#anti romantic sheith

[larothoughts]

anti-ship adjacent ships: liujiu and qijiu

so there's this weird thing that's happening in svsss of all fandoms that reminds me a lot of voltron's klance and sheith fiasco AKA the formation of what i like to call anti-ship adjacent ships

basically, when someone's favorite ship is more indicative of them being an anti-shipper of another ship.

i've had to start excluding liujiu in my ao3 searches because more often than not, the fics that come up are yqy-bashing and what?? this is svsss, right? mxtx's trashiest, most problematic, harem-bicycle-shen-yuan svsss? what is this moral outrage doing in my degenerate danmei fic space, and why are you mischaracterizing yqy just to make an excuse to hate on him??

i've had a few thoughts on the rising dichotomy of shen jiu sympathizers both validating sj's bad behavior and hating yqy for enabling the same behavior. and then shipping him with lqg because liujiu is 'less toxic.' As an old lady fanfic reader who's trawled through all the godforsaken dead dove ships of the old livejournal kink_meme, i'm writing these out because making sense of things helps me cope and i am too old for this shit

(this is actually more 'why anti-qijiu' word vomit than liujiu specific--it just so happens that so many liujiu fics are bizarrely anti-qijiu.)

narrative reasons for anti-yqy liujiu fic:

aka why an author finds it easier for the plot to bash qi-ge

accepting either romantic or platonic qijiu means trying to fix qijiu. this is hard. yqy and sj already have a proven history of failure, while sj and lqg (aka author's ideal white-knight love interest) would be the perfect do-over. making yqy a clear abusive villain sj must cut off ties with 'for his mental health' solves the problem without having to fix things. it frees the author to write what they thought qi-ge should have done to 'save shen jiu right.'

on the same note, liujiu have nearly no canon crumbs. the author can write them however they want without being constrained by their canon relationship.

why lqg over other possible ships? other than yqy, lqg is one of the few characters with any sort of previous relationship with sj. lqg is canonically hot, has strong (even if negative) feelings towards sj, and has no textual or subtextual canon ship (beyond a one-sided crush on shen yuan, with lbh getting in his way lol.) he is also the same generation as sj and thus avoids any age gap squicks like with sj's other ship partners (looking at you tlj)

yqy is the only person in cang qiong with higher authority than shen jiu. while other peak lords are antagonistic, all are ranked lower and can't get in liujiu's way the same way as yqy can as a sect leader. not even the old palace master has the same power because he's the head of a different sect. so if you really want to write a villain abusing their (implicit) power over shen jiu, yqy is the only one that fits the bill.

lbh, as sj's disciple, does not fit the same abuse of power trope even if he becomes an op demon lord. as for bingjiu, lbh's brand of diabolical stalkerish yandere is so over-the-top it's hard to equate him to any real relationship. it's easier to twist yqy's passivity to villainy because it's closer to reasonable human behavior.

if one is coming from the tgcf fandom, yue qingyuan is the closest junwu-adjacent character in terms of personality and rank (on the surface.) so it's easy to transfer any junwu hate to yqy by giving him all of junwu's worst traits and making him 'junwu-lite'

same thing as above but with mdzs and the lan xichen hate for his inaction regarding his own little meowmeow (jgy).

personal author-reasons for anti-yqy liujiu fic:

aka when the character himself doesn't matter

let's get a silly one out of the way: maybe the author only headcanons top shen jiu and most qijiu has sj being a bottom. lqg gives off better hot twinky bottom energy than submissive-but-still-tops yqy. this does not explain the anti-shipping though.

less silly: an author is projecting either themselves or other people in their real life onto their fic, and changing the character's personalities to match their real life projected counterparts (even if ooc). sj is a clear abuse-survivor insert, which shoe-horns other characters into roles that real people in the author's lives have. i think yqy is often seen as the insert for someone who 'could have helped but didn't.' there are many valid reasons why someone would be more mad at the person who averted their gaze rather than their actual abuser, but that doesn't change the fact that qijiu's relationship in canon is so much more complicated.

(it's easier to hate enablers instead of abusers, because hating abusers and inviting confrontation is dangerous. most of the time, enablers won't hurt you directly. they are the safer person to hate.)

an author thinks they could have saved sj better, that qi-ge had more than enough time to fix things and his failure not to do so must be punished by taking away his sj-simp-card and throwing him into the villain bin. this is similar to the phenomenon where an author hates the wife of canon anime couples b/c the author could clearly wife him better. and then writes a fic bashing said wife.

an author sees a messy relationship and equates messy with abusive. in reality many relationships can be messy but not abusive, messy but still fixable, but due to their personal experiences they see any attempt to do so as toxic. in this scenario yqy is often the abuser-insert and his ooc characterization takes after the author's own abuser.

specifically in fics where lqg has the personality of a cardboard cut-out: using liujiu to tell others they are still pro-ship, when in reality they dislike qijiu for their own reasons (and can't help but write it in their fic). it really reminds me of middle school lol like kids trying to find their identity by hating another identity. the whole 'ew pink is overrated, i hate preps which means i must be a nerdy rebel' and then two years later you realize you're not a nerdy rebel after all, you just based your entire identity on what you thought was the opposite of what you hated.

