#see also: my post on my personal blog about unhealthy romance

[neverwasreddie]

i already made a post on my personal blog about how we don’t talk enough about the fact that richie murdered a man (as he was right to do given the everything about their lives) but there was a fic I read this summer where richie and eddie were about to have sex possibly even for the first time??? and richie just strokes the scar on eddie’s cheek and says “I killed the man who did this to you” and then kisses eddie before he can respond and WHEW that should….NOT be giving me the types of feelings it does but holy shit

#see also: my post on my personal blog about unhealthy romance #no one does it like richie and eddie #idk how a relationship can be so loving and lighthearted #while also being SO codependent and trauma bonded and toxic #I’m obsessed with them #if anyone knows which fic this is I’ll send you a million rays of love beamed from my brain #**obviously they’re not toxic I just mean their lives and the way they’ve been affected #they’re both disasters and they’re absolutely perfect and I love them #reddie #richie tozier #eddie kaspbrak #it chapter 2 #reddie fic

[stop-breaking-my-heart-telltale]

a brief retrospective on Louis and Violet as love interests, Clementine's bisexuality, and the fandom's continued insistence on fighting over this

In December of 2019, I made a series of posts called "An Explanation of Why Louis and Violet are Both Excellent Love Interests" that explored my feelings on the topic after seeing a lot of fighting in the fandom over who's better; who is the "right" choice for Clementine?

The answer is simple: there isn't an objectively correct choice.

I compared Louis and Violet to the romantic options in other games, including Life is Strange, Persona 4, King's Quest 2015, and Catherine, as well as TWDG: A New Frontier. I wanted to show how much better TFS handled the romance versus those games, why we should be grateful for what we got since it could've been a lot worse, and how the fighting over who's "right" was a waste of time.

I suppose it's only fitting that I'd be driven to revisit this topic after seeing fans continue to argue amongst themselves over this years later in the trenches of a weakening fandom.

Just when I think I'm done writing pieces for TWDG, some random redditor writes an essay about how violentine only exists for "woke points" that grabs me by the throat and throws me down. Then another will insist that clouis is abusive since Louis voted against them in ep2 in their own essay and I'm dragged back here, kicking and screaming.

While I think my previous Excellent Love Interests posts about this are on the juvenile side, I do still agree with my main point: Louis and Violet are excellent characters who make for compelling love interests. The fact that we got them both, that we were given the choice, and that they're as well done as they are, is something I don't think we appreciate enough. Hell, I don't think we even appreciate that Clementine's a canonically bisexual protagonist as much as we should.

We're too busy trying to one up each other with, "Well, actually, clouis is superior because of this and this," and "no, you're wrong, violentine is actually better because of this and this," and sometimes a wild non-shipper will appear out of nowhere to slap down an, "actually, you both suck, singletine is better."

It's sad that this is what fandom inevitably defaults to, always. It stops being about the game we love, the thing that brought us here, and it becomes a pissing match.

Doesn't matter what fandom it is; we end up projecting too much of ourselves onto fictional characters, investing too much of our time into ship culture, hyper-fixating until it becomes part of us... and let's be real, sometimes it's in unhealthy ways.

So, when someone else attacks the things we're attached to, it becomes a personal attack... and when we feel threatened, we become defensive and retaliate... and sometimes, we take it too far and target others out of insecurity, to feel validated, even if it means going after someone who is just minding their own business.

Also, I think some people are just assholes who want to piss on everyone.

Because of this, I would like to discuss Louis and Violet as romanceable characters, why they're both important to TFS no matter who you choose, why Clementine being a bisexual protagonist matters, and the fandom's continued insistence on fighting over this.

For many personal reasons, I've always been trepid about being open with my sexuality as a bi woman. I've done a lot of reflection this year on why that is; internalized misogyny, the biphobia that lingers in the queer community, insecurities, regrets, how I tend to be harsher on female characters over male characters, why it took me so long to not feel afraid of engaging with queer media, admitting I was wrong about so many things I've said in the past, how it's all affected my writing, etc.

When TFS released and I made this blog, I had already accepted my bisexuality but was in no way public about it, not online or in my personal life. But playing the first two episode of TFS, being presented with both Louis and Violet as potential romantic partners struck something inside of me.

Yes, I picked Louis; we all know I'm a major clouis shipper at this point, and if you're new here, then now you know, too.

But it's the fact that Violet's also an option, that with just a few different button presses, Clementine could've fallen for her just as she did with Louis; that there's evidence in game that she shows interested in both of them no matter your choices; that no one in-game judges Clementine for who she chooses to be with... that meant something to me in a way that it hadn't before.

TFS wasn't the first game I played with a bi protagonist; in Excellent Love Interests, I compared Louis and Violet to Life is Strange's Chloe and Warren. I have a lot of mixed feelings about the first LiS game overall, but I've been quite open about my dislike of Chloe and indifference to Warren.

Chloe, to me, is everything I dislike in a love interest, predominately in wlw. 2023 was the year of "CJ dives into sapphic literature and it's a 50/50 chance of striking gold or gettin' hella eaten by disappointment, shaka brah." Meaning I've read a lot of wlw novels, and all the ones I hated featured a Chloe clone, sometimes done even worse.

And Warren? I'll be real honest with you- I couldn't even remember what his name was when I started writing this. I had to go back and check. That tells you what I think of him, no?

So, LiS didn't strike me the same way. Sure, I knew Max was a bi protagonist and that's great, but the choices weren't appealing to me. This was when I was a teenager still somewhat in denial of my sexuality, which most definitely contributed to me being uncomfortable when faced with a wlw relationship portrayed in-game, especially when I found myself wishing Kate was an option for Max... but y'know, "shhhhhhh if I don't acknowledge it, it doesn't exist."

When the first episode of TFS released, I was older, I was no longer in a not-so-great relationship, and had better accepted who I am. The first episode does a great job of introducing you to Louis and Violet, and giving you the opportunity to spend more time with the one you're interested in.

I actually really liked them both when ep1 dropped, but I've always had a preference for a character who is kind, deflects with humor, and tends to be picked on by the rest of the cast... so it was inevitable that I'd stick with Louis. Though I won't discredit Violet in ep1, or the rest of the game, just because I didn't choose her in the end.

That's one of the best things about Louis and Violet as options; they're opposites, yet alike in many ways. They have their appeals and charms. They're flawed. It never feels like a "love triangle" situation where they're fighting over Clementine. Louis and Violet are friends who have known each other from before the walkers came. It's refreshing to have two characters who are interested in the same person but don't go for each other's throats over it. When they do argue over her, it's more to do with AJ shooting Marlon and whether it's safe for the group to let them stay.

I can't fault anyone who struggled to pick between them. When someone talks about who they picked and why, it's all about the player's preferences.

It's your choice to make, and no matter what, you're not wrong for it.

This season concludes Clementine's story, regardless of what some comics will say. It's the last fight. It's her happy ending. She and AJ finally found a home, a family.

I've played these games since S1 came out in 2012, over ten years ago. Clementine holds a special place in my heart. Not only did this important character have a great final season [despite Telltale shutting down and TFS nearly being left incomplete, remember] but she's also revealed to be canonically bisexual.

They didn't release the whole season and then as an afterthought be like, "oh yeah btw she's bi, she has oneline of flirty dialogue with this character so see? we did good rep."

Yeah, I'm side eyeing you, ANF.

They didn't try to hide it. They presented it to the player unapologetically and made a conscious decision to exclude anything biphobic from other characters... which meant a lot to me.

Biphobia is real and it's not that I don't want it explored well in media, but there's something appealing and safe about a game with a bisexual main character who isn't questioned about it negatively; "You're bi? Doesn't that mean you cheat on all your partners?"

To give a compliment to Life is Strange: True Colors, I had a similar feeling in that game, too. Alex is openly bi, she can date either Steph or Ryan and no one questions the "legitimacy" of her bisexuality.

Because that's always a thing on top of everything else, y'know? "You're a bad bi unless you're with the 'gayer option.'" "Bisexuality isn't real, you're just confused." "I don't date girls who've been tainted by a man." "Oh, you're into girls? How about a threesome?"

Violet never turns her nose up at Clementine for admitting she had a crush on Gabe. Louis isn't ever gross about Clementine and Violet getting close. It speaks volumes for their characters and how accepting they, and everyone else at Ericson, are of Clementine no matter who she chooses, if anyone.

That acceptance, even if it's just in a game, means more than words can express to queer players who don't feel that acceptance in their daily lives.

Which means it hurts all the more when it comes to the fandom's own display of biphobia; "You're bi but ship clouis? Why ship something hetero when violentine is right there?" "Well, MY Clementine's straight because she picked Louis! Stop forcing the gay onto MY Clementine!"

Clementine's important to all of us. Why do you think so many people are pissed about the comics to the point of spewing disgusting bile toward Tillie Walden? I've said my piece on that plenty times before, so allow me to say it on this; the representation of bisexuality in Clementine is beautifully woven through TFS in ways that are subtle yet impactful, and I thank TFS for giving that to us.

One argument I've come across recently against Clementine's bisexuality, and violentine in general: "blegh they only included violentine/made Clem bi for lgbt points." y'know... as if that's a bad thing.

It bothers me because A. saying "I'm not homophobic *but*-" and then making a homophobic argument against violentine while insisting that Clementine's bisexuality came out of nowhere and was forced is icky, and B. I know I've said similar things about violentine in the past. I know I used to argue that violentine's underdeveloped, yet the devs pushed it to the forefront over clouis to pat themselves on the back for doing representation, etc.

I don't believe that anymore; remember when I brought up people making arguments out of insecurity? Yeah, that and being lowkey bitter that violentine got more dev attention than clouis sometimes even though like... that doesn't matter? It literally doesn't matter. That's what I meant when I said you get so invested that certain things feel like a personal attack when they're not.

