#cancel culture and purity culture are bad

[nicolabarth]

Do you remember the time Neil Gaiman stopped talking about Doctor Who with fans, because he shared his opinions on who the next doctor should be, but it diverged from what the majority of tumblr users wanted?

He got hate over it. Everyone here claims to love him now, and there’s all this “Neil Gaiman is the only celebrity allowed on tumblr” talk. But he got hate over sharing an opinion about something he was passionate about as a fan

I can't stress enough how much the John Green debacle was an early example of how cancel culture and purity culture combine to make people feel righteously justified to engage in harassment.

John Green, during his time on tumblr, committed the heinous sins of...being neurodivergent and talking openly about it, earnestly interacting with fans in a very direct and unfiltered way, and writing about teenagers navigating first love and sexuality while he himself was an adult. The worst things he ever did were be a little cringe or misspeak, for which he was always prompt to apologize (often whether he really needed to or not).

Yet despite the former two being things tumblr claimed to love and the last one being true of 99.99% of YA authors, in this case a large segment of tumblr users steeped in the early 2010s resurgence of purity culture decided that these things were suspicious and predatory, and used that as an excuse to justify some truly awful behavior.

Which is really all that cancel culture is: the normalization and even celebration of the process of misapplying morality or ethics to dehumanize someone for the express purpose of justifying whatever pain and suffering you want to inflict upon them. Basically, deciding "this person is bad, so I am exempt from affording them basic respect and human dignity, and am allowed to cross any and all otherwise uncrossable lines in order to punish them without damaging my own moral or ethical standing."

Contrary to popular tumblr lore, the infamous "cock monologue" was not the sum total of the harassment, or even the worst of it. Callout blogs issued long lists of "receipts" about how terrible John Green was, most if not all of which were either taken out of context or completely refutable. His works were torn to shreds by people who'd never read them, as evidenced by much of the criticism being obviously and blatantly counter to the actual contents of the books.

Not that it mattered. Once the John Green hate party reached a certain level of critical mass, it became less about who he actually was or what he'd done, and more about proving you were a good person by hating him. That's the natural conclusion of cancel culture, after all: virtue signalling by identifying yourself in opposition to the cancelled parties. They're bad, and I'm good, so I hate them! Or, more often: They're bad, and I hate them, so I'm good!

Before it was over with, John Green had been accused, with no evidence, of being everything from a Nazi to a pedophile and subjected to hate mail and death threats. He eventually left the site for the sake of his own mental health, and because he no longer felt comfortable engaging directly with fans in the same way he once had.

Yet even now, with the benefit of hindsight, and even among those who ostensibly reject purity culture and condem bullying and harassment, very few on tumblr take what was done to John Green as seriously as it should be taken or condemn it as thoroughly as it should be condemned. Which I think is something we need to at least consider doing, given the increasing rise of purity and cancel culture online, and given the recent influx of professional creators eager to interact with fans on a more direct level than they have on other social media.

And my concern is not purely, or even primarily, for the Mike Flanagans and Lynda Carters of the world. I'm far more concerned, actually, for the small, independent or self-published creators in this space, and how much even a very small level of visibility gives too many people a feeling of carte blanche to engage in harassment.

I myself have less than 3k followers on here, a handful of popular posts, and zero notoriety or consequence outside of tumblr whatsoever, and I've been repeatedly told to kill myself for saying such innocuous things as "I don't think censorship is the cure for the world's evils" and "maybe learning the history of communities you want to participate in would be a good idea."

Thankfully, all it took for me to stop the harassment that came my way was to block those few individuals. But there have been many instances over the years of small creators or just random tumblr users that got a bit popular being stalked, doxxed, swatted, and harassed to the point of leaving the site and dealing with serious mental health issues as a result. It has never been just John Green. John Green isn't even the worst example. And tumblr has never learned its lesson.

[engelsschwert]

Girl help, my blorbos got woobified by the source material.

[queerlyglittering]

I know you're upset, but using the r word (even just in the tags) is honestly wiiild...

