#it seems to be a trend that the more ‘‘progressive’’ a fandom claims to be the more regressive takes they have | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

miraculouscontent · 4 years ago

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Askplosion #12 2/4:

.:New Miraculous Asks:.

Anonymous said:

Can people just STOP calling Marinette a "stalker"? Like, seriously? Especially TV Tropes. They have her listed under the trope for "Stalker With A Crush" and even have a video source of her(from Copycat) which was taken WAY out of context. They also listed her under "Stalking Is Funny If It Is Female After Male", which IS an existing double standard, but Marinette is still not an example and wouldn't be even if she WERE a stalker, because Wayhem's stalking actually WAS played for laughs!

Granted he was stalking another male and we don't know if he has a crush on him(but if he did it would be...unfortunate), but it's still an example. Plus, they claim that Volpina is about her learning her lesson regarding her stalker tendencies, but that no matter how many times she learns it, it never seems to stick. Yes, because everything is Marinette's fault and she's the stubborn shallow bitch who needs a kick in the ovaries, it's not, you know, the writers making her look bad/OOC!!!

THIS. ALL OF THIS.

Oh my god, I cannot tell you how infuriating it is to see “stalker” get thrown around like that. I would need two hands to count the amount of words that have lost meaning to me because people throw them out wildly and without any self-control. Stalkers engage in far more aggressive and obsessive behavior than Marinette, and usually also feature them harrassing whoever they’re stalking (such as calling them a lot), and they also never stop when they’re asked to. Marinette doesn’t fit the description of harrassment at all; Chat Noir does more than her and I don’t even call his behavior “harrassment” because that’s another word that’s lost all meaning by now and I wouldn’t use it in the first place.

Anyway, I think the Wayhem example is valid because Marinette’s crush on Adrien is written very much like a celebrity crush, so it’s similar territory.

On the note of “Volpina,” I do not understand it considering that Tikki was all on board with Marinette following Lila for the sake of getting the book back; that was one of the cases where there was an alternative motive out of just “follow Adrien” (which is not really something we see Marinette frequently doing; usually when we see her watching Adrien, it’s because she wants to approach but can’t bring herself to).

And yeah, most of the time, it’s just the narrative. The show basically puts it all on Marinette to solve all her personal problems (while constantly piling more stuff onto her) instead of getting active encouragement (no, eye rolls, verbal jabs, and groans do not count) from her friends and Tikki.

Like, what am I supposed to expect from Marinette when her friends still actively support Adrienette? By supporting Adrienette, regardless of the comments they make, they’re supporting Marinette’s behavior. Same with Tikki.

Anonymous said:

Have you noticed that with love interests of Marinette and Adrien, it's always the girls who like Adrien who are shallow, mean bitches and competition to Marinette(like Lila, Chloe, Kagami at first), while the boys who like Marinette are nice, friendly, and have no competition between each other whatsoever, sometimes not even knowing there IS competition(Adrien, Luka, Nathaniel). It's just really unfair and sexist because it's like girls can't be civil/friends and must fight over a guy.

That’s been a common topic of salt for a long while, yeah, I just don’t talk about it much.

It’s a difficult subject because I’m the type who can’t hold it against the guy characters (so I won’t dislike Kagami for “being similar to Chloe/Lila in terms of aggressiveness,” for example) because it feels wrong to, but I can hate the trend itself.

It’s also doubly unfair because Marinette’s crushes blip away quickly (like Nathaniel and Nino) while Adrien’s crushes stick around specifically to upset Marinette, so it’s like the show is saying, “if there’s a character who loves/supports Marinette, they gotta either stop or leave” (I’m pretty sure I got a “Didn’t Need Burrow” about the narrative sending Luka away and I don’t doubt it).

Anonymous said:

Personal Heacanon: Marinette and Chloé used to be friends until Marinette found out what Chloé (and Sabrina) has been using her commisions (mostly elaborate traps "to guard off thieves") for. This is why Chloé has it out for Marinette specifically. This is why everyone stood by as it happened. This is why she hates liars. This is why her "friends" are so casual at making jabs at her self-stem (they never believed she never knew what Chloé was truly up to). And also why Lila had it so easy at gaslighting everyone againts her (she's "relapsing" and it's easy to think she "deserves it").

Dang. That’s intense.

Yeah, Punch has given quite a few ideas about Marinette and Chloe previously being friends if I recall correctly. I like the idea even if I never use that kind of idea myself.

Anonymous said:

I feel like Adrien could be a really cool character if they focused less on romance? If that wasn’t his only motivation, and they developed his friendships more, and they didn’t have this entitlement. I also would like more actual friendship in regards to adrien & marinette? And him actually having interest in her but denying it bc he thinks he can only like ladybug. I feel like the sexism of the creators/writers are seeping into the character a lot and ruining it, too... It makes me really sad.

I’m hoping Adrigami will help adrien sort out a lot of his stuff bc Kagami doesn’t take any crap, and I actually really like their relationships, but I don’t have much hope. I would love for the show to use her and this relationship as a way to call out and develop adrien, but I doubt that will happen bc that would mean acknowledging his flaws. It’s just disappointing, really....

Yeah, Adrien could’ve been interesting, especially if they used Adrimi to its full potential, but they don’t. The show also has a history of letting Chat Noir get away with things and not punishing him so I wouldn’t be surprised.

Anonymous said:

Honestly, I don't even ship the love square anymore, but Fanon Adrienette is a thousand times better than canon Adrienette(the same goes for every other side of the love square, obvs). It's what the canon should be but we fans can only wish. Take, for example, the whole "she's just a friend" statement. In canon Adrien makes it because he genuinely sees Marinette as that and nothing more(which of course isn't bad, it's just sad when Marinette's always humiliated for the sake of getting his love).

In fanon, he makes it because he's actually in denial about his feelings for Marinette(which reminds me of a definition for "just a friend" on Urban Dictionary, which had Adrien drawing her name with hearts and flowers around it, and yet, when Nino asked if he had a crush, he STILL insists she's just a friend!), but realizes his mistake later.

In canon, Adrien thinks Marinette is Ladybug only because it's convenient for him since she's in love with him. In fanon, he actually does notice things about her that make her similar to Ladybug, and falls for her BEFORE knowing their identities because he sees the same qualities of bravery, strength, and femininity that he sees in Ladybug(I remember one fanfic where Marinette stood up to GABRIEL'S overprotectiveness, and Adrien could only admire how much she resembled Ladybug in that moment).

In canon, Chat is ignorant of Ladybug's feelings and agency and doesn't comfort Marinette when she's sad; instead, she has to comfort him. In fanon, Chat Noir cares about how Ladybug feels and values her agency, his jokes are genuinely funny(although canon Chat can be funny too, it's just the where and when), and he backs off when Ladybug is uncomfortable. In fanon, Chat Noir genuinely helps Marinette when she's sad and sometimes comes to see her just because, not out of plot convenience(and calls her "Purrincess" a lot more, why did the English dub just change it to "little lady"?).

It makes me think, maybe, just maybe, if these things were canon and the world was fair to Marinette, I might actually ship it; it might actually have a fighting chance against Lukanette and Adrimi. But while all these things are cute, it only makes canon more disappointing. Fanon is doing what canon should be doing. Fanon is supposed to build off of what canon gave us and expand on it. Fanon shouldn't create its own alternative because canon isn't giving us enough to chew on, it shouldn't have to.

Sadly, I think most of the fans, including the Adriennette-shipping ones, should be on some level in charge of the show; things would be SO MUCH better for the main ship(which isn't even progressing that far) and SO MUCH fairer to Marinette if that were so.

I feel this very much so. The show has been around for a long time and fandom can shape a lot of things. I think the love square wouldn’t be as beloved as it is if not for the fandom expanding on it and making it better (obviously, in some cases, they don’t make it better, but the love square is plentiful so there has to be some good takes out there).

Some shows do in fact let the fandom build off the foundation it makes and then you have things like Astruc outright lying and saying that Chat apologized in “Frozer” when he, in fact, did not, which makes everything more muddled.

maxwaspace said:

What is your opinion of the Scarlet Lady webcomic by Z.O.E?

I’m not into the love square no matter how better one might do it (it’s been soured too much for me in the show), but I do get happy seeing Zoe’s art and wondering how she’ll change/expand on the plotpoints in certain episodes.

Anonymous said:

Not sure it anyone's already said this but-

Canon Audrey: you're fired!

MC Audrey: you're hired!

Okay but hear me out.

Canon Audrey being put in charge of dealing with Miraculous’ writers, MC Audrey put in charge of hiring new ones.

Anonymous said:

Something the genuinely scares me is how close some people’s predictions where for miraculous I just saw predictions people made for season 3 and it’s worrying that the worst possible scenario for them ended up happening beat for beat.

The show can be very, very predictable that way. The way I’d describe it is that I do expect these bad things to happen in really convoluted and dumb ways, but it still surprises me by exactly how predictable it ends up being. I mean, I catch certain things really easily and the phrase, “the whole episode just flashed before my eyes,” is something I commonly say.

Predictability isn’t entirely bad, but when the prediction is unwanted? Yeah, there’s a problem.

Anonymous said:

You could basically summarize the difference between what Miraculous fans want and what the Miraculous writers want by using the John Mulaney "Delta Airlines" bit as a template.

I had to get said bit explained to me since I haven’t seen that one, but yes, now I can confirm.

Anonymous said:

How do you think Chat Blanc would play out if Marinette and/or Adrien were already dating other people? Like if Marinette had already moved on, do you think the narrative would punish her for it?

I imagine it would have Adrien still be crushing on Ladybug and he’d break it off with this other person when he realized that Ladybug is Marinette, which the narrative would then promote as “the correct decision” because they’re soulmates and such. If Marinette has moved on, she probably won’t care about his advances, which would lead to Adrien getting upset and maybe being convinced that an identity reveal would solve the problem and/or speeding up getting Hawk Moth defeated/arrested.

Marinette would probably be blaming herself for not being “sensitive enough” to Adrien/Chat’s feelings, which is what led to him being akumatized.

I could also see the girl squad forcing Marinette to give Adrien the present similar to canon, but maybe the beret doesn’t have a heart and Marinette isn’t actually interested, but rolls with it because the girl squad insists on it (probably convinced that she’s denying her own feelings).

Anonymous said:

What do you think constitutes as a "strong female character"? Do you think the girls and women in Miraculous Ladybug are "strong female characters"? Why or why not(I'm sorry if this sounded like a school assignment, by the way!)? Because to me I feel like a lot of them are given depth and focus, but they're often forced into stereotypes, and let's not forget how the show derail's Marinette's character for a joke. But lots of people think a strong girl has to be boyish or else she's weak somehow.

“I'm sorry if this sounded like a school assignment“ dfhgkfdgfg

I guess it depends on what you consider a strong female character. Like, can a shy female character be “strong” if maybe she holds firm to her morals or can fight people off?

I think Marinette has the potential to be a “strong female character” but the show nerfs her using her crush on Adrien (which raises so many red flags that I can’t cover here) and all it’s really done for her is get her laughed at and humiliated. If her life didn’t revolve and get ruined so badly due to her crush on Adrien, I think she’d be a strong female character (I know what the Season 3 finale did but I’m not buying any of it until we see proper results in Season 4).

That’s not to say that characters with crushes can’t be “strong” but it has to not control their life. I mean... okay...

Would Sabrina be considered a “strong female character” if she recognized Chloe’s treatment of her and worked hard to get out of it? Is the want and attempt to move on from something what constitutes “strength,” or do they have to succeed?

My conflict is always... I want to give Marinette credit for trying to move on from Adrien, but I know that it’s just the writing trying to make things seem tense/strained just to make it feel “better” when they actually get together. You see it all the time in anime/manga where a misunderstanding/self-doubt ends up hurting the relationship of the main ship; it’s to force conflict and separation, giving the ship something to overcome so they can get together.

I will say though that shy characters can be strong, physically strong characters can be weak, and so on. What defines a “strong” character may be vague to me, but I take it as I go. I would like to say that Marinette is a strong character on her own because she wants to improve even if she fails, but I also don’t want to give the writing credit for something that ultimately means nothing. I want to say that she’s strong but the narrative seems to do everything in its power to tell me that she’s weak.

Let me give a non-Miraculous example: say that you have a pacifist character, but there’s a villain who has done terrible things, cannot be redeemed (plz do not swarm my inbox with “anyone can be redeemed” comments, this is a hypothetical), and any method besides killing them right there and now would lead to more destruction/lives lost.

You might say that that the pacifist character would be “strong” in sticking by their morals and trying to find another way even if they ultimately would fail and the villain would get away, but an argument can also be made that the pacifist is being stubborn and letting people die because they are unwilling to rethink the morality they’ve chosen. Is a pacifist a pacifist if they’re letting the blood of other people spill because they themselves aren’t willing to have the blood be on their own hands? Are they “strong” because they stuck by what they believe in or are they “weak” because they refused to expand what they believed was “right”?

You could apply that to Aang from Avatar: The Last Airbender (I know he’s not female but stick with me here). He was faced with having to murder the Fire Lord to the point where a past reincarnation who was raised on the same values as him didn’t agree with him. I think it was acceptable for him to try and stick to his morals and find another way, but he came up empty and the show had to give him a way of taking away the Fire Lord’s power so Aang didn’t have to make that choice in the end (there’s also that thing with the rock to his back and having to give up Katara but we’re not getting into that).

People could argue that, “oh, he admitted to himself that he’d have to kill the Fire Lord and then he got the Deus Ex Machina so it’s okay!” but the problem there is that the narrative basically gave two options: Murder or Take Away the Guy’s Bending, but there was incredible risk involved in the latter option. Aang almost lost himself against the Fire Lord and risked everything so that he would not have to kill him.

I would argue it makes him weak. I would argue that needing the narrative to favor him makes him weak (which is one plus for Marinette I guess the narrative is usually against her???). The lack of ability to understand his past lives and see things from their perspective made him weak for me, as him holding so stiffly to his values made it appear that he felt his ways were “better” than everyone else’s (which had been a long-standing problem for me and I never forgave him for “The Southern Raiders”).

Anonymous said:

What do you think of adriens mom Emilie. Like what do you how do you feel she wound up using the peacock miraculous personally I’m leaning into her being a villain due to the fact that there aren’t any stories of a peacock hero (unless they retcon that) and that her husband is well freaking Gabriel who has no real form of morals. Also I can’t help but think of how they got the miraculous in the first place. Anyways overall what do you think they will do with her or think of her right now.

I see her like I see any dead mom in media (I know she’s comatose, not the point); a tool for angst. Her reasons for using the peacock could be anything (might even be that she was given it and simply wearing it was damaging to her, or she transformed once to try it out and that was that), but I just don’t feel strongly about her because I’m not invested in the Agreste plot.

Me personally, I headcanon that she’s kind of like Bustier where she appears good but is actually very damaging. Instead of the generic “good mom who tried to do good things for her son but folded to angry dad’s demands,” I would like to imagine that she’s selfish in her own right and was part of the reason for Adrien never going to public school; she’s possessive herself (a contributor to why the Agrestes are so wealthy) and wants her son to remain close to her even if she genuinely cares about him and should want him to be able to go and learn from the world.

But I imagine they’ll probably make her either “pure good mom” or “villain like Gabriel where she’s ‘sympathetic’ but also evil.” The show has never been good at doing gray morality (see my MC Audrey for example) and usually messes things up if they try.

Anonymous said:

Honestly, I don't like Mme. Bustier, but if they DARE pull the pregnancy jokes with her--and I don't mean "pregnancy puns", like those would be ACTUALLY funny without offending anybody, but "ooh, she's pregnant so now she's moody and has wacky cravings and screams at everybody and is a nightmare to be around" and other things that just scream "male writer who mocks female biology and doesn't understand women", I'm going to cry. We already don't like Bridezilla, and this isn't any better.

Ugh. I don’t even like pregnancy plots in general or anything related to pregnancy (my followers who have been around forever and know of my hatred towards babies: wow what a shock!!), so adding on “jokes” like that?

Hard pass. I already don’t like Bustier so the mere idea of her potentially getting any focus there--

Anonymous said:

What do you think of the Alyanette ship? Personally, I'm ambivalent to it, but I can sorta see Alya being bi and having a crush on Marinette but Marinette doesn't like her back. Or she could have a crush on Ladybug. But I don't like the idea of it being mutual, considering how pushy and invasive Alya is. It also doesn't make sense for her to so insistently push the love square if she likes Marinette. But perhaps that's where some of her sarcastic quips come from: jealousy(cliche I know).

