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arom-antix · 21 days ago

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So, with the main part of this whole thegirlwhorideslikeasamurai (Samurai from here on) situation having blown over, I thought I'd make a final-for-now summary post that outlines the key points in this situation so that I can cap this for the time being. It's also for the people who've stumbled upon one of the many posts about this and have no clue where to start or don't understand the context, because yeah, there's a lot. I've had multiple people reach out who were in that situation, so here's the summary for anyone who's interested.

Links to all the posts in this situation:

Initial posts: 1. Samurai's answer w/ my response 2. Samurai's response to me

Main threads: 3. Culture and fandom thread 4. Screenshots thread

Other threads: 5. Initial receipts 6. First ask 7. First anon ask, rebuttal 8. Second anon ask 9. Third anon ask 10. Fourth anon ask 11. Fifth anon ask 12. Sixth anon ask, thread 13. Disclaimer to not misuse my posts 14. Follow-up regarding Samurai's continued hypocrisy

I will be referring back to these post in the normat "no. #".

There are multiple key players in this whole thing but seeing as this post contains primarily my words and take on things (and the others involved have honestly had enough stress about this for one month) I've elected not to tag them. You can find them in the posts I linked to. However, I will note the abscence of any real response from Samurai. I'll get into that further down.

A big thank you to everyone who's contributed to this discussion. It's been wonderful finally getting all this stuff out in the open.

Break for those who want a usable dash or don't care. But I encourage you to do so because this does matter for your fandom experience going forward.

So first, what happened? Well, the first thing to understand is that this whole thing started a long time ago, and the reason it's becoming a big thing now is pure chance. It was going to happen eventually. It happening now is just how it went. But for the sake of cohesion, I'll approach it from where the situation itself arose, especially since it displays some of the behaviours I'll be highlighting later pretty well.

The way this all kicked off was that Samurai posted no. 1 in response to an ask about the canon vs. fanon spelling of Yuuri and Viktor's names. In this response Samurai was pretty rude and demeaning towards Japanese name translation inconsistencies. There was also a minor spelling error. I pointed these things out in a reblog of Samurai's post which can also be found in no. 1. Now, Samurai did respond to this, but not in the way you'd think. She didn't reblog my post. Instead, she quietly edited the spelling error in her original post (just became incorrect in a different way), and then reblogged that new version of her own post and tagged me in it. Strange, but okay, I guess. In her response she apologised for the cultural insensitivity and explained that English was not her first language which, sure, that's fair. However, she also went on to explain the spelling error was actually just a misunderstanding, and then was even more wrong about Japanese in her explanation of that. Go to no. 3 to get an explanation as to why she was doubly wrong. I couldn't be bothered to start anything about this poor response, so I reblogged it so people could see it, said "sorry if I was harsh, have a good day", and went on my way.

Later that same day I then got an ask (no. 3 and 4) about that last reblog which said that I shouldn't have apologised for being right, and explained that Samurai was not a stranger to poor behaviour and bad takes. I was already tired of Samurai and had been for a while, so I answered the ask by explaining that I just apologised to keep the peace, but I was over trying to do that anymore.

And this is where the situation took off from. People started reblogging my post with their own grievances about Samurai, including bad experiences from interacting with her, and I began getting asks where people corroborated these claims and shared their own frustrations. I won't explain those asks and reblogs here since they're in the links at the beginning, and their main points can be boiled down to the following:

Avoiding accountability Samurai has a knack for worming their way out of taking accountability for their actions. She'll divert attention from the issue at hand, she'll use whataboutism to point fingers back in your face, she'll fabricate a sympathetic angle of her actions and use your natural tendency to want to see the good in people against you, she'll make sure you know just how sad and insecure she is, and she'll do it all while talking like she's an expert. Like when she responded to my post but didn't actually admit that the spelling mistake was just that. A mistake. She didn't have some advanced knowledge that she proceeded to explain. She was just wrong. Twice. And she couldn't even just say "Ah sorry, my finger slipped."

Victim complex She's also always the victim. She doesn't get enough engagement? The fandom doesn't understand her. She's trying so hard, why are worse posts getting attention when she makes such high quality stuff? The fandom must be rotting from the inside with no academics left to admire her supreme intellect. Someone posts an anylisis similar to hers? Plagiarism! Thievery! Piracy! It could never be because there are only so many scenes and conclusions to draw about said scene in a show that people have been analysing for eight years. Someone disagrees with a conclusion of hers? Well they're an acephobe, of course! A bigoted Karen who's trying to erase the real academics in the fandom! God forbid someone criticises her? Blocked, blocked, blocked, the fandom is so toxic, omg, she needs to get better at recognising fake friends, smh.

