#their whole dynamic is interesting because it's so messed up! it's not romanticized or whatever it's just messed up and it messes them up! | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

lovebecomeshim · 3 years

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hello! your zutara posting today has finally motivated me to ask this question because I came to atla very late(last year, to be specific) and I Love It Very Much but am 1000% out of the loop as far as why what remains of fandom (at least that I've seen among my friends) is so very strongly zutara. I'm not opposed to it per se I just don't really know what has driven it to apparently be such a popular ship? can you help me understand and maybe convert me a little bit?

Hey!! Your ICON! :D I can try but I’m not sure how coherent I’ll be; however I AM sure someone a lot more competent will be willing to add to this. Either way, I’m glad you asked because my plan was to drag down as many people as possible with me.

*smacks the hood of zutara* this baby can fit so much mutual love and support!

This got so long, I’m so sorry. I don’t know how to put it under a cut on mobile and it already got deleted once so I’m scared to mess with it lol. Moving on.

I’m gonna start this with a disclaimer that im on mobile so formatting is tricky and I’m also really new to atla in that I only completed my first watch through in like 2019??? So some of my info is all just based on what I’ve picked up from Discourse 👀 so anyway the sparknotes version: zutara was wildly popular from the beginning. To the point where the atla crew internally disagreed on which ship should be endgame. (Ex. Bryke [showrunners] asked the writers to rewrite The Southern Raiders to make Zuko seem less ideal for Katara than Aang [which failed, depending on who you ask]; the animation team purposefully created a visual parrallel between Oma and Shu in the Cave of Two Lovers and Zuko and Katara in the catacombs under Ba Sing Se in the Crossroads of Destiny; etc.)

The ship was popular enough that Bryke actually chose to display zk fanart at a con for the sole purpose of mocking the fans, but that’s neither here nor there. The entire episode Ember Island Players, while a love letter to/parody of the whole show, was an opportunity to address zutara’s viability as a canon pairing (while, again, mocking zutaras for romanticizing that catacombs scene). Point is! It’s always been popular but with it not being endgame, there’s got to be something that’s given it staying power.

And that’s honestly got to do with three things: their dynamic, thematic cohesion, and potential.

(You know what... you know what, it’s four things. The fourth is they’re so aesthetically pleasing together and individually. Like, they’re just good looking people [specifically when they’re grown but they’re also cute kids] and that absolutely doesn’t hurt) (but it’s not the Point, it’s just nice to point out sometimes)

The dynamic is hard to get into without also looking at the canon pairings, but I think I can do that without unnecessary bashing. It’s just that part of the magic of zutara is really highlighted by what they give to each other that their other relationships don’t.

First off, it’s classic enemies to (would be) lovers. The absolute truest form of it. It’s not too different from how CS started out: a rogue antagonist with a job to do—but no personal vendetta against the future love interest—who is deeply and emotionally invested in his personal storyline (revenge/redemption) with little regard for how it effects other people after his entire life and genuine good nature are marred by suffering, and a fierce warrior girl with a strong moral compass and her own personal investment in stopping him (protect her family and save the world doing it). Obviously frustration and animosity grew between them by the nature of them being on opposing sides, but that just lends itself to the sweetness of their later reconciliation.

The thing is that while they’re wildly different on the surface (he’s a hot-headed prince of a fascist regime who is trying to capture the Avatar to please his father; she’s a nurturing daughter of the chief who is trying to protect and train the Avatar in order to topple his father’s throne) they find out that they have so much more in common both in their experiences and their personalities.

(What follows is an excessive use of the word “both” and I’m sorry about that)(I can edit it. I can do that. That IS an option............)

They both have an innate sense of justice that they are determined to see done (zuko, at the war meeting, sticking up for the Earth Kingdom kid when the guards torment his family, choosing not to steal from the pregnant couple despite his circumstances, abiding by his word to leave the SWT should Aang come willingly, etc.; katara, literally.... at any point). They both have pretty one-track minds at accomplishing certain goals once they’ve put their mind to it, regardless of a lack of support in that endeavor (it goes without saying I guess, but zuko’s entire hunt; katara’s determination to get the earth benders to fight back, her determination to absolutely destroy Pakku until he agrees to teach her, etc.). They both lost their mothers at young ages. Their worlds are war-torn and traumatizing to them both, if in different ways, but that ultimately forces them to grow up too quickly to be wholly independent individuals. They both have issues with their fathers (for WILDLY different reasons, but). They both hold extreme prejudices that they need to learn to overcome (which ties into thematic cohesion)(bit like Lizzie and Darcy in that way but magnified by a million). They’re both extremely emotional and empathetic—which can and often does result in loud outbursts. Katara’s a bit better adjusted and can temper her anger for longer than S1 Zuko can, but they both feel that anger deeply and have no compunctions expressing it (Katara is, usually, more justified, particularly in S1. Again, S1 Zuko is severely maladjusted but at the point when they could’ve feasibly become a couple, he’s so much better off with the way he carries himself). They both struggle with feelings of inferiority in their bending abilities when confronted with prodigal benders like Aang and Azula, but have the work ethic required to double down and become two of the most powerful benders in the three remaining nations. This is a little more minor but it is a parrallel that appeals to some shippers that they both have these alter egos in the Painted Lady (notably fire nation coded) and the Blue Spirit (water tribe coded) that are pretty different from who they are day-to-day and are useful in accomplishing a purpose that they as themselves cannot.

(I’m.... I just realized that this could potentially get very long. Should I have made a slide show with bullet points??????)

Anyway, similar. I know there’s more but there’s literally so much to love about zutara that I’ll drive myself a little crazy trying to compile all the ways they’re similar. (Just gonna say that at this exact moment I went back to add more similarities.... so okay then)

Once they’ve reconciled, we see how all of these things only lend themselves to a deeper intimacy together than they share with literally anyone else. There’s a steady partnership that positions them as the mom/dad of the gaang, while also providing the support necessary to allow the other to not have to carry so much responsibility. A lot of zutaras will point out how zuko is actually depicted doing the more domestic chores that are normally relegated to Katara once he joins the gaang, since the others in the group are two 12-year-olds and sokka. The one that sticks out the most is how he makes tea for the group and then serves them, while Katara is able to just relax with her friends around the fire. Fanon expands upon this a lot to Zuko helping with the laundry or the cooking or whatever else needs doing since he, as a once-refugee, is used to doing his own domestic tasks. Before Zuko joined, Katara was the one mothering everyone, sewing for them, cooking for them, etc. She’s always tending to the needs of the group, and that includes emotionally. She does the emotional labor for the gaang 99% of the time, but when she’s the one falling apart, she’s usually doing it alone and without the comfort that she normally provides for others. Until Zuko. And that’s before they’re even friends.

Which is WHY people romanticize the catacombs of Ba Sing Se so much. Katara is verbally attacking Zuko out of her own righteous anger but also her own prejudice when Zuko, surprisingly, chooses to be vulnerable with her. He’s been on a journey that’s opened his eyes a bit, but he’s never actively chosen to expose the rawest parts of his past to anyone. But for some reason he chooses to do that with Katara of all people. While she’s yelling at him. He sees her humanity, and for once can look past his prejudice and empathize with her. And this time, when she breaks down, she gets to be comforted. Katara normally talks about her mother when she’s trying to explain to someone else that she sees and understands they’re pain, as a form of comfort to them. Here, Zuko uses the exact same tactic. He sees her and he understands. And for zuko? He’s not being shut down. He’s allowed to articulate his pain regarding his mother without being ignored and made to internalize it, and he’s allowed to process how he feels about his scar out loud without being told that he deserved it. And then he lets her touch his scar, something we’ve seen him actively avoid before. He’s completely open to her and she’s completely open to him and all it took was one five minute conversation. She was about to use the little bit of Spirit water that she had, that she was saving for something Important, to heal the scar that still daily causes him pain just because they had, somehow, connected.

Plus there’s the whole parallel to the star-crossed lovers forbidden from one another, a war divides their people—

And then zuko messes up, he regresses, he gets what he wants and he HATES it. And the sense of justice he had as a child has been restored to him against his will and he can’t think of anything he wants to do more than the Right Thing, so he joins team avatar. Before he does that though, we get to see his relationship with Mai, which is where comparison really comes in. And what we see is Zuko, fresh off of his encounter with Katara in the catacombs, trying to be emotionally honest with Mai... and getting shut down and dismissed. Which is just how Mai is and it’s fine, but not for Zuko. Still, he keeps trying, and he keeps getting ignored or scoffed at or yelled at. Which is really a larger symbol for how he doesn’t fit in his old life anymore, but again that’s about thematic cohesion. He tries to articulate his anxieties about returning home, he tries to make romantic gestures, he tries to explain how morally conflicted he’s feeling—and Mai diverts to some kind of physical affection to shut him up and a parting comment that is pretty much always, in essence, “I don’t wanna talk about this.” So they don’t. On the other hand, once zuko and Katara are friends, we see him again emotionally distraught and caught up in his anxieties about facing Iroh, and it’s Katara who comes to him and listens to him and comforts and encourages him.

Similarly, we have Aang clamming up and getting uncomfortable whenever Katara shows any negative emotion, usually resulting in him making excuses or running away. Or, in the case of the Southern Raiders, lecturing her on how she needs to just let go of her anger about her mother’s murder. People have talked this episode to death and usually better than I ever could, so imma... keep it brief. There’s a serious disconnect between Aang and Katara in his ability to empathize with Katara and her needs that has her tamping down her vulnerability and amping up her anger. He tells her that he was able to forgive his people’s genocide and appa’s kidnapping (petnapping? Theft??), which is blatantly not true but also not an entirely equal parrallel to Katara’s situation, and continues making these little remarks throughout the episode. But it’s Zuko that Katara opens up to. It’s with him that she’s able to talk about the most traumatic day of her life, and it’s with him that she’s able to get the closure she needs, cementing their bond as friends and partners. This disagreement between Aang and Katara is then... never resolved. They just never bring it up and hear what the other is saying.

There’s a fic called The Portraits of Ember Island that has a line that so completely sums up the heart of the matter for why people love their dynamic. For context, zuko has woken up early to help Katara with the cooking and they spend the whole time just letting one another talk, and zuko stops to ask why she always just lets him talk. And so she stops to ask why he’s always helping, and it goes as follows:

There’s just... so much mutual support! Trust! Intimacy!! And it just continues like that from the Southern Raiders on, listening to each other, advising each other, watching each other’s backs! And then! Literally saving each other’s lives!! I will never be over the last Agni kai. Not ever. Zuko may have been willing to jump in front of lightning for anyone, but he actually did it for Katara. And in a show, that’s the thing that really matters. It’s a fulfilled trope usually exclusively applied to romantic pairings, and it ended up applying to Zuko and Katara. And then she ran out into the middle of a fight with tunnel vision just to get to him.

Also!! Also Zuko pushing Katara out of the way of the falling rocks at the Western Air Temple!! And Katara catching him as he fell from the war balloon that he fought Azula on!! Before they’re even getting along, they’re the ones reaching for each other. They come to this place of equal ground, as partners, who watch each other’s backs, call each other out but still listen attentively and understand, and provide the support that the other has been sorely lacking up until they knew each other (whether that be from lack of effort or lack of understanding from others, or an unwillingness to accept it for themselves).

Then, trailing along under the surface of this, we see the themes of the show totally embodied by Zuko and Katara as individuals and in their relationship to one another. There’s a YouTuber, sneezyreviews, who has a, like, 2-hour explanation on why she not only loves zutara but also believes that their endgame would’ve actually elevated the writing of atla to new levels particularly because of thematic cohesion and resolved character arcs. It’s the zutara dissertation I never knew I needed, and it’s funny and eloquent and effective, so I’m just going to sum up her section on thematic cohesion to the best of my abilities and then link it for whenever you have the time. And I HIGHLY recommend it, especially if you want a full understanding of what makes zutara so great and gives it such longevity.

