#fictional love interests don't have to be unproblematic

[nikethestatue]

It’s funny to me how a somewhat big moment in ACOMAF is when they are in the summer court and one of the more significant lines we get from Rhys as a character (IMO) is when he says he is jealous of Tarquin because he would be easy to love and befriend, he doesn’t have to wish for anything, whereas Rhys doesn’t have that life because he is always making tough decisions for what he believes will be good outcome, which in turn gives him enemies and moral grayness and hardship. I feel like that idea - that bold action in the face of conflict isn’t the easy path but it’s the right one compared to passive inaction that won’t ruffle any feathers - is how SJM views the world (at least, her fictional worlds) but it’s something the fandom completely misses. Saying Tarquin, Helion, Eris, Lucien, Kallias, and every non-main male character has never done anything wrong. Saying Vivianne is more suited to be High Lady. Saying the Inner Circle is evil. All the Gwyn stuff. It’s crazy to call characters we only get little snippets of unproblematic and more interesting when we don’t really know them. We know the IC much more intimately and see their faults and fallout from their actions. It’s just funny to me that SJM had that whole ACOMAF scene to show where Rhys and the NC are coming from, yet everyone glosses over it and falls into exactly the thing that SJM was saying not to do. Sorry for the rant.

I think it's actually very true. A good observation.

Because it's EASY to love 'unproblematic' and uncomplicated characters. Every time I see on Reddit some post about 'Gwyn is the only unproblematic character in ACOTAR' and it's true, but i wonder if she WAS problematic, would you like her as much?

I think the rabid hate that Cassian is experiencing now--whereas before he used to be universally loved--is exactly because of that. He WAS unproblematic. He was good and kind and fun and loyal. But the moment he was paired with Nesta and suddenly he is not making 'perfect' decisions and not behaving in an ideal way, he is being lambasted right and left and suddenly 'the mate bond is fake!' and 'Eris is Nesta's true mate!' and stuff like that.

I think SJM does show the difficulty of making decisions which are usually imperfect and how oftentimes, people are forced to do their best under the circumstances. Like with all the 'good' characters, we only hear snippets of the good things that they did--Helion, he has this unrequited love thing happening, and he tore the beasts to save LoA, and he is helping Rhysand in the war and whatever. Same with Vivian and Kallias--we only heard the good and valiant and honourable things that they did.

I dunno. Sometimes I feel like huge chunks of this fandom aren't ready for 'morally gray' and don't understand what it means. Whereas that's exactly what SJM is writing. Moral dilemmas, ambiguity, imperfect actions, bad decisions, etc.

[omegastation]

Once saw someone describe ME as copaganda and honestly... I feel like that's a 100% accurate statement. It honestly dampens my enjoyment of the saga. Genie is out of the bottle, as they say.

Open contempt for civilian agencies, check. Repeated instances where they present fascism as a Good Thing Actually, check. Cops and military almost unilaterally depicted as correct and just, check. Ones like Harkun are treated as merely bad apples and hand-waved away whereas any and all politicians are treated as incompetent at best or outright corrupt/malevolent at worst. Not to mention the whole thing with Khalisah al-Jilani.

Idk. It all just feels so dim-witted and mean-spirited.

There are a lot of good things that make me love it with all my heart, and things that are not so good. I try to do my best to acknowledge the bad stuff and remain critical. So yeah, I do agree that some elements of the trilogy should be analyzed closely because it's kinda fucked-up.

Genie is out of the bottle, I find that the expression explains a lot. Because Mass Effect is a product of its time and place, and /insert the speech from LOTR/ the world has changed. I don't mean to say that it was never this bad, because I think it was, but we now are getting images, videos and live updates all the time showing us exactly how bad it is. We see so much suffering and injustice. And it's us "outside". Some are inside, and they're the ones showing us how bad it is. So... It's harder to see specific themes, stories and characters that are unchallenged. It's harder to see injustice being portrayed, even if the content doesn't always condone it.

I also think we are more critical in general. We are, unfortunately, used to specific issues so it's easier to recognize when they appear in fiction. I can really see that in the way people talk about specific characters. People idolize less, and I honestly think that's an improvement, because idolatry, at least how I see it, is not about seeing characters or stories as they are, but putting them on a pedestal. Characters are complex and flawed, and that's what makes them interesting. Real growth happens when characters change and adapt and rethink their position. Sometimes it means they have to look inside themselves and see the ugliness, and that means we get to see the ugly too. Not only that, but we can also contemplate what is ugly inside us, and see what we can do to change and grow. But not so long ago, before my hiatus, it was really hard to step away from "this character is a god" or "this character is flawless and if you don't see it you're not a fan" and "no no i can't see this issue at all, doesn't exist, lalalala" talk. Now it's harder for people not to see the issue. But the issue was always there.

You talked about Khalisah. I saw a meme on FB recently that says that if we can't hit someone like Khalisah in the new Mass Effect, we shouldn't bother playing it, which to me is 1. disturbing, 2. missing the fact that wars need journalists and reporters, even someone like Khalisah who is not always playing fair. I don't understand the option to hit her. I've ranted about it enough here. If you don't hit her, you get to encourage her and reassure her. It's obvious she's falling apart and she needs to be reassured. One of my favorite quotes in the game is what Shepard tells her: "Keep asking the hard questions." That's what is needed in a time of war. And sure, this one beautiful interaction and line won't take away the fact that some choices can feel mean-spirited but to me, it means it's not black & white. I see the ugliness, I do, but I also see the beauty.

IDK where I'm going with this. I guess that Mass Effect was never flawless and unproblematic, and in a way, I think it's a good thing that issues are seen and we can have a critical look at the worst parts of the trilogy.