Manipulating the narrative As you might not be surprised, she also loves being in control of what her audience sees of the discourse she gets into. See: her not reblogging my post and instead making a separate post when that was more work than just responding directly. She's also notorious for editing her posts so when people criticise them she can feign ignorance and claim she never said that. And in terms of the individuals who've been intimidated into silence by Samurai and her entourage, if their stories got out, that would be a catastrophe, right? It would hurt her precious reputation after all.

General Manipulation and Gaslighting And yeah, that leads us to the big one. Now, these are hefty accusations and I'm especially bringing up the latter a bit dubiously. However, I think it needs to be said that many of the tactics she uses are manipulation strategies. I'm saying that as someone who's been at the receiving end of these methods. They get you to shut up. They get you to doubt your own judgement. They get you to think things you wouldn't have otherwise. And, most importantly, they get you to forgive things you never would. They worm themselves into your brain and get you to question your own ability to make decisions and understand the world. And that right there where it becomes gaslighting. Again, I'm not saying Samurai is being all that extreme but I am saying that she's leading people down the slippery slope of accepting this type of behaviour by convincing them that it's actually okay because she said so.

Insincerity This overlaps a good amount with manipulation, but I thought it was necessary to point out separately, because she's notorious for it. As was mentioned in no. 12, she has repeatedly displayed disingenuous behaviour across social medias and has used those different behaviours to twist the story into what she wants it to be, so she comes out of it looking either like a victim or like an underdog and saviour of the fandom. Is it a crime to want to look good online? Of course not. Does she use that liberty to fabricate a benevolent image of herself despite repeatedly not living up to said image? Very much so.

Bullying and Namecalling This goes back to how I mentioned her accusing people of being acephobes for not agreeing with her very important and perfectly correct analyses. Beyond this, she has also called people illiterate for not agreeing with her analyses as if these "academic" takes of hers are so obviously right that only someone incapable of accessing the source material would disagree, has called someone a Nazi for using the actual current DSM-5 medical term for autism (as far as I've been informed in private, see no. 3, 4, and 5 for partial context), and has recently become very fond of calling people dicks.

Superiority complex This all of course comes down to the actual issue at the bottom of all of this: Samurai thinks she's better than the rest of us. She thinks she's more academic, more literate, more intellectual, and laments the lack of people who can match her frea- I mean, level. No weird takes on her blog as she says (no. 4). This is a "dick" move to use her own vocabulary but is even worse when you realise that she's not all that academic or intellectual herself. Which, by the way, is completely fine! You don't need a PhD to discuss anime men. However, she makes it sound like that. She belittles posts that aren't as "academic" as hers simply because they upset her or have more interactions. She belittles the entire fandom simply because other people don't subscribe to her lonely intellectual narrative and enjoy fandom casually. She insists that her analyses are better than other metas when the academia she's so proud of isn't even really there in a lot of them. And she will absolutely make you feel worthless for thinking you can contribute to the fandom on her level because no one is as good as her.

Do I really care much about some arrogant loser on the Internet? No. Do I care that she's belittling her entire community by ridiculing their contributions and positioning herself as the one true deliverer of gospel? Absolutely. See, the issue isn't just that she's arrogant. It's that that's not enough for her. She pushes the rest of the community down so that she can feel even more superior. She also routinely complains about her lack of engagement which, wow, what a mystery, what might be scaring them away? But secondly, she's indirectly belittling the support the fans of her content are giving her. No. 11 is from one such fan who experienced this. Let it be made clear that Samurai might genuinely want to form a community and be social, but she does not see herself like the rest of us when it comes down to it. She sees herself as better. Or, at the very least, she posts as if she does.

