#anti fandom war

[terrietont]

My favourite thing on the internet:

When a person who sees some petty fandom war going on and is either in both fandoms, one, the other or none at all and creates a depiction of fanart/fan fiction of both fandoms being super friendly with eachother and it brings people together away from the shit that is cringe culture, gatekeeping and general fandom toxicity.

The harmony of crossovers being depicted as not a ‘X vs Y’ but a “Nice to meet you I’m from X” “Nice to meet you too I’m from Y, wanna be friends?” “Yeah sure!”

It’s just a thing that needs to be done more.

Same as mixing genres from a more “serious” one to something funny, wholesome or silly.

Never had so much fun putting a xenomoph in a Sims alien bachelorette challenge and putting Samara Morgan in a house with two other ghosts and a drunk werewolf. Just 👌 lovely nonsense, I am here for it.

[josephsaturn]

I think that “Anakin was a slave child who was groomed by Palpatine and raised by someone who wasn’t ready to take on a child, thereby leaving him in a social limbo state where he’s surrounded by people but only has a few close confidants, with the one he trusts the most actively trying to take advantage of him”

and

“Anakin was taught right from wrong from a young age, first by his mother and then by Kenobi, but any time he was presented with a choice, actively CHOSE WRONG EVERY SINGLE TIME”

are two sentences that can, should, and MUST coexist to fully understand Anakin Skywalker as a character

Edit: PART 2 of this post here

[spidersinsalem]

Team Iron man fans saying that Steve was wrong for not telling Tony that Bucky killed his parents but honestly, seeing how Tony handled finding out about it, I wouldn't have told him either. Tony was already willing to throw bucky into prison or an institution IMAGINE what he would've done if he found out bucky killed his parents while they still had him in custody. Steve was doing what he always has done, protect Bucky.

People openly supporting the revenge killing of a man who had NO control over his life for the past 70 years and wasn't even conscious for the majority of it because of something he did WHILE BRAINWASHED is insane to me.

(also please don't attack me I'm just stating my opinion TwT)

[sjbattleangel]

Face it, Darth Vader, Zuko, Piccolo, Vegeta, Magneto, Loki and Venom did far worse, unforgivable things yet when they were redeemed to varying degrees, fandom gave them free passes. Yet when Catra ,a child soldier who was physically and mentally abused by her mentor, realizes how much she has hurt the people around her; strives to be a better person; saves her childhood best friend and the entire world with the literal power of love (in spite of the series being cut short), fandom screams for her blood, yelling that she was "the real villain" and "should've died".

I have nothing against either Vader, Zuko, Piccolo, Vegeta, Magneto, Loki or Venom. However, when fandom declares a queer catgirl to be "the face of unforgivable evil", that's when we need to call out the blatant sexist, and kind of queerphobic, double standards.

And no, don't even give me that "BuT BaD WrItInG" thought-terminating rubbish. Funny how everything seems to be "BaD WrItInG" only when it involves some form of media made by and/or starring women, queer people and other minorities. Don't you think?

[sunnysaystuff]

we need to put some RESPECT on harry james potter's name right now. hp is literally HIS STORY and y'all are over here dissing him & acting like regulus black could have done better. "if regulus was the chosen one-" if regulus was the chosen one the war would already be lost because he was literally a DEATH EATER. "he redeemed himself" ummm he did literally nothing of note. "he found the horcrux" so did dumbledore whose sacrifice he rendered immaterial. regulus black was absolutely useless i fear!!!!!

[animentality]

[cacodaemonia]

I've seen non-antis doing this for a while now, so here's your reminder that 'proship' is NOT an adjective for describing fictional relationships.

The 'pro' does NOT mean 'problematic,' as in "this is a problematic ship" (which, if you have critical thinking skills, you'll know is a ridiculous statement). That 'pro = problematic' idea is just something antis made up—or they didn't understand that in English, 'pro' is the opposite prefix of 'anti.' You know, how they're anti-ship, which means they are against fictional ships that they don't personally like.

The 'pro' in proship simply means 'in favor of.' And 'proship' as a whole describes the 'ship and let ship' mindset, which has been a core of fandom basically forever. The reason the term 'proship' exists at all is in response to antis crusading against particular ships and harming real people because of their preferences.