why i try not to read anti-qijiu liujiu fics:

aka write whatever you want, but sometimes i have to choose not to read

authors can write whatever they want. we're all doing this for free, so it's expected that a lot of fanfic have venting and some self-imposing onto a fictional character. i don't expect authors to NOT put themselves in their fic in some way. at the same time, however, i hope authors are self-aware enough to not bash another character just because that character reminds them of someone irl.

aka i get uncomfortable when i read a fic that has an author's obvious real-person insert. i'm not reading svsss fic anymore, i'm reading the author's version of punishing their abuser using fiction. i love transformative media that adds onto the canon! i love different interpretations even! but i'm here to read svsss? where are the svsss characters??

i'm not into character-bashing in general. i think the point of svsss and all of bingqiu's misunderstandings is the fact that good/evil is not a binary. sy spent the whole series fearing the 'evil' binghe despite the fact that post-abyss binghe was a complex person, causing a chain reaction of disaster. hell, shen jiu is the king of gray characters! he is a scum villain, evil and misunderstood, to be a sj-fan means to understand that no one is entirely good or evil. so it's even more cognitively dissonant when a pro-sj fic is so categorically anti-qijiu, as this often paints sj as good/misunderstood and yqy as bad.

(the only character-bashing i don't care about is the old palace master mxtx clearly wrote him to be bashed so throw him in a fire)

i don't mind liujiu actually, i think the dynamic has potential (see all the sj harem fic i've read lol) but qi-ge is such a big part of sj's character that vilifying/getting rid of him does sj a disservice too? sj has a shit ton of bad coping mechanisms, these aren't going to be magically fixed if yqy gets his limbs chopped off as 'just punishment' (??) for not stopping sj from abusing his own students (????)

in conclusion

there is no point to this rambling, and you don't need to agree with me on anything. these are just thoughts i had when trying to figure out why anti-ship adjacent ships even exist. the moral outrage is giving me war flashbacks of anti-sheith klance fans using their age gap as justification for their own ship, rather than liking klance for... being klance.

(I briefly considered going over all liujiu vs qijiu morality arguments, but if you're an sj fan i feel like morality arguments are pointless. he is an angry feral scum kitten who hits kids, no sj-fan has the moral high ground here.)

it's always unfortunate to see so much anti-shipping spilling into fandom, since by default most of us are living in the fringe minority anyway. further dividing us is just going to sink the whole ocean ala the death of livejournal and chinese ban on ao3. there's no point in ships if there ain't an ocean to sail in! aren't we all here because we are fans of these stories???

bonus

to make up for what must feel like a huge anti liujiu wall of text, here are some of my general thoughts on how their relationship would work. i'm more familiar with sj so most of these are from his pov.

while sj often has schemes upon schemes upon schemes, when it comes to anger/criticism/negativity, he's scathingly honest. lqg, a fellow honest asshole, is often on the same wavelength. once misunderstandings are cleared up and lqg realizes sj will do whatever it takes to protect big bro yqy (and thus the sect), they're able to work together as a ruthless team against cang qiong's enemies.

let's also assume fixing sj's emotional issues stops him from the worst of his scumminess aka whipping his disciples half to death.

teamwork -> enemies to lovers -> only one bed trope???

sj needs someone who will overtly believe in his goodness, and lqg, once he realizes the mistakes in his assumptions, is a loyal wall of support. unlike qi-ge who must always play diplomat, lqg blazes over all social cues. who cares if this looks bad on cang qiong, he'll throw down with anyone if his boo is insulted.

lqg is upfront and honest. there are no hidden plots for sj to be paranoid about in lqg, he's a Good Man through-and-through. if lqg has problems, he'll tell him. if he needs to apologize and sj tells him why, he'll do so. and if sj asks him a question, he'll always do his best to answer.

while lqg knows sj has trauma and a dark past, he will never truly understand what it was like. and that's exactly what sj wants. he likes how lqg knows him more as he is now in the present vs. someone who has lived through the same past. being with him is a reminder that he is now a powerful peak lord, not the starving street rat he once was.

for lqg, sj is like a complex puzzle box. an enigma so outside of his understanding of how the world works, he can't help but be drawn to it. he used to equate scheming with evil, but once he realizes much of sj's scheming was for the good of the sect, he lets himself be impressed by sj's intelligence. the fact that sj became a peak lord from nothing shows a certain type of strength-- and lqg has always appreciated strength.

a big roadblock in their relationship was sj's antagonism towards yqy (their sect leader whom lqg respects.) once qijiu reconcile (or sj stops being so disrespectful to yqy in public) lqg is better able to see him as an ally vs. an enemy.

sj rewards this loyalty by taking care of lqg's hidden enemies, because straightforward brutes are especially susceptible to devious snakes like that. sj would know. whether or not he tells lqg can go either way. he tells lqg if only to stop lqg from hearing it elsewhere and assuming the worst; or he doesn't tell lqg because he knows lqg trusts him and confusing his mind with schemes would just make him grumpy for not understanding.

...even if he's cute when he's grumpy.