Guru pathik has a line that goes something like this: separation is an illusion; things that seem different are just two parts of the same whole. Iroh also tells Zuko something similar: balance and strength are achieved when the different nations come together and influence one another and celebrate what makes them each unique. And this lesson is a massive central arc that both Zuko and Katara go through, moving past a black-and-white, good guys-vs-bad guys, us-vs-them mentality and into a greyer, more nuanced view of the world. Zuko sees the fire nation from an entirely new perspective and while he still loves and hopes for his nations future, he surrenders his blind loyalty to them in exchange for an unflinching loyalty to peace and love. Katara too had to come to terms with the fact that cruel people exist in the earth kingdom and water tribes, while some fire nation citizens are just regular, kind people who also need and deserve to have someone speak on their behalf. And this is honed in directly on how they view each other. They grow in their individual journeys to be open to the humanity in the other and then, once they’ve found that, they’re able to grow more in compassion for others in a beautiful feedback loop. And this is all matched in the symbolism repeatedly and intentionally associated with them in canon: sun and moon, fire and water, yin and yang, Oma and Shu who found love despite their warring nations. Their individual arcs are completed in each other and complement the themes of atla beautifully.

The canon pairs... just don’t. Which, again, is fine. But the very things that give atla longevity and popularity are anchored in zutara. Kat@ang doesn’t accomplish this. They’re... nice. Sweet. Especially when you erase a good portion of their interactions in S3. It could’ve been just a sweet love story. (Personally, the dynamic between toph and aang accomplish the same thing that zutara does, with complementary personalities that fulfill the theme of opposites blending in harmony) M@iko, on the other hand, is less sweet but I think wasn’t even supposed to last. Zuko’s relationship with Mai seems to represent his relationship with his old life as a whole. He can’t be emotionally vulnerable, he’s goaded into abusing his privileges, his agency and opinions aren’t respected. They just don’t have common ground with which to discuss anything that matters, so they don’t. As far as themes, the relationship doesn’t fit with atla. It’s zuko returning to and sticking with what is (on the surface) like him, what’s expected. Fire nation with fire nation. Fluid water bender with the flexible air bender. Like with like, separated from what is different and challenging and complementary.

And all of these things combined of course lead to the potential for the ship. I don’t know how familiar you are with the post-atla canon but... well, miss “I will never turn my back on people who need me”, miss “I don’t want to heal! I want to fight!” ends up living quietly in the SWT as a designated healer who turns a blind eye to the water tribe civil war happening right outside her front door. Which can be fine! People change! Some people just wanna stay inside. I just wanna stay inside! But the potential future for zutara is so much more satisfying, with Katara becoming the most unconventional Fire Lady the uppity old cads who are stuck on the old ways have ever seen. Fanon has her serving as a voice for the other nations within a kingdom at the point of its biggest political upheaval, as a confidante to Zuko who can actually help him while he’s trying to figure out how to move forward and make reparations. They have the opportunity, together, to accomplish what they both have set on their hearts to fight for: positive change that lends itself to harmony and balance. And the steambabies! A popular headcanon is that their firstborn daughter, the crown princess, is actually a waterbender, which causes such an uproar among the people who are adamantly clinging to the old ways. It’s just a future full of potential to be forces for good together, full of trust, intimacy, joy. The exact era of peace and love and balance that zuko announces that he intends to ring in with the start of his reign as Fire Lord is, again, magnified by the very personal zutara relationship. And we love to see it.

tl;dr zutara isn’t for everyone. Some people just don’t vibe with it. Some are nostalgic. Some love the canon they grew up with. Some have been disappointed for years. Some just see themselves in other characters and want their happiness instead. Whatever the reason, that’s fine. But for me, I love the way these two, from the moment they give each other a fair chance, are able to lower their walls and prejudices to see the other for the kindred spirits they are. They see each other’s humanity, and their response is to pour out love and support and compassion. I love that they’re a power couple in battle. I love the symbolism and, honestly, soulmatism that colors their every interaction. I love that they embody the whole storyline of atla in their relationship and how it develops, which is notably why their seasonal arcs always culminate in each finale with how they relate to one another. I love that zuko adopting a waterbending move is what actually saves his life and then katara’s. I love the chemistry! And I love the future they could’ve had, instead of the ones they were given.

So, in conclusion: I just think they’re neat and I hope you do too, at least a little bit. Even if it’s just respectfully from a disinterested distance cause you do you. And now here is the video I mentioned. I’m sorry this post got so long and then I gave you an even longer homework assignment, but I can’t recommend it enough. She says it all better than I can.

youtube

#zutara #atla #zutara rant #like really the way the canon relationships were written throughout s3 #it would’ve been more believable for zutara to happen #or at least be hinted at #all of the major issues presented in those relationship were dug up extensively and then... never resolved #and then they just slapped some kisses on a screen and said ‘there all better’#and we just kinda had to say ‘oh ok guess it’s all better then’#this got long I’m sorry #I wrote it all out and then tumblr ate 2/3 of it #which is why it took so long #and what I’ve written now doesn’t even match what I had before #because there’s too much to say about why I love zutara #and the stuff I left out the first time is what came out this time #rip to my original thoughts but this post is different #anyway that’s why this took so long #and I should’ve just made a PowerPoint...#I can do that too if you’d rather not read all of this lol #I won’t be offended #this is incoherent #Alia rambles uselessly #also hoping this doesn’t end up in any wrong tags because I don’t wanna step on toes lol #it’s not anti!! it’s just critical #in a compare/contrast way #I can pinpoint the moment when I started trying to rewrite my points from memory #because everything gets shorter and more succinct #like... I really said all that??? sounds fake and I don’t remember it anyway so here’s the condensed version #with no!! smooth!!! transitions!!!!#also why am I so lazy with proper grammar over text

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dragynkeep · 3 years

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Okay this is something that bothers me in fandom spaces a lot: say you’re reading a fantasy novel or watching a fantasy show/anime. Main protagonist is probably a teen and gets whisked away to a magical world meets new people and swept up in an adventure to save the world right? Standard stuff. And then the love interest is usually a part of the world and physically they also look like a teenager or same age as the MC but in actuality they’re hundreds (and rare cases thousands) of years old. But they fall in love anyway. Now I’m seeing people decry it as pedo behavior that it’s gross weird and unnatural.

But like, that’s part of the fantasy. There’s never going to be a case where a magical immortal prince comes to you and says, “hey totally average person you’re actually part of a great mystical prophecy to save my world and yours. Also we’re destined forbidden lovers and I’ve been waiting for you my whole life let’s go.” It’s physically and literally impossible for a person to look like a teen/young adult and in actuality lived several centuries. Now it is possible for actual adults to prey on young people which is obviously not okay and gross. But this? I always found this outrage so stupid teen me was alllllllll over that trash ya paranormal/supernatural/urban fantasy immortal bad boy and anime husband. I just truly don’t get why people can’t be like okay it’s literally impossible for this to happen might as well enjoy it. No it’s a moral failing and you condone child grooming or whatever like what??? Am I alone in this?

dude omg this mentality towards ships like that is so weird because what exactly is it romanticizing, dear anons with the same amount of braincells as a mollusk? huh? is it the eternal devotion of a powerful being who often times is utterly beholden with the very human mortal, who paradoxically tends to hold all the power in the relationship? is it the alluring mysteriousness of a seductive love interest?

there is no real life danger from these types of relationships that have shown up in fiction in memoriam because as op said, there’s no way for this dynamic to be replicated irl & even if it could, fiction is not responsible for the actions of mentally there adults. especially when there has been centuries upon centuries of this type of almost erotic looks into the supernatural & that type of forbidden love, hell all the way to dracula & further back, that hasn’t managed to convince rational people yet that these are ideal relationships.

my favourite example of this is a film that was close to my heart; labyrinth. antis decry it as a pedophilic story when in actuality; it’s a coming of age story for sarah. she’s taken the iconography of her starlet mother & the famous man she left the family for & seen that as something to emulate as “growing up”; & jareth’s power over her is the truth of how powerless we can be of the actions of adults in our live. it’s only when sarah stops devolving to childish phrases like “it’s not fair” & more importantly, lingering in them & sulking to her own detriment, does she regain her power, make her own choices & bests jareth. jareth, who i might add, fed into this fantasy by being utterly devoted to sarah beyond belief, someone who would love her despite the “flaws” she was berated for at home & without responsibility, with abandon. he would love her & he would be her slave; but part of sarah’s growth is that she didn’t want that. she just wanted reciprocal, mutual, love. & when she returns home, she’s not quite fully an adult but she has matured; she is fair with her parents — which is why i don’t like that they made the stepmother abusive in the manga — & fair with toby, but she’s also allowed her childish delights in her toys & her friends from the labyrinth.

none of that is endorsing a pedophilic story or telling young girls to go run away with the nearest old man; it’s a story that tells young girls in all the confusing mess of puberty & having to grow up that sometimes, things won’t be fair. but that they can also still be childish & most importantly of all, they can & should demand a fair, mutual, empowering love.

#labryinth #pro fiction #owl.txt #answered #q

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officialjakotsu · 4 years

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How fandom fucked me up and got me abused

People often say fiction doesn’t effect reality, when defending their “controversial” ships. Firstly. This is complete and utter bullshit as you can find with a quick google search.

Secondly, I want to add in with my own personal experience as to how fiction and fandom was used to lure me into specific mindsets and allowing my abuse.

HEAVY TW FOR ABUSE AND SEXUAL ASSAULT OF A MINOR

When I was 12, I came out as bisexual to a close friend, who we will refer to as L. L, at the time, identified as a girl but has since come out as a trans boy. I will be referring to him with he/him pronouns but I feel it’s important to keep that at the time we believed we were in a same sex relationship. I believe L was 14 at the time (he was one grade above me but a little older for his grade and I have always been one of it not the youngest in my grade due to my birthday.)

L and I had first become acquainted through school and became friends due to shared fandom interests, at the time this being Hetalia. (I could write a whole essay on why Hetalia is bad alone in its effect on people, but that’s not the point. Also I was 12 and didn’t realize it.) After about a year after meeting was when he asked me out and I happily accepted. During our relationship, he also introduced me to Homestuck, which I then became a fan of.

As our relationship continued, we both got very into very roleplay, usually of our favorite ships, most of these being ones L liked that I just liked for him. The important ones to this story being Dirkjake, Dirkhal, Johnjake, and Erisol. With Johnjake, this was a very sneaky way to get me to ship incest. I had not, at the time, realized it was incest. Dirkhal was something I was uncomfortable with, but he pressured me into roleplay with it.

The dynamics between Dirkjake, Dirkhal, and Erisol are... Uncomfortable, to think of now. Dirkjake, as a relationship, canonically failed because it was toxic, and when I read it I was upset they broke up despite how obviously toxic it was. I couldn’t read it as that, because of L. With Dirkhal, it was always roleplay as incredibly passive aggressive between us (the few times I gave in to his begging to roleplay it). Erisol was always roleplayed incredibly aggressive, like how they acted to each other in canon (the characters hate each other.)

These dynamics were romanticized- possessiveness, jealousy, and aggression towards your partner. Then in other fan media I consumed, I found the romanticization of the taking of innocence, of relationships between a caretaker type and the person they were taking care of, of someone incredibly possessive over their partner, of specific types of abuse that made it so much harder for me to realize I was being abused. This was all stuff introduced to me by fandoms, by fanfiction, whether through my own internet usage, or my abuser showing them to me.

I was also drawn into this idea that because it was a “gay” relationship, it was better and more pure than a “hetero” relationship. I was told gay people weren’t abusive. And I believed that.

Fandom taught me these things were okay. Fandom taught my ABUSER these things were okay. So despite how bad it made me feel, how isolated from my family I felt, I thought it was okay. I was the younger one, I told myself this was how relationships were supposed to work because this is how fandom taught me and how my abuser taught me they were. I was inexperienced and I easily swayed because I was a child. Remember, I was a 12 year old when this relationship began. I was 14 when it ended. It was my first relationship. I had no clue how this shit was supposed to work.