So, antiship, proship; antishipper, proshipper.

Just as you can say you're pro-choice, you can say you're proship—as in, you're in favor of letting people ship whatever they want and it's not your business. That's basically the same thing as calling yourself a proshipper, though I tend to see that more from people who are really into the ship war discourse.

Anyway, calling a fictional relationship a 'proship' makes as much sense as calling that ship an 'antiship.' And when you conflate 'pro' with 'problematic,' not only are you playing into antis' moral purity nonsense, but you're entirely changing the subject of the conversation. Please stop doing it.

[allthingswhumpyandangsty]

one of the things I see the most in any fandom space is pearl clutching people saying how “shocked” they are when it turns out a “problematic” ship or a “problematic” character is loved a lot in said fandom.

the most recent example for me would be from this poll where it asks people to vote which ship they like the most, thousands of fans have voted, and the results happen to show the ship that is — according to these people — most problematic has won. needless to say, hundreds of these “noble people who usually harass real people, who just want to ship their little ship in peace, over fictional characters in the name of being morally superior” are so shocked that such a “harmful and problematic” ship is the one that is most liked within the fandom they’re in.

I mean… I don’t know what to tell you, but just because you’re “loud” and you like to “witch hunt” people who enjoy fictional things that you think is Bad, doesn’t mean the ship or the character you deemed Problematic is actually hated by the majority of the fandom you’re in.

sure, you are allowed to hate these ships and these characters for any reason, but other people are allowed to like them. and surprise surprise, the world doesn’t revolve around you and your mindset that Liking Bad Fictional Things Equals Condoning Bad Things in Real Life.

shocking, I know. but most sane people can actually distinguish the differences between fiction and reality. and that’s why people who like fictional villains aren’t actually serial killer in real life.

fandom is and has always supposed to be a safe and fun space in which anyone can like and enjoy whatever they want. it never is, and it’s never supposed to be a courtroom where someone’s moral compass is judged based on how they enjoy Fictional Things. because the whole point of enjoying a ship or liking a fictional character is that it’s fictitious, it’s not real. no one in real life is getting killed because a hot fictional villain is loved by hundreds and thousands of fans.

I hope you feel better soon though 🤍

[changeling-droneco]

Honestly I think this has been a sign that we no longer need to try and tolerate or ignore purity culture, but that shit needs a hard stop now. I fully blame it as being one of the causes for the intense growing black and white thinking in a lot of youth or young adult spaces that prevents meaningful change or to take actions that help even if they aren’t perfectly pure

[marinette-buginette]

Kiyi is not a Princess - A Look At the Fire Nation's Line of Succession

It's not even that much about Kiyi. But the creators seemingly got so lost in the sauce that their ideas about how absolutist monarchies work are as good as taken out of Disney movies now. So, let's set the record straight.

The Fire Nation line of succession

When it comes to royal lines, there were multiple elements that went into setting the line of succession: descent, sex, legitimacy, religion etc. For the Fire Nation, the ones we have 100% confirmed are descent and legitimacy (this last one seen with the Camellia-Peony War, where Chaejin was excluded from the succession because he was born out of wedlock). I would have gone on a whim to say sex counts as well, however, it is a bit foggy. In the Reckoning of Roku, it is mentioned that Firelord Taiso believed Zeisan (Sozin's younger sister) would have been a more competent ruler but could never become Fire Lord due to being a nonbender (I didn't actually read the book, so if someone who did wants to pitch in with the exact wording, please feel free to). This implies that being a Firebender is a requirement, but being a woman isn't. However, it also implies that Taiso would have been fine with ignoring the descent part (Sozin was older) if he deemed fit. Skipping the firstborn in favour of the second one isn't unheard of when it comes to succession so sure. And he is the absolute monarch, if he wants to pass papers to change the line of succession, he can. It is unclear to me if there is any power in place to veto or block a Fire Lord's ruling on any matter so for all we know, if he wanted, he could have. Plus, the fact that Ozai got crowned over Iroh because it was 'Azulon's dying wish'. For the religion part, it seems like the Fire Sages have to perform the coronation and acknowledge the monarch.

