#maybe i do wanna hear usagi's future tax policies

[trickstarbrave]

i don’t like the comment way far up in this thread about the literary analysis class (not that OP is wrong, a professor telling you you should pick a particular school of thought you analyze everything through is blatantly incorrect im about to elaborate on why).

different schools of thought of how you analyze a piece of media, or even how your analyze other problems, are not ones where you pick one school of thought to view a subjective piece of media. you don’t pick a school of analysis you think is the most correct or you agree with the most and stick with it. the reasons we have different schools of thought is this: every person on the planet is biased. there are not objectively or subjectively “more correct” ways of analysis. you can and should approach a different piece of media (or other thing ur analyzing actually) with multiple different schools. do a marxist reading. then a feminist one. do a pragmatic critique. do an ethical one. adopt, for each one, the rules and angle of that critique. you don’t have to agree with all the points. you probably wont. the point of learning these schools of thought is to see the different ways everyone interprets a piece of media or information. because we cannot know or understand everything and the closest we can get is by experiencing and understanding as many different perspectives as possible, even if they contradict each other 

critiques of a media are not personal attacks on them. they are not attempts to undermine them, to see flaws that discredit them. if you do a literal critique of sailor moon and the eternal neo-monarchy this is for an exploration of the media, seeing the strengths and weaknesses of it. from a standpoint that assumes we all have an education in media analysis, we all know you arent making this critique because “this is why sailor moon is bad” and instead because pointing this out can help us look at, understand it, and understand why it doesn’t do that. what story sailor moon is not. 

not only does fandom spaces often have ppl who lack and understanding in characters you arent supposed to root for, it also has people who simply don’t get the goal of some media critique. in school for research i took marxists views to analyze and discuss data and studies, that doesn’t mean i am arguing that marxism is the best or only school of thought you should apply to it. i was doing it because it helped point out issues and strong points in the study that other schools of analysis glossed over, but the full marxist framework was good at communicating those effectively. critiques are not supposed to exist in a vacuum but in a larger conversation about media and data analysis. 

sometimes in analysis you take positions you don’t 100% agree with, because its helpful for the overall discussion. no you shouldnt be in favor of taking bigoted positions, and you do still need to be careful of how you word things, but it does mean pointing out when people you agree with make the wrong points. it will mean telling people you agree with on a fundamental level they don’t see the larger picture, or they are missing something. sometimes it will mean making a million different arguments mentally so you can understand more clearly why you believe something and can articulate it. 

and this is hard. in public education group discussions i find happen only in your later years, in high school, and by that point most people get into the grove of being told what symbolism they are supposed to look for, what a piece of media means definitively, and what the “correct” answer is, when ultimately the world is made up of way more subjective answers particularly when you look at art and media. and don’t even get me started on christianity’s influence on it and how multiple different churches basically tell you you don’t get to interpret the bible and read multiple translations and instead have to take the word of your pastor exclusively or else you’re a sinner who’s going to hell. 

One thing about fandom culture is that it sort of trains you to interact with and analyze media in a very specific way. Not a BAD way, just a SPECIFIC way.

And the kind of media that attracts fandoms lends itself well (normally) to those kinds of analysis. Mainly, you're supposed to LIKE and AGREE with the main characters. Themes are built around agreeing with the protagonists and condemning the antagonists, and taking the protagonists at their word.

Which is fine if you're looking at, like, 99% of popular anime and YA fiction and Marvel movies.

But it can completely fall apart with certain kinds of media. If someone who has only ever analyzed media this way is all of a sudden handed Lolita or 1984 or Gatsby, which deal in shitty unreliable narrators; or even books like Beloved or Catcher in the Rye (VERY different books) that have narrators dealing with and reacting to challenging situations- well... that's how you get some hilariously bad literary analysis.

I dont know what my point here is, really, except...like...I find it very funny when people are like "ugh. I hate Gatsby and Catcher because all the characters are shitty" which like....isnt....the point. Lololol you arent supposed to kin Gatsby.