#hate when creators of good aus are problematic

[strpedsweaters]

dustshift hopelessness creator dni

[musicalmoritz]

I wanna ask your opinion on people who ship Tsukasa with like, Kou or Mitsuba? Most of the AU’s or arts Aidairo do either have him close with one or the other. Or both. That one witch AU had him be friends with both of them. There were like two banners where he and Mitsuba were together I think, but the anime merch tended more to Tsukasa & Mitsuba than they did (I think, I can’t remember much art they posted) but the fandom seems to grab their pitchforks and threaten ANYONE who ships Tsukasa with them, or anyone of his age, claiming Tsukasa is a monster and a demon and that people who ship him are abuse apologists. Do you like, agree with that?

So I’m gonna be completely honest here, and I mean this in the most lighthearted way possible, I am not your mother. There are certain ships I deeply dislike, and I will shade those if I want to, but I make sure to censor them so they don’t end up in the tags of people who enjoy the ships. Even with ships that are deemed universally bad, I have no interest in arguing with anyone. My anxiety issues are too bad to carry out internet arguments anyway and also it’s so much easier and more fun to just block people

Equally, I cannot control what other fans do. I don’t agree with ship hate because it gets people nowhere, the person you’re telling to kys is only going to ship that thing harder out of spite. Some fans feel that they have a moral obligation to call out certain ships, and I don’t really have an opinion on that. If you strongly feel that you need to do something then that’s your business, not mine. I may not approve of the hate, or I may not approve of the ships themselves, but either way both are going to continue to exist

I’m not gonna ship Tsukasa with anyone because I headcanon him as aroace. I think some of the rarepairs are funny but I still won’t actively engage with them. Certain ships with him also make me uncomfortable, and yes that includes the ones with him and Mitsuba or Kou. I don’t want to see them so I’ll just block those tags and creators. I may not assume they’re horrible people, but I still don’t want to see the creations they make so they get blocked. I think everybody would have a much nicer internet experience if they realized they can block people for stupid reasons

All this to say, I’m not going to tell you what you can and cannot ship. There’s not really a point in being like “this ship is toxic, you can’t like it” when many fans ship things because they’re toxic or problematic. I’m also not a total hater, I can see edits of Mitsuba and Tsukasa and be like “hey that’s pretty good.” But the ship itself still makes me intensely uncomfortable so I’m gonna avoid it, unless it’s a past toxic relationship that ends in Mitsuba and Kou. I do think they’d be a funny friendship duo in AUs but even then I prefer to see Mitsuba with the Toilet Gang

Thank you for the ask, I hope none of this came off as rude. I just feel like I am not the best authority on what pairings people should and shouldn’t be allowed to ship lol, that’s more of a subjective thing. And I literally ship Louis and Lestat which is arguably way worse than Tsukasa with Kou or Mitsuba so yeah, I have no room to talk lol

[cyberspookviv]

my experience with the hazbin/helluva hatedom and how I continued to hate myself from there on TW: vent/s*icide/problematic stuff

I guess I was lowkey kinda young when I found out about Hazbin/helluva (around 2023 and I am a minor around 12-18) I know i shouldn’t be watching that shit and considering how bad the fandom is now with kids I feel guilty but it wasn’t that “big” back then I didn’t like it at first but then I tried it some more there was too many cursing it kinda made me scared for once and a while but I sorta liked it? Maybe because it was my first experience with violent content? Idk ajsjdj

yet little did I know that it would be considered one of the most hated fanabases I seen in my entire life

I guess it was a primary fandom I was really into as embarrassing as it I just fell in love with the characters and lore a little “too fast” this was such a fun fandom to make aus and theories because of how fun the lore was it wasn’t good at all but atleast I had “fun” right? Sometimes now I thinking about it I was too obsessed with it and hell I was so distracted by all the fun stuff about it that I forgot about the criticism in the first place i wasn’t immune I tried to take it by watching videos online but it was….. harsh…. And shit hell sometimes I was kinda immune bc I still needed to continue most of hb lol but…I guess it got to a point where it felt…kinda bad maybe “too” flawed so I got scared I had experience with my interests being despised before and I didn’t want the same to happen again so I tried to defend it and that’s where the creator….comes in…..

.

I thought her imagination was…fascinating she had such passion and thought behind her shows…that she became… my role model…. So I tried to defend her…but tbh nobody really seemed to like her I tried sticking to people who defended her like ayy lmao

but then I realized about the stuff she did…

It make me look like a damn fool…

and what’s even worse people who defended her were called “dick riders” I then started seeing hate around her “with the written by vivziepop jokes” and the controversies on Twitter

I got anxious…. But at the end she was a bad person right…just separate art from the artist

but nobody liked the art either

Hazbin finally came out and there’s was either love or hate and tbh I got really back into Hazbin bc of the release of it being on “prime” but I knew something didn’t feel right I went on Twitter a lot “too much” actually and i discovered these rumors about her and if I defended these rumors about such terrible things I would just look like such a stupid pathetic dick sucking retard so I forced myself to hate her either way so I forced myself to go online and read “hh/hb critical” content but then I began to hate myself even more they painted her as such a terrible person but i agreed anyway because it was the “truth” but then again she was my idol…my role model….i got so anxious and I never even gave a damn about the shows writing making it even worse when it came to criticism it was noticeable in the show but I choosed the ignore it and when I saw ppl complaining online I felt like a complete pathetic asshole for liking it and what’s worse they would say shit like “she’s manipulative and narcissistic and her fans are nothing but dick riders that are thoughtless and can’t take criticism and deserve to die in a fucking fire” it made me want to absolutely k*ll myself and made me feel like i wasn’t worth living

THIS SHIT FUCKING EXPLAINS IT ALL

I wanted to talk to somebody or a therapist desperately about this but I loved her and her shows so either way my behavior was fucking creepy making me hate myself even more because my story was never “valid”

so I just ran away

I’m doing better now….i still miss the shows tho even though most people call it “toxic” for supporting a “horrible” person but still have that charm when i see it or see posts about it it makes me remember how “happy” i use to watch it and the fact that i had to ran away a join better fandoms that were accepted by people and wouldn’t make me feel ashamed and wanting to end my life i just finally…finally decided to share this post now despite how controversial it may get i might honestly get death threats or hate comments tbh lol

but I just want some people to know out there about my experience because I just desperately need a heartwarming comment right now to make sure that I’m not alone please…I just wanted to have fun I’m doing better now…. I just want everything and I mean EVERYTHING to be ok…

I just want to be accepted…..

.