[olderthannetfic]

We all know how fantis can be hypocrites when they ship police and the differences of how they treat m/m, f/f, and m/f ships. This one I'm going to point out is really fucking wild. In 2022, there are three noticeable anime with the theme of adult/minor, they are Cyberpunk Edgerunners, Call of the Night, and Vermeil in Gold - I watched all three as they aired. We all know this type of relationship in fiction is a huge ass no-no to fantis. So then, where the fuck were fantis when these anime were airing?!?! Especially with Cyberpunk Edgerunners and Call of the Night cus they got popular

Cyberpunk Edgerunners: David 17 and Lucy 20, it doesn't matter if he aged as 18 as the show went on, Lucy met him as a minor and groped him. Call of the Night: Kou 14 and Nazuna 40+ vampire, the whole plot is Kou have to develop romantic feelings for Nazuna in order to be turn into a vampire. Vermeil in Gold: Alto 16 and Vermeil 550+ demon, a demon Alto summoned that Vermeil sexual throw herself onto Alto that he always freaks out when it happen - both of them develop romantic feelings towards each other

You should see and expect a shit ton of posts from fantis screaming their hearts out pedophilia this and that, but from my knowledge I haven't seen a SINGLE post from them about it with these anime - or the least there wasn't some popular hot take™ "xyz anime is pedophilia!!!" when the shows were airing

Y'all would say David just 17-18, it's just a 1-2 years gap, but fantis declared a late teen with someone in their early 20s as pedophilia. Y'all would say does it really matter human with a monster that is immortal of aging like humans, but fantis declared even between immortal non-humans with a huge age gap is pedophilia even if the human is an adult

I have a theory on why these anime with the pairings that gone under fantis' radar, and it's not only because they are m/f though it's part of it. It's cus these pairings are younger boy/older woman. I GUARANTEE you if these ships were younger girl/older man, fantis will be ranting these shows "normalizing pedophilia". If the ships were m/m, oh boy. Fantis will be having a field day foaming at the mouth like dogs with rabies, countless shit takes posts of anti fujo rhetoric, misogyny, xenophobic, and homophobic. Think back then and now how fantis treated Killing Stalking and any m/m ships that they highly despise cus ~it's bad~ by their standards eg. sheith, otayuri, kaeluc etc

In conclusion, fantis are hypocrite losers that pick and choose how they have their pixel ship ""fights"" and are obnoxious as fuck

--

[just-antithings]

Expanding on this ask here: https://at.tumblr.com/just-antithings/jat-going-onto-the-cosplay-fanfiction-video-from/7y7s5wia1nvi

Do antis really not realize that when they say stuff like “He just wants his brother back, it’s just normal sibling affection!!!” they’re the ones inadvertently normalizing incest?

When you take something in what is obviously supposed to be a shippy context and really try to frame it as just “bros being bros,” hate to tell you antis but you might be the weird ones not, the incest shippers.

If you really think it’s oh so normal behavior to get jealous over your sibling’s significant other and directly confess your love to them, seek therapy I mean it, cause that’s not a normal family.

How is it that antis in an attempt to bend over backwards trying to do mental gymnastics on why an incest ship isn’t being shipped end up creepily normalizing irl incest way more than incest shippers ever could?

oh yeah antis do that kind of shit all the time with ships that they’ve declared incest. remember all those flirty sheith fan arts that they would insist were just platonic—while also reimagining the romantic poses with Keith and Lance. the eremika antis were especially bad about it, insisting that they just saw each other as siblings when mikasa almost goes to lean in and kiss eren on the lips and their behavior towards each other in general was nowhere near platonic.

[pepplemint]

Yanno I did get a lot of shit by the voltron fandom back in the day for not liking sheith as a romantic ship. And I did say some things that I regret no doubt but I also thought about it today as I was mucking up shit for an hour. I never initiated talk about ships I don't like, but I did respond to asks about it. I get that it was an infected topic because the anti/proship wars were at an all-time high, maybe I should have just deleted the asks, but I always did like rambling about storytelling-

Either way, the reason I thought about it now after all that time is I always put all my responses under a cut, tagged it ship hate and never with the ship name. And I realized in modern day terminology, isn't that the definition of Dead Dove: Don't Eat? The thing that today is kinda the proship symbol for you know what you were getting into, so why are you mad? I did it right, right? If they had actually played by their own rules, I didn't do anything wrong? They did the exact same thing they blame others for doing?

Well it won't solve anything now anyways, I was just thinking about it. The whole conflict is something that changed the way I interact with fandom and shipping especially. I don't really feel comfortable contributing in an artistic way because I don't want to get that kind of attention on me again, or worse, have my actions somehow represent others just because I draw their ship. At the same time I really do miss it because to me it was about interacting with others while making them happy. People like shipping.

And it's interesting now when I notice how many people have me blocked. I still have no interest in taking a side, because both labels were - and I suspect are - used by people the same way, to feel victimized and morally superior. It's just kinda a label that makes me kinda wary of interacting with someone in general.

[ardenrabbit]

Thanks for answering my ask.....if you don't mind me asking (again), who are your favorite romantic relationship's couples in books/ manga/ anime/movies/tv series (can be canon or non-canon)? Why do you love them? Sorry if you've answered this question before......Thanks....

Please don't apologize! These are fun :D I hope you can find something you like in my replies! 💜💖💜

I'm realizing that I don't ship a whole lot of things, but I get really invested in a handful. I deeply want more involving women, but I sadly just haven't found a lot in media that I relate to or find compelling?? :( I have more women in relationships in my OCs, but all of the following are m/m.

1. Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji, from MXTX's Mo Dao Zu Shi, canon: These guys are individually such fundamentally good and selfless people and express it with wildly different impacts to their reputations. Extremely different personalities while alike in all the right ways. The longing. The gentle care and appreciation for one another. Also unfathomably horny. They have a cute house and pet rabbits.

2. Xie Lian and Hua Cheng, from MXTX's Tian Guan Ci Fu, canon: So. SOFT. Just. The gentlest and most unrelenting devotion. Eight hundred years of longing. It is unfair to compare any other slow burn to these guys. Hua Cheng is batshit insane but we forgive him for being a stalker and a zealot because he is so unhealthy levels of in love, and I am such a sucker for it. They are unfailingly so kind to one another and it murders me.

3. Xiao Xingchen and Xue Yang, from MXTX's Mo Dao Zu Shi, possibly one-sided canon? Def not requited: Okay so this isn't a ship I'd go down with by any means, but I just enjoy how fucked up it is. Xue Yang is a psychopath, liar, and literal serial killer and Xiao Xingchen is a saint who deserved better than what happened. I'm just fascinated by Xue Yang's horrible little brain getting attached to the one person who ever showed him real kindness, and how he was never going to be able to redeem himself or even acknowledge his mistakes in a way that they could ever be together. Xue Yang is a bad person and the narrative neither forbids you from caring about him nor tries to absolve him. Just really well-written tragedy.

4. Keith and Shiro, from Voltron, not canon but we all agree that canon shafted everyone: Okay yeah I still love them. The anti thing was new and spooky to me when I first joined the fan community, so I was a secret sheith fan for a while, but these two are just special to me. They never give up on each other. That's a whole Thing. They actually get each other's dumb adrenaline junkie hobbies and their deep senses of justice, and they complement and support each other in the mature ways they need to grow as people. The stupid, unwavering devotion thing. The Eyes. The soft way they say each other's names??? Kills me. For me, canon feels like it was truly built on the foundation of their relationship.

5. Keith and Lance, from Voltron, not canon but we all agree that canon shafted everyone: I started out only posting Keith/Lance on AO3 because I was new to like, Talking to People and didn't want to get jumped by antis, and klance was the anointed, schoolboard-approved ship at the time. These two are sweet in that competitive boys way, and they gradually grow and become friends who actually support each other. It takes them a minute, and canon doesn't do it justice and then kind of uncomfortably forces it, but they get there.

6. Fenris and Hawke, from Dragon Age, canon depending on playthrough: Wow. Again, the Devotion. Fenris is a character that Hawke can really help heal from his past. They actually make a profound difference in each other's lives. The puppy eyes. Fenris's very real and nuanced trust issues and his efforts to navigate them. Hawke having opportunities to truly Support him. They can have great conversations and affect each other's perspectives on important issues. Love them.

7. Kvothe and Bast, from Patrick Rothfuss's Kingkiller Chronicles, unconfirmed as of yet but at least one-sided canon as far as I'm concerned: A pair of fucked-up people. One is an unreliable narrator with possibly a case of megalomania + self-loathing, and the other is an unhinged Fae prince with a hero-worshiping crush on him that is dangerous for everyone else in the vicinity. Bast is scary. I am obsessed with him.

8. Lu Qingyun and Liu Jianghe, from Saved the Public Enemy by Mistake, canon: Please please please read this manhua. It's ongoing and incredible. It has six fics on AO3 and I want to talk to people about it. Dark wuxia story with spooky cultivation, a surly doctor, and an unpredictable genius maniac who isn't really the bad guy. These guys are ridiculous, and it's confirmed that they get together in the future and have a soft, happy ending, but for now their relationship is delightfully strange?? They have deep trust and respect for each other, and it's THERE once you see it, but the narrative does a great job of not showing it too much on the surface. Very cleverly written. I have a feeling that Liu Jianghe has been in love with Lu Qingyun from before the start.

9. Shion and Nezumi, from Atsuko Asano's No. 6, canon: Chaotic revolutionaries in a post-nuclear fallout dystopian utopia. Both simultaneously very intelligent and so stupid. Melodramatic bastards. Shion is the idealist and Nezumi is the one who just wants to burn it all down (he doesn't). They open each other's eyes to a lot of things, emotionally and existentially. My favorite blend of very different people with ultimately similar values, but different ways of going about them. They also can call each other out on their bullshit, which is important.

Having trouble thinking of anyone else 😂 All of these are ones I've cared enough to dabble in fic about, whether I've posted it or not, which I think is a decent metric. I'm nice to myself so I tend to lean toward canon stuff.

Thank you again for asking! Have a great day! 💕💐✨

[avidbeader]

I always said Dent has the patience of a saint and I meant it. Constantly getting asks like this one, some anti trying to find yet another way to ask the same questions over and over, no sources to back up their claims. And Dent would always reply with the growing lists of evidence that the staff liked Sheith and shared the idea of them as romantic.

See also: LM and JDS sharing that they were *surprised* by the popularity of KL, indicating clearly that it was never in their plans.

jds and lauren have described s and k as brotherly and have said s was acting fatherly towards k once. but you guys ignore that because you ship them

I realize you forgot to put any kind of sources to back up your claims here, so let me help you out–the show runners have mentioned Shiro and Keith’s bond in a brotherly context before, that’s fair–but that’s not at all unique to Shiro and Keith. Jeremy said Keith and Lance have a brotherly bond, which you can find here. Weird how no one says you can’t ship k/l because of that, huh?

