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damnfandomproblems · 2 days ago

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Going to finish out the remaining submissions from this user from 2024, this should cover September through December, as well as a few additional submissions that would have been included in the earlier parts but were hidden in the inbox due to Tumblr being a functional website.

I've seen some confusion since not all of the submissions mention or deal with bisexuality. I reiterate from the first part, these are all of the submissions from the same user, even including ones that are not on the topic of bisexuality. Submissions about bisexuality from different users will not be included either. The reason for rounding up the posts has nothing to do with the subject matter, only to condense items sent by a very prolific submitter so the entire queue is not dominated by one person for months on end.

I don't see why one should take discussions about "sexualization," of female characters seriously when the majority of those involved call flatchested (and/or short) women in fiction "pedophilia" or "child-coded" and simultaneously assume the creators are pervs. Made humorous when it's a woman doing the supposed "sexualization" and they still assume it's men, staying in denial. It really is blown out of proportion in many cases.

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There is nothing more telling when the same fans who call a series, "so bad, it's good!" When it is legimately well-written and they actively ignore that for the most fussy reasosn. Even more when they are also (toxic) shippers. You'll lie about a work of fiction just because your ship isn't canon? Go outside.

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I love how many fandoms are "Bisexuals are valid!" and "The bi gaze!" until a bunch of bisexuals find a "sexy" fictional woman attractive and openly say they find her hot.

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It's so odd to me whenever a fanbase calls a character "clever" who is anything but clever in canon. Most of the time, the fanbase is really biased or somehow not aware of bad writing. Things working out whenever a character has a problem =/= said character finding a clever solution to an they have issue. I have to admit. It is pretty funny when a scene goes out of it's way to show they are anything but clever and somehow most of the audience didn't notice.

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Unless they claim to be one in canon, or canon backs it up, assuming a kind character is a pacifist and/or hates fighting on the basis of being kind can often be a pretty OOC assumption about them.

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I'm not gonna lie, it's kind of lame and boring how "abusive childhood under abusive parents" seems like the ONLY kind of parents a fandom is willing to give a character who clearly has major issues with feeling unloved and/or true happiness in canon, but it's never confirmed what exactly they're upbringing was like. That's not the only kind of parenting that can lead to someone who feels that way and I can't help but think that overlaps with the problem of how most fandoms only believe there TWO kinds of parents (in fiction): Perfect or Abusive Parents.

September 2024:

I rarely care how much spite towards something most of us collectively dislikes was put into a book/movie/game/tv series/story: there needs to be more substance and creativity past that. Spite is a motivator; it's rarely as effective when it's the ONLY motivator. Hence why it's rarely seen as a long-term motivation. A creator and/or group of people can't make a piece of media that is plain bad, and expect the fans to clap like trained seals, all because it said "thing/group/person you dislike is bad," since that doesn't negate the necessary criticism for how poorly written it was. And it's just as annoying watching other fans defend whenever it's done and view any hate as defending where that spite is directed towards in the source material. "OMG! This book dunks on (insert famous person who was exposed) at multiple times! If you don't like the book; you are defending said horrible celebrity!" In addition; no one needs a work of fiction to tell them to dislike something, someone or even an entire company in real life. They can do that themselves just fine.

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I love how the immense HATRED for a male character lessens when a fandom collectively headcanons him as trans. Yes. Lessens. It's not going away in most cases since the hated male character in question is still a man. And it's not any better when it only goes away under that context. And it's amazing how that's seen as a win by almost an entire fanbase. Keeping a hatred for men with tolerance for trans men. For claims about how a fanbase must always reject things that are written off as "terf" (or "radfem") rhetoric to show they care about trans men and to prevent more fandoms from being radfem indoctrination grounds, a lot of fandoms are certainly in a rush to accept other things that sound almost like it under a new coat of paint. All because the "man bad!" stays. If I didn't know any better, I would say if terfs didn't exist and radfems exclusively hated men, a lot more wouldn't care about fighting back against radfem rhetoric. And not just in fandoms. In all social spaces.

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It's amazing how many fandom spaces are chill with ableism towards neurodivergent men, all because said ableists are aware of how much "man bad!" they have to add to get away with it and how many more will side with them. "Fandoms are a safe space for ALL minorities!" No. Not always. More like a safe space for everyone who agrees with the main, no room for argument opinion; hell on earth for anyone who disagrees.

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"How can anyone unironically like this series!? It's weird (and clearly confusing)! Weird mean bad!" It's earnest. And often very heartfelt. Not everything needs to be ironically enjoyed guys & gals. And here I thought we were in a "cringe is freeing" era. You can just like something. And it's a lot more freeing when you do.

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Look. I get not enjoying when the creators of a franchise give the official rundown on what's canon and what isn't canon. It's all opinions. But at the same time, liking canon is not some kind of boring, evil thing and not everyone joins in on hating canon. The popularity to do that is not universal. Plus, as much as the official canon may be not to everyone's tastes; not everyone loves the fandom-wide headcanons that some fandoms insist are canon. Canon may suck, but I know 30 fanfiction writers who can do MUCH worse. The important thing to remember is a difference of opinion should be encouraged.

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"Everyone feels tempted to headcanon a well-written m/f pairing as two bisexuals in disguise or a bi man with a woman in disguise or two trans characters in disguise! Anyone who feels otherwise is a dumb straight!" No. And plenty of people DO NOT feel that way. Which is funny when this mentality is rarely ever carried over to canon bi characters being shipped with characters of the opposite gender in fandoms. No matter how "healthy" or "well-written" said ships are. Or when hated m/f ships are headcanoned as bi.

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It's always, "Fandoms were started by old women who wanted to see two men kiss! KNOW! YOUR! HISTORY!" Until you politely point out who the majority of fanfiction writers are.

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It's always "BI RIGHTS!" until some fans ship a bi female character with a male character. Made worse when the bi female character in question is propped up as a "strong female character who needs no man!" by most of a fandom.

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It's always "You CANNOT enjoy an m/f pairing WITHOUT headcanoning the male character or both parties in it as bi! OTHERWISE! The ship is a boring straight ship!" until a fan headcanons a hated m/f pairing they like as bi.

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I'm gonna be completely honest with you all: the lack of modern strong female characters who understand it's okay to ask for help and be vulnerable is just disappointing. Made more disappointing by all the defenders who act sooooo surprised a bunch of one note, "I punch things!" flawless "girlbosses" who are as interesting as watching grass grow, are not that popular. Vulnerability and having emotions is not a weakness.

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There are very few things more media illiterate than a fandom saying it's okay for a traumatized character to hurt (or worse) anyone they want all because said character has a sad past and trauma.

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Few things creepier than a [fan]artist who is under the impression that because their art has fans, all of their fans must share the same politics and views as them. Or fans must disclose their own; or else.

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Really can't stand when someone who has nothing better to do decides to misuse and devalue certain terms, all because they can't handle being told that fiction doesn't affect reality. No matter how you state it, pedophilia will only apply to irl cases: someone shipping a pair of characters with a two year age gap is VERY different from that. And never will be the same.

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"I will ALWAYS look at the hatred of a female character as sexist! No ifs and butts!" "Even the ones who receive hate for mistreating and abusing the male characters badly, and never getting called out in canon? Female on male abuse will never be funny. It's not empowering, and double standards should be called out in every shape and form." "MISOGYNY!"

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"You're not allowed to hate this character! They're a child! Hating fictional children is the EXACT SAME as hating real-life children!" It's not and I'm going to go dislike them regardless.

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I'm not sorry for disliking this. I'm never going to be a fan of when a canon bi female character is either written in fancontent to hate men every two milliseconds or her being attracted to men is erased because it's "lesser" or she's "above that" and/or her attraction to men is erased making her only attracted to women because "man bad" is rampant among fans. It's all so boring and frustrating how common this is among fandoms when it comes to canon bi female characters. And then fandoms act so shocked by the lack of fancontent they caused due to how widespread this usually is in a fanbase. (Similarly can be said for canon bi male characters)

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I fail to see what's so bad when fans of a character they love acknowledge any badly written appearances of said beloved character. It doesn't mean they (now) hate the character. Unless they say that. It usually means they're simply critiquing any times they believed a fan-favorite could've received better writing.

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It's hilarious watching the same fans who say a character doesn't need to be bi in order to be attracted gnc characters, immediately turn around and say no one is allowed to ship a gnc character with any characters of the opposite gender. Which gets worse when said canon gnc is bi and they still say that. And then they wonder why said character is so untouched in shipping circles.

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"WE HAVE TO FIGHT BACK AGAINST BIPHOBIA IN ALL FANDOMS!" Y'all can't even talk about or to bisexual men without saying they're all privileged, all gross men and don't face any biphobia (unlike bi women) due to being privileged gross men. The only ones you positively acknowledge are fictional characters, you're headcanons or celebrities, or in passing. It's either that or never at all. Somehow, the latter is still seen as a sign of privilege. Perhaps not as anti-biphobic as many of you claim.

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I don't get why so many get so worked up when a sci-fi/fantasy race is divided by male & female. "THEY'RE NOT HUMAN! That means they don't have human genders!" They're still a fictional race of beings, meaning it's up the writers if that's the case or not.

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I may be a lot of things, but at least I never encouraged racism or stereotyping towards Japanese people just because of fictional women from there.

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I really can't stand how much modern fandom & shipping acts like a fictional woman having negative traits is a silent sign to never ship her with male characters. "You can't ship her with men! SHE HAS A TEMPER!" How about I do anyway?

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It's amazing how many fans project their "Being bisexual means hating men every 3 seconds!" onto canon bisexual characters then acting surprised that mentality is not universally agreed upon and often creates less fancontent of said canon bi characters.

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You can't go on and on, about how you wish there were more women in fiction who want to burn the world after losing the ones they loved, only to get worked up that a "strong woman" is mourning an "icky and gross male". I will NEVER get fans who want fictional women to be written with as much freedom as certain preexisting fictional male examples, yet immediately get worked up at something that should be viewed as minor. Attraction towards men is a morally neutral thing. Also, way to tell male fans that they should embrace a very low opinion of themselves. How kind of you to say. So let me see if I'm getting this right; you will praise every fictional antagonist who is a man that wrongfully lost a woman he loved, yet you will want the opposite and not want it at the same time? No wonder there aren't more. So many people WANT more fictional women written under certain clichés and tropes with the same freedom as many fictional men until the fictional women in question are attracted to men in canon.

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It's really funny hearing "Do better!" from toxic fans who don't do that themselves.

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I'm not sorry. I'm never going to be a fan of when female characters hit and mistreat male characters as unfunny jokes. And it only gets worse when a fanbase praises said female characters for this and views all critique as sexism.

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"I wish more fandoms liked female characters... ... ... ..." (sad face) "You're in luck! Here's some very popular exampl-!" "THEY HAVE BOOBS! THEY! SHOW! SOME! SKIN! That means NONE OF THE FANS actually love them for who they are! I can't enjoy them for those specific reasons; that means NO ONE ELSE is allowed to be fans of them anymore!" "..." "You can thank me now for protecting women and saving fandoms!"

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If you want the "Evil Superman" trope to die down so badly, I believe elevating some of the characters who are based on the Big Blue Boy Scout and are far from evil will help. Show that's not the only thing to do with the iconic character.

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I often hear of artists and writers in fandoms who worry about their own work being too similar or a "rip-off" of something they are a fan of. What's important to remember is many of the books, comics, cartoons, movies, video games, etc., that you consume are made by creators who have media inspirations of their own. Try to remember that next time you worry over your own creations being too similar to what you are a fan of. Many of your fave creators are fans as well. It's not a bad thing. Inspiration can come from practically anywhere.

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"There aren't any women writing female characters who are described as a 'girlboss' instead of an actual character and/or turning current popular ones into 'girlbosses' at all!" lol.

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I love how so many of the same people who want to confront the abundance of "strong female characters" in media in the last few years and put an immediate end to it, ONLY want to confront male writers who make them. Purposefully tackling the issue halfway. No wonder it's barely going anywhere.

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I love how a female character having no interest in being a parent is some kind of secret code to fans that she's only attracted to women. And then they act so surprised (and angry) when it isn't in canon.

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Very, VERY unpopular opinion: We can't only look at sexism when it comes to why a fictional woman is barely used by shippers. Stuff like "she's a strong independent woman who needs NO MAN!" & "She's bi! NEVER ship her with men!" & treating them as little girls who are abused by fans for not abiding by the set of fandom enforced guidelines, will not create fancontent and should be critiqued more.

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It's really boring when a fandom can't accept a canon bi woman without projecting their hatred of men onto her.

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It's amazing how many fandoms can't look at beefy & kind male characters who are either intelligent or of average intelligence, without making them really dumb.

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Fandoms have been too quick to call every male character a "nice guy" for too long. And before anyone says anything, no, it is not an "attack on women" nor does everyone who feels this way is a nice guy in disguise, when you reinforce a very simple lesson: Words have meanings. Unless you have concrete evidence, stop calling every male character you hate a nice guy on the basis of said hate and stop calling the fans and people who disagree nice guys as well.

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So many hate bi erasure in fandoms until it's a fictional bi woman that's mainly shipped with female characters and the fandom wants to keep it that way.

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It would be nice to be in a fandom that talks about canon bi women without going on about how much they clearly hate men and finding attraction towards men disgusting. As it turns out, not every bisexual relates to that. Who knew?

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It's really funny watching the same people who try to fight back against notion that bisexuality is far from binary for both real people and fictional characters/headcanons, turn around and invent new binaries. "Being bi means being wonderfully attracted to the good side (women, nonbinary people, trans men & trans women) and regretfully attracted to the gross, evil side (men)!"

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So many fandoms these days come up with such poor reasons to say why you can't ship a fictional woman with a man. "You can't ship her with men! She has a temper!" "You can't ship her with men! She's struggling to move on from a traumatized past!" "You can't ship her with men! She's mean to other people!" Even smaller examples. "Why would anyone ship her with a man? She teases him!" It's amazing how many fandoms these days can not look at a female character having a toxic trait without assuming she full-on hates men/is not attracted to men. Apparently, "mean" female characters aren't allowed to be shipped with male characters these days.

October 2024:

OP: Man... ... I wish there were more m/f ships that fell under *(insert relationship dynamic here). It would also help fight back against certain stereotypes. *enemies to lovers, woman wants to burn the world after losing the man she loved, murderous & protective women to male characters, etc. Just to name a few. Some of the notes: "OP! You dumbass (affectionate)! They should be wlw!" "Make them LESBIANS and then we're talking!" "This ship dynamic only works with two women, let's be real." Full offense, but every time someone here posts about m/f ship dynamics they wish they saw more of, the comments about how said ship dynamics only work when it's between two women are not needed and often very annoying. You are more than welcome to prefer to when a ship dynamic or tropes are done with two female characters, but acting like everyone should agree that's when it only works is really ridiculous. It's also not helping fight back against any aforementioned stereotypes anytime someone does that. Especially with how many fandoms are under the impression certain ship dynamics are only good that way.

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It's really funny hearing the same fans who want more gnc m/f pairings turn around and say men finding gnc women attractive is inherently predatory. Whether they are real or fictional. Talk about reinforcing stereotypes. (Similar nonsense can be seen in vice-versa)

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It's hilarious watching the same fans who treat real people as fictional characters and fictional characters as real people, turn around, and act like representation is just going to make a form of bigotry go poof. My friend, you are the biggest example of that NOT being the case.

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Unpopular opinion: we can't only blame misogyny on why a fandom looks at a female character with a (huge) temper and insists she's a lesbian that hates every male character in canon. The fact that a lot of fanbases can't look at a fictional woman who gets angry easily without insisting she hates men should receive more analysis.

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It's hilarious hearing, "Where are the female Kuzos?????" from the same fans who immediately want to start fights because the writers dared to callout an arrogant female character for being such a jerk towards other characters in-universe and grew to be more kind & less selfish as the story went on. Arrogance is not only a flaw for male characters to deal with.

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"I wish more would bring up female characters they love and have as their favourites! It's almost always male characters!" Those same fans when when other fans bring up a bunch of non-Western female characters they love and have as their favs: [LOUD ANGRY SCREAMING] That's right ladies & gents! Sexism is okay in these certain cases!

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I really can't stand how a fanbase can rarely imagine or accept a fictional woman unless hating and being "better than the men" is a big part of who she is. Whether it's actually canon or easy to project onto her. And then the same fanbase acts so surprised she's seemingly not more popular with more fans, writing off all the haters as dumb incels (because apparently this is sooo empowering & bullying men is also sooo empowering) that prove she's actually a good female character in canon and male fans are too stupid to realize that. (Women who hate her? GET OVER YOUR INTERNALIZED MISOGYNY!) So many like the "don't be disrespectful to your audience!" advice until it's directed towards male fans. How charming. Perhaps instead of starting more fandom discourse, try to listen for once and spread something good for once.

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Most of the fandom discourse in the last few years reinforces the statement "gatekeeping is good, actually," and that's the truth, so many refuse to accept.