So to make it more digestible, the line of succession (while Azulon was still alive) is: Iroh → Lu Ten (firstborn of the heir) → Ozai → Zuko → Azula. With Lu Ten dead, Iroh MIA (at the time) then we have Ozai → Zuko → Azula. When Iroh came back, he gets added at the end of this line of succession. I am a bit unclear on Iroh in current times because it looks to me like he rescinded his role in the line of succession altogether with deciding to live in Ba Sing Se and letting politically inexperienced Zuko rule instead of taking over for a few years to create some stability.

Right now, we have Fire Lord Zuko and his heir presumptive (aka an heir that can be displaced if the monarch has children) Azula. Unless he wrote a decree to take her out of the line of succession — which would require a lot more brain cells than the writers are willing to give Zuko, not that he had a lot of them when it came to politics to begin with —then she's next in line. It doesn't matter how much anyone wants it or not, if Zuko drops dead tomorrow, Azula gets the throne.

Now, onto the other matter.

How does one become a Princess?

Option 1: You marry into the royal family. For example, Ursa was styled as a Princess, as she married Prince Ozai.

Option 2: You're born in a royal line. For example, Azula is a Princess because her father is a Prince, her grandfather, at the time of her birth, was the ruling monarch of the Fire Nation etc.

Bonus Option it's complicated: Royals had a habit of having children out of wedlock sometimes. Said children, if acknowledged, could be granted titles (Count of X, Dutchess of Y etc.) . Getting acknowledged and a title does not automatically put you in the line of succession, though. For example, Firelord Chaeryu was forced to acknowledge Chaejin and avoid dishonoring his noble mother and her house, but he excluded Chaejin from the royal family.

So Kiyi is not a Princess. Simple as that. Neither of her parents are of the royal line.

Could she become a Princess?

Well, this gets interesting.

Let's start with the fact that Kiyi got a pretty bad deal in a class-based monarchical society.

First thing, while her mother is a noble, her father is a commoner. Even if Ursa's family became destitute after Roku's death because of political reasons, it does not change the fact that she is still nobility unless Sozin revoked Rina's title, which I am not 100% sure he did. We don't know anything about Jinzuk besides the fact that he was the magistrate of Hira'a. While magistrates do not have to be part of the nobility, they can be. He could have been a second/third/fourth son of a small noble family with limited power/resources, given the position he was given was in a place like Hira'a, which is what I am inclining towards. He could have also been just some guy, but someone appointed him, and as a rule of thumb, you don't just go into the street and pick a random person to appoint to an administrative and leadership role, even if it's a small town. Given that Azulon was set on Ozai marrying Ursa because she was Roku's granddaughter, whether or not Jinzuk was a noble, it doesn't matter all that much in the grand scheme of things. However, in Kiyi's case, it does if Zuko wants to give her a title. It's more stigma than anything because people can be given nobility titles for specific services to the crown etc. But this is not her only issue. Which leads me to...

Second thing, Kiyi is a bastard. Which, in my opinion, would hold even more stigma than her father not being a noble. Ursa never divorced Ozai. As far as we know, polygamist marriages aren't a thing in the Fire Nation, so her marriage to Ikem/Noren is invalid. Could she be granted a divorce retroactively by the Fire Sages? Actually, yeah. Because Zuko named Shyu as High Sage, which was like the one sound political move he ever did tbh. We don't see what the Fire Nation's stance on divorce is, but given that Shyu is a Zuko loyalist, he'd probably grant Ursa retroactive divorce from Ozai. I am not a legal expert, however, as far as I know, retroactive decisions tend to be reserved for correcting a mistake or omission in the written record. She was still married to Ozai when she went and married Ikem. Though technically, she married him under a fake identity (and so did he), which might make the marriage void regardless in the eyes of the law. Idk how Spirit involvement affects legal matters in the world of Avatar, but as things stand right now, unless we pretzel-twist ourselves to make excuses, Kiyi is born outside of legitimate wedlock.

Now, Zuko might not care. In fact, he probably doesn't. He could still give Kiyi a title, including that of Princess. It was not uncommon for illegitimate relatives of rulers to be offered roles/titles once acknowledged. The real question is if he would put her in the line of succession. Kiyi has no business being there because she does not have royal blood.

