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thrilling-oneway · 1 year

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There’s something about how a lot of project sekai fans approach found family that just. I dunno, rubs me the wrong way i guess? I feel like a lot of people are missing the point.

950 something words of me rambling like hell about frienship under the cut

Sibling HCs are very popular in this fandom and I’m not saying that’s a bad thing (i even have a couple myself) but the way people treat them is very nuclear, and agh I just really feel like you’re missing out on the nuanced platonic relationships that come with found family.

Like found family doesn’t fit conventional “nuclear family” dynamics. That’s the whole point! You can have a deep familial platonic bond with someone but that doesn’t always equate to siblings. I’m talking about this more in a fanon sense, because in game the Tenma’s and Toya consider each other like siblings, but I feel like especially on twitter people are overdoing it, for lack of a better term, with the sibling HCs.

I’m not trying to say it’s bad, have your fun HCs no one’s stopping you, but so many people I’ve seen recently where like every platonic ship they have (especially m/f ones) they consider as a sibling duo/trio/etc. And you are seriously missing the point of found family when you are building a whole extremely nuclear mum/dad/siblings dynamic between cast members. It’s all about the unconventional yet still familial bond. Found family is so good to explore because of the fact it isn’t the “default” family structure. You aren’t quite siblings or don’t have a parent/child dynamic, but you are family!!

Like just to talk about the fact that sibling HCs are something I see constantly with platonic m/f relationships as well. I know not everyone does this but so many people completely write off m/f friendship - either you are a couple or you are siblings. And maybe this is because of heteronormativity and the expectation that men and women who are friends must have underlying romantic interest in the relationship and if they don’t then they’re biologically related but maybe it’s not but still! Don’t overlook it. Normalise platonic m/f relationships they don’t need to be romantic or familial they can just be friends and I feel like this is such an underutilised dynamic in prsk fanon content, which is unusual considering it is so fucking prominent in the game particularly with VBS and WxS.

And even outside of m/f, platonic relationships of all gender combinations within the fandom are so so so overlooked. “But they’re not” okay you can’t just say “they are all besties <3” and get a pass because it feels like you have a very idealistic and blatantly unrealistic idea of how friendship works to the point it feels almost ingenuine. Like placing them all on that same level of frienship when friendship is so nuanced and truthfully you’re not gonna be that close with everyone. You grow distant from people or just never grow that close to people but these interactions can still be incredibly important even if they aren’t connected to a deep personal bond. On the other side of things you can have an extremely deep bond and close attachment to someone and it can be entirely platonic and just platonic. Not romantic not familial not queerplatonic. It’s just friendship and this game is all about platonic relationships even if it does delve into ship tease at times. Literally the theme that ties everything together is unity and friendship and community.

And this is getting offtopic from found family so I now present to you: Wonderlands x Showtime - the unit whose underlying theme is literally found family and I am willing to fight people on this. According to wikipedia (unreliable source, i know), found family is "a non-biologically related group of people established to provide ongoing social support". And while this applies to every unit in the game to some degree, it perfectly describes the WxS dynamic. Yes I know Niigo fits that definition too but their overall dynamic is a lot more centred around emotional support and some of their dynamics are still somewhat detached because of their individual situations and mental health problems. But WxS is about the social support aspect and it is staring you right in the face. Everyone in WxS was a weirdo or outcast or alone in some way but they find solidarity and a place to belong with each other. Nene was too shy and insecure to face people, Emu wanted to be taken seriously, and Rui was shunned and outcast for who he was. Tsukasa had a dream to become a star, Emu found him and hired him so she could fulfil her dream of revitalising the stage, which led to Rui being brought along and finally giving him somewhere where he was accepted, who got Nene to go with him so she could overcome her insecurities and perform again. They have each other when they don't have other people, they support each other in achieving their dreams because they share the same passion even if their goals lie on different paths. And it's just so fucking good. They aren't siblings, they aren't love interests* - they are friends. They are found family by definition and by example and it's not nuclear - it doesn't fit a familial structure at all they aren't siblings, it isn't a parent/guardian-child dynamic. It just is and that's what matters most.