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It's really disturbing how many people are "respect your audience!" Until male fans are a clear part of that audience. Classic, "it's okay when we do it,"

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I can't stand how good or bad a woman in a piece of fiction is these days, is based on how "better than the men" she is. Unless her entire character is going on about how much she can't stand the men in canon, she's immediately written off as a bad character. Or if the fanbase can project that trait onto her. A female character with male friends she cares about? SEXIST! EVIL! Such smart criticism.

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My happiness at seeing fans who remind other fans you can ship bi male characters with female characters immediately fades seeing those same fans never say the same about shipping bi female characters with male characters. The latter is almost always met with "I know she's bi... but seeing her with a gross man still feels gross/gives me the ick!" or "This bi queen is too good for an icky man!" You can't claim to care about fandom biphobia and only concern yourselves with how bi male characters are treated in shipping.

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It's really disappointing finding a blog that goes on about how much they love bisexuals and being bisexual, then you find on the same blog they won't shut up about how much they hate men and hate being attracted towards men. Even worse when more join in and start projecting it onto fictional bi characters & headcanons.

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"Everyone feels VERY tempted to headcanon every well-written and good m/f ship as two bisexuals because we can't imagine a healthy m/f pairing!" Rip to you, but I've never felt that way. At all. If I headcanon a ship where both parties are bi, it's because I can. It's not everyone's reason for liking a ship. Surprise, surprise. Many fans like a pairing, and that's all. How about saving some of that "positive" energy for fans who ship canon bi characters with characters of the opposite gender, if you're going to be so quick to support bi headcanons for m/f ships?

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I really can't stand how many fandoms don't believe in being nice to male fans until someone puts "trans" before "male" or only focusing on the fandom trans men. Same can be said about many online spaces.

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There is nothing on Earth stopping someone from enjoying "representation" in fiction and still treating irl minorities like trash. And I'm tired of fandoms acting like an increase in "minority" characters is a sign of that having the opposite effect. Don't even get me started on when the minority fans themselves don't even like the representation and receive a bunch unwarranted crap for that.

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I'm never going to feel comfortable around how quickly a fanbase is to call all male fans and male characters "incels" for next to no reason. And it's annoying how easy it is for a fandom to use that word and write off all haters as either suffering from internalized sexism or incels themselves. Fandoms are supposed to be welcoming to all, and this goes against it.

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It's so baffling to me when a fanbase acts like you're not allowed to acknowledge badly written appearances of certain characters. And that talking about them is some kind of "attack" (They're not real) on said characters. It's called constructive criticism for a reason.

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I don't care how beloved an actor or actress is. If they don't fit a role better suited for another person, they don't fit a role better suited for another person. And I can't stand how many audiences and fans only critique actors who play a character they don't fit as, when they hate said actors themselves. Pretending to care.

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There's nothing like hearing positively about a (popular) series from its fans and seeing fan content for it, then getting into it yourself because of all that and understanding just how different fans view the characters themselves to what's in canon. It's quite the whiplash. For example: That popular man-hating lesbian/girlboss seen almost everywhere in fancontent and fanon? Is actually bisexual in canon. How annoying. Yet I'm not surprised since fandoms still have very "interesting" views around canon bi characters.

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It does not matter how many fanfics pairs a canon bi character with a character of the opposite gender. It will never erase the fact said bi character ended up with a character of the same gender. Stop acting like it does, and stop being being so surprised and angry that canon bi characters are featured in fancontent where they are shipped with men AND women. In addition to it never touching canon, you can just not touch or read them. Don't like, don't read. It's also very counterproductive in many cases. For example: "Why are female characters so under-utilized in shipping? Use them more!" [Later] "Why would ANYONE ship this bi female character with any of the male characters???"

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"I can't BELIEVE so many tumblr blogs are so quick to let hatred of men off the hook when OP clarifies they are NOT talking about trans men and that's the only group of men they like! Why is that?" Because loads of blogs here love trans men and hate cis men, next question.

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I'm NEVER going to take the "you can't properly enjoy a ship unless you headcanon both as bi! Only stupid straights don't do this!" seriously when fandoms have such a visceral reaction when you headcanon a hated m/f pairing as both characters being bi.

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Bisexual blog: *exists* Me, a bisexual also on Tumblr: LET'S GOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! That same blog: *keeps on talking about how much they hate men, hate being attracted to men and acts like its something every bisexual agrees on* Me: And that's disappointment comes in.

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It's so wild witnessing numerous female fans rag on and hate certain female characters you like for years, then every discussion you enter around fighting back against hatred for a female character acts like all the haters are male.

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So many people hate biphobia until the victims are irl bi men and not their fictional blorbos or headcanons.

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It's really interesting being a fan of a character and loving them in spite of any badly written appearances you are willing to acknowledge, being surrounded by fans who act like even the smallest form of constructive criticism is an attack on a character.

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I always laugh whenever a fanbase claims they want to confront the haters of female characters and they gender said haters as all being male. Even funnier when they come across some of those haters and many of them are not male. Most of them end up being female fans who hate a female character (or characters). If you want to tackle the negativity around any female character, you have to acknowledge gender is rarely a factor for anyone who likes or dislikes a character.

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I find it very, VERY amusing how many fandoms and audiences these days utterly REFUSE to enjoy a female character for who she is, unless she is "better than those (GROSS) men!" or fans can project that trait onto her and she reminds the audience how much she hates men every two seconds. Often getting worked up for no real reason over all the female characters who don't fall under this and have a lot of fans. In addition: Where are all the male characters where a main selling point is being "better than the women" in canon? A female character's popularity doesn't need to purely come from comparison. She should be able to stand tall on her own. That doesn't sound like a very "strong female character" if her strength only comes from her in relation to others, does it?

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I find it very boring and disturbing how most fanbases these days CANNOT conceptualize a good m/f pairing unless it's a "strong woman" who has ZERO character flaws and is completely perfect, is paired with a male character who is defined by how pathetic he is and only exists to praise her every three seconds. Both for canon pairings and taking canon pairings and making them this way in fandom. Otherwise, it is somehow sexist towards women to create female characters who have character flaws and struggles, also being paired with male characters who are also flawed. A strong woman with a strong man? SEXISM! In some cases, it only "gets better" when she hits him as a joke and that's also used to be an empowering woman. A woman being allowed to hit a man? Yes, stereotypes are okay when it's to prop up women. (Funny how no one calls this toxic femininity) It should come as no surprise to you when (male) fans dislike how prevalent this is ship dynamic is. The other issue is how many other potential m/f relationship dynamics are swept under the rug and this is made out to be the ONLY way to go. Made more annoying when it's paired with "this only works with mlm/wlw pairings!" I also find it very interesting how many state this is the ONLY good m/f ship dynamic and those same fans act surprised when it has the opposite effect on other fandom issues. For example: You are not going to create more pathetic female characters if you keep acting like this is the only m/f ship dynamic writers should bother with and it's somehow sexist towards women to have pathetic female characters end up with male characters.

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I hate how a fanbase refuses to enjoy a decent male character without using him to talk down male fans and saying such nonsense as "one of the only good men!" or "this is why fictional men are superior to real life men and all real life men should kill themselves!"

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Full offense, but so many Tumblr blogs using "damn radfems!" as some kind of swear at everything or source of blame before even checking who is to blame really annoys me. I can't stand them as much as the next person, but all you're doing is giving them more ammunition and giving them more reasons to make themselves out to be an oppressed group that did nothing wrong. When they aren't. Additionally, very concerning how many people on this site are okay with certain things being said unless the ones saying it are radfems.

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I believe the most hilarious part of the "we're tired of m/f pairings where the female character is an untouchable girlboss & the male character is pathetic!" is so many people try to say that the solution is making both of them pathetic. That's not really changing anything. You are still incapable of making an m/f pairing where a woman has flaws and that's final. It's not bad on paper, it's just tiring to see so many fans only like this ship dynamic when it's to avoid the bigger issue, as opposed to actually liking it.

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"How can you even LIKE this series!? IT'S WEIRD!" It's earnest and I'm not going to see it being "weird" as stopping me from liking it. If anything? It makes me like it even more.

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Megamind & Roxanne... Arnold & Helga... Light & Misa... Don't mind me folks! Just listing off pairings fandoms insist are prime examples of how to write m/f enemies to lovers! Anything more "toxic" than these examples are just romanticizing abuse!

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Unpopular opinion: if we're going to tackle the "let men feel emotions" discourse around fictional male characters, we need to talk about how many fandoms will praise certain male characters for "not snapping" or getting angry (at all) for all the wrong reasons. Many of those wrong reasons have very gross undertones. Like outright saying you're glad a male character doesn't let their trauma get to them and they get angry over it. When it would make sense for a lot of them to be mad. There's also a pretty huge difference between liking a male character who is hurting a lot on the inside and doesn't show it on the outside, versus saying that's the ONLY way they should be written, lest they face mockery. A similar case can be made for fans who write off male characters for never crying or barely crying at all, as being heartless for all the wrong reasons. Another similar case can be made for male characters who have been through a lot and yet are made fun of by fans for being sad in the "wrong" way. (E.g., not crying enough). Everyone's different, guys. And fictional men fall under that as well. Crying is not a universal sign of showing emotions or expressing yourself. So many want "emotional" male characters until they get some or get ones that are different from the ones they know. Don't even get me started on all the male characters that are made written off for having "manpain" by fandoms for all the examples here. And more. That's even more annoying.

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"It's not bi erasure to state that a bi female character is not allowed to be shipped with any male characters!" Yes, it is.

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"WE NEED MORE MEAN FEMALE CHARACTERS IN FICTION!" Y'all can't handle mean fictional women who don't hate all the men in the cast and have personalities outside of that hatred.

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"I CAN'T LIKE THIS FEMALE CHARACTER! SHE! HAS! BOOBS!" RIP to you, but I've never seen that as a barrier at all.

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I love how fandoms are all "we have to FIGHT BACK AGAINST FANDOM BIPHOBIA!" until it's biphobia they are okay with letting slide. "It's amazing how much biphobia persists in fandoms until now!" [Later] "Why would ANYONE ship this bi queen with icky males!?" "Why would ANYONE ship this bi woman with anyone else if she has a canon female love interest!?"

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It's always "every fictional character is bi! DNI biphobes!" Until a fan headcanons a very hated character as bi. Then suddenly a lot of discourse starts. You're in a fanbase. You're going to see fans of characters you dislike.

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I love whenever a fanbase pats itself on the back for being so progressive by stating male fans aren't allowed to find any gnc female characters attractive. And then they act all shocked by the lack of fans those same characters have.

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There's some real twisted logic in how many long tumblr posts here will talk about issues faced by bisexual women, and the moment someone points out it affects bisexual men as well, it's just written off as privileged bi men whining and/or men trying to take attention off of the real issue.

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"You have to understand! Only bi people understand what makes a good m/f pairing and must headcanon every good m/f pairing as both parties being bi!" Those same fans when you are a fan of and headcanon a hated or "oh soo abusive" m/f pairing as bi: "STOP! ROMANTICIZING! ABUUUUUSE!"

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I really can't stand whenever someone uses the term "terf juice" or "radfem juice" since all that tells me is plenty of people on tumblr are okay with certain things being said or sprouted if the ones who say it are either not terfs or radfems and never become them. it's often worded in a way where it gets a free pass. A post that says trans men deserve to die will rarely get a pass; think of all the innocent trans men who don't deserve such cruel words! A post that says men deserve to die and says other stuff about them? Met with lols and agreements. Rarely being questioned until one person in the notes goes "guys! OP is a terf/radfem! this post might be great but imagine what they say about the real victims on their other posts!" If more actually cared like they claimed, then they wouldn't wait around for confirmation of the source being a group they hate and were bothered by all the negativity to begin with. Also, open your eyes: plenty of people here state they refuse to see man-hate as a part of what terfs & radfems believe. Often wishing that was the only group they hated if they are proven wrong. And there is NO force on Earth stopping someone from hating men and terfs/radfems at the same time (e.g., "Terfs/radfems hate men? You know who else hates men? ME! They aren't special!").

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There's nothing like coming across a blog through their posts about how evil biphobia is and how evil it is that the LGBT community hates its own members. Then, when you go on their blog, all they post about is - how privileged all bi men are, - how bi men are a "dying race! :D" (i hate overly quirky some are), - how it's soo quirky to treat them like lost dogs or cats waiting to be called as opposed to actual people, - how disgusting it is to be attracted towards men, - how the erasure they face means they're all privileged, - and how "men being bisexual is such an attractive trait" is said in such a gross manner. (I wonder what the notes of posts for that last one would be if we saw more "men love it when a woman is bisexual" posts instead of the usual ;)) And no. It is not any better when all those blogs like this have nothing but nice things to say about fictional bi men & headcanons, since I'm sure we're all familiar with people who treat fictional characters better than real people. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. I see similar nonsense with LGBT men in general. Trans headcanons (for example) do not correlate to zero transphobia to trans men. I wish more would stand by the values they claim to hold.

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Not every bisexual relates to only feeling deep, regrettable attraction towards men, and purely romantic attraction towards women (the "respectful" group). This applies to both real people and fictional characters. Stop speaking as if everyone does.

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I really can't stand how so many fandoms are under the impression a woman only dislikes certain female characters out of internalized sexism. Because as we all know, a difference of opinion and simply disliking certain characters don't exist. This nonsense is funnier when the women in question are fangirls of other female characters, yet that's still not good enough for toxic defenders of female characters they simply dislike. A difference of opinion is something a fandom should not be surprised by, every fan is different.

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I really can't stand how most fandom-wide bi headcanons narrow down to a fandoms inability to admit they actually enjoy a canon m/f pairing ("this healthy m/f pairing is actually two bisexuals in disguise! Everyone who disagrees is a stupid straight!") or a male character ("this male character is actually bi! No [fictional] straight man is this healthy to the woman he's with!"). It makes bi headcanons feel A LOT less genuine because so many fans aren't doing it for fun and assumes every bi fan relates to doing it for this reason or they all find doing this fun; otherwise, they would be a lot more accepting of bi headcanons of hated ships, for example. Or more accepting of any other reason for that matter. In addition, it's not any better for bi headcanons of female characters. When was the last time you ever heard most of a fanbase go, "this woman is nice to the man she's with! that makes her bi!" to a piece of media? Most bi female headcanons are to avoid shipping them with any male characters and ship them exclusively with other female characters. Yet a fanbase acts so surprised some fans still ship her with male characters. What do you think "bi" means? Don't even get me started on when a fan headcanons a female character who is usually headcanoned as gay, as bi. If you ever wonder how a fandom views bisexuality, look at how fandom-wide bi headcanons usually go down.

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It's really dull how many fans save their "this adaptation surpasses the source material!" praises for source material that is good to begin with. It's not impossible or unheard for an adaptation of something bad to be much better.

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I love how Jack Horner is a SINGLE. CHARACTER in the Puss in Boots sequel, the only "irredeemable/unsympathetic" (as many put it) villain in the movie and suddenly, so many people (as seen in a few other submissions to this blog) are so worried more writers are going to look at that well-written movie and we'll see a sudden spike in antagonists who aren't sad and clearly enjoy being evil. RIP to you all but... I don't see it that way. Sympathetic villains aren't inherently better than unsympathetic ones. And he's not the first one to be written. There's little to stop both kinds from coexisting. The bigger concern should be if they're compelling or written well.

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I love when a fandom acts like all the bigots are coincidentally men. Then they act so surprised so many issues stay the same and more arise, all because they lack the ability to as much as acknowledge bigoted women. It's not hard. Stop assuming women are always the "heroes" and coincidentally on the side of good.

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I love how many people are actually trying to pull the "Do MeN eVeN lIkE wOmEn?!" nonsense around non-western female character designs being liked and failing miserably LMAO Ignoring all women who like certain ones (or claiming they all suffer from internalized sexism for daring to have a difference of opinion and just enjoying them) and acting like racism is okay when a non-western woman designs a "sexy" female character, while a western woman who draws one is either "empowering" or "awe-inspiring" to every fangirl alive.

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It's always "every character is bi!" until someone headcanons a very hated character as bisexual.

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Really tiring how many people have a "trans men are better than cis men" attitude on this site, whether it's towards irl men that only trans men are good or insisting every "healthy" male character is secretly trans.

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Always a "fun" day whenever a fandom calls shipping a bi female character with a male character "homophobic."

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If we're talking "tropes that are seen okay in the west versus seen as wrong anywhere not in the west" it's pretty strange how many more fans come to the defense of western characters that believe in talking things out with antagonists versus non-western characters who believe that as well.

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It's really lame whenever a fandom decides every kind character in fiction MUST have a deep hatred for fighting and believes in only being an uwu soft character that talks everything out. Just because some are like that, doesn't mean they ALL should be.

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I really can't stand when a fanbase is so quick to shut off any criticism for certain characters, to the point of calling it "siding with the main antagonists/villains" and/or "wishing death on (insert characters here)" every time someone gives constructive criticism. It exists for a reason. Pointing out the flaws in a character is not the same as attacking them. Just because some can't give proper constructive criticism, doesn't mean everyone can't.

