#Stop infantilizing her

[happyvoltz]

can we stop babying lucy she’s not some little girl who doesn’t know anything, shes smart and self assured, sure she’s naive/sheltered, not in her maturity or intellect but rather her knowledge of a post war wasteland. shes not gonna cry if cooper tells her to shut up shes gonna lecture him about how his words hold meaning or some bs.. like guys shes not a child, shes a grown ass woman.

[harrowscore]

can't believe a show based on a videogame (usually games adaptations are notoriously bad, which isn't the case here tho) gave me the beauty and the beast/twisted mirrors/enemies to traveling companions/ruthless antihero+optmistic but still badass heroine who takes none of his shit/age gap but make it sexy dynamic of my dreams. as much as i love maximus and i think he deserves the best writing ever because 1. he's a clever deconstruction of the aspiring Knight bro who's actually a bit of a loser and, as much as lucy, sees the world in black&white at first and then doesn't get what he thought he wanted but what he needs (or at least i hope he'll eventually get it), and 2. he's a cutie and i want an epic love story for him too, it's very funny how they tried to give us a puppy kind of romance and the tumblr girlies still fixated on the "toxic ~she bites his finger off and he cuts hers off and sews it on his hand in what we'll pretend it's a symbolic marriage rings exchange or whatever~ asshole who used to be a nice guy/good girl™ with a lot of spunk and hidden anger but unshakeable morals" kind of relationship.

[farosdaughter]

There's no rule that says Coriolanus Snow can't be a romantic and a gentleman to his girlfriend while at the same time as being an evil dictator villian with the blood of millions of teens and children on his hands. He can be both. It makes him more intriguing that he can be both. That he has empathy for a certain number of people, but can't spare more than that(I headcanon that he was a good grandfather to his grandchildren)

PREACH!

If things had gone slightly different in canon, I’m convinced Snow would’ve had a loving marriage while still becoming the villain we know in THG. After all, his decision to forsake romantic love after the events of TBOSAS is in itself a testament to the depth of his feelings for Lucy Gray.

Love doesn’t equal redemption or goodness, and the fact that he’s a fundamentally selfish person in a position of power doesn’t mean Snow isn’t also capable of human emotions and attachment. Especially when the prequel makes the opposite argument. I agree with you that in canon he seemed like a loving grandfather even as he reached unheard of levels of cruelty as President.

His innate possessiveness would on the contrary make him a very doting and protective husband (to the right woman, sorry Livia). Whether the relationship would have stood the test of time (and of his thirst for power) is another matter entirely. Most AUs where Coryo and Lucy Gray go back to the Capitol and he goes into government have her betraying him in the end, and I also think that would the most likely outcome. Theirs is a monstrous love, etc etc

[satisaranea]

re; ableism in the hunger games, infantilism of the traumatized/shunning of the traumatized.

okay so i woke up & my awesome mutual @ongreenergrasses made a post about this too (i JUST saw it and like oooh my god. i agree so hard and so much) and i'm just going to talk about what i've been thinking.

the hunger games is doused in some really nasty thinking when it comes to mental health, and then even more so when it comes to disabilities, addiction and PTSD. i'm going to break down this post in parts based on each character who represents this, and any misc. ones will simply be the issue at hand alone. i find that suzanne writes a certain stereotypical sort of rhetoric that goes unchecked by this fandom because the majority are not those who have experienced these things, but the ones who *have* should at least bring this to more attention if possible. katniss to me, is one of the most ableist characters (not of her own knowing) as the good and mighty protagonist, and seeing people headcanon her as autistic is very interesting when her takes on people with any sort of difference in mental states is.. it comes into question constantly.

𝐀𝐍𝐍𝐈𝐄

annie is very truthfully, a character who is only based on being the ‘poor mad girl who wins finnick's heart’ and yes, a victor with more severe PTSD which has come to affect her daily life, or at least when it comes to the games. suzanne collins’ constant use of the term ‘mad girl’ comes from katniss as protagonist, which reads as so ableist. watering anyone to their inpairments or their level of health is dehumanizing, and it reads to me like she regards annie as a sort of special case, like a wounded animal almost. the only positive talk about annie as a character minus her wedding, minus her relationship with finnick is when peeta explains annie's experiences in the games, which comes with empathy and understanding that most,,, are overbearing with. i see so many people water her down to just, being finnick's, and only being whatever level of trauma has enabled her consistent struggles. this i won't put a label on because i don't know what collin's was trying to achieve.

