#I’m sorry I genuinely don’t understand why ppl are criticizing it the way they are | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

chaosandstardust · 2 years

Note

Unfortunately I have a genuine question about Towa from HnY.

Why would she be calling Rin "mother"? Setsuna too to be honest.

I've read your posts once before on adopted kids/ppl but I can't remember how you'd feel about this.

Towa had parents, an adoptive mom and dad. Is it "wrong" of her to call the 13 year old she's never known "mother" just because she found out somehow (I don't know how, I don't watch this shit) that Rin birthed her?

And Setsuna... Setsuna was raised in caves? Was a drifter??? Idfk. Every post I see on her character she's acting differently than the last. But it still seems ooc for her to be interested in Rin at all, let alone calling her "mother". She didn't give a shit about Towa for the longest, I assume she similarly didn't care about P*domaru. Why the sudden interest in middle school mommy?

I WROTE OUT THIS ENTIRE POST AND THEN FUCKING TUMBLR JUST DECIDED TO DELETE IT THIS TOOK DAYS AND I’M PRETTY SURE THE ORIGINAL POST WAS MUCH MORE CONCISE I’M SORRY

And I unfortunately have a genuine answer, LOL!

My overall opinion on this is that I don’t ever feel it’s necessary to police any adopted child’s relationship with their birth parents. There are way too many different situations that would lead to a child being adopted, and way too many varied experiences to narrow them all down. My own experience with adoption is going to be different from others. If Setsuna and Towa want to refer to Rin as mom, I think that’s great for them.

Before we get into it; I like the Sota-Towa dynamic. I definitely don’t think it’s perfect, but they passed the (very low) bar. They did fine. The only reason I didn’t talk about it in my original video was because I wanted to wait to see what they did with them in season 2.

I’m about to go on a roll here, because I’ve been thinking about this ever since they brought Inukag back, and it was clear that they were just going to brush over and ignore Moroha’s feelings towards her biological parents and simplify it into “they’re my bio parents, so they’re better”. I could yell about the Inukagmor dynamic too, but for now, let’s stick to Towa, Setsuna and Sessrin (SESSRINTOSET?).

The issue with how they approach the SessRin-Towa-Setsuna dynamic is that they’re asking me to be emotionally invested in their relationship without ever doing the work to get me there. This is compounded by the fact that Towa and Setsuna had two very different childhoods and if they were well written, would likely have two very different reactions to meeting their birth parents. They come at this from two opposing angles, and it needed to be dealt with in two different ways. Ironically, they address this in the show that they’re very different, but not when it actually matters.

(WEIRD, DONTCHA THINK? IT’S ALMOST LIKE THIS SHOW LIKES TO PRETEND TO BE DEEP BUT IT’S AS DEEP AS A PUDDLE WHICH HAS ALREADY DRIED UP!)

First off, Towa.

So, like you said. Towa had someone to take care of her. She had people who stepped into the spot that Sesshomaru and Rin and Setsuna weren’t there to fill. She suffered a terrible loss, but she still had somebody. But, and this is a big but; she is in a space where she is not comfortable. The first episode she’s in talks at length about how uncomfortable she is in the modern world. She doesn’t have any friends, and doesn’t care about school. Her family loves her, but they don’t understand her and on some level want her to hide herself.

While I did criticize how well things go for Towa in the feudal era, my critique wasn’t that she was suddenly comfortable, it was that she never struggled and things just kinda work out for her and she always has to be the most powerful one while also being stupid (GIVING THE PEARL TO RIKU WAS VERY STUPID). Her comfort in the feudal era opens up a very interesting problem; which is that suddenly, she’s choosing between her comfort and a family she loves.

Towa isn’t just picking between two houses or even two cities, she’s picking between two different timelines (if they go with making it easy for them to time travel, they didn’t understand the point of Kagome’s sacrifice in the first place i said what i said).

In one, she has a family who she loves and who has loved her for a decade, and in the other, she’s finally comfortable and has found people who understand her and she can fully be herself without much issue. She doesn’t have to hide herself at all in the feudal era. She can totally be herself around Moroha and Setsuna, which she can’t really do that around the Higurashis. Moroha and Setsuna get annoyed with her, sure, but it’s never about who she is as a person, it’s more about how she’s occasionally just really naive and they've never had that luxury to be that. Don’t get me wrong, I have a ton of critiques for Towa’s character and how the three girls operate, but overall, I think that what the show is trying to express is that they finally feel at home with each other (Towa liking being in the feudal era, Moroha expressing never really having friends before, Setsuna not leaving when I don’t think it would be hard for her to do, etc).

So it makes sense for me that she would latch onto any semblance of a parental figure she could find as a way to replace what she would lose if she stayed in the feudal era, which is Sesshomaru and Rin, and would be excited at the prospect of having parents who finally understand her and let her be herself. But she would also feel guilty, because there’s a sense of betraying her adopted family. The modern era has a family that she loves, but she’s not comfortable. The feudal era has a group of friends that she adores, the potential of a family who understands her, and she finally feels at home in her life. That tips the scales. But this would probably lead onto guilt for her, because it feels like she’s abandoning Sota and his wife, whatever her name is. This is why I loved the Sota goodbye scene, because Towa did feel guilty for wanting to go back, but Sota wanted her to be happy first and foremost and he was willing to let her go without any issue.

