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crisisdparity · 1 year ago

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I sincerely apologize if I insulted you. That was not my intent at all.

You are correct that Aizawa’s practice is terrible if we take only canon information before 254 into account and is probably still pretty terrible after.

However, just because this trait isn’t productive as shown in the series doesn’t mean it doesn’t have the potential to be. I have been trying to prompt you to imagine such a scenario since you are clearly a very creative individual who writes amazing stories, but if this is the thing that is beyond your ability to imagine, that’s fine. I can spell it out for you.

Here’s the problem: We don’t have that much canon information to work with in the first place. We get the minimum possible information to establish Aizawa as expulsion happy and are expected, as readers, to fill in the many blanks ourselves. You have clearly chosen to do so in a way that paints Aizawa as being that bad or worse all the time given your vehemence that this is the only possible interpretation of events.

You keep pointing out that this is a permanent black mark on the student records. What about the other side of the coin? Where the hero industry is incredibly dangerous and quirks can be highly lethal? You know, the very thing that the USJ lesson was supposed to be highlighting according to Thirteen before the LoV attacked?

These kids have potentially lethal abilities and training and are going to be going into a profession that will threaten life and limb on a regular basis. I myself would sooner put a permanent black mark on a student’s record than risk them being one more corpse on the streets or getting others, like a classmate, killed. First year should be the safest a hero course gets, and there are several close calls in the series itself, some of which aren’t even related to villain attacks.

Honestly, for as expulsion-happy as Aizawa is supposed to be, there are spots where I honestly think he isn’t expulsion-happy enough. Such as Katsuki in the battle trial. He should have booted him that same day or at least the next morning and we all would have cheered him for it.

I think a lot of Aizawa hate comes from the fact that he is seen as an obstacle for our favorite protagonist, Izuku. I agree that Aizawa should have done more to help Izuku overcome his self-destructive issues, but he isn’t wrong that a kid so self-destructive that he cripples himself with each use of his quirk is a bad fit for heroics. A conclusion that Izuku proves right by wrecking his arms past the point that Recovery Girl can heal them. Aizawa isn’t right about Izuku, but he’s not necessarily wrong either and Izuku pays the price for not learning that lesson soon enough.

The main issue with Aizawa as a teacher isn’t just the threat of expulsion, it’s the fact that he’s very hands-off in his sink-or-swim style. There’s a lesson to be had in his expulsion threats, but he just isn’t involved enough in canon to make it viable. Most writers lean into tired hands-off Aizawa and drop the expulsion aspect to make him palatable. However, to fully explore the expulsion-as-teaching method, we have to make Aizawa more involved with his students.

So here goes:

Aizawa prepares some very well-researched files on each of his students and is very concerned at Izuku’s listing him as quirkless (among other things), but chalks it up to him being a rare late bloomer and puts together a list of trustworthy quirk counselors who specialize in late bloomers/difficult quirks that he intends to give Izuku day one.

The expulsion scare for the quirk assessment test is half a logical ruse to light a fire under the class’s butts. He was still prepared to follow through if someone got last place from half-assign it, but that didn’t happen.

When Aizawa hands out schedules after the assessment, Katsuki nearly explodes at seeing guidance counseling on his. This prompts everyone to check and see that, yes, they all have scheduled guidance counseling as well. Aizawa tells them that regular guidance counseling is mandatory under threat of expulsion. Because every pro hero needs therapy and far too few get it, so they’re going to be developing good habits starting now.

Aizawa takes Izuku aside after dismissing everyone that first day and tells him that he needs to get his quirk under control and if he breaks any more bones in class, he’s expelled, listing off several heroes that Izuku’s never heard of who all were crippled in the line of duty by being reckless. He follows that up with the list of quirk counselors for Izuku to look into.

The battle trial happens as in canon and Aizawa is livid. Bakugou is expelled to Gen-Ed the next morning before class starts, very publicly, for reckless endangerment of his classmates and “excessive force in a load-bearing environment”. He has to write a 10-page research paper on the dangers of destructive quirk use indoors, citing at least 5 different news articles where someone lost their lives as a result and will not be allowed back in the classroom until he can produce a paper worthy of at least a 90 grade. Also, because Aizawa believes in equal-opportunity unfairness, the rest of the class has to write a 2-3 page paper on the same topic referencing at least 1 news article.