Uhh I'm still bad at ending these things. Platonic relationships in Project SEKAI are important and you shouldn't water them down to fit nuclear family dynamics or idealistic expectations and accept that they have nuance and aren't always going to be perfect without flaws. Also heteronormativity bad, m/f friendship good, WxS is found family and you can anon hate me on that (also that was meant to be part of a different essay that has been in my drafts for months but the demons won).

If you made it this far congrats. I'm sorry you put yourself through reading whatever the fuck this is.

*i know a few of them have ship tease but shhhh it's not nearly as prominent as other units like MMJ/VBS anyway because guess what - the unit is much more focused on the platonic stuff. this is literally why L/n and WxS don't have as clear quote-unquote "most pushed pairings" as other units do because frienship is the main theme for those two units. this is not confirmed at all (according to colopale there is no ship tease in the game) but it doesn't take much to work out.

#idk maybe being into stuff like bat.man and so.nic before prsk kinda fucked me up #this is so messy if you can't read past paragraph 2 i don't blame you i literally wrote this whole thing in one sitting and didn't proofrea #project sekai #mine #it gets longer every paragraph because i gradually became more and more unhinged because god fucking damnit i love friendship #it is SO important #and found family is SO important as well #and OUGH this game is so good at writing platonic relationships #rambles

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magnus-the-maqnificent · 3 years

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Let's Analyze - Alec in CoFA

So, I’ve been seeing plenty of discourse on two of my mutual’s blogs about this topic… so I thought I’d sit down and write another analysis post about my beloved Alec Lightwood cause people are still giving him shit for a book that came out ten years ago 🤦‍♀️

This is gonna be in two parts, and I'm putting both under the cut:

PART 1 - ALEC’S INSECURITIES

So, the first part - how Alec’s insecurities drove him to saying stupid things in CoFA

A quick disclaimer - I’m NOT blaming Alec alone for his and Magnus’s break up. What happened was pretty complicated, and the blame cannot be put on one person alone.

That said, let’s start with Magnus and Alec’s early ‘official’ relationship, in trsom.

These scenes are taken from only the first part of the book, but I’m pretty sure they’re more than enough to get a sense of Alec’s insecurities and all the chinks in their relationship. Throughout the entirety of trsom, we see more bits and pieces of Alec’s insecurities about Magnus’s sexuality, and his past and all the people he might have known - and that’s okay! Insecurities happen, cause brains are stupid like that.

But all of Alec’s insecurities could’ve been laid to rest with a simple conversation. But the conversation never happens. Magnus tends to deflect and change the topic every single time his past is brought up. I understand Magnus’s reasons for hiding his past, of course, but it doesn’t help his relationship with Alec. Magnus hiding a good chunk of his past will inevitably lead to Alec questioning himself - why is he so secretive? Why is he not telling me anything? Does he not trust me? ...and so on.

And when Alec is already feeling insecure in this relationship, this happens - (sorry about the terrible cropping btw)

And then later, while Magnus is talking to Camille,

Now… when people are insecure about something, they get irked at the smallest of things. I’m saying this as an insecure person myself. So now, you've got Alec, who's insecure as fuck, and his vacation with the person he loves got cut short by his ex who refuses to talk to anyone but him, and when they get there, his lover and his lover's ex seem to have obvious chemistry, he gets hit with the reality that his lover has dated several, probably even hundreds of people before him; and he has to leave them alone in a room so they can talk, and then he hears the ex basically just list all his shortcomings - i.e, his mortality, his appearance is compared to some random dead guy (sorry, Will) whom your lover had a crush on, which is just weird, and when you've had enough and open the door, it's to see your lover and his ex, standing close as fuck, and he's! touching! her! face! and! looking! into! her! eyes!

*takes a sip of water* yeahhhh... Alec was straight up having a bad day.

And at this point, a) Alec is still in his first relationship. He didn't get to navigate romance when he was younger, and while there's nothing wrong with that, there weren't exactly cutesy presentations titled 'how to keep your relationships healthy' floating around the internet. Heck, he didn’t know the internet. He didn't know that he had to communicate with Magnus, and it doesn't help that boy avoids conversations about feelings like the plague. And b) at this point, Alec would be facing several negative emotions - insecurity, obviously. Hurt. Helplessness, because of his mortality. Fear, that he might not live up to Magnus’s past lovers. Jealousy at seeing Magnus and Camille so close.

