#cw: mariposa being more vulgar than usual

[blonde-and-cat-suc]

choose violence ask game: 3, 12 and 22?

p.s. love your blog, please keep spreading the truth!

And I love blogging <3!!! I do it for the girls and the gays.

>>>><<<<

Answers under the cut . . . This is gonna be a long one.

3) Screenshot or description of the worse take you've seen on tumblr?

Okay, so, the only problem with this one is that I've literally seen too many to count. But the one that I'd often seen and had the most visceral reaction to were definitely the longer, well articulated analysis posts from stans that did SO MUCH bending and twisting to claim Adora being equally toxic/(and or abusive) to Catra. Which, obviously, I also spent time analyzing. Trying my best to understand what was going on. And you know what? I get it. I don't agree. But I get it. Adora and Catra grew up under the same circumstances, so yeah, they wouldn't be entirely innocent of picking up bad habits from their childhood. Realistically. Fine.

But implying that Adora is worse? Worse than Catra?

...

Anyway, I've suffered from my own self-inflicted torture in the past. I wish I hadn't spent so much time reading stan analysis the way I did, but... Here we are.

And that's just on Tumblr. I don't believe that other social media/forum sites are better or worse about c//a and SPOP, but I have seen worse in The Wilds. (At least on Tumblr there's the filtering options. Everywhere else, good luck).

12) The unpopular character that you actually like, and why more people should like them?

Guys. I LOVE SWIFT WIND. I FUCKING LOVE SWIFT WIND I DON'T CARE THAT HE'S ANNOYING THEY'RE ALL FUCKING ANNOYING!!!

First of all, yes, yes, yes, Swift Wind is horrendous wasted potential (surprise, surprise), and yes, of course, I'm still pissed over it. Those scenes where he's so loyal and kind to Adora, and she, having no other point of reference for a friend, much less a resourceful friend... Like, awwhh. Plus, he makes it very clear that he has his own will and isn't just mindlessly following Adora around like a god-honest horse would. He has his own agenda. He doesn't have to go into battle with Adora, and doesn't gain too much from risking his life to help her and her friends in the short term, but Swift Wind does it anyway. He's interested and invested in Adora, personally, anyway. He wants to be there for her and support her growth as a person.

And Adora deserves all of those amazing, raw, sappy, fairytale friendships!

I DON'T CARE THAT HE'S LITERALLY A HORSE HE IS STILL FUNCTIONALLY A HUMAN BEING. THEY ARE BESTIES. THEY LITERALLY HAVE A MY LITTLE PONY FRIENDSHIP IS MAGIC LINK GOING ON. THEY SHOULD HAVE CONSIDERED SWIFTIE TO BE APART OF THE BEST FRIENDS SQUAD, I ACTUALLY DON'T UNDERSTAND WHY HE ISN'T.

MORE LOVE FOR SWIFT WIND!!!

22) Favorite part of canon that everyone else ignores?

In my experience, this is the type of fandom that cultivates, um, extreme niches, for lack of a better term. As in, literally what my blog is compared to a "stan's" blog. They're like. Different SPOP fans everywhere, so I don't truly believe that there's a portion of this show that is genuinely ignored... There's someone out there that liked even the tiniest, unimportant fraction of this show. Just got to go find them. (Hell, I know people that love, like, Tall Star specifically, out of all the other characters. Nothing has gone totally unnoticed, which is something I really love about the fanbase as a whole, despite everything).

Anyway, to keep it short, my favorite "underappreciated" parts are hm... Maybe the parts where Adora gets to explore the world around her? And not in a super plot related way. I know that the BFS goofing off so much isn't totally ignored. But I like to see that Adora especially was still learning new things everyday in canon, just like, randomly. Nothing to do with the Horde or the Rebellion. Just. She should be excited for the new world around her, dude. Those are pretty rare moments in the show, actually. Wish there were more.

[blonde-and-cat-suc]

they fuckin what 

I still haven't recovered from that time spop got nominated for an NAACP award despite the fact that there were no black writers and all the writers were of white skin tone and the fact that that happened just a few months after the slavery jokes

[blonde-and-cat-suc]

1, 9, 16 for the ask game please also thank you for providing a safe space for antis!

It's no problem at all! happy to be here dude xoxo

-

1 ) Character everyone gets wrong?

*deep breath*

Almost. The. Entire. Main Cast.

But, perhaps most egregiously, Catra.