No. What's "honesly wiiiiild" is you unnecessarily tone-policing me for *checks notes* Quoting the invective directed AT ME on a regular basis, on my personal blog, in the tags rather than the main body of the post. Holy fucking shit. We're not even allowed to TALK ABOUT SLURS BEING USED AGAINST US anymore without somebody getting their knickers in a twist. Unplug your router, put your phone down, go touch some grass and don't ever come back to my blog. Jesus fucking Christ.

[allthingswhumpyandangsty]

"guys I do not condone any of this in real life" "this is fiction" "consent is key. this is only fiction" "murder is bad irl" — I wish fanfic authors didn't feel like they had to clarify this in author's notes or else they might be accused of being abusers or worse (I admit that such disclaimers are also something I personally use for my own stuff because I feel like I had to make it clear). like... people used to not care if an author wrote dead dove fics because people used to understand that ao3 fics are not a reflection of someone's in real life views or morality in any way. people used to understand that fanfics mean what they mean; fan fiction. none of it is real. maybe it's purity culture that normalizes witch hunt and censorship in the past couple years, and therefore authors feel like they have to clarify that just because they write about violence or noncon stuff doesn't mean they're murderers or sex offenders in real life. and I think it sucks that these things (purity and cancel culture?) have made authors feel like they have to apologize for the art they created instead of being proud of their hard work and all the dedication they put into creating these art. artists should not have to feel like they have to apologize for creating art that isn't all rainbow and sunshine. artists should not have to be made to feel ashamed of their own art if it's not all rainbow and sunshine.

I don’t agree with the “you can write noncon and dark fics as long as you make sure your readers get the message that these things are bad” or “you can write noncon and dark fics if it’s your way of coping with your trauma” take either. because writers do not owe you anything. the message writers want to send to their readers — whatever that message may be, if there’s any message or moral of the story for readers to take from the stories at all — is none of your business. why writers write what they write is none of your business. remember “don’t like don’t read”. no one forces you to read anything you don’t like. dark and noncon fics are a form of creative writing and creative writing is a form of art. you can’t pressure artists into creating art that “fit your moral compass” nor can you apply your own moral compass to artists to determine if they can create dark art or not, if their reasoning behind creating dark art passes your moral compass. like… what artists create and why artists create are none of your business. and you don’t get to shame artists for creating art that you hate / art that disgusts you. what you can do is ignore the art because it clearly was not made for you and that’s okay. what isn’t okay is you harassing artists because you don’t like the things they created.

writers, embrace and be proud of your works. as long as all the trigger warnings are tagged properly, you have nothing to apologize for.

[sandinmybed]

You can't scream about wanting people to change but then expect them to spend the rest of their lives stuck in the past and on who they used to be. You can't expect people to spend the entire rest of their lives grovelling and apologizing and demeaning themselves.

I actually love hearing about reformed people's stories. I love hearing about people who were in toxic communities or people who used to objectively be dickheads talking about how they got out of that. How they made themselves better.

I hate how most people's initial reaction to stories like that are things like:

"How could you have ever done those things?!" "Oh my god, you believed those things?!" "Well it doesn't un-do the harm you did!"

People incessantly advocate for change but then refuse to allow people who have changed the grace of being acknowledged and given opportunities and chances.

I love hearing about ex-antis talking about how they don't spend their days being angry and sending death threats anymore.

I love hearing about ex-homophobes who realized there's no magic law about what is "natural."

I love reformed bullies talking about how they made amends with their victims and spend their days being considerate of others.

You can't scream about wanting people to change but then expect them to spend the rest of their lives stuck in the past and on who they used to be. You can't expect people to spend the entire rest of their lives grovelling and apologizing and demeaning themselves.

Instead of clinging to who they were, latch onto who they are.

Ask how they got out of it. Commend them on changing. Enjoy that there's one less cause of harm in the world.

[ihaveanaversiontodecisions]

okay I am not involved in the current call out drama personally but it's made its way to my Twitter feed and im so genuinely confused because have none of you interacted with fandom before?

yes, the jrwi boys explicitly stated that there is a hard boundary against rpf about them and that they do not want to be shown nsfw art/ fics of their characters. these are reasonable boundaries to have, and they should 1000% be respected.