But what is very specific to you, anon, is what you can tolerate, appreciate or enjoy. Some parts of the trilogy make me sad and or angry but it doesn't stop me from really enjoying the whole. If you find that you don't get to enjoy it anymore, because too many elements make it difficult to appreciate and it's now a real dislike, don't forget that you can step away. I'm not telling you that you have to do it. You can do what you want, but don't forget that you don't have to force yourself to love something. It's okay to move away from things because you now find them disappointing.

[nataliescatorccio]

Do you ever struggle with liking ships that are widely hated?

You seem to like Darklina and Daemyra and obviously they have big fan bases, but they also get a lot of hate and there’s a lot of criticism towards people who ship them. Does that ever get to you?

I also really like both of those ships but I almost never post about them or re-blog stuff about them because I’m so nervous about getting hate.

just to clarify i don't ship daemyra, i like each of the characters and find their fascination with each other interesting as i believe daemon wants rhaenyra's life and rhaenyra wants daemon's life, but i do not buy into them romantically at all.

but anyway, i think it probably just comes from being on this site for a long time, but no i really don't care what people think about what i ship. for as long as i've been in fandom there's been hate directed at a ship i love, and people who even if they are not a majority are loudly hating on what i like. i've had to deal with so many entitled people in my inbox over the years bashing my ship and trying to makeup reasons why their ship is 'better' that in the end, i just kind of switched off to it all. what i'm trying to say is no matter what you ship there will be people out there who hate it and they will insert their opinion on it no matter what. you could ship the most perfect, unproblematic ship in the word, and you can and will still get hate for it, because that's fandom.

ultimately it just comes down to ignoring it, moving on, and focusing on just what you like. why does it matter if a stranger who hides behind an anonymous face anyway sends you hate? you can't control what people will think, and there will always be those that are negative, you can only control what you enjoy. fiction is fiction and you're allowed to bond with whatever tropes give you an escapism, people seem to think it means you're 'endorsing' negative tropes in real life and then completely ignore the fact a) that you're dealing with a fantasy land which doesn't exist anyway and b) this is fiction and unrealistic negative plots will always be brought in to every single ship to create drama. find people who like what you like, even for the smallest ship there will be those out there, and enjoy it with them. that's all you need, no one else's opinion matters.

[snickerdoodlles]

ellebeesknees replied to your post "choose violence ask game except its just me complaining about fic tropes..."

☕☕☕.

ooooh three bitchy opinions 👀 okay so, not really a trope but:

authors who are snide towards canon

this one is kinda hard for me to describe, but you know those fics that have a line that Makes A Statement about something in canon and the tone of it is just bitchy? or just any sort of vibe where the author clearly thinks they're Much Better than the actual show writer? sighs.

we've all had that phase in fandom where we hate read/watch something and then bitch about it online but my god am i glad to be over that bullshit. if you don't like it here, you don't have to be here! there's nothing making you stay! I've noticed the trend that if the author's a snide cunt about canon, they're inevitably going to be a snide cunt about some canon thing i do like, and i don't need that in my life. you can disagree with/change canon choices in a way that doesn't automatically put down anyone who does like what canon did, and you can't do that if you're going to be smug and superior about what you do or what you don't like. canon is a sandbox and if you're not here to have fun, please go to a different sandbox where you will have fun, it'll be much nicer for everyone.

spite fic

similarly: i have negative patience for spite fic. what's the fucking point of spite fic? if you only participate in spaces you don't like, you're never going to find the stuff you like or convince anyone in those spaces to change their minds, you're just going to piss everyone off as you trample on their toes. i'm a little steamed thinking about this because of the debacle of people trying to start fights in tags, but overall its just so childish and exhausting. again: why are you here if you aren't having fun!!

like i said above, there's a way to...hmm, dance? with stuff you don't like that still comes from a place of love. like, personally! i do not like Macau & Chay friendship! which is a different post, but fandom largely likes to smash the two of them together for some reason and i Don't Get It. so i avoid that tag, but i wrote interior design with the sort of playfully-antagonistic dynamic i would love to see more of between them. but like, my point was "hey, has anyone considered how funny this would be" and never at any point "the other way people write them is WRONG." because it isn't wrong, it's just not my cup of tea. i'm rambling, but tl;dr- anything tagged with "spite fic" or is spite fic in vibes has me rolling my eyes and scrolling by, no thanks.

fix-it fic

okay so like. i don't automatically click out of anything with this tag, but i'm very leery towards it. my joy in fandom is exploring all the "what-ifs" of canon and canon-divergence is such a fun playground, but i've gotten...really, really frustrated with the fix-it fic tag over the past few years. a lot of fix-its revolve around "what if x choice never happened" scenarios and very often the answer to that is "this significantly more boring y result happened instead" and meh. generally, i find it more interesting to work with things that happened in canon than to just banish them, so anything starting with the premise of just erasing something is a hard sell for me.

for example! after kinnporsche ep4 dropped and the spurt of ~fix-it~ fic that dropped so that either kp didnt fuck or it was fully consensual or whatever. it just...missed the entire point of why it was narratively important, or stripped Porsche of the agency he did have during that scene, or missed the point of how Kinn can't ignore the power imbalance between them. i'm not going to ramble more on the meta about it here, but it felt like a bunch of people clutching their pearls and more anxious about making some fictional guys ~unproblematic~ instead of digging into the story the writers were trying to tell. plus, KinnPorsche as a ship minus the power imbalance or the tension of their circumstances is a much more boring story to me, so my inclination is to just scroll by anything wanting to avoid it.

another example of fix-it fic i hated was after good omens s2 came out, a bunch of people rushed to write ~fix-it fic~ where Aziraphale didn't go to heaven or it turned out ~he was drugged all along~ or anything that didn't have Aziraphale and Crowley splitting at the end. even a lot of the literal story metas dropping at the time were theories on how Aziraphale wasn't actually leaving Crowley or he was literally being brainwashed/drugged into it somehow, and it was just like. hmm. the s2 end was the natural build-up of the story (all???? of s2 was them miscommunicating or trying to find their new purposes in the world???) (also: in all trilogies, the 2nd story ends on a cliffhanger, that's How You Write Trilogies) and like. blah, idk, i get how the natural instinct is to want some comfort food after the bombshell, but the good omens tag (on AO3 and even tumblr in many ways) was impossible for me post s2 because i was really excited about their divorce and all the ways to dig into that split, but everywhere i turned was about turning the wheel back to erase it. bleh.

anyways, overall, nothing wrong with fix-it fic, but it's usually easier to just assume anything with that tag is not a story i'm interested in reading.