Even after the relationship ended I didn’t realize how bad it was. I had found by then it wasn’t good because I saw a post on tumblr warning me about red flags in a relationship and I noticed some of them lined up with L. But even then I didn’t know it was as abusive as it was. It wasn’t until about four years later that it hit me.

Through the romanticization of the dynamics between those relationships, from all the fanfiction, and the fan content, I had gotten abused horrifically. He used this in roleplay, and in our overall relationship, to gaslight me, to abuse and then lovebomb, to excuse himself, and to sexually assault me. He used roleplay to push me into sexual situations I was uncomfortable with (again. I was 12/13/14 during this relationship) and this was an action that was played off as “cute” or “romantic.” He was my “first” in so many things and he loved to coo over my inexperience and lack of knowledge of these things. My childishness was seen as cute. How is this not creepy?

To this day I have trauma. It’s been years but even as I’m typing this out I’m getting itchy and shaky and my chest hurts. I still see L sometimes and every time I do I’m reminded of what he did to me. And he did more outside of fandom too- he tried to ruin my life and tell my friends I cheated on him (I didn’t). I was taken advantage of in so many different ways, because of my introduction to fandom spaces, and the rampant romanticization of abuse in fandoms. I’m not trying to promote “purity culture” or whatever I’m trying to protect vulnerable young kids who are like I used to be, from the situation I was in. My relationship with my mother has never fully recovered. My mental health has never fully recovered. I still have nightmares about him. My relationship with myself is still skewed, and I’m still a fucking doormate because that’s what I was turned into.

Anyway this post is a mess because I can’t fully coherently talk about L, but long story short?

I won’t sit back and let you ship what you want and romanticize what you want. If I can save even one little kid from what I went through, then it’s enough. Fuck you and fuck your ships.

And if any of you pro ship fuckers come on here to complain, you get blocked immediately. I don’t want to hear you defend yourselves on a post where I’ve just told you I was assaulted because of your rhetorics. Fuck you

#anti sessrin #anti shipping #anti discourse

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flying-elliska · 4 years

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S5 Review pt 2 : the Bad

So in my last meta I listed a lot of reasons to like this season...but then why did it not (at least to me) all add up together ? Looking back, I can think of so many clips that I thought were incredible. But looking back at the season in general, I just feel a big ‘meh’ and it’s sort of puzzling - why exactly ? Here is where I thought the season could have been a lot better :

I loathe love triangles : I hate the trope in itself. Is S5 the worst example of it ever ? No, it served somewhat of a thematic purpose and the resolution was interesting. But I can’t help it, when I feel a love triangle coming on, I generally disconnect emotionally because I have been annoyed to hell and back by it before - one big offender being Skam France s4, in which the love triangle/quadrangle marked the beginning of the season going down in flames, with it overshadowing everything else and making the characters behave in completely obnoxious and puzzling ways. S5 isn’t quite as bad, it feels more respectful of the characters, but I find it weird that the writers chose a love triangle again on the heels of the reception of s4.

The problem with this trope is not ‘oh we don’t want drama ever’ it’s just so bloody annoying, so trite and overused. It rests on centuries of sexist tropes : either a wishy washy girl in the middle who doesn’t know what’s good for her/her own heart ; or two girls competing for a man’s attentions. It often ends in the fandom villifying the women involved no matter the shape of the triangle, comparing them against each other, which definitely happened this time (Twitter was just so annoying this season), and this whole ‘team x’ thing gives me hives, as the assumption that this is what young women viewers care most about.

Also it generally involves the characters showing that they have very little self respect, letting themselves be walked over, bad communication, implications about what the ‘better woman/man’ should be like, cheating, etc...it’s very rarely fun or interesting to watch because we’ve seen it a thousand times before in teenage soap operas. Again, the s5 ending avoided the total trainwreck but this is a show you watch in real time, and for weeks I was afraid it was going to be absolutely terrible, and it ruined a big part of my experience of the season. When they introduced Noée I started being scared, and when it became clear Arthur was developing feelings for her, I basically noped out emotionally. I started following it in a much more detached manner, I wasn’t looking forward to the clips anymore, I stopped writing meta so much. And it sucks. I wanted to love the season. But this was just not a ride I really wanted to be on.

Alexia (and Noee) deserved better : I love Alexia and developing her character is one of the best things Skam France ever did. In OG, the character of Chris, if interesting, is just continually reduced to the ‘funny fat friend’ persona and it really sucks. So giving Alexia a real personality, making her bisexual, giving her more of a role in s3, making her a dancer and a singer was really cool. I’m bi myself and I spent most of my high school struggling with my weight and if I’d had a character like her, who radiates self-acceptance, it would have meant so much to me. I was really stoked for her to have more of a role in s5 - only to spend most of the season feeling really sad for her. It was just...not fun. I so wish she could have had her own season and her own story that didn’t revolve around a dude she was so supportive of and still ended up treating her like shit.

Also, real talk : when is a curvy girl actually a love interest without it being shown as funny or not good enough ? Especially of the main character ? Almost never. Coline might have lost some weight, but she’s still written as a curvy girl this season and it’s an important part of the character. So for her to have this particular role this season - the girl that isn’t romanticized, that doesn’t get to have the cute and thrilling moments, that is just sort of there and patient and understanding as if she couldn’t get anything better, it just leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Sure the end of the season did her more justice but god it took so long and in the meantime, it just felt...very ill considered and careless.

In the same way, I wanted to love Noée, I thought she was amazing, but because of her role in the plot I just felt this instinctive defiance towards her character. It would have been so cool to have her in a friend role, or even a love interest outside of the triangle or I don’t know like...have someone else fall in love with her. Also, I just did not understand why she loved Arthur ? Like she just met the dude a few times, and he’s mostly been a total asshole to her, who makes very little efforts to communicate with her...I get she could get attracted to him but love ??? The moment where she tells him ‘I love you’ felt demeaning to her, like the moment in OG where Noora falls after running after William. It’s like, Arthur has just been an enormous asshole to her, and she pushes herself to do something she’s never been comfortable with in the first place ? Why ? This show romanticizes teenage boys being assholes and girls being desperate way too much.

The Skam dilemma, love vs politics and “Let’s all just be nice.” : There is a reoccuring problem accross all Skams, starting with the OG : they bring up very political topics, usually in the beginning of the season, and then they...don’t really do anything with them. In the OG, Noora’s feminism is really just window-dressing and we see her bend over backwards to accomodate this super toxic asshole into her life. And we see Sana’s struggles as a Muslim in Norwegian society, but then love drama takes over, and it’s waved away with an insulting ‘everyone should just communicate more’ ending. Skamfr s4 made it even worse, by making the girl squad a lot more overtly racist, never having them make a big gesture for Imane, putting her in a position to apologize, and never showing that the girl squad had an idea of where they messed up or real growth. It was insanely frustrating, especially since the beginning of the season was so good at showing all the little micro-agressions. In the end it felt like all the racism was just there to motivate Imane’s breakdown for plot reasons and not to actually say something. S5 never stoops quite that low, but there was a bit of a similar dynamic at hand here. Instead of the boys actually have a real conversation after their fight, most of the denouement of the show was consecrated to talking about the love drama. It was, again, as if the focus of the show was on the wrong things, and it robs you of the catharsis you’re expecting. As if they used the love drama for a metaphor for the actual issues, have it do all the emotional heavy lifting, and in so doing bypass having to adress the actual problem. There is this weird ideas that the audience of the show - teenagers and young women, mostly, in the end care the most about the love stuff and that everything else has to take a backseat and...this feels neither a good message to send, nor realistic to me. I like it when shows about teenagers decenter love and show the real complexity of their characters’ lives without making them paragons of virtue or wokeness - Derry Girls is a brilliant example of that. Skam, and Skam France in particular, feel a bit immature still compared to those, punching below their weight for shows that pride themselves on their social impact.

Hit with the idiot stick : Speaking of underwhelming resolutions - yes, the boy squad messing up with Arthur, I found relevant and realistic. But...did they really even adress it ? I was really hoping for the boys to have more of a conversation, for Arthur to open up to them about what he went through, about his father, to tell them that they should have asked him/listened to him more, etc...and I know ‘teenage boys’ or whatever but ...aren’t they trying to change those stereotypes too ? Like when Arthur went to see Basile, they must have had a conversation, why the fuck did we not see it ? That’s the emotional bond I cared most about ! And we just had a hug ...underwhelming tbh. Same Arthur talking with Lucas but then it was just about their love lives ? Or when they came to the hospital, again, it was just about the love drama ? God it really sucked out the oxygen out of the season. The resolutions of those things just being hugs or speeches or handholding at the end felt hollow, and a lot less powerful than they could have been. And again, there has to be a tolerance for messiness, but I found the boys so incredibly dumb at several points in the season. Especially them being like ‘oh cheating isn’t so bad’ after they found out that Arthur’s dad was cheating on his wife ? Like why the fuck did they take Patrick’s side ? What kind of lack of empathy ? It would feel a lot more coherent for teenage boys to be furious at the destruction of a friend’s family, not talk like cynical 50 yr olds who just divorced for the fifth time. It felt so unrealistic and stupid and just meant for Arthur to finally clue in to the idea that cheating and lying is bad maybe, himself first without external clues from characters that really should have known better by now. Especially Yann and Lucas advising Arthur to keep his mouth shut after what happened in s1 like...did whoever write this read the previous seasons of the show ? There were just too many times where the boy squad felt out of character and mandated to be idiots just for plot reasons, and it felt...very crudely drawn. Disappointing, because the beginning of the season was awesome. But again, Skam France failed in delivering real growth for their friend group. At times, it even felt like character regression. Them holding hands at the end of the season made me emo but damn it could have been so much more.

Also some plot twists - the car crash in particular, just felt dumb and unnecessary, seriously.

A too distant main : In the end, like I said before, my main issue is that I didn’t feel as connected to Arthur as I wanted to. I mean, the cheating bit was just very unrelatable to me, after how they showed how supportive Alexia was and how she supposedly made him happy like...why. But maybe that’s just me. Regardless - in the first few episodes he felt distant in an interesting way, because it made sense for his character to be so walled off. But...I felt like his self discovery was way too blurred with the ‘oh I like Noee’ part to the point where it ended up being obscured. I would have loved more clips on his own, maybe something more about him questioning his path in life, whether he truly wants to do medecine. And like apparently he liked fine arts ? Then, why didn’t we see anything about that ? Did he paint the x-men painting ??? That feels so relevant, why the fuck didn’t we see that ? Also why didn’t we see him take those LSF classes with Camille and actually make an effort this time ? Having almost all of his realization moments tied to Noee was just...the manic pixie dream girl trope. That’s what it’s called, when you use a quirky female character as a device for the emotional development of the male one. It’s...not flattering tbh. And then that farm episode - it was funny but for a week I felt like I completely lost touch with Arthur’s POV ? I’m really not sure that was the right choice. All in all, there were just not enough introspective, small, intimate clips for it to really feel like Skam, and that’s a shame tbh. I recognize a lot of myself in Arthur, and Robin acted his heart out to make him relatable, but because of the writing, there were way too many times where I was reluctant and puzzled instead of in it. I saw several people saying it was too much tell and not enough show and I think that’s very on point. I feel like a lot of Arthur’s actual character development happened behind the scenes in moments where we didn’t see it.

Yeah...I think as a conclusion most of my issues are tied back to the preponderance of the love triangle. The season wasn’t bad but god it could have been so excellent if they hadn’t gone that route, and this swerve from greatness is just sooooooo frustrating. I don’t think it’s enough to condemn the whole season but...

Next up : some things I’m just very ??? about and a general conclusion.

Bonus bitching round, fandom edition : oh my god, I don’t get into this often but...the fandom was so bloody annoying this season. Starting with the people sending death threats over a tv show (like...what the fuck) or thinking them being nasty assholes is somehow for the greater good (???), from people that don’t want anyone to use even 1 analysis capacity (especially on Twitter) and go beyond praising everything on the show, or the people either villifying Alexia and Noee and indulging in that ‘team’ crap, to the people that shoot down every single detail of the show without discernment or accuse the creators of being ableist sexist garbage or maltreating their actors ... And then you have the other remake stans coming to pollute the tags talking about how we were all stupid for liking the show in the first place. Like...seriously, what is up with you people. I really loved the block button this season, damn.

