#not really bc i do not claim it as fanfiction bc its just the bare bones outline

[ad-astra-per-aspera-1389]

Lab Rats episode in 2023

We open on the living room. Bree does her teenage girl squeal. Chase emerges from... wherever that hallway leads and says "Would you stop screaming? I'm trying to work" and then bree says that taylor swift is going on tour and she absolutely HAS to go. Adam overhears this and says he wants to go too. Chase thinks it's dumb until bree tells him he'll have the 4 hour show, plus the post concert haze to have his siblings out of his hair, and later Chase returns with a detailed calculated plan on how to secure two tickets for the eras tour.

Chase uses his brain and bree uses her speed and 27 tabs to get tickets for herself and Adam. Leading up to the day of the show, a bunch of girls from school are going and bree wants to seem cool so she tells them she's going too, and they ask if she wants to hang out with them at the concert. She says yes because she wants to be cool, and she doesn't tell adam.

Bree and Adam spend hours training (but especially training Adam) to not glitch too badly when they get excited, because plasma grenades going off in a concert venue would probably put them on a watch list. They eventually succeed, but they had so much fun that now bree feels worse knowing she said she would ditch Adam at the show.

The day of the concert, chase finally gets to enjoy the peace and quiet at home, and he gets to spend time working with Mr Davenport. Leo makes this more challenging than they wanted it to be, so they keep pushing him onto Tasha to distract him.

At the concert, bree meets up with the girls from school a little ways away from her and Adam's seats. The girls are having fun but they're clearly only there because it's the cool new thing and so they can post about it later. Bree sees how much fun adam is having and realizes she'd rather be having fun with her brother than be cool.

At home, chase and mr Davenport finish their project as bree and Adam return. They ask how it was and bree says "I... don't remember" and goes to her capsule to go to bed

[cryptidsmagick]

About Soulbonds...

Intro

So, I thought I might talk about this as it's not really a big part of my practice per se, but it is part of my experience and sometimes pokes into the WitchShit™️.

Most people, when talking about soulbonds, are talking about an intentional connection to, most popularized, a fictional character's soul.

Well, that is not my experience.

People often forget that soulbonding started with... walk-ins. Before it was even called soulbonding and developed its own community, it was predominantly, if not completely, walk-ins.

Okay, I'm going to ask you all not to click away yet. I have absolutely no issue with the modern practice of soulbonds, I just want to explain the origins and my personal experience.

Let me introduce you to something called a Lost Soul.

Lost Souls

A Lost Soul is a soul that, after their original body dies, quite literally becomes lost. They may be incarnated (not reincarnated) into another body, coexisting with the Host Soul and sometimes controlling the body (soul shifting). However, there are cases where they don't coexist and completely replace the Host Soul (soul swapping).

A Lost Soul...is quite frankly a Soulbond.

Some Lost Souls simply wander the realm of the undead, sometimes body-hopping (like a particular pesky soulbond named Astra I had to deal with).

The concept of Lost Souls show up in various things (webtoons, animes, fanfiction, witch communities, plural communities, etc) and it's...hard to pin down the origin. However, doing some research, I did dig up that the terms "soul shift" and "soul swap" (and "walk-ins"!) are used by those who incorporate the Akashic Records into their practice.

The Akashic Records were first coined in the 1800s, but individuals claimed that the records existed in BC. It was officially known as part of Theospy later on in the 1900s.

Here's an article I found on the different types of walk-ins. (I found more but I would...not recommend wasting your time.)

In Shamanism, they were sometimes mentioned as "Free Souls." However, Free Souls may be interpreted slightly differently depending on the tribe and people.

In my research, however, I could not find anything about the origin of the term, "lost soul." Just the occasional usage of it.

We personally, frankly, can barely remember the first time we heard the phrase, but we have run into people with residing souls that resonate with Lost Soul more than Soul Bond which... I found interesting, frankly.

The Differences

Now, here's the thing. So far, while reading this, you might thing, "oh, the difference between modern and historical soulbonding is intention!"

...no.

There's a reason I said most people earlier. Many people start soul-bonding by accident. However, note that the linked resource is an example for fictional characters, which once again are in the majority for soulbonding.

In addition, I can't really call Lost Souls and whatnot "historical" soulbond because of how it apparently still happens in modern day, but I can't call it "traditional" soulbonding either. They're both under the same umbrella though, that's for sure.

Paradoxical, however, the main difference is the intention, just in a different way than you expect. Mainly:

Intentionally creating a character and developing a bond as you do so.

Actively wishing to be/be like a character.

Acting in the writing practice of letting the character "take over" and write their "own story."

Plus similar situations. Meanwhile, with Lost Souls, it's more of:

Not a choice made while you're alive. Those who believe in the Akashic Records might believe that walk-ins/walk-outs might be planned before birth, but not during life. They might also believe a soul swap might occur when you lose with will to live, but that's more of dying spiritually rather than choosing to.

Some other differences from Soulbonding include:

Can be a fictional character, but more often, people and things you have absolutely no connection to. Sometimes you might have a connection with them in a past life, but it's uncommon.

Has a higher chance of being malicious (or becoming malicious) than soulbonds.

A Lost Soul may sometimes struggle to leave, unlike a Soulbond. But this is not always the case.

Although the Lost Souls may be a predecessor, it's different enough to be its own thing and/or an umbrella. Kind of like how otherkin is the older term and umbrella for therianthropy, but they're considered distinct things (as they have differences).

My Own Experience

As of currently, our residing soulbonds:

Apostasia (not the fictional character)

The Arbiter/Noren/Gale (not the fictional character[s])

Autumn Fae (he refuses to say his name)

Neuvillette (the fictional character)

"The God" (also refuses to say his name)

Soulbonds who frequently hop in:

Astra

Stardust Cookie (the fictional character; humanoid)

Bennette (the fictional character)

Fierce Deity Link (the fictional character)

All of these soulbonds align more accurately with Lost Souls. Apostasia and the Arbiter are both incarnated deities, for example.

The Autumn Fae showed up randomly one day and still hasn't left. He's distinctly his own soul.

Neuvillette comes and goes (which the Arbiter also does), but mostly resides here. We can distinctly sense his sovereign.

All four of those weren't intentional summonings, and the only one we had any connection to was Neuvillette as we were playing the game at the time. Even the Arbiter, who looks similar to a character from childhood, was here before we were even introduced to the character.

Sartdust Cookie visited before he was 1) released to the game and 2) before we were introduced to the game. Same goes for Bennette and Link (and we did not know about Fierce Deity Link until much later). Astra's just a normal guy.

Even if Neuvillette was a normal soulbond, all of the others above didn't have the preexisting connection to be Soulbonds.

Where Are You Getting With This?

Because of the evolution of terms over time, many lost souls are considered to be soulbonds. I personally use the term soulbond because it's easier for people to understand. But there is a history to this all and I wanted to share it. As mentioned at start, I don't have a problem with modern practice. The point of this isn't to bash on modern soulbonding or claim it's "appropriated" or anything similar—previous practices aren't superior, and both are valid.

The point of this is to share information and my own experience for others to learn from them.