...reading back and the tl;dr of this post is that i find it more fulfilling to play in a sandbox i like and take all canon choices in good faith to work with lol

[ send a ☕, get a bitchy* fic opinion ]

*personal opinion, I'm not going to be mean

[seasideoranges]

❤: Which character do you think is the most egregiously mischaracterized by the fandom?

❤: Which character do you think is the most egregiously mischaracterized by the fandom?

Ask Game! OKAY SO I know this is asking for one specific character, buuuut I'm going to go through more than one character haha. To start;

Toph!

I was just talking about Toph in a server a couple of days ago, and I feel like people mischaracterize her a lot, but I kinda don't blame them! Toph is kind of a tricky character to write! But I read so many fics that just boil her down to "tough girl who doesn't take shit and bullies everyone" and like, yes, there is some truth to that, but she is also so much more! She's soft, she listens, she's genuinely a kind, good friend, despite her rough demeanor! There's a reason Sokka opens up for the first time about his mother with Toph.

Azula!

I adore Azula to bits, I love her, I want to see her get better and get another chance, but man, I hate how people lately have been woobifying the crap out of her lately (this happens to Iroh and Zuko too!!). I seen an argument on TikTok that Azula had a right to mortally wound Aang because it was SELF DEFENSE?! I thought OP was joking, but uh, nope, they were completely serious haha. You can't say you love 'problematic' characters only to try and make them 'unproblematic' as possible!

Aang!

I noticed that there's some people that hate Aang with a passion, so much so, that they'll try to paint him out as this sexist, abusive person/partner/father, and it bugs the hell out of me. Kind of makes me laugh a little too, seeing how powerful the haterism is towards this fictional 12 year old boy. This discourse especially gets worse when TLOK gets thrown into the mix and people try to paint him as a 'deadbeat' father, and some even try to compare him to Ozai?? It grosses me out, and the 'deadbeat' part is far from the truth! Words have meaning and weight to them, people!

Sokka!

Had to throw my fav in here of course. Here's the thing, people will either characterize Sokka as being nothing more than a dumb jokester, or they'll acknowledge that he's smart, but completely forget that he's incredibly grump, sarcastic, and skeptical which can lead him to be borderline cynical, especially in S1! There's also the whole "Sokka didn't really love his mom" discourse and, not to sound dramatic, but it makes me want to rip my hair out LMAO. I personally think that Sokka is one of the most interesting characters in ATLA and it kinda sucks seeing people gloss over him so much.

URSA!

Now this might be my most controversial take lmao. Before I start, I'm not saying Ursa was a perfect parent, and I wont be talking about the comics in this part, just strictly the show. But at this point, I almost feel like an Ursa defender because people greatly misinterpret her character and try to paint her to be just as bad as Ozai, especially when Azula is thrown into the mix. I'm sorry y'all, but I don't agree with the "Ursa was a 'boy' mom and favorited Zuko and abused Azula" takes. I don't think this was the case at all, and her relationship with Azula is so much more complex than that. People tend to forget that A) This was all Ozai's doing, he saw Azula as a weapon and put a wedge between her and the rest of her family (specifically Zuko and Ursa) and B) Ursa was also abused. She was an abused woman, trapped in a horrible situation, and wasn't left with a lot of great options or freedom.

Anyways I could talk about this all day with pretty much the rest of the Gaang, but I'll try and keep this from getting too long haha! AND AS ALWAYS, I don't want any discourse! I am always open for discussion! I love reading other peoples takes and I am always willing to change my views!

[letteredlettered]

I'm conflicted about whether to encourage you to read the MDZS novel or not. On the one hand, it's revolutionary for danmei in many ways (to the hatred and love of many), and reading it would be akin to reading Jin Yong one day. On the other hand, if you love Wei Wuxian and find some actions in the show "unforgivable," you will be severely disappointed with him. For the sake of censorship, many of the "crimes/sins" he committed were passed onto Jin Guangyao so that the idea of "good" and "evil" are more clearly distinguished. In recent years, China has even censored some of its most popular works like Empresses in the Palace, Story of Yanxi Palace, for having heroines that were too morally grey. And of course, there were some actions too heinous to even be passed onto another character. Plus, consent is a little grey in the novel, and first times were simultaneously great and awful, prompting a sudden confession in dramatic areas.

But, I think even a bit more laden with the evils of this world... I still really loved Wei Wuxian of the novel. He tried. And failed. And maybe made things a lot worse. But as Lan Wangji said, his heart was in the right place. And... I think you'll feel a lot more for the Wen in the novel. They-- just the idea of continuous sacrifice and gratitude. I cried so much for them.

Sorry, you might regret it a bit, but I think it'll also make you feel fulfilled to read the novel.

Anyway, I hope your day is going well!

I'm already reading it! So you don't have to feel conflicted about whether to recommend it. :)

I don't think that liking it or not liking it will affect my interest in CQL or the fandom. I've been in many fandoms with multiple versions of canon; I find it's best to pick the versions that work for me and stick to them. Sometimes it can be frustrating when you love one version and hate the other version and it feels like everyone is disparaging the one you think is good in favor of the one that gives you moral hives, but I haven't really seen those kinds of comparisons going around, and this isn't Star Trek, so I'll probably be fine.