I’m always here for bi representation (no one can take my bi disaster headcanon’d Nino and Kagami away from me), but I actively dislike the Alyanette ship. I was okay with it back in Season 1 but it started to fall off in Season 2 and officially die in Season 3.

I don’t judge people by what they ship (...much; there’s obviously that little part of me that can’t help giving the side eye) but yeah, not for me.

Anonymous said:

As a different flavor of angst: Can you imagine Marinette’s class going to Riverside park in NYC and Tikki spotting the Jeanne D’Arc statue? I always wondered what it would have been like for Tikki to see Jeanne burned alive by the people she swore to protect. I think Nobody briefly touched on this for Witch Hunter, but not many people I have seen (probably missed something) talk about it. What do you think?

I’m indifferent to past holders getting mentioned and acknowledged; not sure how I feel about them given specific names and such (I kinda like seeing their designs and such but making them actual people from the real world? mmmm not here for that as much).

I like the idea though of addressing those real world things and having the kwami reacting to them. Like, it did make me genuinely sad in the New York special to see Liiri come out and call out Gilbert’s name, only to see this other guy standing there and we know that this Gilbert guy is very much dead by now.

On a related note, I’d be all for a special getting into a kwami’s problem and not making everything Marinette’s fault, so having Marinette maybe helping a kwami through theri issues and it leads into getting more lore on the kwami.

Anonymous said:

I just had an epiphany today: People who hate on Marinette for being "mean" to Lila/teachers telling Marinette to ignore Chloe and Lila and treat them nicely are the equivalent of real adults telling girls who are being bullied by boys that "he does it because he likes you." Ladies, raise your hands if something like this has ever happened: "Jamal tried to cut my cheek open with a razor!" "Oh, Aaliyah, he's only doing it because he likes you." Now that I've seen it I can't unsee it. Disgusting.

“Marinette, they’re just jealous of you, that’s all! Can you really get angry at them for that??”

us: yes

Anonymous said:

Thinking about Puppeteer 2 and how Marinette's identity could have been blown if she had talked to Tikki because of Plagg's incompetence angers me beyond belief because I know, just KNOW, if that had actually happened, Marinette would take ALL THE BLAME for it like there's no tomorrow. It would never occur to anyone that she normally talks to Tikki while she's alone and had no idea that the "statue" in front of her was a real boy AND her partner, or that Plagg should have said something. Ugh.

I KNOW, RIGHT????

That was such a big annoyance to me in that episode. They literally neglected the actual reality of what would happen (”Oh, Tikki! No one’s here, I could practice on this Adrien statue!”) for the sake of humiliating Marinette... again.

Anonymous said:

Your comment about how Ladybug always says she's "in love with someone else", as if that should matter diddly squat when the problem is with Chat not respecting her feelings on their own without another guy in the picture reminds me of a #YesAllWomen post I saw on Twitter. It read: "'I have a boyfriend' is the easiest way to get a man to leave you alone. Because he respects another man more than you." It's just like this except without the dating and the fact that Chat DOESN'T leave her alone.

And then you remember that the “someone else” she’s in love with is the exact person who’s disrespecting her feelings and you proceed to hate everything.

Anonymous said:

The statue scene in Puppeteer 2 could've easily kept its humor by having Adrien fall over when Marinette puts her weight on him and almost kisses him, then Marinette goes "Gasp! You're not a statue!" Marinette is always being forced to humiliate herself in the name of "love", even when she doesn't deserve it, so for once, let Adrien be the one utterly humiliated of his own doing. Then they could have a sad scene where Adrien ACTUALLY comforts her and...wait for it...LEARNS A LESSON.

Alternatively, someone who works on the statues comes in and, also mistaking Adrien for a statue, tries to do some sort of work on him.

Anonymous said:

Since we can all agree that this show is sadly not very good at girl power/inclusivity, how would you tweak the show to make it more genuinely female-empowering/inclusive(can include racial/sexual inclusivity)? Besides the obvious(including more female and/or POC writers on board).

Orientation-related inclusivity isn’t even that hard. Have a character get a call from someone and just be like, “oh, it’s my boyfriend/girlfriend,” and then other companies can just dub it if they’re so afraid of characters who like the same gender.

Firstly, I’d have Marinette learn and become more of a mentor character to other characters (male and female), lean more into more “females in power” (like Mylene showing genuine interest in being the next mayor), either less focus on the “girl antagonists are evil/unredeemable” plots or at least make them legitimate threats that don’t need the narrative to cater to them to make them threatening.

Secondly, Adrien needs to STOP being the one to keep telling Marinette/Ladybug what’s right or the way to do things. I can’t stress this one enough.

Thirdly, maybe not having a season dedicated to three guys getting miraculouses while all the girls are either questioned, self-reveal, or get their miraculous revoked. That might help. :P

Anonymous said:

The saddest thing is that I can see ML going through a "Fate: The Winx Saga" in the future and having an awful, edgy reboot to appeal more to adults.

Different writers probably but at what cost.

+ more sexualization obviously since that’s usually what “more adult” means; Audrey gets the cleavage that her design clearly calls for at least, but again, at what cost

Anonymous said:

I hate what TheOnesWhoMustNotBeNamed have done to the Love Square but I also don't like Lukanette and Adrigami (nothing against the characters themselves). This is going to be one of those shows that regardless what ship wins is going to disappoint around 90% of the fans.

No hate for not liking Lukanette/Adrimi, I understand that.

And yeah, there’s a <1% chance that they can pull out anything satisfying.

Anonymous said:

Off topic, but I realized why I don’t like Clara Nightingale’s design, there’s no light to her eyes, makes her look kinda dead, kinda evil.

DQ tend to do that when they’re the ones animating. I remember “Christmaster” doing particularly well with the eye highlights.

Anonymous said:

What do you think about the future Miraculous specials (Africa, Japan, Rio, Shanghai, London)?

Will be happy to see a new setting because it shows different cultures (though there’s always the chance that the culture is poorly-represented) but that’s basically it. Specials are usually just a cash grab that are just there and any expansion on lore and such is shunted to the side for the sake of love square drama, judging by the New York special.

Anonymous said:

I haven't watched the New York Special yet, don't think I can bring myself to tbh, but this whole time I thought Aeon was the name of the superhero persona, and that the fandom was collectively calling her civilian identity Uncanny Valley bc her model was that bad.

I was genuinely shocked to find out that her civilian identity is named Aeon and that her hero name is Uncanny Valley bc that is not only a stupid name, but kind of insulting since she's an android character of color. (Well, she's a character of color except for when shes running around as a pale naked superhero. Majestia, give your kid some pants!)

oof

Yeah, the Uncanny Valley thing threw me off too. “Aeon” really does sound like a superhero name.

I can’t believe they made her a robot and were like, “mannequin robot design.” I question so many things about the decisions made around Aeon fdkjgjfdg.

Anonymous said:

Do you think they’ll ever leave DuPont college, since it’s a middle school (essentially) and go to a lycee (high school)? I think they’re in their second year of four at DuPont, judging by the previous class picture.

I doubt it, unless we get more seasons? It would mean having to model a whole new school.

Anonymous said:

So I was reading again tikki brand boyfriend and this come to my mind and I have to share it with you.... Tikki is the mother in law of marinette in the future lol (sorry if this isn't the right blog to ask this) (I love yours au, you are amazing!)

(this is the wrong blog, yes, you’re looking for mc-lukanette, not miraculouscontent)

Thank you though! i agree, that’s cute, ahaha~

Anonymous said:

Did you know that there's a TV Tropes page for LadyBugOut?! And someone even left a review there saying they liked it and that they were sick of the Marinette embarrassing and wanted some Lukanette. They say your au is their favorite au in the fandom! Isn't that just swell?

Yes! And the TV Tropes page is fantastic! Thank you!

Anonymous said:

OMG IVE FIGURED OUT WHY MARINETTE IS UNABLE TO GET OVER ADRIEN!!! She’s under the influence of a love potion called Amortentia, which causes a powerful obsession from the drinker (it’s from Harry Potter). That’s why she’s so obsessed, and that’s why she can’t get over Adrien! She literally can’t while under the influence of the potion! She just needs to drink the antidote, and then she can finally be free!

Oh no!! Someone get this poor girl an antidote, STAT!

Anonymous said:

I was just reading your review of Silencer(which I totally agree with by the way), and when I got to the part about how Ladybug lost her voice and her powers are voice-activated, it got me thinking about how annoying Chat was being(as another anon noted, which I also agree with), and then it hit me. While it may just come off as his usual flirtatious banter that's innocent, the fact that he doesn't even seem to mind Ladybug not being able to detransform because then he gets to "be with her" forever and ever and ever amen just proves your point about Chat Blanc. He cares more about being with Ladybug than Ladybug herself, so long as she gets to keep being Ladybug "for him", that's what matters. Remember that the girl he fell in love with was the superhero persona and not the girl under the mask. He couldn't care less about who that actual girl is so long as she's his "lady" and loves him back. He just wants her to uphold the image of his strong and powerful "lady" that he admires.

(Glad you enjoyed the “Silencer” review! Thanks!)

Full agreement here! Chat isn’t really in love with Ladybug; he’s in love with the image he’s made of her and wants to keep it that way, no matter how much he may suggest otherwise.

Anonymous said:

Luka is soooo much more interesting with Marinette like, why isn't he the love interest? Same with Kagami for Adrien. To be honest it would be cool if the show set up the love square at first but then slowly started to change to Lukanette and Adrimi once Marinette and Adrien realized their crushes were just not working out. They can still have an identity reveal, but they'll refreshingly stay friends. But the writers don't have the ovaries to do that, I get it. -_- Such wasted potential.

They could’ve done a really interesting bait-and-switch but they decided not to. The love square is full of holes and flaws that they’re very likely never going to address (outside of anything used for that “gAsP maybe they won’t get together???” drama), so having it actually be addressed and be like, “okay, we’re better as friends,” would’ve gone over so much better.

Anonymous said:

I hear people complain all the time that Lukanette is toxic because Luka is merely the "second choice" for Marinette, and that she just uses him as a rebound when she fails to get Adrien's attention. But the truth is, that's not how it is at all. Luka's not anywhere near her "second choice". He gives her tranquility and stability, and she helps him loosen up and have someone to express his creativity towards. Plus, it's totally normal for teens to have two crushes whom they can't choose between.

THIS

ALL OF THIS

I am so tired of people saying that Marinette is “using” Luka in someway as if it’s a conscious decision on her part to take advantage him.

Luka makes her happy. That’s it. Luka is aware of how she feels and respects her space, but I guess that makes him a “pushover” and “he lets Marinette walk all over him” because he didn’t get upset with her and embarrass her in “Desperada” by calling her out over her Adrien blindness.

Anonymous said:

People who say "I like Marinette but she's getting to be pretty embarrassing sometimes" really don't get that the show constantly forces her into situations where she's embarrassed and made out to be incompetent. Like, it's not her that's embarrassing, it's the show that's always embarrassing her. Kind of like Serena/Usagi in the (shitty)DiC English dub of Sailor Moon. It's getting irritating to hear people continually rag on Marinette as if SHE'S the clueless idiot, rather than the writers.

There are some things that happen to her that she literally could not have predicted. Like, just saying, if I had someone claiming to be my friend, I would expect them to know I’m anxiety-prone and not pretend to be a statue just

Anonymous said:

Remarried Empress Anon: I can see Felix as the Duke and maybe Jagged Stone as Kosair (but an uncle and not her brother).

I agree with both of those! Jagged Stone as Kosair/Koshar, omg.

Plus, the idea of Luka and Felix being “friends” amuses me.

Anonymous said:

You know, I find Felix/Marinette content to be really funny. Because, Felix in fanfiction is a completely different character than his canon self- with a different personality, background, and maybe even last name. So, the entire Marinette/Felix fandom is literally just Marinette/oc except it's always the same oc

I struggle to get fully behind Felinette because so much of it does rely on fandom interpretation and playing with fanon in general (plus, having to clarify “I ship fanon Felinette” is weird).

I do however agree that it’s interesting that it ultimately comes to a character built on fanon grounds, and how much more acceptance characters get when they’re based on “canon”/originally canon characters.

Anonymous said:

How would you write the Miraculous PV version? Just wondering.

I don’t think I could without drastically changing characters and at that point it’s not really the PV anymore. “Bridgette“ and Felix’s relationship is the exact opposite of what I like to watch/read about so yeah, changing both of them to what I like would either be too severe of a rewrite or me working too far within the restrictions set out for me.

Anonymous said:

There's a YouTube video claiming that someone will figure out that Marinette is Ladybug and that she will suffer...I mean, yeah? Isn't that what we've already been getting? I mean, not the first part, obviously(and when we have, it's been undone), but the second? Have we been watching the same show? No, have we? Because Marinette suffering, sadly, is not anything new.

lol “Marinette will suffer!” and us like “did you seriously use future tense as if Marinette isn’t already suffering??”

Anonymous said:

Am I the only one who feels like Miraculous Ladybug is feeling less like a magical girl show and more like just another superhero show? This isn't even because of "girl power" or anything like that, or the fact that there are male Miraculous wielders like Chat and Carapace and(long dreamy sigh) Viperion. This is because the outfits don't really resemble magical girl outfits at all and, after watching various magical girl shows both in and out of Japan, Miraculous is starting to feel like its genre is shifting from magical girl to that of "superhero" in its broadest term. And I know I said I wouldn't bring up "girl power", but the fact that so many of the girls aren't treated respectfully by the narrative and are pitted against each other, to the point where they're more likely to lose their Miraculouses or reveal their identities(which often culminates in losing their Miraculouses), only adds to this because the Magical Girl genre is about female empowerment and solidarity.

It's sad because I really don't want this show to become one of those shows where "there might be one or two girls, and she might even be the lead, but it's still mostly guys who are front and center doing the heavy lifting" that we get all the time. Things are starting to change for the better and I want Miraculous to capitalize on that emergence of female empowerment as much as possible. Plus, with the New York Special, the magical girl aspects of the show have been toned down if not obliterated entirely: the transformations for the superheroes only last one minute, and they feel more like the Avengers than Sailor Senshi(which I don't mean in the most literal sense, of course, I am in no way saying that none of them can be male.). Plus they pulled the whole "Samus is a Girl" thing TWICE! TWICE! Come on, if you're show is really about girl power, it shouldn't come as a surprise when girls are, well...powerful! And especially not in Magical Girl for obvious reasons.

So while I'm not saying it's bad for a show to shift from the original genre it was meant to be in(although it must be done carefully, otherwise it looks like you don't know what you're doing), and there is of course no wrong way to do Magical Girl(except for Madoka Magica and Yuki Yuna, do NOT go there!), it does make me wonder. And it's kind of disappointing, because I really love Magical Girl and I feel like shows like these could introduce the genre to a wider audience and could renovate it as well. But unfortunately they're going a different direction, and that makes me sad. If not for the transformation phrases/sequences and the fact that they have animal companions, I imagine most people would be totally clueless as to how on Earth this show counts as Magical Girl. It still counts as such for me, but it's deviating farther and farther away from the genre to the point where it becomes nigh unrecognizable, or like even the show writers forgot what genre it's supposed to be. Sadly.

Yikes.

Yeah, I can’t imagine how seeing this show must be like for people that are more savvy with magical girl shows. Me personally, I had to be told that it was a magical girl show because it honestly just gave off the “superhero show” vibes even with the magical girl-esque transformations.

Plus, with magical girls, you usually expect a group of girls? Here, we have Ladybug and Chat Noir, who the writers keep being like “they’re equals” which... yeah, that’s fine but it doesn’t really work with the idea that this is a magical girl show? I mean, “Party Crasher” was basically Ladybug and her reverse harem of superhero guys who just got out of a “males-only” party.

I dunno, coming from someone who doesn’t have a lot of experience with magical girl shows, it just doesn’t have what I would expect when I think “magical girl show featuring a healthy dose of girl power.”