#skam france #skamfr s5 #my meta #arthur broussard #skam france meta

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ambitionsource · 4 years

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001 for Maggie!! About Rucas!

werk werk werk lets go lets go lets gooooo!

Riley & Lucas James

When I started shipping it if I did: okay so like… technically I cannot answer this question because I… like… made the show so fkdsjhgkjdfgd BUT. interestingly enough i’ve actually said before that if I were a viewer of AAA and not the creator, i would be very cautious about RL. like i think it would take me a while to warm up to the possibility of them (as well as lucas, bc i think the “seemingly broody snarker with a heart of gold and is secretly soft” can be HORRIBLY done), but i think around 103 i would start to change my opinion about lucas (and then would be definitive about him after 105 from the way he is with isa), and then i think i’d really lock into RL at the end of 107 with their convo in the aud where she’s like “maybe you don’t have to do everything alone” and hes like “… no maybe not.” that’s my genuine honest feeling on how i’d approach it as a viewer

My thoughts: many thoughts… many thoughts head empty… i guess like the entire show are my thoughts FJDSKLGFDG but i will say i’m very excited for the rest of S2 for them, as well as going into the next season. it’s gonna be really fun to see y’alls reactions and hopefully we’ll come out on the other side together ✊🏻

What makes me happy about them: oh so much… how riley is so skilled at catching lucas off guard and seeing through his defenses from like day 1 (and evidenced early on i.e. the way she just plops down at their lunch table and he literally stops eating gkfdhgkjdsfh), how deeply they respect one another and see the other for what they are capable of rather than how they view themselves with all these imperfections and limitations, how lucas encourages riley to stand up for herself and be empowered and not downplay herself, and conversely how riley is slowly but surely changing lucas’s perspective on the world and what he deserves from it and that romance can be real, touch can be soft and non-threatening, love isn’t inherently a weakness to be taken advantage of but something delicate and lovely and a source of power (i.e., i think that lucas’s growth and interactions with riley also influence how he reevaluates his friendships with like dasher and stuff like that – something you’ll definitely see evidence of in 209)… could go on probably

What makes me sad about them: oh well like. how self-destructive lucas is at this point and how he literally cannot fathom that people care about him – let alone romantically that’s like a whole other ballpark. how their own insecurities allowed external opinions to detour their dynamic, although understandable. the trickiness that exists currently where riley, just being a generally forgiving and optimistic person, is constantly being told that she needs to give up on lucas and that there is a sort of question she and probably us as viewers start to wonder of like… is it even worth it? whether lucas deserves riley’s devotion is certainly up for debate, and it’ll be interesting to see if he addresses the mess of the last few months moving forward… but then it’s tricky too, because much like the position dylan was put in, i think in some ways riley does need to still have faith in lucas, because if she doesn’t then who will, and it’s kind of like… very complex. very messy, much to analyze and pick apart and perhaps account for at the end of the day… but that’s the kind of complexity i love in relationships (provided steps are taken to amend them to the best of their ability and respect always remains intact), so it’s no surprise they have all this fkdshkfjdhgkjdfshdh.

Things done in fanfic that annoys me: well obvious fanfic doesn’t really exist, but i’ve been in fandom long enough to be able to say EXACTLY what would happen if ambition were a huge fandom like tw, glee, etc. the first thing that would annoy me the most would be an exaggeration of rl’s worst traits to make them like a pairing that they aren’t – key being making lucas more aggressive, dominant, and like genuinely disrespectful, and then making riley like an innocent wallflower pure goody two shoes or whatever. like that kind of characterization really strips down their complexity as characters (and is also like just wrong FDJSKFDSLG like one thing i’m excited for in S3 is the chance to really explore what they’re actually LIKE when like… depression isn’t warping their personalities FJDSKFLDSGJ and also how they bring out certain traits in one another). i also feel like any sort of like… overt tooth-rotting romanticism would feel really ooc for them; they are quite romantic in how they treat one another and see one another, but both of their personalities in a relationship together i think create a romance built more on realism and appreciation and a sort of grounded display of love than anything even remotely Cheesy. that’s one thing that really changes about riley from The Former Source Material to AAA is that she’s far more grounded given how her parents have… spun out let’s say

Things I look for in fanfic: i do think often about how nice it would be to just go on ao3 and scroll the ambition tags… find a good rl zc or da fic to peruse… oh there’d be garbage undoubtedly but the good fics… i would like to see it 😔anyway lmao i think if i were looking for rl fics in aaa i would look for ones that a) retain their core character traits and b) strike that perfect balance of grounded yet uniquely soft in the way rl are with each other that they aren’t with anyone else – i wouldn’t want to see their integrity thrown for the sake of being uber fluffy. but that’s like just a complete personal pref.

Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: hmm… obviously this is all conjecture, but in terms of CANON, i cannot see lucas ending up with anyone else. like i just do not think it’s on his radar at all – it wasn’t before riley showed up, and if she floated away, he’d go back to just forgoing it entirely (it’s not entirely a joke when we joke around that lucas is rileysexual fkjdhsgk). riley i think like, zay would treat her nicely if they were ever to go past best friends. fanon wise just going by dynamics and personalities, i have a really special place in my heart for lucas x charlie (oh, and how fun it will be to share that dynamic with y’all in the future bc reading that rn i’m sure y’all are like HUH JFGDKLJGFLKSJHKLDSJHLJFDHL valid!!). could also probably enjoy a riley x isa fic or two. i also love digging into the relationship between lucas and asher (especially given that asher was lucas’s first crush… he he he) but as for them actually being a relationship i couldn’t because i’m 10000% sure they’d kill each other. even dylucasher wouldn’t work romantically, because as nice as it all is if lucasher didn’t kill each other, dylan would end up killing them both after mentally Snapping from playing mediator one heckin time too many. so. yes. fDSJKGLDFKLHFKLDH

My happily ever after for them: i can’t really say specifically because spoilies!! but i just want them to feel… settled. they’re constantly in worlds of turbulence right now, and i can’t wait for the day that they can just be together and get away from the city (because i firmly believe lucas hates living in the city) and just. start a life on their terms. that will be so beautiful :’)

Who is the big spoon/little spoon: i’m inclined to say lucas is the big spoon, but i don’t think it’s set in stone at all. like you know, if there’s a particularly rough day and lucas really needs that Comfort, then riley will by all means be the big spoon and hug him real tight. it’s what they both deserve!!

What is their favorite non-sexual activity: i love that this question specifies non-sexual specifically FDJSKFDKLSGJFLDKH like are there couples who truly enjoy sex with one another above all else…………. but i will say i think one thing that is nice about RL is the most important thing to them is just being together. like i think they’ll happily spend hours in the booth together not like, actively doing anything and focused on their own things (homework, production work, what have you) but just the other person’s presence there with them is comforting. you kind of see this in 109 when riley takes refuge in the booth, and i think this is core to their relationship. they don’t need to be talking or actively doing much – just maybe like, riley is tapping her foot against his knee absentmindedly or has her feet up in his lap. if they’re sitting closer, lucas is rubbing her knee with his thumb. you know what i mean? presence and the knowledge that they’re together is more important than any sort of sense of Action if that makes sense. but some others to list would be getting out of the city and going exploring in the Fresh Air away from… everything and everyone else lmao, and going to the animal shelter!!

send some winter hiatus asks !! :)

#thank you for sending!!!!!!#i love them... i do dont ever think i dont #riley x lucas #winter hiatus 2019 #Anonymous #maggie #answered

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onetoomanysteps · 5 years

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Regarding the problematic dilemma that is SnA’s eight episode

“The source of every crime, is some defect of the understanding; or some error in reasoning; or some sudden force of the passions.”

― Thomas Hobbes

..Okay, so, here I am again with a long-ass critic post about Shoukoku no Altair’s anime release. Yes. It has been a while and the anime had long ended. I know. Maybe some of you would say that roasting the anime again after all of this time is moot point, since it’s less likely that many people will come and search for it as it’s already out of season. But then again... compulsory community service in the middle of holiday time unfortunately can’t manage to shift my saltiness towards SnA anime, and once again I decided to resume doing this review that I initially thought I would abandon at the pilot episode.

Whew. Okay then, OOT rant out, now time for some content.

Warning: Spoilers, as usual. Also, quite more opinionated than the first review. Differing opinions are welcome, but please relay it with class.

Maybe some of you would be surprised when this particular episode became the next choice for my reluctant SnA anime bashing session: after all, compared to the other ones, this one is quite tame and consistent in regards to pacing, nothing out of ordinary as it was basically adapted from the interlude-type story of 4th volume of the manga. No sloppy scene cuts and merge like the ones littering the pilot episode, the seiyuus’ expertise shining through their well-executed lines delivered with emotive and fitting voice acting, fairly decent editing for supposedly dynamic scenes like Mahmut’s gambling parade (though a dark glittery effect and Katou-sensei used in the manga would make it 100X more awesome, as it added to Manga!Mahmut’s rightfully conspiratory look when he swindled the bar patrons’ money), the smoothness of it would not give the impression of another episode that messed up so bad that it needed a bashing post of its own.

Except that that was apparently not the case. As with most of its notable adaptations recently, there is a disturbing theme that repeats itself across some of Mappa’s recent adaptation works: For some god-knows-why reason, Mappa reeeally likes to change some aspect of the story, so that it diverges from the original source material and transform the show’s overall tone. This, in my opinion, is a kind of hit-or-miss situation; when it’s done well, it can make the story even more interesting and/or bringing out a kind of freshness to it, but when done poorly, it can destroy it into barely recognizable piece of... whatever it is instead.

Two of the most apparent examples of this theme is how Mappa did Dororo and Kakegurui’s anime adaptation. In Dororo, the important, plot-relevant differences shown since the beginning created a darker story that has a whole unique and interesting nuance compared to the more lighthearted original source. Meanwhile, in Kakegurui, in which the noisy, fanservice-laden changes only happened at the very end of the season, it felt abrupt and destroyed the tension that had been building since the first episode. For me, it gave an anti-climatic impression like the ending was written from a completely different story altogether and just slapped on the rest of the season like some kind of poorly made band-aid.

Apparently, it turns out that SnA anime also followed (or maybe some would say preceded, as it was aired even before Mappa!Dororo and aired together with Kakegurui) the same trend. To some extent. Here I see that SnA anime, as I had written about in the pilot episode critique, had changed some components of the story, in which the change didn’t really stem from technicalities and more of an artistic license to change the story’s overall tone. The problem is, the way that the anime changed scenes here and there is not consistent and overall not suited to the kind of story SnA is trying to tell us: the anime tried to somehow mix an image of Mahmut as a righteous, morally superior protagonist that always thrive in his every impulsive, ego-driven endeavors with a particular shape of world- building that centers on realpolitik-esque international politics, in which the highest reward would go to the actor that appeals the most to pragmatic rationality in ensuring their goal’s attainment. In this work, this mostly meant the characters’ goals regarding the wellbeing of their respective nations (i.e. national interest). In other words, the anime tried to blend two things that was supposedly not put together, and somehow tried to make it work. This made the overall tone inconsistent, as the anime was not clear on what kind of message it wanted to tell us.

This flaw was, in my opinion, most apparent in this particular episode. Why, you ask?

Because of this sly, sly, fabulous piece of work.

As some of you might already know, this magnificent bastard of a doge above is one of the, if not THE one, most pragmatic character SnA had to offer. Even more Machiavellian than other magnificent bastards such as Zaganos and Louis that has their own momentary emotion-controlled decision resulting in abject barbarism, Lucio for the most part managed to keep his underlying human emotions to himself, dividing his emotions as a human being with his rationality as a statesman with such surgical precision that even some of us sometimes forgot that he, like all other characters in the series, still has a heart underneath all of that smug diplomatic farce of his.