I'm a little flummoxed by this word "unforgivable." First of all, I find most things forgivable; I'm a forgiving person. Second of all, these are fictional characters; if someone does something unforgivable it doesn't make them uninteresting or unrelatable.

I don't dislike JGY because he does bad things. I am uninterested in JGY because his personality is boring to me and not something I find relatable.

I'm also a little flummoxed by the idea of not liking something because it is morally gray. I know I stomp around on tumblr.com a lot yelling about morality, but my basic moral philosophy boils down to "try your very best to cause no harm," which is something that is extremely gray, because there are no absolutes. There is no good and evil. There is only the effort to be kind and help each other, and it is shocking how fuzzy and unclear that can be.

I have hesitated to read the novels partly because I'm aware of the consent issues. I think it is important to have fiction that has non-con, including fiction that has very sexy unproblematized non-con that allows people to indulge in fantasies that would be unsafe and harmful in the real world. That said, I don't like it. At all. Not for moral reasons but because I find it singularly unsexy.

I'll conclude by saying that it's very true that I tend not to be drawn to villains as characters. It's less because I find them morally repugnant, and more because they are often uninteresting to me. I think possibly the thing that draws me to a character the most is effort, especially an effort to do and be good--but this is a personal preference, not a moral one. I identify with characters who try to be good, and this makes me like them. I enjoy them the most when they fail a lot while trying their absolutely little best. Personally, I've heard mixed reviews about WWX in MDZS canon; some report, as you do, that he tries a lot and fails; others report that he's pretty careless in ways that make me feel a lot less interested in him. Since I'm already reading it, I'll find out, but the main thing I've taken away so far is that these novels are hilarious. I can't believe how funny it is. What a delight.

[cometrose]

Exactly the only thing different is the genders, if they were reversed everyone would be on his side like you said we've seen this story a 100 times, not that there isn't a lot of misogyny in fandom spaces like all spaces and dramas still have room for improvement when it comes to female characters in general but the way fandom has changed these last few years is just crazy, no nuance no complexity nothing interesting just perfect characters or they will get eaten alive and when it comes to romance, all they want is endlessly devoted men the women and their actions don't even factor into it it's all omg he's such a green flag and she fell first he fell harder we've completely lost the ability to engage with media, everything becomes morality discourse for fake people. I don't remember how they phrased it but someone said the way these people engage with media is because the only activism they know is online they haven't done anything in real life which is why they think fictional characters and their actions are tantamount to what real people believe...

ooh this is such a good point and I agree truly.

Bullied by in-laws? Ignored by spouse? In any other story people would be rallying for HW to get on the quickest flight out of there (I mean I was lol)

There is still a lot of misogyny within fandoms and dramas themselves so I always try to be thoughtful when discussing female characters but god you're so right. We just want perfection from these characters all the time and some many people just want perfect tropes perfect characters and perfect stories all the time its exhausting.

I am repeating myself but I do like how they aren't hopelessly devoted to each other all the time. I've watched two dramas this year, Marry My Husband and Perfect Marriage Revenge, and both male leads are knee-on-the-ground, would do anything for their respective female leads and while i do like those boys I also don't mind a male lead that has contradictory emotions for his partner.

Like the biggest thing here is nuance, the truth is obvious from the beginning that Hyunwoo clearly loves Haein he has just buried that feeling under all this frustration and resentment that he can no longer recognize it. These people don't have perfectly good feelings or behaviors towards each other and I think that's fine.

Plus this is a story about an estranged married couple like how would there be drama if they were perfectly perfect partners to each other all the time? Even though they may love each other that love isn't enough to be a happy couple. Haein says that she did not write Hyunwoo in the will because she wished to marry him as soon as possible and had to get through her mother first essentially leaving him high and dry but they were so in love it didn't matter. Like noooo these complexities are interesting plus it is so common for spouses to grow to hate each other and seeing there relationship grounded in some aspect of reality is a fresh change. I welcome it.

Don't get me started on morality politics on social media, the first two eps dropped I went on twitter saw one discussion tweet and knew I couldn't stay there it would drive me crazy. People are always trying to idolize someone these days, to find some perfect thing or unproblematic item to worship unconditionally instead of just accepting some things are fundamentally flawed and discussing their strengths and weaknesses.

[rizzlerosaka]

introduction post ^_^

my name is mimi (not my real name), i mainly post my drawings here

sometimes i post/reblog horror, suggestive or vent content so be careful

my main interests are weezer and my ocs (i created a manga/anime of them in my mind)

i also like animes/mangas such as evangelion, nana, azumanga, utena and black butler

i love both real people and fictional characters but i think fictional characters are better

i'm an adult but pls don't be judgemental, i swear i'm not a groomer or pedo i'm just a silly artist lol /gen

if you wanna know about my ocs you can dm me

also i'm a little problematic but i think it's ok bc nobody is %100 unproblematic lol

dni: basic dni criteria (bigots, pedos etc), anyone who hates me (yeah lol), zionists, real people shippers (unless they're really in a romantic relationship or you're just joking), lolicons and shotacons (just minor sexualizers in general), age shamers, kink shamers, anyone who talks shit abt my fav band/ship/character etc (i respect your opinions but i'm sensitive abt this topic srry)

socials: reddit , youtube , twitter, instagram, pinterest

i also have discord, if you wanna chat my username is gayriverscuomo

that's it, have fun silly :3

[utilitycaster]

Hi I just wanted to say thank you for putting everything that frustrates me about the fandom’s interpretation of Imogen and Laudna into words. I’ve made a few posts about Imogen’s flaws and how easily she seems to switch loyalties and I’ve been met with so many people telling me I’m not watching the show right or how Imogen isn’t to blame because she’s being controlled by the moon and it’s exhausting. I’ve been wanting to make a post about it but I didn’t know how to phrase it and you articulated pretty everything I’ve been thinking. I’m also planning on writing about the weird misandry in the fandom and how a lot of people don’t like male or male presenting characters if they can’t them their uwu sad white boy of the month and am really interested if you have any thoughts on that. I really hope people aren’t assholes to you about that post❤️ -brjeauregard

Hey! Thank you so much! I'm assuming you're ok going by your handle here since it was a voluntary add to an anon but if you want me to delete this for whatever reason feel free to message me and I will.