Okay, that's all well and good, but Arom, why does this matter? Isn't it just petty fandom drama? Why should we care? Well, you should care because the people who've been hurt by this behaviour and those who've left the fandom to be free of it are your peers. They're not random Internet strangers. The next one could be your close fandom friend. The one after that could be you. The reason I'm making this post is so that you can understand how Samurai operates and not fall for her tactics. They're incredibly easy to start forgiving. I've been there. You have to catch this stuff before it turns into something legitimately damaging. I also want you guys to be able to take this situation with you and apply what you've learned to other actually dangerous people. I don't consider Samurai dangerous. To be frank, I consider her an immature embarrassment. Can she hurt you? Of course, but the scope will be limited. However, there are plenty of people of there who are much better at doing these things and do them far more insidiously with far worse goals. I want you all to be able to realise before it's too late. I was in one of those much more insidious friendships once even if the goals weren't any worse than Samurai's. They sneak up on you so damn fast.

And now, because I know some of Samurai's entourage might be itching to hit me back with this: Why is this public? Shouldn't stuff like this be kept private? Isn't this just us bullying Samurai in the hallway where everyone can watch?

Now, if you're a specific person, you'll likely recognise these coming points because yes, they're lifted directly from your ask. However, seeing as this ask was not sent to me (I'll leave you guys to ponder why that is considering all other asks were) and has not been published because the recipient didn't want to spend their energy on it, I'm not going to say who the asker is nor am I going to be speaking to them directly in this part. Rebutting a statement no one but me and a few others have even read wouldn't be fair to the asker. However, the ask brings up some very common points in discussions like this that I want to catch right now before anyone starts thinking those points are good.

So first: Why is this public? Now, on the surface this seems quite reasonable to ask, right? I personally agree that private beef should stay private and that there's no need making a bigger scene out of things than necessary. But this beef isn't private. It's not a one-off thing, and it's not new. It's been happening for at the very least months and has been happening both publicly and privately on different social medias. Oh, also, it has already been attempted to be handled privately. Doing so did diddly squat. People have actually been scared into silence by attempting to handle it like that. Some things just cannot be handled one on one because one party is entering it with malicious intent.

Allegedly Samurai has also been called out in a Discord server before (no. 12) which I can't confirm but wouldn't surprise me. Guess how much that did. Nothing. Nada. Nul og niks. But then you might be asking why a second call-out is supposed to do anything, and that's where I get to the real point of this whole thing: Getting the word out. This and all the previous posts aren't about actually getting through to Samurai because I'm acutely aware that she won't actually change by being told off. She's demonstrated time and time again that she'll simply wait the situation out and then vaguepost about how much of a victim she is and how toxic her ex-friends are.

So, instead of getting her to own up, we're trying to reach everyone else. If we can make people aware of her tactics so that they can avoid her or at the very least be wary around her, I consider that a success. If we can limit her access to victims, we'll have done what we set out to do.

Second: What about Samurai's mental health? Aren't we hurting her by destroying her reputation? Well, dear reader, what about everyone she's hurt? Do they not deserve to talk about this stuff simply because it'll make Samurai upset? This might be a kind of wild suggestion, but there's a very easy way to not be publicly called out for being an arse: just don't be an arse. No one made her do these things. Like mentioned in no. 12, she destroyed her reputation all by herself. If stating aloud what someone has done ruins their reputation, then the person who did said things is at fault. Spare the messenger. They've already been hurt enough. If Samurai had simply owned up to her behaviour and apologised and made a change when people had called her out in the past, we wouldn't be here. She made this necessary. Don't feel bad for her that she's getting what was always coming to her.

Third: Why are we digging up old posts? Isn't it unfair to hold Samurai's past against them? Now, I want you to notice what this whole situation is actually about. Is it about a single incident? No. Is it about a set of repeated behaviours which are harmful and manipulative? Now you're onto something. I agree that digging up unrelated dirt on someone just to slander them for their past when it has no or an at best flimsy relation to what's actually being discussed is mean and unnecessary and should not be done.

However, the point of showing those older posts is to make it clear that this isn't a new thing, and it's repeated and unchanging. Bringing up their posts about being insecure and being sad about not getting traction isn't about those posts, it's about showing how much Samurai clearly cares about interaction and to point out a repeated behaviour of deflecting criticism by hiding behind insecurity and making their own fans feel bad about not being good enough. It's not about the posts. It's about explaining why Samurai is uncomfortable to be around.

Oh and fourth because this is the funniest thing: What about the new fans? They'll think we're all mean and negative! Okay so first of all, and please excuse my French, absolutely dogshit take. "What about the new fans?" Dude, what about the ones who are already here and are being driven away by Samurai's awful and demeaning behaviour? What about the people who've been hurt and are finally being heard? What about when the new fans see Samurai calling others acephobes and Nazis for disagreeing with her? Is that not driving them away? Is that not projecting negativity?