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"This take sounds kinda radfem-y/terf-y to me, ngl." - Take said by numerous people who aren't radfems or terfs, often telling them to dni (which many of them ignore) I hate terfs & radfems as much as the next person, but using them as some kind of buzzword and blaming them for something any person can believe is not helping anyone. All you're doing is giving them more reasons to see themselves as the "victim" of the story (when they are anything but that).

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Nothing funnier than hearing someone go "damn white people and their overrepresentation!" with such fury towards the characters and the character(s) in question are all Japanese characters in a manga/anime set in Japan.

November 2024:

Such an annoying overlap in shipping discourse when "she's a strong independent woman who needs NO man!" and "she's bisexual! DO NOT ship her with any male characters!" are the same female character[s].

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"PEOPLE ON TUMBLR MAKE UP SHIT TO GET MAD AT!" "Can you please stop saying a bi woman, both fictional and irl, is lesser for being with a man?" "NEVER!"

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I LOVE how everyone's so quick to write off all rule 63 and genderbends as transphobia with no hesitation (I don't btw. I see it as just for fun), until a fan takes a preexisting pairing between a male and female character, and makes them either two men or two women. Even fewer baseless accusations when a fandom agrees on a wide level, that this is "improving" upon the canon pairing it was done to (e.g., "They fixed this clearly abusive pairing!"). How telling.

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"I don't like this pairing that's being set up in canon. CLEARLY they don't have any actual feelings for each other!" That's not based on how much you like or dislike them.

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Most people who claim to care about how much the entertainment industry hates voice actors & actresses, only cares when it's a celebrity they don't like taking a job meant for an actual VA and it shows.

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It's always "BISEXUALS JUST KNOW WHAT MAKES A GOOD M/F PAIRING! YOU DIRTY STRAIGHTS DON'T!" Until a bisexual ships a female character with a male character, who both HATE each other (or the male character hating more) and headcanons both of them as bi. Or headcanons a hated m/f pairing as bi in general. Or ships a female character with a male character she hates and headcanons both as bi. Then, suddenly, that bisexual is written off as being a gross straight who's sexist towards women and romanticizes abuse towards women by other bisexuals. When so many mean only bisexuals have good m/f ships, they mean in the most sickeningly sweet and sanitized way possible. Anyone who doesn't follow that is "CLEARLY" a fake bisexual in disguise.

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It's super lame how many fandoms assume a character must HATE fighting with a deep passion in order to be a good person.

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There is nothing funnier than watching everyone dunk on a parody blog that decided to say something "serious" or "political" instead of sticking to humor, and it's the worst take know to man.

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Full offense: I'm NEVER going to take the term "Incel community" seriously. Learn that there's a difference between shitty men and men who are just there. The average man is not a bad person. Collectivism can never be a force for good. Especially in fandom spaces.

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You are lying to yourselves if you earnestly believe a fanbase is always chill with a female character who is a part of a popular f/f pairing being shipped with male characters. Especially if said female character is bi.

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"BOTH SIDES ARE BAD!" One side: (Believes censorship can never be a force for good, no matter how hard you try to reframe it and understands being pro censorship has never been a good thing. Understands somethings just exist whether they like it or not) The other side: (Believes in reinforcing censorship and censoring anything that presents a "moral" issue and bullying anyone who dares to disagree) "SAYING BOTH SIDES ARE BAD CRITIQUES HOW NEGATIVE BOTH SIDES CLEARLY ARE!" Sure. Keep telling yourself that.

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It's amazing how many people on this site openly prefer trans men over men in general, and believe that's genuinely a good thing to do.

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It's always so funny to me, whenever someone assumes all man-haters are all terfs and radfems, because the moment you bring up the fact they do hate men, a lot of people on this site love to go "terfs/radfems hate men? You know who else hates MEN!? ME!" There's no force on Earth stopping anyone from hating both men and radfems/terfs. Happens all the time on this site. The only thing stopping someone from hating men is just not doing that.

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I love how RPF and shippers of real-life celebrity men exist, have the power to cancel male celebs who dare to take a stand and tell them to back off, yet they believe they're in the right ("men have themselves to blame for not us viewing each of their interactions as inherently sexual!") and are such an oh so oppressed minority for being this creepy.

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It's amazing the numerous amount of fandoms that would rather view fictional male abuse victims as women or "female-coded" than view them as fictional male abuse victims.

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It's really funny hearing about the "evils of power fantasies" from the same fans who complain when a modern character is not an exact representation of who they are, meaning they're not good.

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*New live action adaptation of a franchise is announced* Fans: OMG if they don't cast this character as *completely made up/headcanoned ethnicity for a character that doesn't make sense and even contradicts certain aspects of the character* they're racist!

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"ALL MEN ARE EVIL BECAUSE THEY CHOOSE TO BE MASCULINE! MASCULINITY IS EVIL!" Ezra Miller is right there.

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"Excluded," and "Not the target audience," are NOT the same thing. Stop acting like the former is at play when you clearly just can't engage or get into something not made for you.

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I love how quickly so many people went from "Stop assuming everyone is a little or secretly bi! You're reinforcing dated stereotypes!" to openly assuming every single celebrity (except the ones they really hate) is bi and being confused when they stay straight, often assuming they're lying. Stereotyping is not suddenly good when you are the one doing it, as opposed to being on the receiving end of it.

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After seeing how much "representation" flops in media these, maybe, just MAYBE, assuming older shows from the 90s to the 00s that gave the main character a black best friend with an actual personality & character was secretly racist (for example), was a bad idea? Just a thought. I'm black and I used to believe this was a good idea.

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It's always so funny to me whenever a fanbase assumes men couldn't possibly be attracted to (insert female character here) and then immediately blows up when it turns out she has plenty of male fans, crying over themselves at how shocking that is and refusing to accept the truth right before them. A lot less funny when they refuse to believe any of the male fans genuinely like her. And that leads to a lot of stereotyping and bullying. How about you stop stereotyping an entire group for more than a minute and take on a more nuanced view for once? Creating more division in a fandom is not necessary.

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It's hilarious watching a fanbase praise a pairing where a male character respects the hell out of the female character he's with, as she disrespects him, never returns the same love and respect, and treats him badly at almost every turn (often as a joke. ugh), in ways they would never praise a pairing with this dynamic but reversed. Even funnier when they can't conceptualize why some male fans just don't care for pairings like this. "MEN! THOSE STUPID, OVERWEIGHT INCELS! Unable to understand what a man should be like when he's with a strong woman! This is why Fictional men are the only men who don't deserve to die!" No, a lot of male fans just hate double standards with how fiction views a woman mistreating a man compared to the opposite. It's not #goals when a man is mistreated by a woman. And it's not "omg! what a girlboss!" when the only way a woman can be a great is if she's propped up as being "better than the men" every 2 seconds and abuses her man. Both irl and in fiction.

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Fandoms will go, "MEN! THOSE INCELS ARE JUST INTIMIDATED BY A STRONG WOMAN!" and the "strong woman" in question is just an abusive woman who never gets called out on treating others like crap and other fans call her mistreatment of male characters (or the male love interest) in canon "girlboss behaviour" And I sincerely doubt it's only men who dislike female characters like this.

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Everyone hates biphobia towards canon bi women until they view erasing said bisexuality as the perfect way to lessen and erase bi female characters being shipped with any of the icky male characters. "I HATE biphobia- WAIT A MINUTE! You mean to tell me if we erase a female character's bisexuality, LESS shippers will ship them with gross, disgusting males? I changed my mind; bi erasure is based!"

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Please stop making every post about irl bi men about canon bi male characters. Fictional "representation" growing =/= real people being treated nicer. Doesn't help how many people openly prefer fictional characters over real groups.

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I love how so many people who try to make a fandom more inclusive, ACTIVELY ignore all the diverse groups that already inhabit a fanbase and have been huge fans of (insert franchise here) for MANY years. Or yell at them and say they aren't liking said series the "right way" or are too oblivious to understand it needs to change to be more inclusive! Even though they already love and adore it. Or write them off as "dumb, neonazi, white, straight, cis males" because they can't conceptualize minority fans who disagree with them. You all don't care about making a fanbase more inclusive or more inviting of more people. You just want an excuse to be angry and hide it under a guise of helping others. Which is even more telling when the same fans who do this, turn around and never offer the same openness to any fandoms they are already a part of. "I can excuse telling icky males, those stupid incels, to kill themselves for daring to even LOOK at My Little Pony! But I draw the line at fandoms not being more inclusive until they meet my demands!"

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"The film industry pandering to one group of movie goers is VERY bad... that’s why we must ONLY make movies for women and minorities uwu!” (A few moments later) "WHY DID THIS MOVIE BOMB!??!?!?"

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Please stop getting worked up at fanartists who don't redraw talking animal characters as black characters. They're literally just having fun with the concept of humanizations and aren't secretly racist for not complying with your complaints. It also leads to some very questionable (and often stereotypical) implications when you state the reasons why everyone must only draw anthro animals as black.

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"Why aren't more bisexuals coming out???" "Stop hating men, hating attraction towards men, and stop projecting it onto fictional bi characters. Then more will come out." "NEVER!"

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You can't complain about female characters being untouched in shipping circles and then go "She's a strong, independent woman who needs NO MAN!" the moment anyone ships any of them with any male (original) characters. And then act surprised when said female characters go back to being barely touched by shippers. The blame for that is closer than you believe.

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"ALL Fandoms love ALL emotional male characters! Just like how EVERYONE loves ALL men who aren't afraid to be emotional!" Being an emotional male character did not save Aang from being written off as an evil, twelve year old incel who talks over everyone, and needs to just get over his trauma and get over not wanting to take a life. Being an emotional male character did not save Spider-Man (Tobey Maguire) from all those complaints about crying too much and being called a baby all the time. Being an emotional male character, who struggled with his emotions, did not save Anakin from being hated on sight and his (emotional) issues formed from past trauma, being seen purely as his own fault. Being an emotional male character did not save Luke in a similar regard. Do I even need to EXPLAIN the likes of Deku? Or ANY male Shonen protagonist who is hated for either struggling with their emotions, being written off as too stoic, or being too emotional and/or crying too much? Everyone loves emotional male characters until they actually get them. And aren't uwu soft bois 24/7, who hide most of (or all) their own trauma, rarely if ever cry and be the therapy friend of the series and other characters (I'm sure anyone reading this knows some). Which is interesting when a male character who rarely if ever cries, shows up and everyone is all like, "This is teaching men they aren't allowed to cry or embrace their emotions!" (this DOES NOT imply that) We've all seen how you respond when they DO cry in canon. You're asking for a free punching bag by this point. I refuse to believe they are as beloved as many fandoms claim they are and the fact I've heard irl men bringing up how they have opened up, before being harshly reminded why they should not similarly to these examples, only reinforces that.

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It's amazing how many fandoms are full of fans who REFUSE to talk to each other as actual people. Everything has to be viewed in an oppressor/oppressed victim lens. Everyone who faces a disagreement in an argument has to be validated that the one who disagreed is apart of "the evil side" (e.g., every fan who insists zero women draw nsfw fanart and it's all men, arguing with a woman who disagrees with that) Every callout post must be believed even with the lack of any real evidence present. Every accusation has to be validated even when proven wrong. It's all so boring how many people drag politics into fandoms and believe they are making it better. When they are doing the opposite.

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It's amazing how much of the same fans who get worked up at male characters that have been with multiple women in the past, be labeled as "gay" (by either the creators or the fanbase) just for hooking up with one male character, are fine when the opposite happens. "I HATE bi erasure! It should come as no surprise when a male character that has been with both women and men is bi!" "Why would ANYONE say this woman is bi? She's CLEARLY sapphic. All those men she was with before her current female love interest? Just friends; she didn't know they were friends. My canon, poor, dumb, gay baby (affectionate). That one woman she's currently with? No more proof needed! She'll NEVER touch another icky male now!"

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"It takes a true bisexual to look at an m/f pairing and know it's two bisexuals in disguise! It's the only way a pairing between a fictional man and a fictional woman can be healthy!" (those same people when it's a hated m/f pairing) "WHY ARE YOU ROMANTICIZING ABUSE!?" It's disturbing how many fandoms are chill with biphobia and harassment, the moment someone headcanons a hated m/f pairing as bisexual.

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It's really boring how a fandom's definition of "fictional bi rights!" is just headcanoning every canon "unproblematic" m/f pairing where both are really nice to each other as bi. The lack of variety is really lame. No other pairing of any other trope or cliche is allowed to be headcanoned as bi by a fanbase. An enemies to lovers pairing where both characters really hate each other before not hating each other? STOP! ROMANTICIZING ABUSE! Made worse when it's a canon bi character or one a fanbase strongly headcanons as bi. A canon "strong female" character commonly headcanoned as bi or is bi in canon? NEVER PUT HER WITH A MAN! "You have to understand! Only LGBT fans have a good taste in m/f pairings! Those stupid straights DO NOT get it!" Those same fans: "You're ship needs to be THIS! HEALTHY! to be considered bi! Otherwise, it's a lame ass straight pairing!" It's not any better when a fandom dictates TWO options to pick from: a male character and female character who are nice to each other OR a strong woman with no flaws and a dumb male character who exists to praise her.

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So many fans who want female characters to be used more in shipping, often have themselves or other shippers to blame for the lack of usage. Sexism can be a factor in many cases, but not always. You have to find other reasons to blame and not purely that to tackle the whole issue. For example...

Good luck shipping a female character with any male characters if the fanbase projects their hatred on men onto her.

Good luck shipping a female character with a male character if she was abused by another male character in canon.

Good luck shipping a canon bi woman with any male characters.

Good luck shipping a female character with anyone if she's viewed as a "strong, female character" that's either too strong or too good for a relationship.

This all goes back to the main issue with female characters and fancontent as a whole: too much of a fandom spends too much time being so restricted on what fans can or can't do with them. Then complain when the rest of the fanbase barely touches them; they know the amount complaints and "you hate women!" for not abiding by the strict guidelines being enforced.

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It's so disheartening, coming onto the internet for some escapism from irl biphobia, then everywhere you turn around online, there's junk such as,

"ONLY bi women face REAL biphobia!"

"YOU'RE NOT A REAL BISEXUAL, if you are happily attracted towards men!"

"The ONLY THING stopping a bisexual from coming out is themselves!"

(Only talks positively about bi male celebrities and bi male characters and headcanons; real life bi men get hate & disgust)

"Bisexual men these days are fake bisexuals! Back then, they were so much cooler and not these lame ass, gross straight men in disguise!"

(Writes off all bisexuals as privileged)

(Writes off all bisexual men as privileged morons, who have themselves to blame for biphobia)

(Treats all canon bisexual characters as "appealing to the straights")

"No REAL bisexual would like this CLEARLY abusive m/f pairing!"

(Writes off all fans of a pairing they hate as icky straights; no REAL bisexual would like this pairing!)

It's funny when someone goes, "I wish more bisexuals would come out," before saying saying or all of this.

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It's really annoying how many fandoms will assume NO ONE will ship a canon bi woman with any male (original) characters. Often insisting it stays that way. Or else. Made worse with examples that have a female love interest in canon. Breaks my heart how hesitant some fans are to use her in shipping in general because of this, knowing the bullying that comes with as much as giving her a past crush in non-canon fancontent. And then some fandoms will be sooooo confused and mad as to why these female characters are barely used in shipping. Often blaming sexism. Not understanding the reason is right in front of them.

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There's nothing like watching fans call a canon bi woman "sapphic; but bi my heart" or "sapphic, but I would never wish men on her lmao"

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Constantly treating attraction towards hot male characters and hot female characters as two separate worlds helps no one, and has been an issue in fandoms for too long. Seeing a fandom openly attracted to "hot" (that tend to be subjective) male characters and yet every "hot" female character is written off as not being a good character from the start is very annoying. It also reinforces stereotypes. Yes, every woman attracted to women is utterly disgusted by every "sexy" fictional woman that pops up. How smart of you to say. Which is funny considering how many simped for Lady Dimitrescu before the game she was in even came out, with no one really concerning themselves with separating the attraction into two groups. It's also very annoying how many fandoms feel the need to enforce not being allowed to like certain (female) characters because how "hot" they are, as if that should act as a barrier to being a fan of them to begin with.

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Fandoms come up with so many pointless and annoying reasons to insist that no one is allowed to ship a female character with any male characters. "You can't ship her with men! She has a temper!" "You can't ship her with men! She's bisexual!" "You can't ship her with men! She's gnc!" "You can't ship her with men! She's a strong, independent woman/a strong female character!" "You can't ship her with men! She's evil/the main villain!" "You can't ship her with men! She's a role model to young women!" "You can't ship her with men! She has trauma/a traumatic past!" "You can't ship her with men! She was abused another male character!" And then these same fans wonder why so many fictional women are untouched by shippers and overall shipping content.

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Please acknowledge bi women who are biphobic towards bi men, especially if you emphasize the opposite. Support for fictional bi men does not mean real ones are always held in the same positive view.