Aizawa tells Izuku that Katsuki’s deadly attack is the only reason he isn’t being expelled as well and to see him after class. Talking with Izuku about what happened makes Aizawa realize just how damaged Izuku really is. He’s a natural self-sacrificing idiot (good for heroics, bad for self-preservation) with a self-destructive quirk and a potentially fatal lack of self-worth. He understands in that moment that threatening expulsion will not work on Izuku because he doesn’t care enough about himself to give that any teeth, but he needs something to keep the kid from crippling himself in the short-term so he can get to the point that he isn’t breaking himself all the time. So Aizawa does something he really didn’t want to ever do and threatens to expel Uraraka as well if Izuku breaks any more bones in class. He does not mean this and is praying like crazy that Izuku does not call his bluff even as he is listing incidents where people died because the hero on scene was too injured (from being reckless) to help. He then starts suggesting everything Izuku can do to get it under control, from daily quirk counseling (starting that same afternoon) to just talking it out with his classmates or even just practicing with activating his quirk without doing anything with it. Whatever it takes to get him past the bone-breaking stage. (Izuku shakingly takes this to heart and attacks his own quirk in counseling and study groups with an analysis fervor beyond anything he’s ever shown before, figuring out Full Cowling before the USJ and Aizawa is so proud and relieved when he can rescind the expulsion threat against Uraraka and just limit it to Izuku himself.)

+1 - “I am here to help you be the best heroes you can possibly be, and if you ever make me think that your best potential is a corpse or an enabler of corpses, I will expel you so hard you would think All Might punted you out the door himself and then <I>re-enroll you just so I can expel you again</I>. Hate me if you want, <i>I don’t care</I>.”

+2 - Aizawa has a near encyclopedic knowledge of heroes getting themselves or others crippled or killed on the job through recklessness, showboating, or incompetence. He will cheerfully whip out such examples any time they seem appropriate to the situation.

I know you like quoting canon at me, but the point of fanfiction is to go beyond canon. To fill in the gaps that the original creators left. If on this point you honestly can’t look past canon to see potential, then I genuinely have nothing more to say on the subject. Thank you for taking the time to debate me.

On 254 being a retcon for Aizawa’s expulsion tactics: I’m not so sure. I think the intention was always to go that way, but the writing was never able to focus enough on class life to the point that it could be established and built upon as we just jumped from crisis to crisis. I agree that the practice as shown is detrimental, but I disagree on the idea that it is completely devoid of potential. To me, that is as shortsighted as declaring certain quirks inherently villainous.

what.

I--

sorry hold on let me see if I can understand this.

You're suggesting that me saying Aizawa placing a permanent black mark and traumatizing his students for no benefit is bad, is the same as me declaring that a Quirk is inherently Villainous.

Not only is that one of the single dumbest takes I have ever had the displeasure of reading with my own eyes, you're also leveling personal insults at me. What the fuck. Why-- are you okay? WHat the fuck.

Honestly I've blocked people for less. I could easily justify deleting this ask, blocking you, and going about the rest of my life a happier person. But I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt. Don't waste it.

So let's ignore your strong implication that I'm discriminating against poor little aizawa who just wants to cause unrelenting and incredible stress to his students for again, no benefit, and focus on the actual meat of your argument here.

Are you aware that in Japan, High School is not compulsory? From the perspective of his students, Aizawa is not only threatening their time at UA, but any high school at all. That Black Mark is still on the records of the students he expelled! I'm not making that up! I'm not exaggerating!

He never indicates that he transfers them to Gen-Ed for 250 chapters. We have no reason to believe that he transfers them to Gen-Ed before this. Even if it was hypothetically planned from the start instead of something to retroactively make him look like he isn't ruining he futures of these students by throwing them out of the top school in Japan with a Black Mark damn-near ensuring that none of them are ever accepted into a High School, it's still a shitty retcon because there's no foreshadowing! There is no reason to believe otherwise! Hell, we're given every reason to believe him at face value!

If Aizawa really did renroll them, then it should've been listed there in the records All Might read, or Aizawa should've said something about it. The line about ending half-assed dreams is practically confirmation that they are kicked out of UA. There is no reason to say that if he intends on renrolling them.

Unless, of course, it was a retcon thrown in later.

Funny how when Shinsou talks about the possibility of taking someone's place in 1-A and them being move to Gen-Ed, he calls it a Transfer and not fucking Expulsion.

And we are now something like five asks deep in this chain of your insistence that Aizawa's expulsion do in fact have some level of value, but you've yet to identify a single case where they would be useful except when Bakugou knowingly and deliberately used lethal force against Midoriya. Congrats. The burden of proof is on you and all you can do is repeat the same line but slightly louder. That's not even Aizawa's expulsion scare tactics, that's how literally any school would function in the real world!

You want to convince me that Aizawa's expulsion threats have value? That's your fucking job to prove! Give me a decent example! What the fuck makes you think it's okay to tell me to convince myself and insult me for not doing so?!

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