us have both suspected and claimed, it is clear that you do not understand what “I’m sorry” actually means. If you were actually sorry, you would express actual sorrow towards your actions and you would purposefully make a point to stop acting the way that you have that has upset several different communities, but you have not. 

While I’m at it, you apologized to me and I said I hope you’ll do better, you responded with “I hope so too”. That is the perfect indication that you were unwilling to actually try to improve yourself. You weren’t sorry, you’re just looking to get all the pressure from the groups of people you’ve pissed off off of your back. Not only is that the perfect indication that you’re not willing to improve, but it is also the best possible example of you, Jacob, and your shitty character. You “hope” that you will do better. Instead of actually putting the work in to improving yourself. You do not “hope” that you will do better, you just fuckin’ DO BETTER. It’s not a gamble when YOU are the person behind the goddamn wheel! Wake. Up.

You cannot blame “stress” for how you are acting the way that you are online. We all have “stress”. The majority of us are older than you and have bills to pay, you don’t see us using that as an excuse online to shit all over people we disagree with. I’m not talking at you because I’m stressed, I’m talking at you because you’re a young person that needs to understand that this is not how someone communicates to other creative content creators. This is not okay. You’re being really fuckin’ shitty.

Whatever you are going through in the real world, it is absolutely unfair to bring that forward and take your “stress” out on the people who have nothing to do with your “stress” online. That is extremely selfish, destructive and fuckin’ mean. Blaming stress for the bullshit you’ve been providing us since fuckin’ March is NOT an excuse for an adult to make. If you’re referring to ‘stress’ online, then I know I’m victim-blaming, but you brought this on your fuckin’ self, dude. You’ve been causing nothing but “stress” on everyone else since you arrived your garbage and yet you’re the only one lashing out at people and citing “stress” as the culprit.

If it’s driving you nuts then do something to change it. 

If your dog is that sick, being on the internet whining about a fictional blue fox, is the absolute fucking LAST thing you should be doing.  

I’m glad you’re trying to treat his cancer as best you can. But that still doesn’t excuse the environment you’re providing for the poor thing. If he’s that sick, he ABSOLUTELY. SHOULD. NOT. be in that dirty of an environment, what the fuck is wrong with you!?  Actually. Don’t answer. I don’t want to see you come up with a shitty excuse for this one either.

This was posted while I was typing this response.

If you wanted to be my friend, you WOULD NOT lay into me for the shit we disagree with. the idea behind making friends is focusing on what you have in common with others. You would put effort into getting to know people. You’re not trying to befriend me; you’re trying to prove how much “better” of a Star Fox fan you are than I am because I see things differently than you, (y’know, despite the fact that I’m much older than you, have been playing the games longer than you, but here I go fuckin’ gatekeeping). I guarantee you, you don’t know how old I am, what my favorite color is, what Star Fox game I prefer, what my opinion of Krystal is, or hell, what my real name is: all you have ever cared about is how I’ve presented Krystal to a space you have invited yourself into. Don’t try to twist things, buddy.

Don’t you ever. Ever. E V E R. try and suicide-bait me ever again, do you understand me? it’s disgusting that you would ever even fuckin’ try that shit. There are people in this platform that SERIOULSY struggle with suicide, that are struggling to find the strength to go on, to face the entire day for real; it is a constant battle and you’re just making light to make me feel bad for pointing out your shitty behavior is incredibly outrageous and infuriating. The fucking fact that you would try and use that as a fuckin means to get the upper-hand in this conversation is absolutely, positively fuckin’ disgusting, and outrageous. I mean how dare you? How. Dare. You? Fuck. You. NEVER do that again. You are an absolute insult to those who actually struggle with depression and self-esteem. The fact that you would actually try this shit as a means to get me to back off over something this fuckin’ trivial is absolutely disgusting. DISGUSTING. You’ve made things absolutely fuckin’ worse. 

This is not a game. I’m demanding accountability and I’m making sure that every single person is aware of what you just tried to pull with me. Newcomer24 just pulled the suicide card over Krystal bein’ acknowledged as a Star Wolf team member.

Suicide threats are not a joke, they are not a weapon. You’re crossing a major line over FUCKIN’ KRYSTAL. How. Fucking. Dare. You. Over the course of an hour, you’ve made yourself look a hundred times worse. Stop trying to save your skin. Of course you meant to send those messages; you wanted to get back at someone that upset you and you chose the most toxic, most vile most evil way to respond. You wanted to hang your life over my head. You wanted to put your blood on my hands. 

You are talking to a suicide attempt survivor. Any amount of respect you still had with me, you’ve absolutely lost. 

All.  Over.  Krystal.