On one side the manga showcased his ability to create carefully balanced moves, crafted in order to maximize his city-state’s gain as a middle power with decent defensive capabilities and flourishing economy, but otherwise not immune to the effects of Turkiye and Baltrhein’s power struggle that reverberated throughout the region.

On the other hand, the manga also explored his inner, more vurnerable moments through carefully placed flashbacks and delicate showcase of blink-and-you’ll-miss micro-expression from time to time, creating a subtle nuance of conflicting desires in his mind that never truly surfaced for the whole world to see, painstakingly contained lest it becomes a crack that will rupture the delicate balance of his conscience and affect his decision-making abilities.

This two images of Lucio that the manga expertly portrayed, to me, is a good crystalization of the implicit rules of pragmatism present in the SnA universe already mentioned above. The ‘rewards’ for his ideal behaviour are readily apparent throughout the storyline, up until now. Venedik, the city-state that Lucio currently leads, always occupies ‘safe zone’ in the manga’s plot progression: it never suffered a crippling destruction that robs it of its sovereignty (compare to Phoenicia and some of Rumeliana mainland’s city states); haven’t experienced the kind of back-and-forth win-and-losses that causes drastic depletion of its resources (compare to Baltrhein that lost a lot of human and material resources along with their territories, and Turkiye that also lost a lot of human resources, intellectual properties, and arguably their subjects’ trust); and last but not least, it is able to participate actively, according to its own terms, in securing its interest throughout the great war that engulfes the entire region (somewhat of a luxury, certainly not possessed by the Cuore that depends on the Alliance to conclude the war in favorable terms for them).

In my opinion, those advantages that Venedik has would not be there without Lucio’s careful and logic-driven way of directing Venedik’s domestic and foreign affairs and masterful management of his personal sentiments. This is especially apparent when we compare Lucio with other policy makers in the story, that more often than not commited grave errors when they let their personal sentiments cloud their judgement (Mahmut’s impatience to save Ibrahim regardless of his position that led to his demotion in the story’s early stages; Zaganos’ thirst for revenge that led to many unnecessary sacrifices in recent chapters; Constantinos’ pride that led to Phoenicia’s harsh subjugation by Lerederik’s troops; Louis’ apparent prejudice at other other states that emptied Baltrhein’s coffers to fund a costly war, et cetera). The message is quite clear: as a statesman/woman, it’s imperative to separate one’s personal sentiments from his/her job as clean as possible; or else he/she will suffer grave consequences as a result; it doesn’t care what kind of personal morality or quirks you have, it decides that you’re finished when you let them dictate your actions (although still, being shonen manga, Mahmut as the protagonist still gets more ‘redemption’ than most...). Despite it being a value that is somewhat a bit foreign and outdated in manga world, (especially when considering the modern world’s worship of Romanticism and animanga’s reputation as one of the most expressive medium of storytelling), this subtle nuance is what separates SnA from another works in the same medium, even the ones with the same umbrella genre of historical fiction.

It’s this whole nuance that the anime failed to capture in its entirety, thus creating an underwhelmingly generic show of shonen adventure that moves because of Hero vs. Villain plot based on black-and-white morality. The drastic change they did to Lucio’s character, the character that I thought of as the ‘It’ standard of the manga’s reward-and-punishment system, presented this error clearer especially when combined with their hideous portrayal of Mahmut throughout the series already realized by a lot of other manga reader. In the anime, I didn’t see the realpolitik-savvy, confidently prudent Doge that I know and admire. In here, I saw a man so insecure about his own political inclinations that his most trusted subordinate deliberately hid a crucial intel in anticipation of an error in his judgement.

As this is already quite long, here are some screenshots to ponder on. Go figure.

Manga:

An elaborate, brilliant piece of roasting that we never knew we needed, yet the anime never gives

Anime:

Seriously? That’s all?? How about.. the Magistros’ death?

Totally blindsided by an unanticipated jab on your personal sentiments thanks to some missing intels, possibly showing your weakness and incompetence in front of foreign politicians and your own subordinates. Fun indeed.

Um... I think this is not a matter of personal preferences anymore... do you really not trust each other that much??

....Who are you, and what have you done to Lucio?

#shoukoku no altair #the eight episode #long post

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shadowsong26fic · 7 years

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So when you say you ship obianidala, do you mean, like, obi-wan and padme have feelings for each other and padme has a relationship with both obi-wan and anakin? I just really don't like obikin because the power dynamic is really messed up. Obi-wan raised Anakin. And sure, they started working together more as equals, but obi-wan is still an authority figure in anakin's life. He still calls him master in rots. Obi-wan called Anakin his brother, but he's still a much older brother who raised him.

Soooooo my answer turned out to be really, really long, talking about what works for me in the various subdynamics of the OT3 here XD.

Uh, short answer: when I say I ship something, I don’t necessarily mean all the time in every timeline it is the best of all possible worlds? There are definitely ships I can only ship in certain AU contexts (example: in ATLA, I can only ship Zutara in an AU that diverges from canon no later than Crossroads of Destiny). Also, I very, very rarely ship OT3s in general (example: I am one of the like two people in the Leverage fandom that doesn’t ship the OT3). But Obianidala is one of the few OT3s that works for me at all, whether as a full triad or as a vee of some kind.

Anyway, in terms of the three possible romantic sub-pairings (Anidala, Obikin, Obidala), the only one I ship by itself is Anidala. And, honestly, I actually ship them as a pair more than I ship Obianidala, for the most part (though, like, ideally Obi-Wan is always part of their life/dynamic/etc., just not necessarily as a romantic partner for either of them?). This has a lot to do with my personal history with these characters and their relationships and various broad shipping culture things. Especially in terms of the Obikin arm of the triad–I’ve gone back and forth on it a lot as a SW/prequels fan. In part for the power dynamic issues you mentioned, and in part because of personal Feelings I have about the way platonic love tends to be treated as something Lesser Than romantic love, and the two of them (or the way people shipped them, or something about this dynamic) used to hit that button for me really, really hard. But at this point, I like/can work with any of the potential OT3 variants where the Anidala arm is present (i.e., full triad, Anakin-centered vee, Padme-centered vee).

[This is all, of course, assuming canon/a near-canon AU—I don’t really write/am not super interested in Total AUs like modern day/coffee shop/whatever so I can’t really comment on those. And a canon-divergent AU with a significant/early enough breakpoint changes the potentially hinky dynamics and therefore at least some of my feelings/opinions on the subject. On a purely personality basis, though (i.e., in a not-necessarily-near-canon AU, or with the right post-ROTS AU setup), yes, I ship them in any of the three permutations mentioned above. As I mentioned before, they’re one of like two OT3s I ship at all.]

All right, this is already super long and I have like at least 1k words worth of more detail (about the triad as a whole, about Obikin, about Obidala). So we’re going behind a cut. For the purposes of this discussion, I’m classifying ‘near-canon AU’ [henceforth abbreviated as NCAU] as one where no significant plot changes up to AOTC have occurred (i.e., Anakin still grows up in the Temple as Obi-Wan’s apprentice and Padme’s life during those ten years follows much the same trajectory).

So, to start, for the Obidala arm—this one’s hard for me to make it actually work without being part of some form of triad in canon/NCAU, mostly because of the way Anakin fits in with each of the others individually (regardless of whether his dynamic with Obi-Wan is romantic or platonic). Also, we don’t really see the two of them interact much in canon without Anakin being either there or the conversation somehow being about Anakin (which is one of the things I wish we’d gotten more of in TCW…). That being said, I do find their (potential) dynamic very, very compelling? They both…hmmm, I’m trying to figure out how to word this. They have a lot in common, in terms of worldview, interests, how they approach complex problems (though Padme tends to be very “fight me” and Obi-Wan tends to be more “…well that escalated quickly time to jump off a building”)—and they both really, really love to argue/debate in a way that would make the parts where they do disagree a lot of fun for them. Or something? I’m not articulating this well (again, in part due to the lack of canon foundation, also I haven’t explored this arm as much as I feel like I should; certainly not to the point where I could explain why I like it), but…they just work together, you know?

Anyway, apart from their separate relationships with Anakin making it hard for them to be an exclusive romantic couple [at least in canon or an NCAU], the main problem with this pairing, for me, is getting the relationship started. Like, don’t get me wrong—Padme jumps off that cliff in AOTC just as hard as Anakin does; she’s just as attracted to him as he is to her; the only reason she doesn’t make the first move is because she has like 2% more impulse control (and 100% more mental stability) than he does and I will fight anyone who says otherwise/attempts to push that ‘he accidentally mind-controlled her into loving him’ headcanon in my face. …which is another discussion for another day, sorry). And, I mean, I am of the firm opinion that she had THE BIGGEST CRUSH on Obi-Wan for a while, and if they’d reconnected slightly differently somewhere along the way…but that would not be an NCAU. But even given her probable crush and her hopeless romanticism and her less-than-perfect impulse control, it would play out very differently with Obi-Wan than with Anakin.

For starters, he’s not the type to make the first move or any kind of declaration/confession the way Anakin does in canon (or so I assume based on the way things Satine play out). And he’s a lot more reserved and better/clearer about boundaries (as discussed elsewhere re: the full triad dynamic), so she wouldn’t necessarily do it either (even given the lack of impulse control) without major external forces pushing the issue. Basically, it would take a mutual near-death experience or something to make it happen [or, alternatively, a situation like with Satine only Padme actually would ask him to stay at the end of that year–but, again, that would probably not be an NCAU]. But once they get past that first stumbling block, they would be the power couple to end all power couples. Like IDK if I can articulate it, just. Damn. I mean, I don’t think they would actually conquer the galaxy, but only because neither of them really wants to. Because they absolutely could.

[Incidentally, I don’t actually feel a mutual near-death experience (like in canon with the arena) would have been necessary in the end for Anidala to happen, because they’re both extremely stubborn/passionate people, extremely into one another (fight me), they’ve at least acknowledged this/floated the idea of being together, and neither of them is good at impulse control; it would just be a different (and probably healthier) way/pace for their relationship to develop. Also, ALL OF THE MUTUAL PINING until something finally gave. Like, I can’t write it because courtship narratives aren’t really in my wheelhouse but I would read the HELL out of a fic like that.]

Anyway, clearly, a Padme-centered vee works for me ^_^. I think it would still take a mutual near-death experience, and I think Anakin would have to be there when it happened (because of his issues with jealousy etc.; I mean that subplot in ROTS was stupid and I’m very glad it got cut, but he is clingy and possessive and insecure, especially when it comes to these two. If he was there from the start, though, I think he would very much be Shipper On Deck. Possibly to the point of actively shoving them at one another with all the subtlety of a brick [b/c then he can keep them BOTH]. And this is a Happy Endings type post, so we’re gonna go with that).

Moving on; for the Obikin arm (and also sort of blending into the idea of an Anakin-centered vee or full triad)–basically, the way I view it is this: Anakin has two soulmates (and a parasite, but this particular discussion is not about Palpatine and how he fits into things). Whether these relationships are platonic (because I do absolutely believe in platonic soulmates) or romantic depends on a lot of different factors. Generally speaking, in a near-canon timeline, I tend to go with Anakin and Obi-Wan’s relationship is platonic, and his relationship with Padme is romantic; mostly because of the power dynamic issue you mentioned. And, because of that (as well as because Anidala was p. much my first OTP ever, to the point where before I really knew fanfic was a Thing I wrote a really, really terrible serial-numbers-filed-off story that was basically Padme turning up at Yavin), it is really, really difficult for me to be sold on Obikin by itself, so to speak. It’s not a hard no for me, the way shipping Obi-Wan with Qui-Gon is, but it’s not really my thing.

