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ghost-shipping · 3 years

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Being challenged by media is scary

I love a lot of media aimed at children and teens but I really think the instinct on tumblr (and the tumblr refugee parts of twitter and discord) to never be willing to move on to content aimed specifically at adults ever is why the general media literacy and reading comprehension is so fucking low in these circles. Again, I adore a lot of media for young people, but a lot of it isn’t exactly meant to challenge adults. Kids cartoons can get away with portraying morality as more black and white, with always having the protagonist be in the right, with oversimplifying themes and subject matter, etc because it’s aimed at people with less experience with the world in general.

Things that are fully tackled in shows on cartoon network or in the most recent pixar movie likely aren’t challenging for adults, but they absolutely can be for kids. And there’s nothing wrong with looking to fiction for simple escapism or to feel happy or whatever, but the instinct to never consume fiction that actually challenges you as an audience member can stunt your growth when it comes to general media literacy or literary analysis.

Long before I ever knew about the larger fanpol movement (a movement wherein a lot of people are genuinely just scared of certain more challenging themes being portrayed at all, let alone being portrayed in a way that isn’t spoon-fed to them like they’re used to) I saw people criticizing media/fandoms aimed at older audiences as if they were weird reddit people who didn’t belong on the site. I’ve seen posts from people who are actually talking about Game of Thrones or Better Call Saul be misconstrued to be about cartoons simply because some people don’t consider that others are fans of media aimed at their own age group or that they’d be on tumblr. I’ve seen people be shocked at Hannibal “being able to get away with that shit” despite the fact that there has been art aimed at adults doing the same or worse since the dawn of man. For many, anime is seen as deviant and awful by default, not only because of latent racism, but because a lot of it contains themes and messages that read very differently to western fans because of cultural differences when it comes to sex and other taboos and that’s seen as a threat.

Content that doesn’t go out of it’s way to hold your hand and teach you clear and obvious moral lessons is not the enemy, it’s simply built for audiences to engage with in a fundamentally different way. A story having a villain protagonist or a lot of character death or any portrayal of sexual violence is not automatically bad or dangerous or less worthy of someone’s time because of those factors. I understand if your personal preferences happen to fall towards easily digestible children's media, BUT if you’re one of the many people on here who are essentially fandom police or think adults enjoying things aimed at their age group are weird/have worse taste, PLEASE consider why you think that way and ask yourself if it’s time that you start broadening your horizons.

#long post #pro fiction #adults who only watch western media for kids have the worst reading comprehensioon and this is why #i've seen this be said before but this is my blog and it's my turn

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maggieisalarrie · 6 years

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This is long overdue and I feel guilty that it has taken me this long to put myself together enough to finally formulate somewhat-coherent thoughts. I’ve been dealing with a lot of personal things recently and this “incident” has been very stressful and nerve wracking for everyone. Even though I’m not actually involved in any of this, and my opinions don’t really matter, I’d like to share my thoughts and let it be known where I stand.

This is still a jumbled mess and I apologize if I’m unclear at any time. If you’d like clarification, please ask. I’ll be happy to expand on anything I mention here.

I’ve taken some time to go through everything I can find on the subject, to make sure I have relevant and informational pieces from both sides to come to my own conclusion, and I can confidently say that I am appalled at what happened a few days ago.

My initial response to seeing that anonymous post was shock and disbelief, because I simply couldn’t believe that the people mentioned in that post could possibly be capable of the things they have been accused of. I’ve witnessed most of them, if not all at some point or another, interacting with people on Tumblr and, although I don’t know any of these people personally or outside of their posts appearing on my dash, I can’t believe that the same kind, generous, open, helpful, understanding, welcoming people I see on my dash would be the same people to either abuse someone or witness abuse and sit by doing nothing. I can’t believe that. It simply doesn’t match up to what I’ve witnessed myself.

