#kgpr fandom issues

[masonsystem]

what are ur biggest gripes with the way the current fandom characterizes the mekatrio? besides like. oversimplifying seto and stuff. asking bc ur the no. 1 expert imo & i want to hear ur thoughts

tq for this ask and giving me a reason to blabber abt the mekatrio 😏 but also aw you dont want me to talk about seto mischaracterization for the nth time? :( im joking lol, and also im not quite sure what ur quantifying by 'current fandom' so im just gonna go over whatever recent portrayals ive seen from both english and non-english speaking fans 👍 with seto stuff excluded ofc bc i have a whole tag for tht.

my general gripes with overall mekatrio portrayal:

- perpetuating the incorrect notion that the mekatrio were adopted by the tateyamas. they werent, this was a mistranslation by the official translators. the terms used throughout kgpr to describe their relationship to the tateyamas has always been 'fostered'. and ofc, ive only seen this happen in english-speaking spaces (bc i primarily engage with the english-speaking fanbase, and we often work from the translations and not the direct text).

another issue i take with this is that ive seen some english-speaking fans express their dismay at the fact that the mekatrio were only ever fostered, as though adoption wouldve been 'better'. this is something i find very troubling, bc the vibe i get is that theyre implying adoption is like, more intimate, more 'valuable', in a sense, than merely being fostered. and it feels very rooted in their own cultural understanding of fostering/adopting kids, whatever their culture may be.

to me, this feels like a very insensitive view to have, bc the matter of fostering and adopting children is way more complex than "adoption > fostering". adopting a child is more than just making them a part of your family, its about legally and materially severing the bonds between a child and their birth parents. its bc of this nuance that adoption is uncommon in several countries, like japan, and is also why adoption is forbidden in islam. this is also why adoption has been used as a tool of genocide. im not trying to say that 'adoption is evil and bad and its good that the mekatrio werent adopted' etc etc etc, but i wish fans would consider the different cultural aspects of this matter b4 speaking about it.

- having the mekatrio use their first names with each other. eruhefjksjfhjks... its not like completely wrong to do or anything, but i just find it so weird, bc they literally only ever do this with one another in the anime. in the manga and novels, they hv never referred to one another by their first names at any point in time. never!!! when they first meet each other, after being fostered together, after ayaka dies, after ayano dies, and during the present day plot, they have always consistently referred to one another by their last names. the mekatrio using their first names with one another has always been an Anime-Exclusive Thing. so i find it weird that fans hv adopted this tidbit into their overall kgpr interpretation, when its something that's only exclusive to the anime. it would be like if someone adopted mca azami's massive fucking house into their interpretation, or kido still wearing the clothes she died in at the tateyama residence, which are two other weird things that are anime-exclusive.

also this is just my personal headcanon/interpretation, but i would imagine that the mekatrio using their last names with one another would hv a deeper underlying meaning, considering that the three of them are orphans, and have lost the people they had shared these family names with.

- shipping the mekatrio with one another. this is a no-brainer, i dont really think i need to explain this one. its way less common in english-speaking spaces than it used to be, but unfortunately its still just as popular in japanese spaces, knkd being the most prominent one 😑

- denying that theres knkd in canon texts. andd this is smth ive only seen in english-speaking spaces. ive seen some fans make it seem as though there isnt any romantic knkd implications in canon, and that the shippers are just weird and delusional, but as much as id also like for that to be the case, it unfortunately isnt true 😮‍💨 chp 38 of the manga very strongly implies that kano has a crush on kido, and kano's pov in novel 8 practically confirms this. and im too lazy to find proof of this, but i remember there used to be some fans (back in like 2016 - 2019) who believed that the knkd in the manga was just satou mahiro's doing, but no, the manga manuscripts were written by jin, meaning that entire stupid convo between kano and mary in chp 38 was completely jin's doing. this means that, yes, kano does (unfortunately) canonly hv a crush on kido.