i even believe that finnick as her lover commits a level of ableist thinking in their relationship. he withholds information of the rebellion from her (despite her being extremely smart and just as career as anyone else from four,) and despite that not changing anything because she's still tortured, still abused in some way, he has a level of extreme overprotectiveness that reads as infantilism of his partner, and it seems to me like everyone considers finnick as annie's carer, and doesn't consider annie as his partner. yes his *lover,* but not someone on equal ground as far as their mental health issues go. the way annie is seen on both coins of fandom and book are incredibly ignorant and very, very harmful to disabled people. just because someone has a debilitating issue does not mean you get to treat them like they're a child, does not mean you go onto label them from that single trait. like i said, the phrase ‘the mad girl back home’ is so, so degrading to annie, who is a survivor and has overcome her experiences with respective scars. respect her humanity, because it's sub human thinking to call someone mad based on PTSD. leave that in the 1910s/20s.

𝐌𝐑𝐒. 𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐃𝐄𝐄𝐍 & 𝐇𝐀𝐘𝐌𝐈𝐓𝐂𝐇

(note that the haymitch part will be longer than the rest because i have enough content to go off of & this is my specialty)

mrs. everdeen and haymitch as characters both experience deprecating grief, to the extent where their mental health is tarnished from that. mrs. e becomes withdrawn and stiff from family; only able to function for the sake of work. her love, her husband dies and it emotionally disables her and severs a proper relationship to her two daughters. her mental health being dependant on the man/the loss of him and the fact that she discards her family is not only somewhat realistic for *some* cases, but also equally spitting out ideas of tradition and how "women need a man," with hazelle contrasting this and having to work for her 4 children to the point of blood. katniss’ perception of her mother's issue do come from hurt, but also internalised prejudice against those with mental health as she can see the extent of agony her mother is in and still loathes her, never leaving the door open for empathy.

the treatment of haymitch in both book and fandom is equally prejudiced and incredibly uneducated on addiction, and again — grief. haymitch self-medicates because his trauma, the extent of it is so mutilating to the point where he has to be flushing out memories on a constant basis. the fandom calls him a stupid drink, looks down on his intelligence. the books make him look volatile, squalored. the way in which suzanne collins describes his kitchen (which is filthy with old food, hazards, bottles and mice droppings) is VERY true of several people with severe mental health. katniss makes fun of him while he's in a state of approaching withdrawal, saying that the smell brings tears to her eyes, and at the end of the conversation ‘to take a bath.’ people with depression (which is what mrs. e and haymitch both have in different cases) find it difficult to do everyday chores and simple tasks, and katniss also repeats the idea of haymitch being unhygienic when she says ‘he's disgusting, but I'm greatful’ alongside commenting that it must've been a long while since he had bathed. haymitch is the richest man in the district, but not even that can stop the blatant hatred that katniss parrots. haymitch is to me, ill, and it reflects in his attitude during the games and when he's in withdrawal. suzanne hones in his mental state the most, and what he is a functioning alcoholic, and while that differs from regular alcoholism, people are consistent to demean his character with misconceptions and text books beliefs of what an alcoholic looks like. there are *many* takes, many examples of these sorts of people in society, but the constant abusive, violent, hateful, squalid, hedonistic ideas are parroted in fics when it comes to haymitch when he isn't.. any of those things. the society around him cares to consider the extent of his suffering and he doesn't have a good enough support system, as all whom he has loved are dead. i finish this by saying what i always do; he's extremely intelligent, extremely empathetic and wholly feeling, extremely caring and protective, and is meant to *defy* stereotypes. his ending however diminishes his ability to get better, and practically undoes any hope of his betterment despite it all.

����𝐑𝐒. 𝐔𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐄𝐄

mrs. undersee is mentioned a few times through the trilogy, and when it isn't related to her late twin maysilee donner, or her daughter madge, it's her chronic illness. katniss basically only mentions her when referring to her constant headaches and her morphling addiction, which makes me wonder why suzanne collins doesn't go into depth about how she's taken care of, who she's getting support from as the wife of the district mayor, and how she functions as a mother. she is basically made useless to the narrative despite her important role as a mayoral first lady & family member to someone who experienced and was slaughtered in the arena. i see next to no content on her which upsets me as she does play such a big role in the scheme of things, and has connections to the everdeens, to haymitch and to the donner family. she's got next to nothing on her wikipedia, and it's unfortunate as she could've been a good example of chronic ilness in an already revered YA series (which now comes under scrutiny for the faults being uprooted.)