[army-of-mai-lovers]

in which I get progressively angrier at the various tropes of atla fandom misogyny

tbh I think it would serve all of us to have a larger conversation about the specific ways misogyny manifests in this fandom, because I’ve seen a lot of people who characterize themselves as feminists, many of whom are women themselves, discuss the female characters of atla/lok in misogynistic ways, and people don’t talk about it enough. 

disclaimer before I start: I’m not a woman, I’m an afab nonbinary person who is semi-closeted and thus often read as a woman. I’m speaking to things that I’ve seen that have made me uncomfy, but if any women (esp women existing along other axes of oppression, e.g. trans women, women of color, disabled women, etc) want to add onto this post, please do!

“This female character is a total badass but I’m not even a little bit interested in exploring her as a human being.” 

I’ve seen a lot of people say of various female characters in atla/lok, “I love her! She’s such a badass!” now, this statement on its own isn’t misogynistic, but it represents a pretty pervasive form of misogyny that I’ve seen leveled in large part toward the canon female love interests of one or both of the members of a popular gay ship (*cough* zukka *cough*) I’m going to use Suki as an example of this because I see it with her most often, but it can honestly be applied to nearly every female character in atla/lok. Basically, people will say that they stan Suki, but when it comes time to engage with her as an actual character, they refuse to do it. I’ve seen meta after meta about Zuko’s redemption arc, but I so rarely see people engage with Suki on any level beyond “look at this cool fight scene!” and yeah, I love a cool Suki fight scene as much as anybody else, but I’m also interested in meta and headcanons and fics about who she is as a person, when she isn’t an accessory to Sokka’s development or doing something cool. of course, the material for this kind of engagement with Suki is scant considering she doesn’t have a canon backstory (yet) (don’t let me down Faith Erin Hicks counting on you girl) but with the way I’ve seen people in this fandom expand upon canon to flesh out male characters, I know y’all have it in you to do more with Suki, and with all the female characters, than you currently do. frankly, the most engagement I’ve seen with Suki in mainstream fandom is justifying either zukki (which again, is characterizing her in relation to male characters, one of whom she barely interacts with in canon) or one of the Suki wlw pairings. which brings me to--

“I conveniently ship this female character whose canon love interest is one of the members of my favorite non-canon ship with another female character! gay rights!” 

now, I will admit, two of my favorite atla ships are yueki and mailee, and so I totally understand being interested in these characters’ dynamics, even if, as is the case with yueki, they’ve never interacted canonically. however, it becomes a problem for me when these ships are always in the background of a zukka fic. at some point, it becomes obvious that you like this ship because it gets either Zuko or Sokka’s female love interests out of the way, not because you actually think the characters would mesh well together. It’s bad form to dislike a female character because she gets in the way of your gay ship, so instead, you find another girl to pair her off with and call it a day. to be clear, I’m not saying that everybody who ships either mailee or yueki (or tysuki or maisuki or yumai or whatever other wlw rarepair involving Zuko or Sokka’s canon love interests) is nefariously trying to sideline a female character while acting publicly as if she’s is one of their faves--far from it--but it is noteworthy to me how difficult it is to find content that centers wlw ships, while it’s incredibly easy to find content that centers zukka in which mailee and/or yueki plays a background role. 

also, notice how little traction wlw Katara ships gain in this fandom. when’s the last time you saw yuetara on your dash? there’s no reason for wlw Katara ships to gain traction in a fandom that is so focused on Zuko and Sokka getting together, bc she doesn’t present an immediate obstacle to that goal (at least, not an obstacle that can be overcome by pairing her up with a woman). if you are primarily interested in Zuko and Sokka’s relationship, and your queer readings of other female characters are motivated by a desire to get them out of the way for zukka, then Katara’s canon m/f relationship isn’t a threat to you, and thus, there’s no reason to read her as potentially queer. Or even, really, to think about her at all. 

“Katara’s here but she’s not actually going to do anything, because deep down, I’m not interested in her as a person.” 

the show has an enormous amount of textual evidence to support the claim that Sokka and Katara are integral parts of each other’s lives. so, she typically makes some kind of appearance in zukka content. sometimes, her presence in the story is as an actual character with layers and nuance, someone whom Sokka cares about and who cares about Sokka in return, but also has her own life and goals outside of her brother (or other male characters, for that matter.) sometimes, however, she’s just there because halfway through writing the author remembered that Sokka actually has a sister who’s a huge part of the show they’re writing fanfiction for, and then they proceed to show her having a meetcute with Aang or helping Sokka through an emotional problem, without expressing wants or desires outside of those characters. I’m honestly really surprised that I haven’t seen more people calling out the fact that so much of Katara’s personality in fanon revolves around her connections to men? she’s Aang’s girlfriend, she’s Sokka’s sister, she’s Zuko’s bestie. never mind that in canon she spends an enormous amount of time fighting against (anachronistic, Westernized) sexism to establish herself as a person in her own right, outside of these connections. and that in canon she has such interesting complex relationships with other female characters (e.g. Toph, Kanna, Hama, Korra if you want to write lok content) or that there are a plethora of characters with whom she could have interesting relationships with in fanon (Mai, Suki, Ty Lee, Yue, Smellerbee, and if you want to write lok content, Kya II, Lin, Asami, Senna, etc). to me, the lack of fandom material exploring Katara’s relationships with other women or with herself speak to a profound indifference to Katara as a character. I’m not saying you have to like Katara or include her in everything you write, but I am asking you to consider why you don’t find her interesting outside of her relationships with men.

“I hate Katara because she talks about her mother dying too often.” 

this is something I’ve seen addressed by people far more qualified than I to address it, but I want to mention it here in part because when I asked people which fandom tropes they wanted me to talk about, this came up often, but also because I find it really disgusting that this is a thing that needs to be addressed at all. Y’all see a little girl who watched her mother be killed by the forces of an imperialist nation and say that she talks about it too much??? That is a formational, foundational event in a child’s life. Of course she’s going to talk about it. I’ve seen people say that she doesn’t talk about it that often, or that she only talks about it to connect with other victims of fn imperialism e.g. Jet and Haru, but frankly, she could speak about it every episode for no plot-significant reason whatsoever and I would still be angry to see people say she talks about it too much. And before you even bring up the Sokka comparison, people deal with grief in different ways. Sokka  repressed a lot of his grief/channeled it into being the “man” of his village because he knew that they would come for Katara next if he gave them the opportunity. he probably would talk about his mother more if a) he didn’t feel massive guilt at not being able to remember what she looked like, and b) he was allowed to be a child processing the loss of his mother instead of having to become a tiny adult when Hakoda had to leave to help fight the fn. And this gets into an intersection with fandom racism, in that white fans (esp white American fans) are incapable of relating to the structural trauma that both Sokka and Katara experience and thus can’t see the ways in which structural trauma colors every single aspect of both of their characters, leading them to flatten nuance and to have some really bad takes. And you know what, speaking of bad fandom takes--   

“Shitting on Mai because she gets in the way of my favorite Zuko ship is actually totally okay because she’s ~abusive~” 

y’all WHAT. 

ok listen, I get not liking maiko. I didn’t like it when I first got into fandom, and later I realized that while bryke cannot write romance to save their lives, fans who like maiko sure can, so I changed my tune. but if you still don’t like it, that’s fine. no skin off my back. 