Yeah...I'd agree that it's really tiresome how if you actually want to engage with Imogen as an entire character with motivations and flaws, there's this immediate freakout. It's obnoxious that people seem to think all her impatience, grudges, and little snipes and unkindnesses must come from some other source (the gnarlrock, Ruidus); it can't be her cynicism or being cranky due to exhaustion from holding up her psychic barriers; that only makes her more nurturing and empathetic, apparently). Like, there's all these accusations that people have no empathy for Imogen, coming from people who openly would happily throw every other character (sometimes even including Laudna) from the skyship for the crime of having individual motivations different from Imogen's goals, and I'm very over it.

I would love to see more posts about the misandry, tbh. It's a really tricky subject because like...look, in the real world, misogyny is a load-bearing pillar of oppression not just of women, but one of the core underpinnings of homophobia, transphobia, and toxic masculinity as well. What people call misandry irl is, much of the time, either hatred directed on an individual level rather than a systemic one or is actually oppression of men under a different system (eg, transphobia towards trans or gnc men; racism towards men of color, etc). But in fandom, especially on Tumblr which is overwhelmingly female and/or queer, there is this weird hatred towards men (or, as we've seen a bunch with Ashton, masc-leaning nb people) in fiction for no reason other than they are not women. I'm not linking them here so as to not invite weird shit to the doors of my mutuals but I can think of two very good recent posts that touch on this subject, one from a month or so ago about the fandom tendency to reshape characters in their own (often white middle-class queer) image instead of trying to relate to someone not like you; and one from yesterday that does address fandom misandry directly.

It is interesting because it feels like half of the hatred or weird fanon towards male characters comes from a "well I can't make him into a palatable white sadboy" (trying to turn Orym into The Most Tragic when he is just a guy; ignoring Chetney, Fjord, or Scanlan because they don't fit that mold neatly); and the other half comes from hating the character because he can conceivably be treated as a white sadboy even though he's got much more going on (Vax, Percy, Caleb, sometimes Caduceus). Like, there is really no winning. To be fair, there's also no winning for female characters among people with that mindset (see: the entire post that prompted this, in which they must be Good Examples Of Sweet Unproblematic Women who Chastely Kiss, Pinterest Style) or nb characters (will be misgendered in an instant if they do not support the narrative of the fave or interfere with preferred ships).

I think, generally, once people start judging a fictional character, who lives in a gender-equal world with no transphobia, primarily on the basis of gender, it just turns into a slippery slope of kind of hating every character. I do want to see interesting women in fiction! Part of why I watch actual play is because it is a still relatively rare case where many of the originators of these characters are women who are granted nigh-total creative control over their characters! But I'm not going to write off a character with a personality that speaks to me simply because our genders don't match; that's not interesting to me and it feels far too close to gender essentialism for my comfort. And if you do for whatever reason want to watch actual play that only has female PCs, that is your choice to make...but you then need to find that show instead of being mad that there are men on the show with five men and three women in the main cast.

[rockinlibrarian]

why do you ship incest. adoptive siblings are still siblings

Well, of course they are, in real life. But we're talking fiction, and fiction is not about showing only the perfect and unproblematic. It's about asking what if?

Now the chances are that you, Anon, don't even follow me and aren't actually interested in my response. You've made up your mind and are only using this ask to express your disgust in the form of a question. But I think it's an interesting question, and I'm going to respond anyway.

There are many different angles to reply from. Why do I ship incest? That almost implies that I choose my ships based on whether or not they're incestuous. What you have to understand is that, in almost every instance, people who ship incestuous or even pseudo-incestuous (which I'll get to in a minute) relationships have not chosen to do so because incest turns them on. They're not saying, Hey, it's COOL to be in a romantic relationship with your sibling, EVERYONE should try it! Shipping, in fiction, is about exploring the relationship between two characters in different settings. In fact, you'll frequently find AUs of such pairings where they aren't siblings at all, allowing the writer and reader to explore the relationship without having to consider the implications of whether or not it's incestuous. Of course, I say that, even though I've never written such an AU myself. Nope, I've always addressed the issue head-on.

Which brings us to the pseudo-incest concept, which tends to be the warning tag I use on my Fiks-- because sometimes it's up for debate whether the pairing IS incestuous in the first place. Again, in real life, you are correct, adoptive siblings are still siblings, and adoptive families are REAL, often more so than their bio families would have been, and I've got a different fandom whose third season I could rant about for forgetting that canonically for reasons completely unrelated to incest (*cough*Legion*cough*). But the only ship I have that falls in this category is between two of the Hargreeves "siblings" from The Umbrella Academy, and I put the "siblings" in quotes here because in this case we are not talking about a happy little adoptive family here. We're talking about a group of children who were "adopted"-- ie purchased-- and raised in basically a military academy, not a family. In fact one of the themes of the show is that these incredibly messed-up people finally come to SEE themselves as family and love each other as family-- which they were NOT doing from the beginning. It's like chastizing couples who meet at boarding school for incest because they lived together as children. The Umbrella Academy even canonically has at least one romantic history amongst them (and I'm not particularly interested in that pairing even. The Homecoming King and Queen, eh. Has nothing on the Apocalypse and the Knight-of-Stopping-the-Apocalypse, the One Who Cries if You Step on Ants and History's Most Notorious Assassin, the ones who are simultaneously Best Friends and Nemeses-- see? INTERESTING!) Now, it is still debatable, and I don't fault anyone for saying "still too close, it's not for me," but that's different than saying "this ship is morally repugnant and therefore you are morally repugnant for not understanding that."