Could Zuko do whatever he wants, give her the title of Princess and shove her in the line of succession while taking Azula out of it for good measure? Sure, he can. He'd probably love that, in fact. But that leaves two things open.

One, nobility would not take kindly to a bastard child of a commoner with no royal blood being in the line of succession. If we also add the angle of taking Azula out of it, it would just increase their ire. There is already a long list of why the nobility is probably angry at Zuko (and should attempt to assassinate him a lot more than they do), but I think this one in particular has other implications. There might be nobles who are neutral about Zuko. Shamelessly discarding societal norms on a whim might make their perspective swing towards negative. It could make him lose goodwill he might have or potential allies.

Two, it will make the commoners wonder. If this random girl, raised as a peasant, with a commoner father, born out of wedlock, can be put in the line of succession just like that — while discarding a princess of the blood if we are at it — then… is the royal line not that special? The whole premise of a monarchy is that the monarch and their descendants have the divine right to rule. Being part of that bloodline gives you the right to rule. So if that can be discarded, if that bloodline is not all that important… should Zuko be Firelord? And most importantly, does the Fire Nation really need a monarch at all?

Kiyi is not a princess, and for the well-being of Zuko's reign — which is already barely holding together — he better not make her one.

[jedi-enthusiasm-blog]

Jedi: *start training when they're fourteen at the earliest, don't have solo missions until they have several years of training in their shoulders and are Knighted/become socially adults in their early twenties*

SW Fandom: They indoctrinate babies and use them as child soldiers 🤬!

Mandalorians: *they actually indoctrinate babies into their culture after killing their parents, and finish training them at thirteen*

SW Fandom: They adopt and protect children 😍

JA series has the aging out at thirteen thing, but considering Ahsoka was asigned to Anakin at fourteen and he thought she was too young, that shows have canonity priority over everything but the movies, aging out at thirteen is not canon. Ahsoka in TCW is the same age Padmé is in TPM. The Jedi are unironically the ones who take child protection the most seriously in the GFFA.

Mandalorians take their children into warzones to train them at eight years old, and are considered adults at thirteen. This is in the Karen Traviss worldbuilding, which I'm sure most of us despise, but it has yet to be contradicted by new movies, shows or even books, so unfortunately it's still canon.

[nando161mando]

[elf-trash]

reposting this bc the OP blocked me (and is blocking anyone else who disagrees which means blocked people can't reblog) and i want to say this loud and with my whole chest!!!!!

another Dragon Age fic was recently outed as being AI, and this is what the writer had to say for themselves about it:

so actually, Grammarly uses generative AI and is just as bad as ChatGPT. it also objectively makes your writing worse, it sucks the voice out of your prose and turns it into corporate sounding homogenized paste. it's also unethical for all the same reasons any generative AI is unethical. get a writing group and have a real human beta read for you if you don't trust yourself to check your own grammar etc. but honestly something unpolished and written entirely by your human brain and human imagination will ALWAYS be better than AI slop.

also, the part about published authors doing this is patently untrue. i know this is a huge problem in the self-publishing space, but most publishers now are including clauses in their contracts that expressly forbid the use of AI in ANY part of the creative process. this includes using ChatGPT to generate or clean up outlines or Grammarly to spellcheck and revise. so if you're trying to publish, don't fucking do this or you could literally be asked to return an advance if you get caught.

i've posted about this in the past, but AI detectors are actually shocking accurate these days. i've tested them extensively recently and they can consistently and correctly flag individual sentences written by ChatGPT in an otherwise original passage. and they almost never flag false positives. so the argument that AI detectors can't be trusted is just flat out wrong. are they correct 100% of the time? no. but can they indicate with a high degree of accuracy if AI was used in some capacity? absolutely, especially if there is additional evidence.

and for all the people hand wringing about AI detectors flagging false positives, let me just say this: if something is not AI written it is very easy to prove. you can't write anything of any considerable length without leaving a massive paper trail of notes and drafts. almost all writing software tracks changes and makes it very easy to prove you wrote something yourself. being falsely being accused of AI isn't actually a real problem and is only being made to seem as such by people who are trying to get away with and justify using AI or who are worried about getting caught.

i think a lot of people are just lured by a seemingly easy shortcut, and to their untrained eye, what the AI is spitting out feels "better" to them than their own writing. but i promise you it's not. trust your own brain and put in the work to improve at your craft rather than outsourcing the gift of your imagination to a robot that steals from other people's work.

i will continue to die on this hill!!!!!