Negative emotions like these often tend to show up as anger or sorrow... and in Alec’s case, that would be anger. Which leads us to THIS- (🙈)

*sighs in second-hand embarrassment*

*drinks more water*

*this is gonna be so hard aksjakak*

So. Alec dealt with his insecurities... by being a mean, mean bitch to Magnus :/

Let's break this scene down, slowly, bit by bit.

First, Alec cuts into a conversation between Magnus and Jordan, when Magnus mentions Woolsey Scott, followed the rest of that particular page. To Alec, he's just a figure from Magnus’s past, and a possible lover, though in Alec’s defense Woolsey Scott WAS Magnus’s lover. This is the first instance that we see in which Alec lashes out at Magnus. It seems like he's trying to make a point to Magnus - "I don't know anything about your past, and so I don't know who you've had romances with, but I want to know." Except he makes his point in the worst way possible and ends up slutshaming Magnus.

The "What's true?" line, in response to Jordan saying "so it's true what they say about warlocks, then?" is pretty obvious. Alec is clearly not liking the idea that this random werewolf might know about warlocks, and in particular, his Warlock boyfriend.

Next... ooh boy... Alec basically snaps and in the next few paragraphs accuses Magnus of wanting to flirt with others which... is not a good look on ya honey 😕. These lines are the ones that get him accused of being biphobic... but is he really? I'm gonna talk about that in part 2.

So, in the first paragraph, where Alec makes the comments about Jordan, I find his choice of words pretty... interesting, seeing as 'messy-haired', 'broad-shouldered' and 'chiseled-good-looks' are all used to describe Alec in the series. Not sure if its relevant, but definitely interesting.

And in the next one, where Alec says, "or there are plenty of pretty girls here, since apparently your taste goes both ways. Is there anything you aren't into?" The 'apparently' makes me curious. In rsom, Alec mentions that he's only recently heard of the term bisexual, and there's plenty of time between rsom and cofa, so Alec should be absolutely sure of atleast the basic meaning of bisexuality. But I'm pretty sure it's just inconsistency on cc's part, since if rsom didn't exist, this book would be the first time Alec learns about Magnus’s bisexuality. (Which is obvious when you look at the scene after Magnus reveals that Camille is his girlfriend.) And as for the second sentence, I feel like it's a fallback to earlier in the book when Magnus says (I'm just gonna write the dialogue from memory), "I've dated men, women, warlocks, faeries, vampires, werewolves and even a djinn or two." Here, Alec is angry, and he takes the knowledge that Magnus has dated a variety of people and once again, lashes out.

Looking at all of it together, Alec’s insecurities are definitely a factor in all of this. We know Alec has pretty low self esteem in tmi, and he keeps having irrational thoughts about someone else grabbing Magnus’s attention, like in the trsom scene I've posted above. And he ends up taking out his insecurities on Magnus.

Was it wrong of Alec to say all those things to Magnus? Yes, absolutely. But looking back through all his scenes in cofa, it's easy to see how he could've fallen into the pit trap of emotions.

And before anyone says "but it wasn't addressed in the later books", it was, in CoLS. I’ve hit the image limit, so I'm just gonna type it out -

"[Magnus] said it would be better if he didn’t come. Apparently him and the Seelie Queen have some kind of history."

Isabelle raised her eyebrows.

"Not that kind of history," Alec said irritably. "Some kind of feud. Though," he added, half under his breath, "the way he got around before me, I wouldn't be surprised."

"Alec!" Isabelle dropped back to talk to her brother....

So, there. Alec makes yet another slutshaming comment, Isabelle overhears and is clearly not happy about it, and it's clearly implied that she talks to Alec about it. And Alec doesn't make any more slutshaming comments since then. Boy now knows what he did was wrong, and makes sure not to repeat it again.

Although, I do wish we had more than this. I wish we had more of Magnus and Alec talking about this argument, heck, even about all their arguments and the reasons they broke up, but you can't get everything you want, apparently :(

And now onto the next part...

PART 2 - IS ALEC BIPHOBIC?

The short answer, uh, no, not really.

The long answer.... would be complicated.

So, back in the day, when this discourse was at an all time high, I remember reading a bisexual person's essay about this topic, and they said that this comment from Alec - "or there are plenty of pretty girls here, since apparently your taste goes both ways. Is there anything you aren't into?" - would be a biphobic microagression.