[weirdestcornelius]

I just think the au premise is bad on the face of it... Just bc its 'supposed' to be a swap au doesnt mean thats a good thing. Why do u feel the need to justify a decision like that when u criticize people for supporting Kittycorn? I'm sorry for implying u werent disabled, but even being disabled doesnt mean u cant be ableist or support ableist people. It just feels like u people are so desperate to hate on Kittycorn and support literally anyone else that ull support someone whos actually problematic....

I'm just trying to look out for u guys, ok? It can be dangerous to give the wrong people a platform. I don't want this to be one of those situations. Especially since u guys seem to want to isolate urself from others and stuff. Just think about it more, ok? If someone made an au of u where u werent disabled would u be ok with that? I really don't think so.

Please don't act like you're trying to "look out for me" when just moments ago you were calling me ableist and saying that I'm not disabled enough.

You do not know me. Do not try to psychologize me. I don't care if anything you did was in good faith, because NONE of that was okay to say. I am aware that I can still be ableist, but instead of talking about the actual ableism in the main comic you came to me to complain that some random creator was being ableist by erasing disabilities (which they didn't, by the by. The only ones that were removed were the ones that would NOT allow the patients to be staff at all. TUC would not help with being a nurse, whatsoever.) Jay still has dwarfism, Barry still has a weak immune system, Polly still uses its cane, Hemera still bleeds. They are being treated for the conditions that they can be, which is why Hemera's bleeding isn't as much of an issue; the reason it is in the main comic is because she is not getting treatment for it.

A character's disability not affecting every single part of their life does not make them less disabled. Despite what Kc shows in kits comic.

Also, you have to remember that these are fictional characters, okay? That's like saying that people can't make headcanons for characters that go against canon because it would be weird to do so to real life people. And it would be! But these are characters. These are not real people. And I don't "support literally anything else", I'm actually critical about my other interests as well. I like taking things apart and analyzing them, that doesn't go just for sc.

[teeth-cable]

Helluva boss fandom is turn into a cult that is very true. Fandom can be turn into a cult so whenever someone bring up some of the problematic thing that has done by certain individual the fans get defensive instead of holding accountable they infantilized the individual

When somebody bring up about how vivziepop is antisemitic, racist, the fans will always bring she doesn't know. Really giving a bad look it show how they don't care about valid concern and criticism surrounding helluva boss & it's creator

When a fandom grows in popularity and size, there is alway a belief it's now a cult. I don't believe Helluva Boss has hit peak cult status but it's bordering. Out of all the fandoms I've been in, Helluva Boss takes the cake for toxicity because instead of dumb kids being toxic to each other, it's grown ass adults who think it is totally fine to harass each other and children because they had criticism about the show or are against Stotliz.

This is a true story, a popular artist in the fandom @NOT_THE_BEEEES QT a tweet expressing their disappointment at the show for making Stolas, the damsel in the distress for shipping purposes (Stolas being tied up by Striker, this was before the EP aired) and then they RT their tweet with their own version of an evil Stolas and the fandom flipped. Adult fans were angry, spamming harassment towards them, insulting them, and being happy that a 17 year old was getting dogpiled because they criticized the show. Also during this, fans started to believe they straight-washed Stolas because their AU design for evil Stolas wasn't stereotypically gay. Bee had been critiquing the show and Stotliz for a while before then so the majority of the fandom hated them and were waiting for them to slip up, but they never thought to block them.

Same grown ass adults are also very blinded to Vivzie's past and the current valid criticisms around her but you know, damn well if someone else who wasn't Viv had the same controversial past as her and they slipped up, the fans would criticize them.

But to be fair the critical side of the fandom isn't free from this either. Some "critics'" advice is to ignore the show's good traits and the impact it has on indie animation to just stomp and complain how terrible Viv and the show is. People who clearly hate the show get easily work up and can't even write a cohesive critique without exploding from rage and critics forget Viv isn't the only one working on Helluva. Yes, Viv has more power as the directer of the show but they are still other people responsible for the bad writing, Adam and Brandon. Also we should focus more on how Viv's friends are toxic too. We tend to forget Viv's close friends, Sam, Sam Haft, Morgana Ignis etc are all as toxic and insufferable as she is.

[m-to-z-andbackto-m]

UnderLust Ramble Time (Main points/summary at bottom of post)

TW for my sex repulsed fellows, this is not for you along with related topics like minors are a nono and Ess/Ayy

Okay so I looked back into it (because I drew Lust in my last post lol) and I still see the same issues and I'm gonna be honest. I'm pretty neutral about UL, they're just some silly guys, guys-

Well. No. Not just that but. That's why I'm rambling!

I am not siding with the original UL, its creator, or people who say it's problematic for the wrong reasons. I kinda have my own view of it, lemme explain:

Okay so people are saying it's problematic JUST because people are focusing on the sexual characteristic and that's all anyone sees it as.

But DustTale isn't problematic when people only see Murder as a crazed murderer without a heart. Which is completely untrue, did you know that? Broski's oddly chill y'know- Depends. De- Yeah it depends but he's not exactly out for bloodlust-

Okay I got side tracked

Anyways the point is unaliving people is BAD. Being overly sexual is...? Ehhh... Depends how you go about it (more on this later) BUT.

The reason I first heard/saw that UL was problematic was because of sexualized minors (Chara's design and not many people know this but Temmie is also a child) And... Eugh... Proshipping...

THOSE are the reasons it should be farted on 😭

Okay back to people only making it to be about sexy stuff.

I mean. When you don't count Mettaton's storyline. That's essentially what makes UL... Well? UL. This is the wrong reason to hate on it, it's literally in the name, it's supposed to be lusty and if people overdo it, just take it as thier interpretation/variation.

Same way people interpret Dust as a mindless power hungry murderer, it's not right, or canon at all, doesn't mean it's wrong, just how someone sees it.

Now I suppose it's chill with me and a lot of other people to explore Ess/Ayy and what it does to someone's mental health and their relationships with others. Plus other topics related to a sexual environment, but there's a line where it's okay and where it's messed up (Some Random Examples, But There's More: Say a victim "falls in love" with their perpetrator, ew, no, just no- Say, a victim is learning to cope and recover, yes, just yes.)

So yeah! It's nice we have an AU/Concept that gives us the grounds to do that!

It's irritating sure but there's good content, look for that instead. I don't think we should shun the idea of anything as long as its basis isn't something disgusting?

"But MZM, lustful behavior IS disgusting 🥺"

...

