#i have nothing against zuko/sokka i just have strong feelings about fanon sokka

[myhyperfixationisiforgot]

The ATLA renaissance shifting the fandom from Zutara towards Zukka without actually changing the ship dynamic is so fucking funny because most of the time it functions pretty well. However today I saw another 'oh Sokka had this forbidden crush on Zuko from the beginning' and. Look. What happened there? Seriously, did we watch the same show? Fucking nobody likes Zuko from the get-go! He's an acquired taste at best. Jet notably falls for Zuko at first sight under explicitly false pretenses. Sokka has both a brain and a decent understanding of Zuko's early role in the Fire Nation. He would not say that.

[zvtara-was-never-canon]

https://www.tumblr.com/burst-of-iridescent/769146448190324736/you-know-what-i-still-find-it-beyond-weird-that?source=share

I thought about it, but do fn and water tribe have cultural similarities that secretly point to zutara??

1 - Nothing in the show is EVER "secretly pointing to Zutara." You can like the ship, but it is pure fanon that the lead writer didn't care for and that the creators/showrunners clearly don't like. Everything was always pointing to Kataang and Maiko. Again, you don't have to like it, but it is an undeniable fact.

2 - The only things the Fire Nation and BOTH water tribes, as well as the Earth Kingdom, have in common are "The kids are not raised communally, but rather by typical nuclear family (mom and dad)" and "they're not literal nomads." Something SO general that applies to literally everyone except airbenders simply cannot be used as a real parallel between these two nations.

Katara is from a tribal culture where chiefs are chosen by the people, they're all trying to survive a genocide, and they have a very strong sense of community. Zuko is from a industrialized, imperialistic nation that is actively banning/killing it's own culture (kids not knowing traditional dances, dragons being killed, spirituality being neglected) with a royal family that is in power because "divine right to rule", and their approach to "community" is based on royals using "peasant" as an insult and killing their own relatives for power, or disfiguring their own children, in public, because said kid spoke out of turn. HOW are these cultures simmilar?

3 - Aang not liking the food is not the same as him hating Katara's culture, and the ONE time he ever said something genuinely passive-aggressive about their practices was in the Bato episode, and it was clearly just him being a 12-year-old that didn't like feeling left out. That same episode has him engaging with a traditional ritual of ice-dodging in which Sokka is supposed to "become a man", and oh, yeah, KATARA'S ROLE IN THE STORY IS TEACHING HIM WATERBENDING. Ya know. Bending. The thing that is canonically tied to a nation's culture and spirituality?

The closest Zuko got to enganging with Katara's culture that way was by learning lightining redirection from Iroh - something that he developed by "observing" waterbender. Now ask yourself, in what context did a general from the Fire Nation "observe" a waterbender's fighting style? Could it have been during one of the raids on the South Pole or at least fighting people like Hakoda, who weren't home but were still trying to prevent the Fire Nation from killing everybody? Not exactly a heartwarming thought of cultural exchange, is it?

4 - Katara and Aang's cultures might not be that simmilar, but they have WAY more in common with each other than with the Fire Nation, hence Aang being so immediately beloved by Katara's tribe (and immediately being willing to sacrifice himself for them) and water being the element he struggled with the least. Not to mention the whole experience of "we're both trying to survive a genocide here" which literally unites the whole world AGAINST the Fire Nation. And on the personal level instead of broader, cultural one, both Katara and Aang long for a home, while also craving adventures far away every now and then. THE perfect compromise between life just at the tribe and life just traveling.

5 - Even if the Fire Nation and the South Pole WERE super simmilar culturally: that doesn't mean Zuko and Katara would inevitably develop feelings for each other, much like their cultural differences were not the reason why said feelings didn't exist in canon. Cultural clashes pushing lovers apart is a thing that CAN happen but it's not a guarantee because, at the end of the day, people fall in love with PEOPLE, not the nation/culture they're from.

Katara didn't help struggling Fire Nation citizens because "they're just like me!", she was just a compassionate person. Zuko didn't regret his role in the war because "the water tribe is not that different from my home", he just finally realized "Holy shit, they're HUMANS, not just obstacles in my path" and wouldn't have been able to live with himself if he continued to hurt them. Their cultures are really different, and that doesn't prevent them from being friends - but the fact that neither would ever permanently leave their home is one of the core things that would have made them incompatible as a couple, not because they simply see things differently, but because their PERSONAL goals and attachments in life push them in opposing directions

[ultfreakme]

Im really sorry if this is blunt, but are you taking a break from the atla fandom? Totally understand if you are, btw (dw, I'm really tired rn too)

Yep, a break from the fandom to find out my joy in the show again. I did not have a good time interacting with the larger fandom. I don't agree with a lot of fanon surrounding the show. The discourse is tired and honestly stupid 90% of the time. Everything is about ships, ships, and more ships. I tried to draw my boundaries and regulate my experience but I feel like a majority don't give a shit about my boundaries and squicks.