what IS skin off my back is taking instances in which Mai had justified anger toward Zuko, and turning it into “Mai abused Zuko.” do you not realize how ridiculous you sound? this is another thing where I get so angry about it that I don’t know how useful my analysis is actually going to be, but I’ll do my best. numerous people have noted how analysis of Mai and Zuko’s breakup in “The Beach” or Mai being justifiably angry with him at Boiling Rock or her asking for FUCKING FRUIT in “Nightmares and Daydreams” that says that all of these events were her trying to gain control over him is....ahhh...lacking in reading comprehension, but I’d like to go a step further and talk about why y’all are so intent on taking down a girl who doesn’t show emotion in normative ways. obviously, there’s a “Zuko can do no wrong” aspect to Mai criticism (which is super weird considering how his whole arc is about how he can do lots of wrong and he has to atone for the wrong that he’s done--but that’s a separate post.) But I also see slandering Mai for not expressing her emotions normatively and not putting up with Zuko’s shit and slandering Katara for “talking about her mother too often” as two sides of the same coin. In both cases, a female character expresses emotions that make you, the viewer, uncomfortable, and so instead of attempting to understand where those emotions may have come from and why they might be manifesting the way they are, y’all just throw the whole character away. this is another instance of people in the fandom being fundamentally disinterested in engaging with the female characters of atla in a real way, except instead of shallowly “stanning” Mai, y’all hate her. so we get to this point where female characters are flattened into one of two things: perfect queens who can do no wrong, or bitches. and that’s not who they are. that’s not who anyone is. but while we as a fandom are pretty good at understanding b1 Zuko’s actions as layered and multifaceted even though he’s essentially an asshole then, few are willing to lend the same grace to any female character, least of all Mai. 

and what’s funny is sometimes this trope will intersect with “I conveniently ship this female character whose canon love interest is one of the members of my favorite non-canon ship with another female character! gay rights!”, so you’ll have someone actively calling Mai toxic/problematic/abusive, and at the same time ship her with Ty Lee? make it make sense! but then again, maybe that’s happening because y’all are fundamentally disinterested in Ty Lee as a character too. 

“I love Ty Lee so much that I’m going to treat her like an infantilized hypersexual airhead!” 

there are so many things happening in y’alls characterization of Ty Lee that I struggled to synthesize it into one quippy section header. on one hand, you have the hypersexualization, and on the other hand, you have the infantilization, which just makes the hypersexualization that much worse. 

(of course, sexualizing or hypersexualizing ANY atla character is really not the move, considering that these are child characters in a children’s show, but then again, that’s a separate post.) 

now, I understand how, from a very, very surface reading of the text, you could come to the conclusion that Ty Lee is an uncomplicated bimbo. if you grew up on Western media the way I did, you’ll know that Ty Lee has a lot of the character traits we associate with bimbos: the form-fitting pink crop top, the general conventional attractiveness, the ditzy dialogue. but if you think about it for more than three seconds, you’ll understand that Ty Lee has spent her whole life walking a tightrope, trying to please Azula and the rest of the royal family while also staying true to herself. Ty Lee and Azula’s relationship is a really complex and interesting topic that I don’t really have time to explore at the moment given how long this post is, but I’d argue that Ty Lee’s constant, vocal  adulation is at least partially a product of learning to survive at court at an early age. Like Mai, she has been forced to regulate her emotions as a member of fn nobility, but unlike Mai, she also has six sisters who look exactly like her, so she has a motivation to be more peppy and more affectionate to stand out. 

fandom does not do the work to understand Ty Lee. as is a theme with this post, fandom is actively disinterested in investigating female characters beyond a very surface level reading of them. Thus, fandom takes Ty Lee’s surface level qualities--her love of the color pink, her revealing standard outfit, and the fact that once she found a boy attractive and also once a lot of boys found her attractive--and they stretch this into “Ty Lee is basically Karen Smith from Mean Girls.” thus, Ty Lee is painted as a bimbo, or more specifically, as not smart, uncritically adoring of Azula (did y’all forget all the non-zukka bits of Boiling Rock?), and attractive to the point of hypersexualization. I saw somebody make a post that was like “I wish mailee was more popular but I’m also glad it isn’t because otherwise people would write it as Mai having to put up with her dumb gf” and honestly I have to agree!! this is one instance in which I’m glad that fandom doesn’t discuss one of my favorite characters that often because I hate the fanon interpretation of Ty Lee, I think it’s rooted in misogyny (particularly misogyny against East Asian women, which often takes the form of fetishizing them and viewing them only through a Western white male gaze)  

(side note: here at army-of-mai-lovers, we stan bimbos. bimbos are fucking awesome. I personally don’t read Ty Lee as a bimbo, but if that’s you, that’s fucking awesome. keep doing what you’re doing, queen <3 or king or monarch, it’s 2021, anyone can be a bimbo, bitches <3)

“Toph can and will destroy everyone here with her bare hands because she’s a meathead who likes to murder people and that’s it!”  

Toph is, and always has been, one of my favorite ATLA characters. My very first fic in fandom was about her, and she appears prominently in a lot of my other work as well. One thing that I am always struck by with Toph is how big a heart she has. She’s independent, yes, snarky, yes, but she cares about people--even the family that forced her to make herself smaller because they didn’t believe that their blind daughter could be powerful and strong. Her storyline is powerful and emotionally resonant, her bending is cool precisely because it’s based in a “wait and listen” approach instead of just smashing things indiscriminately, she’s great disabled rep, and overall one of the best characters in the show. 

And in fandom, she gets flattened into “snarky murder child.” 

So where does this come from? Well, as we all know, Toph was originally conceived of as a male character, and retained a lot of androgyny (or as the kids call it, Gender) when she was rewritten as a female character. There are a lot of cultural ideas about androgynous/butch women being violent, and people in fandom seem to connect that larger cultural narrative with some of Toph’s more violent moments in the show to create the meathead murder child trope, erasing her canon emotionality, softness, heart, and femininity in the process. 

This is not to say that you shouldn’t write or characterize Toph as being violent or snarky at all ever, because yeah, Toph definitely did do Earth Rumbles a lot before joining the gaang, and yeah, Toph is definitely a sarcastic person who makes fun of her friends a lot. What I am saying is that people take these traits, sans the emotional logic, marry them to their conception of androgynous/butch women as violent/unemotional/uncaring, and thus create a caricature of Toph that is not at all up to snuff. When I see Toph as a side character in a fic (because yeah, Toph never gets to be a main character, because why would a fandom obsessed with one male character in particular ever make Toph a protagonist in her own right?) she’s making fun of people, killing people, pranking people, etc, etc. She’s never talking to people about her emotions, or palling around with her found family, or showing that she cares about her friends. Everything about her relationship with her parents, her disability, her relationship to Gender, and her love of her friends is shoved aside to focus on a version of Toph that is mean and uncaring because people have gotten it into their heads that androgynous/butch women are mean and uncaring. 

again, we see a female character who does not emote normatively or in a way that makes you, the viewer, comfortable, and so you warp her character until she’s completely unrecognizable and flat. and for what? 

