#yall see unfollowing/blocking as like. a punishment. I hate it so much

[snekdood]

the vast gulf of a difference between ppl unfollowing or blocking me on tumblr and people unfollowing or blocking me on deviant art cant be understated

[keiths-salt]

(1/6) as a kl shipper, i wanna say from the bottom of my heart: thank you thank you thank you. so many times i've wanted to shout stuff like "why do yall hate k/eith so much" and "you guys never cared abt s/hiro or a/llura, let alone s/hallura" and "why do you want so bad for this writer/artist to be a p/dophile godDAMN" like, holy shit. u beautiful salty jem of a pearl at the bottom of this tumultuous fandom ocean. -

- (2/6) even your blog title is golden, bc it feels like so many people are so deluded, trying to make a ship, something you’re supposed to sit back and enjoy, into a sort of spiteful activist bullshit-filled “movement” like what??? and telling folks to unfollow if they ship s/haladin bc they’re “cleaning out they’re blog”, like, fuck off??? sorry but here’s a salt-filled rant and i don’t know where else to put it so here! -

- (3/6) side note, i’m rly trying to get across to you that i’m NOT being sarcastic abt how much i want you to keep doing your thing, bc now they’re trying to tackle RACISM. in grosser and grosser ways every day! calling some of the only asian rep i see in media “white-passing” and saying that l/ance can’t have a last name that isn’t 1000% authentically cuban, whatever that means, buncha hypocritical racists. i have never been so angry and ashamed of a fandom. -

- (4/6) it’s gotten to the point where i, someone who ships kl and NOT sk (just my personal tastes), am rly happy to see any sk on my dash bc that poster must have been so brave! to post something as simple as sk hugging or smooching or whateverthefuck, i don’t care! you do you! fuck all these nasty haters, THEY’RE the toxic ones who just want someone to hate! yall deserve props! -

- (5/6) also, my compliments to the chef regarding that pining k/eith theory, it’s So Good, like i ghostwrote it somehow. the whole “projecting onto l/ance” thing (which is being done to a painful degree, i can testify) tries so hard to remove or overvalidate his flaws that it’s laughable. making lance into an insecure martyr angst-sponge hybrid with no agency and no room for personal growth, it’s sooo bad. -

- (6/6) and villainizing everyone else! reminds me of that jaden smith tweet: “when i die, then you will realize” shit he wrote when he was like 14. transparent af, like we get it, you’re insecure. and sometimes i WANT to hop aboard the black paladin lance train, but it’s always this idealized version of him that’s almost unrecognizable, and it’s at the expense of better black paladin candidates. goddamn ok, that was all my salt for the time being! much love, thank you and goodnight!

This is one of those asks that I’d love to keep in my inbox forever, but I’ve spent the last three days trying to come up with a response because you deserve one.

I think we’re all aware that tumblr is an explictly shitty place when it comes to “activism”. There’s this black-white-mentality that anything and anyone needs to be put in a box based on whether they agree with someone’s world views. Everything needs to conform to a specific label too, fiction is only allowed to be healthy, you condone what you enjoy etc., and the #1 argument by people on this site, also widely used by antis, is “Think about the children” but also “Expect everyone else to take care of you”.

People actively go into tags of pairings they hate and then yell about how triggered they are. Really? I’ve been repeatedly told to kill myself because I liked something they didn’t (and I’m talking about my 99.5% discourse-free main blog, not this one where I passively seek out conflict). You either conform to the popular way of thinking (shipping, in this case) or you’re irredeemable trash and a threat to the public. Any shit you get over having your own opinion will be justified because you deserve to be punished for thinking on your own. Tumblr mentality is the modern equivalent to medieval politics.

Fandom always has a terrible side - I know - but the Vo/tron fandom has become a place where people tear each other down rather than block the content they don’t want to see. Converting people to one’s own thinking has becume such an essential part of “activism” to the point where people forming their own opinions and learning about an issue on their own pose a threat.

In the Vo/tron fandom you see this toxic mentality with K/ance, rabid L/ance stans, anti Sha/adins and so on. You said everything I’ve been trying to say since I made this blog, and it saddens me that people can only safely voice their opinions and concerns when hidden behind the Anon feature.

Fandom isn’t always fun, but the Voltron fandom has become a place where people are too scared of posting their art or speaking up because they’ll legit receive death threats over liking a fictional ship. I don’t know if I’m doing a good job at pushing back against the anti side or if I’m just making it worse at this point. But salt, spite and messages like yours keep me going.