HOWEVER: they also explicitly said that they could not stop people and they're RIGHT. fandom is, at its core, weird. people write weird, gross, and even immoral shit all of the time. thats what tagging systems, scrolling, or blocking fan creators is for. for example: i really hate arthur being shipped with either of the twins or the twins being shipped together. i think its gross. so i exclude tags, and i scroll. its that easy! weird stuff will always exist on the internet, and nsfw works in the jrwi tag have some of the highest hits. many people read and write these things casually, and that isn't inherently wrong.

it's completely understandable that the jrwi guys dont want to see the characters that they put pieces of themselves into in nsfw situations. SO don't show them!!! as a general rule, you should not be showing, @ing, or sending creators of any media your fanwork, especially if it's suggestive or gorey. THAT is what a boundary looks like. fandom is not for creators anyways, and involving them in it tends to break many creators boundaries, even in more innocent situations (as a general pattern I've observed)

the person who made the call out post is a minor. they are likely steeped deeply in purity culture and have not interacted with fandom much. HOWEVER, calling specific people out by name is not a cool move. these are not bad people. they aren't being bigoted or doing harmful things irl or in the community, and their fan content is relatively harmless as well. they are simply creating things that people feel uncomfortable with on a personal level, and instead of blocking or scrolling, people have decided that they are morally bad people. and that's just... wrong?

sorry about this rant but writing "weird" or "gross" things is not a cancelable offense; it's a part of being in fandom. I am begging anyone who is genuinely upset by this to click on a supernatural or mha tag on ao3 and scroll for 3 seconds. I promise people writing correctly tagged gore or porn that will never be seen by people who don't want to see it is not the end of the world.

love you to the people who got called out and have been getting hate anons if you see this. yall are cool as hell

[rederiswrites]

So, ok, so. Unfinished thought.

We've got callout culture, we've got purity culture, we've got people being cancelled. This creates fear. I think Gen z especially lives with a crippling amount of fear in general, but these things are a focus. But this particular brand of purity culture has a heavy emphasis on...can we call it the contagion of impurity? Honestly I think we can, right? If, say, you are a Youtuber who is friends with a recently cancelled fellow Youtuber, you MUST immediately publicly distance yourself from both your friend and their Bad Ideas. It will be demanded of you. "You were in contact with them; do you have the Bad Ideas too? Because if you do, I have to stop watching you lest others think I also have Bad Ideas."

I suspect that this is basically how we end up with my notes full of people who won't vote for Biden because he supports Israel. It doesn't matter that his domestic policies have been frankly more liberal than I hoped for. It doesn't matter that he's gotten a remarkable amount done given his constraints. It doesn't matter that Trump, the only opponent likely to be a real challenger, not only also supports Israel, but supports them with far more enthusiasm and far less reservation. What matters is that they not be associated with him and his Bad Ideas, even if that means giving up their chance to fight Trump. They'll give the advantage to someone much, much worse, if it means they can pretend they have no culpability. Because the image of purity is more important than acts which actually improve the world.

[elumish]

Maybe this is me just trying to articulate the same thing over and over in different ways, but I think some people in fiction (fanfiction and original fiction) circles have overcorrected and basically ended up at "all writing is value-neutral and nothing that is written is bad and nobody ever has the right to tell anyone not to write anything ever and we can never criticize old books with modern sensibilities."

And I think we should figure out how to have a useful and nuanced conversation about the fact that some things are bad and probably shouldn't be put out in public. And that's not me saying that anyone should be drawn and quartered or or harassed or cancelled or whatever. But we have to be able to think critically of writing and get past the knee-jerk reaction that any criticism ever is purity culture or censorship or conservativism in a gay hat.

[thebreakfastgenie]

This is what Vietnam War discourse would actually look like if there was tumblr in the 60s/70s:

That scene in Mad Men where Glenn tells Sally if he doesn't go to Vietnam some poor Black kid will get drafted instead

Draft dodging privilege

Failing the draft board physical on purpose is ableist

Trying to get a psychological deferment is ablesit/sanist

Pretending to be gay to dodge the draft is homophobic

If you're pretending to be gay to dodge the draft you can reclaim slurs

Trigger tags for topics related to Vietnam because it might trigger veterans, people getting screamed at for not using them, discourse about whether they're racist

Can Asian Americans reclaim "Charlie?" (Yes. No. Only if you're Vietnamese. Only if you're literally a member of the Vietcong.)