Azula

no, I didn’t come up with a snappy name for this section, mainly because fanon interpretations of Azula and my own feelings toward the character are...complicated. I know there were some people who wanted me to write about Azula and the intersection of misogyny and ableism in fanon interpretations of her character, but I don’t think I can deliver on that because I personally am in a period of transition with how I see Azula. that is to say, while I still like her and believe that she can be redeemed, there is a lot of merit to disliking her. the whole point of this post is that the female characters of ATLA are complex people whom the fandom flattens into stereotypes that don’t hold up to scrutiny, or dislike for reasons that don’t make sense. Azula, however, is a different case. the rise of Azula defenders and Azula stans has led to this sentiment that Azula is a 14 y/o abuse victim who shouldn’t be held accountable for her actions. it seems to me that people are reacting to a long, horrible legacy of male ATLA fans armchair diagnosing Azula with various personality disorders (and suggesting that people with those personality disorders are inherently monstrous and unlovable which ahhhh....yikes) and then saying that those personality disorders make her unlovable, which is quite obviously bad. and hey, I get loving a character that everyone else hates and maybe getting so swept up in that love that you forget that your fave is complicated and has made some unsavory choices. it sucks that fanon takes these well-written, complex villains/antiheroes and turns them into monsters with no critical thought whatsoever. but the attitude among Azula stans that her redemption shouldn’t be hard, that her being a child excuses all of the bad things that she’s done, that she is owed redemption....all of that rubs me the wrong way. I might make another post about this in the future that discusses this in more depth, but as it stands now: while I understand that there is a legacy of misogynistic, ableist, unnuanced takes on Azula, the backlash to that does not take into account the people she hurt or the fact that in ATLA she does not make the choice to pursue redemption. and yes, Zuko had help in making that choice that Azula didn’t, and yes, Azula is a victim of abuse, but in a show about children who have gone through untold horrors and still work to better the lives of the people around them, that is not enough for me to uncritically stan her. 

Conclusion    

misogyny in this fandom runs rampant. while there are some tropes of fandom misogyny that are well-documented and have been debunked numerous times, there are other, subtler forms of misogyny that as far as I know have gone completely unchecked. 

what I find so interesting about misogyny in atla fandom is that it’s clear that it’s perpetrated by people who are aware of fandom misogyny who are actively trying not to be misogynistic. when I first joined atla fandom last summer, memes about how zukka fandom was better than every other fandom because they didn’t hate the female characters who got in the way of their gay ship were extremely prevalent, and there was this sense that *this* fandom was going to model respectful, fun, feminist online fandom. not all of the topes I’ve outlined are exclusive to or even largely utilized in zukka fandom, but a lot of them are. I’ve been in and out of fandom since I was eleven years old, and most of the fandom spaces I’ve been in have been majority-female, and all of them have been incredibly misogynistic. and I always want to know why. why, in these communities created in large part by women, in large part for women, does misogyny run wild? what I realize now is that there’s never going to be a one-size fits all answer to that question. what’s true for 1D fandom on Wattpad in 2012 is absolutely not true for atla fandom on tumblr in 2021. the answers that I’ve cobbled together for previous fandoms don’t work here. 

so, why is atla fandom like this? why did the dream of a feminist fandom almost entirely focused on the romantic relationship between two male characters fall apart? honestly, I think the notion that zukka fandom ever was this way was horrifically ignorant to begin with. from my very first moment in the fandom, I was seeing racism, widespread sexualization of minors, and yes, misogyny. these aspects of the fandom weren’t talked about as much as the crocverse or other, much more fun aspects. further, atla (specifically zukka) fandom misogyny often doesn’t look like the fandom misogyny we’ve become familiar with from like, Sherlock fandom or what have you. for the most part, people don’t actively hate Suki, they just “stan” without actually caring about her. they hate Mai because they believe in treating male victims of abuse equally. they’re not characterizing Toph poorly, they’re writing her as a “strong woman.” in short, people are misogynistic, and then invoke a shallow, incomplete interpretation of feminist theory to shield themselves from accusations of misogyny. it’s not unlike the way some people will invoke a shallow, incomplete interpretation of critical race theory to shield themselves from accusations of racism, or how they’ll talk about “freedom of speech” and “the suppression of women’s sexuality” to justify sexualizing minors. the performance of feminism and antiracism is what’s important, not the actual practice. 

if you’ve made it this far, first off, hi, thanks so much for reading, I know this was a lot. second, I would seriously encourage you to be aware of these fandom tropes and to call them out when you see them. elevate the voices of fans who do the work of bringing the female characters of atla to life. invest in the wlw ships in this fandom. drop a kudos and a comment on a rangshi fic (please, drop a kudos and a comment on a rangshi fic). read some yuetara. let’s all be honest about where we are now, and try to do better in the future. I believe in us. 

[antiloreolympus]

10 Anti LO Asks

1. I personally would be more willing to excuse the constant art mistakes and issues in LO if it was actually just Rachel doing it all herself. The fact the reality is actually her only sketching it out at best while her team of 4-5 people do the actual art is just inexcusable. The biggest selling point about it too is it's supposed to have great art, so why can't it even keep basic features correct? This is just ridiculous. How do you get more people working on it and it's only worse for it?

2. I think its PJO that said Gods can easily change how they appear (PJO Aphrodite for example looks how the viewer finds attractive, while PJO Persephone's looks change off the seasons) but that's all established and confirmed very early in the series and has in-universe explanations. LO has none of this minus "emotional hair" (???) so there is really no excuse Rachel & her 5+ person team can't even keep Hades' nose right. It's honestly a bit ridiculous how art issues are more frequent than not.

3. IDK why Rachel keeps pushing for Hera and Persephone to be the same person bc not only does that imply Hades wants Hera but is using Persephone to replace her, but Hera sucks?? She's an elitist jerk, she's racist against nymphs unless they're "one of the good ones" (🤢) she claims to be so loyal yet cheats on Zeus with his BROTHER, she neglects her kids to were her 8 year old has to act like an adult, she lies to her own sister, etc. Why would you want Persephone be ANYTHING like her?

4. About that thing about the kings using a fertility goddess (Gaia, Rhea) to gain power... did Rachel entirely miss that the kings themselves ARE fertility gods? Cronus is straight up an earth god, Uranus and Zeus are both sky gods (=rain)

5. sorry, no amount of "thats just the angle!" or "that's just the lighting!" can excuse rachel's piss poor character designing. the character's whole faces, bodies, and skin colors shouldn't change literally every other panel unless its copied and pasted the same panel, which even then theyre still often redrawn to look different and thus off model once again. There's no part of the story confirming their have fluid looks, so it looks even more ridiculous it can't keep even basic things on model.

6. You fools.  Clearly the more creepy and controlling he gets about Persephone the longer his nose grows. Why do you think he looks even more like a swordfish now? I’ve cracked the code. 

7. I’m not saying bad faith critique of LO doesn’t exist but I’m really disturbed over how the stans act like BIPOC readers, LGBTQ+ readers,  SA survivors, Greeks, etc critiquing it’s very real flaws and issues that are sold to literal children is just lumped under that same bad faith argument or “being an anti”. Like?? We’re not arguing about stupid ships, we’re critiquing how it sexualizes a girl that’s barely legal, a story that frames the poor as the real oppressors to the rich and powerful, a story that uses sexual assault to push a creepy, power imbalanced ship along, a comic that spits in the face of the culture and stories it’s butchering and profiting off of, a story that (I will hope unintentionally) has very real implications of racism and antisemitism, a story that frames a slave owner and potential groomer as the best man ever, a story that took a famous bisexual god and made him the abuser to a poor little straight girl, a story claiming to be feminist yet is deeply rooted in pushing misogynistic messages, and the list goes on and on. That’s not “anti” behavior, it’s being able to critically consume this media and not being blinded by marketing and the bright colors it can’t keep consistent. 

8. I feel so bad when I think about the fact I wasted all my time and energy into Lore Olympus fanart, fanfiction, fandom (discussions, theories and even arguing), compared to when I used to be in other fandoms. Like... League Of Legends fandom, yeah, that boring and ugly moba game, has made me feel much more fulfilled and welcomed, especially because of how many amazing story and world building related things they provide from time to time.