If I try to to criticize the OG, or point out something wrong with it, people just spin it as some "totally intentional commentary guys the creators are GENIUS". I'm mostly on the zukka side, but it feels like......the fandom worships big creators a lot and take their word as law. And if you go against it or have a different interpretation, it gets completely sunk or ignored. I'm not expecting people to agree but like at least try to entertain something new (like, I don't think Azula needs a redemption arc, I don't think Sokka has any issues with Hakoda, I think Sokka remains childless out of choice and was happy when he died and there's literally nothing in actual canon indicating otherwise- he died younger than the rest, so what? I don't care for the excessive focus on Zuko EVERYWHERE, or the girlboss-ification of literally every female character and ignores their wrongs *cough* Azula and Mai *cough*. I don't like how fanon reduces Toph to "funny strong girl" and never discusses anything else, or how everyone ignores Aang's grief and Katara's genuine mistakes and asshole moments. I have a lot of problems with just how....everything is discussed).

This was not intentional and I don't blame anyone for this but I just felt.....isolated. It didn't feel like anyone was willing to talk about anything new. It keeps circling back to the same thing everyone's already talked about a million times. Which is fine! The show's 2-decades old and it is very direct, the subtext is basically text. But the fandom is set in its ways and thoughts over these two decades and atp it just feels like people patting each other on the back for having the same takes as each other. I don't get the chance to talk about my own stuff or explore anything new, I constantly felt like I was getting sunk under everyone else's interpretations, and there was this invisible pressure to create fanon a very specific way.

Idk, it just felt boring after a while. So, I'm taking a break for a few months, maybe a year. I'll probably upload and work on my fic but I'm not going to interact with fandom at large. I have a couple of friends, but that's all it'll be.

[vomara]

@irresistible-revolution yeah, i'm growing to dislike the pairing more and more as the fandom latches onto it. like... i decided to look through all the episodes briefly just now to recall any significant zuko-sokka moments and it's about nothing. you could quite literally delete their interactions without changing canon, save for the boiling rock episodes. (which, besides those two bonding, is mainly for the reintroduction of hakoda+suki, along with mai+ty lee's betrayal of azula.) there's zuko and sokka's first meeting, in s1e2... and then nothing but the rare fireblast or boomerang thrown at each other. even in "the western air temple", zuko's welcome-to-the-gaang episode, sokka probably had the least notable reaction to zuko -- aang verges on hopeful and is shown thinking about zuko several times, katara is shown as growing more spiteful as she remembers "the crossroads of destiny", and toph has little history with him, so her reactions completely contrast with everyone else. sokka's opinion barely matters here except as peer pressure to keep aang from accepting zuko into the gaang.

they're paralleled occassionally, but it's not too significant. sokka-hakoda is sometimes juxtaposed against zuko-ozai, but so is katara-hakoda. there are a few battle prep scenes that parallel sokka-zuko but more often than not it's aang-zuko. the most significant parallel is their actual position within their family, not anything related to the actual relationship between them -- both of them are swordwielding brothers who are overshadowed by prodigal younger sisters. all of this is so minor that you could remove it or modify it so that there isn't any sokka-zuko interactions, and it would essentially be about the same. meanwhile, if you tried to crop out aang-zuko or katara-zuko interactions, the narrative would actually fail. you'd lose significant amounts of depth and meaning.

not considering aang, katara, or any of zuko's family members, the characters that zuko has the most dynamic with, surprisingly enough, may be mai, jet, then sokka and ty lee, in that order. and yes, i said jet before sokka -- zuko has a three-episode arc with him that's intentionally made to compare and contrast the two, at a time in the narrative where zuko is rarely creating strong or interesting bonds with other characters. sokka and zuko have a two-episode arc that, while focused on them, is also mainly concerned with advancing plot elements, during a time in the series where zuko is actively working to create bonds with everyone. the former feels more significant as a result of its context.

either way, it's like... this is what the fandom is making a full following out of? this is the pairing that's oversaturating the fandom and becoming fanon? this is the pairing that's somehow considering to be realistic post-canon? if i have to sit through more post-canon 'verses where it's just assumed that sokka gets married to zuko without any good development, i think i'll throw myself out the fucking window. and that's double if the person opposes katara getting married to zuko but is just peachy about sokka doing the same.

why does the atla fandom have so many stone cold takes... it's like drinking cold tea. unpleasant and boring