Lists of celebrities that are canceled for supporting Vietnam ranging from people who actually support the war to people who shared a post about supporting families of POWs

Someone posts about being happy their POW cousin got released, gets anon hate for supporting the war

Excuses not to boycott Dow Chemical, "there is no ethical consumption under capitalism"

Women and people of color get anon hate for talking about misogyny and racism in the anti-war movement

Women shouldn't go to college/law school/med school/grad school because men need those slots so they can get a deferment

The draft proves misandry is real

Anti-electoral leftists opposing the 26th amendment because both sides are the same

"Voting for LBJ is the lesser of two evils!!!!"

"At least Barry Goldwater wanted to end the forever war in Vietnam!"

The students murdered at Kent State get "canceled" for failing some moral purity test

Post about how Jackson State got less attention than Kent State because the students were Black which is actually but in the most bad faith, accusatory tone possible

Feminism and Civil Rights are distractions

Black bloggers get hate for publicly mourning MLK because "thousands are killed in Vietnam every day!!!!"

White American mixes up Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos because they don't know they're three separate countries

Working class people support the war so opposing it is classist actually

"The movement isn't about your fave I hate stan culture!!!!!"

[wings-of-fire-confessions]

absolutely insane how bad the witch hunting purity culture is in this fandom,

its basically impossible to exist online especially as an adult without some kid on instagram labeling everyone you know or even you as a pedophile, zoophile, or whatever because someone accidentally followed someone or misspoke 3 years ago.

it takes away any actual meaning from those words and labels which are insanely disgusting and illegal

people conflate their personal morals/comfortability with what is unsafe and that is not okay, and it has been INSANE in this fandom especially as of recently, plenty of my close friends have been targeted and labeled as problematic with out of context or extremely out dated evidence, insane stretches/overexaggerations of words, and literally just lies.

also, just because its a childrens series does not mean an adult space and adult people arent allowed to exist

cancel me if you want, but ill probably get cancelled for having someone i barely know friended on discord anyways

.

[raelle-writing]

DFF is such great show and I enjoy the portrayal of the characters and the plot. Although I am not much into JinPhee ship (even though their scene was hot) - meaning I won't actively search fics of them;-D. But I absolutely don't understand the hate this ship gets. Or Jin character gets? Like, did I miss something? Why there is so much hate towards this pairing? I don't get it. Or do they dislike Jin character so much?

So I think there are 3 main reasons that people hate PheeJin and specifically Jin as much as they do, and I'll see if I can explain it coherently below lmao

First is cultural differences.

I've noticed that by and large a lot of the hatred directed at Jin comes from international fans being extremely harsh, and I think it's partially because they don't understand some of the nuance of Thai culture. Which to be fair, why would they?

One aspect is that they get angry that Jin lied to the police without taking into account that the police are corrupt - both in the narrative and also in Thailand in general.

Another is they get mad at Jin for recording Non - which to be fair, really does suck lmao. But they make it about Jin recording Non instead of reporting the assault happening, without taking into consideration that the age of consent in Thailand is 15, which means that what happened with Non and Keng isn't technically statuatory rape. Still bad and awful and Non was coerced and assaulted, don't get me wrong - but that makes it slightly less clear cut IMO when it comes to the question of Jin seeing Non "cheating."

You can even see within the show that the reactions to that video are by and large slut-shaming and not "omg that kid was assaulted."

So to recap: Taking the video = bad. But I think people get a bit too self-righteous about the reasons why Jin took it.

Second is purity/cancel culture.

I'm sure it hasn't escaped your notice that in the internet age, if you make one mistake you're a terrible, irredeemable person and should be canceled forever. I think that's playing a part in this. All of the characters make mistakes, and because of that they're all irredeemable pieces of shit who deserve to die. Except for Non who is just a victim and has never done anything wrong (sarcasm).

In seriousness, I think that's part of it. And the fact that Non is SO sympathetic it kind of overrides people's sympathies for the other characters. I'm not 100% sure why people hate Jin the most out of everyone else considering he's the one who has tried to help Non the most out of the friend group... I guess they just have higher standards for people who try to help? Idk. Either way it seems to me that they expect Jin to be a perfectly-well-adjusted little hero who always does what's right and never makes mistakes. Instead of what he really is: a kid.