[moonrotting]

also i am tired of seeing people say that helaena was having an anxiety attack during the funeral procession. where are all of my autistic helaena targaryen truthers. that was the beginning of an autistic meltdown/shutdown and i will not accept other interpretations

[maxthesillyy]

as much as i like to have Max and Victoria leave each other on a high note at the party, i would be an absolute straight up liar if i ever claimed to not love Max’s bitchy as fuck line here— and that i didn’t think it’s one of the most slept on lines.

[fromtheseventhhell]

Zutaras are really the original self-insert, "we understand the story soooooo much better than everybody else" girlies and they just never moved on

[allamericansbitch]

hey so since when is expecting taylor to not enable bigotry and publicly love and humanize trump supporters too much to ask and 'expecting perfection' from her.... is that the absolute bare minimum of human decency...

[nachosncheezies]

💋🎉🥰🤲

For this ask game.

💋 First kiss fics. Love em or hate em?

A fact about me, which may seem counterintuitive given my posting, is that... I'm actually not that much into shipping. I appreciate it, when done well, but it's not really the romance per se that draws me to things or drives my interactions with a piece of media. I don't really love OR hate first kiss fics; I suppose I would put them in the same category I put whump: if it's well done, and has some kind of plot or deeper introspection or something around it, something that helps the characters develop in some way, that's great! But just for its own sake? Meh.

🎉 What leads you to consider a fic a success?

It's cliche, but feedback, especially comments. One of the best I ever got was on the first fic I posted, where I'd put a stereotypical "I'm not a writer, please be nice" sort of nonsense at the top. I got a comment from a complete stranger that started with, "okay, 'not a writer,'" and rode those four words straight into the next two stories I wrote. If I've made someone feel something enough that they've taken the time to say so, that's pure gold, and a definite win.

🥰 How do you feel about reader interaction? Are you open to receiving questions about your fics?

I LOVE questions about them!! I love chatting about my shows in general, but tbh writing meta sometimes hurts my brain. My fics are almost all canon-compliant and usually express a headcanon or an interpretation of canon events. Sometimes I'm demonstrating why some part of canon that folks seem to hate or think makes no sense actually makes perfect sense to me. It's always so fun to chat about blorbos, I guess I'm just better at showing my thoughts on some things through fic than I am at explaining. :D

🤲 Would you please share a snippet of a wip?

Bless you 💕 every time you do this you force me to look at another bit I've not worked on for a while and it sets my brain on fire with ideas for how to improve or expand on them. :D How about one not from season 8? Set in the reduxes, a scene I drafted ages ago for Scully and Bill Junior. I was delighted to later discover it has a lot in common with the deleted scene from I think it was memento mori? (also delighted that the deleted scene can't be considered canon, because what did air has him not aware of her cancer until much later, so my version could still stand :D I'll post it someday, probably)

"You're being rude," she stated. "I'm just looking out for you." "I know that you believe that, but you're also being rude." "Dana, I know-" he started, but she cut him off with a look. "I asked to speak to you, I would like you to listen," she said, and tipped her head toward the chair beside her bed. "Sit." His jaw flexed, but he acquiesced. "Look, I'm not going to ask you to like him-" "Good, because I don't," he interrupted petulantly. She gave him a quelling look. "I am not going to ask you to like him," she repeated, pausing between each word for emphasis, "and I'm not going to ask that you understand him. But I need you to respect me. We aren't kids anymore Bill, I'm a grown woman; I can make my own decisions. Please don't belittle that by assuming that I'm somehow being..." she searched for the right word, "manipulated."

thank you thank you thank you, a million times thank you for asking 💕💕💕

[six0fcorvus]

You ever read a fic where the mischaracterization is so bad you don’t know what to do with yourself

[solar-halos]

🔥🔥🔥Annie (or anything you want) (but preferably about Annie)

ooh okay not to sound like a broken record but idrk how unpopular this opinion is, but it’s definitely unexplored:

annie’s first love was not finnick. i think it *is* pretty popular that they met when annie was reaped, so i wanna know what she was up to before that!! our girl literally has beautiful big green eyes and dark hair u can’t tell me that she didn’t have everyone in the district lining up at her door

okay that’s a bit of an exaggeration but basically what i’m trying to say is that annie experienced what love felt like before she knew finnick. who else was gonna teach him how to kiss?