Some of the developers of TFS are queer people. They probably wanted a bi protagonist with a wlw option because that representation is important to them and they had the opportunity to express it, not because they were trying to get "points" with anyone. Go listen to the commentaries for TFS; they talk about violentine with nothing but positivity, and they didn't do that to shade Louis or clouis shippers. And if you do think they did it shade fans, then maybe stop and consider why; do you actually believe that or are you annoyed that your fave wasn't the center of attention?

On the flip side, I also want to say that gloating and insisting that violentine is the better/right choice because of these things is also unpleasant and untrue. It sucks when it feels like things are biased against you and it sucks even more when that bias is weaponized by other fans to beat you down.

But honestly? If you need this much validation on your opinions about fictional characters, maybe you should stop to think about why that is and what it says about you, yeah?

Truly, this whole clouis versus violentine thing is irritating at best, vile at worse. Thankfully it doesn't happen as much on tumblr given the state of the fandom, and everyone's at least agreed that no matter their feelings toward each other, clemricca is worse. So, that's something, I guess.

I think the best way I can put this is you don't get to dictate what other people think and feel. Being passionate is great until it becomes an excuse to be an asshole. Not everyone is going to agree with you and you need to put your big kid pants on and accept that.

I'm under no impression that the fighting will ever stop, even when this fandom is dried up with only bones and memories haunting its desert... but at the very least, I can point some of it out and ask that we do better than this.

The focus gets lost in the fighting, and that focus is Louis and Violet themselves. Y'know, the two this retrospective's about.

Remember when I talked about Persona 4 in Excellent Love Interests and how much it sucks when the person you want to romance isn't actually an option--?

Hmm? What's that? Ah, yes, right- @pi-creates insists I add that TFS and Persona 4 actually are the same because Aasim wasn't an option and they're still bitter about that... but this isn't about Aasim, that's a topic for another day. Sorry Pi, but thanks for the screenshots used in this retrospective👍

Anyway, TFS gave us two excellent choices, and it would've been worse off had it only given us one of them, or none at all.

Louis wears charisma as a mask and uses humor as a shield to deflect. Violet, for as quiet and standoffish as she first appears, has a heart she's both eager and reluctant to share.

Louis is warm curtains of sunlight seeping through the murmuring woods of green leaves and little song birds. A heart carved into the rustic wood of an out-of-tune piano. Music echoing in the early morning hallways.

Violet is the glow of a full moon that illuminates still waters so the stars can dance in its reflection. Paint smeared over finger tips to offer a piece of herself meant to be worn. Constellations of stars named in secret.

They're both lonely people, often misunderstood by the others at Ericson, and sometimes by each other. They want to be known. They want to be seen.

But fear is a powerful wall to overcome.

And that's the beauty of choice. You get the impression of knowing them in the beginning, but it rarely breaks surface tension; Louis is nice and funny but undependable, Violet's rude and reserved and a little awkward. Neither are outspoken about any issues around Ericson, content to keep their heads down.

Clementine has to make the effort to know them, and the game establishes this by asking you an unassuming question: do you want to go hunting with Louis or fishing with Violet?

Clementine either makes an effort to understand Violet's feelings toward Brody and why she's so mean to her, and try to help her through it... or she doesn't listen to what Violet's saying, is dismissive, and ends up making things worse.

When Clementine goes hunting with Louis, she has to make the decision to spend time with him or ignore him in favor of hunting, and should she choose him, he opens up to her just a bit.

Then comes the confrontation with Marlon at the end of the episode where Clementine has to make the choice of who to appeal to. The gravity of this choice is often glossed over, I think.

Marlon has a gun pointed at her head, and she pleas for Louis or Violet to step in and save her. Both are hesitant because of course they are! They've known Marlon longer, he has a gun, and he's using manipulation to scare them into submission; he uses his friendship against Louis, and Minerva against Violet.

But when Clementine gets through to them? They stand between her and Marlon in rather in-character ways; Louis eases in with his hands up, attempting to deescalate the situation while Violet pulls out a weapon and demands he back off.

They risked getting shot. They risked death. They knew what was happening was wrong. They didn't want Clementine to die, they didn't fully believe Marlon's bullshit but were too scared to step forward until Clementine asked them, too. In that moment she basically told them, "I trust you. Instinct tells me you are the one who can stop this. My life is in your hands."

This choice changes them, and this moment ripples through the rest of the season. It makes perfect sense that Louis would be upset over Marlon's death and feel unsafe with Clementine and AJ there whereas Violet sees the death as justified and Clementine and AJ shouldn't be kicked out over it. It's an overwhelming situation for everyone.

I've talked about ep2 and the vote until my lungs nearly collapsed and I saw the gates of Hell over the horizon... but that's fine, I can talk a little more about it and maybe this time the flames with cleanse me of my sins or something.

This is where the fighting really began, and I shouldn't have to say it again, but I will anyway: There isn't an objectively correct answer here, there's only personal preference.

Louis and Violet take very clear, opposite stances on this situation. I think they're both a little wrong and a little right; they shouldn't ignore that AJ killed Marlon, but kicking them out isn't the best solution either.

As a clouis shipper, I happen to like the way these events play out with Louis' vote. But not everyone feels that way. For some, Louis' vote is a deal breaker, making Violet the more appealing option given she voted for Clementine and AJ to stay.

Do you want a girl that's been by Clementine's side from the beginning and was vocal about keeping her and AJ here?

Great, Violet's the choice for you. Enjoy the lovely moonlight and constellation mini-game.

Do you want the extra angst of a boy who made a vote he comes to regret and then does everything he can to apologize and make it up to Clementine?

Wonderful, here's Louis. He'll play you a song he wrote and then name it after Clementine, it's very cute.

While on the topic of ep2, I also want to discuss the episode's final choice of saving either Louis or Violet and the consequences.

You know how in other games, say like massive RPG's with "good" and "evil" choices you can make that end up defining your character? You know how sometimes people question why developers even bothered putting those evil routes in since a majority of people will choose to be good? This isn't a new topic of discussion, but it's relevant to my point- they do it because the option to be evil makes the choice to be good more impactful. If you do choose to be evil, you did it knowing you could've been good and yet you decided chaos was the way to go, and now everyone and everything around your character suffers.

I don't think it only applies to binary "good" versus "evil" choices, either.

TWDG is great with its "You can only save one of them" choices, even if they usually fumble with the consequences in later episodes.

When I'm faced with this choice to save either Louis or Violet, I don't save Louis just because I like him more. Sure, initially that's why I saved him on my first run... but then the rest of the season came out and I learned the consequences of the choices I did and didn't make.

Knowing that he'll get his tongue cut out if I don't save him makes me all the more anxious to choose him. And I know violentine shippers are gutted knowing that if they don't save her, she'll feel so betrayed that she turns on Clementine and in the end is blinded in the boat explosion, so they're just as eager to save her.

But all of us have to live with the consequences of what happens to the one we didn't save, too. We made the decision to save the one we love at the cost of hurting the other we didn't love enough. You can't save them both. You're forced to hurt one of them in order to protect the other.

And it doesn't even stop there. TFS isn't done twisting the knife.

Mere moments before you have to make the choice to save one of them, Lilly's standing over Clementine with her finger on the trigger... only to then be tackled by the person you didn't choose to spend time with.

They just saved Clementine's life only to be dragged away by their neck, and the game asks you what that's worth: They got captured saving you, so do you save them in return or do you remain loyal to the one you chose before?

And when you know the consequences of both routes, when you know Louis will have his tongue cut out and Violet will have her eyes burned?

Louis and Violet are good people at their cores who only wanted to be understood and loved, and no matter what, you have to abandon one of them for the other... and they are left physically and mentally traumatized because of it.

But wait, there's more. The one you didn't save will always survive to the end and act as a constant reminder of what you chose... but the one you saved? If you don't trust AJ, then you'll be forced to watch them get torn apart and eaten alive by a herd of walkers. The only way to save them is to trust AJ so that he shoots Tenn.

A child has to die in order for you to save the one you love again, a choice you indirectly made.

The ending shows you the one you didn't save, and it shows you Tenn's grave... and it presents a quiet question: was it worth it?

Would you make those choices again?

That's the power Louis and Violet bring to TFS.

That's why the choice matters.

We justify trusting AJ because we'd rather see Louis and Violet live over Tenn, knowing we're taking away the best friend AJ's ever had and allowing Minerva to get her way. We save Louis knowing that it breaks something inside of Violet and results in her permanently losing most of her eyesight. We save Violet knowing that we'll find Louis bloody and sobbing in the cell after having his tongue cut out of his mouth.

And we argue about it amongst ourselves even though it's all fucked. There isn't a true happy ending here, not for everyone.

Louis and Violet stand on their own as great characters, but you only get the true depth depending on how you play. They're excellent love interests because they care for Clementine. Through their relationship with her, they grow as people and find the acceptance and love they're starved for.

It's not perfect, but it honestly doesn't need to be. There was care woven into these characters. Both routes have a wide appeal. That means something to so many people.

I know we as fans often will say we wanted more, we wanted this and that, we wish this was different. It's not a dating sim where the main objective is to woo them. It's not a massive RPG with hundreds of hours to explore every nook and cranny of their characters. This is a Telltale game. It's a narrative with Clementine and AJ at the forefront, and it's up to you whether you want Louis or Violet to share that spotlight.

It's a story about Clementine finding a home, about molding what kind of survivor AJ comes. It's about Clementine meeting two broken people with glass shards at their feet, about her glass mixing with theirs. It's a game about choice; which glass pieces do you pick up, and which do you step on?