Anonymous said:

I was once reading this review of Miraculous Ladybug called "Miraculous Ladybug is a Hot Mess: A Rant", and while it's a good video and you should watch it and I totally agree with everything she said(plus, it made me laugh a few times!), I had a huge issue with the way she made Marinette's stammering around Adrien to be ALL HER FAULT since he's never mean to her and is always patient with her(yeah, more like oblivious), but that "she's incompetent" and "cockblocks herself", which annoys me because Marinette on her own is not the incompetent one here(I also don't like the term "cockblock", like, can we not? But anyway...), rather, it's the writers who make her incompetent for cheap laughs and don't allow her to improve or let anyone(but Luka, bless his kind soul!) truly be on her side. She then had the nerve to say "Marinette needs to learn to define herself outside of who she's crushing on", when, NO, once again, the WRITERS are the ones who define her by her crush on Adrien.

It's one thing to blame a character for something even when she's clearly written by a writer, because characters are supposed to be consistent yet flexible and have free will in-universe. But when she's written this inconsistently/it's obvious the writers have it out for her(to the point where they even say it) it is nigh impossible to pretend it's an aspect of the character herself and not the writers at fault. THAT'S where you draw the line between blaming the character vs the writer.

In fact, speaking of Luka, she also said that she wants the show to get rid of Luka because he's just a "plot device" and has no reason to like her beyond the fact that she's a "funny girl". She also said that Luka is a stereotype of the "cute bad boys who are emo", when that's blatantly untrue. She's allowed to not like Lukanette but all the things she's saying really ignore the point of his character and that his life DOESN'T revolve around Marinette; the writers simply don't respect him.

Even worse, she contradicted herself by saying that Lukanette is pointless because "we all know that Marinette is going to get with Adrien; it's endgame so why does the show even bother with Luka?" Then right after that says that Kagami's okay and that it's okay for Adrien to move onto Kagami because Ladybug has rejected him as Chat so many times(which is apparently not the case for Adriennette because "MaRiNeTtE's JuSt InCoMpEtEnT" right?). So teenage girls aren't allowed to like other boys or date more than one boy, yet teenage boys can date as many chicks as they like. Nice.

And apparently, any problem in a relationship or potential relationship is the girl's fault no matter what. She can't approach him because Goddess forbid girls not always be perfect and capable? She's incompetent and it's all her fault she can't properly talk to a perfectly nice, cute, FAMOUS boy. She rejects him every time he confesses despite him knowing it will fail. Her fault for being mean and not giving him a chance. She gets tired of chasing him and decides to look at someone else since it's not like she's legally married to Boy #1? She should stick with the original boy since they're gonna get together anyway. He gets tired of chasing her and decides to look at someone else since it's not like he's legally married to Girl #1? She should've realized his feelings for her and returned them since they're gonna be endgame anyway. Has this lady ever even been a teenage girl?

Plenty of teenage girls get tongue-tied around the one they love even if he or she is a perfectly nice, sweet person, it doesn't mean they're incompetent(especially when the girls are fictional characters in a world set out to punish them for not making progress and for trying to make progress at the same time, and the fact that the boy is a celebrity who is always made oblivious and kept distant enough from the girl so she can keep putting him on a pedestal and never truly get to know him). Plenty of teenage girls lose interest in one boy and so fall for another. Yet it's somehow only okay for boys to do it? Seriously?

And then for the episode "Ladybug", the reviewer continues to rag on Marinette, blaming her for the fact that her reaction to getting expelled was "I can't let that nasty Hawkmoth win", claiming she wasn't reacting like a normal teen or human in general would react in that scenario, completely ignoring the fact that it's TIKKI who doesn't comfort Marinette and forces her to focus on her duties as Ladybug and almost getting akumatized. She's right about the plot moving too fast, but she doesn't take into account WHY it's moving too fast, because the show doesn't focus on Marinette's inner struggle and what she has to go through. Instead of giving her time to process her thoughts after all that goes on and providing Tikki as a source of comfort and support(which she's, you know, SUPPOSED to be), they make Tikki berate her and force Marinette to push it to the side.

She's never allowed to feel. And that's why it hurts all the more when this woman insults Marinette for her perceived ineptitude, and she's fully allowed to dislike Marinette, critique her behaviors, dislike Luka, critique his role in the story etc., just don't reinforce a double standard as you do so and look closer: ultimately most of Marinette's problems are due to her not being permitted to FEEL. She's not allowed to be nervously in love, or be calm, or be offended, or be just not ready.

The writers keep pushing her in one direction, to be emotionless, to be selfless, to be nice, to be honest, to be "the mature/responsible one" to be a perfect little "Purrincess", to not push for or want anything for herself, even though the show is supposed to be about girl power! She does somewhat touch on that by saying that Ladybug never gets to "take a hit" and that the Marichat scene in Glaciator was too short, but she never goes into why everything is too-fast paced. And if she did, she wouldn't be saying everything she does about Marinette and Luka. Because Luka is more than just the "plot device" she dismisses him as.

He's like a calm oasis, the apple of the hurricane who keeps Marinette calm and just lets. her. breathe. He's possibly the only person who doesn't berate her, who doesn't mimic her, who doesn't insult her, who doesn't ignore her. And the one time he does, he apologizes RIGHT AWAY when he sees how sad she looks. And the funny thing is, I used to hate that scene, because when I first saw it, I thought "Oh man! Luka did the same thing as everyone else did once!" But now I see that it serves as a contrast, whether intentionally or unintentionally, to the other characters in the show. Whereas they never apologize for how they treat Marinette(and often she somehow ends up apologizing instead, sadly) and in fact seem oblivious to it at times or just don't care, Luka notices, Luka cares, and Luka apologizes. That shows that he cares about her and her feelings, unlike the rest of the characters in the show.

And while they do care about her, they're never held accountable for how they treat her. Anarka and Plagg are probably the only exceptions that I can think of(who contribute to the plot of course), but they're obviously not love interests, and the video doesn't talk about them, so I won't talk about them either. But my point is that this review, while good in other ways, is still problematic in this regard, for how it completely ignores Marinette's struggles and how they affect her, as well as the value of Luka's character(even if the show doesn't recognize it at times) and the POSITIVE effect they have on each other(especially since he actually, genuinely, wholeheartedly loves her and is patient with her, since Adrien is barely even her friend and Chat is pushy and entitled. And he has a life outside of her too, which this video chooses to ignore.)! So yeah, I'm sorry this took so long, but I just had to protect my favorite characters because that video did them so dirty. Thank you for coming to my Lukanette Ted Talk! Have a miraculous day! ;3

...Wow????

Can I just say wow??

Firstly, kudos to you for having the patience to not only write all of that, but simultaneous deal within Tumblr’s limitations while doing so? I almost wish I had a video detailing all of these topics (not exactly a video response to that person, but just detailing all of this without explicitly calling people out).

Secondly, I absolutely, 100% feel you on the double standards. I have seen so much hypocrisy in my experiences and it’s insane how people will bash Marinette relentlessly and then let Adrien off with a bunch of excuses, or hate Luka for essentially existing and then accept Kagami.

I also hate the idea of disliking Luka because he’s there to make Marinette feel better, and then liking Kagami because she causes conflict, like the implication is that conflict equals good and things that make Marinette feel loved and cared for are bad because love square endgame, I guess.

It’s exhausting, especially when Marinette is fourteen, clearly tries, but is getting no support. Like, have you ever thought how weird it was that Tom and Sabine seemingly knew back in “Gamer” that Marinette was crushing on Adrien, but in “Weredad,” they don’t worry about the fact that Marinette is into someone else or wonder what might’ve happened with Adrien, like if he might’ve hurt her in some way? If the assumption is, “oh, they just think that’s a teenage thing, flip-flopping between love interests,” well... Tom clearly takes what he thinks to be her current crush very seriously, and even if it was true that they presume she’s just flip-flopping, that really doesn’t show them to see Marinette as more than just a clumsy teenager-in-love stereotype.

So yeah, the characters who are meant to be there to support her ask no questions, but here’s Luka with his sweet “you can tell me everything or nothing, you can be yourself around me,” line, and yet... Luka is the problem???

Sure, how dare this sweet boy NOT cause Marinette more stress. He makes Marinette feel better about herself and therefore he’s “pointless” (which, really, is the true mark of someone who doesn’t care about Marinette).

Ugh.

But yeah, in conclusion, people can have insane double standards when it comes to Luka and Marinette, and thank you for the Lukanette Ted Talk, this was a really good piece! You have a nice day too! ;3

(note: the below ask seems to cut short at the end and I didn’t get a message back about it but I at least wanted to have it here so the anon has (most of?) their story heard even if I can’t properly comment on it:)

Anonymous said:

Relating to the ask about Marinette imagining the events of the series. For me it would be realistic as I sort of see myself in her position for some parts, especially how her friends are represent (mainly Alya) and I can see myself picturing the events of the story (surrounding them) to some extent.

I'm continuing on to explain and rant about how I relate to Marinette. So about Alya's pushiness with Marinette's crush and how she won't let her move on. I used to be sort of friends with this person and one day we hanging out at school and she started badgering me to tell her who my crush was, even though I told her I didn't have one (I didn't have one but even if I did it wasn't her business, especially because we hadn't really interacted for a couple years).

She pressured me enough that I felt the need to make up a person, then she called me out just after I did it because she knew I was lying but didn't realise how uncomfortable I was lucky we were by ourselves so no one could hear how embarrassing it was. It still is but I sort have gotten over it (that's why I'm hear complaining). For her being made to sit by herself because everyone else paired of, I can relate.

I have never been the person who is really close with the friend group (probably because I'm quiet and struggle to interact with others), but I still I hang out during class time, but there have been times when two of the friends sat together and the other friend chose not to sit with me but just in front of me (the tables can fit two people at them) until one friend I went to primary school asked "what about [me]", so them she sat next to me.

The person I went to primary school with also has chosen to sit with the person who was not to sit with me so she could sit closer to the other two friends diagonally across from me on the table next to mine. I can understand Marinette in The Chameleon for how she would of felt when her friends turned in because I am left wondering if my friends even like me, although primary school friend sometimes tried to get to wait with them when we were waiting for the teacher to show up.

As I mentioned earlier I anxious when trying to interact with people who are even considered my friends so I wait for them to invite me to hangout with them. And for the ending of The Chameleon when everything went back to normal, in primary school we had this task we were told research a person and write a biography on them so as the teacher told us we were writing a good copy and the work in our books was a rough draft.

I wrote the information down as I would the good copy to make sure I was happy with it. When we were writing the good copy, I started to worry I had done something wrong as I had seen my friends work and they bith had just written down the facts. So as my friends and I kept having arguments and fights so I told them that I hoped I remembered to spell all the names correctly because they were not names I was knew how to spell which was true so they didn't question it as I could tell they did

#category: salt #character: Marinette Dupain Cheng #relationship: love square #character: Adrien Agreste #category: fandom #MC: Audrey Bourgeois #episode: Chat Blanc #character: Emilie Agreste #character: Caline Bustier #relationship: Alya Cesaire & Marinette Dupain Cheng #episode: The Puppeteer 2 #MC's Adjustments #adjustment: romance #category: staff #character: Clara Nightingale #episode: Silencer #relationship: Luka Couffaine & Marinette Dupain Cheng #relationship: Felix Graham de Vanily & Marinette Dupain Cheng #other: askplosion

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tepkunset · 4 years ago

Photo

@avatarfandompolice is a blog that likes to misuse progressive language in attempt to make ignorant, racist posts sound more intelligent than they are. While most of their blog consists of arguing about ‘zutara,’ (which I recently learned is a ship name for Zuko and Katara from an anon), there is also a large number of posts and reblogs under the premise of being “hot takes” on how unfair it is to address racism in fandom and in media.

Avatarfandompolice is very sensitive about people pointing out that Avatar: The Last Airbender is not, in fact, flawless. That a show made by two white men featuring Asian and Indigenous characters and influences is fully capable of getting things wrong. That their western colonial views are influences all on their own, and it shows. Rather than listen to fans of colour point out things like these posts for example: [Link] [Link] [Link], avatarfandompolice has decided that such things must simply be fake, and has made multiple posts complaining it. This is not just regular ignorance, this is wilful ignorance. The dismissal of critique simply because they cannot fathom not everyone being able to handle the amount of issues they are freely educating others on, or people holding the ability to like something overall while also pointing out where it could be better.

It is my firm belief that you should never absorb media with an uncritical eye. If this was the case, if people just accepted everything given to them, then we would never see any progress. We need to be able to look back at something and say here’s what we did right, and here’s what we need to do better with.

The argument that A:TLA was made in 2012 and therefore should not be analyzed with a modern understanding of the world is downright hilarious, too. As if we aren’t taught to write literature analysis on books and plays that are centuries old in school. In particular regards to the whole cop thing... if anyone reading this seriously thinks that hate and fear of the police is just a 2020 trend, you can meet me in the pit. I was four years old when I learned how terrifying cops are. If your experiences differ, let me tell you that does not make them universal. And as for all the 20-somethings talking about it today, well, gentle reminder that as said by avatarfandompolice right here, the show aired in 2012. Little 10-year-old kids don’t have social media, (at least I hope they don’t,) and unless they grew up experiencing first-hand police terror, probably were not aware of it at that age. I do not know why avatarfandompolice insults people's ability to grow and learn. I can only guess it’s jealously from their lack of ability to do so.

Now let’s address their defences of whitewashing, which is easily the most backwards reaching I’ve seen on this issue in a while. Primarily their defence relies on four repetitive “points” —

Fake minuscule percentages to downplay the high prevalence and extremity of whitewashing in the fandom

Deflecting the addressing of whitewashing with rapid-fire fake scenarios and claims of “reverse racism” / “blackwashing”

Claiming whitewashing isn’t real because people only care about it with Katara

Claiming that calling out whitewashing in fandom is wrong because it hurts artists

I have only so much as dipped my toes into the A:TLA fandom, and even I have seen a lot of whitewashed fan art. If you do an image search for fan art, I guarantee within the first couple rows of results, there will be in the absolute least, a few examples. The idea of these artworks not substantially lightening skin is also just plain inaccurate. Just from a quick Google search, this is literally the first result for ‘Avatar The Last Airbender Katara fan art’:

Avatarfandompolice is also hyper-focused on the lightening of skin, and seems to be under the impression that this is the only component of whitewashing. I come to this conclusion because when someone pointed out the equal prevalence of depicting these characters of colour with Western European features instead of their actual eyes, noses, etc., they rip a giant turd out of their ass and scrawl the words “but stereotyping” over it. No, not all Asian peoples and Indigenous peoples look the same. The original poster made no such claim of this at all. Avatarfandompolice jumped to this conclusion all on their own... (which really says a lot in itself). It is entirely unrelated to the point. The point being the erasure of how these characters look, in favour of giving them whiter features. And guess what? This does hurt. But I’ll get to that below.

The lack of understanding of whitewashing is on full display when avatarfandompolice talks about “blackwashing”; the idea that colouring characters with darker skin is just like whitewashing. Firstly, there is no such thing as “blackwashing.” “Blackwashing,” “brownwashing,” etc. does not exist because it is a false equivalency to whitewashing. It is a false equivalency to whitewashing because white people are not even in the slightest loosing representation when a white character is re-imagined as a racial minority, whereas when racial minorities are re-imagined as white people, they are taking away from what is already very little representation for us. If we lived in a world where the statistics of representation were not so drastically disproportionate, then there would be something to talk about. But if you are really wanting to support equality, you should focus on equitably supporting those who actually need it, not white people. As for specifically depicting characters like Sokka and Katara with darker skin than what they have in the show, the same applies, (so long as it’s not racebending them as we really shouldn’t be taking representation away from each other, and the artist avatarfandompolice ridicules above has done no such thing,) because colourism also exists within nonwhite communities as well.

As for the fake questions about cosplaying, the answer is really simple: Cosplay however you want, but don’t make pretending to be a different race part of your cosplay. If you want to cosplay Katara, you can do it without painting your skin darker, aka brownface. If you want to cosplay Zuko, you can do it without editing yourself to look East Asian, aka digital yellowface. The racist history behind this is an internet search away, but I suppose that is too difficult for avatarfandompolice to do.

Avatarfandompolice has made multiple claims that people must not really care about whitewashing if they only call it out for Katara. It is laughable at best, and sad at worst, that this is the conclusion they come to, and not the fact that unfortunately Katara just happens to be subjected to more whitewashing than other characters. I assume this is from a mix of her popularity as well as being a WOC and not MOC. This is not to say that whitewashing does not exist with male characters—not in the slightest. Half the images on this “10 fan art pictures of Sokka that are just the best” list from CBR are whitewashed. Only that across fandoms, whitewashing is more prevalent in female characters, by my observations at least.