[skywalkr-nberrie]

Deadass just saw someone on twt say that Padmé would divorce Anakin after 20 years of marriage because she’d become fed up with his possessiveness and jealousy and someone agreed to it saying that Padmé is too duty oriented to deal with a co-dependant Anakin for the rest of her life, and mind you these people claim to be “Anidala understanders”

💀 💀 💀 💀

[Lol, The woman who died from a heartbreak over losing the love of her life to the darkside would just one day up and become sick of him after 20yrs? Babe, this ain’t a reality based television flick, it’s a Space Operatic tale of an undying and timeless love story between Star Crossed Lovers. But to address your false argument: Anakin only became possessive when Padmé’s life was in danger and he only got jealous when some man tried to hit on her, and that’s really like how every other normal person would react..? Padmé understands Anakin’s nature too, that's why she loves him. She even teases him to make him jealous at times, always in a playful manner though. She loves when he's possessive and jealous over her, what she doesn't like is when he overthinks things and anxiously believes she'll leave him one day for another man. Which again is a normal reaction for anyone with insecurities. Anakin rarely behaves that way, the only times his jealousy got out of hand was in ROTS and that’s thanks to Palpatine’s manipulations and in the Clovis arc which is more so fear for Padmé’s safety and not trusting Clovis around her. Not because he doesn’t trust Padmé. And there are other times in the novels and even in TCW series where Anakin is jealous and possessive over Padmé’s safety and he doesn’t project his fears onto her. He always succumbs to her wishes at the end of the day because he trusts her. (I elaborate on this in the notes to this post.)

Saying something that’s not a constant occurrence within their relationship would ensue a divorce after 20 years? And you’re saying this about a couple who’s love is described by another character as “transcendent love”?? Yeah, not really. Oh! And also: Padmé who wanted to leave duty behind to run away with Anakin to Naboo is too duty oriented for him??? Padmé, who wanted to run away with him even despite hearing of all his crimes and fall to the darkside??? Saying he’s too co-dependant for her even though she loves him just as much??? Please, him becoming a mass murderer wasn't even a dealbreaker for her and it never wavered her love for him, and yet somehow we still have people claiming she would've ditched him because she can't ‘handle’ his jealousy and possessiveness even though he's not always like that, and she herself says that she loves this man with all his flaws included because his goodness outweighs those flaws?? Or that she would ditch him because she's too focused on duty??? This is the only man who’s ever made her want something other than duty. At least argue something that makes sense???] - (putting my original tags here cause they deserve to be in the actual post instead of the tags.)

[corgoship]

Fandoms vs. The inconceivable goodness of fictional cultures

It's strange and a bit worrying how (often adult) fans look at fictional marginalized cultures (in kids media) that are by default written to be virtuous, and they twist themselves into knots to try to prove how they were horrible people all along, and I'm left wondering: Why? Not to mention it's often coupled with apologism for the actual, textual bad guys, who are often straight up fascists.

This is mostly about the Jedi (Star Wars) and Air Nomads (Avatar: The Last Airbender) but feel free to add more if you know any.

My analysis and observations are under cut! Fair warning, this is a long post, and I'm writing this on the fly, so please forgive me if this isn't as coherent as it was in my head.

(Sidenote: It appears as though both of these cultures were inspired by Buddhism to certain extents, way more blatantly in atla. However, I would argue that the some of the philosophical conflict regarding attachment in atla was pretty heavily influenced by Star Wars: the season 2 finale is emotionally almost the exact same thing as the climax of Empire Strikes Back! But that's a story for another post...)