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I find it really hypocritical (and freaking STUPID) how so many fandoms go on and on and on, about how men should be encouraged more to engage with more media outside of sexual engagement and consumption, only to NOT stand by that statement in the same breath. Case in point, fictional crushes. Many fandoms will be full of fans talking about wanting to meet men like the ones they see in fiction; yet the moment a male fan mentions wanting to meet a woman like the ones they see in fiction as well, it's often met with negative assumptions... "She's TOO GOOD for a man/a relationship!" "CLEARLY! Men only like her for very perverted & creepy reasons!" "HOW can you look at HER and believe she's attracted to icky MEN like you?!" "I don't trust men who say they like her." "Men aren't allowed to like her!" "NO MAN alive can ever really like her for who she really is!" You'll ALSO hear fandoms talking about how (insert male character here) is the only decent man (e.g., Gomez Addams), why fictional men are better than irl ones and other similar statements, yet that is let off the hook. Basically, male fans are only allowed to view male characters as being better than them, while female characters will always be too good for them. Which is ridiculous. It only encourages more bullying. A lot more men already do engage with content for reasons outside of "sexual" reasons. Quit stereotyping and treat men as people.

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I love how so much bullying in a fanbase is blamed on men, ignoring any real logic. Women bullying other fangirls? THIS IS ALL MEN'S FAULT!

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Feel free to dislike or hate any character you want. Just please leave the actors & actresses out of it. "This famous person played a character I disliked... THAT MEANS THEY DESERVE TO BE HATED!" is so damn childish.

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Me: *mindlessly scrolling on tumblr until a blog pops up* The blog: *a bisexual blog* Me, who is also bisexual: LET'S goooooooooo!!!!!!! The blog: *keeps on talking badly about men and wishing death on them* *keeps on talking about how disgusting it is to be attracted to men* *acts like every bisexual hates men and attraction towards them* *only talks positively about fictional men & headcanons* *only talks positively about celebrity men* Me: Never mind.

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In my experience, in most cases, unless a character ticks off a very specific box (like being a bigot and/or an abusive father, for example) or the fans project onto them as fitting said box, you are going to see "This main villain who has done unspeakably evil things, was secretly good/the secret hero of the whole story/just misunderstood!" takes everywhere. Takes heard so often, I'm surprised other fans are surprised they still happen, but it makes sense. We all have different experiences in a fandom.

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The quicker you understand a lot of fans do things (e.g., genderbends, fanart, fanfics etc) for fun and not some kind of big, special reason or to "prove a point" the quicker you understand a fanbase.

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I find it very boring how a fandom's idea of a good m/f pairing is just two characters who are nice to each other (but one-sided towards him to her), or a man who is nice to a woman. (Funny how many alarms and screams go off when a woman is nice to a man first and everyone hopes it doesn't lead into a romantic relationship. Usually shooting down the few fans who do ship it before canon implies it) Every other example or something a bit different is CLEARLY, "romanticizing abuse towards women!" or "only works when it's two men or two women!" I don't hate pairings between a man and a woman where they love each other deeply and care for each other a lot. I like them. And have a few. I find the lack of variety in fandoms these days uninteresting and the fact most fandoms just make it one-sided towards the woman in the relationship getting caring treatment. No one's allowed to talk about how much they enjoy how nice she is to him or how deeply she cares about him in canon, lest they be called "romanticizing nice guys" or "defending toxic men" or "encouraging incels" And considering how many men enter relationships with women who don't care about them or are openly abusive, either not knowing or not, and are often told it was their fault, I find it very telling how male fans aren't seemingly allowed to romanticize about the kinds of women they see in fiction. It's not only women who use fiction as a form of escapism.

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It is really disturbing how we went from "STOP ASSUMING EVERYONE IS A LITTLE BI! That's disturbing and gross to assume! It also erases other sexualities!" To "every single man is a little bit bi! They're all just too insecure and dumb to come out! The only thing stopping them is them!" Stop treating real-life men as fictional characters and being bi as some kind of "uwu" quirky trait they all have.

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"Male fans only bought this game because they find (insert fictional woman from it here) hot!" And WHAT is wrong with that? Plenty of fangirls say they bought BG3 (for example) because of Astarion. You gonna attack them as well, or swim around in hypocrisy and double standards? Because the latter is sadly more common. And in my experience, most fans do a fine job of finding the cast attractive and have fun for other reasons with the source material. If anything, the fact they enjoy a character and don't spend months on end complaining about the character design for no reason is honestly preferable.

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A big problem with most fandoms these days is they're so in love with "women" as a concept that "protects" other women (e.g., "No REAL woman would produce nsfw fanart! Get over your internalized misogyny!"), while utterly hating men as both a concept AND as a group. View both sides as being full of different individuals, please.

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I love how paranoid the haters of a ship remains, even after the creators and producers state on numerous occasion that it will never be canon yet they're too stubborn and paranoid to listen to that. Gets worse when they view every instance of the two characters that make up said ship interacting in the plot as a sign that their "worst fears have been confirmed." even though that's not the case. Or they blame the creators for the fact the pairing still has fans. A ship doesn't need to be canon for it to have fans, nor do those same fans always expect it to be canon. The only thing stopping someone from liking or disliking a pairing is not liking or disliking a pairing.

December 2024:

I really can't stand whenever a fanbase acts like the more "representation" a certain group receives in fiction, the more acceptance that group will receive. Especially when plenty of writers just have a story to tell and characters to write. Plenty of people treat fictional characters like real people all the time, while treating real people like fictional characters. There's nothing stopping anyone from treating fictional characters better. An increase in bi male or female characters in the next few years is NOT always going to correlate with a decrease in biphobia towards real-life bisexuals (for example). And I wish more understood that.

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There's some kind of hilarious irony in how many pro-jedi stans HATE the OG Star Wars trilogy.

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"Disgusting men and their DISGUSTING drawings of (fictional) women! ONLY MALESSS DRAW ART OF WOMEN AND ART LIKE THIS!" "Can you please stop drawing half-naked art of real-life male celebrities making out (or more adult)? Seems worse, not gonna lie." "NEVER!/IT'S DIFFERENT!"

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It's amazing how many are adamant in standing by the "men are only interesting, complex and deep when they're trans or fictional" idea being spread almost everywhere. Only caring about trans or fictional men is not the amazing, progressive move you believe it is. And it's annoying how many want to "help" men while doing this.

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"Wait a minute, you mean to tell me the main lesson from this story is that no amount of trauma justifies hurting innocent people?! YOUR FEELINGS ARE VALID BUT THE ACTIONS AREN'T!?" Yes. It's not rocket science.

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The strangest (and most annoying) part of the "just write women as people" is how many critics of this ignore the other options outside of "boring" or "not knowing how to write a woman" when it comes to this discourse: Deification. It's not any better when in response to writers not knowing how to write women, just write them as a bunch of flawless girlbosses who face no struggle or conflict or issues of any kind.

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It's really funny hearing "Stupid fandoms! Always hating female characters and NEVER liking them!" from the same fans who go "I CAN'T LIKE HER! SHE! HAS! BOOBS!"

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One of the most annoying parts of how many fandoms act like "Flawless Girlboss X Pathetic (affectionate) uwu boi who praises her every second" is the ONLY way to make a "good" m/f pairing is what it says about them and fictional women. In other words, a fanbase CANNOT conceptualize a "strong female character" unless she never enters a relationship ("She's too good for a relationship!") or she ends with a male character that exists to remind the audience how amazing she is and how much better she is by comparison, while she doesn't really reciprocate any affection. Because for some reason it's so sexist when a female character has flaws and is in a relationship with a flawed male (ew) character. (This dynamic would not have that many fans if she was "babysitting" him, like c'mon. He's more like a sidekick in a Genderbent Gaston & LeFou kind of way)

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"I CANNOT BELIEVE so many people refuse to call this strong bi woman in canon bi! Why is that??" Because most fandoms can't hear "strong woman" and "attracted to men" in the same sentence without complaining or acting like it's incompatible, next question.

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"Why aren't more bi men coming out????" Many of those same people: *claims to hate when bisexuals are called privileged; calls bisexual men privileged all the time* *only uplifts bisexual male characters and male characters they headcanon as bi* *only talks about famous bisexual men and celebrities they headcanon as bisexual in a positive light* Take a wild guess.

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The "Male Fans are universally beloved in ALL fandoms" crowd when you tell them plenty of women (also) write smut and hate plenty of female characters because it's their opinion & no two women are the same: LIEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSS! IT'S ONLY MEEEN! MAAAALES!

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There's some hilarious irony in how many fandoms defend writers and producers who hate their fans and continue to make content that shows how much they hate them.

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It's really boring when a fanbase views a fictional woman as having so many male and female characters to pick from as a love interest, then turn around and write off all the male options as boring or uninteresting. In both canon & fanon. Very telling when the fictional woman in question is bi.

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You can't go around saying certain characters ARE NOT for certain members of a fanbase (e.g., "*Insert fictional woman here* is NOT for men!") and be surprised by the lack of popularity and overall fancontent.

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Very few things create a bigger disconnect from other bisexuals who won't shut up about how much they hate men, believe the world is better without them and believe all this hate is "empowering", than being a bisexual who views men as people and isn't ashamed to be attracted towards them. Did I mention when they project this hatred onto canon bi characters? And then they wonder why so many other bisexuals won't come out. Here's a hint: you are only erasing biphobia if you're first answer to that is "IT'S BECAUSE OF THOSE DAMN STRAIGHTS!"

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It's super odd how the meme is "white woman jumpscare" considering how many non-black characters these days are changed to be black LOL And no. Japanese anime characters, in a Japanese anime, set in Japan, will never be white. Stop erasing them in the name of "fighting white dominant media" or some other nonsense.

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I'm not gonna lie. It's really boring and dull how many fandoms these days can't imagine a "strong female character" unless she NEVER falls in love or can only be paired with a male character who is pathetic (affectionate) and exists to remind you how amazing & flawless she is every two minutes, while she never returns the same affection. Often being the butt of many unfunny jokes and propped up as somehow being "the only good man" because of all of this. A fandom tends to lose interest in the latter, going back to her being all alone. There's such an apparent sense of loneliness and "love is a weakness!" around fictional women these days. There are plenty of "strong male" characters in fiction who have female love interests they care about & value, that it makes it even more boring how disinterested fandoms are in subverting this trope. So many potentially interesting ideas not seen as good enough or "hating women" for very empty reasons.

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I'm going to be completely honest about something I've seen in a lot of discussion around m/f ships these days. A fanbase is so quick to praise and just speak fondly about how lovingly a male character treats a female character in an m/f pairing, commonly seeing him as "the one good man," that it is disheartening & disappointing (and often frustrating) how many view as much as talking about how she treats him as "incel logic" or "appealing to nice guys" the moment someone brings up how nicely she treats him. Which is ironic when this is clearly done to dunk on the male fans in the fandom. Only women are allowed to have soft fantasies, it seems. Way to subvert gender norms and tell men with nonsexual fantasies to shut the hell up. I know a lot of fans are into one-sided ships but this still is annoying how this is usually seen as the ONLY way to enjoy an m/f pairing these days.

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Just... The way fandoms and people in general talk about bisexual men...

*only talks positively about bi male celebrities*

*only talks positively about bi male characters*

"ALL BI MEN are privileged!"

"Bisexual men getting erased is a sign of their privilege!"

*only talks positively about male characters they headcanon as bi*

*only talks positively about celebrities they headcanon as bi*

*rare positive mentions of bi men to dunk on straight men*

*treats bisexual men's attraction towards women as gross & dirty*

*acts like ONLY bi women are affected by biphobia*

"The ONLY THING stopping bi men from coming out is THEMSELVES!"

*treats a man being bi as some kind of uwu quirky trait*

*forgets bisexual men in conversations about bisexuals; proceeds to view any inclusion of them as "making it about themselves"*

*acts like every single man alive is bi; they're all just a bunch of idiots who are too insecure to come out*

*treats hating men as a requirement to being bisexual*

"I HATE when people say bisexuals are privileged!" (proceeds to say all bisexual men are privileged)

*treats bisexual men as a "dying race" (it's so quirky & funny!) and not as a group of people*

No wonder so many are so closeted. No one cares unless they're fictional or famous or someone's headcanon.

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The problem with the "BOTH SIDES HAVE BAD PEOPLE!" is no one does any real introspection when they say that. Most only scream that whenever they face any critique, without questioning if there are any bad people on the side they're on. They act like only they are smart and intelligent enough to notice... while acting like only their side has "the good ones".

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It's possible to praise a female author for her talent and writing ability in a work of her's you enjoyed, WITHOUT acting like the fact she's a woman is why she's so talented. You're erasing YEARS of hard work and dedication an author put into her work, by just narrowing it down to "You're a woman! That's why you're such a talented writer! That's the ONLY REASON why! ONLY women can write and not those gross men!" Also. Very funny as bad writing is not gendered and never will be. There's plenty of bad female authors. You're all just cherrypicking. And very discouraging if you write off anything badly written (whether it actually is or she's just different from the ones you know) from a woman as "clearly no REAL WOMAN would ever write this!" or "CLEARLY! A man wrote this! No woman would ever write this!" because you hate your biases being challenged. This isn't helping any aspiring writers as much as you think it is. Like damn. The mere mention of horny female authors (for example) gets you THAT angry? LOL! The point is: none of this is right or good. Stop the deification of certain female authors and writers in general. They're still people who put effort into their works.

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It's always funny whenever people who have the "ONLY MALES CAN BE BIGOTS!" mentality fail. If only they saw it as more humbling. And a reason to have more nuance.

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It's really tiring how female-centered a fanbase gets when it comes to the topic of abuse faced by fictional characters. All the male characters who face abuse are "female-coded," and you're just a misogynist if you dare to disagree. How progressive.

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Maybe it's because it's I'm bi, but I never got the obsession with treating male sexuality & female sexuality as two separate worlds. Similarly applies to treating the latter as "inherently pure" and the former as "sick, gross & perverted" when it comes to both irl people & fictional characters. Way to erase men who don't care about sex and horny women. And no. What someone draws and/or writes is not a universal indicator of their sexuality. Stop assuming it is and believing you said something smart. There are horny female authors & artists who create content that is reflective of them (stop getting so worked up when not all of them are men), while there are women (and men) who create "adult" content that isn't reflective of them. And never was. It's not always as informative as you believe.

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It's amazing how much of the same fans who get worked up over male characters who have been with women, end up with a man and get labeled as gay instead of bi and/or act like those women did not count, don't do the same for female characters who have been with men in the past and end up with a woman. There's such a loud insistence that she is a lesbian and NO ONE is allowed to view her as bi, headcanon her as bi or accept she is literally called bi in canon or by the creators. Otherwise, you're just lesbiphobic or you just hate women ("She is a strong woman who was too good for those icky men!"/"Those gross men DID! NOT! COUNT!") Funny how many hate when one says the women a male character has been with didn't count, are completely fine with the opposite.

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A lot of fans say stuff like "sympathy for the villain" or "compassion for the villain" which is the case on numerous occasions, but like... What if "pity for the villain" was the main point? It doesn't strike me as impossible to feel sorry for the main villain, but it doesn't go deeper than that. Especially if it was the main point.

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I find it really dull how in the eyes of most fandoms these days, the ONLY kinds of villains that are allowed in media are either the secret, REAL heroes of the stories who did nothing wrong because they're traumatized or sad or the heroes are the ackshual villains, lovable goofs who aren't really "evil," just really silly, or one-note bigots or jerks who are asking to be punched in the face. There's such a distinct lack of variety. And a fear of writing villains who are just evil for the sake of being evil. Making these ideas not as good as they can be when it's done to avoid that.

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unpopular opinion: "Evil for the sake of evil," gets too much of a bad rep by audiences and fanbases these days. Some villains are power hungry and love to spread as much destruction and evil as they can. I know in many, many cases, human beings tend to be more than one thing, but this is fiction and writing this is not an inherently bad thing. These characters are also NOT real. And this is not a bad lesson to teach our main heroes and the audience, far from it: some people don't want to change, refuse to change and just want to be evil, with no complex or sympathetic reason as to why.

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"The only reason y'all hate this one character is not because they are badly written. It's not because they are boring. You. All. HATE. KIDS!" "... What about all the OTHER KIDS that make-up the cast and have numerous fans?" "THAT! DOESN'T! COUNNNNNNNNTTTTTTTTT!!!!!!!! HISSS!" Hating fictional children will never be the same level as hating actual children. Especially under constructive character critique.

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It's really tiring how most male characters are never allowed to look down on and/or confront fictional women who mistreat men (often as a joke) and just hold a low opinion of them in canon, much like the opposite.

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It's really boring and plain dull how many m/f pairings these days when entering the world of fandom (and fanon) is used as a way to critique or judge the male fans. Whether it's assuming all the "decent" men only exist in fiction, viewing said male character in pairing as a way to judge the men in the audience, or assuming a "hated" m/f pairing only has male fans or assuming a "healthy" m/f pairing has zero male fans, the list goes on. It feels like nobody wants to genuinely like them because they like the pairing itself. And a lot of male fans can't just enjoy said pairing. *note: the "assuming a hated m/f pairing only has male fans," ALSO hurts female fans, who are often told they're "romanticizing" abuse or toxic behaviour or some other ridiculous assumption to "protect" women. This is all fictional.