The reason why sister!c//a literally could not be taken out of the narrative is because if we don't accept that Catra and Adora are sharing Shadow Weaver as a mother figure, a HUGE chunk of Catra's arc very specifically is missing (or, more times than not, horribly misunderstood)!

Catra doesn't hate Adora because Adora is a better soldier. Catra doesn't care about that. She makes it extremely clear that she doesn't care about social status that first episode. She's not bitter and pissed about her commanding officer. She doesn't care about Hordak, so it's not really about approval from authority either.

She very clearly and obviously sees Shadow Weaver as her mother. She wants approval and acceptance and love from her mother. She is upset because her sister is the favorite child of her mother.

*exhales*

It's not a secret that I feel this way, but it felt nice to let that out into the air again...

9 ) Worst part of canon?

Uh, probably when Micah is introduced as this lame dad trying to get Glimmer's love.

And then... not much really coming from it. Why didn't he just stay dead. Why did we have to trade Angella for Micah. Why. I don't get it. To this day. 2/10 would not recommend swapping out parental figures. Especially since the narrative kind of seems like... it has nothing insightful to say about Micah in particular. He kinda starts to feel like DILF bait after a while. That might have been a compliment if I wasn't lesbian and he did a little bit more of that Father Figure thing people talk so much about. But, oh well.

16 ) You can't understand why so many people like this thing... (characterization, trope, headcanon, etc)?

Okay, so, we're already in this far, so I'm just going to come out and say: I am actually a furry. IRL. Yeah. No, seriously. I am.

But Catra's? Not??? Fucking? Hot? I just don't see it. She's cute in a purely cat way. But hot???

I feel like people who crush on Catra are closeted furries (sometimes not) and this repression of their furriness kind of... fell on her??? Cause??? What????

But yeah, I'm sorta tired of the characterization that Catra is this ultra hot bad bitch,,, she,,, licks herself clean,,, it's just a little too animal for me. Not even furries really make their fursonas do shit like that. No, seriously. Seriously.

[blonde-and-cat-suc]

28. three's a crowd

rating: g 

wc: 1.5k 

cw/tw: domestic violence isolation tactics (implied), past physical abuse (implied) 

desc: Glimmer, Bow, and Adora arrive in Bright Moon on a high note, excited to have She-Ra joining the Rebellion. Adora is skeptical of their welcoming attitude. Three friends is one too many to be true... 

(Canon Compliant) 

///

"Adora! Show me how you threw that punch again!"

"Well, alright", Adora agreed easily, a golden dapple of sunlight coming through the trees giving away the pinkish-red of her cheeks. She was clearly the type that liked to show off—Glimmer had been privy from the beginning. The freshly new rebel had proven herself to be an ally to them with a sort of flashy, grandiose act of solidarity...

She-Ra.

Glimmer couldn't help her giddiness.

Yes, She-Ra's defense of Thaymor was awesome—yes, Glimmer loved every second of it. Beneath her initial disbeliefs, Glimmer was beginning to understand that it didn't matter where Adora had come from. Only where she was going.

Presently, Adora was set to go to Bright Moon, sitting on top of the wayward horse they had fled Thaymor with. Adora couldn't have been much younger than Glimmer or Bow, but she had not been out much. Everything amazed Adora in one way or another.

I had no idea that we had this many moons in the sky! Adora exclaimed yesterday, staring into the violet-blue deepness enfolding various moonlight hues. And then, hours later, when the daylight moons had rotated to their positions: Where'd they all go? Why did they leave...? Adora was genuinely regretful. So certain that the moons themselves had moved on from her, specifically, and would not return intentionally, somehow. Bow had to reassure her that the moons would return, (and sometimes they wouldn't, when they got into a New Moon phase). She'd perked up instantly, relieved.

Their first few hours of retreating Thaymor had been spent explaining basic information to Adora that she may not have already known. What Bright Moon was like, the Rebellion, Queen Angella's pitiful alliances across civil Etheria... Adora had no trouble accepting these truths with only the occasional inkling of doubt.

It should have been more obvious before, but Glimmer had only caught on to Adora's true merit when she'd talk back to them with her own insights, pressing them for more information, more analogies, more new philosophies and ideas and morals... and then, more.

Adora was a truthful hero who was also eager to learn and explore the world around her. Glimmer couldn't have asked for a better gift to the Rebellion. She-Ra was going to give the Rebellion the advantage that they had needed all of those years ago when her father...