In a nutshell

Both of these cultures are described as wise and peaceful. They both put a lot of emphasis on meditation and enlightement. The Air Nomads are pacifists and vegetarians. The Jedi preach love and compassion, as per Anakin in Attack of the Clones. Both of them value love, but are discouraging of attachment - which a lot of people wrongly conflate with love in these texts, I believe. It is not specified whether or not Air Nomads could marry, but they lived in monasteries separated by gender, and the Jedi were not allowed to marry. Both of these cultures were victims of genocide by a fascist regime. And both the stories of Avatar and the original Star Wars trilogy are about an individual, who can be considered the last of their extinct kind, and the resurgence of their forgotten beliefs of kindness bringing peace to a war-torn world.

(Sidenote no. 2: they both have Mark Hamill. On the actual opposing sides of the spectrum, too. He went from being the hero electrocuted by the Emperor to... Being the Emperor electrocuting the hero. Which is kind of funny to me.)

With all that said, it will always boggle my mind how people will say these fictional cultures were conservative, arrogant, harmful towards children, dogmatic in their religion, and worst of all, DESERVING of being murdered. This is something I will NEVER understand or agree with.

The many crimes of the elemental monks and the space wizards

Let's dig into the criticisms they often receive, shall we?

To rapid fire list off a few: being too isolated from the rest of the world, indoctrinating children, having strict rules that restrict freedoms, deeming feelings to be inconsequential and a bad thing, considering themselves to be superior, and being too arrogant to notice their coming demise, which some consider to be justified by the aggressor.

Now, I will say not all of it is without merit, and some of these things could be taken as real flaws that were intended by the creators of the respective stories. The Air Nomad elders are dismissive of Aang's fears and that fear is what essentially forces him to run away at twelve years old. The Jedi Council tells nine years old Anakin that his fear for his slave mother could potentially lead him to the Dark Side and make him evil. Both cultures teach their children from a very young age, and the children are raised communally - which isn't in itself a bad thing, but I can see how some people mind find that uncomfortable, especially with the Jedi, who take in children from various cultures. Both Luke and Aang are advised to not only forego attachment towards the people they love, but they are actively asked to stand by and potentially let their loved ones be hurt or killed. (Take this last point with a grain of salt because neither Aang or Luke were ready to do what they did, and they both paid for it dearly, so the advice does have real merit, despite what some people might tell you.)

This is about the extent of the textual flaws I could find. So what do fandoms do? They take these flaws and completely blow them out of proportion. I have seen takes that claim both the AN and Jedi steal children from their families. That they are dogmatic in their religious beliefs, ostracize those who don't conform (or don't have their special powers), and they are condescending to other cultures, even considering themselves to be superior to others. That their ideologies were harmful and that they deserved to be eradicated for it.

How do you make a leap like that? In a story made for children, no less? We are presented with these cultures as being good, and the text never urges us to question their goodness. And this is by design - because again, these are stories for children, so there isn't much moral ambiguity when it comes to the murdered peaceful pacifists and the evil imperial super power threatening the world. So why do people still twist the narrative in spite of this?

Grey morality only gets a story so far

My best guess is that they DO want that moral ambiguity to be present, even if there is none, because that's "more realistic" and "better storytelling". I can agree with both of those statements to a point, but realistic doesn't automatically equal better. Sure, added nuance can often enrich stories and prompt more philosophical questions and more interesting conflict within the story itself, but is it always necessary? Does it always enhance the themes the story is trying to tell?

We are told to take the fact that the AN/Jedi are are a force of good at face value. And why wouldn't we? What is it that makes people question this, despite there existing little canonical information to disprove the innate goodness of these cultures built on love and compassion? Again, I believe that people - mostly adults - crave for things to not be black and white. Real life usually isn't. But stories aren't real life. There isn't some hidden secret that proves these bad-faith right. There are some flaws present at worst, but that is enough to spin headcanons and straight up lies that further the idea that there is no such thing as a paragon of goodness. Because of such a thing not existing in reality, it cannot exist in fiction either.

To love or not to love

The biggest issue people take with these two cultures, as far as I have noticed, is their view on love and attachment.

And then there is the most extreme version of this - the people who claim these cultures were the true evil all along, and that they were deserving of being victims to genocide by the imperial power. This is more rampant in atla fan spaces, and the agenda there is a bit more spite-motivated, because while the Air Nomads didn't hurt anybody (unlike the Jedi who could be seen as hurting Anakin, as far-fetched as that claim is), Aang is an Air Nomad, and a certain part of the atla fandom really doesn't like him (not gonna beat about the bush: it's certain zutara shippers). By painting his dead culture - which Aang loves and holds in high regard - as bad, they either make him supportive of harmful beliefs, or naive and ignorant, unwilling to take criticism, therefore stubborn and bigoted.