We should take more time to appreciate Louis and Violet. We should share our appreciation for the development team for giving us a bisexual lead with two great love interests, especially since we almost didn't get TFS in its entirety; we can hate Skybound as much as we want for the Clementine comics, but without them, this team wouldn't have been able to finish the game they were clearly passionate about.

We should have more self-awareness and try to understand why we like and dislike things without targeting others.

In conclusion?

I think they're both neat 👍

#twdg #twdg clementine #twdg louis #twdg violet #twdg clouis #twdg violentine #clouis #violentine #long post #i didn't plan on writing this for new years but here we are #might as well end 2023 with some clouis and violentine talk mixed in with some self-reflection and shade toward reddit #i have many thoughts so thanks for reading them

[sealeneee]

no seriously WHY is there a 50 something year old dude on tumblr with an extremely unhealthy obsession with th*ron sh*n (censoring so he doesn't find me bc he seems to have too many separate blogs for some reason). like my problem isn't the age itself it's the fact that someone who is old enough to be my parent is participating in dumb tumblr nonsense like coming to posts about other LIs and saying th*ron is better than them when nobody asked or saying unhinged things like "th*ron is definitely more enthusiastic with males" or that "you aren't aro or ace if you feel any attraction" (yes, the insane fandom guy is also an exclusionist. big surprise). like i'm not expecting anyone to talk about this or make call-out posts or whatever i just find this person so baffling i HAD to say this. this all started with a friend making a post saying they don't like sh*n and this dude randomly showing up in replies like akchually th*ron is the best romance (1. debatable 2. nobody asked) and you suck for saying this!!!! dude you know you can just. go past. and block/ignore? which he didn't do bc not only could the friend see that bonkers reply she also saw a very insane response post how it's not nice to say that a character sucks. which okay is valid but the formatting was bonkers. unfortunately i don't have a screenshot and the blog is now deactivated but it was an insane post trust me. at the same time this person reblogged a dumb post that was ragging on another character. palpatine-saying-ironic.gif.

why am i even telling y'all this? idk ignore me it's like 5 in the morning and i haven't gone to bed yet. but if you have any more details let me know i am invested. also if you, the dude this post is about, are reading this, get therapy for the love of god you need it more than anyone i ever met

#'sealene this is a wendy's' listen just let me talk it out ok

[bureauified]

guidelines !

➢ warning ! 

some works i write may contain mature content (graphic depictions of violence, strong language, mature subjects, and other possibly triggering subjects). amount & severity of it will differ from work to work. it will always be stated in its respective post. multi-chapter or part works will have individual warnings in said parts. any works with possibly triggering content will be tagged with #TW!trigger. Those works will be hidden under a cut, like with all my others. ➢ dni if . . .

you are homophobic, racist, transphobic, a pedophile, a zoophile, a proshipper, a radfem, support incestual relationships and anything stated before, if you glorify and romanticize abusive relationships and unhealthy dynamics. if you are not comfortable with any of the subjects i write about, please just block me. i don’t want any discourse/negativity on my blog.

➢ i do not write . . . 

explicit sexual content of any kind. this includes (and ESPECIALLY) rape & any forced sexual acts along with underage sex. i am okay with suggestive themes/sexual tension however i will not write any further than such. 

pregnancy, homophobia, racism, eating disorders, suicide, extreme gore, cannibalism, yandere themes, torture, and etc. (i will not write subjects that i am not well-versed in or comfortable with.) this list will grow and change as time goes on. i will not write for exclusively fem!reader content (for character x reader.)

pairings that are pedophilic or/and incestual in a positive light* and in general. (*this applies to abusive and toxic relationships and mature themes as well.)

➢ i do write . . . 

fluff, angst, drama, mutual pining, slow burn, romance, friendship, suggestive themes/sexual tension. dynamics & tropes such as: enemies to lovers and etc. i also really enjoy things that apply to canon lore or alternative universes. i am willing to write for gn!reader or m!reader content (for character x reader) keep in note that some works could include: alcohol use, topics regarding mental health issues, ptsd, trauma, nightmares, gun violence, and violence in general of specific amount. these themes will be in no manner glorified or romanticized in any way.

➢ requests . . . are open !

i am currently accepting requests ! send me ideas, headcanons, and prompts to write for ! i’d be glad to see them. i cannot guarantee they will be out in a timely fashion, as writer’s block comes and goes and so does my motivation. don’t worry though, i still read all of them and love to read your thoughts even so. however, there are a few of rules i’d like to place regarding requests and general writing: 1. i have ALL rights to reject your prompt/idea/headcanon. it might just not vibe with me, or it may be something im uncomfortable with writing. if so, i’ll reject your idea. it’s nothing personal! there’s just some things i will and won’t write. 2. please be civil and respectful! this applies in general and to the rule above. please don’t complain if i don’t accept your prompt / request or spread negativity in my blog. i’ll simply ignore it and move on

3. please do not copy/plagiarize/repost my works. if so, it’s an immediate report and block.

➢ what do i write for . . . ? i write for multifandom along as some original works and ocs! as of now, my main fandoms are harry potter, unordinary (webcomic), and orv! i’m open to writing for different fandoms and i’d love to hear your interests/recommendations. 

➢ anon list ! some of you may not be very comfortable talking to me directly through your blog(s), and that’s perfectly fine! just send me an anon ask, if you’d like to differentiate yourself from the other anons (but still keep your anonymity), you can ask to tack on titles/nicknames/emojis. then, i’ll add you to the anon list (and you’ll get your own personal anon tag.)

#guidelines #writing guidelines #what tags #dni #rules

[realfactsnlogic]

Coming Out Post - #AromanticAwarenessWeek

I’ll make it quick: I found out that I’m aroallo. But also bisexual (EDIT: with a very heavy masculine lean.) And maybe demi.

How I got to this point is detailed under the Read More:

Last Easter season, I was watching the Passion of the Christ, a Smirnoff in hand, and started questioning my orientation (again.) At the same time, I was watching my friend beside me writing yet another…saucy fanfic.

I casually betaread over my friend’s work, of course. But reading it this time made me question myself even more. As they are *that* kind of writer, there was NO romance in this fic. I’ll leave it at that since I know there will be kids reading my blog.

Reading that fic made me consider how I experienced attraction towards others. I didn’t like the sappy, sentimental romances I would see around me. I would get confused with the use of silly pet names and…whatever else the popular view of romance implies.

Everyone’s perception of romance WAS formed by the popular media, after all. Heck, I am not immune to that either! *My* idea of romance was completely different. My idea of romance, I learned, was simply that: just an idea.

On the occasions where I dipped my toes in the dating scene (at least IRL) I felt uncomfortable with romantic gestures. I’d be fine with giving them if I felt like I could, but receiving them was a completely different story.

Now, I’m no stranger to changing labels from time to time. Back then, I thought I was “just gay.” I was even willing to go back to the bi label. I’m still on the fence about this. But I know where I’m at romantically. 

And to be as discreet as possible, I found out the hard way: I broke people’s hearts. I hurt them emotionally. I burdened them with my habit of avoiding and dismissing. 

As of writing, I’m in therapy to work on this. I don’t know how long it’ll take for this to be fixed.

I avoided and dismissed *myself*, too. I thought that there was NO way I could be aroallo. I was subconsciously taught that aroallos were “heartless and selfish and only want ONE thing” Which *can* be true for some aroallos. Sometimes that IS what I am when I’m at my worst.

As I self-reflected on my dysfunctional love life, I noticed that I only chase the *ideas* of romance. The kind of romance I’d conjure in my head just won’t work in real life. You could also say it’s unhealthy if you try applying it into your practice.

Yet: I learned that aromantics have ways to express care and love aside from the ‘I love you’s and the excessive cuddling and the flowers and the chocolate and the kissing—they express it in ways that are different from the indoctrinating behemoth touted by mainstream media.

Personally, I express my love for others by simply getting into thoughtful, philosophical conversations with them. I engage in what interests we have in common, be it gaming, writing or making art--together. There’s many other ways that Society (TM) doesn’t think about often.

But I’m glad that I found a label that fits me. At least for now. 

There’s more to this story, but I want to respect the privacies of people involved, including my own. So this is all I’m going to make public.

#aroallo #aromanticawarenessweek #coming out #my story #personal #aromantic

[magicsocasks]

You can follow my main account @magicwillow if you want, but I won’t make you

This is an OC ask blog, if you can’t tell by my URL and the blog name. I’ll give you guys fair warning and tell you all that I have zero clue what I’m doing! My only points of reference here are other blogs, and I follow like one of those.

I have decided that the best way to go about this is to introduce a few of my OCs at once, that way no one’s overwhelmed by having… *counts on fingers* 17 OCs shoved in your faces all at once. So I’m going to give you five for now, and then we’ll go from there. Fair warning, I made a lot of those OCs when I was like 12 and so a lot of the names are freaking weird. Also I have adult OCs and more than one male OC, I promise, but I asked a friend for input on who I should put in for the first group and this was the result.

———————

OC 1: Adrien Mendelez

(He/him, 17 years old)

Adrien is pretty much what we all wish the school popular boy would be. He’s friendly, easygoing, and sociable, though occasionally flirty or mischievous. He’s also on the rebound from a very, very bad breakup… which has left him much more desperate for romance than before, so expect quite a few mentions of him flirting with some of the others. For how long? Heck if I know.