Anyway, I’ve personally never heard Joaquim and Laure describe Shiro as some sort of father figure of Keith’s. And he’s clearly not. Keith saying Shiro’s like a brother to him rather than a father is a pretty clear indication of that. Also, reminder that Joaquim and Lauren have outright said the Space Dad thing is completely fanon and in no way their intention. Contrary to popular belief, Shiro is no one’s father. Especially not Keith’s:

Going back to the “brotherly” thing, it in no way invalidates shipping sheith. We know that, because plenty of the staff supports it. In fact, we’ve been given explicit fanart by the staff for it. Including Art Director Chris Palmer’s amazing Shiro loves you baby #he’s looking at Keith sheith art–

–as well as Supervising Director Kihyun Ryu’s lovely sheith sketches. You wouldn’t see this kind of content if they were literally meant to be seen as brothers. DW would never allow them to openly ship it. But the fact remains–the staff has literally no moral qualms with this ship. It’s just antis. It’s always been just antis. 

Obviously, the staff is capable of viewing them in a romantic context. Lauren even got shit from a bunch of antis early on because she liked a set of sheith fanart, including the two of them blatantly making out. Someone literally had the audacity to write an “open letter” about how “immoral” she was for supporting romantic sheith. As if somehow they know these characters better than their own creators. In fact, here is an entire list of archived sheith support from the staff to reassure you that they 100% support sheith in a romantic context. 

Returning back to Sheith in a romantic context, acknowledging them as being somewhat brotherly doesn’t invalidate the ship and demonize it anymore than k/l. Literally all of Team Voltron is found family, that’s the entire point. And people who don’t think feelings can evolve into something more? They obviously don’t know friends to lovers relationships. Take Avatar for example, since this is Studio Mir we’re talking about. Aang and Katara literally used to be “like a brother and sister,” but now they’re married with children. It’s almost like relationships can continually change and grow. I mean, if you’ll look at this one line from The Ember Island Players, it sure does seem reminiscent of that one scene in BOM:

Aang: “Did you really mean what you said in there?…when you said I was just like a brother to you and you didn’t have feelings for me?”

Katara: “I didn’t say that. An actor said that.”

Aang: “But it’s true, isn’t it?”

You can also see this post here with lists of positive commentary from the staff about the very intimate nature of Shiro and Keith’s relationship, including commentary like, “Shiro was still [Keith’s] guiding light, things were good,” “Shiro and Keith have the closest relationship,” “Shiro loves Keith”–but sure, lines like that can only be purely platonic, right? 

No one’s saying you personally have to be comfortable with sheith. You’re allowed to not like it. But don’t you dare claim the show runners hate it or us the way antis do. They are not on your side. They are never on your side. Antis are the ones who had the audacity to harass Josh and his family. Antis are the ones that will talk about how much they hate Lauren’s guts behind her back and then go demanding canon ages and other entitled shit to her face. Antis are the ones who will claim to love Pidge but treat Bex like complete trash. Antis weren’t happy Joaquim didn’t get k/l so they claimed he was a queerbaiting homophobe and all other kind of awful shit. Antis are the ones continually harassing and alienating the staff. You are the problem in this fandom and you should understand that the staff will never support you harassing others. 

Also, here’s some kind words from Barlee. Understand that the staff doesn’t condone anti behavior and never has. Never will. It takes more effort to send pointless rude messages to other people than to just ignore stuff you don’t like. If you hate me or sheith, then fine. But don’t claim the staff will take your side, because you’re the ones making them too annoyed and stressed to even interact with this fandom anymore. 

[dchan87]

We can argue over Shamus Kelly all you want, but I think he nails it here; Keith and Shiro’s relationship is better as a familial/platonic relationship instead of romantic.

EDIT: Shamus has since clarified his statement. He’s not attacking you for shipping, but he’s a stickler for authorial intent, which doesn’t change what he wrote.

[tequieroshiro]

obviously, youre free to interpret things however the fuck you want, but im still speechless as to how people call sheith brothers (figurative, adoptive or biological) when -- if you compare the way pidge acts towards shiro and/or matt -- you have the answer right in front of you

[lnkedmyheart]

Remember when Lauren fucking Montgomery liked a fanart of sheith making out? Or when Bex Taylor Claus made those Snapchat posts calling Shiro Keith's true love and made the joke about Shiro bringing the kids to his and Keith's date night? Or when Josh Keaton coined the ship name? Or when Kihyun Ryu, JDS and Chris Palmer all drew shippy romantic fanart for sheith? Remember when Josh Hamilton very explicitly corrected the misconception that sheith are in any way shape or form brothers and Keith's "you're my brother" was actually him trying to convey that Shiro was his everything?