And then, why do I ship it? Why does anyone ship anyone? The irony of this is that I, of all people, am not a shipper. I prefer Gen fic. Even when I DO ship, I still don't like smut. And up until this particular ship, I never shipped anybody who wasn't canonically at least implied to have romantic feelings! If you go through my / tags on AO3, the vast majority of them are in fact canonically married couples. I have always been the person who rolled their eyes and said "You know, people can LOVE each other STRONGLY without it being a SHIP" at shippers. I honestly have no idea why this particular pair wants to be romantic in my head! I have never once entertained the notion that my OTHER, even bigger, favorite pseudo-sibling pair in fanfic, Cary and Kerry Loudermilk, might be romantically involved, and they are even closer, and they love each other SO SO SO SO much, and I have written SOOOOO many fics exploring THEIR relationship. And other people HAVE written slash fics about them. But I can't see it, myself. They just don't do that. And that's the way I see them. But for some reason when I try exploring Five and Viktor's relationship in the same way, the little "NOW KISS!" voice in the back of my head won't shut up. And I accept that there are many other people who do NOT have that voice, who love their relationship purely platonically and are just as sure that they don't do that as I am sure the Loudermilks don't. We can love these characters in our own ways!

Which brings me to the biggest takeaway from this question: ship and let ship. We don't know why anyone latches on to any particular ship, problematic or not. And we all have squicks and even just pairings we're not interested in-- I am not interested in a LOT of pairings, even mainstream canonical ones, especially ones that seemed to be based on hotness and turn-ons rather than personality, which there are LOADS of. There are many reasons for a person to not approve of a ship in their own opinion-- I personally have always found millennial-old immortals with young adult humans to be squicky, and never understood their widespread appeal, but even I made an exception when I fell for Jason Mendoza and Janet on the Good Place (I could write an essay about why THAT one is compelling and a perfectly good exception to the mortal/immortal issue too), so it's not even like there are hard-and-fast-rules on a person-to-person basis. There are even other reasons to find Fiktor squicky beyond their pseudo-sibling status-- the complicated (though not millennial-different) age issues (which can also be avoided through AUs or when-it-takes-place changes in setting), the fact that they've frequently threatened each other with violence-- okay maybe not FREQUENTLY, but even once could be enough of a squick for some people. But everyone's tolerance for whatever they deem squicky is different, so it's their OWN responsibility to just NOT READ that which they don't like!

Now if you HAVE been actually following my Tumblr, you'd know that the biggest social issue I tend to post about is the Freedom of Information, because I'm a librarian and it's one issue I actually have a decent amount of expertise about. The line between sensible curation and censorship can sometimes be hard to see, but it does exist, and one of the main criteria is that, when building a collection, you have to take your own opinions out of it. You can say "I don't agree with that," but as soon as you add, "and no one should have access to this thing I don't agree with," then you have problems. Because some things that some people find perfectly innocent-- like the fact that trees don't have gender-- can be seen by someone else as "dangerous indoctrination". And sometimes someone doesn't agree with something because THEY are objectively wrong-- "I don't agree with teaching the true history of slavery in the United States because it implies our Founding Fathers were imperfect"-- and you ESPECIALLY do NOT want opinions to keep FACTS from being accessible. But anyone can attempt to back up their opinions with facts, so drawing the line is really murky! So you err on the side of accessibility, not on repressing disagreeable ideas.

And AO3 is really great for this, because as long as something isn't plagiarized, it's fair game. It's your job as a READER to use the handy-dandy tags and rating system to avoid that which you don't like! And everyone can hold their own opinions about fictional characters in harmony!

tl;dr: things that are Bad in real life are not automatically bad in fiction. Ship and Let Ship.

[runawaymun]

For the character ask: Galadriel (or Artanis if the time period is preferred) :)

1: sexuality headcanon

Ragingly bisexual & had a Thing with Luthien. Big strap energy.

2: otp

Galadriel/Celeborn. He's Wife Guy and I love them together.

3: brotp

Glorfindel! Shared experiences with the grinding ice and first age in general. I think there's a real sense of easy familiarity and fondness between the two of them, and I headcannon that she uses Laurefindele in reference to him and he uses Artanis in reference to her. They swap war stories about Turgon together :)

4: notp

Haladriel. I keep seeing fics with Celebrian as a Haladriel baby and I want to kms. I am horrified. I am disgusted. I commit my life to my lord and savior jesus christ--

I just hate it so much. Not least of all for the Celeborn erasure but mostly for how it cheapens both characters and has some problematic implications for how we treat women in fiction. I hate hate hate the whole "she has the potential to save him from himself/bring him back from the brink of insanity/hold him in check" die die die stop romanticising relationships in which one party is responsible for the actions of another especially ESPECIALLY women with men. Women are not here to "civilize" men. And just in general please give Mairon more credit than that. No. He is not refraining from certain actions because he wants that pussy. He is refraining from certain actions because he has long term plans and is capable of strategic thought. No, he is not offering for Galadriel to be "his queen" in a romantic sense. He is manipulating her just like Morgoth manipulated Feanor by playing to that disastrous genetic Noldorin arrogance. Also she's clearly grieving her husband and in no way in a position to have a relationship with anyone, least of all a corrupt maia. I know there's like... let people ship what they want and relationships don't all have to be healthy and unproblematic or whatever but I just take a LOT of issues with the way Haladriel is romanticised. And just...with it. In general. As a ship. It's bad & i hate it. UGHHHH I could go on about this for ages I am so sorry. There are very few ships that I hate more than fucking Haladriel.