That being said, romantic Obikin can work for me, assuming they reach some kind of new equilibrium post-ROTS (either without Anakin becoming Vader, or potentially some form of Sith!Obi-Wan AU, though I’m less interested in that without it being an Empress Amidala AU as well and then we’re back to an OT3 of some form). I wouldn’t write it pre- or mid-ROTS, though I don’t necessarily mind reading it, at least from certain authors. But basically, either via an Epiphany Moment or (more likely) a slow maturation process, these two (especially Anakin) need to get to a point where the power dynamic issue is softened for it to work for me. I think they can get to that point, and their relationship can shift in that direction (which I think is part of why Qui-Gon/Obi-Wan is a hard no for me, because I don’t think the two of them ever could). Anyway, the only NCAU [that I’ve talked about here, at least] I’d really do even post-ROTS Obikin (whether as an Anakin-focal vee or full-triad Obianidala) is Distaff, and that depends a lot on which way Obi-Wan’s plotline goes after the shit hits the fan (and even the option that could very well lead there might not). So that’s not a 100% thing right now, just a maybe. It’s not going to be a thing in Precipice. (I ship Obi-Wan with someone else in that AU, anyway.)

In addition to all of that, for an Anakin-centered vee or a true triad—I’m not sure I can articulate it properly, but there was a meta post/thread I was following a few days ago that I’m not sure I can find again that went into details about this—anyway, the dynamics involved with the three of them actually work really well? If I can dig up the link I’ll add it, but this thread basically boiled down to: Anakin and Obi-Wan (leaving aside the potential power dynamic issue) have major issues with communication; and Anakin and Padme have major issues with boundaries. Putting the three of them together helps mitigate that to a significant degree. Plus, y’know, I adore Anakin, really I do, but he is a lot to handle for one person/a single primary relationship, even one who loves him as much as Padme and/or Obi-Wan, so having both of them involved (and everyone communicating properly/laying down appropriate boundaries) really helps take some of that pressure off the two of them (and Anakin, but in a different way). (Related note: part of why Anakin is (relatively) stable in Precipice is because he has an increasingly wide set of close relationships/support system.)

Also, whether both relationships are romantic or not, Anakin really needs both Padme and Obi-Wan in his life in some way. So, like, for me personally, the ideal pipe-dream post-ROTS happy ending involves the three of them running off into the sunset together (so to speak; I think they would all get hopelessly bored trying to retire and that part would last all of five minutes), and exactly who is romantically and/or sexually (as opposed to platonically) involved with who (beyond, as I said, romantic Anidala being very close to my heart/important to me) matters a little less at that point. (That aspect, I think, is probably related to this whole ‘romantic love is not greater than platonic love’ button I have.)

Buuuuuut that’s all in canon/NCAUs. Like I said before, once we set an earlier/more significant breakpoint, it’s a different story. I am specifically aiming for (probably) a true triad Obianidala (though it might end up being a vee) in Auxiliaries, (not sure if the notes on last night’s update may have sparked your question?) but that AU breaks off much earlier, as of TPM, and Anakin doesn’t actually end up in the Temple to be raised by Obi-Wan, so that issue isn’t there. At which point it’s…like, okay, I’ll be honest, I used to have issues with Obikin not necessarily because of the power dynamic, but because it hit my aforementioned ‘platonic love is JUST AS VALID/IMPORTANT/POWERFUL as romantic love’ button pretty hard. Right now, though, my view on the subject has sort of settled as–the two of them are so tangled up with each other (again, soulmates of some flavor) that I don’t particularly care about romantic vs. platonic where they’re concerned for that particular reason. Past a certain point of character/relationship development, anyway, as mentioned above.

So, in an AU like Auxiliaries (where Anakin grows up on Tatooine, meets Obi-Wan once briefly in his early teens, and then they reconnect early in the Clone Wars when they’re both adults), it would probably take a lot of effort to make their relationship not become romantic and/or sexual at some point. (Related note that I don’t think I’ve mentioned before: Anakin tends to read, to me, as very demi and biromantic; that probably contributes to some of my views here). And, you know, the OT3 in that AU might well start with Obi-Wan and Padme sort of dancing around one another in some way, whether they’ve had their requisite Mutual Near Death Experience yet or not, and then Anakin meshes with both of them and things just sort of go from there, though I haven’t made up my mind on that yet.

(Also, an AU where Anakin didn’t end up in the Temple but TPM otherwise went as in canon, he’d probably grow up on Naboo and, despite still being largely an Anidala shipper at heart, the romantic-vs-platonic dynamic between these two relationships would do a total 180 for me. I probably wouldn’t actually write an AU like that for a number of reasons, but…anyway. Figured it bore mentioning.)

…so that was a 2k+ ramble about PT OT3 dynamics, lol. Most of this will probably never actually make it to the foreground of anything I write, tbh. Because whatever I feel about these character dynamics aside…the fact is most of what I write tends to not be shipping fic, precisely. As in, (like I mentioned before) I don’t really like writing courtship narratives/stories where the romantic pairing and their relationship is The Plot. Distaff is really the closest I come to it. Which is not to say that these romantic and/or platonic relationships aren’t super important, just…it’s probably never going to be a real focus for me. Well, portions of Auxiliaries will, for spoilery reasons, and I might to a Valentine’s Day bonus fic or something, but other than that.

I have no idea if I actually answered your question XD Uh, feel free to follow up? Or give me your thoughts, or ask me something unrelated…

#asked #answered #edftwinry #shadowsong writes star wars #shadowsong26fic

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paraxdisepink · 7 years

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I personally think that one of the more fascinating aspects about the Steve & Bucky dynamic IS how dysfunctional it is, especially now in the future, after all the trauma, separation, forced reunion etc. It'd be amazing if that were explored and they'd deal with their issues and see what happens. Steve is one mess of a person who needs serious help to get his personal shit together, but he's only allowed to be Captain America superhero so they'll never let him properly deal with anything.

That’s very true, and I agree too that their relationship is more interesting than fandom or the MCU lets it be.

What I don’t like is that you have this canon character who, as you say, is a complete mess, but somehow that gets ignored by fandom and in fanon he’s suddenly this perfect understanding sensitive boyfriend. Like no. He’s a self-involved, insensitive, self-righteous fuckface who you could argue uses people. No amount of attraction to Chris Evans or pretending that mcu Steve is some kind of minority representation (because his comic creators were Jewish) will change this. (I mean that mcu Steve himself is not Jewish, not that the representation of Jewish people isn’t important to represent)

Also, there’s the fact that IMO fandom doesn’t talk about Steve’s shitty behavior because they do the thing where it doesn’t occur to them that Bucky should demand to be treated well by Steve, because he’s a disabled/a male trauma survivor and a lot of fandom plays into that shitty notion that Steve is doing him some kind of favor by loving him in spite of these things. They even romanticize it. (I can understand him feeling that way sometimes, but not fandom glorifying it) It’s the same as how fandom often can’t treat Bucky like an equal, or even his own person, or anything but the lesser/weaker/subservient part of the relationship because they can’t conceive of a disabled person/male trauma survivor as a real man. So there’s a whole bunch of things going that that makes ignoring some of Steve’s problems a problem.

But I agree. It would be amazing to see them deal with their issues in an honest and truthful way. If Steve has romantic feelings for Bucky, I believe he is in deep denial about them or hasn’t figured them out. I really think that for a long time he had issues with his masculinity (which is understandable and not his fault) and may have willfully dismissed attraction to Bucky as wanting to be like him. If Bucky has romantic feelings for Steve, they don’t seem to be a big priority right now and he seems more invested in getting HYDRA out of his head (also understandable, and not his fault). The thing about Steve though is that the qualities that make him heroic in like a battle of good and evil and are qualities that would be disastrous in a personal relationship. He’s uncompromising, he’s convinced he’s right, he’s stoic and determined when the moment calls for being warm and kind. And for like the thousandth time, comics Steve does not treat Bucky like this at all. He’s always warm and kind, even when Bucky is being frustrating (which is a lot). The scenes were right there. All the Russos had to do was use his actual characterization. MCU Bucky has better personal relationship qualities than Steve, IMO, we’ve known him to be selfless, kind, generous, etc, but once he gets past his more immediate HYDRA problems, we don’t know what other issues he have developed.

But in order for Steve to unravel some of his own dysfunction and learn and improve for his own sake and Bucky’s, Bucky will have to not put up with some of Steve’s crap. It can’t work if people act like Bucky’s just supposed to be grateful for whatever he gets, and should Bucky decide to leave all Steve’s shitty friends gang up and harrass/threaten him because STEEBBBIEE!! and Bucky is soooooo scawed Natasha will kill him if he doesn’t bend over for Steve ASAP.

Ahem.

Yes. But it’s hard to tell an honest and truthful story about actually interesting characters when most of the scenes are just set-up for the next fight scene. I mean I want Steve to be the good caring boyfriend. I’m rooting for him in my way. Their story really would be very interesting if could actually be told.