🎶 "It might seem crazy what I'm 'bout to say..." 🎶

Guys lust is in our nature as primarily sexual beings. (I know fellow Aces, I know, hold on, I love you too but this post isn't the time 😭)

I don't think anything natural is completely "disgusting" as long as you don't go about it the wrong way, then it becomes disgusting (Say, pedophilia is p much a disorder, some people get help, some people get arrested, that's the difference)

UnderLust could very well be like some sex club in Hell or basic UnderTale with slightly sexual undertones, there's middle ground guys, over sexualizing it can be bad, move on and focus on the good people do for this universe

Now, I'm an Ink kinnie so I love creation, I adore it. I hate to shut down a concept just because it's taboo or the creator/s didn't turn out so good. Make something wonderful instead of shutting it down for the problems it has in OTHER people's hands. It's our jobs as a creator to give life to these sillies as long as we're invested, and if someone does a bad job, that doesn't mean you or someone else can't have something good made in place of it.

Love the concept, don't mind the creator.

Love the children, not their parents.

Main points for those who didn't wanna read too much because let's be honest, I talk A LOT:

UL is not problematic because of being overly sexual, that's literally its nature

UL doesn't have to be overly sexual, just because it's common, doesn't mean it's hopeless, there's good content and you can contribute to it

UL is problematic because of sexualization of minors and proshipping if I recall correctly

UL gives us grounds to explore Ess/Ayy, sexuality, lack of it, hypersexuality, etc... it's how you go about it that matters

(I think I lost a bullet point but I can't remember what it said)

Don't turn it down for what it is or what it commonly is interpreted as, give it life for what it could be

For ANY Content Out There: Adore the creation/concept, you don't have to like the creator, or the original.

Thanks For Reading 🫶

[thelovelydoggycatmadi]

a pet peeve of mine is when someone rewrites or remakes a piece of media, whether that be good or bad. And tries to make it into something it’s not because they don’t understand or even like the source material. So they just make what is more appealing to them without even considering what the original creators wanted.

Before anyone calls hypocrisy on my end I’m trying to make my Aphmau content its own thing for me and my own audience. I’ve stated this before multiple times.

I don’t currently claim I’m trying to be constructive with my changes. I’m not claiming to make PDH or Mystreet as a whole better. Am I taking some major inspiration and basing my own story off of it? Absolutely, but I’m not trying to “fix” anything as a whole.

What I’m SPECIFICALLY talking about is those post that take a franchise as claim to be constructive but end up just making something entirely different while claiming it’s the same franchise just “fixed” or “better”. Not fan-fiction, au’s, or rewrites that are just for fun or are just to explore the character and ideas further. I’m specifically talking about rewrites and redesigns that people claim are supposed to be constructive and for criticism.

Examples of what I’m saying include:

Deliberately changing a certain part of the story or character design because you hate it specifically. (It’s not poorly written, problematic, or implemented.)

Not articulating why you changed something if your reason for changing something consists of the following; “it’s just looks bad (and or some other vaguely insulting word)” if you can’t articulate a reason either leave it alone or don’t bother bringing it up. “it’s just for *insert problematic reason but refuse to explain why it’s problematic*” the internet has enabled you to just say things about a person without explaining but I won’t. “I just don’t like it” so you’re making it the creators problem???? Not every little thing is going to be tailor made to you. “It’s just (or) I just” statements in general not all just most, because they normally don’t follow any sort of well thought out reasoning.

simplifying or over designing a character without the consideration of the media they’re from or what the creators intention with it was. (As an animator please stop doing this one specifically it hurts.)

So in conclusion actually be constructive with your criticism don’t just change stuff meaninglessly because of your bias! It’s dumb and unhelpful to creators that actually want to learn. Thank you.

[cyanityinsanity101]

I'm gonna be going on a rant about a specific welcome home au I keep seeing, so I'm putting it under the read more to not make the post take up the whole tag.

So I saw that one welcome home hypnosis au again and, it's just gotten worse. Like, I just don't get good vibes from it. I know the creator has said it's not meant to glorify sa but, that looks like what it's doing. [ It's put in the Barnaby x wally tags including the normal character tags for God's sake. ] I'm not gonna be vague about the au I'm talking about anymore, it's the hypnotic addiction au. I'm sorry to anyone who genuinely likes it but, I just really think the au is kind of problematic.

I do believe there's ways to portray sa in fiction a respectful way but idk the au just feels really wrong to even look at, and the fact it's tied to welcome home just makes it unavoidable. This feels like the pizza tower hypnosis au situation all over again but I haven't seen anyone talk about this situation so far. Idk if I'm just being sensitive or something but I just really don't want to see what's basically a glorified r*pe au when I'm just trying to look through the tags of my favorite character.

And it doesn't even seem like they treat the au seriously. They say that it's meant to be serious but then make jokes and memes about said au. I just feel like if it's so serious, why would you make jokes about it? Like, jokes about the abuser getting hurt ok yeah those are good and I can at least see why they exist, but they've made jokes about the entire situation in the au [ ex. The red flags meme, and doing a matching profile picture meme ] It just feels really wrong.

Just to clarify this though, I don't mean to hate on the creator themselves. I am willing to believe they didn't make the au with any alternative motives other than just exploring dark themes, but I'm just stating my opinion on the au since I've seen it so much.

[egg-emperor]

So, some of the people that judged you badly actually posted some form of similar Eggman content. Sounds like they only want to have the right about it I don't know how to explain this. Like it"s ok for them because they may see theirself as righteous or morally good I don't know so if it's from them it's ok no worries it's all love and peace but if it's from you or someone else it's not because you and others wrote something they don't like and that makes you the 'bad' guys and since they are the good ones they have to stop you regardless of the methods used because hey, they are the good ones they can't be wrong even if they truly did fcked up stuff to you right? Seriously, what the hell?

That sh"t is scary and you're actually right for calling out their behaviour, especially for all the things they did to you and spreading false things so others sided with them, making things worse than what they already were.

Who started that I don't know but no wonder they are full bullies and more.

Yeah it's just hypocrisy. Because while failing to tag something correctly is an issue like I have but always make sure to fix, some act like all my darker creations are wrong for me to make at all, despite having themes just as dark in their works.

I'll respect privacy but a few years ago there was an AU focused Sonic imprisoned in Forces and the tortuous abuse from Eggman. I was interested as someone who explores the concept too. But people tried to call this out and accuse the creators of all kinds of horrible things, just like what happened to me.

One main contributor is with the group that take issue with me and blocked me because of my take on Eggdad and possibly my staregg/eggline concept too. The other person I mentioned who is also involved with them, also blocked me after I interacted with their post where Metal bloodied up Sonic, which is ironic.