OC 2: Sasaya Kumori

(She/her, 15 years old)

She’s Adrien’s cousin, and pretty much his opposite. She’s shy and not really the social type, though she can be somewhat nice if befriended. However, she also has quite the temper at times with people she’s familiar with. She’s even gotten into some fistfights with… a person you’ll see in a later post

OC 3: Aisu Buresu

(She/her, 16 years old)

Aisu is… how do I put this in an accurate but nice way…? The chaotic one. She would not jump off of a bridge if her friends did it too because she would be the first one jumping, probably while yelling “PARKOUR!” Her emotions are a rollercoaster and she’s usually mad at something unimportant. She can be serious if needed, but she will also fight you and win if needed.

OC 4: Clear Kryss

(She/her, 17 years old)

Clear’s the group party animal. She’s usually happy and running around climbing things. This is an intentional decision and she tends to shove away negative emotions and ignore them altogether. Which is probably unhealthy but who cares. Notably, she seems to be anti-getting-in-a-relationship due to previous experiences that she refuses to talk about.

OC 5: [redacted]

(She/her, 14 years old)

An OC who doesn’t give out their name? Hmm… This girl goes by the alias “Lily” for the sake of convenience (not having a name can be confusing sometimes), though most people if not everyone believe it to be her actual name. She’s a loner, and while she is somewhat capable of making friends and/or interacting with others, she can and will clam up completely if she feels like a question will help come close to revealing any of her secrets. She mainly just hangs around with Aisu and another OC that I haven’t put in yet. At least they get that a secret is a secret.

———————

So that’s approximately 1/3 of my characters! Feel free to follow my blog or ask questions if you so please, and have a great day today!

#long post #my ocs #ocs #oc ask blog #send me asks #ask blog #these are my fictional children #please love them as much as I do #help me I’m new to this site

[grumpyorangecat]

Welcome to my blog

Hello 😺 and if you happen to stumble upon this blog I whole heartedly welcome you here. Anyways here's a brief introduction about myself.

• I prefer to remain anonymous about my identity for privacy reasons so I won't be stating out my name but you can call me Cat 😺

•Just to let you know, I am a fanfic writer and reader myself and I have an unhealthy obssesion with fictional characters in general.

•I highly adore 1920's, 30's, and 50's fashion and aesthetics. In my own words, it is simply gorgeous and stylish in it's own way.

•A little trivia to my blog name, I am a cat person myself and due to the amount of cat memes I've been seeing in my social media account I have decided to choose the name Grumpyorangecat for this blog.

•My ao3 account is named grumpyorangecat and please feel free to check it out.

•Funfact: I am also a digital artist and is hugely fond in the genre of romance.

•Another fact: Friends to lovers is my favorite trope while slowburn is a close second.

Anyways that is all and please do enjoy the things I mostly post here. Note, that I may not be active most of the time here since I am also a human with a life. Have a great day!

-Truly yours, grumpyorangecat

#ao3 #writers on tumblr #writeblr #writerscommunity #intro post

[absolutebl]

I really appreciate your breakdowns and I just throw this out there because you actively talk about consent in regards to subject matter about queer men (THANK YOU).

Would you talk a bit about the ubiquity of dubious consent and rape/sexual assault and/or harassment that occurs in BL? And perhaps (personal input here) how that ties into unhealthy and dangerous social and personal anxieties about queerness? Like queerness being inherently predatory, the conflation of pedophilia with (mostly) queer men, inability to express desire due to homophobia, maladaptive coping, agency, and autonomy?

Sorry I know that was a lot for one ask!

WHY SO MUCH DUB CON IN BL? 

This is a great ask.

I have to say to start that while I side mention these kinds of topics a lot but I don't actively use this blog for queer commentary. I’m gonna make an exception, but I don’t want to turn this into a rant, so I’m going to try to be gentle and politic about everything. 

Would you talk a bit about the ubiquity of dubious consent and rape/sexual assault and/or harassment that occurs in BL?

Here’s some scattered thoughts: 

It's very prevalent in source yaoi.

It used to be in standard het romances 1990s and prior. 

It’s still common in its benevolent sexism form in Kdramas in particular. 

I have talked about it before in depth but I can’t remember where, sorry if this is a repeat for some of you. 

Kdramas are gonna come up a lot because they are dictating general taste in romances right now, so Hallyu action is happening in this post, sorry not sorry

So BL is getting it from both narrative and cultural backgrounds. Also all of these notions are being bolstered by Hallyu romances, which are similarly sourced (manga, manwha, web comics, Japan early 90s). 

Fantasies 

Last I checked dubcon/noncon was still the world’s #1 sexual fantasy. Not sure if that is still as strong as it was, but from my experience within the kink community I’d say yes. (In kink the #1 fetish is feet but the #1 fantasy is rape. Yes, there’s a difference between a fantasy and a fetish, this is not that blog.) 

How to unpack that? 

I think the sexiness and appeal comes from the idea that your partner is so overwhelmed with lust for you, and only you, they can’t resist. Many people love the idea of being taken. THE IDEA OF IT. That’s what makes it a fantasy. 

Seme/Uke (AGAIN) 

In BL it remains popular and prevalent partly because of the seme/uke dynamic that imposes heterosexual dysmorphia on the players. I go into this a lot in conjunction with the blushing maiden trope. 

It’s basically that the uke isn’t allowed by the narrative to want sex, he must be taken, because if he makes the choice, he’s dirty and impure. This ties back to the old standard of shaming women for sexual agency (the uke is acting the feminine in these narratives). Stuff like the madonna/whore complex. 

However, removing seme/uke entirely can have an adverse effect. 

If it’s enemies to lovers and the two are physically matched and less seme/uke as you see out of Taiwan, for example, or something like TharnType then the battle of wills becomes a battle of dominance. What in kink might be called rough play. Which is to say the point of the liaison is for one of the boys to come out on top and take what he wants. The fight itself is designed to be sexually exciting for the characters and the watchers. While this is fine in kink play it can read VERY poorly on screen. 

Cultural Biases 

All of this remains alive and well in BL narratives for many reasons.

Legal standing. The cultures producing these narratives do not have the same definition of statuary rape and consent as we/some international watchers might expect. 

Victim blaming. The attitude is that If the sex is between 2 men, as a man the uke should be able to defend himself. If he didn’t fight the other dude off, then obviously he wanted it. (There is no concept of “he can’t” fight him off, maleness negates that possibility/thought process in highly patriarchal societies.) 

The gayness itself is a loss of power. There’s also all this baggage around gay as taboo. If same sex activities are already considered culturally dirty, kinky, abnormal (whatever, sigh) then adding in stepbrothers, age gap, or rape doesn’t matter. It’s already liminal. In a way the characters themselves are “asking for it” by engaging with the very concept of gayness. This is another reason why owning gay as an identity is so comparatively rare in BL. It can be regarded as physically safer to say “I like men” or “I just like this one man.” 

Admitting to being gay puts one in a socially and culturally weak position as a man, because you will be instantly associated with the feminine and that’s a lower status position. Quite apart from however that culture views gay masculinity as valid identity, as of this moment in time, dominant social status as MALE is always materially diminished in the eyes of society by gayness or gay activities. (Gay males who come out move from dominant into marginalized status.) Humans will rarely willing sacrifice social standing, it’s an anathema to the herd brain. If we can linguistically dodge this with a new term, phrase, or semantics, we will. This is one reason why there’s so much debate in the queer community around reclaiming slurs and the word “queer” in general. (Sorry, I got diverted by linguistic anth for a second there.) 

Feminism & agency. Because one character is usually conflated with female (and also because gayness is conflated with the feminine in general), at least one of the BL characters will be fighting a feminist battle as a gay man. But because he is biologically male as a character, he isn’t recognized as needing the bolster or protection that feminist agency/advocacy can provide (even in those places where feminism and queer rights are active). This has to do with a  basic conflation of biological sex characteristics - and associated physical manifestations - with gender, which is a social construct. (And is why trans identity is not just a feminist battle but an obligation of care and protection. TERFs are actually anti-feminism IMHO.) 

You can see some of this play out with Noona romances, especially out of Japan and Korea. The female character is already acting abnormally by “dating down” so she is allowed to push social norms by being more romantically dominant as well. She’s already taken the step into taboo/dirtiness (and agency) by flirting with a younger man. Another way this manifests is in Korea’s fascination with women crossdressing as men in their historical dramas. 

Pure fantasy. The fantasy of all these romances, including BL, is packaged in the abnormality of the romance existing at all. The special uniqueness of it as a pairing and as a romance all. It’s subversions as a fantastical narrative.  

None of this is an excuse, just a sort of explanation, I guess? 

(Here’s an excellent article on the history of consent in the western romance genre.) 

How that ties into unhealthy and dangerous social and personal anxieties about queerness? (Like queerness being inherently predatory, the conflation of pedophilia with (mostly) queer men, inability to express desire due to homophobia, maladaptive coping, agency, and autonomy?) 

Ah yes well, that would make this a much longer essay. And I’m already pushing things here. 

But I think in part when you make a taboo identity a fantasy, then you convince those who are that identity that they themselves are also a fantasy. Some of their selfness is unrealistic, unmoored and unfounded. And therefore somehow more noble and less worthy at the same time. 

Ah the complexities of the human spirit. 

It’s not real if it only exists in a drama. This is the counter effect to the pro normalization stance I’ve talked about before. BL, while simultaneously making gay more acceptable for non-queers to digest, makes it harder for queer people to believe in themselves. BL is putting out this seme/uke, dominant/submissive, top/bottom notion of gayness, and choice within that gayness (as in: to be gay you must PICK your lane). Which is, by its very nature, unhealthy for a gay person because it has all these internalize notions of anti-feminist, victimization, heterosexual dysmorphia, lost agency, and gay = a fantasy and not a reality. 

The BL fantasy forces gay men into a very specific kind of marginalized space: 

if you’re sexually active and expressive about it you’re a whore, 

so you become unable to express desire, 

develop maladaptive coping strategies around sexual activities, 

and lack agency and autonomy as a result 

because you expect your partner to make these choices for you, including around desire.