Yes, Smythe doesn't have much money to provide the fandom with interesting animations, or exclusive music videos or just basically anything other than doodles and memes and concept art... But still for some reason I feel so cheated. The amount of love and time I dedicated to Lore Olympus feels heavily one-sided.

Now it's a matter of time until another fandom will pull me in and I leave Lore Olympus behind for good. I just don't understand what kept me here so long. I suppose it's my need for closure is why I still stay. I just need to know how it ends because I don't want this whole time I wasted on this bad piece of media to be in vain. 

9. I think In trying to make the comic more “serious” Rachel seems to think adding more complicated plots and “twists” makes it better, but it really doesn’t. There’s nothing wrong with telling a simple story and that’s it, especially when the hymn is pretty straightforward in what to do with it. Idk why she thinks adding plots about Kronos, Leto, Eros, Daphne, Echo, AOW, etc would somehow improve a story about HxP getting together, yet here we are. 

10. Not only is Hera a Fertility Goddess despite Rachel's lack of world building, Hera also has a huge overlap with Zeus in terms of powers, such as herself being able to control the weather, cause storms, and crumble empires if she saw fit. There is a reason Zeus and Hera were paired and it wasn't just their for spicy romance, it was also the fact he was the strongest god and she was the strongest goddess. Rachel very purposely nuked Hera of her real power and still thinks she's "empowering" her!

[literaphobe]

(you don't have to answer if you don't want to) but i was curious how you found out you had adhd? esp since you mentioned being singaporean cause like i also grew up in sg and like barely anybody (gov, school, ect) mentioned adhd stuff growing up and tbh i feel like i only saw it in tv and stuff so im curious? also no yeah adhd is a struggle but i know you can do it you're like the sexiest girlboss blogger i know :DDDD

essentially i had a breakdown when i was 15 and i was skipping school so much (i would go one day and skip the next for instance) for mental health reasons i was also addicted to spn at the time like i mean u know my hyperfixation and well i will say that while i would read spn fanfiction and go through the dash when i skipped school it was also not the reason i skipped school like it was just... id just get dressed for school and then something in me would stop halfway and id go back to be and i was getting so much detention and i was suspended multiple times (IN SCHOOL SUSPENSION IS SO BAD THEY MAKE U SIT OUT IN THE OPEN IN FRONT OF THE GENERAL OFFICE AND STUDY ALL DAY LIKE DAMN COOL I DONT EVEN GET TO LEARN THE TIME I COME TO SCHOOL EXCELLENT SYSTEM GUYS) and yeah i remember running to one of my mom's friends house (it was a 2 minute walk away) to sit nearby and secretly use the wifi bc my mom turned the wifi off at our house thinking it would somehow make me more well behaved and she took my phone away and locked it in her drawer so i learnt to pick locks and one time i hid it and she got mad and screamed and got violent etc she had like a friend install something on my computer so i couldn't use it and i just... found a way to remove it somehow anyway um i did not respond well to my freedom being restricted but the adhd diagnosis thing happened bc one day i broke down in a doctor's office bc i was so sick of lying to get doctors letters (sometimes i wouldn't even take the effort to go and just let them suspend me) and my father had stopped speaking to me and didn't visit me for ages as punishment for my school skipping ways (my parents r divorced) anyway lo and behold i begged for help i thought i was depressed and i got an appointment w a mental health person and i was diagnosed for adhd (which came as a shock to me) (in hindsight it should never have been a shock) and well my school was threatening to expel me but after they found out i had adhd my principal was like huh... what are u and i was like i got this thing called medication im gonna try and take it and i pinky promise i will try and come to school more and well a bunch of my family members got all up in hands and refused to believe i had adhd so they brainwashed my mom who believed i had adhd at first (the doctor told her i had it) to thinking adhd wasn't even real and i had this tutor who took a 5 minute adhd test ANSWERED IT FOR ME WITHOUT CONSULTING ME and claimed to my mom that he had proved i didn't have adhd to this day my mother still does not really acknowledge the fact that i have adhd and when my dad found out i got diagnosed he looked up stuff on adhd and began to claim "my adhd is worse than yours!" and years later brainwashed himself into thinking he got me adhd help (so i reminded him that i broke down in a doctors office and got a diagnosis that he wasn't even there for and he thankfully believed me bc he knows my long term memory is really fucking good)

also they put my sister on adhd meds and years later she confessed to me she didn't even think she needed help for adhd "i think i could have adhd but its nowhere near as bad as yours" and well . well. all i will say is that this is the very long version of "i had Problems in school that snowballed and exploded in my face because no one cared until it was too late"

[asterekmess]

1-11 Scott/Posey Stans always try to deflect criticism of the way Scott McCall is written in Teen Wolf by claiming that ANY attempt by a fan, a viewer, or a critic of holding Scott to a level of behavior that one would expect of a character who is a main and the self-proclaimed hero of the show is “racism”. Except that their accusations don’t make any sense whatsoever, because Scott’s canonical shitty actions and behavior don’t stem from his race (or canonical lack of thereof.)

Okay hun, this is a doozy, so I’m putting it under a Read More.

2-11 Scott McCall is mean. He’s mean to Stiles, he’s mean to Allison, he’s mean to Derek, he’s mean to Peter, he’s mean to Cora, he’s mean to Lydia, he’s mean to Jackson, he’s mean to Erica, he’s mean to Isaac, he’s mean to Malia, he’s mean to Malia, he’s mean to Kira, he’s mean to Liam, he’s mean to Chris, and he’s even mean to Theo (“You are barely even human!”) Scott McCall is deliberately rude to the Hales, Boyd, Ethan, Danny, Hayden, Jiang, Tierney, and Melissa.

3-11 Scott McCall deliberately USES, INSULTS, HUMILIATES and DEHUMANIZES people in ways that demonstrate that he is fully aware of what he’s doing. Scott McCall deliberately disregards other people’s needs in order to fulfill his own. Tyler Posey being half Mexican doesn’t change the fact that his fictional character Scott McCall is a whiny coward and an abusive piece of trash,

4-11 and that his so called ‘defense squad’ enjoys the power fantasy that Scott can be cruel, can lie, can assault, can lash out, can violate other people’s boundaries, bodily autonomy and consent, can commit premeditated murder, can break the law without impunity, can dehumanize, can gaslight and victim blame his friends to his heart’s content and no one should ever hold it against him

5-11 In both the production and in some Scott supremacist fanfics, there’s often the premise that people are evil and in the wrong if they call Scott out on his bullshit or hold his toxic behavior against him. Take Season 1. As much as the Scott McCall defense squad brigade love framing Stiles and Derek getting shit done and prioritizing people’s life over Scott’s jealous fits and temper tantrums as the height of depravity

6-11 Scott/Posey Stans consciously and steadfastly ignore all the cruel things that Scott says and does throughout the seasons, such as “How much Adderall have you had today?” OR “What are you trying to do?! I just made first line! I got a date with a girl who I can't believe wants to go out with me and everything in my life is perfect! Why are you trying to ruin it?!” OR “The hunters had a reason to slaughter your entire family and pack”

7-11 (As an aside, it’s amazing to me how Fanon rewrites Scott as this brilliant thinker and strategist and mastermind who is so much smarter and better than everyone else in every way even though Canon Scott spends the entirety of Teen Wolf doing absolutely nothing except get his ass handed to him by everyone, whining about wanting to be popular/get his dick wet/play lacrosse, screaming at his friends and girlfriends, being utterly useless when left to his own devices,

8-11 and planning to bite Stiles against his will because he doesn’t know what to do. But I digress.) Or take Season 5. In the rain argument in Lies of Omission (5x09), Scott McCall’s hypocritical, dehumanizing speech to Stiles is one of the meanest, cruelest, most disgusting manipulations I have ever seen a television character deliver to another television character they supposedly cared about. It’s victim blaming and gaslighting at its vilest.