This is of course connected to his romantic relationship with Katara, which a lot of people claim is a bad thing. I will not get into the specifics here, but a large chunk of the fandom doesn't understand what the act of "letting go of your attachment" means, and that Aang achieves this in the s2 finale (which is what allows him to enter the avatar state on command), and that he's not, in fact, unhealthily obsessing over Katara. A different shade of this criticism is that in being the Avatar (similarly in Star Wars, a Jedi), Aang cannot love Katara in a full, meaningful way, because he is held back by his duties, and he must put the world over her.

Much like in Avatar, in Star Wars, attachment IS an obsessive form of love that impacts people negatively and should be avoided. In the more extreme cases, such as the case of Anakin, it leads to ruin, and it is his inability to let go of his feelings and think rationally that creates problems. In the case of Luke (and Aang in s2) and his love for his friends, he gets punished by the narrative for indulging his fear - he gets mutilated as a direct result of choosing his friends over taking the time to become stronger and have a better chance against his enemies.

Now look me in the eye and tell me where do either of these stories state that love is bad. You can't, because that's not what the stories are claiming at all (there is a reason why Aang ends up with Katara, and why Luke redeems his father through his love), and some people are incapable of drawing that distinction. They would rather claim that the AN/Jedi are dismissive of love and feelings as a whole, than to admit that the sort of love THEY personally value might be unhealthy.

Because I do honestly the believe that most of these detractors are the type to find "i would burn the whole world down for you" to be the truest form of love and devotion... When that, is in fact, the exact thing these stories caution about, and by pointing that out, they're not claiming that love is bad, but that it has the potential to grow into obsession, which we can all agree, is objectively bad.

Lastly, let's look at the other side of the equation...

Long live the empire!

The evil Fire Nation and the evil Galactic Empire are just that - point blank evil. This has never been put in question by either piece of media. There is nuance to be found, sure, with the Headband episode in atla and Zuko as a character, and... I actually can't think of a single not-blatantly-bad thing about the Empire/Sith in the original trilogy + prequels, lol. Maybe that the separatists had a point, and that the republic was collapsing in on itself under bureaucracy and corruption - but that's still no brownie point for the Empire nor Palpatine, lol.

Palpatine's derision and disdain for the Jedi is used to manipulate Anakin to... Become evil. And while his words may have a grain of truth in them, they are deliberately twisting the Jedi ideology and making the Dark Side look not only palatable, but necessary for Anakin to save Padmé, something the Jedi had failed him in (as far as Anakin himself believes). Why would people readily believe the bad guy, who has been lying and deceiving everyone, about the things he deliberately said to manipulate Anakin? Because it makes Anakin's turn seem more... Justifiable that way? It sure did in his eyes, but we as the viewers are supposed to see past that, since we have all the context, and he doesn't.

Atla takes a bit of a different approach and tackles the anti-Air Nomad propaganda head on. In the afforementioned episode The Headband, we go inside a Fire Nation school, and we see how they are being taught lies in order to justify the FN's attack on them (claiming they had an army, etc.). And yet there are still people who claim otherwise, that the FN was indeed right to do what they did, despite canon making it very clear that they are lying about what happened! (Also, let's just throw away the entirity of s1 episode 3 where Aang comes across the charred bones of his people and his mentor... Let's just not touch that, I guess. Don't worry about it.).

In both cases, the common thread is that the FASCIST bad guys are given grace, while the marginalized minorities are demonized. They are excused for their crimes time and time again, because what? Their aesthetic is cool? Their weapons/fighting style are cool? They're badass? You can appreciate these things for what they are, sure, but when does liking how something looks swing over into condoning the very bad things these people are guilty of? Probably when you start preaching how they, in fact, "did nothing wrong", and how the resistance are terrorists, and that people are inclined to be on their side only because the narrative paints them as the good guys... Yeah. You've lost the plot.

Or... Maybe you just like the person committing the atrocities...