[hussyknee]

Fiction (and sometimes real life) has this tendency to frame a character's stubborn belief in people's goodness in the teeth of all evidence as a virtue. As in, not when the person being judged acts seemingly out of character. It's wise to give aberrant behaviour the benefit of doubt. But consistently apologizing for and ascribing good intent to actions that clearly show a bad character, and then refusing to accept that this person is exactly as bad as the trail of victims they've left behind prove them to be— this is not a mark of goodness and kindness.

Wilful blindness and stupidity don't showcase a generosity of spirit. That's simply the need to cling to your own preconceptions for the sake of your own comfort. It's not kind or fair to defend perpetrators at the expense of the people suffering because of them; and infantilizing and finding excuses for people isn't mercy, it's apologia. ("He was a good boy who fell under bad influence" "Ma'am, he's 28 and sold out his own family to pay his gambling debts.") In both fiction and real life, you should be able to look at the situation and choose to safeguard and defend the victimized and vulnerable first and foremost. To accept that you might be wrong, your faith might be misplaced, and prioritise safety, justice and accountability for all the people who are or might be suffering at your friend or family's hands. Because not doing that— not believing victims, apologizing for and defending abusers, centering the perpetrator's interiority instead of the impacted victim's reality— that's just the default evil of real life.

If you being a pure, loyal little cinnamon roll throws other people under the bus, then you aren't actually a cinnamon roll. You're just complicit, enabling and endangering.

[mars-ipan]

hey folks did you know i love super dangan ronpa 2

[astrangetorpedo]

the jb deer memes on bgtwt are getting tiresome

[kimikaami]

I'm willing to put up with a lot of House being... House. But I think Martha Masters should've gotten to rip him limb from limb (along with everyone else on the team)

[findafight]

I agree with you so much about the El thing! I swear 99% of it stems from her 'getting in the way' of byler.

And the way they act like she would have no reason to feel hurt/ betrayed/ upset if byler were to get together.

Oh yeah. It absolutely stems from her getting in the way of Byler. No question.

Not every person who ships Byler believes or thinks or treats El like this, but I've seen it pretty rampant in the tag, especially when it comes to theories. (I want to note that I think it's a cute ship! I'm not a hater of it at all but I do hate how parts of the fandom treat it as some kind of moral imperative and some groundbreaking piece of rep. That's really turned me off the fandom to a degree) El existing and caring about Mike (and Mike caring about her) is portrayed as this existential threat to the ship and its potential "endgame" status, so it has to be belittled, which is just. Stupid. You don't have to tear characters (or their dynamic with others) down to have a ship. (I know it happens in other ships within the stranger things fandom too)

I also see theories that she never loved Mike or never loved him properly or romantically and he was miserable the whole time they dated and confused his own platonic feelings towards her. Her feelings towards both Mike and Will (and their feelings towards her!) Are downgraded and insulted. She's infantilized so much it's disgusting. When shippers act as though she doesn't understand her feelings and that they are strictly platonic towards Mike, and that Mike's own are also platonic and he's been confused the whole time, and he hasn't been able to articulate that or mixed them up (because he's always been in love with Will forever, they claim), they make it seem to me like they don't respect both El's growth as a character in understanding herself and embracing her individuality or Mike's care towards his friends.

And like you said, a lot of folks act like El would have no right to feel betrayed/hurt/upset if Will, now her brother, started dating her ex? Sometimes very soon after they break up? Who she obviously has loved and cared for deeply, who hurt her by being unable to communicate his feelings, and who has been consistently on her side with everything involving the Upside Down or lab. It seems as though these theorists think if El is anything but understanding and enthusiastic about it, she's unreasonable and clearly doesn't care about Mike or Will's happiness (If they even consider El as beyond her current relationship with Mike.) When that would be a natural reaction based on everything we've seen between them and just in general. Idk I just feel like El is done so dirty.