9-11 And, of course, the Scott McCall defense squad focuses exclusively on the idea that Stiles didn’t behave “the right way” in that scene (AKA taking Scott’s bullshit without clapping back like Scott wanted and demanded), and cannot entertain for one moment the idea that Scott provoked that response by dehumanizing Stiles and by accusing Stiles of being a violent, dangerous, inhuman monster and serial killer based on Theo’s words alone.

10-11 After all, it’s part of their power fantasy. Scott being “abandoned” and “mistreated” by his “ungrateful” friends serves another type of fantasy: the poor oppressed martyr. It doesn’t matter why Scott is abandoned or who is leaving Scott, it’s all about Scott McCall’s right to own people and demand his friends’ love, friendship, loyalty, sympathy, forgiveness, obedience and devotion without having to account for his own abusive behavior.

11-11 And that’s Scott Stans’ point: Only Scott McCall Is Important and Damn Derek/Stiles/Liam/Other Teen Wolf character for having a life and motivations that don’t revolve around Scott! To them (and to Canon Scott), the pack exists not to serve all its members, but to serve and validate Scott McWhinyCall. Because, after all, that’s what antis want for themselves – validation in the face of shortcomings and bad behavior.

Wow, that was a lot of anger. Do you feel any better after venting that? I really hope so, it honestly looks p cathartic. Okay, I apologize in advance if I don’t come across as quite so passionate, I’m kinda bleh today and I already used up all my righteous fury in an earlier post, so I’ll do my best.

I honestly understand the worry about people disliking Scott as having racist motivations. As I said in another post, there aren’t a lot of Latino (wait, I read somewhere to use latine? Should I use that instead? I’ll use that, someone correct me if I’m wrong. The thing also said latinx was not great bc of pronunciation issues? I’m not educated enough on this. Halp, please.) Latine protagonist characters in popular television, especially for teen dramas like Teen Wolf. Intentional or not, written into the show or not, Scott is half-latine. His mother is a latine woman. We don’t see them speak spanish or take part in any specific cultural traditions, but that doesn’t make him white. Yes, his character was written for a white guy, but Tyler Posey is the one who got the part and we can’t strip him of his heritage just because the show originally meant for Scott to be white. My husband is almost always mistaken for white, even though he’s also half-latine, but that doesn’t make him any less latine. There’s little enough representation as it is, and if we start being picky about whether characters were ‘intended’ or ‘written’ as POC, everything will just fall to shit. Plus, as a white person, I have literally no rights to decide that Scott’s white. I’m cool with that. Would prefer to just stay in my lane, if I’m honest. With Scott established as being a POC, it’s totally reasonable for other POC and fans of Scott to be worried that those of us who don’t like him have that opinion because of either passive or active racism. There are a lot of occasions where Protags of Color were either liked less, or actively disliked for just being ‘not white.’ It also doesn’t help that Scott is one of very few “good” Characters of Color in TW (whether we agree or not, he is presented as a ‘good guy’). We have Boyd, who dies in 3A and doesn’t get much character developement in the meantime, and Kira, who sticks around for a while, then has to leave because of ‘losing control’ which is apparently a very common stereotype for POC, especially within Fantasy or Supernatural settings. Other than them, the other POC are either bad guys or just morally dubious. I’m not sure where Deaton falls on the scale either. I understand it being frustrating to some people for us to take one of the few “good’ characters and see him/describe him as a villain. It’s important for white people, and honestly, anyone not latine (because even POC can be racist against people who aren’t their race) to be self-aware and analyze the various reasons why we dislike Scott and make sure that we aren’t accidentally being passively racist. Just because we’re sure we aren’t, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t double check. And if we find we are, then it’s up to us to correct that mindset and educate ourselves. There is no shame in learning that you have not great habits or mindsets and working to fix them. That’s how growth works. It’s equally important that when we’re writing fic, we watch how we portray him and the other POC in the show. I’m not saying we can’t write Scott bashing fic. Fuck knows that I’ve written plenty of Bad Friend Scott McCall fic, and I don’t intend to stop. But we still need to be self-critical and make sure that we’re not writing Scott (or the others, please assume from here on out I’m saying Scott and the others) into racist stereotypes. We shouldn’t reduce him to just a “Yes” man, or make him constantly submissive, or constantly vicious and angry and mean for no reason. It’s one thing to write him as doing something bad or cruel and making it realistic for the story. It’s quite another to have him just randomly pop in to say “fuck you” and hit someone (I’m not referencing something specific here, I’m just saying dumb stuff). Honestly, I don’t know enough about this and I’m not really entitled to go into too much more detail. Instead, I’d recommend that even if you don’t think you’re hating Scott for racist reasons, still read This Post about racism in fandom/fanfic. When I read it, it was both reassuring and intimidating. I have anxiety, so I’m usually worried about doing things for ‘the wrong reason’ even when that’s not actually my reason for doing the thing. Reading this gave me a clearer view of my own thoughts, and it honestly made me feel a little more comfortable with my own mentality because it gave me a structure to think about and consider when I’m worried that I’m doing something racist. It’s worth the read. I’d also like to reiterate the suggestion on that post, to check out the blog Writing with Color, which is a great resource for writing Characters of Color. It doesn’t have as many resources for fanfiction writing and the grey area involved in writing characters that your reader already knows, but their ask box is closed at the moment, so maybe when it opens again someone’ll send in an ask about it (If I actually remember to, I’ll do it myself, but that’s unlikely, so if one of you feels so inspired, please do so and help a fic writer out!)

Now. I cannot speak for every single fan of TW who is anti-Scott in some way. Obviously not. But, I can speak for myself and for the experiences I’ve had within the fandom. My issues with Scott are many and complex and a lot of it is intrinsically connected to issues with the writing of the show in general and with the creators and the calls they made. In all the conversations that I’ve had with other fans, I’ve never seen anyone list Scott’s race as a problem. I’ve never seen anyone talk about how they wished he were more submissive or more obedient. Maybe that he would listen to actual adults once in a while, but not that he be unreasonably obedient of white characters. I’m not all-knowing on the subject of racist stereotypes, but nearly every complaint I’ve seen was based on details from the show and specific moments and dialogue, not just a general disgust with his existence. Furthermore, for all the anger I see directed at those of us that prefer Stiles, Derek, or even Peter, I’ve also never talked to anyone who liked those characters who wasn’t willing to admit that there were plenty of points in canon where they fucked up or did something wrong. Again, I don’t know everyone in fandom, so maybe there are people who won’t admit those things, but they aren’t in the majority.