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I LOVE how due to modern stereotyping and ideas, it's more "progressive" to have a "strong" woman who is under the impression she needs to be strong 24/7 and not feel, meet a man who helps her open up and understand it's okay to be emotional. As opposed to the opposite. It's a ship dynamic that's begging to be written, but too many modern fandoms (and writers) are obsessed with keeping all fictional women in a "BEING BETTER THAN THOSE ICKY MEN!" bubble. Hence why it can be pulled off, but hasn't been properly written yet.

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It's funny hearing radfems and overall toxic women go on about everything in fandoms and media supposedly being male-centric, while being male-centric themselves in how much they won't stop talking about how much they hate men.

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It's hilarious watching both the fans who go "You to understand NO MAN likes romance! That's why there's next to NONE for male audiences in official and fan made content! DEAL WITH IT!" and "I wish more men would admit to being into romance..." get worked up at the romance media with very apparent male fans. Stereotyping is not a good thing.

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It is very telling how many people on this site will have so many passionate and strong defenses of bi women, as their sign of supporting all bisexuals, yet unless they are fictional or a headcanon, bi men are seen in a negative light by much of those same people.

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Oddly specific, but I find it very annoying and tiring how many fandoms will look at a "good" and "healthy" m/f pairing, then turn around and tell male fans they're not allowed be fans of her and/or wish to meet women like her irl. Apparently, he's the one decent & "unproblematic" man (the fictional man that makes up said pairing), and all the men looking at the series just suuuuuck. Only women are allowed to romanticize about fictional "unproblematic" men; NEVER the opposite! First off, how progressive of you to say all of this. Gatekeeping attractiveness in a fictional character. Groundbreaking. Secondly, this is making a mountain out of a molehill. Oh nooooo! There are men who find a fictional woman attractive... how evil! It's just really frustrating how many fandoms have such a "no boys allowed!" vibe around them in certain areas. Especially in shipping.

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I still find it amazing how many people on this site (and in fandoms) want to help trans men, then turn around and tell men in general (or cis men) that they should kill themselves, they deserve nothing and deserve to be hated. With numerous other comments on men & "males" that is nothing but negative. Fighting half the battle it seems. It's not surprising. "Only trans men are the good men!" is nothing new. *sarcasm* Thanks for the lack of progress.

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No amount of trauma will ever justify a character taking out that anger on innocent people who had NOTHING to do with said trauma. A character being a victim will never make them immune from creating their own victims. Not everyone looks at their own trauma and instantly goes, "No one should ever suffer like how I have suffered." More fandoms & audiences should understand that was the point the story is telling them and viewing it as a cautionary tale. As opposed to bawling their eyes out and going, "THE WRITERS JUST HATE ABUSE VICTIMS! WAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!"

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"This character HATES a specific group of people for numerous reasons we are given in canon. Why are they using it as an excuse to attack innocents who an unaffiliated with said group and using their own trauma & sadness as an excuse to hurt others?? It's not realistic!" I don't know about you, but that sounds very realistic.

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"There are MEEEN simping for (Insert Fictional Woman Here)! HOW VILE!" Okay. And? There are plenty of women who "simp" for fictional men? I fail to see the issue here. Constantly treating male sexuality as inherently predatory is not the big win you think it is. And no. Assuming all the nsfw fanart of various female characters are only by male artists is not smart. There are plenty of female nsfw (fan)artists. Stop erasing them. Fandoms are made up of women and men.

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No offense, but you are a very, VERY disturbing person if you assume every single kind or "healthy" male character in fiction is either exclusive to fiction, the writers are lying when they say they're based on men they know or they are meant to critique the men in the audience; CLEARLY none of the male fans are this good and NEVER will be! They're all evil! You can enjoy something without attacking other people. This will never be a good thing to believe.

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Not only is it annoying how many have taken the term "objectifies" to just mean finding someone "attractive" but it's pretty annoying how many apply said term to fictional characters. They're not real. They're objects by definition. Drawing fanart of certain characters will never be the same as a people who creepy about other real people. Similarly applies to when a character finds another character attractive. You're not in control of the kind of fancontent other fans make. What you can do is curate your own internet experience. You're not in charge of them just because you're grossed out.

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I find it hilarious how many fans go "I LOVE men who look a little funny and/or have undesirable features!" immediately turn around and bodyshame every actor and male celebrity just because they can. "Men DON'T get bodyshamed!" (Proceeds bodyshame men)

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I'm getting real tired and bored of how almost every "good" & "healthy" *popular m/f pairing (that isn't hated by basically everyone) when entering the realm of fandom, is constantly met with "take notes men!" and the idea that it's A-OK for **women to want to meet the men they see in fiction & in said pairing, but men aren't allowed to want that themselves. Only self-critique. (Or men in general aren't allowed to like the fictional woman that makes up said pairing in general. The only decent man for her is in fiction. Kind & decent men don't exist outside of fiction... how irksome) When it should be fine for both to want that. It's fiction. Let everyone have fun and escapism. "But women NEED to latch onto healthy men! Especially the ones who have met unhealthy or VERY abusive men! Men DON'T KNOW what that's like!" No man alive has ever met or dealt with a negative or abusive woman in their lives. And look at fiction as escapism from that. How smart of you to state that. You all complain to no end, that men apparently never "romanticize" about fictional women, yet the moment that is shown to be true, you all STILL complain. All you're doing is just ostracizing male fans and for what? Just because they're male? You should be very disappointed in yourselves. You have to STOP viewing a female character or m/f ship as having a lot of male fans or potentially having a lot as an inherently bad thing. It's a neutral thing. Especially if you want said female character to be popular. *This is of course isn't exclusive to m/f pairings. Plenty of popular female characters have a "NO BOYS ALLOWED!" sign on them, often by the same fans who are okay with women romanticizing about male characters. **Yes. I know. There are women who are told they are wishing bad things on themselves for liking certain male characters. That's why I said it should be okay for both. And it is. Some people love to hate.

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I REALLY can't stand. "This strong female character is single... CLEARLY, SHE'S QUEER-CODED/A LESBIAN!" being tossed around everywhere. More annoying when said "strong female character" gets a male love interest and everyone gets enraged by that. Chances are she was single for no big, special reason. She was just single. That's it.

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When people want Bi characters but get mad when others ship said character with the opposite gender. Y’all don’t want Bi characters, your just settling. You just want Gay characters and are just using Bisexuality as a means to get it.

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People need to stop asking for Bisexual characters if they can't accept that they're allowed to fall for the opposite gender too.

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It is pretty funny hearing "Where are all the girl Kuzcos????" from the same fans who want to throw hands with writers for daring to portray a fictional woman's arrogance as a flaw and not a strength 24/7. Like damn. You all can handle when egotistical and arrogant male characters learn to grow up and be nicer & more humble as the story goes on, but the moment a female character is told the same, you're going to write it off as misogyny? And you wonder why it's such a hassle with female characters these days. The same things you hate in a male character being portrayed as a strength, you are fine with in a female character. When there shouldn't be a separation to start with.

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Fictional emotional male characters will NOT help more real-life men understand it's okay to feel their emotions, when NUMEROUS fandoms make it very clear they only see fictional men as capable of such AND as the only good ones, while irl men are just a group of "icky" freaks to them, that should all kill themselves. Plenty of fans praise fictional characters while treating real people badly all the time. Fandom is not activism. Which is made MUCH worse by all the emotional male characters who are written off as annoying, whiny brats for daring to be emotional and/or reacting to their trauma. Don't even get me started on all the male characters who do feel their emotions and are STILL written off as heartless jerks by audiences who don't get that most men DO express their emotions differently. e.g., "This male character barely if EVER cries! CLEARLY HE'S THE MOST EVIL CHARACTER IN CANON!" I see men can't win in real life and fiction. Whether their expressing their emotions all the time or not. It must be such a frustrating cycle for them.

"The Bi Guy" Superpost

This is where we're gathering all the remaining inbox items submitted by that one anon. Keep in mind that you may still see some posted in the fandom problem queue, these were submissions that were already scheduled in advance before we decided to finish them all off in one big post.

People have dubbed this submitter "the bi anon", but we're just going to post all remaining submissions of his. This may include some that don't mention bisexuality at all. Submissions from other users on the topic of bisexuality will not be included in this and will receive the normal Fandom Problem image format at some point.

And just a disclaimer in advance, since these were all submitted on anon, we're just making our best guesses for which posts are his, based on formatting, proximity, theme, and for lack of better words, "vibes". It's possible that we could make a mistake at some point and include submissions from other posters. We apologize in advance if we make any mistakes.

Originally we planned to include everything into one big post, but there were so many and the post was already getting so long that I've decided to break it up into a few separate posts. This first post will comprise all the submissions he's sent from the months of February 2024 through May of 2024. So, four months, and we've still got quite a bit of catching up to do. Remaining posts to follow in the coming days.

February 2024:

Most of the time, it's pretty clear and feels like a vast majority of fandoms and in general, don't really care about bi men and only "care" about bisexual men either in fictional characters, in theory, in headcanons, celebrities, or celebrities they headcanon as bi. That last one is in the same boat as shipping real people. Don't do that. It's a huge ick and very gross. In addition to that, it's annoying watching the same people who praise and hype up a (internet) celebrity for having a "queer" taste in women, than assume those are the only men who are like that and men in general like this don't exist. Ridiculous to say, bi men have a "queer" taste in women than not stand by that view, say you need to be bi to be like this than not stand by said view and only pick a select few (straight) men as the good ones. It's even more irritating using this to dunk on men in general. Reinforcing stereotypes, one stereotype at a time. It also doesn't help that erasure is seen as a "privilege" for bi men, when much of the same people who claim that hate erasure directed towards themselves and don't hesitate to call it bigotry. "Bi men face a lot of erasure, therefore in being forgotten about and invisible, they have it easy! The fact they're erased and ignored means nothing bad happens to them!" Way to keep more in the closet. I understand them in some cases; why come out to a community that will ignore you and actively assume nothing bad happens? This view also does nothing for fanbases. Caring about fictional characters over real people will never be a good thing. Writing off all male fans as a bunch of dumb straight incels is never going to be a good thing. I wish things were different. Watching bi men posts turn into posts about fictional characters, and headcanons are never going to be good.

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"If there were more canon bi male characters, they would be shipped with canon bi female characters!" Lol, no, they wouldn't be. When a fanbase makes it crystal clear that they never want to see a (bi) female character as much as look in the same direction as a male character, they mean it. Also, why do we need qualifiers before accepting that some fans just genuinely like "straight" pairings? It's possible to just like it and call it a day. There's nothing wrong with that. And that shouldn't earn negativity from other fans who can just adhere to a "don't like it, don't read it," view when participating in fandoms. Lastly, what a fan does in headcanons is rarely an indicator of what they say about canon. Otherwise, you would see a lot more tolerance for bi female characters being shipped with men or acknowledged as being attracted to men in canon because of all the headcanons brought up the moment a "good straight" pairing rolls around.

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Many times, a fanbase comes up with some of the most boring and annoying reasons other fans should never even look at putting a female character with a male character. Or even just m/f ships in general. When they themselves could adopt a "I don't ship it but I'll leave shippers of it be," view, as opposed to bullying or forcing other fans to never touch these kinds of ships. "The main female character is in a relationship of the same gender!" I can see that. Not an indicator of who other female characters should be shipped with. Also, there will always be fans who ship the main character with other characters "She's a strong independent woman!" Falling in love is not a weakness, even for "strong" female characters. A fictional woman is not a weaker character for falling for a man and loving one deeply. "She's bi, that means never shipping her with a man!" I don't believe you know what that means. Or you just don't respect a bi female character being attracted to men. Also, it's possible to accept the fact that you'll never ship her with any of the male characters, but plenty of other fans will. "All the male characters suck!" That's an opinion. Even if that's somehow the case, OCs exist. "No one is allowed to ship her (with men)!" Not up to you. "She was abused by a man in canon! That means romanticizing abuse if you ship her with other men!" Plenty of women have gone through an abusive relationship before entering a much healthier one with another man. Fictional women aren't any different. "How can you look at her and believe she's attracted to men?" Stop stereotyping. A female character being gnc doesn't mean she's not attracted to men. "She hates men!" Most of the time when this is said, it's either haters projecting or a line or a scene taken out of context. Or both. Leave other shippers alone. It's not that hard.

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There is some sweet and REALLY annoying irony in how the moment a fictional woman is revealed to bi, she takes a complete nosedive in the shipping department. Irony only gets deeper when many of her fans who insist she must never as much as be even seen around a male character (because as we all know, that's what bi means, right?) in both fan and canon content act soo surprised by her sudden lack of fandom popularity as of late. My friends kicked out by the manager, YOU caused this on yourselves. Viewing a female character as incapable of being a popular character and one that is attracted to men at the same time is never going to be the win you think it is. Not even just in the context of bi female characters & biphobia. Female characters in general who are attracted to men in canon being seen by a fanbase as only worth attention and popularity when you ignore that attraction is not a win either.

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If you want to talk about how a fanbase feels about a fictional woman, you need to stop acting like it's exclusively men who have ever (irrationally) hated any female characters. Erasing certain fans who create discourse does more harm than good.

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If you want animation to stop being seen as lesser by audiences and the larger entertainment industry or regarded as "just for (dumb) kids" like many celebrities or famous people have condescendingly said in the past, you have to stop acting sooo surprised when animation does many wondrous things in both the animated and writing department just because most of it is for kids. "I can't believe this cartoon for children tackles so many serious issues in such a well-written way for children! Did I also mention it's a cartoon for children?!" Yes. Because children aren't idiots. And just because something is for kids does not imply the overall quality, nor does it imply being bad or lesser by definition. Your welcome to be surprised when something animated surpasses many expectations, but saying or implying it would be more possible if it wasn't for kids is rarely needed. "Animation can't be worthwhile or worth real respect! It's for kids Lol!" is just as annoying as "It's amazing how this animated movie for children is so well written despite being written for children." If you want animation to earn more respect and stop being seen as a lesser children's thing, you need to let go of this stance.

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It's amusing how much of the same people who go on and on about how other fans can't handle "complex" female characters, not only actively act like there are ZERO pre-existing examples of said characters, also tend to have some very dumb reasons for not handling them either. "THEY RUINED (INSERT FICTIONAL WOMAN HERE)!" "Oh no! What happened? Did they forget all of her character development? Was she reduced down to a stereotype? Down to a bunch of tropes? Is she losing character agency as the plot goes on? Don't tell me she's blatantly being set up for a badly written death!" "It's worse than that! They're... giving her a male love interest*! How dare they give strong female character a (male) love interest!" *It's even more frustrating when she's just shown to have a crush or just finds a (male) character attractive, and fans still get worked up. Or other fans aren't allowed to ship her with male characters in non-canon works for very stereotypical and annoying reasons, such as being a "strong female character."

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Unpopular Opinion: It's pointless for to go on and on about bi men having a supposed "queer" taste in women, if you're going to not stand by that and then turn around, and praise straight men with a "queer" taste in women, acting like they're the only ones like that. No surprise, more bi men don't come out with all this dismissal and erasure. Which is not only hurtful towards bi men. You all complain and stereotype about how straight men in general lack any real preferences (in both fictional & real women) outside of societal beauty standards that the moment you come across men who are different in this regard, you think it's smart to act like only a select few are like this while others are straight-up liars worth stereotyping. For example: "Why can't more men be like (insert male celebrity/internet celebrity here)?" Or "Only this (insert male celebrity/internet celebrity here) has a 'queer' taste in women." Plenty are. You all just hate seeing your stereotypes not be as widespread as you think. Another example: "Why can't more men be like (insert male character here) when it comes to women?!" This also does nothing for questioning men. E.g. you don't need to be bi to find gnc people of the same gender attractive. Reinforcing stereotypes, one stereotype at a time.

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I fail to see what's oh-so-evil when someone points out how a fanbase loves a bi female character points out how fans are NEVER (oe rarely) allowed to ship her with male characters. Or if she never displays any attraction towards male characters and they want to keep that way. In both canon and fanworks, unless it's laced with contempt. And honestly? If it turns out there's more bi female characters, this happens to than male characters? By all means, bring it up and give the problem more attention. "I respect this (bi) female character unless no one acknowledges her attraction towards men," will never be a smart take.

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"This fictional woman is a 'strong female character' because we remind the audience that she's better than the male characters and all those icky men, every second!" is A LOT more prevalent than everyone who stubbornly believes most writers these days have flawed male characters peacefully coexist with flawless fictional women, with some kind of invisible barrier between the two. And I'm tired of fandoms acting like that's not the case. Male fans shouldn't have to put up with all these depictions that are poorly disguised insults and caricatures, especially when written by women who try to hide their bad writing under something that's not even that deep. It's just their contempt for others, in this men. And more fandom women should stop viewing flaws in a fictional woman as some kind of insult towards them. Otherwise, you're not gonna see many good female characters anytime soon, like you used to.

