#or projecting it on themselves or getting offended on behalf of a fictional character

[ricoka]

sometimes I wish you could post an opinion on a fandom blog without inviting a whole witch hunt or being accused of causing drama but alas

#I've not done anything and i won't do anything #it's just something that's annoying?? that you can't say anything without someone doing a bad faith interpretation of it #or projecting it on themselves or getting offended on behalf of a fictional character #the few times i saw someone actually say something slightly controversial all hell broke loose every time #like great that you're passionate but not everything is about you #not everything needs your opinion - especially if you can only give it like a lecture #not everything has malicious intentions #people disagreeing with you have a right to their opinions as well - as long as you respect theirs they should respect yours #the thing is - i don't think I've ever been in a fandom that didn't have to deal with like ship wars or someone doing hate campaigns #of a character or ship - i guess that's just the way it is?? #but here it feels especially tiring because people don't usually disagree on ships #people are literally fighting and hating each other mainly over the same two characters!!! and their different interpretations of them #people disagree over what the right and moral way is to portray and ship those characters #and it creates so much tension because you can't associate with those people because they're doing it wrong #and are acting fucking awful about it #but those people are very exclusionary and if you don't agree with all of their points they don't want to talk to you either #you just float along hoping that you'll find some people who have a similar interpretation and will actually talk to you #it's so weird??? it's so isolating too?? #and it feels like you entered a political landscape in your online fandom space #i will probably delete this and I'm not even sure my thoughts make sense #my thoughts spiralled a bit from thinking how some fan interpretations annoy me into disliking a character hahaha

[river-bottom-nightmare]

Sigh. Me knowing they made Tim bi because he’s the least favorite bat kid among the man-baby-comic-lovers, meanwhile dick is a fav of the man-baby-comic-lovers and won’t be allowed into the gay clubs :(

wait like actually? idk babe i've always seen tim as a favourite of the man-baby-comic-lovers.

or wait, it's split pretty evenly. from what i've experienced every time i go to cons and comic shops and stuff like that, you've got the people who got into dc through dcau and dc video games, and then you've got the people that have been reading comics since they were kids, back when tim was robin.

the first type don't actually know much about comics, and are the people you see going around saying there are four robins!! the older brother, the gun one, timberlina dragon, and the one with the sword!!! batman busts ass and puts his kids in their PLACE! haha have the boys fuck gotham villains and redheads bc it's ~sexy~ and whatnot. joker and batman have such a complex relationship bro, it's so deep and meaningful. also did you see the joker movie? the True Story of the joker Revealed, it's so incredible. look at my batman shirt.

and yeah, these people looovvvee making gay jokes about dick and his ass, but get entirely too offended and rude the minute you try to engage them in intellectual conversation about either dick being seriously queer or dick being too-hypersexualized and how they need to tone it down a bit. they've gotten a little too into the batman-male-power-fantasy and see dick as The Best Sidekick who only listens to what batman, aka themselves, say and think.

and then you've got the second type, the people who grew up with tim as their robin and are therefore 100% devoted to the one image they have of him, which is honestly probably a partial self-insert. and of course there's nothing wrong with being partial to a character you have a long history and love for, but not in the way i've observed these people behaving. they think of any other comic character as part of tim's supporting cast and throw a hissy fit any time they're reminded that other comic runs with other characters exist, and the world doesn't revolve around tim drake. red robin was the pinnacle of tim drake's existence and we need to go back to the Badass, Take No Shit deal tim had going on there. yj98 would have been so much better if tim and cassie got together, but stephs a pretty hot blonde herself, so i'm not complaining much. i only talk to other tim fans and occasionally jason + bruce fans, and therefore build up an entire fanon community about what i think tim's character should be.

these people panicked and got irrationally angry when tim became canonically queer because they've never really stopped projecting onto tim, so it becomes a situation of "my favourite character CAN'T be gay!! he's my favourite character and i'm not ~homophobic~ but only characters i don't care about can be gay. not ones i like, bc then the gays are taking over everything i like!!" they've never really grasped the idea of fictional characters being fictional and subject to growth and change on behalf of the writers/creators, not just a subset of the fans.

um. this got a little long. sorry, i just had some Thoughts that i had to get out there lol. but yes, i do agree with you, dumb man-baby-comic-lovers need to shut up already so dick can be allowed into gay clubs

#dick grayson #nightwing #tim drake #red robin #robin #dc