#the way he carries that war cry against illness so deeply is sooooo. like. thats my friend chopper<3 just like me<3

[namisweatheria]

I need to finish my one piece reread and percolate first but I find it very interesting the thread between different characters reclaiming monstrosity alongside their humanity and specifically how it intersects with chopper's characterization. I think about how he gets more and more baby-ish in the way he acts and looks as the series goes on, and that one sbs where the "bad ending" version of him looked significantly older than the "good ending" version.

He didn't get to be a child when he was a child, having to learn to take care of and soothe himself when there was absolutely nothing but coldness and rejection in the world for him for his first.. 12 years? of being alive. So the meaning of being able to be childlike with his chosen family is apparent.

However, my friend was talking about an allegorically disabled character in a different show this morning, and about how disabled children often experience both infantilization and parentification. Having to care for your parent's feelings about your disability before your own. Being stripped down to nothing but what you can't do.

There's probably nothing there, but the long thread of intertextual connection between disability and monstrosity in culture and fiction is generally on the forefront of my mind. It makes "monstrous" characters feel like my characters. With transexuality too! The cultural and intertextual thread between it and monstrosity is strong! The way trans men in particular are infantilized and also seen as dangerous and aggressive at the same time seems relevant, especially for a character that technically didn't have to claim a gender for himself, being born a genderless animal, but chose to anyways.

I don't know I feel like Chopper's a much more interesting character than we often give him credit for. He's much more than the lonely baby who finally found a home that he's often boiled down to.