When the Horde had made their worse offense on Bright Moon to date.

It was all Glimmer could think of when she looked at Adora. Even when they had become comfortable in each other's presence, even when Adora was guiding Glimmer's hands to throw a punch that those calloused, cruel Horde soldiers used—Glimmer knew that Adora herself was ultimately the upper hand the Rebellion needed. With each other's full cooperation, they could protect Etheria from the evil that had grown in its darkest corner. They would burn the Horde back into the ground. Once and for all.

...But for now, the three of them were only lucked-out travelers escaping the Horde's latest brutality. They were all exhausted and each of them had admitted to the group that they were still sore from the day before. Regardless, they kept steady pace, and soon, Glimmer recognized the thinly trekked dirt roads cutting through the trees... They were close to the outskirts of Bright Moon's city. Bow had realized too, flashing a huge smile, "I can't wait to shower and eat and sleep!"

Adora instantly made a skeptical sort of expression. "All at once?"

"Huh? No! But, well... I could definitely try."

"Are you allowed to do that?"

"Probably not", he laughed. "How does anyone shower and eat and sleep? I understand showering and eating—and sleeping and eating. But all three? No, I'm not sure. Sorry, Adora!"

Then, she'd only frowned at him. "You're...joking?"

"Only a little bit", Bow laughed again. "I'm sorry. Really. This is the kind of joke that my dads would tell. It's funny. I haven't been home in a while..."

"Dads", Adora tested the word on her mouth. "Daaaaahds. What is a 'Dads'?"

Wide-eyed and open-minded, Adora absorbed what Bow had to tell her about his family and all of his brothers. She got around to prying him for information on the word "brothers", eventually.

"Do you have 'brothers'?" Adora looked at Glimmer expectantly.

"No, no. I'm an only child."

"Me too. Well... I assume so. I don't have a 'Dads' either."

"It's just a 'Dad'."

"Yeah, it's not such a big deal not having one." Adora smiled. "I turned out okay, I think."

Glimmer didn't bother correcting her anymore after that. The dryness of her mouth and lips was starting to get to her, now that she knew that Bright Moon was close. All she cared about was drinking water, and doing those other things Bow had listed. And of course, recruiting Adora to their cause. Giving her someplace to sleep. Making sure she knew how to take a bath when they found time for that.

When they'd broken out of the wooded trails, Adora had climbed on top of their horse just to get a better view of the sight—Bright Moon Castle, and the Moonstone, opalescent and shimmering gold hues in the daylight. "Wow", Adora sighed under her breath, fingers clutched in the horse's mane.

Glimmer beamed up at her. "Welcome home!"

"Home." Adora seemed to cringe around this word. She examined Glimmer and Bow, and even the horse beneath her. "You guys are sure that you want me to live here? With you?"

"Where else would you go?" Bow asked with an equal amount of sincerity. "I couldn't bring you home."

"Because of your 'Dads'..." Adora nodded to him in understanding. "Right."

"Well, Bright Moon has space for you", Glimmer promised.

"Um", Adora had only looked between them again, frowning. "Are you sure...?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"It's just... Well. Um. I really do want to be friends with you guys."

"We want to be friends with you, too!" Bow reached up and touched the side of her arm, but withdrew as soon as she stiffened, knuckles white, contrasted in the hazel-brown of the horse mane caught in the pressure. If Adora noticed that she'd frightened the horse, she did nothing but gesture it to keep trotting. Bow muttered a quick apology, and Adora accepted it quietly, but it wasn't enough to get them away from the topic.

Not that Adora seemed to want to stop talking about it. She eventually managed to hold Bow's eyes, shoulders rounded, knees pressing into the horse so that it swung its head back and forced her to relax again. Delicately, Adora petted the horse's neck, voice soft but leveled, "I'm not sure that I could be your friend. I mean. Maybe it's a Horde thing. But... there's already two of you..."

"And three's better", Bow said plainly. "You're not in the Horde anymore, Adora. You can do what you want about that, now."

"Oh...? I mean. I heard that—that those kinds of friendships always end up bad. That's why it's sort of banned in the first place. Not totally banned. Just... You get flack for having too many friends... Is that true for the rest of the world?"

"Not at all. If everyone stays very good friends. And talks to each other a lot. The more, the merrier!"