Finally—and this one pisses me off the most—avatarfandompolice claims that whitewashing is no big deal, but calling out whitewashing is too harmful to justify. How fucking dare you put the feelings of artists who can’t handle critique of their work (that they publicly share) over fans of colour, who are constantly subjected to seeing our identities and looks not being worth respecting. As if it doesn’t imprint on your mind from a very young age how only villains ever have your facial features, because they’re ugly and I guess that means you’re ugly. As if there is something wrong with you. As if respecting you is regarded as extra effort, and not just common courtesy.

Whitewashing is a form of colourism, which is a form of racism. It is the favouritism, unconscious or not, of white features and the erasure of visible characters of colour. It is not fandom drama. It is not being too lazy to focus on “real issues” because it is part of a real issue. It is yet another part of why fandom spaces are so uninviting to POC. We live in a society that favours lighter skin. Corporations make fortunes from selling products to bleach your skin, products to contour your features away or go as far as surgery, all to meet beauty standards set by and influenced by white colonizers. That does not exist in A:TLA, and that’s called refreshing escapism. But it’s hard to escape that when the fandom constantly reminds you otherwise. It is a perfect example of how the classic “just let people enjoy things” complaint is nothing but disguised racism, because it’s only ever said regarding white fans’ enjoyment, at the expense of fans of colour.

None of the characters in A:TLA are white. Redesigning them and recolouring them as if they are, be it out of accident or intent is wrong. If you get called out for it, apologize, learn from the experience and do better going forward. You’ll also improve your art this way.

Beyond excusing whitewashing, avatarfandompolice has overt racist posts as well. A Black fan said they like to headcanon Katara as being partially Black; “I swear Katara was a sister. Im convinced there ain't no way she didn't have some black in her.” Avatarfandompolice jumps in saying “She's literally an Inuit but ok” as if being an Inuk person means Katara can’t possibly also be Black. The OP never claimed Katara was not Indigenous, simply that they also saw her as Black. Black Indigenous peoples exist. Black Inuk peoples exist. It is overtly anti-Black to say otherwise. But what even is the point of talking to avatarfandompolice about that? You know, you would think in trying to put such a front up of caring about the Inuit, they would do the most basic learning of the proper grammatical use of Inuit and Inuk. (As is the case with a great many Indigenous Nations, Inuit is both the Nation and plural. Inuk is singular. “An Inuit” / “Inuits” as avatarfandompolice has used just makes their dressed-up racism all the more pathetic. It’s similar to as if you said “Chinas” instead of “Chinese”.)

But all this is nothing, nothing compared to the worst post I had the displeasure of seeing. In a single post, avatarfandompolice manages to squeeze in insult against low income people, Mexican people, Jewish people, and Black people in a mockery of financial help posts. Absolutely disgusting, childish behaviour from a place of privilege. As someone who has had no option but to make such a post before, more than once, let me fucking tell you that the embarrassment and desperation when in that situation is unparalleled. It is not done lightly. It is done when you are at the last resort of having nothing but hope that the combined generosity of others will be enough to save you and your family. And what adds a whole other level to the odiousness of avatarfandompolice’s post is that they specifically targeting low income minorities to boot. Because we’re all poor beggars, right?

All in all, for someone who prides themselves in calling others ignorant, avatarfandompolice has to be one of the most obtuse fandom blogs I have ever scrolled through. They are as vile as they are pathetic, and my sincere sympathy for anyone who has been unfortunate enough to interact with them. It has been a while since I so strongly recommend blocking someone.

#avatarfandompolice #atla #atla fandom #racism #whitewashing #long post #fit for a queue

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pyropiglin · 4 years ago

Text

rant: twitter and eret’s apology

this doesn't really affect mcytblr that much but i am quite frustrated with twitter at the moment. rant under the cut.

disclaimer: I am poc and have adhd so I feel I can comment on the situation also I am so sorry if I come off rude, I really don’t intend to. also most of what I say is a twitter issue and not something i have seen mcyt tumblr

real quick background:

tonight I joined eret's stream as I usually do homework during his streams and I come to find out they are dealing with a controversy over the diversity in the smp. apparently in last night’s stream a donation asked them about the lack of diversity in the smp and they responded by talking about ponk as ponk had shared his culture experience with eret. tonight eret spent the first couple minutes of their stream apologizing for implying that ponk was all the representation needed and/or that quackity and skeppy weren't poc. in summary, it was a misunderstanding of eret’s intentions.

my issue with this:

first, I am mexican, also I do have a twitter and did browse through the eret tag to see what others were saying, but my twitter is not associated with mcyt, I am not on mcyt stan twitter and do not wish to be. now I understand that a lot of the people in the mcyt fandom are young (I am 18 and in college), however the current trend of feeling the need to "cancel" (although this may not have been the intention) people is not progressive. first of all, eret in my opinion, was not in the wrong, in fact just as they said, they didnt want to say any false information about the other members of the smp, so he only mentioned ponk who he had spoken to. while I understand how their words could have been misunderstood, the drama it seems to have caused was not necessary. as I said before, a lot of people in this fandom are young, so they are generally more quick to jump on bandwagons but I think there are a few things everyone should remember before deciding to claim that someone has done something out of pocket.

1. make sure you have all the information: for one eret likely has little to no control over who is whitelisted on the smp, as a result they likely have no ability to directly change the diversity on the server

2. ask someone educated: I mean this more than just asking a person of color, ask someone who has more knowledge about the situation what they think. for example, ponk who outright stated that the statements towards eret were falsely motivated. this could also include older fans (I say this lightly, but in my experience, the adult members of fandoms seem to approach these situations with more nuance)

3. think about how spreading this type of information will affect others: as seen tonight eret publicly addressed 16k viewers on this controversy, and obviously seemed anxious about it, enough so that many donations referenced their anxiety. now I say this next part as a person with adhd, eret has stated multiple times that they are neurodivergent (adhd + dyslexia) and have anxiety, and with this type of repeated hate they have received recently I completely understand why their mental health is not great at the moment (this has been stated in erets tweets). by not approaching situations that could be misunderstandings (such as this one) with a sense of complexity, others can be negatively affected.

(quick side rant: as someone with adhd this sort of rejection from such a large amount of people hurts so bad, I cannot imagine dealing with it. for context- people with adhd typically have rejection sensitivity)

tl:dr: please think critically before spreading information about ccs or anyone who might have said or done something controversial, although this is mainly a twitter problem.

#eret #the eret #mcyt #mcyt twt #mcytblr #i felt quite frustrated about this and ranted a lot #i do want to see if anyone else feels the same or if it is just late at night for me #regardless thank you to anyone who reads the whole thing #i sort of wanted to validate my frustration

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thealternatemind · 5 years ago

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some thoughts on widojest, vaxleth, and biphobia in fandom culture

i avoided getting into critical role for a very long time cuz ppl always said that it was homophobic because of the semi-relationship between vax/gilmore. but let me just say that calling that situation homophobic is biphobic. as a bisexual person, seeing a character that is openly bisexual express interest in men, women, and all those in between, is INCREDIBLY important. it normalizes bisexuality because the amount of times i see non-bisexual ppl in the LGBT+ community claim that we’re “not gay enough” is ridiculous. vax is definitely good bi rep.

i hate that i avoided critical role for so long because of that lie saying it’s homophobic. it is a beautiful show filled with wonderful representation. are we going to forget about tary? vex? beau? yasha? molly? sure, the representation isn’t perfect, but at least they’re trying and improving! that’s more than we can say for a lot of media, and we shouldn’t disregard the representation because it isn’t squeaky clean.

and now this whole thing/fan reaction with widojest? i’ll be the first to say that i’m not the biggest fan of the ship, but it’s also not my choice. it’s liam’s choice because caleb is his character. also, as someone that plays d&d, i can tell you that characters take on minds of their own. conscious choices can’t always be made regarding a character’s emotions or feelings. as much as it seems like liam made the decision for caleb to be in love with jester, as someone that plays d&d, i am quite certain caleb made that choice himself. in my experience playing characters, they take on minds of their own, and they just happen to take residence in the player’s mind. even if this weren’t the case though, liam still knows caleb the most.

even though i’m not in love with this ship, i’m happy for the people that like it because it’s not us against them. we all love the same show, so why are we fighting over this? we love it. we should be happy for each other but sad for ourselves.

i interpret caleb as bisexual, and i interpret his interactions with essek to be flirtatious, such as many other queer fans do. HOWEVER, this is not the same situation as vax/gilmore, who went on at least one (if not more, i haven’t watched c1 all the way through) on-screen dates. shadowgast, as much as i love the ship, has little-to-no canon confirmation outside of off-handed hints and comments in the game and on talks. also, vax ending up with keyleth was still totally valid because HEY GUESS WHAT HE’S BI. not to start discourse or anything but to say that this is bad representation is super toxic to bi ppl because telling us we can’t be bi if we’re in a m/f relationship is just wrong.

but anyway, everyone comparing the widojest situation to vaxleth is getting on my nerves because:

vaxleth was not homophobic

widojest is not the same situation as vaxleth

it isn’t homophobic either

saying that both are homophobic because you don’t want to see a m/f ship hurts bi fans

if you want to disagree with me, that’s fine. however, i think there’s something rly important that i need to say in regard to what i’m witnessing in this fandom.

you don’t have to like a ship. that is okay. you don’t need to make it “problematic” in order to dislike it. in the end, expressing your dislike of vaxleth and widojest because you believe them to be “lesbophobic” (because it interferes with beaujester) or “homophobic” comes off as, frankly... biphobic. while trying to come off as woke, it just comes off as regressive and hurtful.

some may argue that it’s not progressive for a bi person to be in an m/f relationship, but i completely disagree. part of being bisexual is the attraction to all genders, and not portraying so is honestly a disservice to the sexuality. also, as i mentioned earlier, there is a huge trend is saying that bi ppl in m/f relationships are actually in “straight” relationships and that it’s not “gay enough.” projecting these feelings onto media and saying this to bi fans deeply hurts them. there are already enough bi ppl out there, including myself, that feel insecure in queer spaces regarding their attraction to the opposite gender, because they’re afraid of receiving comments such as ones like those.

but anyway shipping should not be this big of a discourse, and frankly, it shouldn’t be this deep. it’s okay to dislike a ship without making it problematic, especially if making it “problematic” is hurting bi fans, like myself, in the process.

widojest stans, i’m happy for you. i hope that you’re able to enjoy this confirmation despite some of the negativity i’ve seen. don’t forget to love each other ❤️

#if you need to talk about this #or have any reservations about this post #feel free to message me #or send me an ask #i'm open to conversation #cr discourse #vaxleth #widojest #caleb widogast #liam o'brien #critical role #critical discourse

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a-crimson-lion · 4 years ago

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A Look At Bakudeku’s Development (Based On That One Instagram Post): A Photo-Narrative Analysis

Word Count: 4,287 (Yikes…)

[This got long. Like, REALLY long. Don't expect too many colors. There's a lot to get through...]

For those out of the loop, I recently came across this Instagram post during unhealthy hours in the morning. The purpose of this post, I’d assume, was to debunk any negativity aimed at the Bakudeku dynamic/ship, claiming it was indeed not abusive and that the antis in question are ignoring canon in favor of playing Bakugo’s suicide instigation on repeat. Before addressing the post in question, I would like to state two things:

I am not stuck on Chapter/Episode 1 in the series. I have been caught up proper with every story arc up to the JT Training Arc and am roughly familiar with everything past that point. I don’t just take Katsuki’s now essentially forgotten suicide instigation into account; I’m taking every part of his actions well beyond that moment and how they reflect on him, internally justified or otherwise.

While I’m among the people who believe that Bakudeku as of the latest incarnation of the manga (up to Ch. 280) is indeed abusive, I am open to discussions on why it is not. In any case, however, I cannot ignore the fact that the dynamic/ship is incredibly problematic besides the skeletons in both Izuku and Katsuki’s closets.

So, in order to address this issue to the best of my half-awake brain’s abilities, I will review the screenshots within said post and break down how they factor into the Bakudeku dynamic and the overall development. Be aware that there are some manga and movie spoilers, and this is just MY OPINION. I could be wrong, and I’m okay with that. If you wanna talk without patronizing me, the comments are open. I also apologize in advance if I myself come of as patronizing. All the screenshots I’ll be discussing can be found in the video link above (or here).

Well then, no point in beating around the bush...

1) Izuku Taking Katsuki Out Of The Final Exam Gate (Anime Screenshot)

The first piece of “evidence” used to show the merit of Bakudeku comes from the Final Exam arc, shortly after Katsuki succumbs to All Might’s assault, only for Izuku to come in and deck the #1 Hero in order to grab Katsuki and carry him to safety, allowing them both to pass.

However, this photo marks a recurring trend throughout some of the other photos: they speak more about IZUKU as a character than Izuku AND Katsuki.

Izuku getting to save Katsuki is a major development… for Izuku. One that we’ve seen before. Think about it. The first time Izuku saves Katsuki towards the beginning of the exam, he has to punch Katsuki in the face because he was considering throwing the match just for working with Izuku. And after he’s been saved, Katsuki blows up (figuratively and literally) before aggressively kabedoning him. In this scene though? Katsuki got knocked the f*** out, so he really has no room to protest if Izuku comes in to save him a second time.

Plus, this isn’t really anything NEW with Izuku. We know that he’s aware in an abstract sense that what Katsuki did to him was “wrong,” but he doesn’t hold a grudge or any animosity to him towards that. He’s one of Katsuki’s biggest defenders and supporters, assuming Katsuki allows it. So really, him saving Katsuki isn’t really surprising or a major step forward, ‘cause he was always willing to do it from the get go. And again, Katsuki isn’t conscious during his second rescue, so we don’t really know if he would have let Izuku save him again or if he would have protested.

There’s nothing new here, and nothing balanced to the overall dynamic. Just Izuku being Izuku.

2) All Might Acknowledges The New Bakudeku Rivalry (Anime Screenshot)

Deku vs Kacchan 2 was a big moment for the Bakudeku dynamic. I’m not saying it’s a positive moment, nor am I saying it was necessary, but it was big. And in the aftermath of that fight, where Izuku and Katsuki are having a back and forth, All Might thinks to himself that the two have become true rivals now, or something along those lines. And it’s nice that he’s willing to spell this out for the audience and all, but uh…

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: show, don’t tell.

All Might is essentially telling us that Izuku and Katsuki are rivals now. What does the story have to show for it? A brief conversation during their house arrest, followed by a massive stall due to the Shie Hassaikai Arc and Cultural Festival Arc (albeit with one more instance we’ll cover later), and then what essentially equates to Katsuki yelling at Izuku a lot during the Joint Training Arc.

...that’s ...not much.

And yeah, you could expect me to be a good bean to the author and wait until the later arcs, but even then, the execution… just falls kinda flat, at least for me. Going back to that particular moment with All Might’s thought process, it kind of reminds me of Eraserhead essentially acting as a mouthpiece for the Ochako vs Katsuki fight during the Sports Festival, but that’s a can of worms I won’t be indulging today.

What I’m getting at is this: All Might letting the audience know that Bakudeku have reached rival status is great! Now if only the series could deliver more on that...

3) Standing With Two One For Alls (Heroes Rising)

Okay, seriously, if you haven’t seen Heroes Rising yet, I implore you, GO. WATCH IT. It is an incredible film and I would recommend it with warm words. And I’ll admit, it gives us a better incarnation of Bakudeku compared to the rest of the series.

Yes, I said “better,” not “great.”

Look, I’m all for Izuku and Katsuki working past their differences and the clusterf*** that was their childhood, and maybe Horikoshi not being as integrally involved with the film’s writing as people think he is has something to do with it, but uh… you do not say “put myself as low as to working with Deku” or something like that and expect to be casually tossed aside, at least if you’re me. And while I’m glad there was some genuine emotional tension as Izuku gave Katsuki OFA, some part about it feels… off. Like, nothing was really truly resolved. Katsuki wasn’t given OFA as a sign of forgiveness, as an acknowledgement. Katsuki was given OFA because there was an AFO level villain about to wreck the place and kill some peeps and oh look, the narrative made it so that Katsuki was the only convenient holder around! It kinda stings when you look at it that way.