No I don't think you do because you put your fingers in your ear and yell like a bratty toddler and think you can demonize other people by tossing around trigger phrases. Mostly cause you're out here posting uncensored anti bullshit about a dead as fuck show in 20fucking24 because you are desperate for someone's attention.

how can anyone ship Keith and Shiro??

the age gap is insanely weird considering Shiro knew Keith when he was a young teen, like 13 probably. they have 7+ years age difference

I wanna barf

[wallywestisfine]

sheith shippers saying klance shippers dislike the ship because they’re bitter when really everyone with any fucking common sense dislikes it because it’s creepy considering shiro literally raised Keith from childhood and it’s made explicit like ninety times in the show that they see each other as real brothers

[blueskittlesart]

tell me more about voltron please

i considered putting this behind a readmore but i dont think i will actually. i think im going to subject you all to this. okay to begin with when i say voltron i am not talking about the 1984 anime voltron. i am talking about the american 2016 reboot of that anime, voltron legendary defender. it had eight seasons within 2 years and i was obsessed with it for the majority of my time in middle school. it did irreparable damage to my brain.

voltron was run by two people named lauren montgomery and joaquim dos santos. voltron voice actors and writers also had a kind of unprecedented amount of interaction with their fans, both in-person and online. the majority of those fans were adolescent lgbt people, as are fans of most netlfix cartoons. this did not end well. i'll get into it later.

the first two seasons of voltron came out to relative praise. it appeared, at the time, to be an interesting character-driven children's show, similarly to steven universe and other cartoons of its time. As I mentioned, a lot of fans were adolescent and/or young adult lgbt people. this obviously led to fandom, and, as a consequence, shipping culture. the problem was that the shipping culture in voltron was insane. there were two MAIN ships that people were into at the time. keith/lance (klance) and keith/shiro (sheith). for context, keith and lance were 17 & 18-year old classmates and established rivals who had several heart-to-heart/romantically-coded scenes in the first two seasons, causing fans to latch on HARD. shiro was keith's 26-year-old adopted brother.

the mid-stage voltron fandom literally coined the terms "anti" and "proship." "anti" originally meant "anti-sheith" that is the kind of fandom culture were talking about here. before voltron, these debates had obviously still been present in fandom, but voltron dialed everything up several notches. it was insane. I was put on blocklists for being anti-sheith, as a FOURTEEN YEAR OLD.

I mentioned earlier that the showrunners and voice actors had a kind of unprecedented amount of interaction with their fans, and i actually think this is what lead to the show's downfall. What happened was, basically, at the very beginning of the show's run, one of the showrunners teased that they would have lgbt rep in their show. everyone assumed that this rep would be either klance or sheith, and went insane about it. the staff of the show could not have a single event without some fan asking if shieth or klance was going to be canon. they would always dance around it, which i don't REALLY blame them for. the biggest problem was that they actively REFUSED to condemn sheith, an incestuous ship between a 26 year old and a 17 year old. some fans at the time suggested that they even encouraged the shipping culture within the fandom because they knew it brought them more engagement. however, encouraging this kind of thing and refusing to condemn sheith led to several unsavory situations with voice actors and fans, most notably pidge's voice actor bullying a 13-year-old off this site after they pointed out it was weird that the voice actor openly shipped sheith. there were also several incidents where FANS were in the wrong, most notably when a klance shipper took photos of unaired material during a tour of the studio where voltron was being made and then threatened to leak it if the showrunners didn't make klance canon. it was an insane couple of years to be in fandom spaces on the internet.

this is bad, obviously. all of this is really bad. but it also all came alongside the steady, obvious decline in quality of the show itself. what had once seemed like an interesting, well-paced, character-driven narrative was clearly devolving into a badly-paced serialized mess. subtle racism began to creep into the writing. the racism became less subtle as the show went on, obviously favoring white characters. Characters would have development teased and then never followed through on. filler episodes would be full of weirdly malicious digs at fan-favorite characters for seemingly no reason. the story became disjointed, the tone shifted to be much darker with little warning, and the plot became nearly impossible to follow. what came out later on, after the show had concluded, was that sometime after season 3 or so, the showrunners had THROWN OUT THE SHOW'S BIBLE. meaning past a certain point, there was ZERO PLANNING, zero written plot, zero ANYTHING. it was obvious in hindsight why the show started to go downhill so quickly. It was speculated that the bible was thrown out specifically to spite klance shippers, who the showrunners later openly admitted to hating and wanting to screw over.

six seasons came and went with no lgbt rep like they'd promised. the fans were getting incredibly impatient. the longer they went without the satisfaction of a klance or sheith payoff, the harder it became for them to overlook the writing problems in the show. something had to be done.

at sdcc 2018, the voltron team showed a clip of their new season.

this was an EVENT in the fandom. like. i remember exactly where i was at the time. i remember refreshing the blog of a mutual i had who was at the panel, liveblogging it, and praying that they would finally fix everything they'd fucked up over the last year. they showed a clip of shiro and another man, who was named adam. the clip itself was ambiguous, but when asked about it afterward the showrunners confirmed that adam was shiro's fiancee.

this literally sent voltron fans into a rabid state. we were going fucking INSANE for those 2 weeks between the panel and the season's release. as far as we knew, at the time, we had been given the lgbt rep we'd been promised, and they'd somehow managed to do it WITHOUT PISSING OFF EITHER SIDE OF THE SHIP WAR. it was a miracle.

two weeks later, the season aired. adam was in about 2 minutes of the episodes, total. EPISODES, PLURAL. there were 13 in the season. his presence on screen amounted to the ambiguous scene which was played at the con, where it's unclear what his relationship with shiro actually was, and a scene of him DYING IN A FIGHTER CRASH.