5: first headcanon that pops into my head

She collects butterflies. It's her special interest! She has a whole butterfly garden in Lorien & popular gifts from Celeborn include rare sourced caterpillars to add to her garden for her to bond with and study.

6: favorite line from this character

And you, Ring-bearer,’ she said, turning to Frodo. ‘I come to you last who are not last in my thoughts. For you I have prepared this.’ She held up a small crystal phial: it glittered as she moved it, and rays of white light sprang from her hand. ‘In this phial,’ she said, ‘is caught the light of Eärendil’s star, set amid the waters of my fountain. It will shine still brighter when night is about you. May it be a light to you in dark places, when all other lights go out.

7: one way in which I relate to this character

I think I really do have something of that pitfall of ambition & wanting to be someone and do things -- which is not in of itself a bad thing but it can become unhealthy and detrimental, which I think is part of why Galadriel's arc of desiring power and a kingdom, sailing to Middle Earth, but then kind of settling into a more background role of preservation & guidance and ultimately choosing to resist that core temptation the Ring offers her and sailing back home to simply be Galadriel is very meaningful to me.

8: thing that gives me second hand embarrassment about this character

She has boomer energy in my head. Can't really elaborate on any specifics but every time she shows up in longfics that take place in the third age she has moments that feel like trying to watch my parents use a cellphone.

9: cinnamon roll or problematic fave?

Half cinnamon roll half problematic fave imo.

[gwyns]

I just can’t fathom that a female would choose to be with someone that hunted her sister, an accidental accomplice to ending her human life, that still visits Tamlin, and lives in a house her exfinacee provides. That’s a lot. Especially the housing. How do you come back from that? I’m not trying to be all mean but I’m asking honestly how can someone come back from all that and be Elain’s love interest?

sjm likes tension like that though, that's the whole point. that's what makes the eventual union all the sweeter. are we forgetting that rowan beat and told aelin she should've died? or that rhys literally twisted feyre's broken arm to get her to agree to his deal? i think elain and lucien will be just fine lol

different author but a good example is magnus and cleo from the falling kingdoms series. magnus quite literally killed cleo's first love in front of her, and then tried to capture her multiple times as his father killed her family and stole her kingdom. yet they still fell in love. that's the beauty of fiction, you get to see these compelling stories and relationships develop. bottom line is, if sjm wants it to happen, it'll happen

you ask how he can come back from that? respecting her and her choices, something he's already doing. if i were elain i'd rather be with the person who is patient and gives me the time and space to figure out what i want. not someone who speaks for me and calls me "the third", but maybe i'm just built different

you say you're not trying to be mean, and i'm not disagreeing with that, it does come off as genuinely curious, but i'm not in the mood to sit here and try to prove my stance to anyone. ill will or not. i just don't understand why people in this fandom have this obsession with characters needing to be perfect and unproblematic at all times. that's not how storytelling works, if it did it'd be boring as hell

[place-holder-for-witty-username]

They can only love each other as much as they love themselves. they hate the other as they hate themselves. Its not altruistic love, its the complicated destructive relationship an abused child has with itself, reflected outwards towards another person. They don't see each other as a seperate entity. They see each other as a part of themselves, ugly as a human lung but just as necessary to their body to keep living.

I've seen people read the book and "cancel" it because of all the "problematic" content and say "it's not a love story". Like actual puritans who need a morality tale in every work of fiction. Just read the bible if thats what you want, or childrens stories with a helpful moral highlighted and explained at the end. Cathy and heathcliff aren't MEANT to be good people.

Evil, insane, destructive, fucked up, traumatised, co-dependent people EXIST in real life and they do fall in love.

Fiction isn't always a morality tale, its a mirror of reality, meant to help us comprehend real life in a safe way-reading, watching a film. People do not have to be perfect or even Good or for gods sake even not be murdering manipulative bastards to be loved and to love.

True love isn't the purview of the good and pure. Its something anyone can experience because its a HUMAN experience. Cathy and Heathcliff ARE a love story. Thats the whole point.

Another favourite book of mine is dangerous liasons . What happens when truly awful people experience true love? Love doesn't have to be flawless to be genuine, its how the people involved choose to act that makes love a good or a bad thing. We need fucked up complicated and messy relationships in fiction because thats how real life is. But theres a difference between romanticising abuse ie not acknowledging that a story is messed up and glossing over it like how irl abuse is ignored, and refusing to see any worth in a piece of media about flawed characters in a flawed world doing flawed things.

You don't have to be good to be loved and to love. Its how you choose to act on it. Complex people are more interesting to read about and a fucked up love story is STILL a love story. If you have feelings about how a book or film or tv show ended and elements dont sit right with you-lets sit down with a cup of tea and have a chat about why.

what could have been different? Does your discomfort indicate poor writing /handling of complex subject matter on behalf of the author or are you noticing that the icky part of said media is something you've experienced in real life and shouldn't have. Is there a bigger systemic, societal issue that this media feeds into or just reminds you of, and does this need to change in society? How do we do that?

Books, film, tv are all meant to trigger discussion and help us cope with the real world, understand it, and change it. We can't do that if everything is pretty and unproblematic all the time.

ANDREA DWORKIN, ‘Wuthering Heights’ (1987) from Letters from a War Zone

[rise-of-a-morningstar]

-long post, friends; I'm rambling about somethings that Lexie and Sebby have kept to themselves for Probs too long.

