#your fave is problematic

[welcomingdisaster]

i heard from the edain in ossiriand that lord balan is having a mid-life crisis and dating some blond floozy who looks young enough to be his kid. in unrelated news elves in nargothrond tell me that finrod felagund is cradle robbing some human guy like 1/10th his age :/

[your-fave-is-forklift-certified]

Nandor the Relentless from What We Do in the Shadows (2019) is Not Forklift Certified!

[theshinysnivy1]

evbo is a class traitor

[detectivethicc]

Dear Writers

It is possible for your characters to have emotional or healing moments that do not lead to sex (LOOKING POINTEDLY)

healthy people do not solve all of their problems with sex (LOOKING POINTEDLY)

[brieserker]

If Iroh resisted the urge to firebend that tea, Jet wouldn't have died.

[darkshrimpemotions]

This article has been out for over a year, but I just heard of it via a youtube video by Princess Weekes (who I highly recommend you check out if you enjoy media analysis from someone who is clearly well-versed in fandom without feeling the need to establish themselves as some condescending authority studying us like creatures in a zoo, unlike some youtubers who post about fandom).

If you've been on tumblr for as long as I have (10+ years), you probably vividly remember the heyday of yourfaveisproblematic, and how that blog's popularity feels even today like one of the major catalysts for a lot of the purity policing on tumblr. In this article, the author of that blog--who was a teenager when it was active--talks about what motivated them at the time, how they feel about the blog now as an adult, how they see similar impulses being acted out across the internet today, and why they have never taken the blog down.

I highly recommend reading the whole thing, but here are a few key lines that really stuck out to me:

"In the years since, I’ve looked back on my blog with shame and regret — about my pettiness, my motivating rage, my hard-and-fast assumptions that people were either good or bad."

"I just wanted to see someone face consequences; no one who’d hurt me ever had."

"There’s something almost quaint about it all now: teenage me, teaching myself about social justice on Tumblr while also posturing as an authority on that very subject, thinking I was making a difference while engaging in a bit of schadenfreude."

"Looking back, I was more of a cop than a social justice warrior, as people on Tumblr had come to think of me."

These quotes remind me vividly of my own fall down the purity police pipeline, and my struggle to claw my way back out. Looking back, it's so easy to see how my pain and helplessness fueled a ruthlessness in my approach to social justice that was less about actually helping anyone and more about feeling like I wasn't so powerless.

Thinking of the friends I had at the time, many of whom I no longer associate with for related reasons, we were all traumatized or marginalized teenagers and twenty-somethings, newly awakened to the idea that the treatment we'd suffered for most of our lives was not in fact our fault and was due to systemic injustice and culturally accepted cruelty.

But we weren't healed enough, or distanced enough ourselves from the power structures causing or enabling that suffering, to think beyond wanting to flip the hierarchy. In a very real way, we weren't ready for the nuance required to give people grace and the opportunity to learn and grow. Despite having needed, and frankly still needing, those things ourselves.

I think we can learn a lot from Your Fave Is Problematic about the motivations and emotions behind purity culture, black and white thinking, and why neither is actually productive in reducing harm, easing suffering, or creating a kinder and more equitable world. And maybe, if we learn to recognize those impulses in ourselves, we can unpack them before they lead us to cause harm in the name of making ourselves feel less powerless.

[thejakeformerlyknownasprince]

Actually, your answer makes a lot of sense, and has given me a new perspective on the issue of the #Problematic. Due to personal trauma, I've always been very wary of those who enjoy certain problematic media, because I assume that means they support it, which is clearly an assumption that I need to work on. Hadn't considered that I enjoy problematic stuff myself, and criticize it. Being aware of the problematic and not replicating that on Real Life is enough when dealing with fiction.

Anyway, thanks for a good dosis of self-awareness.

Yeah, it's a messy and complicated issue. Because I recognize that, for example, women who say "a guy who mentions on the first date that his favorite movies are Taxi Driver and American Psycho is sending up a red flag" are probably onto something. And I've had students tell me "the Joker from The Joker makes some really good points", and I've felt a prickling of discomfort at their words.

But. I love Fight Club. The movie is a darkly funny critique of the alienation of capitalist life. The book is a brilliant horror story, written by a gay man raised by a single mom who wanted to understand why "masculinity" is considered this fragile thing that must be defended with violence, as someone who was himself shut from qualifying for the precious "man card." I got hooked on horror from Fight Club, I've written imaginary-friend-as-boogeyman as a result of Fight Club, I cosplayed as Tyler Durden in high school, I drove an hour to see Chuck Palahniuk speak... and I'm only spending an entire paragraph defending my love for Fight Club because I know what it looks like and that fragile part of me is tempted even now to scream I'm not one of THOSE guys, I swear!

So, I think it's best to recognize that my opinions can make other people uncomfortable, and that other people aren't having opinions at me. Even the people who like James Bond or Gone with the Wind might do so out of ignorance, or willingness to forgive sexism because of good cinematography, and the best thing for it is just to disengage from the conversation and find other people to talk to.