I personally hate the way I see Scott treat people in the show. I hate the really vicious things he says and does and the chronic lack of self-awareness or growth. Even worse, the way the show excuses his behavior, be it intentional or not, has soured a lot of other parts of the show. The clearly impulsive moments that could easily be excused by him being a really stressed out teenager make me a lot more frustrated than they would, had I not known that he would never get better. That he would never stop saying things like that. I can’t even make myself enjoy the genuinely sweet moments with him and Allison or him and his mom, etc. I might hate that he left Stiles’ messages unanswered and skipped an entire day of school during a crisis to hang out with Allison, but I would’ve liked to enjoy their banter, the soft moments between them that are actually really nice. I can’t though, because so many other things about his character have ruined that for me.

It isn’t okay to attack people for disliking a character and throw around such charged words like “racist” and “abuse-apologist” or anything else. First off, this is fiction, and we all need to keep that in mind. These are not real people we’re talking about. Secondly, calling someone racist because they disagree with you (unless they are actively saying/doing something actually racist) isn’t okay and it isn’t an adult way to deal with things. Someone not liking a character doesn’t automatically make them racist. Someone happening to prefer a white character over a Character of Color doesn’t automatically make them racist. Sure, they might have passively racist motivations that even they don’t realize. But it is not up to strangers to come yell and call names without proof. There are plenty of reasons that have nothing to do with race (Not saying “i don’t see race.” I’m saying “Not About Race”) that I like Stiles over Scott, ranging from the fact that he’s physically more my type, to sharing a neurological condition with him, to just preferring Dylan O’Brien as an actor because he makes me fucking cry every time he cries on screen. What’s important is that we self analyze and check ourselves and our opinions to make sure that we aren’t falling into the racist habit of disliking Characters of Color for no real reason. But that isn’t something that other people can do for us, and it’s not their place to tell us what we think. Calling a stranger racist for saying they hate Scott’s behavior in the show doesn’t do anything for racial equality. It just makes people stop listening to the word ‘racist.’

There are times I seriously get frustrated with TW to the point of considering not watching anymore. Of closing my blog and stopping reading fanfic entirely because every single time I read a fic where Scott’s a ‘good guy’ or a ‘good alpha’ or where Derek is glad to be a beta again because he likes following Alpha Scott, I get squicked so badly I have to click out and just sit there for a second to settle. I can’t disentangle the things he does/says in the show from the fic.And I’ve written Good Friend Scott McCall fics. I have multiple wips where he’s either a decent person or he grows from being a dick to being a decent person. With my own work, I know that there’s an awareness to his behavior in the show and an active intent to rewrite/fix his behavior so that he is a nice person. With other people’s works, I don’t have a guarantee (unless it’s mentioned in tags or author’s notes, and I don’t expect people to have to explain themselves that way), and it personally makes me uncomfortable to read something when I don’t know if the writer actually sees Scott that way. It’s a personal preference, and one that I stick to pretty strictly.

Scott brings me no joy, and with him as the main character, I’ve come perilously close to cutting myself off from the most welcoming, loving fandom I’ve ever been a part of (except the Merlin fandom, but I don’t blame anyone who can’t compete with them. They’re fucking magical.). But I’m still here. I still love, if not the reality of the show, then all the potential I see in it when I watch. I love watching Derek and Stiles interact with each other and with the other side characters. I love seeing the glimpses of Boyd that we get, the tiny scenes of Erica, the snarky moments with Isaac. I even like Kira, though I haven’t seen a whole lot of the show where she’s in it/genuinely can’t remember it (I can’t even remember how far I’ve seen total, but I don’t think it was past S4, and I haven’t seen past S2 in months and months) and she spends most of her scenes with Scott, which just....kind of ruins the scenes for me.

That’s the glory of fandom though, of media in general. I don’t have to like Scott. I can love Derek and Stiles instead and I can choose not to read fics where Scott is a major player or an Alpha at all. I can read fics where Kira’s part of the pack without Scott ever getting involved, and see her interact with everyone else. Or fics where Boyd never dies and watch him bake or read or play lacrosse with the pack. I can curate my own experience, whether that means blocking tags or users or filtering fics, or just straight up skipping certain scenes/episodes of the show itself. I cope with my frustrations by coming on this blog and ranting about it. Yeah, this is a public space, but it’s also a space people choose to view. If they don’t like my opinions, they can block me or unfollow me or all of the above. They don’t have to read it, just like I don’t have to read any of their pro-scott stuff. I also read fic that does explore how Scott’s behavior is problematic and cruel sometimes. Fic that either erases him or turns him into the villain, I find fun and interesting and the relationship between him and Stiles cracking into pieces is something I find extremely cathartic, so I read it pretty much every chance I get (though, i’m so picky about fics I read, you’ve no idea). I also write fic. I write the most mushy, self-indulgent sterek fic and Stiles-centric fic and and Scott bashing fic that I can possibly write. It’s a joy and a therapy all its own. Fuck, I’m rewriting the entirety of canon for fuck’s sake and I’ve made so many changes that at this point I honestly have issues remembering what happens in the show, bc I rewrote the damn thing.

At the same time, Scott fans are gonna write their power fantasies. They’re gonna write anti-Stiles stuff and anti-Derek stuff, and whatever else tickles their fancy. They’re gonna make their own rant posts and gifsets. And to be quite honest, I don’t give a single flying fuck. I already have those tags filtered out on Ao3. I don’t follow any pro-scott tumblrs. That shit doesn’t show up for me most of the time, unless it’s not tagged properly, and even then I just click out, take a second, and move on.

No one is required to like or dislike specific characters, and it’s unfair of anyone to tell us otherwise. Fandom is built on choice. The choice to disagree with canon, or to re-envision it altogether, or to love it entirely. No one can take that away from you. So long as you aren’t hurting anybody, just keep doing you, friend. I’m here for you to vent to when it gets to be too much.

<3

[bluephoenixdruidicprincess]

OMG I remember when I saw Drusilla for the first time. I was 10 years old, she was in wheelchair and she was so scarring and creepy.I know a lot of people think that Glory was the best female villain in Buffy, but I think it was Drusilla. Some spn/destiel fan are so annoying and you're right about the treatment of female character by the fandom and the writers but it's funny bc I've always feel like destiel fan are mostly women. it's up to the writer to make an interesting demon in a wheelchair.

I think there’s something that’s just generally more terrifying about Drusilla in a wheelchair. One of my greatest fears isn’t necessarily the death of my physical body but moreso the death of my mind. I fear the prospect of losing my mind more than my death. And I think that’s what contributes to Drusilla being so terrifying while she was in the wheelchair. When she wasn’t in the wheelchair, she was still very terrifying in the sense that you knew she would tear you apart based on the whim of her mind that we have very little understanding of. But when she’s in the wheelchair, she has limitations on what she physically can do and if you have that kind of limitation you focus on another mode of torture for your victims. If you can’t physically hurt them, then attack them through the mind. And I think that’s what I found so genuinely terrifying about Drusilla when she was in the wheelchair. Just knowing that if she focused her efforts, she could destroy your mind. And we all know she has the capacity to do it. The whole reason her mind is the way that it is is that Angelus did it to her in the first place. Before he turned her, he wasn’t interested in destroying her body first, he focused on her mind, he destroyed her mind first before he destroyed her body. And because of this, to a certain extent, I think Drusilla will always go for torturing the mind as opposed to the body because that was what was done to her.