now, just bc this is canon, doesnt mean i expect ppl to respect or adhere to it. i sure as hell dont, and i never will, the same way i wont ever respect hibiya's extremely dehumanizing obsession with hiyori, or the very questionable manner that shintaro's fetishes are handled. but its irksome to see people spread the idea that it doesnt even exist, and that the shippers are deluding themselves instead, bc that essentially absolves jin of his very real and very shitty writing. like the truth of the matter is that it very much exists, which fucking sucks, but we can disregard it the same way we disregard the other shitty aspects of kgpr. but we shouldnt act like it doesnt exist at all bc 1.) gotta hold jin accountable for his shit, and 2.) it does a disservice to newer fans who may then think this rancid shit doesnt exist in kgpr, when in reality it does. with that said, the shippers are still fucking weird for shipping it. just cuz theres canon romantic knkd implications, doesnt suddenly make all the familial context surrounding them disappear. both the shippers And jin deserve shit for supporting this nasty shit 😑

my gripes with kido specifically

- portraying her as blushy blushy shy tsun tsun AHHHHH WHATEVER BULLSHIT. i see this happen very often w non-english speaking fans. i hate when people draw her all flustered and blushing in a humiliating context. i hate it when she's drawn in a skirt or any feminine clothing. i hate all of that shit... it feels very voyeuristic and misogynistic to treat a female character who uses a masculine pronoun and presents herself androgynously in such a manner. its disgusting. and i hope that all the writers and artists who do this di-*a truck drives past*

- overlooking kido's autistic-coding in favor of projection. now this is a gripe i have specifically with the english-speaking fanbase. this fandom has a tendency to project traits onto characters, traits which are only very loosely based in canon, if not at all. im not gonna beat around the bush; im mainly talking about how fans project their sexuality/gender/neurodivergency/other identity marker headcanons onto characters. this is not unique to the kgpr fandom, nor is it a recent occurrence. people have been doing this type of thing all the way back in like 2013 - 2014, and i used to do this too, but grew out of it as i got older.

im not saying this is a bad thing to do. i understand the merits and joy that comes from it, and that it's something thats essentially harmless. but what i do take issue with is that fans will project all sorts of traits onto characters with little to no basis in canon, but will then overlook characters who are actually coded a certain way. what im talking abt specifically is kido's autistic-coding. she doesnt just have one or two autistic traits which a person could then headcanon her as autistic. no, in canon, she is very much and very downright autistic-coded. since she was a child, she canonly had difficulties communicating, to the point where she needed to see a doctor;

she uses music as a way to disconnect from her senses;

her difficulties with communicating comes out in the form of aggression towards others;

and she's 'eccentric': wearing multiple layers in the blazing summer, speaking bluntly and honestly at all times, using non-standard pronouns for herself, and the list goes on and on... and like Never Lost Word is literally a whole song about her struggles with communication. all of these behaviors are reminiscent of a person with autism, which itself is a communication disorder. if she isnt autistic-coded, then i dont know what is.

but yeah, it annoys me when people project traits onto characters with little to no basis in canon, but then overlook characters who are actually canonly coded with a certain trait, like kido. like it feels ridiculous to me when a fan like, looks for characters they can project neurodivergency onto, but then ignore the actual neurodivergent-coded characters. if youre going to talk at all about these characters' identities, then can you please not overlook kido's very autistic-coded identity... thank you...

my gripes with kano specifically

- saying that kano has it the worst out of the mekatrio. hahahaha...... my main problem with this idea of 'kano has it worst' is that its often coming from people who are either ignoring, disregarding, or dont fully know about kido's and seto's backstories. and i get why this is the case, kido's and seto's backstories are almost entirely novel-exclusive, and most ppl dont read the novels. not to mention that their songs, Mekakushi Code, Never Lost Word, and Shounen Brave, are way more optimistic than the mental breakdown that is Yobanashi Deceive. but in spite of how things may seem on the surface, all three of them have had it pretty bad in the past, and still have it pretty bad in the present day plot. just a brief summary of their traumatic backstories (taken from the novels, but it applies to most routes):

kano: had a physically abusive mom growing up, and was murdered alongside with her. was passed from home to home, and had the police called on him bc of his powers. was discarded into a facility. his new mom passes away. his sister tells him that their father is possessed and plans to kill their entire family, and asks him to go to school in her place. she later kills herself in front of him, and he is made to masquerade as her corpse. he is then blackmailed into secretly working for his possessed father for the next two years.