Not that it matters, because a big thing most people forget is that at the end of this movie, THE ENTIRE THING IS ESSENTIALLY SWIPED ACROSS THE DESK AND ON THE FLOOR. Even if it was going to have some level of effort towards the development of the dynamic, that effort is essentially GONE because Katsuki doesn’t remember SQUAT, and what happens to OFA after the fight is NEVER DISCUSSED. It’s just a hard reset, BOOM, back to normal. *Sigh*

Really, the whole double OFA thing was for convenience, less so for any emotional leveling up that could have been done. And even then, Izuku is still somehow the one putting more emotional input into the entire thing than Katsuki.

4) “I Thought You Were Gonna Get Ahead Of Me!” (Anime Screenshot)

Katsuki’s methods of motivation are… admittedly not for everyone. They seem to work fine for Izuku, as seen sometime after the Cultural Festival Arc, but again, that’s just Izuku. We know how he takes Katsuki’s words and turns it into motivation, but why does Katsuki bother at all?

Well, maybe this comes with desperately trying to find reasons to like a character but progressively despising him and his narrative placement more and more as time progresses, but here’s my angle on it: Katsuki just doesn’t want Izuku dragging his weight for nothing.

Keep in mind, we’re talking about the same Katsuki who held a grudge against Shoto for holding back during the Sports Festival. The same Katsuki who wanted the #1 Hero to go all out and would continuously press to fight him. The same Katsuki who wanted to fight a deadly villain even after being instructed to get back to camp for his own safety. The same Katsuki who challenged Izuku to a fight to finally determine where the gap was, and who was frustrated when he won because the power Izuku possessed was All Might’s, so clearly he shouldn’t have lost.

In short, Katsuki doesn’t like it when people don’t give it their all. And I believe it’s been stated once or twice that once Izuku makes One For All his own, there’s a good chance they’re gonna fight again. So it’s in Katsuki’s best interest to make sure Izuku isn’t half-assing anything, because he wants to prove he can beat Izuku at his best, thus proving that KATSUKI is the best.

So it’s less so for Izuku’s benefit as it is for Katsuki’s own.

5) One Giant Leap (Heroes Rising)

Arguably one of the best moments of the entire Heroes Rising film amongst the fandom is the big handhold scene between Katsuki and Izuku as they make a last gambit effort to take down Nine with two One for Alls. Admittedly this is one of the best if not the best moment throughout the entire progression of the Bakudeku dynamic thus far. I’ll give it that much.

...which makes it all the more frustrating because again: MIND. WIPE. The audience knows it happened, but in canon we never know if Izuku discusses it with Katsuki or if anyone else was aware of the moment in greater specificity. IT ESSENTIALLY NEVER HAPPENED, and I’m starting to legitimately wonder whether or not it was for the best...

6) Datte Atashi No Hero (Anime Screenshot)

First off: how? Second off: huh?

Believe me, the second ending of Season 3 is an absolute bop, don’t get me wrong, but uh… again, it provides NOTHING balanced for Bakudeku, once again relying on Izuku’s perspective on the entire matter. I once read an interesting meta about this ending and how it could be interpreted (take this with a grain of salt), but the biggest contender is that this is in fact Izuku’s fantasy. Think about it:

Izuku is a humble traveling warrior, with nothing to distinguish himself in his own opinion.

Ochako is a magician because she’s alien to Izuku, an unheard of phenomenon.

Tenya being a knight, Shoto being a prince, and Momo being a warrior princess all correlates to their high standings in society, heroic or otherwise.

The reason Katsuki is a barbarian king is because he’s familiar to Izuku in an ancient sense; he’s known him for a long time. The list goes on, but you get the jist.

With this in mind, it’s not difficult to understand that even Katsuki willing to work with Izuku would be another aspect of Izuku’s fantasy: to be able to stand beside his childhood friend once more. And remember the ending of that scene, when Izuku does that big sword slash? That’s him having fully mastered OFA. Both are things that could happen given the manga’s recent direction, but still have yet to happen because this is, again, a fantasy.

And apparently Datte Atatshi No Hero is a reflection on Izuku’s feelings towards Katsuki. Take that as you will, but again, this does not speak for Bakudeku as a whole. Just Izuku’s feelings on the matter.

7) Win to Save, Save to Win (Manga Screenshot)

Since I’ve already penned myself into a short story at this point, might as well take the time to look at this famous phrase from the story.

Personally, I consider it bulls***. It harms both characters overall; yes, I said both. It excuses Katsuki’s need to be a blunt powerhouse that only targets villains, and it redundantly demands Izuku do more of what he was already doing, albeit with less sympathy. I know it sounds corny to say saving is more important than winning, but in the heat of the moment, what gets to the civilians in danger more often? Seeing a guy in a cape deck the latest disaster right in front of them or from a distance? Or said cape guy risking life and limb making sure that this person gets to see life another day?

There’s no perfect answer to it, but that’s my stance.

And this quote, “Win to save, save to win,” justifies the one thing that keeps Katsuki from truly outgrowing his past: his need to be the best. If winning is on the same level then saving, and Izuku has an innate capacity to save, then that means it’s okay for Katsuki to have to win all the time, right?

No. It’s not. And that’s not speaking for all the “Gary Stu” crap, either.

Because being pressured into being the best is what caused Katsuki to hate any kindness offered to him by Izuku. The desire to be the best had him bully Izuku for a decade to ensure that Izuku remained the loser and Katsuki remained the winner. That desire characterizes arguably the worst aspects of Katsuki’s character, and those aspects aren’t gonna fly in the Pro Hero world. Because if Nana Shimura, Shota Aizawa, the Pussycats, Mirio, Sir Nighteye, and a handful of other incidents have taught us anything, it’s that even at their best efforts, heroes don’t win all the time.

Katsuki needs to learn this, or it will crush him in the long term. But he hasn’t. The narrative has kept letting him rack up wins, and his current actions in the manga were spurred on by the fact that he still has yet to truly take a loss.

Say what you will, but I don’t like this line. For what it says about Izuku or Katsuki.

8) The Only One Who Can Accept His Feelings… (Anime Screenshot)

Me @ #7: Wanna see me go off?

Me @ #8: Wanna see me do it again?

Izuku’s perspective on the entire Bakudeku situation is a major reason why most fans condone it. “Izuku doesn’t appear obviously bothered by Katsuki, so that clearly means it’s not abusive/problematic, so just shut up!” or something like that. Well, I’m no psychologist, so I won’t go into a spiel about people ignoring their pain for the sake of others or people trying to excuse others in order to place fault on themselves whether or not it be accurate.

Really, all I can say is that NONE OF THIS should be Izuku’s responsibility.

I’m not blaming this on Izuku because he hasn’t had actual friends or a healthy support system in a long while, but the fact that he decides to take on and enable Katsuki in his element just… doesn’t sit well with me. The logical conclusion would be talking, not throwing hands. I don’t care if they’re “distressed teenagers,” neither of them should be doing this, and Katsuki was fully aware that the teachers would stop them in the first place; that’s not simply adults meddling in what isn’t their business. Katsuki should have really figured out by now that maybe the best course of action is to actually vent to someone without blowing their face off, and I get that he’s absolute s*** at feelings, but really, that’s more of a red flag that he needs to actually get help. And if you think a little too hard on Izuku’s feelings of the matter, well…

Imagine being ostracized for so long that you lose all sense of self worth.

Imagine being told time and again that your worthless, which checks out for you because clearly if your worthless, the guy that enabled that mindset is obviously better than you, and he’s entitled to use you for his own ends.

That’s what I get from this scene.

And again, this is all from IZUKU at this point; virtually NOTHING from Katsuki.

9) Double Detroit Smash (Heroes Rising)

I’ve already said my piece about the film. At this point, it’s beating a dead horse with a stick. Moving on.

10) Word of God (Miscellaneous)

Here’s the thing about Word of God in fandom: the general consensus is that it’s nice to get confirmation from a credible source, but unless it is portrayed in canon, it’s just more words which may or may not be true.

In this case, Kohei Horikoshi, the mangaka for BNHA, is saying that eventually, Katsuki will have to apologize to Izuku. Eventually.

As in, it still hasn’t happened yet.

As in, Katsuki still has yet to decide that what he did in the past was wrong and he should try to fix it.

As in, it currently shows no bearing towards Katsuki’s current character nor the overall Bakudeku dynamic.

Sure, it MIGHT happen, but in another interview (or mayhaps it’s the same one), Horikoshi stated that Katsuki originally wasn’t intended to get as much screen time as he did. Both of these situations are different of course, but with the recent turbulence of the War Arc shaking up the manga, is it really so hard to believe that an apology might slip away from Katsuki’s thought process?

On the bright side, an apology could happen. But until it’s canon, then it’s only a possibility, and therefore can’t be used fully for the intended argument.

11) X-Catapult Handhold (Heroes Rising)

I bet some people working on the movie and some fans on the movie felt spoiled when they included not one, but two handholding scenes for Izuku and Katsuki.

And while the first handhold is certainly a marvel of battle tactics, again, there isn’t much else going on with it. Is it nice to see Katsuki working with Izuku again? Yes, but contrary to popular belief, it doesn’t go past that. Katsuki’s just willing to work with Izuku, full stop. He’d probably be willing to work with anyone because Nine is f***ing tank. And sure, getting a handhold tease is nice, but it’s only to facilitate Katsuki’s subsequent yeeting of Izuku at Nine in an attempt to do damage. Nothing more pressing about the circumstances of their past or anything like that.

12) A Bit of Advice (Anime Screenshot)

Look, this is one of the tamer, better looks at Izuku and Katsuki’s relationship. He’s willing to put his pride aside and give Izuku some advice. But remember what I said earlier in #4?

It’s not just to make sure Izuku gets better, but so Katsuki can feel like it’s a complete win when he beats his ass.

And if we take the line “It pisses me off” into account, we can look at that flaw from the same angle. Remember, Izuku has All Might’s power, the #1 Hero’s power. To Katsuki, that means he shouldn’t have the luxury of making mistakes. But Izuku does. He makes mistakes, and Katsuki sees them and he doesn’t get to exploit them. He still wins, but not because of those mistakes. And part of that pisses Katsuki off. Izuku shouldn’t get to slack. So, Katsuki gives him some advice. Advice that will no doubt help Izuku in the long run, for his (and Katuki’s) sakes. It’s a good outcome from a not very good reason...

13) Have You Made That Borrowed Power Your Own? (Manga Screenshot)

Yeah, no.

I don’t care if Izuku is used to this treatment, it still isn’t reinforcing an overall positive tone.

I don’t care if Katsuki acknowledges at some level that Izuku’s power is becoming his own, he still has the gall to say it was no wonder he passed BECAUSE of his power. Which may be true, but it’s not like Izuku was relying on it 100%, and lowkey comes off as Quirkist.

All it tells me is that Katsuki is starting to acknowledge Izuku, in the “gadfly I can’t get off my back” sort of way. Is this the “best development” y’all are rooting for? Basic acknowledgement of another human being?

14) Outta My Way Punk! (Manga Screenshot)

Katsuki reflexively tells Izuku to get out of his way.

Izuku is used to it, again, that does not excuse it.

Once again, Katsuki reverts back to his usual behavior instead of showing a more subtle approach to show the audience that maybe he’s changing beyond what a chorus of other characters saying “he’s changed!” has to offer.

...even if it’s not abusive, you can’t really say that’s a “good” relationship, either.

15) Blackwhip Training (Manga Screenshot)

Katsuki willing to train with Izuku to help him master his Quirk(s) is nice.

Still blatantly in his element with lots of needless yelling and dominance assertion, but still nice.

And keep in mind, right after it’s clear they aren’t getting anywhere and Izuku tries to rationalize it, Katsuki decides to dip seeing as it’s not worth his time anymore. And even before that, at least in my translation, Katsuki seems to be more interested in beating out Blackwhip instead of having Izuku get a handle on.

Again, maybe not abusive, but not exactly supportive, either.

16) ??? (Anime Screenshot)

I personally have no idea what they were going for with this screenshot, but if I had to guess, that’s after Katsuki gives Izuku an escape window whilst he faces off against All Might alone during their Final Exams.

While I understand that this is early on in their dynamic’s development, the fact still stands that Katsuki still wants to fight for fighting’s sake. He may have been willing to at least give Izuku a chance, but he still sees Izuku’s retreat as cowardly, even though it’s a perfectly valid way to pass the exam. He still just wants to fight.

There’s no mutuality in that sense.

17) Quote from Justin Briner (Miscellaneous)

I don’t have much of an opinion for Izuku’s English VA, but for what it’s worth, I think overall he’s a really cool dude. The same, however, cannot be said for his quote.

I can buy into Izuku wanting to get stronger because of Katsuki, since that is a major plot point. I can’t do the same for Katsuki seeing the good in people because we don’t ever see it, really? In fact, it’s more like people latch on to Katsuki and he just tolerates them until they’ve completely wormed their way into his life. There’s no scene where Katsuki considers someone a good person because of something Izuku did, or anything even vaguely along those lines, at least to my knowledge.

As for their relationship, there have been more downs than ups, and it isn’t relatable to me in the slightest. Maybe that’s just ‘cause I don’t get the overall appeal, but their friendship never really strikes me as a… well, friendship. You could argue that’s the point and that’s what makes them different and interesting, but I would much rather we see more concrete proof of their relationship being at more understandable highs and lows while actually demonstrating it was mutual.

But again. That’s just me.

18) Joint Training Pep Talk (Manga Screenshot)

I’m basically repeating myself at this point. Katsuki might be keeping tabs on Izuku, but again, it’s not entirely for Izuku’s benefit. He just wants to make sure his new “rival” (successor to the #1 Hero, I might add) isn’t dragging his feet through the mud and actually getting s*** done so their eventual third clash will actually be worth his time.

...this relationship is so one-sided in two entirely different ways, I swear.

19) Speaking With Kacchan So Naturally (Manga Screenshot)

Why are we congratulating Katsuki for adding one more person to his already (surprisingly) sizable tolerance pile?

Why are we congratulating Izuku for bridging a gap other people managed to cross with little to no effort even though he didn’t do anything wrong?

Izuku is essentially saying “Good job on me for finally getting the same treatment as everyone else from that one person after over ten years.” Good on him, but uh… that’s not exactly a landmark worth framing the way the fandom does...

The relationship might not be outright abusive, but HOO BOY the bar has never been set lower...

20) “You’ve got a good friend in him” (Manga Screenshot)

And finally, the pièce de résistance. Which is really more narrative mouthpiece-ing.

Even before that, Katsuki yet again can’t take a compliment from Izuku for whatever reason. Yet again, Izuku just shrugs off all of Katsuki’s discouragement, intentional or otherwise. And I love me some Dadmight as much as the next guy, but really, does he have a good grasp on relationships? His only friends in his life were David and Naomasa, and he’s been shown time and time again to not be the infallible man many think he is due to being the Symbol of Peace? But suddenly he goes “Bakudeku rights” and y’all jump on that with no room for argument?

Katsuki has yet to prove what All Might has been saying. Again, telling rather than showing, therefore removing the meaning from the entire thing. Unless Katsuki proves otherwise, I call bulls***.

-------------------------------------------------------

So, my final verdict? Bakudeku is fine. It’s just not as great as the rest of you are making it out to be. I’m not gonna dictate whatever you ship or what you enjoy, that’s not my place, but at least keep these perspectives in mind. You don’t have to believe them, but just… stay aware, y’know?

Alrighty, I’ve wasted enough of your time. If you’ve read it until the very end, then… thanks. Carry on.

-Crimson Lion (10 August 2020)

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4pondsinabox · 4 years ago

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Women of the Waverider: Mona Wu

The Reviews Are In, so guess who’s back to deliver some more of her fandom feminist mantra? What can I say, I serve to please.

For the second installment of my Women of the Waverider series, also known as “the four most hated characters on Legends of Tomorrow who deserve so much more than what they are given by the fans,” I will be discussing Mona Wu. The amount of hate and downright slander against Mona in the fandom has surpassed any I have ever seen for a single character, and that’s coming from someone who uses a River Song icon. Many viewers are already likely aware of this, as this negative response is what resulted in Ramona’s significant role reduction in the latest season, but it’s never too late to thoroughly dig into what really fueled such backlash.