Especially around desire. 

Maybe this manifests as a rape fantasy. 

(OMG did I just bring this blog post full circle? I think I did. It’s like I wrote a litcrit essay even when I didn’t wanna. How, meta: this essay itself is kinda my own dubcon.) 

All of which is to say: 

I fervently hope any female identified readers are spotting something VERY VERY familiar in those bullet points above. Because this is EXACTLY what is done to women ALL THE TIME. Especially straight women in patriarchal environments. 

In the End 

We all love seeing queer happy endings in BL. I love me a kindly coming out scene with the supportive friendship group. But most of us queers know, or fear, that it won’t be that way for us. 

In a very strange way the positivity in BL, and the companion flaws of representation, are like the fantasy of romance in general. The idea that you will be loved, by one person, forever, is as much a fantasy as the idea that being gay is as easy, as one dimensional, as codified, and as lovely as most BLs show it to be (or ends up). 

It’s complicated being a feminist who loves romances (particularly Kdramas!) 

It’s complicated being a queer person who loves BL. 

I don’t know that I have a pithy conclusion, except perhaps something I’ve harped on before. 

Like the fact that is is possible to both be a feminist and cherish a rape fantasy (or even enact one in a safe sane & consensual way), it is possible to both love BL and recognize it’s many flaws. 

The human brain can contain multitudes. 

We are humans who exist in grey spaces (especially when trying to track down some BLs, heh heh). 

More about how this can be handled better and well in this post on Takara & Amagi. 

(source)

#far be it for me not to end on a pun #queer analaysis #queer film critique #thai bl #korean bl #taiwanese bl #bl critique #bl essay #romance critique #feminist critique #this was not how i intended to spend my weds

[1111jenx]

Hiii 🥰 so glad you’re back! You’re the only astrology blog I follow so my page missed you <3! I wanted to ask what signs/placements do you think would stay in a toxic relationship because they lowkey enjoy it lol. I saw someone do this on TikTok and I’d love to hear your view on it.

Hi bby<33

Omg it is so so great to be back and yess I would love to explain more to you about this topic bc this is one hell of a topic to talk about and I have some stories to share with yall:D

Also I have to put this out before anything, I am a firm believer in free will at the end of the day yet I do believe sometimes, the boundaries we set are not necessarily the best for us. Hence, this leads to what we're going to be talking about aka people that are attracted to dangerous/toxic individuals today

I have wrote a post about certain placements from my personal and limited observations, that seem to have this pattern within their relationship, you can find the post down below<3

Before I proceed again, I must stress that this is a judgment free zone, sometimes I understand that there are relationships in which only the people that's within that relationship will truly understand its core, yet if anyone from either sides is hurt, whether physically or mentally, that is not at all acceptable.

I have had my fair share of childish, unhealthy flings to understand how it is so easy for victims to believe what they want to believe. And I know you can't choose who to fall in love with, but you can always love someone but acknowledge that they are not good for you:D

Alsooo a lot of people asked me to clarify what I mean about Libra placements being attracted to that kind of energy, here's my take on one of the Libra placements as an example <3

Libra Rising: I mentioned this in the main post above already yet I feel like it's important to bring this up once again. I personally consider air placements as well as fire placements to be the true emotionals individuals of the zodiac instead of water placements. This is because they often times lack the capabilities of fully understanding their emotions and thus, they cope differently. Remember, fire burns while air rationalizes. Libra Rising have to be the most emotional out of the 3 air risings from my perspective. While they are fantastic and maintaining the colder, calm and collected facade when needed, in relationships, especially when they are younger, its not uncommon to see them with people who are not good for them. Younger and underdeveloped Libra Risings often times have 7th house in Aries where the sign of independence, self-starter, of fire and passion is in the house of partnerships, of enemies but also of marriage. This creates a very interesting dynamic as there will always be this on and off and constant love-hate energy within their relationships. Libra Rising thrives on partnership and they love love with all their beating heart. It is not uncommon for Libra Rising to madly be in love at one point then having the worst of the worst fight with their lover the next. But sometimes I truly want to ask them this: do you love the person truly or do you love the you you could be when you're with them? do you believe that loving someone will always hurt so much? Libra Rising also have a 4th house in Capricorn most of the time so I feel like they also subconsciously search out for chaos and bring order to it as they feel like that's their place of comfort. While their 5fth house is in Aquarius, I see Libra Rising being able to become casual with people easily but have a harder time actually committing with the flaky/"too chill" kind of people. They can also be emotionally unavailable lots of the time if they deem that the other person is not "reciprocating their energy". So someone with all that fire, all that passion and perhaps a little bit of mystery mixed with teeny bits of charm will be able to make them go crazy!

Also, in addition to this post I also have another astro notes on toxic patterns which I wrote in my earlier days on Tumblr haha you can definitely check it out if you want to learn more about that!!

Lemme know if this helps bae<3

saint jenx🪐

#astrojenx #astrology #astro notes #astrology observations #astrology notes #astrotips #leo venus #libra rising #libra in the first house #libra #toxic astrology #astrology rant #moon in scorpio #libra sun #scorpio #taurus #leo #aquarius

[aro-and-tired]

Aromantic Experiences in Fandom: Survey Results

PART 1 - PART 2 - ANALYSIS: TIME IN FANDOM - ANALYSIS: AROALLOS VS AROACES

As this is the second part of the discussion regarding results of this survey, I suggest checking out Part 1 before this.

This post will discuss how aromantic content creators in fandom feel when it comes to creating aro-specific content, and how aromantic fans feel when it comes to shipping and their preferences for it. There will also be a space for additional comments.

Content Creators Questions

The first question here was a check asking respondents whether or not they ever created fancontent, such as fanfiction, fanart, etc. 76.5% (701) of the respondents stated that they have created fancontent, while 23.5% (215) stated they haven’t. Non-creators skipped the rest of this section.

Question 1: Which kind of content do you create in fandom? 

Starting with the options I had given, from most to least picked we have:

Fanfiction - 71.3%

Fanart - 58.8%

Memes - 44.4%

Meta - 22.3%

Playlists - 16.3%

Fanvids - 7.3%

Merch - 1.9%

Furthermore, many people mentioned other kinds of content they create. This includes headcanons, edits, moodboards, roleplay, cosplay, podfic. translations, fan music and ask blogs.

Question 2: Have you ever made content focusing on aromantic headcanons, or other kinds of aromantic content?

Yes, in addition to other kinds of content - 57.2%

No - 41.5%

Yes, I only make aro content - 1.3%

Question 3: If you have created aro content, would you say it got more or less attention than your non aro content?

52.6% of respondents declined to answer or stated that it wasn’t applicable. Excluding these respondents, the results were

It got less attention - 68.1%

It got the same amount of attention - 29.5%

It got more attention - 2.4%

Question 4: Have you ever felt discouraged by your fandom when it comes to making aro content?

Yes, because I didn’t think it would get attention - 42.6%

Yes, because I was afraid to get hate for it - 35.7%

No - 39.2%

Question 5: Have you ever received hate because of the aro content you made?

40.7% of respondents answered saying they have never created aro content. Excluding these respondents, the results were

No - 81.5%

Yes - 18.5%

Shipping Questions

The first question was a check that asked whether or not the respondents were at all into shipping. 88% (806) said they enjoy shipping, while 11.2% (103) said that they are not. 0.8% (7) said that they are not into shipping, and not involved in fandom. Respondents who picked the last option skipped the following section, and were taken to the end of the survey.

Shippers

Question 1: How important is shipping to you when it comes to being in fandom?

Shipping is my primary form of engaging with fandom - 7.1%

Shipping is fairly important to me, but I’m also into other sides of the fandom - 22.5%

Shipping is about as important to me as other sides of the fandom - 38.8%

Shipping is not particularly important to me, I prefer other sides of the fandom - 29.7%

Shipping is the least important part of engaging with fandom - 2%

Question 2: Do you consider non-romantic shipping (shipping characters as queerplatonic partners, friends with benefits, etc.) to be a valid form of shipping, or do you think shipping only refers to romantic situations?

I think shipping can be both romantic and non-romantic - 71.2%

I think some types of non-romantic situations can count as shipping, but not all of them - 21.7%

I think shipping only refers to romantic situations - 7.1%

Question 3: When it comes to your ships, do you prefer content that focuses more on the romantic or sexual aspect of the relationship?

I prefer content focusing on the romantic aspect, I dislike sexual content - 33.1%

I prefer content focusing on the romantic aspect, but I also enjoy sexual content - 23.2%

It makes no difference / I like both equally - 31.9%

I prefer content focusing on the sexual aspect, but I also enjoy romantic content - 9.4%

I prefer content focusing on the sexual aspect, I dislike romantic content - 2.4%

Question 4: Would you say fans place too much importance on romantic shipping, leaving too little space for other kinds of discussions?

Yes - 84.7%

Unsure - 10.7%

No - 4.6%

Question 5: Here I will give you a list of tropes commonly found in shipping fan content. I ask that you pick 5 that you consider your favorites. You can pick less than 5 if there aren't enough tropes that you like, but please try not to pick more.

As a disclaimer, this question is not meant to judge whether or not someone is a “valid” aromantic or anything of the sort. It also does not necessarily indicate that liking the more popular tropes picked is an aro thing, especially since some of these are also popular in fandom spaces at large. It is only meant to highlight general trends in the community.

The five most popular tropes picked were:

Mutual Pining - 46.8%

Domestic Fluff - 46.5%

Slow Burn - 44.8%

Enemies to Lovers - 40.6%

Friends to Lovers - 38.2%

All of those tropes were picked by more than 300 people. Following these, the only trope picked by more than 200 people was Established Relationship.