And another person in the circle drew "problematic content" years ago that I won't detail but some tried to bring it back and make accusations too. Like me, they even said they didn't like when people caused drama behind their back but proceeded to do the same as they contributed to the spread of the worst accusations I've gotten.

In both times people in that circle were called out, I defended their right to create/how it doesn't represent them as a person. They're not obligated to defend me but all I wanna know is if they can depict an actual 15 year old being abused or attacked with gore, why am I a bad guy for writing ageless AI Sage being manipulated by Eggman and a darker staregg/eggline concept?

The more I reflect on how hypocritical it is, the better I feel. Because I feel like some may only be taking issue with what I create as a reason to hate on me for other things about me that they don't like, or they're just against me because others say they should be and they want to avoid drama like before happening to them again.

A lot of them also seem to express moral righteousness too, so it's confusing and a bit concerning that they're okay with some things but not with others, and punish the others even if what they're okay with can be on the same level as or even worse. I just wish they hadn't fallen into this purity and call out culture and reflect on how we've actually been in the same boat.

And it's very sad for me not just for the horrible things I've been accused of but also because of how I looked up to these creators. Now I can't look at certain art on my blog I reblogged or the IDW cover without sadness and anxiety remembering what they did that hurt me.

But at least now I know to just stay in my little corner doing my own thing because these fandom cliques aren't worth the time when stuff like this happens lol

[byierficrecs]

why did you leave sttwt?

welp, to start with, sttwt really started slowing down after august and it practically died after st day. sometimes the flame is reignited when favourable interviews drop or big events occur (like noah's coming out), but for the most part a lot of the people moved on to different interests and fandoms (and i,,, didn't x.x)

that said, i mostly left because it was just super toxic. everyone was always fighting and partaking in dumb ship wars,,, there was constant witch hunting and negative rumours would spread like wildfire, with no one ever bothering to fact-check before cancelling someone,,, there was also a somewhat competitive atmosphere, with people being obsessed over numbers and borderline worshipping big accounts (with their mean behaviour being praised and encouraged),,,

plus, content creators (writers in particular, but fan artists too) were infinitely underappreciated and subjected to the highest, most nonsensical standards of morality that resulted in a lot of unnecessary stress for creators who were just having fun making stuff for the rest of the fandom.

a large part of sttwt seem to have fun condemning people for writing teenagers (often aged-up, sometimes even into adulthood) acting like teenagers when they're in a relationship. the smallest mention of certain words, or detailed descriptions of certain activities (like making out) will often lead to harassment and to innocent people being grouped with far more "problematic" individuals (who, mind you, are mostly just vibing on their side of the internet too). mentions of mature topics like mental health issues also bore similar reactions.

(would you believe it if i told you that my story about hop being a bit of a paternal figure to mike has led to four people calling me a pr0shipper? all because i've tagged it (appropriately) as "mike & hopper" x.x)

of course, the aforementioned competitive nature doesn't help. rating fics and fic writers has never done anyone any good; it just raises expectations (of content quality and morality) for those who garner attention, and it discourages those who will probably never be mentioned in these polls because our stuff is not popular for whatever reason.

(also, they hate au's and that's just sad)

so yeah, i left because it wasn't fun being in that negative environment. it was always there, but i spent months curating my twt experience and at some point all the bad stuff ended up reaching me regardless so i just,,, left. you can still reach me to talk there and i will continue to post recs there so the stories have as big of a reach as possible, but i don't spend much time on twitter anymore because it's way too stressful for being a fandom space.

[xxtsumu0016xx]

Why dose some of my favorite creators have to be problematic?

So just so you’re aware I’m no longer going to draw Bête Noire. It’s just the situation with Camilla and the things she did I just don’t want to be apart of it. And on top of everything I have excepted that Bête is a self insert and a terribly written character,it like Camilla was so lazy to write a good story for her :/

I know this all happened like a year or something ago but I felt it had to be mentioned <3

She will be joining loverofpigs on my list of “Undertale AU creators that are problematic”

(I hate when this happens)

Anyways I hope you have a great day and stay determined ❤️

(Also I’d like to point out that I still like glitchtale but I hate bête and the creator)

[changeling-droneco]

This is a bit of a controversial take, but I think a big problem is writers seem to be given a lot less but also expected to do a lot more. A bit of a double standards. Like fanfiction needs to be held to some higher standards to be worth existing. Like obviously there’s bullying and double standards and discourse for every version of fancreating but it feels like fanfic gets a lot shit for just, existing. It’s the butt of the joke, it’s complained about, people get really picky and really fighty over it.

People constantly complain about fanfics not being finished, or talking about how they refuse to read fanfic unless it’s completed. People complain if it’s over tagged, people complain if it’s under tagged, fanfic is constantly stolen for ai startups or apps trying to otherwise monetize it. Hell, If any kind of money crosses any hands even if it’s buying directly from the author people get up in arms about it being the death of fandom and yelling at people for being a part of it, even when every single fandom Etsy seller gets a pass for like, selling undertale stickers. I promise you me writing a thousand words of mcyter fanfic for like 15 bucks and my copy of a somewhat dark mlp fanfic I bought from the creator did not and could not do that. People constantly talk about “why don’t you just write original fiction if you’re going to make such a detailed fantasy au?” People get super picky about fanfic and get so weird about unfinished fanfic or refuse to engage with it at all. I see a lot more hate or ire or mean spirited jokes pointed at authors more then I see appreciation or care. I know every form of fan creation gets this, but it just feels like crap at how much people seem to take potshots at writers or treat them as inherently more deserving of scrutiny or as inherently more dangerous to fandom because anne rice might rise from her grave and idk delete wattpad. How fic sites get more negative attention about being evil and problematic then any more art based sites.