The most interesting part? How much in common she shares with a male fan favorite.

Why Mona Wu deserves MUCH more from you

Of the four characters I have focused on in this series, I will be very direct in saying Mona is my least favorite of them, but I don’t hate her by any means. There’s just a lot of love to live up to when it comes to the other three. I’m pointing this out because I was surprised how easy it was for me to defend her. A character doesn’t have to be one of your favorites or “click” with you to recognize when people are treating them unjustly.

Personal bias aside, Mona was introduced in series 4 as a generous, bright-eyed delivery girl who always wanted to see the best in everyone. Prior to her arrival, only one other character on the show maintained this eternally positive outlook on life (to the occasional annoyance of the rest of the Waverider team), someone whose departure this season angered many fans.

It doesn’t take a genius to work out that bright, opportunistic Mona Wu was written in as a potential replacement for bright, opportunistic Ray Palmer. All that was missing was a few science degrees. The team greatly benefited from the presence of such optimism onboard, Nora Darhk is living proof of that, but the fans’ poor reception of Mona’s character meant this plan was cast aside - rather hurriedly. So the question remains, what went wrong?

Much as Ray did with Nora, Mona saw the potential for goodness in all magical creatures. Like Ray, Mona stood firmly beside them even when just about everyone else turned against her. There was even a love story involved in both cases, although their endings were significantly different. Her person of interest being noticeably non-human could have definitely turned some viewers off, as that can be an odd thing to watch, but that’s not an argument that’s generally been used against her and was rarely even mentioned as the series went on. Let’s break down a few of my favorite, hard to believe but real, quotes I’ve seen the past few months and find out, shall we?

- “Why tf does she seem happy all the time?”

Ok, why does Ray seem happy all the time? He’s always cheering people up and excited to experience new things even at the most inconvenient of times, but no one has gotten on his case about it. Is the problem that you can only accept female characters when they’re moody and averse to people? Considering other members of this series, I wouldn’t be surprised. There seems to be a trend in fans hating happy, relaxed women, which is concerning when you consider the real life implications. I believe I may have mentioned this in a previous installment, but tragedy and trauma are not what make women interesting. Maybe you do find Mona annoying, but do not attribute that to her happiness when other characters are loved for it.

- “How dare Mona expose Charlie like that in front of Rebecca Silver’s fans, for all she knew she and Mick were on an undercover mission!”

You ... do know what being a fan is like, right? If one of your friends was imposing as a favorite author or actor, wouldn’t you be offended? Stop holding women to impossibly high emotional standards when white men in the same show are beloved for constant drinking and having angry outbursts. Of COURSE Mona was hurt seeing someone she knows pretend to be one of her favorite icons, it’s an insult to all the writing the real Rebecca has done. Why would she have allowed anyone to get away with that, much less people she thought she could trust?

- “How DARE Mona called herself a legend!”

If Wally West is considered a Legend after one episode, Mona absolutely deserves that title too after her handful of episodes. Just because you don’t personally like her doesn’t mean her contribution to saving the world on a number of occasions matters any less.

- “The writers didn’t know what to do with her storyline”

As previously described, there was a clear progression from helping magical creatures, to loving one, to becoming one. Following that, she needed to learn to control her powers and accept her new self. The writers knew perfectly well where they wanted to take her afterwards but the fans stopped them from doing that, so they brought her in only when needed. If you choose not to see that, then fine, but not liking a storyline doesn’t mean it wasn’t well planned out to begin with - even if plans had to change.

- “The actress can’t act”

Now you’re just being petty. It’s all fine and well to dislike a character, but to focus that frustration on the actor themselves? That is step number 1 to becoming an internet troll. Legends of Tomorrow was not Ramona’s first gig and it hasn’t been her last, so clearly many casting directors with far more experience than any individual fan would have something to say about a “bad acting” claim. Mona does have a very distinctive presence, which clearly isn’t for everyone, but attributing that to acting skills is just a poor attempt to justify one’s negative opinion.

Mona is kind, generous, and overly perky much of the time, all traits she shares with fan-favorite Ray Palmer. On top of that, although very brief, we’ve seen the heavy weight her disapproving parents have on her, which makes Mona’s persistence to help others all the more inspiring. If one of these two characters can be recognized for such positive characteristics, then the other absolutely should as well.

#women of the waverider #mona wu #ramona young #legends of tomorrow #character analysis #lot ladies #long post #arrowverse

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frostiifae · 4 years ago

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hi i’m not gonna engage directly with that post about masculinity and the pressures it’s put under growing up bc i am much too fragile for that, but also my feelings on that post wind up going out to jupiter and back instead, so sorry about this but --

I’ve been mulling over the idea that maybe social media, as a whole, is a bad place for social discourse (shocking, I know). The core idea of it is simple - you take a statement like “men are overly sexual”. This statement is at least glancingly true, but not ironclad. It is true enough to make a specific point in context, but it isn’t true enough to project outward into the world without context.

People with more authority than me have already done plenty of research to demonstrate how modern social media is designed specifically to present ideas free of context. It’s virtually impossible to have a meaningful conversation in the open space of Tumblr, Twitter, or Facebook, for varying reasons - but the sites do their best to trick you into not noticing.

In a post I exchange between my two best (female) friends, we may cajole about the horrors and ugliness of men, saying things we don’t really believe, partially tongue-in-cheek, partially to make fun of the radical ideas that say these things without the requisite irony. But it would be so very easy for someone - even someone that knows me, someone I care about - to stumble upon that post and misunderstand. In reality, that post wasn’t really meant to be public. It was just for the three of us, because we have a shared context that changes and colors the way our words are interpreted, and without that context - the things we make look alien, or worse.

How easy it is for this simple misunderstanding to repeat itself at progressively larger and larger scales. Isn’t it amazing how Anita Sarkeesian attempted to say something hardly controversial and completely understandable, but a lack of context drove an entire counter-cultural movement and drove a wedge into the heart of the community she wanted to speak to. Incredible how, even as we all rally behind the cries Black Lives Matter, Defund the Police, we still have people claiming to be races they aren’t, asserting themselves over marginalized voices without thinking - and how, even as I do my best to keep my mouth shut, I can’t help but wonder if something is being missed because I can’t find the words to ask the questions I wish I could ask.

I keep wondering, what if I could just pluck one of those horrific alt-right reddit meme boys from their chair and sit on a park bench with them, offer to get them lunch, and just talk about our visions for the future. Surely, we’d disagree on a lot of things, but I’m used to that. I’ve always been a weird kid, and I found solace in understanding the why of people’s beliefs - people’s reasoning always made more sense to me than the conclusions they would reach because of that reasoning. And I really feel like we could find a lot in common, if we could break past the surface layer of what we believe, and instead talk about the experiences that led us there. After all, I, too, was once a disenfranchised middle-class white male on the Internet, whose favorite pastime was to lose themselves in an emerging culture of chaos and creativity that seemed impenetrable from the outside. I, too, was once frustrated with the posturing of feminism, with the idea that men ought to be judged demographically without regard to their individual status. I still am frustrated with that idea, even now that I’ve come to grips with why it keeps coming up. I can’t say that it’s false. But I can’t say that it’s true, either.

I wish I could explain that it doesn’t matter whether it’s true or false - that it never has mattered - that none of this was ever about telling people how they should think, or what words they are and aren’t allowed to use, or how they should volunteer their assets in the name of the less-privileged, or how they should sit at the back of the bus to make way for the flavor of the month. I wish I could explain that I understand how it seems from the outside, I really do, because I was there once, and it seems like such a mess of contrarian nonsense that can’t even find time to agree with itself, but you have to understand, it’s not about rules and regulations, it’s not about a strict moral or social code, it’s just about trying these ideas out in a public space and seeing if they make things better for people, because the way the world is now isn’t working.

But I know what would happen if I tried that: I would get told, “And what about me?” and, well, there’s the rub, isn’t it? What about you?

Is it selfish to focus on one’s own problems? Is it “male privilege” to listen to a talk about feminism and ask “but what about us?” Does that make you a pillar of the patriarchy? I feel like the answer is so obviously no, but we keep reacting that way, because when some dude comments on a feminist post and all we have to go off of is a name, an anime avatar (and believe me, I love anime avatars, so don’t think for a second I’m going to judge you for having one) and a single off-color remark, we have to come to some kind of judgment and it’s never going to be accurate. We tried so hard to teach everyone to think about the person behind the screen, but at the same time the Internet evolved in such a way that we know less and less every day about the screennames we come into contact with; the mountain is being built higher and higher ahead of us as we climb.

I think the solution is to just stop. I really, really do.

I was educated in feminism by a person who sat down with me in a series of one-on-one conversations and answered my questions as patiently as they could. I’m not friends with that person anymore - we wound up having a lot of disagreements on finer points, even besides the way we actually treated one another - but I deeply appreciate that time they spent with me. I refined my knowledge of feminism by taking those conversations to other people I trusted, and seeing how they felt about those ideas, further whittling away at this chunk of philosophy I had been given, turning into a thing I, personally, could believe in. This is the way human beings learn: we find a teacher we trust to confide in, we find a place to practice that feels safe so that we can try things out, and we build up confidence in private before taking our findings into the open.

What do we accomplish by taking two people who have already cemented their convictions and bashing them against each other in a public space? Spectacle. That’s really all there is to it. Hate to sound like an old batty cynic but social media really is built around social spectacle. Twitter’s Trending tags, fandom discourse, political pages on Facebook mocking each other in memes that spread through social circles while dissidents look on in quiet disgust. The point of the whole model is to turn human culture into a hadron collider. This is not the place for nuanced debate. We should all know better. But, somehow, we don’t. And all the worse for the younger people caught in the crossfire that don’t understand what’s happening.

It’s funny how you hear about things happening to other kids, parents and teachers and principals setting rules that seem completely ridiculous and unfair, and then you grow up and start to realize that - even if you still disagree - there’s a hint of wisdom in there. I dunno, maybe we should be withholding the internet from our kids until they’re adults. Not because they’re not mature enough for the Internet, but because the Internet isn’t mature enough for them.

ᵒⁿᵉ ᵒᶠ ᵗʰᵉˢᵉ ᵈᵃʸˢ ᶦ ᵍᵒᵗᵗᵃ ᵐᵃᵏᵉ ᵐʸ ᵒʷⁿ ˢᵒᶜᶦᵃˡ ᵐᵉᵈᶦᵃ ˢᶦᵗᵉ

#long post #feyranting #adam you enabled this i hope you're happy #(i mean not that it's your fault or anything that i am weird. just. aaa)

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awesome-bamon · 5 years ago

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You know what's even more ironic? On Twitter, if you were to post about Daisy Ridley not supporting Reylo, most Reylos would demand proof (even though the video trended all over social media when it first came out), or that they simply don't care what she says because Reylo is still "canon" & that she doesn't have a say in what goes with Rey's character (which is sexist because they know that the majority of LF is run by males & one awful KK), which is chill in comparison to how they treat John.

They have such a bias against John for racist and anti-black reasons and because of their fictional ship. Now a bunch of white women are joining in on the demonize John Boyega and compare him and “Antis” which include many black fans to the Alt-right. All while declaring the Reylo fandom to be 100% innocent.

And they can point out that they have POC and black Reylos, but just like the case with there being POC and black Trump Supporters, that does not then mean that there still aren’t racists white Trump Supporters and that every claim of racism from Trump Supporters is just made up. Which I guess we shouldn’t be surprised that some Reylos try to absolve their fandom completely from racism, since some of them admit to voting for Trump. And Trump Supporters will try to absolve Trump Supporters and white Conservatives completely from being racist. Is similar fashion to what the Reylo fandom is doing.

They compare Antis to the Alt right and yet display the right wing behaviors in trying to shut down any discussions on race or racism. And claim that all instances of racism and anti-blackness are just being made up out of thin air to make their particular group look bad.

Also what this shows is that white women, who declare themselves as more liberal and progressive can still be anti-black and practice white feminism and talk over black people to protect their white woman hood. Reylos quoted MLK yet don’t see that when MLK talked about being disappointed with the white moderate, he was talking about the white women you see jumping on the bandwagon of throwing John Boyega under the bus and making the Reylo fandom seem oppressed.

#Anti Reylo #John Boyega #Racism #white feminism

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idolizenews · 5 years ago

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JULY SCHEDULE.

Idolize schedules are a narrative opportunity to incorporate into your threads what's going on in the current musical and promotional landscape. They range over a number of things, from brand deals to charting information and reflect trends and changes over time in the narratives of each group. You can redeem up to 15 points, with 5 points redeemable per each 4/4 thread completed with another muse in your prompt. Prompts will incorporate variable numbers of groups under each heading and these groups will change with the prompts each month. In order to redeem the points, you must begin the thread within the month of the schedule's posting. Additionally, points for multiple threads may only be redeemed in the case that the threads are completed with different muns each time, rather than just different muses.

SUMMERTIME SADNESS involved > Aurora, Celeste, MayDay, Heaven

It’s time for the yearly summer battle of the girl groups. In competition are Aurora, MayDay, and surprisingly Celeste instead of Heaven. It’s a decision from 99 that has many fans scratching their heads, angered that the company decided to promote POIZN instead, along with a single Heaven member’s solo (some akgae fans have been up in arms declaring there is still more favoritism to be found under the roof of 99). Celeste has been the surprising dark horse, pulling ahead with the number of digital downloads and listens from the general public. This has expanded their schedules, and the girls have been invited to perform at a number of festivals and have even nabbed a few visual CFs for summer products, like swimwear and fruit drinks. Fans of Aurora have been critical of Midas promoting the girls so closely after MayDay, which MayDay fans are quick to point out probably wouldn’t be a problem if MayDay wasn’t outperforming Aurora, who seem to be on a slow decline.

Regardless, the album still made good sales numbers with Aurora’s strong fandom power. DKDK, however, has really put MayDay front and center despite not being able to nab any wins. Of course, none of the groups really stood a chance with Atlas’ latest release. Unfortunately, none of these groups were able to get a win. It’s said that there have been rumors of animosity behind the scenes between both Aurora and MayDay, as Midas tends to back whoever makes more money which puts Aurora in a precarious position. Heaven are in flux at the moment, unsure of 99’s plans. For the time being, they have been giving large periods of rest and have been granted the opportunity to follow their own personal schedules, barring a summer concert promoted by Umbrella Tree Corp that involved Heaven, Celeste, and MayDay. Midas cited that Aurora was too busy filming a v-live reality show in Jeju to appear.

THE INFECTION SPREADS involved > POIZN, Imperial, Zenith

99 has never been a perfect company, but these days the fans are saying that these words still give them too much credit. The latest happenings with POIZN have been particularly chaotic. While they had a brief, soaring revival with Love Scenario, their follow ups were met with critical reception and disinterest from the general public. 99’s expectations had been set high, but with the boys floundering in their veteran years, it caused strife within the group. Two of the group’s members have decided to break contract and attempted to sue the company, much to their fandoms dismay. While the group didn’t have much of a false bond to shatter, it did leave fans worried over what would happen to the remaining members. A PR official from 99 has gone on record stating that all of the remaining POIZN members who decided to stay will be given solo music projects, and will remain under the moniker of POIZN, even if they may no longer promote together. The boys are, at the moment, dealing with public backslash, trying to appease their fans with constant v-vlives, and also going to meetings with management to plan their new future directions.

Initially, Imperial fans were overjoyed, hoping that their group would be getting more attention. At first, it seems to be the case, with an Imperial comeback slated for August (perhaps to offset the news), as well as a few radio show appearances, but in a later statement it was revealed that investments were being transferred from POIZN to Zenith in hopes to give their boy group an edge among the competition between 99, Midas, and Koala T. on their similarly aged boy group competition. This has opened the doors for Zenith, who have landed a major brand deal with Adidas. It’s rumored that behind the scenes, Imperial members are holding major grudges toward the Zenith members for this. To try and douse the fire, 99 has placed both Imperial and Zenith on a reality show together, where Imperial ‘teach’ their junior group the tricks of the trade. Surprising nobody except the genius in management who thought of it, it has only made their relationship even more strained.

* Note that this schedule will play out IC over a few months, and narrative pann posts can keep you apprised of progress so that the switch isn’t so drastic IC.