Tropes picked by more than 100 people were, in order of popularity, Soulmate AU, PWP, Fake Dating, Getting Together, Porn with Feelings, and with the same popularity Friends with Benefits and Telepathic Bonds.

Tropes picked by less than 100 people were, in order of popularity, Unhealthy Relationships, Unrequited Love, Hanahaki Disease, Arranged Marriage, Hate Sex, Friends with Benefits to Lovers, Jealousy/Possessiveness, First Dates, Break Ups, and least popular Love at First Sight.

Question 6: Here I give you the same list of tropes, but this time I ask that you pick the 5 tropes you dislike the most. Again, you can pick less than 5, but please try not to pick more

The same disclaimers as the previous question apply.

The five most disliked tropes were

Jealousy/Possessiveness - 52.9%

Unhealthy Relationships - 48%

Hanahaki Disease - 42.9%

Love at First Sight - 42.4%

Hate Sex - 40.6%

All of these tropes were picked by more than 300 people. Following these, tropes picked by more than 200 people were Soulmate AUs, Break Ups, Arranged Marriage, PWP and Unrequited Love.

Tropes picked by more than 100 people were Fake Dating and Porn with Feelings.

Tropes picked by less than 100 people were Friends with Benefits to Lovers, Telepathic Bonds, Domestic Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Friends with Benefits, Enemies to Lovers, Established Relationships, First Dates, Slow Burn, and least disliked with the same amount of votes Getting Together and Mutual Pining.

Once again, there is no judgement on anyone who hates popular tropes or loves hated tropes. The aromantic community is not a monolith, there is great variety between us, and no aromantic people is made up only of their aromanticism. There can be all sorts of reasons why one would like or dislike a trope.

That being said, some considerations can be made from these trends. For example, various aros have said that since romantic attraction is confusing we don’t quite get how can someone fall in love with people they barely know, or why is falling in love with a friend considered strange and not the norm. Many of the popular tropes involve characters who have known each other for a long time (Mutual Pining, Friends to Lovers, Slow Burn) while things such as Love at First Sight or First Dates are less popular.

We can also look at tropes various aros find arophobic. Hanahaki Disease is often mentioned as making many aros deeply uncomfortable, and we can see that here few people have it as a favorite, and many pick it as one of their most disliked tropes. Another one that is often mentioned in those discussions is Soulmate AU, that people are more ambivalent about - it’s both the sixth most disliked and seventh most liked. Maybe because it has much more variation than Hanahaki Disease, or maybe because people find it less arophobic as a whole. Or maybe simply due to personal tastes.

Non-Shippers

Question 1: Is the reason you don't enjoy shipping connected to the fact that you are aromantic?

Yes - 87.4%

No - 12.6%

Question 2: Would you say fans place too much importance on romantic shipping, leaving too little space for other kinds of discussions?

Yes - 97.1%

Unsure - 1.9% (2 people)

No - 1% (1 people)

Question 3: Do you think you would be more into shipping if people more often shipped characters in a non-romantic way, such as writing about queerplatonic relationships?

Yes - 82.5%

No - 17.5%

Additional Comments

People were allowed to leave additional comments here about anything that wasn’t covered previously.

Many people remarked on the general amatonormativity that is present in fandom spaces, in particular how it often seems as if fandoms are not interested in character dynamics that don’t involve romance. Some people also talked about often aro headcanons overlap with gay/lesbian headcanons because of the similar traits that can count as coding for both identities, and this can cause conflict within fandom. Overall, many people felt that aromantics are often a subcommunity within the larger fandom communities.

Some people also stated that they feel smaller fandoms are more open to aromantic interpretations than bigger ones. Various people mentioned fandoms that they felt were more or less friendly, often saying that small fandoms with few people tend to be more welcoming to aro fans.

There was also some discussion regarding the concept of non-romantic shipping. While many people agree that they enjoy viewing their ships as, for example, queerplatonic relationships, some also feel that using shipping terminology is inadequate for them. Shipping is by default assumed to be romantic by most people, and some don’t like having to using that word or words derived from it for non-romantic situations.

Part 2 Summary

Many aromantic content creators have felt discouraged by fandom when it comes to making aromantic content, either because they are afraid of not gaining any attention for it or because they fear receiving hate for it.The first concern seems quite valid, as a majority of people who did create aro content found that it got less attention compared to their non-aro content. When it comes to receiving hate instead, less than a fifth was a victim of it. This being said, there’s also a good number of aros who don’t overall feel discouraged when it comes to creating said content.

Out of the aros who enjoy shipping, most of them consider it neither the most nor least important part of their fandom experience, usually also enjoying other ways of engaging with fandom. Most prefer romantic content over sexual content, or enjoy both equally, with a minority favoring sexual content over romantic content. The majority also feels that fandom spaces can be too dominated by shipping.

An even higher percentage of aros who do not enjoy shipping find it too prevalent. A good number of them believe that they do not like shipping because they are aromantic, with many also saying that they would be more favorable to shipping if there was more space for non-romantic shipping.

Thank you for having paid attention so far! You can contact me if you have any questions. As I said in Part 1, I am also working on a couple more posts to look for potential differences in the opinions of a few groups, I will publish them in upcoming days.

#aromantic #arospec #fandom #survey results

[jitterbugjive]

Something I wish more people would understand is how unhealthy and misguided I was in my early 20s. I came out of a life of mental and sexual abuse, for a bit I had a much older boyfriend than me that I didn’t realize until fairly recently was grooming me since I was 14. I was a hyper sexual teenager due to the exposure I had in childhood and I sought people out constantly to ERP with, even adults, without really thinking anything was wrong with that. I had an old friend who started running away from home to look for random adult men to sleep with so my understanding and feelings towards that kind of situation got all twisted and confused and I didn’t know how to help my friend. I had another friend who was pulled in to a 3 way by another minor and an adult, and the other minor was also the sort who actively looked for adult men who would be sick enough to sleep with her. And my best friend had a sister who was also exhibiting this behavior despite my friends’ many protests, because their mom didn’t give a single fuck about anything. I had an older babysitter, by older I mean in his 60s, who would bring up conversations about sex with me and show me porn on TV from when  I was 10-13. I was dealing with unchecked PTSD which made me overly reactive, prone to fits of anger and anxiety.

My point is, back then I didn’t have any kind of professional help or anywhere I could go for answers on things I didn’t understand or had a limited understanding of. When I ask the question ‘what do you do if a kid is seeking out adult sexual attention’ it’s not because I’m trying to blame kids for this, it’s because it scares me when kids are unknowingly, maybe even knowingly, exposing themselves to danger for whatever screwed up reason they may have. And no one wants to talk about that kind of situation, so I couldn’t find any answers. I couldn’t find an appropriate way to process my feelings on the matter, my understanding of it, the way I viewed it, I couldn’t find what the correct way to feel or deal with it was. Again, because no one wants to talk about it. With my naivety and personal experience, I at first held resentment towards kids like that, because I remember being put in danger because of them or they put my friends in danger, and those kids seemed very sure of their choices even when they were perfectly aware it was wrong. One of them I knew, even as an adult, didn’t ever think anything was wrong with what they did, they didn’t come with that regret you hear most people talking about. I regret the way I’ve reacted to these situations and I regret the way I phrased things when I was trying to come to terms with this issue that I’d been honestly traumatized by.

Another thing I didn’t understand in my early 20s was appropriate boundaries, because I wasn’t given appropriate boundaries as a kid I only knew one big basic thing: Don’t do anything sexually explicit with minors.

And when it came to RP, I thought that meant PG13 content was okay. I thought if there was a fade to black, or a time skip, or an implication, it wouldn’t be a bad thing. Now, there are literally only 2 instances I can think of where there was any sort of implication of sexual acts between characters with a minor, I still made sure nothing explicit was shown or explored and I was of the impression that I was just letting the other person have fun because that’s what they were in to. And that was a mistake. Not as big of a mistake as it could have been, mind you, but I’d never cross that line. I thought I had a good line drawn in the sand but I didn’t really understand where it was supposed to be. Because if we’re gonna be honest here, looking back I know now even romantic fluff RP between an adult and a minor isn’t okay, even if it’s through characters and not as ourselves.

I know now how much of an emotional impact RP can have on a person, considering most of my romantic relationships started with RP. When you have a character you deeply connect to interacting with someone else’s character, it’s really easy to start mistaking your character’s feelings for your own. You could believe because your characters get along so well that maybe the two of you can get along romantically too. I’m not saying that RP shouldn’t lead to romance, but that it can easily blind a person from how their RP partner really is. So it’s dangerous to RP with kids like this. I should know, my abusive ex that groomed me until I turned 18 in order to date me certainly had me convinced we were meant for each other just because our characters clicked and my character happened to be a representation of myself.

Something I’m really ashamed to admit as well is a serious misjudgement on my part, where for some reason I assumed bodily fluids weren’t NSFW. Probably because I’ve seen people get away with censoring out naughty bits but leaving the spunk in an image, or just drawing the character with spunk on them or something. Point is, people were getting away with it not being flagged as porn, and my dumb brain was like ‘okay so it’s not that bad’. I need to make something clear here, I don’t entirely remember what happened or why it happened, but it’s true that Bedeviled Derpy had a post that showed spunk in 2 of the images and it was drawn from some sketches of mine by a teenager. I don’t believe I would have requested such a thing, I certainly didn’t script it to say ‘draw spunk here’, in fact the sketches don’t show any indication of a mess anywhere. I just remember being given the finished images with the spunk being added, and I was dumb enough to think “oh yeah this is totally okay for a SFW blog” and my brain didn’t even register like ‘hello yes a child drew this maybe ask them to remove the spunk also spunk isn’t sfw or child friendly in any way shape or form’

Some people, maybe only a handful, or more, I don’t know, but some people have this assumption that my mindset in all of this was like “Hahaha I’m taking advantage of a minor” and that’s just... not it?