"What does the Horde know about friendships, anyway?" Glimmer shook her head, ready to go into grave detail on why Adora should probably disregard whatever it was that she knew about friendship—and to prepare herself to learn some new things about it—but Glimmer stopped herself. Adora suddenly had a startlingly distant look in her eyes.

"I've only ever had one real friend", Adora told them. "And—I wasn't allowed to have other ones. I-I mean, they were friends. But not friends friends. She used to want to have me to herself all the time. It made sense. Our other friends were opposition to me as her friend. And that's no good for friendship. So, I understand if you guys don't want to be my friend and ruin a perfectly good—"

Bow had stopped the horse with an assertiveness that had Glimmer stopping in her tracks, too. He was silent for all but a moment before he went on with the same tone he had used when he was explaining his Dads to Adora. "This isn't the Horde anymore. You can have as many friends as you want now, Adora! Even if it's not with us."

Glimmer nearly butted in because they kind of needed to be friends with Adora if this was going to work between them all. Maybe not best friends but... something close to it. Maybe Adora was thinking the same way because she'd only nodded at Bow, suddenly unwilling to probe him any further than that.

"Adora, um. I'm sorry about your friend", Glimmer added into the silence.

Adora only gave an uncommitted hum, rubbing the side of her cheek as if recoiling from a strike that never hit. But when she moved her palm and the daylight reached her cheekbones, the rigid, perfect cuts were obvious. Three lines, tapered off down to her jaw. They were long scarred over but... still there. Adora didn't seem to notice it when Glimmer's mouth flattened into a neutral grimace, and she shrugged, lifting a brow, "Nothing to be sorry for. It's just... Uhm. What if we start hurting each other because of that?"

"Hurting each other?" Bow blinked. "Over what?"

"Well... Each other...?"

"We're not going to do that", Glimmer said carefully. "That's... That's a little extreme, no?"

Adora paused. "Do you think it's extreme?"

"Yes", Bow and Glimmer blurted almost together.

Another pause. Adora thumbed at her scarred cheekbone, absentmindedly. "Oh." 

[blonde-and-cat-suc]

I'm convinced there's no lesbian behind this acc because a lesbian wouldn't find men hot and demonize the best lesbian villain+lead we got in like 20 years... I just KNOW you're a bihet admin you're so fucking annoying

I think it idiotic of you not understand what a joke is. And then to... Tell me I should find Catra hot? Honestly, Scorpia’s hotter and cuter and she’d treat me right. If you have a degradation kink, just say that 😐

Anyway, I hope you get help and things get better for you soon! (And don’t tell a lesbian what to do or how to feel. Or anyone for that matter).

[blonde-and-cat-suc]

2/2 As a black girl, people see so many of us as beasts and Hollywood & animation played a big part in those racist caricatures and even now, in the 21st century someone actually made a woc into an animal and a vast majority of the animation community will never call Noelle's racist ass out. And it's disheartening to see continued racist stereotypes being made by white people and still getting away with it. And no, being LGBT doesn't excuse racism because my black Sapphic ass knows better too.

My black, sapphic ass knows better too!

It's very, very concerning. But like I said before, it's tone-deafness. I wouldn't go as far as to say Noelle is a full-on racist. Just silly. Very, very silly...

You know, as I was thinking about what else to add to this, I realized that maybe no one says anything about it because they just don't see the issue here.

My solution to this is simple, then.

Imagine Catra is of color. In the canon context. Half of her arc is about why she wants to destroy this white girl with a savior complex. Horde Prime uses her body to motivate this white girl to save her.

And that's the episode's name now, "Save the POC Girl", instead of "Save of the Cat". /s

Do you mind if I rant for a bit about certain real-world POC implications that makes POC!Catra especially heinous in my opinion?

I was born and raised in Bronx, NYC and I am (unfortunately or fortunately) still here. This is the home of such cultural, ethnic, and racial diversity, and yet there are still offenses based on all of this. The police brutality here against POC is a pattern rooted deeply in the idea that we are somehow violent, uneducated, and generally roguish.

So why in the ever-loving fuck would I want Catra—violent, (not uneducated, thank God, but some of the fandom would have you think otherwise), and generally roguish, Catra, representing the Latinx/black community?

It doesn't bother everyone, and I understand why. But, me? I hate it. I hate it here. Fuck, latina/black!Catra, even before we get to the fact that she is literally a fucking cat.

If she was written to be POC, she'd still be horrible rep.

[blonde-and-cat-suc]

My panties just. Get so wet whenever I see a stan in the anti tag.