MEDIAPLAY MADNESS involved > Atlas, Jawbreaker, XLNC

KJH, the underdogs. Fighting for victory, savoring their scraps. Or, that’s what people used to say. Now only their most delusional of fans still believe it. Perhaps because they’ve been letting this title slip from their grasp recently, they’ve been more aggressive in pushing their recent ventures that they’ve acquired: namely Jawbreaker and XLNC. How do they do it? Well, they use their selling power attached to Atlas. Their decision to use a Jawbreaker vocalist in Atlas’ recent title track angered a good number of their fans, who argued that her presence in the song was entirely unnecessary. While KJH achieved their goal of promoting Jawbreaker in the process, they are cropping up negative emotions, which fans and public alike pointing out that they’re shoehorning groups together and using too much media play in order to sell their outfit as “true artists.” Despite the critique, they’re still moving forward in the same direction, and have been packaging their groups together. Atlas and XLNC appeared together on an episode of Weekly Idol (perhaps due to the fact that XLNC wouldn’t be let on otherwise), while Atlas and Jawbreaker both modeled together for a recent line of clothing at Uniqlo. In the second half of July, they’re really tying their groups together with a KJH concert. Fans of XLNC are already in an uproar due to the rumored setlist, where XLNC will only be appearing at the start, and with only a handful of songs compared to the much longer setlist of both Atlas and Jawbreaker.

VETERAN VISIONS involved > OASiS, Olympus

While they’ve been on the block for longer than most, these groups still have high selling power. While Olympus tends to pull a higher fandom, Oasis fights back with a better reputation and claims of musicality. There’s both excitement and trepidation over the fact that these two groups are aiming to have a comeback in August. Some are saying MSG is trying to guarantee a win by slating their comeback near the beginning of August, with Olympus coming later. However, Oasis fans and Olympus antis alike are pointing out that Olympus’ last song was poorly received, and critics were quick to put the song down. Olympus has a tall mountain to climb back up, especially when their comeback is directly on the heels of Oasis, whose songs often are able to receive good reviews from music critics. Both of the groups are knee deep in preparations, with big expectations and pressure from their respective companies. There are teaser photos to take, hair to be dyed, music videos to shoot, and choreography to learn. What’s more, both boys have both landed deals with road shops. Oasis with the Saem and Olympus with Innisfree, setting them up further as pseudo-rivals. How the boys interact behind the scenes is shrouded in speculation, though with the often-unsavory rumors that follow Olympus’ personalities, Oasis fans are quick to point fingers of wrongdoing. Olympus members have been advised to watch their attitudes and expressions by management.

MARSUPIAL MAGIC involved > Koala T solo, B.rite, Divinity

This is the month of Koala T, or that’s what the marketing team keeps saying the KT management anyway. With Celeste already striking higher than expected in the girl group battle royale, they’re really pushing hard for the rest of their outfit in a way that doesn’t look as all in as it seems behind the scenes. Management has been disgruntled at the progress of their company, and while B.rite has been showing steadily rising selling power, they’re still too much in direct competition with boy groups from major companies (99 and Midas respectively) to really put their stamp on the industry. Thus, KT’s CEO is pushing for better company reputation and power, and to do this the rest of their artists need to start standing in the spotlight as well. This is a two step process of saturation and international outreach for their weaker acts. B.rite is slated with a later August comeback and are thus immersed in preparations. This comeback has been strategically placed between Oasis and Olympus, both groups who are all but guaranteed wins. B.rite will be able to get extra views by promoting on the music shows with both, as well as an excuse for no awards won. How the boys feel about this doesn’t really matter to the company.

While Divinity just had a comeback, one member has been selected due to public appeal to go forth as the first solo on Divinity’s roster. They’ve gone with image over direct talent, and how this will play out remains to be seen. While this member is in prep, the rest of the girls have been instructed to film multiple v-lives, as well as dance or vocal covers of their sunbae groups or other popular artists to try and gain attention. KT’s soloist is rounding out the itinerary, a collaboration effort fielded with a 99 soloist in hopes that it will gain a larger following from the general public. They’re hoping for an explosive reception at the end of July, and the pressure is on this artist to really perform to their greatest capability (while in no way, shape, or form getting involved with 99’s soloist past musical decisions). There have been a few cosmetics companies reaching out to the soloist, KT ultimately accepting an advertisement from Banilla Co. on their behalf.

POSITIVE PATHWAYS involved > PRiSM, indiGO, MSG’s solo

MSG has had a well received year thus far with these members all wrapping their promotions to positive reception. indiGO has been trending as a household name, and has proved they have staying power on the charts, this paired with their recently found fandom after re.group means that they have been getting a lot more offers rolling in that previously. The boys have nabbed a few brand endorsement deals promoting various foods, beverages, and the popular bingsoo chain sulbing -- all for goods that appeal to the general public who are easy to recognize them. Prism have similarly been picking up praise and attention, though perhaps not quite to such a mainstream of a degree as indiGO. Still, the girls have been accepting more jobs with group photoshoot spreads for magazines, interviews on their recent success, and a recent brand deal with Etude House. Together, MSG has named them both a collaboration CF with Sketchers which will be filming in mid-July. Much the same as the former two groups, MSG’s soloist has also been spreading the company’s recognition with photoshoots, appearances on various shows such as You Heeyeol's Sketchbook, and is rumored to be filming a new drama of sorts. They’re really rounding out MSG’s expectations, and have been making the public take a closer look at the artists in their label.

MONEY GRAB involved > 1nferno, r!ot, 99’s solo

Summer means festivals, and it also means money from vacationers looking to come and see their favorite singers in person. 99 can be slow to promote, but they’ve at least has enough sense to take two of their artists who aren’t promoting at the moment and send them on a festival circuit together. This has been done for little decision other than convenience, though fans of 99’s soloist have been making jokes of how he has to play babysitter toward 99’s girl group. How he feels about this, and about being sent packaged with a girl group, has not been touched upon. In between these schedules, 99′s soloist is set to record and feature on KT’s solost latest single, set to release in late July. R!ot is using this as a chance for exposure, though it does have some rolling their eyes due to the fact that the girls only really have one title track underneath their belt. However, most of those criticisms are given to 99 for not giving them more music to promote in the first place. 1nferno has been seen overlapping these artists at many of the same events, likely due to Midas’ adage that there is always money to be made somewhere. With no promotions and nothing to prep for in the immediate future, it’s an obvious decision for the company to send 1nferno out to make money, how the boys feel about it or how tired they may or not be has always come secondary. All three have been meeting with fans after shows for small fan-signs or high-touch events.

#id.schedule

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trender-sollux · 5 years ago

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anti anti discourse megapost

I’m probably not the Best Most Informed person to ask about this stuff but!! here’s the disc horse as I understand it. this is pretty much a tumblr formatted argumentative essay, so buckle up or scroll to the tl;dr as fast as you can.

(I’ll put it under a cut bc 1.) things are gonna get pretty controversial, and 2.) things got Very long Very fast.)

the bg (the intro paragraph)

in fandom, as most people know, people tend to ship characters together. it’s fun to think about what two characters may act like in a relationship, and this gives way for loads of innovative and unique content to be made around ships! communities can be built, friends can be made, and lots of original fan content can be made centered around shipping characters together!

now, everyone has different tastes in ships, whether it be gay straight or somewhere in between, as well as different tastes in dynamics! (take the fave ship dynamics art meme that’s been going around for reference on what that means lmao)

some people may not even like to ship anyone with anyone, choosing instead to focus on lore or more platonic but no less important relationships, which is also just fine!

la problema

there however is copious amounts of people who deem other people’s ships “problematic”.

this in and of itself is not the problem: whether the ship makes them uncomfortable because of:

a large age gap (typically of 10+ years)

one person being a minor and the other an adult

it being an incestuous relationship of any sort (whether by blood or not)

they don’t enjoy the dynamic of the characters (perhaps it’s an unhealthy or simply turbulent relationship)

that is not the problem.

people are allowed to be uncomfortable with pairings! it’s not something they can help! content reminding people of real world issues or trauma are especially touchy, and that’s understandable and completely okay.

people may even be uncomfortable with those that consume that content, whether they have a sound reason or just simply because they don’t like it (they don’t really owe an explanation), and if they should want that content tagged so that they can avoid it, or ask simply that people who like it and post about it not interact with them so that they can further avoid it, that is perfectly okay.

ships can squick people out or even badly trigger them (in the serious mental terminology way not the internet watered down ‘this makes me mad’ way)!

the real problem comes when you have people harassing others for ships they don’t like.

you have loads and loads of call out culture where hundreds of people ridicule targeted shippers for their problematic pairings, calling them pedophiles or incest supporters or whatever buzz word of the day is to make them out to be awful scummy people.

they make call out posts to “expose them”, get people on their side, tell them they shouldn’t enjoy this thing that makes them happy, and in a rather awful amount of cases, send death threats and attempts to dox them/leak their information, things that can ruin actual lives.

all over the enjoyment of fictional pairings.

you can replace “ships” with just “fictional characters” or “stories” and you have anti-fiction discourse, where people harass the fans (or authors/creators!) of specific “problematic” characters or stories the same way they do shippers.

(also, about to get real controversial here, but you could also replace shippers w/ fujoshi/fudanshi and get the same effect. I know that saying fujoshi are gross is the hot new trend, but anti-fujoshi are just as bad as anti-shippers. I’m significantly less qualified to talk on that and I can link some really great posts if you want more info on that mess, but for now I’ll just say I’m pro-fujoshi and go.)

(if you go through the vld ship tags, I guarantee you will run into a lot of this for reference, though tw for death threats and A Lot of them. kl@nce has an infamous anti following, and anti-sh@l@din has a very fervent following as well.)

these people commonly refer to themselves as the broad and catch-all term “anti”. anti-insert ship here, anti-insert character here, anti-insert story here. they are against them, those who create content for them, and those who just sit back and enjoy them.

why that’s bad

at first glance, this seems like a good thing.

after all, people who consume that content must condone it, right? why else would they enjoy it? and if they condone such awful things, they’re awful people and they must deserve whatever happens to them! they’re dangerous! they deserve threats and misery and the loss of their jobs! they don’t deserve to be happy! they don’t deserve to be alive!

this mentality is really why a lot of antis end up being young people with an interest in activism. social activism is a good thing, after all. raising awareness about real problems through a social platform is a good thing.

it also tends to attract young trauma survivors who went through similar experiences as those portrayed in fiction.

not all antis are young/naive. that’s too much of a scapegoat (that they already use themselves too much). there are a lot of adult antis.

however, a lot of anti rhetoric is specifically targeted at minors. some antis will go out of their way to harass adults that make explicit content for other adults, saying that they are predatory for making it because it makes the anti uncomfortable.

I’m not saying I was immune either; for a while I thought that was just.

antis have a tricky way of worming themselves out of responsibility like that, after all. they make the victim out to be deserving of punishment, whatever it may be, whether it be some public humiliation or threats or leasing information that could put them in real actual danger (which is illegal, by the way.)

I never participated in death threats or anything (they made me,, really uncomfortable), but for a while, at very least, the public shaming made sense.

however, this doesn’t actually help trauma survivors. it doesn’t help people that actually go through horrible situations like the ones depicted in fiction. it doesn’t help those who are groomed by pedophiles, or abused by family members, or in abusive relationships.

what it does do is bully and ridicule people for something that inspires them and brings them happiness. people who did nothing wrong.

this is commonly referred to as performative activism.

you take the name of something vile and awful, and use it to say you are doing something for the greater good, a righteous and necessary evil, but really you are doing nothing at all. nothing progressive to help those in need, nothing daring or brave, nothing to make the world a better, kinder place. nothing.

it can be done out of the desire to help, or the desire to make a difference as someone who isn’t sure how, but your intent isn’t the issue on the table. the fact is that anti rhetoric hurts innocent people.

walking through common anti talk points (q&a)

now, I know that there are people who interact w/ my tiny blog who are antis, and actually one of my super tiny follower count is an anti (which I’m a lil sad about bc they have super cool art and a generally positive blog; not to be indirect but I also don’t wanna be like Hey I Don’t Agree With You In Particular. like nah they’re really cool actually and I hope they’re having a chill day), and for you antis reading this, you may be thinking, “sol, I see what you’re saying, but I’m not convinced antis are all that bad!”

well, it’s time for a lil bit of q&a!!

What makes problematic content innocent?

the content itself isn’t hurting anyone.

content, online especially in this day and age , is oftentimes tagged to make sure no one is triggered by the content they want to enjoy. if not tagged, usually descriptions or summaries include warnings. if not in the summary, ratings (like in movies) are also a good indicator of what you should look out for.

let’s say, for example’s sake, someone ends up ignoring the warning and consuming the content anyway, and ends up hurt because of it.

the content is not at fault, the willful ignorance of the person is.

What if they didn’t know to read the warning?

they were still warned. this should be taken as a learning experience, and they should be more careful in the future. it may sound harsh, but not knowing how something works isn’t exactly any excuse. people aren’t exempt from consequences because they didn’t know how something works.

What makes the creators of problematic content innocent?

a lot of people have the misconception that if someone makes content for something, they think it’s okay or would do something like it in real life.

this is not inherently true.

I’m not saying there may be predatory content creators out there, but that definitely does not mean that all content creators that produce things with dark themes always always think that it’s okay in real life.

there is such a thing as exploratory fiction. this is where although you know something is bad and dangerous, you’d like to know more about it and envision scenarios around it from a safe environment. writing or making art won’t leave you with permanent life ruining trauma, but you still get to explore that concept and sate that curiosity.

exploratory fiction can even be used as a coping mechanism for trauma survivors! that’s right!! some of the exact same trauma survivors that antis claim to want to protect and give voices to are some of the people hurt by their rhetoric.

my own traumas and potential anecdotes aside, I don’t really know much about this topic and as such I’ll let other survivors get more in depth/talk more personally if they’d like (as no survivors deals with their trauma the same way), but I know for a fact that exploring something that hurt you badly in the past can be an excellent way for someone to better understand themselves, what they went through, and better cope with what happened.

it may seem like making light of a bad situation, but it’s their trauma to deal with, not anyone else’s. no one can tell them that they’re reacting wrong. if it makes them happy and isn’t inherently hurting anyone, it shouldn’t be taken away from them.

(I’ve seen anti rhetoric directly harm trauma/abuse survivors and for their privacy I won’t name them but don’t come @ me w/ your “But I’m A Trauma Survivor And I’m An Anti” junk. I’m not saying you can’t be a trauma survivor and an anti. I’m simply saying that antis can’t exactly be counted as completely innocent and uwu-unproblematic either.)

What makes the fans/consumers of problematic content innocent?

by reading something or looking at something, did you just hurt somebody?

did you read this book or look at this art and in doing so just ruin someone’s entire life by violating them or some other heinous act?

no. that’s not how anything works ever.

by writing about murder, did someone just take a knife and kill someone? did someone die because they wrote a book? is every murder mystery author actually a murderer?

no. (but that would make an excellent murder mystery novel. an unreliable narrator who is revealed to be the murderer all along lol writing prompt)

by that same token, reading about someone dying doesn’t make you a murderer or as good as one.

people may come to realize things about themselves through fiction, as access to terminology and information may help them develop, but someone can enjoy fiction simply because it makes them happy and they enjoy it.

But consuming problematic content can inspire someone to do something problematic! Fiction affects reality!

taking inspiration from something and putting something into action are two entirely different things.

assuming a person has the presence of mind not to be so susceptible to suggestion that they do everything they see on tv, fictional content on the damn internet shouldn’t be any different.

But what about Jaws? Shark hunting saw a huge spike after its release because people were all afraid of sharks because of it!*

people were already afraid of sharks. people probably already wanted to hunt sharks, dude. what do you think inspired the original movie?

I mean, a huge carnivorous fish with rows and rows of teeth? and it occasionally came up and just took chunks out of people?? it was horror/thriller material just begging to be used.

shark attacks definitely got more publicity because of the success of the movie, but if you think there wasn’t a fear of sharks before Jaws, you’re either super dense or super short sighted.

also, if you think hunters won’t hunt something just because it’s super big and scary, you have never met a hunter. Jaws’ story is not exactly the perfect comparison to the average person minding their business who would never ever consider doing something heinous.

if someone already wants to do something, they will do it whether or not they have fiction to blame for it. they may never consume that fiction and still do it.

they are the screwed up ones, and it is not because they consume screwed up fiction. that is correlation, not causation.

fiction in and of itself does not affect reality. it is the people who use fiction as a scapegoat to weasel themselves out of the consequences for their actions who say it do.