And last is fan favorites/shipping.

A big part of the reason that PheeJin shippers are getting so much hate is because TaCode shippers and PheeNon shippers have decided their ship is The Ship of the series, and think that Phee is just using Jin for revenge and anyone who genuinely ships PJ is fucked up, etc.

It's just ship war bullshit waged by largely Barcode stans, but it's certainly tiresome.

To be clear, I have nothing against PheeNon. I am of the opinion that Phee and Non were a cute high school romance that wouldn't have lasted because they had conflicting styles of showing affection and love (I'll write a post about it someday lol) but that doesn't mean I hate the ship. I thought they were very cute and it was fun to see TaCode on screen since I wrote MacauChay in my KPTS days ahahaha I just like the spice and fire of PheeJin better, and Jin is my favorite character.

I just wish that PheeNon shippers would live and let live instead of acting like they're waging some moral war. They were even crying in BOC's comment section on IG today after they posted the PheeJin poster for episode 9 saying "nooooo Phee is there for revenge he can't really have feelings for Jin!" It's exhausting... 🫠

General disclaimer: if you don't like Jin or like PheeNon better I'm not saying any of the above things applies to you. Everyone is entitled to their opinions, I'm just dissecting some of the over-the-top hate I've seen/experienced in fandom spaces lately.

[thdrama2]

Why is purity and cancel culture so prevalent in the toyhouse and furry community? Everyone is so hateful and 1D. Everybody has the same personality and the same far-fetched morals that the abused and mentally ill have no chance of accomplishing. And every time someone messes up, they're immediately written off as a "bad person" and excluded from all communities forever. Forgiveness and redeemability just doesn't exist here and it's possibly the dumbest thing I've ever witnessed from an outside perspective. You people are FURRIES and SPARKLECORE artists. Your job isn't to be politically correct or make moral characters. The entire picture of being an artist is to not be fit into a box. The entire ideal of being a human is to make and endure mistakes and recover from them just to mature as a person.

Because if you stop pointing fingers someone might start pointing fingers at you.

For example when I refuse to post extremely damaging accusations that I do not have the time to fact or source check some anons have used this to fruitlessly attach the same damaging accusations onto me.

The block button has been life saving.

[darkshrimpemotions]

This article has been out for over a year, but I just heard of it via a youtube video by Princess Weekes (who I highly recommend you check out if you enjoy media analysis from someone who is clearly well-versed in fandom without feeling the need to establish themselves as some condescending authority studying us like creatures in a zoo, unlike some youtubers who post about fandom).

If you've been on tumblr for as long as I have (10+ years), you probably vividly remember the heyday of yourfaveisproblematic, and how that blog's popularity feels even today like one of the major catalysts for a lot of the purity policing on tumblr. In this article, the author of that blog--who was a teenager when it was active--talks about what motivated them at the time, how they feel about the blog now as an adult, how they see similar impulses being acted out across the internet today, and why they have never taken the blog down.

I highly recommend reading the whole thing, but here are a few key lines that really stuck out to me:

"In the years since, I’ve looked back on my blog with shame and regret — about my pettiness, my motivating rage, my hard-and-fast assumptions that people were either good or bad."

"I just wanted to see someone face consequences; no one who’d hurt me ever had."

"There’s something almost quaint about it all now: teenage me, teaching myself about social justice on Tumblr while also posturing as an authority on that very subject, thinking I was making a difference while engaging in a bit of schadenfreude."

"Looking back, I was more of a cop than a social justice warrior, as people on Tumblr had come to think of me."

These quotes remind me vividly of my own fall down the purity police pipeline, and my struggle to claw my way back out. Looking back, it's so easy to see how my pain and helplessness fueled a ruthlessness in my approach to social justice that was less about actually helping anyone and more about feeling like I wasn't so powerless.

Thinking of the friends I had at the time, many of whom I no longer associate with for related reasons, we were all traumatized or marginalized teenagers and twenty-somethings, newly awakened to the idea that the treatment we'd suffered for most of our lives was not in fact our fault and was due to systemic injustice and culturally accepted cruelty.