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It's really bonkers hearing a fandom claim: "More would ship this if it was between a male character and a female character!" When most fandoms make it pretty clear, they only care for certain ship dynamics when it's between two fictional men or two fictional women. Anytime it's not, it's all "problematic" or some other nonsense. Made even weirder when it's a popular pairing to begin with.

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"Gays are the only ones with good taste in m/f ships!" Those same "Gays": Why are these bisexual characters being shipped by other fans with characters of the opposite gender??? Bi erasure is not just from the biphobic straight fans.

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There's something amusing in watching fanbases prop up certain characters that are also given more attention by the creators that they and the creators get sooooo surprised when said character is the one keeping that attention, winning awards related to said character in award shows. Or other big things. If you didn't want them to be this popular, why did you give them said popularity? You put them on the same pedestal you claimed you never wanted them on. There's a cause & effect on all actions.

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"I CANNOT BELIEVE THE BIGOTRY THAT IS ALIVE AND WELL IN FANDOMS TODAY! ESPECIALLY FOR CANON!" ... All I said was I don't ship Sam & Frodo? You're always going to meet fans who don't ship the same things as you. Difference of opinion is everywhere.

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Love to one day come across a tumblr blog run by a bisexual here that doesn't go on and on about all men are worthless and deserve to die. And then some of them have the audacity to be so surprised more bisexuals aren't coming out.

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There really needs to be a term (unless there already is one) for when an older male character is close to and looks out for a younger one, but calling it a father son dynamic is a bit of a stretch to some fans who want to purely view it as a close friendship. Especially if the younger character still has a good (alive) dad. And when the older of the two realizes/remembers what it means to be a parent. Or wants to be one.

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Nothing screams apathy harder than everyone who goes, "ARE THE STRAIGHTS OKAY!?" everytime a post about a woman mistreating a man rolls around. It's even more annoying when it's a post that actually puts the man in a sympathetic light, and yet there are still those comments being made. Yet the opposite is often treated as no laughing matter. Double standards, am I right? Made only worse by the same people saying it's men's own fault that they're not believed to be victims of abuse or rape. Also. Way to erase abuse victims of same-sex relationships. Yes, there are examples of posts of fictional relationships where this happens (because we all know how fiction usually tackles women on men abuse), but this is about real people. Tackling the issue in real life will most likely lead to less of it happening in fiction.

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While I sincerely doubt there is a shortage of well-written m/f pairings in media, in regards to many badly written ones, I can't help but feel as though a big problem with the way they're written is right there yet it continues to be ignored. Whether purposefully or just naively. That problem? Most audiences and writers don't ask how men feel about said m/f pairings. Men are just written off as either being why the pairing sucks, not knowing what makes a good one and/or not the ones to turn to because they're men. Even though it's a pairing between a man & a woman. This also sucks because men are rarely given the chance to voice how they feel about how male characters are depicted in m/f pairings. Just put up and be silent, especially around all the "fictional men are better than real ones!" claims. If you're gonna let women voice their critiques, you might as well let it go both ways. Which is most likely also why female characters mistreating male characters get ignored or swept under the rug. They're a part of audiences and fandoms as well. Excluding them goes against the idea that fandoms are inclusive of everyone.

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I'm sure it's been said before, but it's just odd to me when a fanbase insists more fans would ship (insert same-sex pairing here) if one of them was the opposite gender. Which is rarely ever true when a fanbase (these days) makes it pretty clear they only care for certain relationship dynamics if it's between two men or two women. "Enemies to Lovers only works if it's between two women! Women can't hurt each other like how men hurt women!" "More would ship this if it was a straight pairing!" The pairing: (a shonen rivalry between two male characters) Yeah, that isn't happening. But as I said before, it is certain ship dynamics. The fans who make this assumption usually don't point towards the ones where more or the same amount of shippers would ship it. And it gets annoying when said pairing is already very popular inside a fanbase, yet the shippers not only can't accept when they're wrong about this assumption but can't accept only like roughly 30% of a fanbase not shipping it. Differences of opinion will always happen. That's part of being in fanbase.

March 2024:

I'm never going to take any fan who refuses to acknowledge or believe there are any women who hates female characters, seriously. You can't want to change how a fandom feels about a female character and purposefully ignore half of the fanbase.

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I never really cared much for the trope to begin with, but I just LOVE how "himbos" has lost all meaning in the last few years in a fandom. And boy is it annoying watching a fanbase still try to cling to it. At first, it was fans (mainly women) romanticizing about male characters who are simultaneously the dumbest, kindest, and most muscular men fiction had to offer. And, for some reason, that's what a woman should be encouraged to look for in real-life men as well. Because a man with a brain is a red flag, for some reason. Anyways, it wasn't bad in some cases. It just got WORSE when a fanbase insisted that it's the only kind of male characters to write. So, of course, fans started to call every male character they like a himbo, not caring about the fact many examples didn't meet the all criteria, making the term lose all meaning. As long as it was a kind male character they liked, than they just went with it and straight to stereotyping. "My favorite ship dynamic is girlboss x himbo!" The himbo they're referring to: *a kind unathletic male character of average intelligence* Which is horrible, considering how many smart male characters are made dumb in fandom content just to appease these fantasies. Taking canon characters and flanderizing them should never be encouraged. And even funnier when they question the lack of "himbo women" in fiction. How about not turning every fictional woman, uber compentent, and absent of flaws?

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Canon: This character's trauma is valid and not hard to see why they snapped. It still DOESN'T mean they're allowed to hurt whomever they want, especially innocents who had NOTHING to do with it. Pay attention to how some characters may lose sight of what really mattered and became as evil (or worse) as those who hurt them. Most Fandoms: Problematic. Cancel the story right now. They did nothing wrong. This is now the worst writing in existence. Trauma means everything they do now was right and justified. Whose to say every innocent person they harmed was REALLY innocent? How dare the writers victim blame!

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One of the weirdest and most backward things I've encountered about shipping is the number of shippers that just utterly HATE when certain ship dynamics or clichés are not only written one way. You can only write enemies to lovers when it's two men or two women. You can only write enemies to lovers if it's two characters who argue. You can only write friends to lovers if it's two men or two women, or not at all, otherwise you're romanticizing incest. You can only write a ship between a male character and a female character if the former is madly in love with the latter; the opposite or mutual is erasing a woman's agency. You can only write a "strong female character" if she never falls in love because love is a weakness for her. I can't relate to any fan or shipper who thinks that way. Especially with the number of potentially interesting stories and/or pairings that get erased because a fanbase is too caught up in playing it safe. Yet, you can argue that a lot of these examples aren't even playing it unsafe. The fanbase needs to change.

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I know fans are welcome to ship whatever they want but oh my god, it is so disappointing when a women in canon is attracted to men and next to NO ONE in the fandom wants to explore that in fanon or any fan works. A fictional woman is a "strong female character" until fans even just acknowledge she's attracted to men. Her attraction to men is seen as lesser and an antithesis towards being a strong character. Love is a weakness, in many contexts in their eyes. A bi woman is so loved by a fanbase that most of those fans will tell others to NEVER ship her with any of the male characters. Apparently, being bi means not being attracted towards men. Because a woman was abused by a man in canon, that means her attraction towards men goes poof and no one is allowed to put her within 5 feet of a man. Even though loads of abused women in real life say otherwise. And let's not forget when a fictional woman being attracted to men is seen as "romanticizing abuse" on the basis of being attracted to men.

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I'm still amazed by the fact I have to say, "If you want a fictional bi woman to become popular in a fanbase, you have to accept there will be fans who ship her with men," to entire fanbases. "But she has no chemistry with any of the men!" That's just your opinion. "But shipping her with men is romanticizing/normalizing abuse!" Go outside. "But the icky men get in the way of my cute wlw ship uwu!" None. Of. This. Is. Canon.

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It's really annoying in Fandom where people get mad at others for shipping a confirm Bi Character with a character of the opposite sex in the show, especially weird when its implied the bi m/f will not canon, its just a ship people know won't be canon but just like the ship.

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Fandom: "We support our Bi Kings and Queens in canon!!!" Fandom *People start shipping Bi characters in m/f ships* Fandom: "No!! why are shipping them together!"

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It's amazing (and very annoying) how many women in fiction from a few years or even decades ago would be viewed as "repressed lesbians" if the stories they starred in came out today. As opposed to audiences respecting the source material and stop viewing all the headcanons and non-canon shipping they do as canon. Or accusing writers who don't deserve it of being bigots. It's not a good thing that this is the case. It just goes to show how many people are chill with stereotypes when they're the ones doing it.

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There's some hilarious irony in watching the same people who go on about "normalizing gnc," throwing hands the moment they see anyone who is gnc is in a relationship with the opposite gender. In regards to both real people and fictional characters. Always halting the progress before it begins.

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"I can't believe the amount of sympathy the fanbase had for this character dropped, all because they attacked (or worse) whomever they wanted!" Good. A character's trauma can never be an excuse to hurt innocent people who had nothing to do with it.

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It's amazing when a bi woman is not ashamed of her attraction towards men in canon and maybe even open about said attraction, yet fanbases ignore it at every turn. Because most fandoms and most people in general can't conceptualize a bi woman not going on about how much she hates men or feels ashamed or wishes she wasn't or just makes fun of being attracted towards men; fans love to ignore that she is none of those things. And man, does all of this show in shipping circles. As seen in fanart and fanfics that make it looks like she hates being attracted towards men and ignores canon like the plague. Clearly, fanon is better (it's not). Or worse. They take a scene or line out of context to prove she is bi and hates men. Just be more accepting of it. It's not hard at all.

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People SERIOUSLY need to stop asking for Bi representation for a character if they’re just going to get mad when said character is in a relationship (or just shipped in general) with the opposite gender. Like, do you guys KNOW what Bisexuality means??? It’s not watered-down Homosexuality, it’s just as valid.

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"Misandry doesn't exist" What realm do you live in?

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It's interesting watching the same fans who call every fictional adult woman with breasts "sexualization!" based on just having them. Often calling for them to be flat chested immediately, when many of them will yell, "child-coded!" on the basis of that. And no doubt already have for pre-existing female characters.

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"I can't believe the audience preferred the flawed male character(s) OVER the perfect female character(s) who we blocked criticism of at every turn!" And? What else were you actually expecting? It's basic logic at play.

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"Why aren't there more women in fiction who snapped and became evil after losing the man they loved deeply and adored?" Y'all can barely handle when a woman is a "strong woman" and loves the male love interest she is with, often viewing it as her "losing all agency by the writers" or "she can't be a strong woman and with a man" on the basis of such. Is it any surprise that something this complex is avoided by writers, when fans get this unnecessarily worked up over something this simple? It should come as no surprise something as deep as this is avoided. Especially considering how much hate a fictional man gets for daring to be with a fictional woman and, considering how many hate the simple idea alone of her caring this much about a man. "WHY does she care so much for HIM!? HE'S A MAN!" I wish more or anyone would tackle this concept for a female antagonist as well, but some introspection is worth looking at. And biases that need to end now.

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"I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS FANBASE ERASED THESE TWO BI WOMEN AS LESBIANS JUST BECAUSE THEY'RE WITH EACH OTHER! Bi erasure is horrible to see a fanbase embrace!" "Have you tried not erasing their attraction towards men? Or leaving fanfics that ship them with male characters alone? And stop acting like they either hate men, when they don't, or they're only good characters if they hate on men?" "NEVER! ALL MEN DESERVE TO DIE!" Seriously. Y'all want to avoid bi erasure so badly yet contribute to it yourselves and act so surprised that you are. Or are you well aware of this and want to end bi erasure but draw the line at liking men. No wonder a fictional woman takes a nosedive in terms of shipping the moment she's revealed to be bi.

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It's amazing how next to NO ONE actually stands by the stereotype of "you need to be bi to find (fictional) gnc men and/or (fictional) gnc women hot!" in execution. Only in theory. And yes. That stereotype does more harm than good. As most of them do. You don't need to be bi to find those kinds of people (or characters) attractive. There are plenty of straight women (for example) who find feminine men attractive. That's rarely ever a statement on their sexuality; only a statement if a lot of them realize they are attracted to women as well. It is interesting how, once again, most only stand by this in theory. Most of the time, they won't even assume bisexuality of other people while still stereotyping. E.g., "You need to be bi to find (insert character here) attractive!" (Later) "... Why do so many men find her attractive??? Can't they look at her and tell she's not for dumb straights!" Or assuming only certain men find gnc women attractive (and vice versa), and all of them in general are just creeps or fetishizers. It's really not hard to understand. Straight men are attracted to women. Straight women are attracted to men. It REALLY isn't hard to understand. And don't misunderstand me. This does hurt bisexuals because it's such a boxed in and stereotypical view. For example, a bi woman being with a man (or the opposite) who looks like an average person shouldn't receive so much anger. This is anything but progressive, and it's very telling how many so-called "progressives" believe it to be.

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Nothing is more telling than when a fanbase assumes a character is a victim of assault based on how "conventionally" attractive they are or aren't. Or when a character is in canon, but biases such as those prevent most fans from viewing it as canon. This is almost as bad as a character's gender affecting that stubborn view ("How is this character a victim? HE'S A MAN!")

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There's nothing like watching a bunch of people who aren't bi call actual bisexuals "straight" and spread biphobia onto them for the most petty reasons. (Not any better when it's other bisexuals by the way) Yes, there are bisexuals who don't need to headcanon the male and female characters in a pairing as bi in order to like said pairing. Yes, there are bisexuals who ship bi characters with characters of the opposite gender. Yes, there are bisexuals who are accepting of bi female characters and don't erase her attraction towards male characters. Yes, there are bisexuals who find (insert character here) attractive. Yes, even THAT character. Yes, there are bisexuals who headcanon THAT character as bi and enjoy the wide array of characters to ship them with. Both male and female. Yes, even the ones commonly headcanoned as gay. None of this deserves biphobia. Please be more mindful and nuanced of others.

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"I miss when there was no drama, no discourse, no ship wars, no morality contests and nothing negative going on in fandoms." Me, a Fandom Dinosaur: ... There was always negativity like this. It just got worse in certain areas when it shouldn't have. And as much as I hate to say it, ship wars are always going to be a thing because shippers exist in basically every fanbase, and not each of them avoid discourse. Some start it. Fandoms in recent years just felt the need to tag more "moral indicators" onto it for no reason and/or just made them more apparent and known to all fans (e.g., "If you ship this! You hate female abuse victims/all women!") There's nothing wrong with wishing things were better, but acting like there was never anything wrong forgets how long a lot of this has been around for and needs to end by now.

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When people only want to make a character “Bi” so they can be attracted to the same gender and then call YOU Homophobic when you ship them with the opposite gender. This is mostly annoying when said character is possibly Straight, because it seems like they’re just using Bisexaulity as a tool to have their precious gay ship and deem any wlm ship as “siblings”. These are the same people who will claim that “Bisexuality is just watered down Homosexuality”. How Biphobia/Bi-erasure can you get??? Doing shit like this, you’re is just making Bisexuality more invalid, which is terrible.

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"It is homophobia when male celebrities are disgusted over being shipped together and the fans are the ones being told to stop all their gross fantasies around their friendships! As celebrity men aren't allowed to say anything unless they want to be labeled as homophobes. And it's a good thing that we do call them that!" Go. Out. Side. Touch. Some. Grass. These are real life people you're being gross around. Save this for the characters they may play but please don't view that as "ship fuel" for what relationships they have outside of this.

April 2024:

It's possible to enjoy a close canon friendship between two characters and leave the fans who ship them alone. For example, for every "close m/f friendship," you love, there always will be fans who ship them, and just because you don't, doesn't mean they're not allowed to. There's no need to insist that no one can ship them or shout something unnecessary like, "Only boring people ship this!" Or "Why can't fans let men & women be friends!" (Way to nitpick) Differences of opinion should be embraced in a fandom.

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Me, joining Tumblr for the first time: Wow! So many fellow bisexuals! (5 minutes later) And they won't stop talking about how much they hate men, and the world is better off without them. Facing no consequences. Great (sarcasm). At least they're not surprised more aren't coming out while doing this... ... (further sarcasm)

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"Fandoms are meant to be escapist!" - Says the same blog that says all art is political regardless of how much people say it isn't.

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I love how all the "representation" in the last 10 or so years in media has just encouraged more people to watch older media and/or media from their childhood. Bad writing is bad writing, and no amount of "WE HAVE REPRESENTATION!" Is going to erase that. Which is funnier when older media has "representation" and so many people act like they didn't. They just understood better writing and not making it such a big deal. Or they acknowledge it to prop up something from today that either doesn't get it or defend the bad writing of another series. There's more "representation" and good writing in a season of Rugrats than most TV shows in the last few years.

