#block the Kataang tags and enjoy your fanart or whatever

[awkwardandeccentric]

Aang is literally 12/13 can we please not treat him like a sex offender because he misread the situation and kissed Katara when she wasn’t ready?

Sure, I’ll give you that it was a dick move. I will own that. But it wasn’t a power/entitlement thing! It was a “I’m literally a preteen and I have no idea how to navigate this kind of thing because I have no experience with this.” A much more forgivable motivation to misread some signals and push a little harder than is necessary.

Y’all, it’s okay to be a Zutara shipper. Seriously. It’s not my ship but that’s fine. But please just say you like that ship more and call it a day. Don’t cast a preteen as a sex offender. Don’t completely mischaracterize Aang just because you don’t like his ship with Katara. Christ on a stick…

"He backed off" is also a new one in defense of Aang after the noncon kiss, and that literally doesn't matter, but also, Aang absolutely did not back off. He just...didn't pursue Katara further after she ran away from him, and it's not even clear whether he made a choice to give her space or if he just didn't have another opportunity because Zuko and Toph were sitting on either side of her.

Although, actually, if anything, it looks like he was trying to get closer to her, as after the balcony scene, he's no longer sitting on the other side of Zuko. He's sitting in the row behind them, in between Katara and Zuko.

This was probably done to visually emphasize Aang's insecurity about the possibility of Katara not liking him (and liking Zuko instead), but it kinda reads like Aang being a creeper given the context.

Also, I can't help but notice Katara's sad expression when onstage Aang says he's content to have a platonic relationship with Katara. Is she thinking about how very different this is from the real Aang, who got so angry at Katara not being his girlfriend that he violated her consent?