But we weren't healed enough, or distanced enough ourselves from the power structures causing or enabling that suffering, to think beyond wanting to flip the hierarchy. In a very real way, we weren't ready for the nuance required to give people grace and the opportunity to learn and grow. Despite having needed, and frankly still needing, those things ourselves.

I think we can learn a lot from Your Fave Is Problematic about the motivations and emotions behind purity culture, black and white thinking, and why neither is actually productive in reducing harm, easing suffering, or creating a kinder and more equitable world. And maybe, if we learn to recognize those impulses in ourselves, we can unpack them before they lead us to cause harm in the name of making ourselves feel less powerless.

[utilitycaster]

This feels like a weird thing to ask someone but I greatly respect your ability to speak your honest critical opinion (and in such well spoken terms) in an internet atmosphere where you can get crucified for saying anything less than full-throated praise--and that's exactly my issue. I run a small, fandom-oriented Youtube channel and despite knowing that I'm entitled to critical opinions, that I don't even want the attention of delusional reactionaries anyway, etc etc I'm finding it incredibly difficult to share what I really think of some shows + aspects of fandom and shipping. I've become weirdly terrified of saying one perfectly logical thing that does not align with the elaborate fantasy some people have built in their heads and getting canceled/losing the small base of followers I've managed to cobble together. The real nightmare is sharing something harmless like a shipping opinion and having purity culture come for me and call me a p*dophile for absolutely no reason. But at the same time I feel like a spineless coward for letting the toxic side of fandom win by scaring me into silence, especially when one of my goals for the channel from the beginning was to create a place where level headed critical opinion could be shared without fear of gross overreaction and slander. So I guess my questions are: is it as easy for you to speak honestly as it seems? Have you ever flinched before? Is it just about not caring what irrational people think or is there something else to it I'm missing? Sometimes it feels like my fears are valid and sometimes it feels like I just need to grow a backbone and get over it already.

Hey anon,

So I think there is one really big factor here: I am posting anonymously and facelessly and I don’t mind if I alienate people on the basis of an opinion I genuinely hold. If you’re actively trying to build a following and/or if you’ve made yourself identifiable, then I do in fact understand holding back more for reasons of trying to keep that following, or for reasons of personal safety.

But yeah: it’s mostly just that strangers who send anon hate don’t know jack shit about my life or me as a person; they just see an opinion that, as you said, challenges the elaborate fantasy in their head and attack the person who said it. I have, genuinely, been told things that I know for myself to be demonstrably false about my life (not even opinions about me I reject - demonstrably false things) by people who are ultimately just mad that I don’t like their characters or ships. I would obviously feel terrible if a person I knew in real life accused me of something terrible, and I’d still feel bad if it were someone I interacted with online with any sort of regularity, but someone hiding behind complete anonymity? They’re not calling me names because they genuinely think I’m bigoted. They’re calling me names because they are willing to use tools to try to drag me down because they cannot accept I don’t feel the same way they do about a character. They’re like when conservatives claim that denying service to queer people is religious freedom - they are using what appears to be a legitimate appeal to ostensible shared values, but really they’re exploiting the system and people's desire to take things in good faith because they can't stand not getting their way.

The other thing, and I recognize how much I sound like my parents here, is that your bullies are thinking about you more than you think about them. Anyone who sends hate desperately wants you to agree with them. Show them you are not thinking of them.

And finally, some of the hate I’ve gotten has genuinely been about the most anodyne things, which ironically helps because once you realize that no matter how bland an opinion is, some asshole will foam at the mouth about it.  Like, again, I definitely talk plenty of shit about ships or characters or choices I don’t like, but I got some wildly out of pocket shit from people who apparently could not tolerate the completely random example I used to illustrate a fairly uncontroversial and popular opinion re: ship tagging on ao3. And once something like that happens you realize that there’s no point in avoiding the spicier stuff.

I don’t know if this helps, and I recognize that I happen to have a particularly contrarian and not remotely conflict-averse personality. I respect the many people who are not willing to put up with hate and I don’t blame you if you’re one of them; at points in my life I have not been in a place to put up with it and was much less outspoken. But in the end, the thing about people who harass you is that they care so, so much about you agreeing with them, and if you tell them a flat firm no while also making it clear you don’t give a shit if they ever agree with you, they do tend to eventually give up upon realizing how one-sided their obsession is.