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I'm just gonna say it out loud. If you want a fanbase to treat more fictional women with the same level of "shippability" as some of the male characters, you have to leave other fans be. And stop hating the simple idea of a female character who doesn't hate being attracted to men. Or acting like other fans shouldn't ship her with men. Yes, those fans won't always be the same person (some ship her with men, some with other women, some both, you get the idea), but I'm talking about the fandoms at large. No, it is not "romanticizing abuse" towards women when a female character is given a male love interest. No, a "strong female character" is not less of one for having a male love interest. No, a fan doesn't think less of her for shipping her with a man. That alone is not evidence. No, she doesn't lack chemistry with the male characters. That's subjective; also, fanfic writers often do more with them and often better. In addition, OCs exist. Even if the "all male characters have no chemistry with her (and/or are badly written)," was true, original male characters exist. You shouldn't judge OCs based on canon characters who fanfic writers did not make. If you want more fandoms to embrace the cringe (affectionate) of xOC pairings, that also applies to canon female characters x male ocs. All of this also applies to bi female characters. Yes, that means accepting if they don't hate being attracted to men in canon. Yes, that means accepting the fact that some fans do ship them with men. What do you think bi means? Yes, that means Many times, fans claim to "protect" a female character when they're clearly doing the opposite. And hurting many fans in the process.

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A character being mean doesn't instantly translate to being morally gray. It's not always an indicator of their morals. Oftentimes, just a part of who they are.

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Bisexual blog: *exists* Me, who is also bi: "Cool! I can't wait to see it mys-" That same blog: *keeps going on about how all men must die like it's a good thing, wishes death on all men, says being attracted to men is disgusting and horrible, makes rude & biphobic comments about anyone who isn't ashamed to be attracted to men, says being bisexual is "half-failed" when attracted to men; "half-success" when attracted to women* Also, that same blog: *claims to be accepting of all bisexuals here and still spreads positivity* Me: "Don't know what I was expecting. This isn't the first blog where this has happened. And they wonder why so many stay in the closet..."

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"We need more bi characters because they help more bisexuals to come out! Representation matters!" They scream before treating real people as fictional characters and fictional characters as real people. Bullying all around and forcing more to stay in the closet. "Why is this bisexual character being shipped with the opposite gender? Damn straights." "Why are you shipping this bi female character with men?! ONLY DUMB STRAIGHTS DO THAT!" "I don't trust fans who ship (insert bisexual character here) with characters of the opposite gender! They must be straight!" And many more.

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Full offense, but as someone who is bi, I can't stand the insistence that every "good" ship between a male and female character needs to be headcanoned as bi in order for you to like it. You are not going to die liking a pairing between two straight characters. Especially when much of the same fans who do this have such a stingy relationship with canon bi characters. No, it is not romanticizing abuse towards women when some fans ship a bi female character with a male character. Also, how hypocritical. You will headcanon every pairing between a male and female character as being two bisexuals in disguise, all because you see being straight as something inherently toxic, but fans aren't allowed to ship canon bi characters with anyone they want? The insecurity speaks for itself.

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Calling enemies-to-lovers "romanticizing abuse" makes about as much sense as calling friends-to-lovers "romanticizing incest" and it's time fandoms start to retire those retorts. It's been around for WAY too long.

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I hate how normalized and casual it is to treat the men in fandoms like crap. "Men are not allowed to like (insert series here)!" "Only men ship this horrible m/f pairing!" "Men are not allowed to draw (insert fictional woman here)! Only women can like her!" "Men are not allowed to like (fictional woman here)!" "All male shippers do is imagine themselves as the men in m/f pairings to take advantage of (insert fictional woman here)!" "FORBID MEN FROM DRAWING (fanart)!" "BAN MEN FROM WRITING (fanfiction)!" "Keep this fandom men free!" "This male character is better than every man alive!" "All male fans are incel, neo-nazi, overweight, neckbeard, perverted manbabies!" "Why are other women coming to the defense of male fans? THEY'RE MEN!" And no doubt many more. Fandoms should be accepting of everyone, and that means everyone.

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I love how it's always, "respect all female characters!" Until it's one, a fanbase can't project their hatred of men onto.

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"If this show was made today, the evil side would condemn it for being too woke!" And you all would call all the flatchested female characters "children-coded" and accuse the creators of being perverts. Or accuse the creators of "romanticizing abuse towards women" because they gave a female character a male love interest. Or accuse other fans of being pedophiles because they ship a pairing you don't like. Whichever comes first. :)

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I hate when a fictional woman is given many options of both male and female characters to ship her with, but the fanbase can't help but reduce all the male characters to boring and uninteresting options for her that only the dullest of people ship her with male characters, (Or worse; assume abuse is wished on her, just on the basis of fans shipping her with male characters) And then the fans who do this discourse have the audacity to question why she's so untouched in the world of shipping and overall ship content. Stop projecting for one minute.

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Just because you view every pair of male and female characters as siblings does NOT mean no one is allowed to ship them, nor are the fans "romanticizing" incest. A difference of opinion should always be embraced in a fanbase. No matter how hard you try, it's going to be there.

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It's funny to me how watered down to nonsense some things are in a fandom, because so many fans lack nuance and expect to be praised for the lack of such. "THIS EVIL MALE CHARACTER IS A RAGING SEXIST!" The male character in question: *teases both men and women they are friends with* Which is funnier when the opposite is seen praiseworthy and "let's welcome our man-hating queen!" just because fans purposefully don't get a woman playfully teasing her male friends. Funniest when the fans who do this get so shocked if she ends with a man down the line. Your only evidence was misinterpreting teasing and banter? Weak.

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I hate it whenever there's a post on Tumblr about men being able to defend themselves from abusive women, the notes either feel the need to make it gender neutral (where's that when posts purposefully stereotype abuse as purely man on woman? Double standards), defend the women who mistreat innocent men, or say neither side should be hitting one another. In regard to the last one, first off, stay on topic. It's hit "back" for a reason. And you know that. Stop being ignorant. Secondly, I love how no one treats abusive men the same. They see them as unreasonable abusers who won't listen to words and need to be dealt with immediately. While abusive women are so complex and just need to be talked to in order to stop. I'm sure they didn't mean it! Thanks for the double standards. I know who not to call when a man is abused by a woman. Third, stop defending abusive women. Men have every right to defend themselves as much as every other abuse victim.

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One of the most interesting (yet often annoying) things to see happen in a fanbase is assumptions on how a character reacts to crushes on them. Two things: most crushes are one-sided, AND it's not always a universal indication of a character's sexuality. Maybe a male character rejects a female character because he is attracted to men, OR they are attracted to women; this one they are either not into, only see as a friend, or has little regard for their personal space and/or can't take no for answer. Opposite is also true. Yes, this fictional woman fell for another male character after rejecting one they're not into; pay attention to why. Don't even get me started on all the bi erasure that comes with all this assuming. Most fans either assume gay or straight. Nothing else. No, this canon bi woman (for example) rejecting 1 male character doesn't mean they're bi and hate men or gay and hate men; they're not attracted to this one in particular. Not every character who rejects a character of the opposite gender is telling the audience they're not straight. Many times, they just don't share the same feelings as another character, who just so happens to be of the opposite gender.

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"None of the anti m/f shipping discourse hate on the male characters in those pairings!" Y'all assume the writers are romanticizing abuse towards women, just for giving a (strong) fictional woman a male love interest. Or the creators, who are male, are clearly projecting onto the men in these pairings. Or the male fans who are fans of these pairings just have some gross "power fantasy" with the women in them, over genuinely liking said pairings. Or go on about how the women in these pairings "deserve better" than this. Or just hate certain male characters on sight. Only confronting half the problem helps no one.

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I really can't stand how bisexuals (both real AND fictional) are treated as some kind of political stance to support very flawed and idiotic views. "ALL BISEXUALS are sexually attracted to men, so men (who DO NOT deserve it) know what it feels like to have evil sexual attraction towards them! AND romantically attracted to women because they're the fairer sex who don't feel evil sexual attraction and are the only ones who experience romance!" Way to keep more people in the closet by being this boxed in.

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A fandom's inability to acknowledge all the women in it who hate certain female characters is just plain stupid. And will only halt them from being more popular. Assuming all the women in a fanbase loves each female character on the basis of just being a woman, erases all the haters. If you want a character to be popular in a fanbase, you have to call out all haters. Both the men AND women. And differentiate between the haters and fans who just don't like them. Not everyone who doesn't like them is a hater or a raging sexist. It's just their opinion.

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"Everyone who has ever asked why two characters can't stay friends, are CLEARLY homophobes!" My sister kicked into Hell, you look at every pairing between a male and female character asking why they can't stay friends, while praising those same tropes put on same sex pairings. This isn't a bigoted problem. It's a difference of opinion from fans that certain fans don't want to accept, often out of ego.

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It's amazing how simple the lesson of "this character's trauma is not an excuse for them to hurt whomever they want; especially innocents who had nothing to do with said trauma," is so despised by audiences these days. This is what separates the "heroes" from the actual heroes in a work of fiction. Yes. A character is not a "hero" if they hurt whomever they please, as opposed to those who wronged them, and view it as justified. What else were you expecting?

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I hate when bisexuals are treated as some kind of unarguable or "you must agree with this, or else!" view in fandoms. "All bisexuals only feel sexual attraction towards male characters and men! Now, men know what it feels like! No man alive provides romantic relationships!" "All bisexuals only feel romantic attraction towards women and female characters! Women are the pure, fairer sex! Everyone who feels sexual attraction towards women is a damn freak! No one finds 'sexy' women in fiction attractive!" It's funny how much of this same stance comes from the same people who call fictional women "child-coded" on very empty reasons.

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Just because a problem in a fanbase got worse as of late, does not mean it came out of thin air. For example; shippers who believe shipping will lead to their ship being canon. And getting angry when it does not. This has been around for awhile. It's just dragged in more toxicity in recent years. And questionable viewpoints ("You can't ship them with Character B! It romanticizes abuse! The ship with Character A is the healthier pairing!"). It's important to know how old a lot of these problems are.

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When a bi female character has a wide selection of both men and women to ship her with; I hate when the fanbase decides all the male characters you can ship her with are all the "boring" or "lukewarm" or "only lame straights ship her with men" ones. Or her attraction towards men is seen as lesser and "it doesn't count" in the eyes of an entire fandom. Or giving her a male love interest is seen as "romanticizing abuse" by these same fans. And then the fanbase has the audacity to question why she's barely used in shipping while doing all of this.

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Everyone hates corporations until some of them make a huge "men bad" comment. How easily swayed a lot of you are.

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"I can't believe more bisexuals won't come out!" - Said the same Tumblr Blogs who won't stop talking about how horrible and disgusting it is to be bisexual and attracted to men. "No bisexual is actually, happily attracted to yucky men! If they are, something is wrong with them!" You are the ones keeping more in the closet.

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It's astounding how many fandoms get so angry seeing the ship of bi female characters often involve shipping them with male characters. Like, yeah? What else were you expecting? If you want fictional bi women to be popular in fandoms, that means letting fans actually embrace the "bi" part of them. You can't say, "I want (insert bi female characters here) to be used more by fans!" And then get worked up that some of them put them with male and female characters. Also, don't act so surprised or mad if these fandoms avoid as much as looking at her or others. You forced fans into not wanting to touch them unless they abide by strict guidelines, or else. Putting limits on other fans will only limit fancontent and thus, how often you'll see her in said fancontent. Shipping bi characters gets enough toxicity as is. Avoiding this should be necessary.

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The amount of FEAR a fanbase has for a strong woman potentially ending up with a man is just plain pathetic. Made even more pathetic when shippers are afraid to ship her with male characters due to how widespread the negativity is. "You can't be a strong female character and have a male love interest!" Go. Outside. Love is not a weakness.

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"Finding a female character hot means you DO NOT respect her as a character! You can't admire her as a well-written character AND find her physically attractive!" Go Outside.

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"It's so EVIL when you KNOW a character is BISEXUAL but the writers don't!" "Does that mean the fanbase is gonna leave fans who ship them with characters of the opposite gender alone?" "NEVER!"

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It's amazing how many fandoms answer their own questions, yet remain so unnecessarily confused like the answer isn't right before them. "This character/show was made for bisexuals!" A few seconds later. "WHY ARE MEN HERE!?!" Take a wild guess.

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"Back in my day, we NEVER shipped with the hopes our ships became canon, and we NEVER got any ship wars." I hate to break to you, but this was always a thing. Ship wars did not just pop into thin air a few years ago, and doing so erases how long this has been an issue.

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Would be nice to have more kind male characters in modern media who aren't also dumb idiots.

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While there's nothing fundamentally wrong with having this kind of headcanon, it really grinds my gears when the majority headcanon in a fandom between two unrelated grown ass adult men is a father/son relationship, just because one is a mentor to or just older than the other. It especially grinds my gears when I'm considered "weird" for enjoying them as a ship.

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I find it very frustrating in one of the fandoms I'm in how there are people who are like "it's ridiculous that there are people who think these two male characters have a father/son or master/student relationship, the way they interact and speak to each other is not how people in the culture the series is from would behave if they had that relationship' like I'm from that culture and they are absolutly right, in my culture you would not speak so casually to a parental or teacher figure. however the thing that bothers me is that most of the people bringing it up insist that since they relationship can't be father/son or student/teacher, then obviously the only option is lovers. And they act like anyone who thinks the relationship could be platonic is a total idiot and disrespecting the culture. But the thing is that while yes, the way the characters address each other is a way that lovers might, it's also a way close friends or siblings might. There are multiple options for what their relationship is besides father/son and student/teacher that could be the case. But they totally disregard that and treat people horribly for not bending over and agreeing that their ship being canon is the only possible option. Like can you not fucking ship your ship without trying to stop other people from interpreting things differently

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A lot of fandoms these days are full of fans who are under the impression that there is clearly "something wrong" with other fans who wishes there was less "politics" in media and most media these days focused more on quality over politics being brought up. When they are the ones who are in the wrong. First off, most turn to fiction for escapism. They rarely want to connect what they're doing for fun to current events in the world. Secondly, that dates media fast and I mean FAST. Making EVERY. SINGLE. Movie, TV show, cartoon, video game, etc, also be about the current politics and events in the world is gonna leave audiences with less reason to care about it years later, when those same current events become a thing of the past. Thirdly, no. Just no. The examples you bring up of older media pulling off "political" themes in fiction were most likely not entirely political to begin with. Or political at all. And even if some of them were, as I'm sure many examples have crossed your mind by now, that was less of the focus and more focus on the themes themselves. Plus, they most likely wrote it with more talent than most writers these days, who are waiting on fans to defend it for reasons that have little or anything to do with writing quality. In addition, that LIMITS the kinds of stories writers are trying to tell to audiences and fans. "Freedom" for example, cannot be a purely a political theme when writers can do so much more with it. Lastly, all of this applies to fandoms. If the fans don't want to talk about politics 24/7 with people who make wrongful assumptions about others and focus elsewhere: Good. For. Them.

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I really can't stand when the "we need fiction to teach important lessons" is made biased and selective by fans. "I hate how they removed this one male character being sexist for 3 episodes because we need to teach little boys that they're all born fat, misogynistic, rapist, incels who deserve to die and can retain some decency!" "Are you gonna recognize the importance of the same lesson when writers say it's wrong for a woman to hate every single man? It can go both ways." "NEVER!"

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"This male character barely, if ever CRIES at ALL! THAT MEANS! HE'S A HEARTLESS JERK and MUCH more evil than the antagonist(s)! AND the writers are CLEARLY saying men aren't allowed to cry!" The male character in question: *kind, looks out his friends and loved ones, compassionate, enjoys making other people happy, sympathetic for others who have been hurt and still expresses a wide range of emotions* As it turns out, crying is NOT the only way to express one's emotions and writing off characters, male in this case, as being a heartless person for the lack of it is ridiculous. I hope no one who does, this treats the real-life men their friends with like this. This mentality is too close-minded for its own good.

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Common pet peeve; fans calling something plot armour when it isn't.

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May 2024:

One of the problems with, "bring back [more] canon x OC!" is not tackling how many fandoms live in pure FEAR of other fans shipping canon female characters with male OCs. Made more frustrating when some of the canon female characters in question are bi. If you rightfully hate the opposite, this shouldn't get a free pass. You can't want certain characters to be used more in fancontent and not stand by that want.

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It's pointless to go around saying, "Fandoms are a safe space for everyone!" if you're going turn to around and write off all the male fans as a bunch of degenerates.

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The worse piece of "criticism" for "The Simpsons," is how it's "so great" that Lisa went from feeling like an actual kid in older episodes, to just being a mouthpiece for whatever the current issue in the world is. And that piece of "criticism" should be taken into account for anyone who writes children characters. Not making them feel like children is bad writing.

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Media illiteracy is astounding, and I hate how well-written stories have stereotypes and projection forced on them, all because the audience can't enjoy what's there and feels the need to replace it.

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I'm not sorry, but I can't vibe with any fans who insist ALL m/f ship dynamics and relationship tropes only work one way and ONE WAY alone. Made more annoying by all the double standards that follow. "This harmless thing is romanticizing abuse towards women!" They scream before shipping it when the dynamic is reversed. How telling. Not only that, but all they're doing is limiting creativity in shipping and character pairings. Both in fan-content and official content.