It’s hard to put into words ironically, but it feels like at times a good portion of fandom just, kinda hates fanfic writers? I know it’s like a small slice, but damn if they don’t get vocal at times. Though even beyond that it feels like fanfic is often seen as like, lower class of art, like it’s just inherently less serious and worthwhile then other forms of art? Fanfic being good or poignant is seen more often then not as a surprise, and then even sometimes derided for being wasted on “mere fanfiction” or mocking some like classical book or story as “just fanfiction” as a way to devalue it, as if fanfiction is unworthy of being respected as an art form and therefor anything resembling it (insert discussion about how fanfic is often seen as a more feminine thing and associated with writers often being female and how that plays into it being seen as more frivolous here)

Plus people really have no sense of boundaries with it at times. I can’t count the amount of times some YouTuber has just casually read their fanfiction for a video and derided it as weird and cringy and accidentally send a wave of people to bully the writer for being cringy. (The only time I’ve ever really seen this done well is Danny Motta because dammit if you’re gonna do it at least cosplay the anime boy you’re being shipped with, and even then he probably should have still been more solid or clear about getting permission)

I don’t have a solution either but just, stop treating authors like they are somehow more cringy or sad or lesser or dangerous then artists? Give us at least a bit of respect and acknowledgement of us being equals in creativity and innovation to other creators. Don’t be a dick about a fic set in first person or that’s formatted unusually. Especially stop bullying people over fanfic you think is bad or weird, we’ve had enough literal kids who wrote creepypasta-esque fanfic of like, dream, get bullied off the internet or worse. Someone writing grimdark fanfiction is not lesser then someone drawing a fluff comic, and vice versa.

feedback and fic in fandom (3 f's of our own)

This conversation about feedback on fic says everything I’ve been wanting to say better than I could say it. But I’ll go ahead and try anyway.

Over the last five years or so there have been some great discussions around the rise of commodification of fanworks and decline of fandom community. This commodification looks a bit like enshittification of the internet: a cool site exists; its popularity makes someone realize they can get money from it; it has more and more ads; the site adds features to drive engagement, including The Algorithm; the things that made the site cool start to fall away. The site exists now as a vehicle purely to get clicks, and the people on it are on it solely to get clicks—to make money, to be successful, for some kind of social cachet.

AO3 doesn’t have advertisements. It’s not making money. But what is happening to fandom is proof of concept that enshittification changes the way we as humans engage. A cool website in 2004 was often a community space where you could meet people, have conversations, find cool things, and make cool things. A cool website in 2024 is either a content farm that will continually feed you enough content to hold your attention, or a social media site where your participation will come with stats to show you whether you are holding the attention of others.

AO3 wasn’t built to be a community space. It doesn’t have great functions for meeting people and having conversations. The idea was that, because fandom community spaces already existed, AO3 would serve the part of that community where you can find the cool things and store the cool things you made. It was meant to be a library in a city, not the whole city itself.

But it was also never meant to be a website in 2024, a content farm constantly generating content solely for your clicks and eyeballs and ad revenue, or a social media site where the content creators themselves vie for your clicks and eyeballs.

The most common talking point when people discuss the enshittification of fandom is the folks out there who are treating AO3 as that first kind of enshittified website: the content farm. This discussion is about how people treat fanfic as a product for consumption.

The post that kicked off the discussion on @sitp-recs’s blog was about someone who wasn’t getting very many kudos or comments on their fic, and was feeling pretty demoralized about it, then joined a discord server and found an entire channel dedicated to people loving their fic. But those on that server had never come to share that love with the author, which the author found really discouraging.

There are more and more stories like this. Someone on tiktok pulls a quote from a fic on AO3 and makes a 10-second video with them staring at a wall, the quote pasted at the bottom, music playing over it. It has 100,000 hearts, and 100 comments with people gushing over the fic, which has 80 kudos on AO3. Overall, people notice more and more hits on their fics, but fewer and fewer comments or even kudos. Fewer and fewer people seem to feel the need to interact with the author, instead treating the fic like a product to be used and discarded—which the enshittified internet (a stunning feature of late-stage capitalism!) encourages. The fandom community is dying, these stories conclude.

I agree. 100%. Both of the stories above have happened to me—viral tiktoks about my fic, secret discord channels to follow and discuss my fic—and let me tell you, it fucking sucks.

But from these observations about fandom enshittification, the discussion continues in a very odd direction. The solution to the death of fandom community is our favorite enshittification buzzword: engagement. We should engage the authors. They’re producing these products for free. We consume them at no cost. We must demonstrate our gratitude by paying them back.

It’s as though the capitalist consumption that the enshittified web encourages is so ingrained within us that we must think in terms of payment, in terms of exchange, transaction. Or as though, by forgoing payment, authors are some kind of martyrs defying capitalism, and the only way to honor their great sacrifice is comments and kudos.

Indeed, the discourse around this sometimes does veer away from capitalist rhetoric into something that smells almost religious in desperation. Authors are gods who bestow us mere mortals with the fruits of their labor benevolently, through love; the least we can do is worship them. Meanwhile the authors adopt the groveling sentiment of starving artists: I produce great art; I only humbly ask that you feed me in return.

These kinds of entreaties make my skin crawl for a number of reasons. I’m not a god. I’m not writing because I love you. I don’t expect your worship or even your praise.

I think the thing that disturbs me the most about it is that it suggests that authors (or, if the OP is feeling generous fan work creators) are the most important people in fandom. I’ve even seen posts stating that without creators, fandom wouldn’t exist—as though readers aren’t just as important. As though conversations where people discuss characterizations and plot points and randomly spin out interpretations and ideas and thoughts related to canon are meaningless. I’ve even seen people scramble to include folks having these discussions as “creators,” as though realizing that these people are necessary and integral to fandom communities but unable to drop the idea that the producers are the ones who are important. As though that person who just lurks can never count.

Is this what community is? When you join the queer community, are you expected to produce a product of your queerness? If not, must you actively participate and give back to the queer community in order to be considered a part of it? Or is it enough that you are queer, that you exist as a queer person and want to be around others who are queer, you want to be a part of something? What is community, anyway?

The problem with people raising the authors above everyone else in the community and demanding that tribute be paid is that they are decrying the “content farm” style of 2024 website out of one side of their mouth, but out of the other side are instead demanding that AO3 become a 2024-style social media website. Authors are influencers. “Engagement” and clicks are the things that really matter. They are in fact suggesting that the way to solve the commodification of fanfic is by “paying authors back” with stats.

Before anyone comes at me with the idea that comments aren’t just “stats,” I will clarify what I mean. There are literally hundreds of posts on tumblr alone claiming that any comment “helps” the author. Someone replies that they are shy to comment. Someone else replies that incoherent keyboard smashes, a single emoji, or the comment “kudos” are all that is required to satisfy the author, all that is required as tribute—all that is required as payment to keep this economy healthy.

I’m not condemning the comments that are keyboard smashes or emojis or a single kind word. I receive them. They make me happy. If anyone wants to leave such a comment on my fics, I’m really grateful for it. But this is not community-building. This is a transaction. In @yiiiiiiiikes25’s excellent response in the post linked at the beginning, they point out that “you have a cool hat” is something that is “perfectly nice” to hear from someone—and it is! We all want to be told we have a cool hat! But as they go on to say, what builds community is interactions that are deep and specific, interactions that are rich in quality, not in quantity. A kudos or a comment that says only ❤️are lovely things to receive, but they don’t build community.