#mcu steve is an asshole #bucky talk #Anonymous

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topicprinter · 6 years

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Link to part one: https://www.reddit.com/r/Entrepreneur/comments/7wg76u/the_things_i_learned_from_joining_a_startup/Here's the second part:Let’s be honest — ‘sweet beginnings’ doesn’t exactly apply here. Sure, startups are exciting at first, but most people becoming entrepreneurs suffer from the what the heck is next syndrome.Yup.Think it’s not a real thing?Ask the 90% of businesses that fail in the first year, or the plenty of MBA’s out there that end up realizing that the market doesn’t give a shit about their degree.Ask the entrepreneurs that gained 40 pounds of stress, and simply don’t feel like functional human beings. They dropped everything for the glory but all they keep whispering to themselves: what. the f***. am. I. doing?Take a cliche example: Elon Musk. Why do you think everyone around him is able to become successful in their ventures? Kimbal Musk, Elon’s brother is the co-founder of Square Roots- or Elon’s cousins, the founders at SolarCity.The truth is, Elon know’s this world like the back of his hand, after being acclimated of course.No one’s an exception. Feel like you might have this syndrome?My goal here is to rid you of these nags so you know exactly what you should be doing for the next year as an entrepreneur — so you don’t walk a long hallway, in the dark, with a slippery staircase at the end.Everything below will apply to you whether you’re building an app, a physical product, or trying to sell 21st-century lemonade.If there is anything I wish I read when I first started this journey — this is it.You might have already started things up.Stressed? Wanting to just skim through and get to the ‘good stuff’?. I’m letting you know right now that this isn’t going to be some magic pill, because there is always some level of certainty.Nevertheless, you’ll be in good hands at the end.El beginningOK so you’ve got an idea/dream/goal. So what?Some have a preconceived notion that you need to start thinking about the problem it solves, or bartering you to search for other things because “I think I’ve seen this somewhere already”.Load. Of. Crap.Before you make another thought or say another word to anyone else: start sketching/writing/designing your thoughts. Do it in one sitting, and just spit out whatever you have in your head into physicality as soon as possible.The Cabrero was floating in my head for months before I even started to sketch anything! Some people walk this earth for years dreading over idea without even once placing pen to paper. Not to mention the ones that say [place a successful company here] was one of their idea’s, yeah whatever.Simply, the goal here is to get a starting point, dreading over your big idea and altering it in your head is not a starting point.El grand design When designing your product — stop solving your problem and start empathizing with others to solve their problems.You often find entrepreneurs getting a false sense of confidence that they have a great product, when really, the only problem they are solving is their own. The trick is to take away any preconceived notions one may have and just listen.For example, if you’re trying to produce a device that will reduce the workload on coffee farmers, logically then, you need to go speak to coffee farmers. What are their biggest challenges? The tiniest details of your customers lives might be of vital importance to how you design your product.The thinking process needs to start in general terms and get more and more specific over time. You’ll likely need to bargain people with “free [anything relevant]” so that you a relevant basis of people to work with, and of course so that they actually come. Online forums, relevant subreddits, and even reaching out to your own social media circles are great.With Cabrero the first research phase went like this:How often do you drink coffee? Do you enjoy the outdoors? List some pain points you have when you try to have coffee outdoors? We then followed up with the same people whose responses were relevant to Cabrero:What was the last thing you’ve purchased? What was the cost? Do you brew your coffee at home? If yes with what, if not — where do you get your coffee? Finally you’ll come to something like this:Cindy is a badass, she enjoys coffee when she’s out in the NYC streets, but also loves to have it when she’s climbing mountains in the Netherlands.What is her morning routine like when she exits her tent? What kind of gear does she carry? Is the gear high end for comfort, making up for rough use and conditions..? Does Cindy hike alone? Would she be making coffee for everyone? Etc. Etc. Coming up with a creative design isn’t easy. With Cabrero — I knew that my goal was to create a barista quality cup in a portable device, but sitting there trying to fully ‘think’ the process through wasn’t enough. I needed to find a way to be creative.In reality, if you ever face a creative obstacle its important to empty the mind. Have you noticed how your most creative ideas are formed in the shower? the mind empties and goes beyond your pre-conceived notions of how things should be- your mind accepts the absurd, and you’ll soon find your creative answer.Los dream team A vital step in the process is team creation. I’ve placed this section here simply because it’s best to form your A-team early on, yet you want to (at the least) have a well thought idea that can bring others on board.Fact: your team IS your company,Fact: the wrong dynamics lead to failure.Fact: the right team is the number one reason for success.I tend to be egoistic on many levels- — because, well for the lack of a better term my ‘alpha’ personality was a ghost hunting me. Never trusting anyone to do the job correctly, I’ve been like that my whole life, but no matter how ‘good’ you think are, you can’t get everything done yourself.Don’t even think about it. You will fail.In my experience, I’ve jumped around quite a bit until I found a complementing cofounder to Cabrero. Many months were lost —but jumping to a decision isn’t the way to go.When choosing teammates you’ve got to hit some major check-marks:Sit down and figure out the most important skills you’re lacking. For example if you’re a tech company with no developer? the logical question to ask here is: “are you f***ing kidding me?”.Choosing the right skills is actually second to being absolutely sure that this next person understands and believes in your vision. Conflicting views on the future of the company will destroy you. Make sure you’re on the same page with the amount of time/money that this person is willing to spend, whether or not you’ll be accepting VC funding, or whether they are willing to adapt when (and yes it is a when, not an if) you start running into problems.El dinero There are four main ways in which you can fund your startup: VC (venture capital), Accelerators/Incubators, Crowdfunding, and bootstrapping. Up until this point, throw out any sort of idea’s for getting any third party money coming your way and focus on counting your sardines and being able to sustain yourself and your future company for at least 6 months.I used to romanticize living in a studio apartment with three other people, working and eating Ramen noodles for breakfast/lunch/dinner. I won’t get into what you should be eating. Just know that your Ramen fantasy will stand at the cost of your health and productivity — frankly, if you’re even worth your two cents as an entrepreneur you should be able to easily make that extra $50 bucks a week to eat like a normal person.Now, what if you start running out of money (likely scenario)?Remember you A-team…This is where you find out how good your team really is. You can translate the team skills towards doing something else —like a temporary fix, that will allow you to stay afloat while you try to figure the mess out.You’ll be testing your own skills too, because if you’re the entrepreneur and if this is your company, you better be good at making the right decision.And you better do it quickly.As far as outside funding goes, a VC won’t take you seriously until you have a solid proof that there is interest in your company, and crowdfunding should be left alone until you have an MVP (minimal viable product).…and isn’t that a good segue to the next thought.Building el minimumRemember the design process? It didn’t stop there. Because now..You’ve gotta build the thing so the thing does.Start building the minimum through any means possible so you spend the least amount of money and time. There are multiple advantages to doing so:If you crash you crash hard and fast — you’re essentially avoiding the same outcome that gets worse the longer you push it. You’ll also quickly gain a ticket to move onto the next thing. You get to quickly showcase what you have to your desired market and alternate if needed The idea’s above are demonstrated in depth by Eric Reis in The Lean Startup.Getting el right attention With attention spans shorter than goldfish, it feels impossible to get people’s attention. But getting your true initial validation is a HUGE stepping stone to overcome.Oftentimes you’ll hear people say “that looks/sounds super awesome” — IT IS a good sign, and IT IS more likely that sentence is actually true with the more people you get saying it. But a VC wouldn’t trust it — and neither should you.To get true validation you need to ask people to invest something. It can be time, money, and email address — whatever it is.First, we need to first understand a certain principle called the diffusion of innovations. I was first introduced to this idea while getting feedback on the Cabrero pitch from Zoltan Szalas, he is the Co-Founder at Croissant — an innovative co-working company and graduate of 500 Startups.The diffusion of innovation is a theory that demonstrates the spread of idea’s in time.Reference picture: http://sbccimplementationkits.org/urban-youth/wp-content/uploads/sites/9/2015/09/diffusion-of-innovations.pngAll we care about right now are the innovators.Who are they and why do they matter?Innovators are the first people that will be there through thick and thin trying to be on board with what you’re doing. Now don’t forget Cindy here. Since you’ve been designing for her this whole time, your company identity needs to fall under who she is, because guess what? Cindy is your innovator.You should know Cindy like you’re best friends — in fact, draw her.Take ChowHound (social foodie recipes) as an example, here’s a demonstration for how they acquired their first customers:Her name is Nancy, she’s a modern conundrum — Nancy LOVES using technology but also cooks like she is a stay at home mom with four kids. Nancy lives in new York & while some people from the south may call her a communist hippie, she still holds onto conservative values — as she remembers the beautiful dishes that her mother used to cook and wants to be that for her family as well. Nancy is deep secret of ChowHound, she was cooked up in their little lab as their perfect costumer. The hard part is out, now the guys at ChowHound need to go find where Nancy hangs out online, and lure her into their cave that can only survive on the delicious recipes of its own dinner. While ChowHound grew really well — its not really surprising to see a bunch of people who love to share their food skills other than Instagram that is only image based. Imagine trying to sell those same recipes — you now have a whole different person named Drew that loves cooking but also has no clue what he is doing &… So you reverse engineer further down the line — you find both Nancy and Drew, thereby luring Drew into checking out ChowHound and signing up for a weekly “hello que paso?” email. Meanwhile, Nancy is making her stuff and when she’s done Drew gets his email, “WHAT !!! CHOCOLATE SHRIMP!??”. So, Drew goes absolutely crazy for Nancy’s recipe, buys it and the whole cycle begins again but this time with Joe as Nancy and Rogan as Drew. Nancy and her Chocolate Shrimp is the reason ChowHound has been able to do so well acquiring their target audience — they knew them from the start.Innovators — Join el rideThus far, we’ve been able to achieve direction. Pat yourself on the back. At the end of the day, no matter how much money or effort you spend, if you’re not even facing the rim there’s absolutely zero chance you’ll hit the shot.Now that you have a direction and the MVP that will absolutely blow our innovators away, you need to form a presence.If you were selling shoes in the 1950’s you’d open up a store so people had a place to go and actually buy your shoes. Likewise, the place where people shall find you today is at your website. Specifically, through your landing page.Most large website builders will do, but, save yourself the headache of a fully personalized page through WordPress and just use Leadpages instead. It’s free, intuitive, and versatile enough to do the perfect job for what you currently need.So what’s a landing page?It’s essentially a way to build your website in the simplest way to market your mvp, with the sole goal of having a visitor do just one thing: sign up.Anything you provide on the landing page needs to enhance the need for signing up, and anything that strays away from that goal needs to be scrapped.Besides designing the page with your innovators in mind, here are three major pointers to keep in mind:The fewer clicks and information a visitor needs to provide, the better. As soon as a visitor see’s your page they need to know exactly what it is you are doing with a full page picture and very short & on point description. Your sign up button/form needs to be seen well Decrease the loading time of your website. Check your load time and how to fix it using the pingdom tool here. Hubspot put together a great list of examples for landing pages here.The reason for why you’re asking for people to sign up to an email list is because it separates your message from all the noise online -thereby providing the largest return on your investment (ROI).https://neilpatel.com/blog/email-marketing-case-studies-how-4-companies-increased-their-open-rates/Remember, you’re trying to be lean — expensive facebook/google ads, SEO, Influencer marketing, and etc. are out of the picture for now — oh, and email is king! Use MailChimp to build your list, it has all the qualities of Leadpages :)Other than building a great landing page, your presence needs to be heard in other online mediums that already have an audience — the actual places where you should be is unique to your business.If you’re trying to reach older professionals, LinkedIn. Skateboarding millennials, Instagram. Teenage girls, Tumblr.The basic point is this: find out where your innovators may hang out, and double down on the places that perform best for your business.Most things you’ll read today will probably end on that note — and you’re then left sitting there, yet again thinking, “yeah but, what’s the thing that I’m doing that I’m doubling down on? Why can’t you finish the damn sentence”.OK. let’s figure that out here. It’s a golden rule that I’ve figured out, and it can be used as a tool that can be applied anywhere (don’t worry I’ll provide examples too). You’ll use your forsaking lack of money to your advantage:Do what no one else is willing to do.When competing with larger, established businesses — I’d bet all my bitcoins that they have zero interest in minor winnings and would rather spend their money to be more efficient, with bigger gains (and it’s totally fine).But in your situation, doing shit that no one else wants to do is where you shall win for the time being.Presence on Instagram? Cool, reach out to your followers personally, one by one. Working on SEO? Cool, reach out to others on who shared similar articles and ask them to share yours too, because its better. Offering your agency services on UpWork? Cool, work for a dollar with stellar results for the next 6 months. Stand outside and advertise if you have to.Whatever it is, just do it smart and see what gets you the best results.Testingos ResultingosAs an analytically oriented person — there’s nothing that turns me on more than hard data (no pun intended).Intuition is likely to fail in the long term, and protecting yourself through data is key. A major part of marketing has grown out of this idea, called growth hacking.In short, you brainstorm unique idea’s on how you could get more sign up, test, alternate, and repeat. Before you start, install google analytics on your landing page. After you do so, you can start testing your results — google analytics will give you everything you need — where the traffic came from, age, bounce rate and much more.Final Note Like I said, this should keep you busy for the next year. And although you should now be well off on your way, here’s the most important note:The startup world has its own Ying and Yang, and you need to know when to push, and when you should take a step back. The road is long, and creating balance in your life is key.Get rid of any clutter in your life, schedule your time, exercise.Ultimately, never let your environment take control, rather, have full control of your mind.Keep hustling, enjoy your life, and continue creating great things.Content upgrade: I’ve started Cabrero with the sole goal of allowing people to get away from the daily insanity of life and to find balance.Consider checking it out!