Now, yes, that was targeted towards the asker because oh my fucking stars, I haven't seen a take that bad in a while. If you want to ignore or criticise this point of mine, go ahead because I can't source it and the asker's full statement isn't publicly available so I'm aware that this is a weak argument. But I want everyone to know that if you've been ignored and demeaned and called names for simply trying to assert yourself, you're allowed to be negative publicly. You're allowed to publicly make it clear that someone isn't listening privately and so you're speaking in the only place they can't ignore. You're allowed to not be peachy and positive at all times just because a new fan might come across your post. You don't have to treat every post and word you make public as an exhaustive representation of the entire fandom.

And so, with all of this outlined, I have a personal message for Samurai and Co.: Do. Better. I know you can because I've seen you interact amicably with the fanbase multiple times. I'm not here to tell you to get off the Internet and I'm not here to get you to stop participating in fandom. What I am here for is to get you to treat the fanbase with the respect it deserves. You're not better than people just because you're queer. It's the Yuri!!! On Ice fandom. Basically everyone is queer. Get over yourselves. Develop some maturity and accept that you can be contradicted. Accept that not everyone will agree with you. Accept that just because you point really hard at canon, your analyses will still just be theories. And that's okay. You don't need to be an academic to be part of fandom. You don't even need to be right. You can be straight up wrong and still be allowed to be here. However, you also have to let others do all that stuff too. You can't tell people to be nice and then not be so yourself. Fandom is collaboration which means that sometimes you have to just accept that some members of the group have takes you disagree with or find straight up stupid. However, that does not give you the right to tell them they're doing fandom wrong or claim that your way of doing it is better. Because that's how you come across. Whether intentionally or not, that's the message you're sending. Stop acting suprior. It's actually very easy and frankly embarrasing that you haven't figured out how to not be insufferable yet. You're adults. Act. Like. It.

Finally, and I promise this will he the last thing: What do we do now? Samurai has been exposed, hasn't responded, and will probably just wait for this to blow over. What are we supposed to do with all this information? Well, you're free to choose of course, but my suggestion is to simply keep an eye on her and her entourage. They've so far showed no sign of wanting to change, and if you see them misbehaving, don't be afraid to hold them accountable, or, if you'd rather not be mixed up in this, feel free to shoot me a DM or even an anonymous ask. If I get enough reports or the reports are egregious enough, I might make a follow-up post just to keep people updated.

And if keeping a 40+ year old (yes, Samurai is really that old, I was shocked too) on an Internet leash seems extreme, just remember that she made it necessary. She clearly won't listen when people tell her directly how she's hurt them. In my opinion, some social pressure to behave is in order. All she has to do is be nice and nothing more will come of this. It's up to her. It takes a village and sometimes the entire fanbase.

So, it's up to you, Samurai. Your behaviour will be the direct catalyst for whatever I and others choose to do or not do. All you need to do is behave. If you can do that, we'll get to go our separate ways. If you can't, well, you've seen what that results in. But if you do legitimately make a visible effort to change, I'll gladly make a post about that too. I'm all for a redemption, but you're the one who has to put in the effort. Not your friends, not your fans, not your victims, not me.

Your choice. I'll be waiting.

And to anyone who's dying to tear my head off: Please read all the posts linked to at the top before responding. I'm not naming any names. You know who you are.

#that got long but is anyone surprised anymore?#anyway i hope everyone is having a good start to the new year #yuri on ice #arom antix

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winteriron-trash · 6 months ago

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rdj the (whitewashed) electric boogaloo

This is a reminder to everyone who's excited about RDJ's casting as Doctor Doom that this casting is whitewashing. Victor Von Doom is a Romani character and has been a Romani character since his introduction in the 1960s. (Fantastic Four Annual #2 [1964]) Not only that, but his Roma identity and the persecution he and his family faced due to it is integral to his character, it is what forms his identity. (Books of Doom by Ed Brubaker) Even if on the off chance this casting is meant to not be Victor but instead be some variant of Tony or whomever else becoming Doctor Doom, it is damaging to the character to rob him of that important cultural background. Doctor Doom does not exist without that history. Fans have been pushing hard to cast Doom as a Romani actor for years, especially since the MCU has whitewashed other Romani characters. (Wanda, Pietro, etc) This casting is not a celebration moment, it's fucking heartbreaking that the MCU repeatedly ignores the important and nuanced cultural backstories of characters.