My reaction, when I see people begging for kudos and comments as the only means by which to keep fandom community alive, is very close to @eleadore's. I want to say, “No. Readers do not need to comment or kudos. Believe not these hucksters who claim to know the appropriate method of fandom participation. Participate as you feel able, or not at all; nothing is required of you.”

I’ve been told before (several times) that I’m not qualified to participate in such discussions because I am an established author who has some fics with very high stats. It doesn’t matter that I have also been a new writer with almost no one reading my fics. It doesn’t matter that I still write in new fandoms where no one in that fandom knows me. It doesn’t matter that I, like any human being, still care about receiving recognition and attention and praise.

And maybe that’s correct. I personally don’t think that billionaires have a place in deciding the direction of the economy, and--if we're really going to consider fandom an economy--in fandom terms, if I’m not a billionaire, or even a millionaire, I’m definitely in the infamous “one percent.” So, just as no one wants to hear Elon Musk say “money isn’t everything,” maybe it’s not my place to say “kudos isn’t required, actually.”

That said, I’m not the only one who has a problem with the stats-based discourse around fandom community. However, the main counter-response to this discussion I see goes something like this: you shouldn’t be writing fic for validation. If you’re writing for attention, you’re doing it for the wrong reason. Authors should write fic because they love it without any expectation of return.

This is, in my opinion, missing the point of what is meant by fandom community.

I wrote fanfic before I knew that fanfic, as a concept, existed. I read books; I wanted them to be different; I wrote little stories for myself with new endings, with self-inserts, with cross-overs, with alternate universes. I did it for myself in the 90s. It never occurred to me that anyone else would do this, much less that people would share.

As @faiell points out—creating and sharing are two different things. I created fics for myself, but I decided to share them in the early 2000s because other people might like them, too. And of course, I wanted to hear whether other people liked them. How could I not? I might decorate my home just for me and not for anyone else’s preferences, but when people come over and say my house is nice, how can I not enjoy that? And if a lot of people think my house is nice, which encourages me to post pictures of it online, isn’t it understandable I might do so with the hope that more people will say my house is nice? And, honestly, if no one is appreciating my pictures, I probably won’t continue to go through the trouble of taking them and posting them. I’ll just enjoy my house that I decorated without sharing, the end.

When I found out there were whole fannish communities where people discussed canon and tossed ideas around about it, made theories and prompts and insights into the characters, fics they had written and recs for other fics and analyses of fics and art based on fics and fics based on art—I wanted to be a part of that, too. Now, sometimes, I write fic not out of an internal need to do so but out of a desire to participate in that community.

The idea that we write fic only for the love of it, then post it only because we possess it, is a process entirely centered on the self. It’s fandom in a vacuum. The idea that we share this thing, that we feel pleasure if someone likes it but feel nothing at all if no one says anything about it, that it’s completely okay to be ignored and unseen—that’s not what a community is either. That’s some weird sort of self-aggrandizement through self-effacement—because yes, there is often a weird kind of virtue-signaling in this kind of discourse.

I say this as someone who has virtue-signaled in that way: “some people write for stats, but I write for myself.” It’s bullshit. Sure, I write for myself, but why post it on the internet? Honestly, said virtue has a whiff of the capitalist machine, which would like you to produce for the sake of production, work for the sake of work. The noblest among us expect no recompense for that which they give!

The reason that I’m bringing this back around to capitalism is that capitalism actively works to dismantle community. The reason that folks are out here pleading for “engagement” in order to “pay back” authors for the products they give us “for free” is because people no longer even have the language to discuss how to participate in meaningful community. And frankly, how to build back fandom community, in the face of enshittification, is getting harder and harder to see.

But I do think that if we value fanfic and the fanfic community, it’s really, really not constructive to judge whether someone’s reasons for writing fanfic are valid. It’s also weird to me that it would be considered wrong that someone’s reason for sharing fanfic is because they would like to receive some recognition for it, when in fact that seems to be the most natural reason in the world for sharing something so private and vulnerable with the world.

Let’s go back to that idea of how hurtful it is to find out your fanfic is trending on tiktok without anyone from tiktok saying anything to you about your fic, or how it can be painful to find out there’s a secret discord channel dedicated to your fic. The people who respond to that with, “Ah, but you shouldn’t be writing to get attention!” are missing the point. The fic did get attention. It got lots. Attention obviously wasn't why the writer was writing--they were writing to participate, and they didn't get to. At all.

However, if your conclusion is that the author was upset because these particular stats were not accruing under this author’s profile, thereby preventing them from achieving the vaunted status of BNF and influencer—I don’t know, maybe you’re right. But I don’t think that’s why I, personally, have been hurt by these things, and I doubt it’s what hurt the people in these posts either. They’re hurt because they want to participate, and they have been systematically excluded by the very people they thought were part of the community they thought they could participate in.

Sure, if those folks from tiktok and the discord server all came and showered the author with kudos and comments that said “kudos,” the author might have felt satisfied enough with the quantity of this recognition that they would continue writing. But in the end, this still does nothing to address the problem of fandom community, in which the deep, meaningful recognition, interactions, and relationships in fandom are getting harder and harder to have and to build, as a result of how people now expect to engage in online spaces.

So, how to address the problem of fandom community? You probably read this long, long post hoping that I had an answer, and for that I must apologize. I don’t have solutions. My intent was to be descriptive, rather than prescriptive. I wished to outline the problems that I’m seeing in what was hopefully a slightly new or at least thought-provoking way, rather than offer solutions.

But, now that I’m talking about being prescriptive, maybe I can offer one suggestion, which is—maybe the solution to this isn’t about prescribing behavior. I do understand the irony in writing a prescription saying we shouldn’t prescribe people, but I’m going to write it anyway:

Maybe we shouldn’t be telling anyone the appropriate reasons for writing fanfic or for sharing it. Maybe we shouldn’t be telling readers they need to kudos or need to comment. If we’re going to go pointing fingers, we should be pointing at the institutions of capitalism that have made the internet what it is today—but I don’t think that’s going to solve the problem either.

But I do think that describing this problem, understanding what it actually is, not blaming readers for it and not blaming authors for it—I do think that helps. The discussion I linked at the beginning of this post is what I think of as the fandom I miss, the fandom that's now harder and harder to access, the fandom that is dying. That fandom was a social space where people had opinions and disagreed and went back and forth and gazed at their navels and then talked about Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

In the words of @yiiiiiiiikes25, it was a fuckin’ discussion about hats. And we’re hungry for it.