In regards to that last repost,

Honestly we were, and still are, extremely hesitant about how much we're choosing to interact and get involved with HH/HB. Hellaverse is something we've been enjoying greatly and we love sharing our ideas and learning other people's ideas as well, no matter the fandom or media it's over. When we take interest in something, it's deep rooted.

But every time we venture to fandom spaces that we haven't been to, there's this sense of dread and fear we get. Especially when there's a flocking of new and young fans.

Lexie and Sebby were lucky with the delightful crowd they fell into over in the corner of the Star Wars Rebels fandom. We've been lucky to have both friends and mutuals unconditionally support us, be just as eager to hear us explore our thoughts and fantasies as we are theirs.

Above all else, we operate on a ship and let ship type of stature. Don't judge kinks or fantasies or how someone chooses to cope. We get antsy and anxious when people conflate their personal discomfort over X as "X is immoral". I'll be one of the first to admit that there's a lot of weird shit, but weird shit is okay. There's nothing shameful or immoral about it as long as it isn't hurting a real person.

What so many people don't understand is that they are responsible for curating their own online experiences, but they take that as they have to make this other person change. Instead of just simply blocking things or people when they feel uncomfortable.

The "everyone has to be unproblematic and share the exact opinion and perspective as I do" is such a highly and deeply flawed mindset to have. It's the "you don't think the same way I do, therefore you're wrong and that isn't allowed". And often it's hypocritical.

Not everyone will get along and not everyone will agree and not everyone will have the same perspective. But that's life. That's real life. You can either embrace it or just keep scrolling.

Curating your online experience does not mean harass and berate others into submission to your will and beliefs.

For us, we welcome anyone and everyone, we love broadening the horizons of understanding or perspectives. But what we don't welcome is when people try and make all fiction "unproblematic", when they believe that what a person creates is a showcase of what that person's morals are, or when they think it's okay to berate someone over their taste in *fiction*.

We've been fortunate in the fact that someone hasn't directly targeted or harassed us, but that's also because we have a tendency to stick to ourselves and our small circles when it comes to closer/direct interactions.

I know Lexie would love to interact more, but he's also the most hesitant. He acts tough, and he is, but he also has a lot of the mental stuff that he has to balance.

Regardless, we're still excited to share our exploration thoughts and listen to others, excited to meet others. Above all else, excited to offer a safe space for others to explore their imagination freely and without judgment.

I fell asleep writing this, hehe, I'm just rambling. The boys kept this in for too long, and after reading through the documents of what happened, my heart ached. For Shay, their friends, their family, and their dreams and passion.

I hate how toxic fanspaces can become. How unwelcoming. And how it's been escalating from more than just the typically more erotic side of things. Every thought, take, and imagination has to be "the right one". If your imagination isn't an exact mirror of your real world morality, then there's the risk of someone with no media literacy but equipped with more words than they know how to wield safely harassing you instead of simply just scrolling on or blocking.

There's more I wanted to say, but it's not in my mind's orbit at this moment. And I'm not sure what else to say that isn't just going to be repeating what I've already said.

Nevertheless, we still firmly stand on being as welcoming as possible. On providing a safe and gentle space.

Love,

Alice 💖

[thelesbianpoirot]

Yes exactly. I also think it’s interesting that rather than wanting to be the proactive complex character, they would rather be a passive simplified version of that character? I relate to characters like aziraphale who prefers calm and slow pace so if I want to see aspects of myself somewhat reflected I do go to these characters as I’m more similar to them, or the male writer self insert nerd characters too, but fiction is also for escapism and imagining yourself as something else and so why would I take the power fantasy characters and turn them into another type of character to be more similar to myself? I don’t always want to be me and I don’t need characters to have similar traits as me for me to relate to them and want to be them. Often I like to imagine myself as characters more cool, more confident, more competent etc than myself, then the power fantasy is also aspirational to me. I even like to imagine myself as cool and tragic villains, not because I agree with the villain but because it’s just, you know, it’s just escapism to imagine yourself as someone more powerful or interesting.

In the case of crowley, I am not sure why the fandom has “feminised” him so much. It might be because they want him to be more like a typical representation of a demon who’s more androgynous and seductive because they’re attracted to him? Or want to be that kind of character (especially considering the gender fandoms obsessions with making gay characters’ sexualities fluid, aziraphale being gay).

Anyway, I think in general the baby girlfication of male power fantasies and other heroic powerful and competent etc type of characters might also be a result of this generation using representation and diversity in fiction as a criteria for whether the story is good or “unproblematic”, and the seeming inability or unwillingness to read about people different than yourself (ironic when you want diversity. It’s almost like some just want diversity so every story has a character with a similar identity as themselves that they can then project on?). Like how similar a character is to yourself is used as a criteria for whether the story is good or worth reading.

YOU ARE SO SMART

And so right. The diversity they ask for is usually within a group they fit in so they can project on more easily. The inability to identify with people unlike themselves force them to conform every character to their demographic in their fanon - suddenly the white straight able man is a brown "queer" autistic fat anxious nb with vitiligo . I do not need a character to be like me to love them or recognize good writing. I enjoy knowing people unlike myself (AZ & Crowley & Dean & Poirot & Columbo& Chloe & Nadine (uncharted btw) & Ellie (last of us) & Xena & Gabs), and getting to see their experiences in a way only film/video games can do. While I don't want every character to be a straight white man, I don't want every character to be like me. I have read YA and New Adult books with anxiety ridden "queer" millennials/gen Z that never do anything worthwhile and waste their time obsessing over identity, I hate those characters. I don't want to change every character into that....it's not diversity it's a new homogeneity. Turn on the latest procedural, and 40 yr old characters are talking in woke speak like their 19 yr olds on twitter. It's exhausting. But I am talking about a series of problems right now. Thank you for taking time out to rant with me. You are way more eloquent.

[theghostofashton]

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