I know I can't change anybody's mind on whether or not you want to be excited about RDJ's return to the MCU. But I do think at the very least you should be mad that the MCU is baiting us all and destroying nuanced and interesting characters for the sake of self-referential easter eggs and nostalgia bait. Because that's what it is. Feel how you'd like to feel about RDJ's return, but personally, this is soul-sucking. I had such a deep love for the MCU as a teenager, it was obviously something incredibly formative to me, especially Tony Stark. This isn't recreating what I fell in love with the MCU for. This is turning a well-planned and artistic storyline of adaptations into cheap cash grabs and fan service. Because, I think we're past the point of being able to call the MCU an adaptation of anything. They can use existing characters' names and powers, but to say they're being properly adapted is laughable.

This is not an adaptation of Doctor Doom. This is RDJ the Electric Boogaloo because Marvel's fear of losing the interest of dedicated MCU fans overrides their willingness to tell stories that are genuine to the characters. I don't know what there is to be excited about that. The MCU has lost its authenticity and aside from a few projects, feels heartless. Every movie is a copy of a copy. This announcement isn't something celebratory, it feels like a death knell of a cinematic universe that's so desperate to cling to relevancy it's resorting to nostalgia for a character/actor who hasn't even been dead for a decade. We're not getting anything new, we're just rinsing and repeating the same song and dance.

I get it. I love Tony Stark, his death destroyed me and I to this day, rue the ending he got in Endgame. It misunderstood his arc and it robbed him of a satisfying conclusion. But the solution to that isn't dragging the corpse out of the grave five years later to whitewash an existing character with rich and interesting nuance, just to forcibly tie his existence in the MCU to Tony. Whether he is a variant or not. Why would you want someone else's fave's legacy to be destroyed simply so your fave's legacy can go on? Hell, if we were really all so hellbent on the return of RDJ and/or Tony to the MCU, we have the multiverse for a reason. There were other ways to do it that didn't whitewash and ruin someone else. This just. Isn't something to be happy about.

#... we will not be addressing that i'm a dead blog #no one say a WORD about my inactivity for 4 years this isn't about that /lh #also if anyone tries to get smart about “romani isn't a race” i don't care and you can shut up.#it's an ethnic and cultural identity. and it should be portrayed correctly.#ESPECIALLY for a character like *victor von doom* of all people. like it is fundamental to him.#i would've included panels of the comics mentioned but most of them use the g-slur and i don't wish to encourage that here #like listen i don't think you need to be a comics fan to be an mcu fan. they're so divorced from each other atp #nor do i think the mcu owes complete comic accuracy. but i do think you should at *least* care when characters are whitewashed.#look. i really don't want this to be a debate on if rdj's return is good or not #i've been frankly baffled at how many old mutuals are excited but. whatever if you want him back i get it.#but it shouldn't be like this. not at the expense of a different character.#this whole thing made me realize i'm *far* more jaded and turned off to the mcu than most of you guys are.#which is fair you can still be an mcu fan. if it brings you joy i'm so happy for you #but how does this like. bring joy i don't get it.#this is soulless. it's uninspired. it's done purely for shock value.#i occasionally get asks to this blog about why i left and asking me to come back #and i get it. i *want* to come back.#but i don't *care* about the mcu anymore. this is not the franchise i fell in love with.#i don't recognize what once meant everything to me.#winteriron will always hold a special place in my heart (as will tony stark)#but like. i just don't have love for it. and it sucks that this bullshit from marvel actively kills the love i had.#this sours tony stark to me. i'm sorry but it does. because was it really worth this? is this what his legacy has become?#this does cheapen his legacy btw. like without question. it turns him into a cheap cameo reference. heart of the mcu my ass.#my fandom circles have *massively* changed #i'm now entirely surrounded by comics fans bc my primary fandom is dc comics. that's what i'm up to these days #and the difference was actually baffling to me. everyone i follow now is *pissed* about this. comics twitter is so mad.#and then i see ppl on here excited and i'm just genuinely surprised this is something you want. i don't get it.#i don't say that to be rude. i just don't get it. how is *this* actually something people *want*.#do i still care about marvel? eh.#i like winter soldier comics and i could give a comprehensive rec list. and i read some other characters i deeply enjoy.

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