[zeravmeta]

actually yknow what i do have some thoughts abt this i wanna get out not only abt danganronpa but problematic media as a whole and to start i do think the reason dr is so rife with discourse about being Problematic or not just has to do with the history of how the series came overseas and it does lead to a larger discussion on how to engage with media critically i think. like for dr you had to be the Dankest of Weaboos to get into it when it launched, with a whole ton of overseas non-tld stuff slowly coming in for about 2-3 years before it actually got popular here, and the series' specific style of playing with tropes, stereotypes, the artstyle, all of it just kind of conglomerated into a very recognizable and love it/hate it type series where the fanbase was mainly a whole bunch of impressionable progressive teens, and really just being on this age group with a shifting internet culture is part of whats made dr endure for so long as a memorable series. you had people growing up and out of it you had people being very into it people being very against it and a lot of the discourse surrounding it was infamous bc dr DOES have problematic aspects to it but (and this part is very important) those unfortunate aspects arent what the series is about, and the venom came from trying to reconcile that. i feel like a lot of modern internet culture has this issue with reconciling the problems of their media because so much modern progressivism is performative and the fast nature of this culture means people have to sanitize themselves as much as possible lest they face the horrible loss of internet clout. people either take misplaced embarrasing pride in ~denouncing problematic media~ or are entirely uncritical of media with problematic elements as a way to defend it and generally both of these are unhealthy ways to engage in media, not even mentioning stuff like shipping culture and peoples staunch refusal to engage in media unless they can ship things in it, or how people just run with a shows base concept and make millions of au concepts out of it without really appreciating what the media is about. and look, people are free to enjoy/engage with media in any way they want, if someone wants to make 15 million coffee shop au fluff fics about whatever new movie came out they can do that, but the problem with those mindsets come from when inevitably they step out of that bubble and have to engage with other media critically, it leaves them unprepared, because the fact of the matter is that no media is truly unproblematic. there will always be some failing people can find, whether at fault of the creator or audience, theres no perfect pure piece of media out there, and where this really comes into play is when making the distinction between problematic media, and media with problematic elements. problematic media is stuff like hp or aot, where the inherent racism/sexism/transphobia/etc is a CORE, DEFINING PART of that series’ themes, vs media with problematic elements (like dr), where they’re unfortunate side effects. does it suck that theres racism/sexism/transphobia in dr? absolutely. should it be excused/overlook? no. is the racism/sexism/transphobia what the series is about? absolutely not. another good example i could point too is fate bc anyone who knows even a little about fate knows that, unfortunately, theres these problematic aspects in every corner of the series, but the reason theres such hardcore fans is because those problematic aspects arent what the series as a whole is about. this doesnt annul any discussions on these problematic aspects, and moreover its actually IMPORTANT to have these conversations because theyre a part of critically analyzing media, but overall its a matter of taking the good with the bad. no one is holding anyone at gunpoint to like anything or excuse anything, and you can just Not vibe with a piece of media, but people arent evil for liking media with problematic elements. and really instead of picking fights its important to be able to engage critically with any type of media and make peace with any problematic elements whatever media you may enjoy might have in them by actively being aware of these problems and being open to discussions on these issues rather than taking these criticisms personally and denouncing any criticism altogether. theres absolutely nuance to this btw depending on the vast variety of different media franchises that exist but overall being uncritical of media as a way to either denounce it or defend it is ultimately a losers game for both and only hurts any type of meaningful discussion to be had, especially with the assumption most of the time that liking media with problematic elements = excusing these aspects. please just be critical with media and be kind with people

[thequasarwinds]

(I would also like to preface this with this: I only watch the anime ((Eng Dubbed- on a piracy sight no less so further disconnection from the mangaka)). When I post about the series ((primarily regarding my AUs)) I am talking about specifically the anime, including the changes from the manga to adaptation.)

I spent months worrying about coming across as a bad person for having MIA being one of my favorite things- and I’m just very tired. So I am so happy to see someone outside of the fandom defending us. I love MIA for its many good traits, not for the problematic under tones. And I, in no way condone the actions of the creator.

MIA to me, will forever be about traumatized kids finding love and joy within each other despite the cruel world around them. Finding light in the darkest of places. About perseverance and determination. Lost kids who found each other but not a way home; though in the end maybe that’s all they need.

And I hate to see it get boiled down to its worst qualities; to its awful creator

(PS. This post was done on a whim without much forethought- simply it was rash. So I apologize for the possible poor wording or passive aggression)

I really really need y‘all to use some critical thinking right now.

Like it or not, but „Made in Abyss“ is extremely successful and critically acclaimed. It’s not some Dark Web niche child torture porn. Most anime fans have checked it out at some point or another.

The story isn’t centered around child molestation. Children are the main characters and it’s a dark twisted story so dark twisted things are happening to them. Is it my cup of tea? No. I dropped it after a few episodes, though I can’t remember why.

However, a plot like this isn’t unique to this story either. Though dark in a different way, „Promised Neverland“ also had child orphans as lead characters and terrible shit was happening to them as well. I really loved that one. Does that mean I enjoy watching children suffer? Fuck no. I enjoy the plot and watching these kids overcome the darkness and the same seems to be true for most MiA fans. Now let me make it clear: I’m in no way saying PN is as problematic (it seems like the MiA author actually caters to the messed up subsection of the fanbase on bonus pages that don’t get published and translated), but simply pointing out that there’s been other popular horror series with child protagonists.

Is the author of „Made in Abyss“ problematic as fuck? It sure seems like it, but that shouldn’t reflect on his readers. I sure as hell don’t research the authors of every piece of media I consume and I’m pretty sure that goes for most people.

I‘m also not defending the pedos in the fandom, but y’all, even My Little Pony has a huge chunk of those in the fandom but they’re clearly not a reflection of the entire fanbase.

TLDR: Don’t base your entire opinion on Twitter threads. Research the content you’re criticizing. Use critical thinking. Someone using big words doesn’t mean they’re right.

For reference, here’s the critical reception section of MiA‘s wiki page.

And from the reply by @niwakunis - some censored manga panels so you can get an idea of what the controversy is about:

Controversial scenes and elements are also listed and further clarified here:

[minas-linkverse]

QnA

What is this?

Apparently a webcomic! This started as me just sharing some headcanons, but in the end I got really carried away and Linkverse is now a full story with a planned middle and end.

As someone who’s struggled with mental health and trauma, I’m hoping to explore the variety of ways people react to the hurt, and how one may start moving forwards. I’m mostly here to write a comedy comic, though.