Does that mean that all fiction is exempt from criticism?

hell no. in fact, fuck no.

fiction can still be bad. fiction can be piss poorly written. the characters can be well presented but executed poorly. the designs might be good but they might not make sense. the anatomy might be fuckin wack and the story might not go anywhere. it might just be pure self indulgent nonsense that no one on earth but the creator enjoys.

this does not mean anyone gets the right to completely forget all sense of human decency and make people feel like shit for the things they created.

as a creator, creating stuff is hard. it takes time energy and practice.

some professional artists’ work aren’t really my thing and their work may make me a little uncomfortable to look at, but I’m not all in their comment sections making their days worse. I recognize that they put time and effort into it, and they may not even be too confident about it!!

sometimes the nicest things you can say is absolutely fucking nothing. however, if you have to say something mean, if you have to give those damn two cents, at least recognize that there is a real human being with thoughts and feelings on the other side of your screen, and they’d probably appreciate some manners and maybe some well wishes for the trouble. no sense belittling people when you can uplift them and inspire them to do better instead.

Does this mean you hate antis?

in any other post I would just say yes. I hate their rhetoric and the awful shit they put creators and fans alike through. however, because this post is informative, my precise answer is not technically.

I do not wish harm on antis. I don’t wish death on them. they deserve their privacy as much as anyone, and I won’t harass them though they may harass others.

I think the things that they do is often times abhorrent and I think that their toxicity is largely a contributing factor in how draining fandom culture has become and I hate that. I hate feeling unsafe in spaces meant to be fun and community driven. I hate looking through blogs to make sure I don’t accidentally come into contact with someone who may potentially try to dox me because I read a comic they think is garbage.

however, I don’t think all antis deserve real hatred. some are simply misguided and don’t do this super invasive awful shit. even if they do this awful shit, I still hope they can change for the better and address their issues, apologize even if they can’t/won’t be forgiven, and become happier chiller people who can focus their energy towards better things.

like... I don’t think I hate them as much as I hate who they are right now. despite what another bit of anti rhetoric says, people aren’t static. even if it doesn’t excuse what they’re doing and consequences will find them accordingly, they deserve room to grow. all people deserve room to grow. they aren’t entitled to my forgiveness, nor my time, nor company, but I wish the best for them at the end of the day. I hope this passes for them and they learn better.

and w/ that I think we’re done!

I think that about explains everything I know, and while at the time I’m writing this it is very late and I’ve been staring at this for a few hours now, I don’t think I’ve missed much of anything!

if I’ve missed a talking point you’d like to see explained, have any questions this post doesn’t answer, or have a post that disproves anything I said, my ask box is always open!!

I humbly request that any debate that may happen on this post if any stay polite and sexy. negativity earns yourself a hearty block from me bc it’s my blog and I do what I want. take it to dms if you must but please don’t be all up and rude. this may not be the most polite and neutral post around but I don’t think any argumentative piece is. I am in fact opinionated and I won’t present both sides of the argument as equal when they quite clearly are not, thank you.

tl;dr

antis are harmful to the very people they claim to protect and stand for and can do better things w/ their time like ride a bike or roll in some grass. they can go step on an entire bucket of legos. just plunge their feet in the sharpest of lego bricks. I hope all their library books are dog-eared to death and their internet is slow. I wrote an entire essay on this practically for over 2 hours no breaks. I’m tired. I’m more tired of their shit but I’m tired.

* this was a real and original argument I saw to justify fiction affects reality that I saw while I was scrolling someone’s blog. it sucked bc the rest of their blog was pretty positive and cool and I even wanted to follow them but like,, ya know, yikes. they seemed condescending and close minded and I was outta there.

edit: this is actually being posted bc it’s been brought to my attention that the antis have already taken to “calling me out” (lmao okay jan) so like. this is wildin - I’m by no means an influencer (I have?? 8 followers. I’m not actually famous.) nor have I been super vocal about it thus far but like,, my dudes I am laughing this is exactly what I knew would happen and I still manage to be surprised.

#2ol 2peak2 #discourse #info post #anti anti #anti antis #pro ship #pro shipping #pro shippers #pro fiction #anti censorship #I don't wanna pick any fights #so I won't get all up in unnecessary tags #but like?? yeah #it's real anti anti on main hours

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marshmallowgoop · 6 years ago

Photo

I can’t think of anyone else who does this kind of year-in-review compilation for writing, but I put one together for 2017 and would like to continue to do so. It’s just nice to get a sense of what I’ve accomplished in 12 months, especially when I feel that I haven’t accomplished much of anything.

Unlike last year, though, I’m including all kinds of writing I’ve done this time around. My non-fiction work is important to me, too.

Mental health talk and text versions of these snippets under the cut.

To cut right to the chase, 2018 was rough. No matter all my flowery pep talks trying to be positive and uplifting, my feelings of inadequacy skyrocketed. I drenched myself in my own self-depreciating “humor,” and I ridiculed my hopes and dreams. Every time I felt my work was poorly received, I’d tell myself, “Well, what did you think would happen? That people would actually like what you do?”

But I never wanted to stop “keeping on.” I wanted to continue what I loved no matter what, and I threw myself into my writing. There would be days where I wouldn’t eat or do anything else until I’d finished an essay. I spent practically the entire month of November sleeping on my couch because I never wanted to “go to bed” until I had written more, posted more, done more. My head became filled with a constant mantra of, “You’ll never be enough.”

And I wanted to prove myself wrong. I wanted to be something—even if that something was just being happy with myself. But all the proclamations that I’m “getting better!” and “improving so much!” never did much for my confidence. What good is progress, after all, if I still feel like I’m nowhere?

Still, I tried to be productive about my failure. So I wasn’t satisfied with what I was doing. What could I do to be satisfied? I took different approaches to my content. I asked for advice, opinions. But that feeling of being nothing remained.

And yet, I’d always say things like, “I’m okay. I’m just frustrated.” Or, “I felt better after I binged some Netflix, haha.” I wanted to be helpful, inspiring. I wanted to tell people that it’s hard, but it gets better. I wanted to come off as the happy person I so wish to be, and I felt guilty every time I revealed any of my insecurities. Nobody wants to hear that stuff. Everyone suffers. I’m not special.

So maybe that’s why I feel it’s important to say now that I’m not okay. I’m hurting. I’m in pain. There are times I hate myself so much that I can think of nothing but how I’m ugly both inside and out, that I’m selfish, ungrateful, a total bitch.

And I want to be better! Of course I do. And I want to continue to work to be better.

But right now? I’m not okay. And running away from that fact and trying to hide it won’t help me or anyone else.

It was a rough year. I feel I made a total fool of myself more times than I would care to admit. But I also created a lot of art. I shared a lot of art with the world.

And you know what? I am proud of myself. I did impact people with what I did. I answered over 100 asks! I added more than 17 pages to my “replies” tag! I’m not nothing, and I need to stop treating myself like I am!

On to a better, healthier 2019!

Texts

January

Yes, DARLING goes way further than I’m comfortable with, but in doing so, and in doing so seriously, it tells the viewer in no indirect terms that the relationship between Hiro and Zero Two isn’t a joke. This ain’t another Ryuko and Senketsu, where all the blatantly suggestive themes between a human and a non-human are easily neglected and there’s the insistence that the relationship is akin to that of a child and their parental figure (yuck), because unlike Ryuko and Senketsu, there is 1,000% the sense that this series intends for its leads to be like that. There’s practically no other way around it. Just look at the title.

DARLING also doesn’t seem to be following in the footsteps of a run-of-the-mill monster movie, either, where a relationship between a human and a non-human is treated as something terrifying. There have only been two episodes so far, but I would say that there is something genuine in the relationship between Hiro and Zero Two already.

February

So, I don’t have a “bad” section this week. While DARLING might have tonal problems as a whole, as far as “Your Thorn, My Badge” is concerned, there’s little to complain about. The episode is serious, and it stays serious. For the first time ever, there’s a distinct lack of gratuitous fanservice, and other issues that plague the show are also wonderfully absent. No awful cockpit set-up can be seen here, abuse from a woman isn’t depicted as funny, quirky, and cute, and what’s unsettling is portrayed as unsettling.

March

Senketsu’s story—intentionally or not—has easy parallels to stories of marginalization and “otherness.” Like Akira Fudo of Devilman, Senketsu has the body of a “monster” but the heart of a human, and consequently, he can’t fit well in either world. No matter how silly Kill la Kill is, there’s something incredibly worthwhile in a narrative where someone who feels worthless and as though they don’t belong anywhere finds love and comes to understand that they matter. The fact that Senketsu’s story gets so neglected is beyond disappointing for exactly this reason.

But the erasure is also disappointing because Senketsu’s story is plain good. Throwing out everything I just wrote, isn’t it sweet, for a girl to decide that she cares more for a kind, compassionate person than what anyone thinks of her for being with him? Isn’t it heartwarming, that she would push herself to be as strong as she can be to return him to full health when he’s injured? Isn’t it worthy of praise, that there’s the depiction of a relationship built on communication and respect between the two, without either of them unhealthily idolizing the other even though they are both among each other’s first friends, and where they openly discuss their thoughts and feelings and concerns together? Isn’t this all something to be celebrated?

April

To make matters worse, the almost-final version of the script (as included in The Complete Script Book) doesn’t even include that tiny moment of Ryuko’s grief in the end at all! To quote:

街(数ケ月後)

可愛い服を着てマコとデートしている流子。ソフトクリームを買おうとショップによる。そこにもう一人の手が伸びる。買っているのは皐月。彼女も私服だ。驚く流子とマコ。はにかむ皐月。三人、笑いあう。その姿は屈託のない１０代の少女だった。

Incredibly rough translation:

City (a few months later)

Mako wears cute clothes on her date with Ryuko. The two go to buy soft-serve ice cream. Another person’s hand extends, and it’s revealed that Satsuki is buying the ice cream for them. She’s wearing normal clothes, and Ryuko and Mako are amazed. Satsuki is shy. The three laugh together. It is the image of carefree teenage girls.

May

Of course, as I’ve said before, I do think it’s important to talk seriously about media, because media is important. Media constantly impacts and influences us. #TheDiscourse definitely has a place.

But the goal of these kinds of discussions should be to improve. We should strive for better and more inclusive media. We should strive for better and more inclusive fandom. When #TheDiscourse instead becomes more about who’s the most morally superior and who’s the most garbage, it’s failing at this goal. Instead of being about bettering our art, #TheDiscourse seems to, more often than not, be about bullying other people under the guise of righteousness. And it’s utterly repugnant.

June

But what bothers me most about the argument isn’t really the argument itself. What irks me more than anything else is how this widely held belief emphasizes a disheartening trend: whenever something as popular as Kill la Kill comes along, there’s perhaps an eagerness to accept some of the most negative interpretations possible, almost as if there’s a desire for something awful.

And, sure. Maybe I’m just “reacting in shock and horror” to interpretations that are separate from my own. It’s not like there’s anything inherently wrong with a negative view of a work. It’s not like any of my more positive readings are “more correct.” I can’t claim to “get” a piece of art more than anyone else does.

But I can’t help it. I wish things were different. I wish negative interpretations weren’t seen as “more valid” simply because they’re negative. I wish more people weren’t afraid to disagree with popular negative interpretations for fear of sounding like they’re “reacting in shock and horror,” as though there’s really something so wrong about being passionate about art and finding a negative interpretation of art to actually be negative in itself. I wish for more nuance. I wish for more discussion.

July

I mean, just imagine this. You’re fighting a battle whose outcome will literally decide whether or not your entire planet explodes into a billion pieces in like two hours. It’s not only your life on the line. Everyone you care about have their lives on the line, too.

To make matters worse, it ain’t going well for your side. You’ve been rendered basically immobile by a cheap attack from these world-destroying baddies… and so have all your allies. Things are looking pretty grim, to say the least.

And then one of your big-name enemies goes and does it. She laughs at your efforts and taunts you and—get this—she says something that totally insults your OTP.

Now, a normal person would probably not be thinking about OTPs during a fight to save the Earth from turning into confetti.

A normal person is not Mako Mankanshoku.

August

But I find Grosz’s thesis compelling in regards to Kill la Kill because, in a lot of ways, Ryuko and Senketsu do rather embody typical positions of men and women in fictional stories both East and West… except, the roles are reversed. Ryuko is the unruly, aggressive, and hot-blooded protagonist just as a man often is, and Senketsu exhibits many traits that are traditionally associated with women; he’s sensitive, emotional, and a considerable worrywart. Further, while I find the term “love interest” both degrading and unfitting for Senketsu in a series that Word of God denies any romantic intention for, I have to admit that he fits many of the conventions. In an anime with a cast primarily composed of women, the fact that Senketsu is arguably coded as male makes him, just as the standard heteronormative “love interest,” the most narratively significant character of another gender in the show (for just a few other examples, see Ran from Detective Conan, Sam from Danny Phantom, Katara from Avatar: The Last Airbender, and Tuxedo Mask from Sailor Moon). Whether I’m watching an anime or an American cartoon, I don’t think I’d be too surprised to see a scenario like the one from the end of Kill la Kill’s thirteenth episode, where a man tells a woman that he’s afraid of losing control and needs her to be there for him so that he doesn’t.

September

The official website for Kill la Kill the Game: IF is now up.

As of this writing, the site details gameplay mechanics and other general information regarding the game. There are also short bios and new game-specific artwork provided for the four confirmed playable characters: Ryuko Matoi, Satsuki Kiryuin, Ira Gamagoori, and Uzu Sanageyama. The “Video” section features the trailer from Anime Expo 2018 and the original 30-second commercial (which now has English subtitles available).

The “Top” page also includes a link to the Arc System Works Event Portal Site, where any potential players can download a detailed Play Guide for the game. Additionally, the site provides a schedule for the upcoming showcase of Kill la Kill the Game: IF at Tokyo Game Show 2018:

October

She catches their reflection in the long mirrors that line the gym walls and asks how in the world it all works.

He does not know what she means.

She holds a hand to her hair. The strands are bright and red, leaping into the air like fire.

His voice is a low rumble. The sound fills her as though it is her own.

We are one now, he says. Your skin is my skin, and mine is yours.

The words remind her to once more return to herself.

But when she looks to the glass, she still sees him.

November

Gridman is also quite stunning from a directorial and visual standpoint. As I wrote up some notes for the premiere while waiting for my multiple-hours-delayed Greyhound bus (hey I can’t not recommend that service enough, but those of you who were in full-out cosplay at the station are so much stronger than me), I made sure to mention how much I enjoyed the focus on scenery and environments. A lot of anime will rely heavily on stale shot-reverse-shot conversations in which the characters hardly move, but Gridman mixes things up. When the characters talk, viewers get these wonderful glimpses of their world. Sometimes, you’ll hardly even see the characters at all! This choice feels so fresh and different, and I was particularly taken by how the opening moments of the show are just about entirely background shots.

Takeuchi mentions in the interviews that Gridman director Akira Amemiya is incredibly skilled at what he does, and everything in a cut—from objects to angles to facial expressions—all have meaning. I think I could definitely see that from episode 1, and it’s a real treat. That’s exactly what visual storytelling should be doing.

December

Jiro’s Mubyoshi is neat, but Ryuko’s? It’s sweet as all heck. No matter Houka’s complicated info dump about what she’s doing, the actual scene simply plays out like one of the purest expressions of love. There’s a reason that there’s nudity here, and it’s not for fanservice or titillation. It’s to signify the closeness of Ryuko and Senketsu in this moment—to say that, right here, the two of them are uniting as one.

And it’s beautiful. Intimate. Absolutely heartwarming. Ryuko openly shares a part of herself that even Senketsu hadn’t known before, and he adores it. He loves being with Ryuko so much. He loves her so much.

And Ryuko? Shy, closed-off, keeps-her-distance-even-from-her-family Ryuko? She’s completely unabashed. Senketsu has always paid attention to her pulse and breathing and so on and so forth, and she doesn’t even hesitate to reveal more. This is her sound, and she wants him to listen. She wants him to hear nothing else. She trusts him, fully and completely—and this trust is so breathtakingly powerful that Houka even unzips his hoodie in awe of it.

#just before 2018 ends over here!#goop makes a personal post #long post #ramblings #happy new year y'all!

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