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topicprinter · 6 years

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Link to part one: https://www.reddit.com/r/startups/comments/7wg5xp/the_things_i_learned_from_joining_a_startup/Here's the second part:Let’s be honest — ‘sweet beginnings’ doesn’t exactly apply here. Sure, startups are exciting at first, but most people becoming entrepreneurs suffer from the what the heck is next syndrome.Yup.Think it’s not a real thing?Ask the 90% of businesses that fail in the first year, or the plenty of MBA’s out there that end up realizing that the market doesn’t give a shit about their degree.Ask the entrepreneurs that gained 40 pounds of stress, and simply don’t feel like functional human beings. They dropped everything for the glory but all they keep whispering to themselves: what. the f***. am. I. doing?Take a cliche example: Elon Musk. Why do you think everyone around him is able to become successful in their ventures? Kimbal Musk, Elon’s brother is the co-founder of Square Roots- or Elon’s cousins, the founders at SolarCity.The truth is, Elon know’s this world like the back of his hand, after being acclimated of course.No one’s an exception. Feel like you might have this syndrome?My goal here is to rid you of these nags so you know exactly what you should be doing for the next year as an entrepreneur — so you don’t walk a long hallway, in the dark, with a slippery staircase at the end.Everything below will apply to you whether you’re building an app, a physical product, or trying to sell 21st-century lemonade.If there is anything I wish I read when I first started this journey — this is it.You might have already started things up.Stressed? Wanting to just skim through and get to the ‘good stuff’?. I’m letting you know right now that this isn’t going to be some magic pill, because there is always some level of certainty.Nevertheless, you’ll be in good hands at the end.El beginningOK so you’ve got an idea/dream/goal. So what?Some have a preconceived notion that you need to start thinking about the problem it solves, or bartering you to search for other things because “I think I’ve seen this somewhere already”.Load. Of. Crap.Before you make another thought or say another word to anyone else: start sketching/writing/designing your thoughts. Do it in one sitting, and just spit out whatever you have in your head into physicality as soon as possible.The Cabrero was floating in my head for months before I even started to sketch anything! Some people walk this earth for years dreading over idea without even once placing pen to paper. Not to mention the ones that say [place a successful company here] was one of their idea’s, yeah whatever.Simply, the goal here is to get a starting point, dreading over your big idea and altering it in your head is not a starting point.El grand design When designing your product — stop solving your problem and start empathizing with others to solve their problems.You often find entrepreneurs getting a false sense of confidence that they have a great product, when really, the only problem they are solving is their own. The trick is to take away any preconceived notions one may have and just listen.For example, if you’re trying to produce a device that will reduce the workload on coffee farmers, logically then, you need to go speak to coffee farmers. What are their biggest challenges? The tiniest details of your customers lives might be of vital importance to how you design your product.The thinking process needs to start in general terms and get more and more specific over time. You’ll likely need to bargain people with “free [anything relevant]” so that you a relevant basis of people to work with, and of course so that they actually come. Online forums, relevant subreddits, and even reaching out to your own social media circles are great.With Cabrero the first research phase went like this:How often do you drink coffee? Do you enjoy the outdoors? List some pain points you have when you try to have coffee outdoors? We then followed up with the same people whose responses were relevant to Cabrero:What was the last thing you’ve purchased? What was the cost? Do you brew your coffee at home? If yes with what, if not — where do you get your coffee? Finally you’ll come to something like this:Cindy is a badass, she enjoys coffee when she’s out in the NYC streets, but also loves to have it when she’s climbing mountains in the Netherlands.What is her morning routine like when she exits her tent? What kind of gear does she carry? Is the gear high end for comfort, making up for rough use and conditions..? Does Cindy hike alone? Would she be making coffee for everyone? Etc. Etc. Coming up with a creative design isn’t easy. With Cabrero — I knew that my goal was to create a barista quality cup in a portable device, but sitting there trying to fully ‘think’ the process through wasn’t enough. I needed to find a way to be creative.In reality, if you ever face a creative obstacle its important to empty the mind. Have you noticed how your most creative ideas are formed in the shower? the mind empties and goes beyond your pre-conceived notions of how things should be- your mind accepts the absurd, and you’ll soon find your creative answer.Los dream team A vital step in the process is team creation. I’ve placed this section here simply because it’s best to form your A-team early on, yet you want to (at the least) have a well thought idea that can bring others on board.Fact: your team IS your company,Fact: the wrong dynamics lead to failure.Fact: the right team is the number one reason for success.I tend to be egoistic on many levels- — because, well for the lack of a better term my ‘alpha’ personality was a ghost hunting me. Never trusting anyone to do the job correctly, I’ve been like that my whole life, but no matter how ‘good’ you think are, you can’t get everything done yourself.Don’t even think about it. You will fail.In my experience, I’ve jumped around quite a bit until I found a complementing cofounder to Cabrero. Many months were lost —but jumping to a decision isn’t the way to go.When choosing teammates you’ve got to hit some major check-marks:Sit down and figure out the most important skills you’re lacking. For example if you’re a tech company with no developer? the logical question to ask here is: “are you f***ing kidding me?”.Choosing the right skills is actually second to being absolutely sure that this next person understands and believes in your vision. Conflicting views on the future of the company will destroy you. Make sure you’re on the same page with the amount of time/money that this person is willing to spend, whether or not you’ll be accepting VC funding, or whether they are willing to adapt when (and yes it is a when, not an if) you start running into problems.El dinero There are four main ways in which you can fund your startup: VC (venture capital), Accelerators/Incubators, Crowdfunding, and bootstrapping. Up until this point, throw out any sort of idea’s for getting any third party money coming your way and focus on counting your sardines and being able to sustain yourself and your future company for at least 6 months.I used to romanticize living in a studio apartment with three other people, working and eating Ramen noodles for breakfast/lunch/dinner. I won’t get into what you should be eating. Just know that your Ramen fantasy will stand at the cost of your health and productivity — frankly, if you’re even worth your two cents as an entrepreneur you should be able to easily make that extra $50 bucks a week to eat like a normal person.Now, what if you start running out of money (likely scenario)?Remember you A-team…This is where you find out how good your team really is. You can translate the team skills towards doing something else —like a temporary fix, that will allow you to stay afloat while you try to figure the mess out.You’ll be testing your own skills too, because if you’re the entrepreneur and if this is your company, you better be good at making the right decision.And you better do it quickly.As far as outside funding goes, a VC won’t take you seriously until you have a solid proof that there is interest in your company, and crowdfunding should be left alone until you have an MVP (minimal viable product).…and isn’t that a good segue to the next thought.Building el minimumRemember the design process? It didn’t stop there. Because now..You’ve gotta build the thing so the thing does.Start building the minimum through any means possible so you spend the least amount of money and time. There are multiple advantages to doing so:If you crash you crash hard and fast — you’re essentially avoiding the same outcome that gets worse the longer you push it. You’ll also quickly gain a ticket to move onto the next thing. You get to quickly showcase what you have to your desired market and alternate if needed The idea’s above are demonstrated in depth by Eric Reis in The Lean Startup.Getting el right attention With attention spans shorter than goldfish, it feels impossible to get people’s attention. But getting your true initial validation is a HUGE stepping stone to overcome.Oftentimes you’ll hear people say “that looks/sounds super awesome” — IT IS a good sign, and IT IS more likely that sentence is actually true with the more people you get saying it. But a VC wouldn’t trust it — and neither should you.To get true validation you need to ask people to invest something. It can be time, money, and email address — whatever it is.First, we need to first understand a certain principle called the diffusion of innovations. I was first introduced to this idea while getting feedback on the Cabrero pitch from Zoltan Szalas, he is the Co-Founder at Croissant — an innovative co-working company and graduate of 500 Startups.The diffusion of innovation is a theory that demonstrates the spread of idea’s in time.Reference picture: http://sbccimplementationkits.org/urban-youth/wp-content/uploads/sites/9/2015/09/diffusion-of-innovations.pngAll we care about right now are the innovators.Who are they and why do they matter?Innovators are the first people that will be there through thick and thin trying to be on board with what you’re doing. Now don’t forget Cindy here. Since you’ve been designing for her this whole time, your company identity needs to fall under who she is, because guess what? Cindy is your innovator.You should know Cindy like you’re best friends — in fact, draw her.Take ChowHound (social foodie recipes) as an example, here’s a demonstration for how they acquired their first customers:Her name is Nancy, she’s a modern conundrum — Nancy LOVES using technology but also cooks like she is a stay at home mom with four kids. Nancy lives in new York & while some people from the south may call her a communist hippie, she still holds onto conservative values — as she remembers the beautiful dishes that her mother used to cook and wants to be that for her family as well. Nancy is deep secret of ChowHound, she was cooked up in their little lab as their perfect costumer. The hard part is out, now the guys at ChowHound need to go find where Nancy hangs out online, and lure her into their cave that can only survive on the delicious recipes of its own dinner. While ChowHound grew really well — its not really surprising to see a bunch of people who love to share their food skills other than Instagram that is only image based. Imagine trying to sell those same recipes — you now have a whole different person named Drew that loves cooking but also has no clue what he is doing &… So you reverse engineer further down the line — you find both Nancy and Drew, thereby luring Drew into checking out ChowHound and signing up for a weekly “hello que paso?” email. Meanwhile, Nancy is making her stuff and when she’s done Drew gets his email, “WHAT !!! CHOCOLATE SHRIMP!??”. So, Drew goes absolutely crazy for Nancy’s recipe, buys it and the whole cycle begins again but this time with Joe as Nancy and Rogan as Drew. Nancy and her Chocolate Shrimp is the reason ChowHound has been able to do so well acquiring their target audience — they knew them from the start.Innovators — Join el rideThus far, we’ve been able to achieve direction. Pat yourself on the back. At the end of the day, no matter how much money or effort you spend, if you’re not even facing the rim there’s absolutely zero chance you’ll hit the shot.Now that you have a direction and the MVP that will absolutely blow our innovators away, you need to form a presence.If you were selling shoes in the 1950’s you’d open up a store so people had a place to go and actually buy your shoes. Likewise, the place where people shall find you today is at your website. Specifically, through your landing page.Most large website builders will do, but, save yourself the headache of a fully personalized page through WordPress and just use Leadpages instead. It’s free, intuitive, and versatile enough to do the perfect job for what you currently need.So what’s a landing page?It’s essentially a way to build your website in the simplest way to market your mvp, with the sole goal of having a visitor do just one thing: sign up.Anything you provide on the landing page needs to enhance the need for signing up, and anything that strays away from that goal needs to be scrapped.Besides designing the page with your innovators in mind, here are three major pointers to keep in mind:The fewer clicks and information a visitor needs to provide, the better. As soon as a visitor see’s your page they need to know exactly what it is you are doing with a full page picture and very short & on point description. Your sign up button/form needs to be seen well Decrease the loading time of your website. Check your load time and how to fix it using the pingdom tool here. Hubspot put together a great list of examples for landing pages here.The reason for why you’re asking for people to sign up to an email list is because it separates your message from all the noise online -thereby providing the largest return on your investment (ROI).https://neilpatel.com/blog/email-marketing-case-studies-how-4-companies-increased-their-open-rates/Remember, you’re trying to be lean — expensive facebook/google ads, SEO, Influencer marketing, and etc. are out of the picture for now — oh, and email is king! Use MailChimp to build your list, it has all the qualities of Leadpages :)Other than building a great landing page, your presence needs to be heard in other online mediums that already have an audience — the actual places where you should be is unique to your business.If you’re trying to reach older professionals, LinkedIn. Skateboarding millennials, Instagram. Teenage girls, Tumblr.The basic point is this: find out where your innovators may hang out, and double down on the places that perform best for your business.Most things you’ll read today will probably end on that note — and you’re then left sitting there, yet again thinking, “yeah but, what’s the thing that I’m doing that I’m doubling down on? Why can’t you finish the damn sentence”.OK. let’s figure that out here. It’s a golden rule that I’ve figured out, and it can be used as a tool that can be applied anywhere (don’t worry I’ll provide examples too). You’ll use your forsaking lack of money to your advantage:Do what no one else is willing to do.When competing with larger, established businesses — I’d bet all my bitcoins that they have zero interest in minor winnings and would rather spend their money to be more efficient, with bigger gains (and it’s totally fine).But in your situation, doing shit that no one else wants to do is where you shall win for the time being.Presence on Instagram? Cool, reach out to your followers personally, one by one. Working on SEO? Cool, reach out to others on who shared similar articles and ask them to share yours too, because its better. Offering your agency services on UpWork? Cool, work for a dollar with stellar results for the next 6 months. Stand outside and advertise if you have to.Whatever it is, just do it smart and see what gets you the best results.Testingos ResultingosAs an analytically oriented person — there’s nothing that turns me on more than hard data (no pun intended).Intuition is likely to fail in the long term, and protecting yourself through data is key. A major part of marketing has grown out of this idea, called growth hacking.In short, you brainstorm unique idea’s on how you could get more sign up, test, alternate, and repeat. Before you start, install google analytics on your landing page. After you do so, you can start testing your results — google analytics will give you everything you need — where the traffic came from, age, bounce rate and much more.Final Note Like I said, this should keep you busy for the next year. And although you should now be well off on your way, here’s the most important note:The startup world has its own Ying and Yang, and you need to know when to push, and when you should take a step back. The road is long, and creating balance in your life is key.Get rid of any clutter in your life, schedule your time, exercise.Ultimately, never let your environment take control, rather, have full control of your mind.Keep hustling, enjoy your life, and continue creating great things.Content upgrade: I’ve started Cabrero with the sole goal of allowing people to get away from the daily insanity of life and to find balance.Consider checking it out!

#/r/startups #reddit

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