A woman who is deeply and madly in love the man she's with, can be just as interesting as the opposite.

A woman who wants to burn the world after losing the pure-hearted man she loved can be as intriguing as the opposite.

Pathetic female characters can be potential love interests of male characters, not just the opposite.

A grumpy female character with a kindhearted male character can be as cute as the opposite.

There's bound to be more. And I wish more fandoms understood all of this. And I hope they do.

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There is no bigger slap in the face on Tumblr than coming across a bisexual blog, and it's full of posts about how being attracted to men is horrible, and everyone attracted to them are disgusting.

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It's so odd to me when a fanbase acts like you can't like two characters at the same time, all because of the contrast they share in canon. Or one made by them. e.g., "They're both in-love with the MC (or potential love interests for said MC), how can you be fans of BOTH of them?" Chances are, they have identities and character outside of this. Or some of us are fine with either pairing happening. Or we're multishippers. And fans don't really care either way. Not every fan who likes Character A views that as some kind of intended attack on Character B. This is made even more nonsensical when the contrast between both characters is a major part of both characters. And we as fans are supposed to pay attention to said contrast, since it was written by the writers into them and for us to notice.

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"If these two characters were not of the same gender, you would ship them!" No. I most likely wouldn't. Why? 99% of the time, I ship based on tropes and ship dynamics. Changing the genders of the characters won't erase how "meh," I feel about pairings I don't find too interesting. A boring fictional pairing between a man and a woman is just as boring as a pairing between two men or two women. This is amusing when this same accusation is often made by the same people who refuse to ship certain pairings unless both characters are the same gender. And insist that everyone who doesn't ship the same as them are bigots. No. A lot of the time, fans just like or hate ships regardless. No biases present.

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The hypocrisy of a fanbase to say, "Looks aren't everything!" Then immediately turn around and go on and on about how ugly an unconventionally attractive actor is. With the occasional comment on no one having (insert facial feature here) being an attractive or a good person. With more comments about how no one finds him attractive and everyone who finds him attractive is a gross person.

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"I cannot believe even after everything this male character has done for the woman he's with and madly in love with, the fandom still writes him off as just some jerk!" Because he's a man. Who cares if he has a bunch of positive traits? The fanbase won't care. It doesn't endear him in their eyes. Once a hated male character, always a hated male character. Especially if they would rather see her with a woman and don't see what the issue is in resorting to actively lying about him. Or accepting other fans who do like shipping her with him.

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Not everyone who says "This character deserved better," is talking about them in the context of how they were written. Some are. Some are talking about the life they lived in canon. As we see with tragic characters. Context matters.

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I'm never going to feel bad for fandoms that lack the ability to acknowledge women who hate female characters. You can't keep the attention exclusively on toxic men and be surprised by the lack of progress you play a part in halting. "This female character is a bad role model for young girls!" is often said by fandom women. Amongst others. I fail to see the appeal in letting them off the hook.

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I'm never going to be a fan of the assumption that every straight man is a bi man who is too much of an insecure jerk to come out ("They put themselves in the closet! Those privileged morons!"), hence why we need more representation in media. Or all straight men will come out as bi and become the "safe" group to be around. Focus on good writing, and drop this view.

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I can't stand terfs or radfems as much as the next person, but the assumption a woman needs to be one or become one in order to be a toxic woman (both in and out of fanbases) is downright infantilizing. No one says you need to be in PETA in order to hate animals. This toxicity is based on choice.

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"THIS IS ALL A DUMB POWER FANTASY!" My sister dropkicked in Limbo, anything, and I mean ANYTHING, can be a power fantasy. It's not just a male character having a bunch of women faun over him (or the opposite), it can be anything big or small. Limiting it to purely romantic fantasies limits the term.

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"This conventionally attractive actor is playing a conventionally attractive fictional male character who has a couple of scars. They have a lot of fangirls! THAT MEANS NO MAN ALIVE HAS EVER BEEN BODYSHAMED (by a woman)! And any man who has deserved it! Or those incels are lying! All because this male character exists!" This is a major reason as to why fighting bodyshaming and a lot of "body positivity" have largely failed. A lack of empathy for certain people. And outright dismissal fueled by a lack of logic. In addition to how some people enjoy this level of apathy and power over others. This doesn't diminish individual experiences. This just creates more.

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I can't stand the "All fandoms must be women (and gay men) only!" mentality. Look. It's bad enough that male fans (with little regard for teen ones) are written off as incels and creeps for as much as being in a fanbase, but all the memes and jokes are pointless, and only creates more division. Not only is it antithetical to the idea that fandoms are inherently welcoming of all people, regardless of who they are, but it's present in so many fanbase circles and hurts so many innocent people. All for getting back at those so-called gross men; the nuance is NOT present. As we see with fanartists. "CLEARLY! The artist who drew this is an icky male! No real woman draws like this!" "... I'm the woman who drew this." "LIAR/GET OVER YOUR INTERNALIZED SEXISM!" Or with fictional characters. You're not a clever person for reminding men how disgusting they are for finding a fictional woman attractive. Nor are you funny for making "leaves you for a woman!" jokes about female characters towards male fans. Which is ironic, when a fanbase applies this nonsense to a fictional bi woman. How progressive. Seriously, none of this is acceptable and fandoms don't gain anything from treating the average male fan like $hit. For both all the bigger reasons here and the fact bullying is plain wrong. It will never be justifiable.

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Everyone who acts like the anti-anime sentiment that's been present for many years is not fuelled by sexism in any way, shape or form, is making the issue go for much longer than it needs to be. And chances are, many who do this hate the fact they can't be sexist in peace. Of course most haters who go on about how inherently degenerative all anime and animation from Japan is, feels the need to remind you that it's the fault of men who live there and make those series to begin with. Why would any haters care about the fact they might be racist? They're attacking "icky" men and placing themselves as some kind of moral good, protecting you from them. "We're doing this for the right thing!" And any men who doesn't make a series "like that" (grow. up.) are just rare exceptions. As we see with all the unfunny Miyazaki jokes. This is also present in how most perceive women there who work on and/or create anime. The constant assumption that no woman "would make a series like that," is not as progressive as you think it is and is backwards as heck. In addition, praise them for their talent and not the fact they only made something worthwhile because they are women. It erases the years of talent they put into what they made. And it's not progressive to act like there are only a select few women who are actually good at making an anime, while the others suffer from internalized sexism or are not "real" women. Or secretly gross men in disguise. None of this is proper criticism. Treating women or men as a monolith is never going to be progressive. Once again, to act like it's not fuelled by sexism is ignoring an entire part of the larger problem.

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Whenever a franchise is going to get a new installment or addition that is bound to fail based on many clear bad factors already present, it's amazing how all the creators have to do is just say something "woke" to drag in a bunch of defenders who won't even consume the product to begin with. Or many of those defenders do openly admit to either not being apart of the audience or even a fan to begin with, yet still feel the need to be here and write off all legitimate criticism as bullying of the creators. Like, all you're doing is making things worse and defending something destined to fail. I miss the days when a creator didn't have to fund very questionable charities and/or be exposed as a bigot of some kind, in order to not defend what they're going to make. Empty excuses for something badly made is not any better.

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I'm never going to pity a fandom's inability to acknowledge women who hate female characters.

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You have little room to talk if you wish more fans would acknowledge bi women in canon as being attracted to women AND men, if all you ever do is go on about how much these characters hate being attracted to men in canon and how disgusting it is. I see it all the time. Fans adding to stereotypes they claim to hate.

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I always hold in a big laugh, whenever someone says the biggest problem with how most fandoms treat m/f pairings is taking a canon pairing and making it into one where a woman "MoThErS" a male character. My brothers and sisters kicked into purgatory, this level of flanderization and obsessive need to take an m/f pairing and make it into what it is not, would not receive so many fans if that were the case. This is NOT the dynamic present. The actual problem is not only a fanbase making canon pairings very OOC, but it's making it into one where a woman is stripped of all her flaws and the man she is with only exists to be a pathetic cheerleader, as opposed to an actual character. In other words, fandoms refuse to believe that a woman in a piece of fiction can be a good character AND be with a man that compliments her flaws and strengths as much as she does with him. This is not any better than saying a fictional woman is too good or too much of a "strong female character" to be in love. This is just that under a different coat of paint. It's also very alienating in certain circles, when all a fanbase wants to do is go on about her fanon version, writes off all her canon flaws as sexism and views acknowledging how she treats her partner instead of the just how he treats her, also as sexism. The alienation also applies to how fans who actually like the canon pairing and not the fanon version that is almost unrecognizable in comparison. In addition, this level of hyper-fixating on how he treats her instead of looking at how they treat each other makes it feel like less of a relationship and more of a dull power fantasy disguised as one. I see what other fans mean when they say, "sometimes, fandom is worse."

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"I hate stereotypes." Much of those same fans: "This fictional woman is gnc/tomboy-ish. That means no one is allowed to ship her with fictional men." "This fictional woman is bi. That means no is allowed to ship her with fictional men." "This fictional woman is muscular. That means no one is allowed to ship her with fictional men." "This fictional man is effeminate. That means no one is allowed to ship him with fictional women." "This fictional woman has a mean side. That means no is allowed to ship her with fictional men." I love how hypocritical many fans are, and then are in denial they're the ones creating so much division.

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Unpopular opinion: I'm often disappointed in the lack of male oc X canon female character pairings and related fancontent in fandoms these days. Especially in regard to all this talk of bringing back canon x OC pairings. I know this won't seem like much to most who read this, but it's a bit sad when a woman in a piece of fiction has attraction to men, yet a fanbase has little or no real interest in exploring this part of her character. Mainly when you look at many of the reasons given. Such as. . . Many fandoms refuse to believe a woman can be a "strong female character," and attracted to men at the same time, looking down on that part of her character, refusing to view any pairings with male (original) characters as interesting, or outright ignoring said attraction. And then there's when we get around to canon bi female characters. Oh, when we get around to there. Yes, letting a fandom have fun with bi female characters in shipping means leaving any who ships them with male (original) characters be. They're bi. It's not that shocking. I also see this similarly with female antagonists. Both in comparison to male antagonist x female ocs or not. Look. It's great hearing how many fans and fandoms want to see more canon x OC pairings, both for bringing them back, and for helping fight back against this being "cringe" when fun to should be the focus in a fandom. And I'm in full support of that. Along with encouraging others to do that themselves. I just wish this was brought up more.

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unpopular opinion: I really cannot stand the recurring fandom takes on a fictional bi women's attraction towards men (and women). It's so annoying, when a fandom pats itself on the back for being so accepting of bi female characters in a very narrow way. Bi female characters must either hate being attracted to male characters, make fun of it every two minutes, or experience it with such a low opinion. Bi women in fiction are rarely allowed to just like the fact they're attracted to men in fanon; a fanbase can't be normal or accepting of that fact. And fans who are accepting of said character's attraction to men and women equally, are bullied or ignored for not following this mindset. In addition, it sucks when this is applied to ship dynamics and shipping in general. I'm sorry, but I don't see the appeal of every pairing involving bi female characters with male characters only being with pathetic male characters. Whether it's actual ones or flanderized canon male characters. This trope is commonly in comparison with female characters who are often allowed to be actual characters when paired with bi female characters. Which sucks when fans who don't portray that attraction to women in a "pure" way are looked at differently. Or bullied. All this stereotyping is not worth it.

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It's always been so odd to me, whenever a fan acts like there aren't any male characters demonized in shipping, when there are plenty of examples and trends to go off of. It would not surprise me if some fans who act like this are aware of said hatred; they want it to stay. For example, some male characters are often called incels or "nice guys" just for being awkward or shy around a woman they're crushing on, when that is not what either of those terms mean or refer to. Or all interactions they have with a female character are seen as trying to get with her and/or force a relationship with her. Because apparently they're not friends in canon and there's no ulterior motive present. (Or them along with many other male characters are written off as incels just on the basis of being there) And this view is commonly heightened if the female character in question that they crush on is either too much of a "strong female character," to be with a man or she's popularly shipped with another fictional woman. That latter especially. Demonizing other characters in shipping will never be a good thing. It doesn't help when no one seems to want to fight back against this view. By not fighting against it, this treatment tends to leak outside of shipping. The same contempt for male characters here is present outside. Hating a character for traits they don't hold is not any better. Ship and let ship should be the main focus. Not this.

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If you want being gnc to be normalized so badly, that means accepting and acknowledging "Le Evil Straights" in this discussion. To elaborate, there will not only be plenty of people who will be gnc and straight, but also plenty of people who are into said gnc people who are straight themselves. Not every woman into gnc men will come out as bi. Not every man into gnc women will come out as bi. The same applies to fictional characters. For both fans of said gnc characters and for fictional relationships those characters enter. And with shipping. It shouldn't surprise you to see gender nonconforming characters being shipped with the opposite gender. Don't even get me started on phrases like "this man has a lesbian's taste in women," being tossed around. Stop stereotyping. Some may realize they are bi, but expecting it to happen for each one is weird. And very gross and invasive. Also, this is not doing any favors for anyone questioning their sexuality. Stereotypes are not a step in the right direction. And it's interesting of me to say that when some who believe in this stereotype don't stand by it afterward. In other words, it's interesting how many people will say you need to be bi in order to be into gnc men & women, only to turn around and act like bisexuals don't exist. "You need to be bi in order to be into (insert gnc character here)!" (LATER) "This proves you were straight all along!" Once again, stereotypes are not a step in the right direction.

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I hate how the phrase "gay people have great taste in m/f ships" ignores biphobic gay fans in fandoms and shipping. It's not good when those same fans with "great taste" in m/f ships are also biphobic. Nor is it any better to listen to their alone opinions when it comes to m/f ships. Or worse. Which ones to ship and/or are good ships. It's all opinions.

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"I've met/know people who don't act like the ones you mentioned therefore it NEVER happens and what you said NEVER happened." Your (fandom) experiences do not mean someone else's never happened. Stop being this dismissive.

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Yeah, as a bisexual I CAN'T relate to only finding (fictional) women attractive because they're all goddesses that walk this Earth while men are weird bugs (affectionate). Sounds like yet another box to be forced into. And the assumption everyone who doesn't think like this not-so secretly hates women. Get a hobby. Which is funny of me to say, whenever someone says they're only into "weird-looking men" and the men or male characters in question are all conventionally attractive men that either smile a lot or just give off "weird" vibes. Especially attractive actors for some reason. Average man, who? I see a lot of denial.

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The lack of kind female characters in today's media is disappointing. Made more disappointing in how it's great that more fans understand that kind characters and kindness aren't boring; yet that is rarely extended over to fictional women. This also extends to when fans believe making a preexisting female character only mean makes them a good character. Being kind and/or driven by kindness is not a weakness for female characters who embody said traits.

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I'm happy to hear more and more fandoms and audiences these days are starting to get that a kind character is not inherently boring, and there are plenty of worthwhile kind characters in fiction. I'm not against edgy characters or characters in general with a "dark side" to them, but it's great to hear that not only are more growing tired or bored of the badly written ones, but ask themselves this: should a character having kindness as a big part of who they are be a barrier to being a fan of them? And more answer no. It should not. It never will.

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Many fandoms either deify female characters (strip them of all flaws) or infantilize them for very empty reasons (child-coding is one of the worse things to happen to fandom) or both, than act so surprised those same female characters are largely left behind by the same fans they force these views on. Made worse when much of those female characters are loved, but they believe everyone else must love them for aforementioned reasons, or else. The fans who treat these female characters as whole characters and as fictional people with flaws? Sexists. The fans that understand a woman in a piece of fiction does not need to fight to be a good character and loves her all the same? Misogynists. The fans who don't infantilize or deify them? How dare they hate women. The women who don't join in on all of this? Suffering from internalized misogyny. It's amazing how it's viewed as respecting (fictional) women to infantilize them or put them on a pedestal.

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Not every character in fiction who is against killing is a morally gray character. That's too broad and often not applicable to many of the examples people give of a "morally gray character" who isn't one.

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How interesting that the "ALL MEDIA IS POLITICAL!" Fans tend not to be in support of any anti-communist messages or themes in said media. Or put any to begin with. Either identical, half-baked political messages or subtext inserted by the fans that narrows down to their own interpretation. I wonder if there's any coincidence.

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Stop calling men “porn addicts” or “gooners” for liking attractive fictional women. Especially since some of you have a whole bunch of porn of your favorite male characters and some of you sexualize them way worse than a man sexualizing a female character. Porn addiction is a serious addiction like every addiction. Stop reducing it into an insult as a “gotcha” towards men because you hate men because of your one terrible experience with them. Stop letting your confirmation bias determine your opinions towards all men in fandoms. And gooner is not the insult you think it is. Might as well tell a man to edge himself to his favorite female character. He won’t see it as an insult. He’ll see it as a command. Jokes aside though, sexism in fandom generally is a huge issue. It’s not just misogyny that is an issue in fandom. It’s also misandry. You guys can’t be crying about sexism in fandom meanwhile you treat men like they’re subhuman and like they’re objects.

#bi anon #character problems #shipping problems #mod sf

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