I’m a colossal dumbass, I admit that, and I was really irresponsible, but it was NOT because I had any intentions on preying on a child. I just don’t do that.

The things I said and did, I did out of ignorance, and most of the bad stuff people talk about me saying was from 5+ years ago, before I got any help, before I had anyone to walk me through these incredibly complex emotions and opinions that were ingrained in my head since childhood.

I just wish that people could see I had no malice or ill intent, I wish people could realize they’re way overthinking my actions and taking things a lot more personally than they were ever meant to be. Maybe if they could see this for what it is rather than assuming I’m a villain who purposefully did everything wrong, they could learn to move on in a healthy way.

I understand I did a lot of harm and there’s no undoing that.

But I do NOT deserve to be accused of pedophilia. Pedophilia has literally ruined my life and my perception of the world. I’m a victim too, and just because I became an adult doesn’t mean I suddenly know right from wrong. That’s not how becoming an adult works. You’re allowed to make mistakes as an adult, being an adult doesn’t mean you won’t make mistakes any more. Yes it’s easier to say to someone ‘you were just a kid, it was a mistake, you didn’t know any better’, but adults have a hard time knowing ‘any better’ too. We’re always growing and learning and I’d like to think people are smart enough to see that I have grown in to a better person.

I hope people can find it in their hearts to forgive me, but I fear some people are too far gone down the rabbit hole of being convinced that everything was on purpose and from malice, that I’m some evil mastermind who thrives on manipulation and taking advantage of kids. I’ve only ever associated with 2 minors since becoming an adult and I have no intention of associating with any more that aren’t directly connected to my family or my friends.

Anyone who actually knows me would know I have a 0 tolerance for IRL pedophilia, when I found out a member of one of my groups was showing nudes to minors he was immediately kicked out and I kept tabs on the situation to make sure he’d be caught by police. When a member in my server was exposed for ERP and orbiting with a minor, I kicked him out too.

I worry about kids to a point that it’s part of my PTSD, I have anxiety attacks just worrying about how a kid might be getting harmed, the last thing I want to do is bring harm to them.

And I did cause harm, I didn’t know that was what I was doing, but I did, because I wasn’t mature enough to understand how to interact with kids as an adult. And again, I’m just incredibly sorry things had to even come to this. I’m not lying when I say I think about this every single day, and sometimes spiral in to really bad anxiety because of it. It affects me heavily.

I want to move on.

And I want the people affected to move on too.

Because dwelling on this isn’t going to do anyone any good.

#apology #important

[eivor-basim]

I've seen more and more anti eivor x basim lately. so fine, let's address this:

first, the alleged randvi hate

I have never seen a randvi hate post from a basim shipper

I haven't seen any anti eivor x randvi posts from basim shippers

the only "randvi hate" I've seen is when randvi fans demand to know why we don't like her, and basim fans say they don't find her that interesting. which somehow gets taken as proof that we've hated her all along (lol)

personally? it's just not my fave ship. I don't find it super interesting. you know what that means? I don't read fic, I don't reblog content, I don't send anti randvi asks on anon, i don't go into the randvi tag, and I don't make weird vague posts

the cheating storyline

eivor x basim shippers only bring this up when pressed by eivor x randvi fans to justify why they don't like it (which is embarrassing for y'all, no one has to have a reason to ship or not ship)

it is NOT "oh well randvi cheats so that's worse than what basim does"

it's "personally the cheating storyline didn't draw me into the romance"

it's not about morality, it's just about interest

shipping is not a contest of morality. it's not a contest at all

it literally does not matter if a ship is "unhealthy" or "toxic"-- these are not real people. enemies to lovers ships often have these traits. and it's fine

calling a ship "abusive" because it's two enemies is a misuse of the term

using these arguments to "prove" your ship is better is just a sad misunderstanding of what shipping is-- you don't have to prove anything. other ppl are not here to compete with you

this goes for other "my ship is better" arguments too, such as "it's canon" or "it's LGBT" or “basim is just loki, real basim doesn’t exist”

your ship is canon? well it's an RPG, so canon is created by player choice. but if a randvi romance was your player choice, awesome. go kiss your pixel gf and stop bothering me

basim = loki is a gray area that is not fully answered. bringing it up as a “haha gotcha” to say that ppl can’t really ship eivor x basim doesn't work. the characterization of basim we see in game is who we ship with eivor

in the end, what do you think happens if you “win” the argument that eivor x randvi is the “better” ship? eivor x basim shippers suddenly convert and start making randvi content? it’s not a zero sum game. people shipping eivor x basim doesn’t take away from your ship at all (unless you let it bother you)

looking for hate against your ship where there is none just creates unnecessary drama and is reminiscent of 2013 ship wars

"eivor x basim shippers are homophobic"

many of us are LGBT

many of us ship bi!feivor x basim or meivor x basim-- how are either of those less LGBT?

more importantly, shipping is not activism. it's insane to try to guilt trip someone into supporting a ship

it's also insane to judge someone's irl morals by which fictional characters they wanna see kiss

I've seen a number of randvi blogs attack other wlw feivor ships just bc they're not randvi. using wlw activism as "proof" to ship and then attacking other wlw ships? very performative, congrats

once again, shipping is not a contest of morality. you are wasting your time trying to prove that you have chosen the "better" pixel people. go outside

in conclusion, ship eivor x randvi as much as you want. I don't care. none of us care. just give us the same respect and leave us to ship in peace.

#discourse #eivor x basim

[pentowrite-wingstofly]

Amatonormativity is not a thing because it IS normal AND HEALTHY for humans to experience romantic and sexual attraction. Just like all animals, it is GOOD that humans NORMALLY experience these things. It's fine if you don't, but don't pretend that it's bad to "normalize" very normal behaviors. Asexuality is a non-oppressed minority that does not require representation in every single post. Trying to take away joy from people who are healthy, normal functioning humans is evil and you need to stop being so narcissistic.

Hello, Anon! Thank you for sharing your opinion. :)

You are right in that it is "normal" for humans for experience romantic and sexual attraction. Around 99% of the population is allosexual and alloromantic.

However, the insinuation that asexuals and aromantics are nonfunctioning and unhealthy is both incorrect and impolite.

Amatonormativity is not the belief that romantic attraction is wrong, it is a term referring to societal assumptions and pressures concerning romance and marriage. To quote Elizabeth Brake, the first person to use this term, amatonormativity refers to "the assumptions that a central, exclusive, amorous relationship is normal for humans, in that it is a universally shared goal, and that such a relationship is normative, in that it should be aimed at in preference to other relationship types."

Skimming over your statement about animals and romantic love, amatonormativity is both real and harmful. Singles researcher Bella DePaulo says, "It’s hurting single people because they’re led to believe that there’s something wrong with them, something wrong with their lives, even if they recognize at some level that they want to be single, and it also hurts married people, and people who want to be coupled, because if they’re in a bad relationship, they still think, If I become single, maybe I’m going to be even more unhappy.”

Amatonormativity affects people who are single, aromantic, polyamorous, or prioritize platonic/familial relationships in their lives.

"It's hard for these categories, because the world around them assumes they will want one type of love and may discriminate against them or make them feel weird or isolated for being 'different,'” says Dr Meg-John Barker, who is a psychotherapist and specialist in gender, sexual, and relationship diversity.

I am not referring to amatonormativity as "'[normalizing]' very normal behaviors," I am referring to it as unhealthy pressures concerning romantic and platonic love.

You are correct, asexuality is a minority. We are not by any means non-oppressed. If you like some more information you can read this post.

I'm not sure where you're getting what the rest of what you're saying. Requiring representation in every post? Feel free to search my blog for the tag "asexual." You know how many posts show up? 6. I have more than 175 posts.

I am not in any way trying to take away joy from alloromantics. Most alloromantics are beautiful, amazing people. What I was doing in saying there was amatonormativity in that post was pointing out exactly how ingrained amatonormativity is in our culture. It's impossible to escape, whether you stay in a fandom or post memes or have a writing blog. There's no way around amatonormativity.

I'm sorry if pointing out things you don't want to know makes me seem evil.

Narcissistic? That seems a bit strong, don't you think? Being involved in issues pertaining to myself is absolutely normal.

I am being no more narcissistic than a gay person indicating heteronormativity in a post.

I am being no more narcissistic than the time I educated my male friend on women's safety.

I am being no more narcissistic than my friends who are not white-passing talking about racism.

It is important to educate society on the issues it has. These issues are real. And we need to address them.

For more information on amatonormativity, see here, here, and here. (These are articles from The Washington Post, BBC, and Psychology Today, respectively.)

#anon asks #answered asks #Em answers #tw negativity #serious post #ace #asexual #aro #aromantic #amatonormativity #tw amatonormativity #asexuality #aromanticism

[marzipanandminutiae]

I've never seen crimson peak, but from what I think the plot is based on the posts on this blog, I want to stab Thomas. He killed his wives for money while boning his sister, and he can get stabbed. I hope the movie ends with Edith(?) getting therapy and living to the age of 93, because she deserves it

The movie does not end with that, but the ending doesn't preclude it. She lives, so who knows what happens next?

(Except possibly the therapy, which wouldn't become widespread until the last few decades of Edith's life- IF she lived that long. And by that point, she might be resistant to trying it.)

So, I really feel this is a point where you'd benefit from actually seeing the movie. Because the thing about Thomas is, he's sympathetic. Very sympathetic.