According to Google, a microagression is "a statement, action, or incident regarded as an instance of indirect, subtle, or unintentional discrimination against members of a marginalized group such as a racial or ethnic minority".

And in Alec's case, IF his words were biphobic, they were completely unintentional. They were microagressive. Which is... still bad, of course, but it's more complicated than that.

If you look back on Alec's supposedly biphobic statements, they're more about Magnus’s hypersexuality and promiscuity than anything else. Yes, even the line i mentioned like two paragraphs ago. At first glance it may seem like a direct attack on Magnus’s sexuality, but think over the explanation I gave for the line and it will make sense. And a lot of people know that the whole 'bi people fuck around a lot and are cheaters' thing is a stereotype.

Now, it may seem like I'm going off topic here, but bear with me. I couple of days ago, I watched this video by chance. (Tw for the aids crisis and lots of biphobia, not from the narrator, if you wanna watch the video). Basically, back in the 1980s, bisexual men were scapegoated for spreading aids to the straight community and were vilified by popular media as being promiscuous scepters who would cheat on their wives with gay men and then give aids to their wives. (Yikes 😬). And since bisexuality was practically unheard of before all this (several bisexual activists have stated that all this shit, though unfortunate, pulled bisexuality out of the closet), it's safe to assume that this is how those stereotypes came to be - through 1980s propaganda.

But living with this propaganda is... a very limiting experience. The people who leaned and unlearned and fought against this propaganda are mostly US Americans who grew up with it, either the actual propaganda itself or passed down by their parents. But like I said, it's a very limiting experience. US is but one country out of many, and even for those living in the USA there's a chance that they grew up in a very hush-hush environment. People who grew up hearing all these stereotypes will see it as biphobia, while people who didn't - like Alec, and me, and several other people will not. A lot of people grow up with absolutely no knowledge of the queer community, and chances are that they'll be incredibly confused when a stereotype is pointed out to them, and they often get no more explanation than 'this is a harmful stereotype'. Queer experiences aren't the same for everyone, and while I respect the people who see this as biphobia, they should recognize that there are many people who won't see it that way.

I have seen bisexual people say that Alec's words were biphobic, and I've also seen bisexual people say that they weren't. Thus, there is no clear consensus about whether or not Alec was being biphobic. And like I said earlier, Alec grew up far, far away from mundane anti-queer bigotry. He was essentially a clean slate when it came to knowledge of eer microagressions of any kind, because microagressions and stereotypes are often incredibly specific, don't have anything to do with a person's race/sexuality/gender, etc. and will make zero sense unless you know the history behind them. To Magnus, who lived through the anti-bisexual scapegoating, the words would've definitely stung, but Alec didn't even know the implications he would be making with this words! Of course, the impact is greater than intention, and I imagine Magnus would sit Alec down one day and talk about all this history with him.

And idk if I can even blame cc cause the history of bisexual men is RARELY ever talked about, atleast on the internet.

Also, this scene in cofa is the only instance where he can be interpreted to be biphobic. Nowhere else in all of tmi, and even tec, do we see Alec express hatred or disgust or microagression towards bisexual people. If this was seen in a repeating pattern from Alec, one could argue that he's biphobic... but he isn't. Some might point to some of his internal thoughts in trsom to argue otherwise, but I believe that actions are superior than thoughts.

There's also the thing about unlearning prejudices, but in Alec's case there was hardly anything to be unlearned. The only prejudices he did pick up on were against himself, through vague homophobic comments from Robert.

P.S if you've read this far, I am legally entitled to compensation for thinking of cofa Alec for 48 hours. Put your favorite Alec moments in my askbox cause I wanna focus on his good side now. 😎

But yeah, the main thing here is that Alec has grown from his mistakes, apologized, and hasn't repeated this behavior at all.

And lastly, I just wanted to add - I don't think all this was unintentional on the author's part. She's grown up with the us American queer community, and has mentioned that she has bisexual friends, who have no doubt faced prejudices because of these stereotypes. I think she was trying to condemn making such statements, but a lot of people don't read between the lines and end up misinterpreting it and make both the character and her to be biphobic.

So... TLDR; was what Alec said biphobic? Maybe. It depends on who you're talking to. Is Alec, as a person, biphobic? Nope. Not at all. 😌

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