Which is where the internet can be nice. I fully support blocking and muting people whose opinions make me uncomfortable. I support others blocking and muting me. In fact, my most-used reason for blocking someone is that I'm unsure whether or not I qualify for their DNI (do not interact) list. I can't tell if I'm a BNHA Apologist or not... guess I'd best not interact. I googled KL//Ance Shipper but nothing came up, and I might support KL and Ance's romance... guess I won't interact. So on. I never hear from them, they presumably never hear from me, and we're all so much happier than we would be if we got into a shouting match over Your Fave is Problematic.

[alarrytale]

It's interesting that on Tumblr I always see attacks on H, from "fas" or accounts that are Larrie. But Louis comes through unscathed, and he's done some terrible things in the last 2 years. Anon said that H only treats his fans well when he needs them. Didn't she see Louis in latam? What did he and the team do? That he only changed his stance after the exposure in twitter? lol people just want to criticize H, that's the truth

Hi, anon!

I can only speak for myself, but i criticize them both equally. Neither of them are perfect and they've got different strengths and weaknesses. It should be possible to discuss H's problematic behaviour or his image, or have people vent about H, without people bringing Louis into the conversation and start to compare and contrast. It's comparing apples with oranges either way. The same goes the other way around.

Of course larries will criticize H, who else? Harries won't. A lot of harrie larries won't do that either. They gloss over everything or prefer not to talk about it or bring it up. Just like louies or louie larries tend to do with Louis. That's just how things are. Most people got a favourite who they want to protect from criticism.

I think both H and L should be called out for their bad behaviour. I like to hear from anons who struggle with accepting, or coming to terms with, H or L's problematic behaviour or their shitty images, because i struggle with that too sometimes. I don't like to sweep things under the carpet. I like to talk about what's bothering me, understand why it does, vent, and end up accepting it or moving past it.

Remember the "Your fave is problematic" blog from 2013? I think we need to teach the new generation of fans that everyone has got a problematic fave. The world isn't black and white. H and L both show hypocritical, egotistical, capitalistic and spoiled rich kid behaviour. They're gaslighting and lying to their fans. It's happening and it's going to happen again in the future. So you can either choose to ignore it or you can call them out on it. It doesn’t mean that they are bad people or should be cancelled. It means they should correct their behaviour and do better.

[personal-blog243]

When are we going to unpack that in “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” there is a literal pedophile ring of mostly underage girls in a place called “castle anthrax” and that Sir Galahad is an adult who is VERY much wanting to fuck the teenagers 😳 and it is portrayed as genuinely harmless and justifiable and normal.

The movie might take place in the Middle Ages but it came out in the 70’s surely the British had an age of consent by then???

[tintenspion]

Your fave is problematic: Manfred von Richthofen

No, I am not cancelling Manfred von Richthofen. This post is more about clearing up misconceptions in the least hostile way that is possible to me. And I‘ll try to look at it from the point of view of the early 20th century, and not overly judge his actions by modern standards and peacetime standards.

Most of the „problematic“ stuff that comes up about him is because people have an incredibly warped view on how aerial combat works, and also because he has been lifted to a sort of legend-status that is hyper unrealistic to the point where people refer to it as the „Richthofen-Myth“.

The myth of chivalry in aerial combat

First and foremost: No, he did not „spare his enemies“ when they ran out of fuel or their machine guns malfunctioned. This was a war! I see someone spreading this myth at least twice a month now. Its time to stop. If he „spared his enemies“ he wouldn’t have had 80 victories. Yes, there was this one instance where he felt bad for his opponents (his 18th victory) and talked to them on the ground, and the instance with his 61st opponent Lt. Bird, but those were the exception.

Chivalry in aerial combat has been under debate for a long time, basically since fighter planes existed, and the usual consensus is that in the air it is a „man vs man“ fight, reminiscent of knights in the middle ages. Now I do understand where that is coming from, because in the air you usually do have more individualized battles than in the trenches, but the belief that Richthofen, or anyone else to be clear, would rather force a pilot to land than shooting them is a weird misconception. MvR usually aimed for the head. Maybe I can give insights to his fighting manual in a different post.

Another example of alleged „chivalrous“ behavior would be waving to your enemy pilot or giving them a thumbs up. MvR was someone who found that to be very disrespectful, and therefore he would have never done that. Something he also thought of as disrespectful was going to the funeral of a pilot that he shot down. (Both of the described cases are from the Lanoe Hawker victory) Make of that what you will.

The weird comparisons between being a fighter pilot and being a hunter

Manfred von Richthofen was a passionate hunter from a very young age, and often used hunting language to refer to his work as a fighter pilot, as in, referring to flights as a hunt. While this is definitely something to be discussed, it is absolutely noteworthy that „JaSta“ stands for „Jagdstaffel“, which translated means „hunting squadron“, so those sentiments were not exclusive to MvR. In general, a lot of the things people criticize him for are not exclusive to him at all, and are more of a shared sentiment in society itself back then. He did refer to dogfights as a „Menschenjagd“ (human hunt) at one point in his autobiography, and also said that after shooting down a plane, his „hunting passion“ was satisfied.