I am a proud activist and advocate, and I fully believe in supporting victims and people/animals/living beings who cannot defend themselves appropriately. I did take time to hear the accuser’s side and, had their words held any evidence-supported truth, I would have believed them or, at least, asked or searched for further information. However, there was no relevant evidence supporting their side that I could find and an overabundance of evidence supporting the people who were accused. I heard both sides. I compared notes. I took other people’s thoughts and opinions into consideration. I came to my own conclusion. I encourage you to do the same.

Because my response to everything is coming so late, there’s not really much more that I’ve thought about that hasn’t already been said so I’d like to highlight some key pieces that are important for me:

For anyone who may still be against the people who were accused or if you’re simply unsure, please look here, here, here, here, here, and all of the other posts about this topic you can easily find by scrolling through those blogs. Please. Please, look into things yourself. Don’t believe everything someone else tells you. Believe what you see, hear, and experience yourself. Think for yourself. And if you still side with the accuser then at least you made that decision on your own.

Every person deserves to have their side heard in every case, no matter what. Innocent until proven guilty is something most people tend to forget.

Basically everything Lisa ( @a-writerwrites ) has been posting. She’s brought some really great points to light and has touched on some really important things that we should all read/learn about, but I’d especially like to highlight her post about teen social media use. “39% of online teens admitted to falsifying their age”. That number is staggering to me. 39%. THIRTY-NINE PERCENT! I’ll try to put it into perspective for you, if you can’t quite grasp that: If I have 1000 followers and if every one of those people is a teen (which my actual followers aren’t, this is hypothetical and I’ve asked minors not to follow me anyway), that means, on average, approximately 390 people who (again, hypothetically) follow me are lying or have lied about their age online. That is disturbing, uncomfortable, and gross. Kids (because if you’re under 18 you are a kid (don’t wish it away, it passes quickly enough)), NEVER EVER EVER LIE ABOUT YOUR AGE. NEVER. Even if you think you should for some reason. For any reason. Don’t do it. Adults (and children) can be really gross. You need to look out for yourself because no one else is going to. If you feel uncomfortable, unsafe, uneasy, get a weird vibe, or anything else, please remove yourself from the situation or get help to do so. You’ll always have help if you just ask.

@twopoppies said, “... don’t think for a second it couldn’t happen to you.” I agree. Please understand that this sort of thing could have happened to literally anyone. Any of us could have been painted in this light. Me or you or your parent or your best friend or any of your mutuals or followers or anyone. All it takes is one person to spread one lie and it takes off like wildfire. So be careful. And, if something like this ever happens to you, I truly hope people treat you with more respect and kindness than most people in this fandom have ever expressed to anyone during their time here.

Your words and actions online have consequences, just as your words and actions in real life do. Think before you speak. Think before you act. Think for yourself. Think. What good does it bring you to harm other people?

If my opinions or stance on this issue make you uncomfortable, I strongly encourage you to unfollow or block me. If you are under the age of 18, I strongly, strongly, strongly, encourage you to please unfollow or block me, at least until you turn 18. Please.

With all of that being said, I’d like to take this time to personally apologize to @tvshows-addict, @nottooldforthisship, @cuethetommo, @twopoppies, @littlechilllarrie, and anyone else wrongly accused in all of this. I’m sorry this is happening to all of you. I’m sorry more people haven’t taken the time to find as much information as possible to come to their own conclusions rather than believing whatever has been spoon-fed to them. I’m sorry those who were quick to fire and later regret (or delete) their actions and words haven’t apologized to you or tried to make up for their wrongdoings. I’m sorry it took me so long to express my opinion on all of this and to show you all my support. I know I don’t know any of you and you don’t know me, but I’ll do what I can to help or alleviate things for you. Please don’t hesitate to reach out to me if I can do anything. You have a friend here if you want or need one.

Apologies never really fix anything and I understand my words are simply words from a stranger on the internet, but we’ve all seen what words can do. Hopefully a little bit of kindness can go a bit farther than all of the hate that has taken such precedence in this fandom.

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