kido: her birth mother passes away. she gets whisked into living with her father and stepsister whom she had never met before. she lives with them for at least 7 months, and in this time she is never let out of the residence, and is stuck with servants who berate her and look down on her. her father then drugs her and her stepsister, locks them inside of the basement, murders all of the servants, prepares the house to be destroyed, and then comes downstairs to kill her stepsister. kido has to kill him in self-defense. the house then burns down, killing her and her stepsister. for the rest of her life, she uses concealing eyes on herself without realizing it, in order to repress the traumatic memories of her father. she gets discarded into a facility. much later in life, she lose a mother and sister once again.

seto: grew up in a facility where he was ostracized and bullied by children who were cruel enough to kill a dog. died alongside said dog. spent over a year in this facility all alone, listening to the thoughts of these cruel children who hated him. later in life, he learns that him and his family would be murdered in the future, and never shares this burden with anyone. his mom passes away. he learns his father is possessed and plans to murder the entire family, but again, never confides this to anyone. his sister kills herself.

so like... can you really say that kano has it the worst? if you still think so after knowing all this, then thats fine. but please evaluate kido's and seto's backstories properly if youre going to say so... 🙏

- misunderstanding kano's powers. specifically, saying that:

1.) his powers are cancelled out by pain, and

2.) he mastered his powers earlier than kido and seto.

im planning to write a more detailed post about kano's powers some other day, so ill keep it very brief here. but regarding point 1, in the present day plot at least, its very explicitly stated in 'Today, On The Street' from novel 5 that no, pain no longer cancels out kano's powers:

as for point 2... this is difficult to disprove without going on an insanely long tangent, so.... i wont do that. and will instead just leave these panels from chp 27 here:

^official translation on the left and fan translation on the right. im putting two translation to show that yes, kano is really saying that, in his youth, his powers have a tendency to act out of his control. just like kido's and seto's.

yeah, im aware im not really disproving those two points that much here... but its like i said, to do that, id need to explain loads of things, things which i plan to explain in a seperate and more detailed post about kano's powers. his powers are a lot more complex than it initially seems. once i finish that post, ill update this answer and link it here.

- depicting kano as a sociable and outgoing guy. he is not!! he's very shy!

^fan translation by fuyuyuu. pic is takane, kano, and seto speaking in that order

he is merely playing as a character who is sociable and outgoing. but he is lying! he is very shy! he is yobanashi deceiving you!

- i dont like kanoshin lol. dont get me wrong, i completely get why ppl would ship them. like i always burst out laughing whenever i reread novel 7, cuz i always end up seeing how gay these fuckers are acting:

^like seriously, in what world is this not meant to be taken in a romantically homosexual context 😭 no cuz help me i feel like throwing up from laughter WHAT IS THISFJSDLK

with that said, i still dont like kanoshin bc 1.) i simply dont think theyre a good pair, and 2.) i think the resentment in their dynamic was poorly resolved. i have many issues with the way shintaro as a protagonist is handled throughout kgpr (especially in the novels), as he is often overshadowing other characters Because He Is The Protagonist. and my dislike of kanoshin's dynamic has to do with that. also another thing i dislike abt the fandom's portrayal of kanoshin, is that i dont like it when ppl make it seem more toxic than it actually is. like i wish they had a spicy feud with one another, but no, novel 7 has made it so they forgive each other like... immediately. which im not a fan of, but oh well. but ultimately im not too bothered by what kanoshin fans are doing, bc ive had kanoshin blacklisted for the past 4 years and it will continue to remain that way 👍

and yeah! thats my list of gripes with the kgpr fanbase's characterization of the mekatrio! (excluding seto). its very short and not at all immensely detailed because i am soooo normal about these characters (lying). theres probably a few things i missed like little 'they would not fucking say that' type of things, but i think these are my main gripes. yippee!

^visual allegory of how the fandom cares more abt kano than seto & kido

#kgprambling #mekatrio

[fuckyeahkagepro]

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