It's not my fault my blorbo is a fascist warmonger!

This is the last point I will go over, I swear. There certainly is an overlap between fans who hate said marginalized cultures, and fans who love a certain character... Who happens to be a part of the fascist regime. Respectively for these fandoms, it's Zuko and Iroh in atla, and Anakin/Vader in Star Wars. Now, I am not saying Zuko is a bad person by the end of atla, don't get me wrong, but he spends the majority of the show flaunting the fact that he's a prince, and he's actively oppressing and terrorizing people in the first season. A huge part of his growth is recognising how the Fire Nation is crushing the world in an iron fist and reigning terror - Zuko says as much in his conversation with Ozai before he defects. I feel like the vast majority of people recognise that his words ring true, and that he's become a better person by confronting his father and his evil regime. But there are still some, who will bend over backwards to make the Fire Nation look better, so that Zuko and/or Iroh are absolved of their earlier crimes. Because god forbid my favourite character did bad things in the past, right? It's blatantly clear when people do this, and why they do this. An extended version of this is when they make the FN seem less evil so that Zuko can be shipped with Katara without any hang ups about her becoming the Fire Lady or similar common tropes in the zutara fandom.

And then we have Anakin. To keep it short, a lot of people view Anakin and Vader as two different people (Anakin didn't murder the younglings. Vader did!) and believe that he's not responsible for his actions after falling to the Dark Side. How to deal with his actions pre-fall, you ask? Well, he was justified, because the Jedi were holding him back, because they lied to him and belittled him, and refused to help him. All of Anakin's actions up to that point are the Jedi's fault, of course! I'm not saying their treatment of him was inconsequential to how things turned out, but he was very much in control of his actions and chose to do the things he did. The Empire wasn't going to magically fix the problems of the republic (and by extension, the Jedi) and I have no idea why certain people would think so.

Just kidding, I know why...

So... Where do we go from here?

I don't know man, I don't have a conclusion drafted. I just think this phenomenon is quite sad to see - people are refusing to see past their own biases, and they would rather twist the story to their liking than engage with the text in a more meaningful, constructive way.

I do think this needs to be called out when you see it, because it's a very relevant issue today. Fascism isn't cool just because the people doing it are someone you identify with in some way. Genocide isn't cool because the people affected are someone you disagree with.

It's just fiction, but these problems are present in the real world, too. People are very quick to forgive someone they support, and very eager to stone anyone they disagree with. They are not past creating and spreading misinformation about those they hate, just to get more people to agree with them.

It's quite worrying to me, especially since in these fandoms in particular, it boils down to the same thing - if people can't understand right and wrong when it is being spoonfed to them by a story crafted to be understood by children... Then how will they act in the real world, when met with more complicated matters?

Thanks for coming to my ted talk.

[paulie-lombardos-boy-toy]

Imagine claiming you’re still indie, but really, your greed made you another concubine of Amazon, who can take away your prestige if the higher ups feel like the show’s a net loss, not that she isn’t already loosing her fanbase.

This dumbfuck, this absolute greedy manifestation of Mammon himself, probably fucked herself over so so bad with property rights and it’s funny in a cosmic sorta way, ya know.

Imagine having two shows so mid, filled with nothing but pandering garbage, not reaching it’s old levels of relevance, that you sell your soul to one of the most soul crushing and dystopian companies the modern day has ever seen.

If anything, I feel so bad for the animators, VA’s, storyboard artists, etc and I’m glad Ke$ha dipped when she did cause even in her debut Queen Bee, I could tell that Ke$ha really wasn’t into it. Bee’s voice sounded like one of those girls that pretends to be interested in the weird girl’s fantasies, but genuinely does not care since I haven’t seen Ke$ha publicly promote the episode or even talk about it, unless someone in the critical community has links.

I just….. As my dad would always say “Don’t stress yourself out over bullshit. The universe and Lady Karma is never late with retribution and they give their targets multiple warning and signs and it’s up to them to change or heed them.”

At this point, I’ve stopped getting myself worked up over idiots cause as someone who’s been in fandom since childhood, I know the cycle and eventually, the diseases bud will be nipped and stability will come back, even if it’s never the same as it was before.