„Were sportsmen, not butchers.“ is a really misleading quote stemming from the 1918 translation of his biography and being reproduced in the 2008 „biopic“ movie. In context, he was referring to himself as a „Weidmann“ and to his brother as a „Schießer“ (Hunter and Shooter). Weidmann is an out-of-fashion word for hunter, however the sportsman translation probably comes from the fact that Weidmann, in contrast to Jäger, somewhat implies a sort of hunters code on how to hunt honorably (Waidgerechtigkeit).

Side note to the hunting stuff is him hunting the Wiesent, an animal that he knew was endangered at the time (and is largely extinct now).

Something that is also at least criticism worthy is his trophy collecting, which then again was just super normal for pilots to do. He gets a lot of shit for the engine-chandelier, but honestly he probably saw that in the Boelcke-Squadron and just copied it from them. Something that I actually find hilarious and oh so flashy about him is that he requested a silver cup made for every single victory he had achived, with the serial number of the plane engraved into it, bug he stopped doing that when there was a silver shortage and he allegedly didn’t want to continue the collection with tin cups. Usually every pilot got a silver cup for their first victory, but for him that probably wasn‘t enough.

Bombing and strafing

Now we get into war crime territory! Strafing is a practice where a figher plane flies low and shoots at targets on the ground. The strafing of an enemy who has been rendered defenseless is a war crime. In his autobiography, he notes that there was one instance where he strafed an enemy because even though they were downed, they were still shooting back at him. It was debated if this can be considered a war crime, but most historians agree that it was a gray area and can’t really be considered a war crime. I am not going in depth on his general fighting style, as I have already explained the misconceptions about „chivalry in fighter pilots“, as most of the criticism allied pilots had about him were things they indulged in themselves.

As he started his aerial career out as a bomber, he stated that he enjoyed scare bombing at the eastern front, which is definitely pretty morbid and I don’t really have much more to comment on that aside from the fact that is is really alien to me.

He also had a weird obsession with shooting planes down burning. Especially towards his later victories he would shoot the fuel tank after killing the pilot so the plane catches on fire.

Pride and prejudice

Aside from like two times in his autobiography he is one of the least self-politicized historical figures there is. He never really made political statements. However I am going to adress instances and debates of him being racist because its not like I wanna sweep that stuff under the rug. He referred to Russians as „half wild asian tribes“ once which is yikes but pretty standard for the time. And because its a big point people try to make: No, so far there is no record of him being an antisemite. Im not saying it’s impossible because…i mean he lived in the early 20th century and was raised in the prussian cadet corps which was notoriously anti semitic, but there is no direct statement by him where he is saying anything regarding jews. On the other hand he did not have jewish people in his squadron (unlike what the 2008 movie wants you to believe). Then theres the whole thing with him saying that the french are all cowards and I would also bulk that in with „standard ww1 soldier mindset“.

Something that definitely needs to be adressed too in this post is „his arrogance“, because I see this popping up over and over again. Yes, he was proud of his victories. In his mothers war diary they claimed that after his 60th victory or so he allegedly wanted his victories to be counted for the squadron and not for him personally, but that is propaganda. Every discussion regarding his victory count is pretty much speculation, but I have not seen any solid (as in, written) evidence that he „faked“ or „stole“ his victories from his comrades. The relationship between him and his squadron mates completely depended on the time you look at them. He had some friends, who were not nobility (Voss, Wolff, Zeumer, Böhme and a couple more) but those friendships were from his early Jasta 2 and Jasta 11 days. Towards the end of his life the relationship between him and his comrades seems to be a lot less close, as in, they respected him, but he was a lot more reserved and usually by himself.

TL;DR

His list of sins includes:

-killing people (obviously)

-making the weird connection between hunting and fighting humans

-being cocky about his victory count

-hunting endangered animals

-being racist

[your-fave-is-forklift-certified]

Dream of the Endless aka Morpheus aka Sandman aka Oneiros aka Kai'ckul aka L'Zoril from The Sandman Comics is Not Forklift Certified!

[riondisease]

i love when people post hate about a piece of media in the art/community tags because i just read the first few words, realize its a dumb hate post, and then block them

like what do they think they’re achieving

[kyliafanfiction]

Also, is it wrong that I kinda ship Amanda and Emily a little? There's something so deliciously toxic there. :rofl:

[mahostudio]

Two of the most popular games from Spooktober Visual Novel Jam 2022 have landed on Tumblr Melissa❤ by @cattrigger is a “dating sim” where you meet MELISSA, the latest and greatest in computer girlfriend technology. Choose your options carefully, and you may get a SMOOCH before she conquers the planet Play in browser or watch Markiplier play it Parasite in Love by @nightasobu is all about family: The family you are forced to breed inside your head by your new amoeba boyfriend. His name is Naegleria Fowleri, but you can call him Niall. He only wants what’s best for you, and also what’s best for him. Unfortunately, what’s best for him is eating your brain. You both try not to talk about it too much. Hopefully you can convince him to leave. Download the game or watch ManlyBadassHero play it Me? I’m Cody. I’m the voice director for Parasite in Love. Thanks for checking us out. We’re happy to be here <3

[the-space-junker]

He’s a classic - no one ever said he’s one of the good classics!