the fandom fucking imploded at this point, and i left it basically immediately afterwards because the lgbt rep was basically the only thing i'd been holding out for. i can't tell you exactly what happened after that but the rotten tomatoes score for voltron went from like 79% to 10% overnight, if that gives you any idea. voltron legendary defender is also currently cited as an example on the wikipedia page for queerbaiting. they lost about 90% of their fanbase that day, and the rest was lost a few months later when they killed their only black character and redeemed their genocidal villains in the final season.

voltron sucked ass and i have no idea what possessed me to sit through ONE season of it, let alone seven, when it was just so obviously never going to be what i wanted it to be. that being said, the fandom was a literal cultural reset for every lgbt person between the ages of 14 and 25 at the time. make of that what you will but for the love of god do not watch it for yourself. stay as far away from this fucking show as humanly possible

[kny]

wow, i’m sorry, i still can’t hear you over this song:

[valkylander]

Alright, so, in 2016, TERFs were actively inserting their rhetoric into fandom spaces to convince a new generation of teenage girls to agree with them despite the fact that everyone on tumblr understood "TERFs are bad" even if they didn't understand what all TERFs believe or why it's bad. One of the talking points that got really big was the idea that DDLG and related kinks normalized and enabled incest a pedophilia. 2016 was also the year after Hannibal finished, the year after The Force Awakens came out, the year Voltron: Legendary Defender started, and the year Donald Trump was elected.

(more under the cut)

A bunch of would-be progressive kids felt powerless and wanted some way to take control and make a positive change in the world. A lot of these kids also hated Reylo and Hannigram because they're problematic ships that gross them out. They took the TERF talking points and ran with them, saying that shipping those two ships "normalizes abuse". This only got worse when VLD came out and the two biggest ships were Klance and Sheith. Klance had a bunch of people just here for some skinny pretty boys, and Sheith had a bunch of textual support and actual moments between the two characters, so the Klance shippers got pissed. They decided to push the line that, because Shiro is older than the rest of the cast and Keith said "you're like a brother to me" that Sheith normalized incest and pedophilia. Worse, tehy pushed the line that anyone who shipped Sheith was actively supporting incest and pedophilia and therefore was a fair target for harassment and abuse.

They called themselves "Antishaladins" and went after anyone in the Voltron fandom who shipped Shiro with one of the other paladings (except Allura, because she's a black teenage girl and so they saw her as a sexually available adult and therefore perfectly fine to ship with a canonically gay man). When antishaladins teamed up with anti-reylos and anti-hannigrams and began to apply their worldview to fandom in general, they called themselves "Antishippers" and "Antis" for short. As people got sick of this harassment, they started speaking out against it, tagging their posts with "anti anti" and then "proship". The fact that none of the ships antishippers went after are actually incestuous or pedophilic is relevant, but it wouldn't have justified their behavior if they were.

I get why you'd be skeptical of someone saying "My side just believes harassing people is bad" but that is seriously the party line here. If you ask an antishipper if they think it's okay to harass people who "like incest and pedo ships" they will say yes. If you tell an antishipper that it's not okay to harass people over ships, they will call you a proshipper for it. In practice, both antishippers and proshippers believe that being a proshipper is about being against harassment over ships.

Now, if you're asking why people would ship things that they would not condone IRL, there are several reasons. The most important thing is that it is normal and healthy to feel differently about fictional scenarios than you would about that scenario happening IRL. It's normal and healthy to enjoy watching Iron Man but also to feel shocked and appalled when a real person goes on a vigilante killing spree. It's normal to think it's cute and romantic when Jessica and Roger Rabbit kiss but to be disgusted and upset when someone sexually assaults a real rabbit. It's healthy to think it's okay for Mamoru to date Usagi but to think an actual college student dating an actual middle schooler is a predator.

Given the fact that fictional children resemble actual children and fictional siblings resemble actual siblings to about the same degree as Bugs Bunny resembles an actual rabbit, it is not surprising that people will ship a pair of characters who have an age gap or who are siblings if they would ship those same characters if that weren't the case. The characters are shippable and there's no reason that should stop them, even if it would make the relationship immoral if it were happening IRL.

There is also a distinct appeal to ships that comes from their problematic aspects. Forbidden love is a very potent romantic trope, it allows for a lot of tension and a lot of strong emotion in the form of guilt, fear, angst, and a love so strong it override's a person's moral compunctions. To love someone so much that you want to be with them, even though you know it's wrong, even though you know it could destroy you both, is a powerful narrative. It is often more powerful when the reason the pair cannot be together is something you, the reader, agree with. If they can't be together because their parents hate each other, or because they live in a homophobic society, a reader may roll their eyes when the characters treat those reasons as legitimate and not just barriers. But if that's your sister, if that's your student, if that's a child, then there is no eye-rolling.

(Interestingly, this can make it a useful metaphor for those lesser taboos like homophobia or family feuds. If you're a gay girl dealing with some amount of internalized homophobia even though your brain knows homophobia is stupid, it can be useful to sublimate your internalized feelings into a relationship you would consider actually morally wrong in order to explore and process those feelings.)