Is this Linked Universe?

Nah, I am hoping to keep this as an entirely separate entity. Sure the idea of multiple links interacting did come to me from Linked Universe, but these are my interpretation of the characters, and the set up is different.

If you can avoid tagging my work as Linked Universe, that’d keep the tags clean! Although no hard feelings if accidents occur!

Are the links signing?

I am trying to keep that up, yes. I love the headcanon that Link doesn’t speak, and the silence in canon isn’t just so we could project onto him.

Why the Links of this au don’t speak is open for headcanons. Trauma, them being mute, or anything else, feel free to fill the answers yourself.

Here’s a list of who communicates in what way:

Sign:

Team A: Twilight, Sky, Time, Wild, Legend

Team B: Hyrule, Worlds, Four

Team C: Warriors, Smash

Verbal:

Team A: Wind, Ravio

Team B: Shadow

Team C: Karts

Dont speak:

Team A: Minish

Team B: -

Team C: Sprite

All the above depending on the situation:

Hero

Can I join the discord?

Sorry, it’s currently closed for new people. We ended up finding such a nice atmosphere that letting in just anybody seems like a threat to the good vibes. I know that’s not professional, but LV isn’t exactly a big popular comic with thousands of fans. Someday perhaps, tho! ...Er, the server opening, not thousands of fans. I mean, I’d welcome them, but, h-hi-

Stuff nobody’s asked but I want to state:

Linkverse will explore some deeper mental health issues, please be careful even when the comic is mostly jokes. Also I have autism and every Link is autistic, sorry I don’t make the rules. 😔 I’m doing my best to represent it, but even with personal experience I might make mistakes! Please let me know!

Also I’m putting my gay hands all over this franchise.

Also Please Don’t:

- Send me nsfw things - Ship these Links - Be afraid to tell me if something I did seems problematic, I want to make a safe environment. Tell me if you want something tagged, even if it’s not a common trigger. - Post hateful comments of other creators on my work

[inkblot-skyz]

mARTch, Week 1: Meet the Artist, Day 3: Inspirations

Okay, today's gonna be a text-post because I'm not sure how to format it in an art piece.

If you hadn't noticed, I'm very much into both Undertale and Your Boyfriend (I've said it before and I'll say it again, Minors DNI with the fandom and/or game, it's strictly 18+ with its NSFW and horror themes. Don't care if you "can handle it," just. Don't, thanks, for your own good).

Like, a lot. Undertale's been my ultimate hyperfixation since I was 13; about a year after it was released, in fact, so I've seen a lot of the fandom's growth, decline, then growth again when Deltarune was released. Your Boyfriend is understandably newer (I only turned 18 last October, and couldn't interact with the fandom when I first found it because I was a month early, but I miraculously remembered when the time came), and, heck, it could fade at any point. But both media have helped with my artstyle a ton.

I'll talk about Undertale's influences on my art first, since it came first.

I first found Undertale through Aphmau back in the Summer of 2016 (yawn, Aphmau, I know, I was that kid), but it wasn't until the end of the year where it properly kicked off. I watched a couple lets plays after remembering it in passing, and I was hooked. Undertale's the reason I wanted to draw digitally, mostly for the spriting aspect. It also affected my art in a non-visual way; its writing and plot has honestly encouraged me to pick up a pen or pencil and just write the most out of anything. I wanted to make a game because of Undertale, a project that I admittedly made no progress on, but I often find myself blowing the cobwebs off of it and updating with new lore and the like every so often.

Then, I found the fandom, which is admittedly the biggest part of why I've stayed so long.

I was a sans fangirl. I'll hold my hands up and say it without a lick of shame, because I was a dumb obsessive kid (who admittedly turned into a dumb obsessive adult, but at least I'm now self aware lmao). I will say I wasn't as bad as a large majority of the others at the time (I didn't understand the infighting because, cmon, guys, it's a fictional character, you can't claim ownership over him...I wonder if this was an early sign of my polyamory but probably not lmao), but it was...Something that happened.

That honestly didn't last long because after that I found the AUs and, yeah, I simped over Ink and Error for a while (albeit a very fanon version of them but it was 2017, everyone wrote them like that), realised they were cute together and voila, Sans x Sans shipping happened. I mention this not because it's a curse I can't rid of myself (which it is, don't get me wrong, but it's an enjoyable one), but it's crucial because:

As soon as I found Errink, almost immediately after I found TheGreatRogue. Yeah, that Rogue.

Their artstyle, and I hate to say it, completely shaped my own, even if it was Very Bad in comparison. This was before NaJ AU was a thing and a lot of their problematic content was a thing, but it was around the time Vampverse was being conceptualised iirc??

Basically, I slowly amalgamated Rogue's art style into my own.

Then it evolved into other creators' art styles being mimicked in my own. Tiny_Inky_Sans on Instagram and Comyet come to mind, the latter being especially influential when Ink's redesign came about. And I guess over time it's evolved into my own thing?

And, ok, it's important to note that I'm a huge anime fan (this is important!), because that used to influence my style a lot. Heck, it probably still does, hair wise. But I used to draw human characters with HUGE anime/manga eyes. Hell, have an example from last year!

It's not terrible, but it's not the best either. There's worse of mine out there.

But here's where Your Boyfriend comes into play.

So, here's the scene. It's August. I'd just finished Yoosung's route on Mystic Messenger earlier in the week and, because I don't have enough of the in game currency to do his post-game story, I feel kinda empty inside. I'd play Pokemon but I'd just end up beating the League again and feeling worse, because I hate when I finish a piece of media I enjoy. So, I go onto YouTube, hopefully to watch some old Vine compilation.

That's when I stumble upon ManlyBadassHero's latest upload: a playthrough of the first Day of some dating game, which probably has horror elements because that's MBH's thing idk. Bored, with nothing else to do, I decide to check it out, because the name of the game rings a bell (I accidentally reblogged a piece of art to Mul71v3r53 earlier in the year without knowing what it was).

And oh boy.

I was hooked again.

I checked some stuff out online after the video was over, and to my dismay it's strictly 18+. That was understandable, it's obvious from the get go that the antagonist is creepy. So I waited a couple months, hoping my memory would be ok, and surprisingly it was for once.

And so, I did more digging into the fandom and the rest is history.

As I said yesterday, it did inadvertently remove ears from all my drawings, but ears are overrated (floating earrings are funny to draw lmao)

And uh, yeah, I think I've mentioned everything?

This is probably a mess, blame my brain,

and yayyyy Day 3 is done byebye see you tomorrow