I mean, Glory was a good villain in the sense of her power. She was super powerful in ways that were very threatening to the Scooby gang. Most of the fights they had with her, they only made it out alive due to luck. However, I don’t think Glory is a great villain beyond that. To me, as far as her motivations, I think she’s kind of bland. She’s the villain that does villainous things because she’s the villain and has very little connections to the protagonists of the story. While you can say that Drusilla is the same that she wants to do villainous things just because she can, the difference is that Drusilla has a connection to the protagonists when she was first introduced that really propelled the story in interesting directions. And the state of her mind lends credence to an explanation of why she does the things she does. We really didn’t have any of that with Glory. Glory just does things because she’s evil. I mean, the show basically had to retcon Buffy being an only child just to give Buffy a personal link to her fight with Glory. But I also did find Glory quite terrifying as well. That whole thing where she fried Tara’s mind was pretty horrifying. As I said, I have a fear of losing my mind. So that part played perfectly into my fears. As a scary villain, Glory works but I feel like Drusilla was more interesting and dynamic. With Drusilla, you never knew what you were going to get. Was she going tear your throat out or did she just want to have a cup of coffee with you? It was anyone’s guess really what she was going to do from one moment to the next. And that unpredictability was always super interesting.

And to be clear on this, I don’t hate Destiel fans in general. There are some Destiel shippers I do like and am good friends with. And in fanon, I do like the ship (canon Destiel is just a no-go for me anymore), I will still read Destiel fanfiction (although its mainly AU stuff, like I said, canon stuff with Destiel just doesn’t work for me anymore).There’s just a certain faction of Destiel shippers that are just the absolute worst. The group lording over the entire fandom claiming that their ship is the only valid interpretation and everyone else just isn’t reading the foreshadowing, symbolism and subtext correctly. Or if you’re a Megstiel shipper, you’re heteronormative and homophobic. All that crap that comes from certain members of the community is what I can’t stand.  Those people disregarding and invalidating what other people choose to enjoy from the show is what I hate to see. Especially since a lot of these other communities within the faction are actually super nice and supportive. Like, when I decided to jump-ship from the Destiel community and dig in a little more into the Sastiel and Megstiel communities to see what those were all about, I was just flabbergasted to find out that there’s communities in the SPN fandom that are super supportive of their thing but they also don’t put other people down at the same time while liking their thing like you see happen with the Destiel community a lot. When I started to really dig into the Sastiel and Megstiel tags, I really began to realize these communities are so much more healthy and positive and supportive and it was just amazing. You can ship Sastiel and Megstiel however you want, using whatever context you want and no one tries to tear you down for it. While when I was in the Destiel community, I had a different take on Destiel and it was like whenever I would talk about Destiel I would have to constantly defend my views on the ship but there’s none of that with Sastiel and Megstiel. There was barely any toxicity and if there was any toxicity it’s when Destiel shippers go into these tags and do what they do as I’ve already previously discussed.

Generally, for the most part Destiel shippers are women. I mean, I’ve met men who ship Destiel as well but I typically notice the ship more with women. But also generally speaking here, women have more of a connection to wanting to see things like romance in the media they consume so maybe it’s not so much that more women ship Destiel than men, it could simply be because there’s more women that engage in “shipping” in general more than men so it would stand to reason that there would be more women shippers of Destiel because there’s more women engaging in ship culture than men. Again, I’m not saying men don’t ship. Plenty of them do, I just think the ratio leans slightly more heavily on women.

If they do bring back Rachel for season 15, I’d be really interested to see what they do with her. Meg was a total badass character before and there’s no reason she shouldn’t continue to be a total badass now that she’s in a wheelchair. And reasons for why she’s in a wheelchair can easily be explained away. Like say Meg is stuck inside of her current vessel because a spell similar to the one Crowley used on Lucifer so he couldn’t jump out of the Mark P skin was used. And season 15, in general, feels like a season where anything can happen. There’s no doubt in mind there’s a way for the show to write Meg back in. I just hope it won’t be something dumb like a flashback.

[kaisoo-isboombayah]

There r some kd hardcore shippers who think that kd isnt an actual thing and its only their fantasy. They also write "we support kxk" in their bio. I'm a kaisoo shipper and I think that JI and Ks are a couple but I don't understand those shippers. I mean... u ship bcs you think they are in love, right?

those are 'casual' shippers. kxk really fucked some of them over and they refuse to get over it. but also some people just like the IDEA of ji and ks being together; they think by saying 'i'm not pushing my fantasies' on them, that it makes them a good person or reasonable shipper. because in this fandom, if you say you think ks and ji are dating, you're automatic scum. this has nothing to do with 'fantasies'. you'll never say ks and mixnah or irexne or whatever else girl he barely interacted with could be a 'fantasy' of the shipper.it's just really hard for people to wrap their heads around the fact that 2 guy idols in one of the most popular kpop bands could be tgt. and ofc it don't help that we have people who think all and ever ship ever is real. that's not what i'm saying. kds circumstances, imo, are very rare. there's no other real ship in exko. chanbeak, xiu_chen, or whoever else is allowed to openly feel each other up on stage and do variety shows tgt. or like acknowledge the fact that they know each. or like sit by each other without the sitting arranging changing mid showcase. or like stand beside each other without members forcing themselves inbetween...like i'm sorry. but i have been a kpop fan for almost a decade now and the rumors/things i've seen circulating about kd; i have neveeer seen before. hell, the media claimed ji injured himself on a skiing incident and the only person connected to skiing was ks who purchased equipment before the fact. it's all these little things add up and ppl refuse to see because they can't get pass "2 boy idols".supporting kxk or pretending to support kxk doesn't make you special. the blind item literally described kd and then mentioned it was buried in the same month of kxk, it just funny to me. skeptical is cool; but that fucking blind? but anyway supporting every kpop confirmed rs makes you look good. anyway, people can like kd in their fanfiction and not acknowledge they could be tgt in rl all they want to.

[strawberrymillks]

Honestly, your not wrong about the majority of Dabi stans 😭 I am one myself, but I’ve seen so many who like him but then mischaracterize his character or just don’t have the best takes (everyone has their opinions and stuff, but sometimes 😬) And although I do indulge in fanfiction, some of them make him really abusive/a ra****t and man, I myself may be mischaracterizing him now but I don’t think he’d be like that (not saying he’d be like a soft-soft bean since he’d def have attitude, but hopefully you get what I mean.) And with Compress and Twice, fans really only got to like/pay attention to them because of the Compress face reveal and Twice’s death. Like, I loved them in the Training Camp arc when they were first introduced and loved them absolutely more in MVA. Including Spinner, I think he’s underrated and I notice some fans judge others for liking him because he’s a lizard. Like y’all, your literally fitting into what HK is portraying when it comes to quirk discrimination regarding mutant-type quirks. The guy is still a human after all :/

oh yeah no i hate the r*pist/ab*ser dabi hcs and they are 100% ooc. he literally hates his abusive dad and anyone who commits terrible crimes why tf would he be like that. and like you said he's not some soft baby but like... he feels things very strongly and is very insistent on accountability. yes he's a dick, yes he treats the lov terribly, that does not mean he's an emotionless, heartless monster. his actions come from a place of pain.

and yeah, i mean at least with compress we just didn't know anything about him and he barely had focus (which was annoying when it came to people who said they liked dabi bc he was mysterious bc we still knew more about him and his identity), but with twice and spinner its like... we got so much about them in mva. and so many people claimed to care about twice the entire time but never said a single word about him until his death. he doesn't have to be people's faves or anything, but i wish people would stop pretending they care about him when they just ignored him prior to it, justify his death (people who go "i like twice but umm he was dangerous"), or ship him with his murderer.

also i havent seen that about spinner wtf?? people actually say that?