Also, breaking taboos is hot. So yes, that's a factor in the smut.

ok im doing a bit of a study

proshippers, what is that, what is a proshipper

are you guys writing incestuous/pedophilic scenarios for the sake of disgust, sexual gratification, shared catharsis, like whats the goal

and dont give me that "we just dobt harass people!!!" shit because both you guys and antis explain yourselves in the most "normal" sounding ways to sound good its what every human being does they WANT that moral superiority, i get it

if someone can explain what a proshipper is to me properly id be grateful

no judgement unironically from either side ty ty

[kila09]

The Kataangers on Twitter are really coming out in full force. I lol'd when one tweeted Katara was canonically in love with Aang and every gif/screenshot show the romance from AANG's POV. Like...it legit looks like a girl just giving this friend a kiss on the cheek but the friend takes it romantically lol.

Another hot take from them: ZK clearly had no chemistry while KA was pure love and Aang was the best for Katara lol

Jesus wept.

No hate but thats like Sheith antis *coughs*KL shippers*coughs* say Sheith was purely brotherly while KL were best friends and destined 😅😂😆😂😆😂😆😂😆😂😆😂😆😂😆😂😆

[starburstdragon]

Someone: *cites the scene where Keith says Shiro is like a brother to him as a sh////e/i//th/ scene* Me: *concern intensifies*

[dchan87]

Do sh/eithers honestly believe that Keith is romantically in love with Shiro now? I hate to break it to you, but... that two-year stint with his mom killed romantic sh/eith dead... er.

We know that Keith is much more mature and in touch with his emotions after that “time skip”. He’s not a kid anymore. We see that he’s more confident, more commanding and more emotionally stable. This is thanks to only having his mom to talk to. He was more comfortable talking about his issues and his feelings. And he knows love; love for his friends and family. That’s what enabled him to bond with the Black Lion and save his friends. So it’s fair to say that he’s no longer the confused teenager we first met.

So going by this logic, would Keith know he’s in love with Shiro?

Well, he loves him, but not romantically. He went from “You’re like a brother to me” to “You’re my brother”. Knowing that he’s much more sure of himself, it’s obvious that he’ll never see Shiro as anything but his brother. And since he’s known Shiro for years, likely as a adopted brother, or just as a mentor/student relationship, that feeling’s most likely solidified. The time he spent with his mom would’ve been that solidification factor. By talking to his mom, he would’ve figured out if he’s in love with Shiro or not.

Well, he’s obviously not. And given how he reacted to Lance, the same logic can be applied to sh/eith. To hammer it home, Krolia just thanked Shiro for raising Keith. Either she talked Keith out of his romantic feelings for Shiro, or more likely, she just knows that her son doesn’t see Shiro as more than a brother. It’s part of the theme of the importance of found family/nakama. Making it romantic undermines the theme.

Keith loves Shiro as a brother. And it’s going to stay that way in canon. Which is perfectly fine. Their bond is already very strong and I love that.

“Um, excuse me, but you ship Kallura? Wouldn’t that like, make you a hypocrite? Because same thing?” No fucking shit I ship Kallura. I don’t try to hide it. But Keith and Allura barely even talked in S6. But Keith and Shiro had an entire episode. I have no idea what might happen with Keith and Allura, but going by established Voltron canon, it’s fair to say that Keith and Allura’s feelings for each other could change in the next 26 episodes. On top of that, we don’t know how Keith feels about Allura right now.

“I’m gay and I called my SO my brother/sister!” Good for you! I’m glad you discovered your sexuality, and I hope you and your SO are happy. But using personal experience as evidence for your ship happening is shaky at best. Your experiences are not universal. You’re not Keith, and Keith isn’t you. Accept that fact. It’s not a bad thing. Unless Shiro and Keith do become a couple and the creators explicitly say that’s what they were going for, of course.

“It’s just like Korrasami!” No. Comparing any ship in VLD to Korrasami is already a bad call. The similarities between them are shallow at best. Even going by Korrasami “absence makes the heart grow fonder” logic it still doesn’t work. I watched LOK, ship Korrasami and have written Korrasami fanfic. I know what I’m talking about.

“The creators draw sh/eith!” Oh my god, the creators draw art of their own creations, just like they’re allowed to! *GASP* Seriously, this is another tenuous connection. A creator shipping two of their own characters doesn’t always mean they’ll be endgame.

“The way Keith said ‘I love you’ in two dubs proves it was meant to be romantic!” I’m a Pokeshipper. A lot of Pokeshipping moments are English-dub only. Using dubs as evidence is also shaky at best. On top of that, those phrases you’re talking about can still be used in non-romantic settings.

“It doesn’t have to be canon for me to ship it!” Good for you. I’m not stopping you, just asking you to temper your expectations. And don’t put words in my mouth.

(ADDED 7/22/2018) “Shiro and Adam broke up, so Shiro can go to Keith!” Honestly, this is the attitude that told me the sh/eith fandom is no better than the k/lance fandom in regards to how they treat their characters. You honestly don’t think that Shiro still has feelings for Adam and won’t try to reconcile? And he obviously isn’t attracted to some much younger? And if you treat Keith as some jealous harpy, you don’t get Keith, either. As for your treatment of Adam... you’re hopeless.

Basically, don’t get your hopes up for romantic sh/eith. Go ahead and keep shipping it, I’m not stopping you. But authorial intent is obvious, and they’re obviously never going to progress past platonic. Be fine with that. Learn to take valid criticism. And don’t get upset at people who think otherwise. You just look like a jerk if you do.