For me it's like...I don't blame him more than his sister, by any means. I sympathize with him just as much, and as I've pointed out, Lucille is an entire Garbage Fire, so I'm not letting her off the hook. I also have to give him kudos for at least trying to be better (when he had absolutely no other choice, and a personal stake in doing so).

I just don't blame him less, which a lot of the fandom seems to do.

He does get stabbed, which should make you happy- but he gets stabbed by Lucille, not Edith. Which, to me, reinforces the idea that any kind of external moral judgment/punishment is simply not a factor in this story. The antagonists happen to die and the heroine happens to survive, but it's handled without the implication of a Hays Code-style "just desserts" situation. Which I really appreciate, because, hello, Gothic romance. Not here to teach Very Important Life Lessons or whatever.

In that vein, my perfect ending for these characters would honestly be an OT3 situation. It would be DEEPLY unhealthy, of course, but again...Gothic romance. It's not here to be Morally Upright. It's here to be tragic and beautiful and full of love in all forms: pure, monstrous, or any combination of both.

#ask #anon #crimson peak #there's this one person in the tags who seems to think everyone 'ignores Thomas as an abuse victim because he's a man' #and also that his history of being abused absolves him of his part in Actual Serial Murder #(but the same standard somehow doesn't apply to Lucille which is. very interesting) #(considering she's also an abuse victim) #(not everyone but. a large part of the fandom seems to be able to grasp 'abuse does not excuse horrible behavior') #(when it comes to Lucille) #(but suddenly lose grip on that concept where Thomas is concerned) #(fandoms that involve Tumblr Sexymen are Cursed)

[alegacyofmonsters]

I have a stupid comment that I don’t have anyone to tell but you’re my favorite legacies blog so I’m gonna leave it here. As someone who is bipolar seeing Lizzie as a protagonist on this show effected me in ways I didn’t even fully comprehend until the aftermath. The TVDU doesn’t have a great track record with the portrayal of mental illness and I try not to take characters like Aurora to heart but it’s hard sometimes. And even if I do think the writers have seen Josie as the good sister and want us to be on her side against Lizzie a lot of the time (or at least that’s how I’ve interpreted their intent) it’s so good to see. Seeing both when she describes how she’s feeling in 3x03 or her breaking down in the first season was like seeing my experiences on screen for the first time. But more than that her having storylines that weren’t tied to her disorder? It just isn’t something I’ve literally ever seen.

Side Note on Aurora: Why is Aurora’s relationship with her brother portrayed as as like good? I don’t mean good in a healthy way but I more mean I would be so unbelievably upset if my brother was transferring me from sanitarium to monastery to some other thing for a thousand years. I can’t imagine the terrible things that no doubt happened to her in those places and the writers even implying that that is something that could be forgiven or justified is so shitty. Doing research on the past treatments for my disorder is horrific. And I wouldn’t protect or avenge someone who put me through that. Even if she is an antagonist I’ve just grown to feel bad for her in my rewatches of the show.

Anyway I love your blog! It’s always great to see when your parallels pop up on my dash! 💜💜💜

I had a much more eloquent response the first time I typed this out a week or so ago, before Tumblr decided to delete it mid-post, but I'll give it a shot again:

Firstly, your comments are never stupid and they're always welcome here! That's exactly why I run my mouth so much. This is always going to be a safe space.

Secondly, yes! That's the huge importance in representation. But where Legacies dropped the ball a bit is they forgot that other characters are a part of that representation. Yes, Lizzie is a good representation of a bipolar character and they do well addressing that while also making it not her only personality trait or storyline. But equally important is how the other characters interact with that aspect of her. In all four seasons of Josie saying ableist things about Lizzie's MI and using it to excuse her bullying behavior, it's only addressed as wrong once (once!) and even then, only in a single sentence that got brushed over and never mentioned again. She says and does these horrible things and then everyone just moves on. That's terrible representation. That's where the problem comes in.

Thirdly, I think your Aurora/Tristan thoughts are valid. I also think the same thing applies to Lizzie/Josie and their relationship. Yes, I love sibling/familial relationships being prioritized or favored to romantic onces, but it's just as important to have healthy dynamics there as it is to have healthy romances! It seems like a lot of writers (not just on Legacies) miss the significance in that. Toxic siblings are just as unhealthy as toxic partners. Being family doesn't excuse it.

Anyways, those are my thoughts on it. I'm glad you're enjoying, and I've got plenty more to come!

#legacies #legacies cw #hope mikaelson #lizzie saltzman #josie saltzman #asks

[gatesofember]

can you expand on the canon and fanon ableism in solangelo? I sort of picked up on the infantilisation of nico (hes dealing with ptsd and i guess chronic fatigue, hes not a baby) but i always thought that was handled better in canon than in fanon? But then i havent read ToN i admit

Sure! I don’t know that I’m the best person to ask this because while I am disabled, I’m still unlearning a lot of ableism myself. But I’ll try my best to explain! Maybe some people could recommend some good posts about this if they know any?

Infantilizing—like you mentioned, this is one of the biggest problems with ableism in the fandom. There isn’t much of this in canon, but in fanon Nico’s often characterized as helpless and he’s not taken seriously. Will often plays the role of caretaker rather than boyfriend to an infantilized Nico, which creates an inherent and unhealthy power imbalance.

Will being portrayed as a savior—a common and dangerous trope in romance is that one character is saved by the love of another. It’s especially damaging when the character being saved has mental health problems or physical disabilities. I think most people realize nowadays that this isn’t okay, but you’ll still occasionally see things that portray Will as a savior. Nico entering a relationship because he’s healing and accepting himself is great! But Nico being saved by a relationship? Bad.

Victim blaming—honestly most characters who interact with Nico in canon engage in some level of victim blaming, but by far the worst one was Will (aside from like. Hades and Minos.) In BoO, Will went on an entire rant telling Nico that he was responsible for his own problems and that he manufactured his own abandonment by pushing people away, when really, Nico was the victim of bullying, rejection, abuse, and serious mental health problems—and he already blamed himself for all that so Will’s rant only would have made him feel more invalidated. Later books definitely pulled back on the victim blaming, but it was such a prevalent part of the foundation of their relationship that it’s been ingrained in the ship. It shows a severe and dangerous misunderstanding of mental health on the part of both Riordan and the fandom.

Will being Nico’s healthcare provider—What makes Will being portrayed as a savior even worse is the fact that Will is a healer. Doctors shouldn’t date their patients. Much like the caretaker issue I mentioned above, it creates a power imbalance which is usually satisfied because the doctor is paid for doing their job, but things get messy when any kind of personal relationship is involved. Will should not be in charge of Nico’s medical care. Of course he can act as Nico’s healer in emergencies, but Nico’s primary medical care provider should be someone else. If Will acts as Nico’s medical care provider out of necessity (eg, because he’s the only healer at camp halfblood), then they need to set up clear boundaries and rules. Will being Nico’s doctor should never be spun as a good thing.

Will abusing his authority as a medical care provider—most notably the “doctor’s orders” and “doctor’s note” scenes. Will was extremely overbearing in BoO, from forbidding Nico from using his powers to ordering him to stay in the infirmary, and that kind of pushiness isn’t okay. He was abusing his power, doubting Nico’s judgement and capabilities, and denying Nico’s right to make his own decisions (again, infantilizing). Disabled people’s agency is often denied and autonomy is so important. Nico should have been allowed to make the choice to stay in the infirmary on his own (or not to stay, or to follow through with his plan to leave chb; he should have had the freedom to make those choices, too), and frankly, it would have been a much more powerful ending to Nico’s pov if he had. He should have chosen to go to the infirmary because he decided he wanted to get better, not because he wanted to be around Will (see previous point about Will being portrayed as a savior) (although it would have been fine if Nico thought of Will as an added bonus). I said in the previous post that Will writing a doctor’s note to allow Nico to sit at the Apollo table doesn’t bother me, but that’s because I imagine that situation being like, Nico was denied accommodations so Will and Nico hatched a plan together to use what little leverage they have to get adults to listen to Nico’s needs and take him seriously, but both of them fully understood that Will should not act as Nico’s doctor again unless there were serious medical reasons. Other people interpret that scene as Will abusing his power as the head medic to sit next to his boyfriend. And I’m not saying that my interpretation of that scene is necessarily the correct one, just that I don’t interpret it as Will being ableist.

Nico faking his disability to get things—I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone bring this point up, but it’s something that really bothers me. The ableism regarding the “doctor’s note” for me isn’t the scene itself, but when the fandom portrays Will and Nico constantly using the doctor’s note excuse to get what they want, often having Nico fake some sort of symptom. Besides the abuse of power I mentioned before, promoting the idea that disabled people fake disabilities to get certain privileges is not okay. This is the sort of thinking that leads to stereotyping disabled people as lazy and it’s so prevalent that it makes a lot of disabled people wonder if they’re really disabled or if they’re making it all up (which ties in with the victim blaming point again).

Sometimes I agree that canon Solanagelo is less ableist than fanon, but sometimes fans do a better job than Riordan. It really just depends. I definitely think that both Riordan and the fandom have gotten better though! Will’s character and his relationship with Nico was very different in ToN than it was in previous books (different for the better but also to the point of inconsistency, but that’s a different critique). There were a lot of things in ToN that made it clear that Riordan was listening to the responses of disabled people. Some fans seem to be listening, too. There’s still rampant ableism in the fandom, but people are getting better at responding to criticism and realizing that a lot of tropes that used to be popular just aren’t ok.

Thank you for your ask! I’m glad you reached out to learn more. Again, if anyone knows good posts to read or blogs to visit for further information, please reply with them!

#anon #tw ableism #ableism tw