[allthingswhumpyandangsty]

just something I’ve been thinking about, I’d like to say I’m lucky to know what whump is and to be in the whump community knowing there’s nothing wrong with liking whump and angst and hurt/comfort tropes when it comes to reading / writing / enjoying a piece of media, because they’re perfectly normal. whump community is not a popular community what’s widely known on a global scale. I’ve been on many social media platforms — twitter, instagram, tiktok, etc — and tumblr is so far the only platform where whump community is genuinely welcomed and valid and you can say you like whump, I can have this whump blog, without anybody judging us or calling us ‘problematic’.

I mean sure there are ‘self-righteous’ people on tumblr who think we’re ‘freaks’ or ‘walking red flags’ or whatever, but they’re such a minority group while compared to other social media platforms, especially popular one like twitter where purity culture and cancel culture dictate the flow. I’ve liked whump ever since I was very, very young. I think I’ve been into it for roughly about 20 years now (holy shit!) but I’ve only come to learn it’s called whump and what whump is in the last 6 years or so, precisely since I stumbled upon the first whump blog I found on tumblr — that means I spent about more than a decade not knowing that what I’ve secretly been into ever since I was a very young kid is actually okay and normal, and so many people are also into this exact same thing.

I just think I’m lucky to be in the place I am now when it comes to whump community because, like previously mentioned, it’s not commonly known and tumblr is not one of those big platforms where the majority of people are on.

so it also means there are still people of all ages out there who like whump, but the problem is that they don’t know it’s called whump, and they don’t know what whump is, they don’t know there’s a very friendly, very safe community for them. they just… like whump. but they don’t know what whump is. so I figure they keep this to themselves and they think that there’s something wrong with them for, you know, liking it when a character is put through pain. I feel… bad for them, not because they like whump but because they don’t know that it’s perfectly okay and normal and that there’s a whole community for them here.

[sing-you-fools]

Here's the thing about problematic fictional characters.

Humans are problematic. We are complex fucked up little creatures and cannot possibly do everything right all the time.

Someday, you are going to be an adult. Maybe you are already. And your best friend is going to have an affair. Or two of your buddies are going to start talking about the times they almost got DUIs and how they got out of it. One of your friends is going to buy [product] when we're supposed to be boycotting [product]. Someone you love will get an MBA, or develop a fast fashion habit that makes you want to weep for the environment, or make a parenting choice you really don't agree with.

Maybe not any of these specifically, but people you love will do things that you think are wrong. It will happen. There is no way to avoid this. And sure, maybe once or twice it will be something so awful you cannot or will not look past it.

But if you cut out everyone who fucks up, you will be alone forever.

Fictional characters who are otherwise likable "good guys" but do some shitty things don't normalize the shitty thing. They normalize the idea that everyone has their areas of shittiness - yes, even you, to other people - and it's okay to still like them.

People know cheating is bad. No one's reading the Witcher books* and saying, "Hey, this otherwise decent guy keeps cheating on his girlfriends! That must mean cheating is okay!" No! That would be ridiculous. No Arya Stark fan decided to go on a killing spree over it. No Buffy fan thinks every decision Spike ever made was morally correct and fine, even if they do like him. No one watched House and said, yeah that guy's normal and I should act just like him!

We have this conversation on a broad cultural level on a regular basis, it seems - was this thing this famous person said really bad enough for them to deserve getting canceled? Are they inciting violence, or do they just have an opinion we don't like? Or just not know something we didn't realize isn't common knowledge? - but we don't really acknowledge that sometimes it's personal. Sometimes the person who says or does something bad is someone you actually know, someone you see and talk to and love, and you'll have to decide for yourself if it's worth cutting them out of your life. Most of the time, it's not.

Slightly shitty characters prepare us for slightly shitty people. They help us understand that we don't have to like everything about someone in order to like them. And they help dampen the self-hatred when we inevitably realize we were the ones who made a shitty mistake this time.

Moral purity is an impossible standard to hold anyone to, but if it's all we're used to seeing in the stories we love, it becomes easier and easier to forget that.

*which, disclaimer, I've never read, or seen the show, but this post was inspired by a post about them and how the show filed off all the "problematic" edges that made the books good storytelling in the first place