#but personally (and esp with the parallels btwn katara and azula) i find katara and zuko becoming - and /staying/ - platonic

[nixariel]

#also I feel like there's this belief that self-sacrifice is inherently romantic#but I think that self-sacrifice in the name of platonic love is just as impactful#and saying that zuko has to be in love with katara perpetuates the idea that romantic  love is the only kind of strong love out there via whinyandcheese724

I think one of the reasons I dislike zutara as a ship so much is because their friendship is so beautiful on its own without romance and such a huge sign of growth and character development. zuko and katara were one of the first m/f relationships I saw in media where the characters weren’t related or love interests. and while there are several other m/f friendships katara was my favorite character when I first saw the show and as such their friendship was (and still is) very dear to me. 

also, I know everyone loves a good enemies-to-lovers, and I do too, but y’all are sleeping on the criminally underused trope of enemies-to-friends. in almost every enemies-to-lovers story I’ve read the reason that they get from enemies to lovers is because of some undeniable and immutable attraction. but what if we didn’t have that? what if you didn’t haunt my dreams at night? what if it wasn’t a struggle to pull my eyes away from you? what if I had every reason to hate you and all you had to give me was a late apology and a promise to do better? what if forgiving you was a choice I didn’t have to make? then what? I’d have to know you on purpose. you’d have to trust me when I forgive you because I’ve thought of every reason not to. 

and I hear some of you saying “oh but that could be a great enemies-to-lovers story too” and maybe it could, but you’re missing the point. the reason zuko and katara hits so hard for me is because they didn’t have to be friends. they both had other friends and other family and they both would have had happy and full lives. but they got past it anyways. and it didn’t have anything to do with romance or love. it was purely growth and self-improvement. zuko didn’t apologize because of a crush on a cute girl, he apologized because he regretted what he did and was maturing into a better and kinder and more thoughtful person. katara didn’t forgive him because he was hot, she forgave him because she understood that her anger and hate was poisoning her and she wanted to move on. 

tl;dr: the beauty of zutara’s friendship is that they became friends because of growth and maturity that had nothing to do with romance and throwing in that they were attracted to or in love with each other cheapens the significance of their character development and shows that romantic love is the only way to overcome personal challenges.