Setsuna, on the other hand, has had the exact opposite experience; she’s never really had to hide herself, she lives freely out in the open (at least as much as she can as a half demon), but she’s lacked the unconditional love and support that Towa got from the Higurashis. She has had relationships with Shiori and Kaede and maybe even Kohaku, but it’s never really implied they’re all that close or that she depends on them all that much. She’s a very independent person. Towa’s unconditional affection and support are completely foreign to her. On top of that, she doesn’t know what she lost because she doesn’t really know what it’s like to have it in the first place. Having Towa and Moroha in her corner is a strange adjustment.

(god i could’ve loved this little girl gang, i want to love them looking at gifs like this when you can see all their personalities in one image; Moroha goes HIGH FIVE, Towa’s like YEAH, and Setsuna’s going I’M GONNA PRETEND I DON’T LIKE IT)

I have talked about how Setsuna latching onto Rin right away isn’t that bizarre to me. What’s weird is that she doesn’t show any tendency to care that much about her biological family before that happens. She doesn’t care to know Sesshomaru or be impressed by him all that much. She’s very dismissive of Towa until near the end of season 1. Which shows you really have to prove yourself to be worthy of affection in some form from Setsuna’s end. She warms up to Moroha much faster than she does Towa because Moroha understands the world they live in and she doesn’t have to babysit Moroha the way she does Towa (also, Moroha and Setsuna is a seriously underused dynamic in this show, I’ll say it!).

This goes to show that for Setsuna, knowing her biological family isn’t much of a priority for her. Which is totally fine, some people don’t care. In the first season, Towa and Sesshomaru are just two people who she happens to share DNA with. What makes Rin so different?

Convenience. That’s what makes Rin so different. The “Dany kinda forgot about the Iron Fleet” kinda convenience (JUSTICE FOR DANY). It was inconvenient for Setsuna to care about her biological family in the first season, so she didn’t, but now it’s convenient for her, so she’s going to care. It’s that simple. But it’s established in the first season that she needs to have time to warm up to any family figure that she’s suddenly going to have in her life, and her characterization in season one should’ve told us that Rin shouldn’t have been much different. Maybe Rin wouldn’t have had to prove herself as much because of Towa already laying the ground work and like a lot of us she potentially connects having a mother to comfort, but there would likely be a period where Setsuna didn’t want anything to do with her.

So you’ve got two girls who are probably going to have very different reactions and reasons to want to be around their biological parents. Towa would probably attach on too fast while feeling like she’s betraying her adopted parents but be excited at the fact that her mom and dad finally GET her, Setsuna would take her time because she’s never had that experience of having an adult care before and would chafe at the confines of having parents. All three girls would probably have a much easier time connecting with and bonding with each other than they would their parents, let’s be real.

This brings us to Sesshomaru and Rin and what role they would have to play individually for their children. Because fixing this family should’ve been at the root of this season if they really wanted to go the “Sessrin with sesshomaru is more of a egotistical jackass than usual on the side” meal plan.

Now Rin, she’s nothing right now. She’s just kinda... there. I have talked about about how they could’ve fixed so many of the problems with SessRin without changing a single thing from season one if they wanted to, but they didn’t want to fix it so they didn’t. When Rin is let out of the tree, I wish they had shown her and Sesshomaru being actual partners. But I want to push it farther than that.

Right from the beginning, Rin is not a priority for Towa and Setsuna. The show is primarily about their relationship with each other, and the hierarchy after that goes: Moroha, Sesshomaru. Rin isn’t even on the list. They don’t talk about her at all for the entire first season unless prompted to by someone else, and it’s never with each other (Towa has one conversation with Kaede about Rin, and she doesn’t mention this to Setsuna). When they find out they have a father, they don’t ask “who is our mother?” She is never part of the conversation (not that Sesshomaru is ever really a part of the conversation for them either, but at least they’re aware that he exists).

But what if she was part of that dynamic from the beginning? What if she was there in the forest with them and they thought they had lost her? What if Towa not only felt guilt for losing Setsuna, but losing Rin as well? What if their problems came from not only their different worldviews but the loss of their mother?

Imagine if at the end of season one, when Zero dies and Sesshomaru brings her back to life, rather than the fake out of Setsuna dying, they instead have it that Rin comes out of the tree. This means that Sesshomaru would actually have to get Towa’s and Setsuna’s help to deal with Zero ASAP, forcing them to work together. After fixing it near the end of episode 2 of season 2, Rin is reunited with her daughters. After seeing how Sesshomaru has not only hurt her children, but also her brother in law, her sister in law, and their daughter, hasn’t even told Kaede where she is, she doesn’t even want to look at him, much less be his loving, supportive wife (more on that in a second).

The first half of season 2 is mostly just random filler arcs that really go nowhere. Setsuna, Towa, and Moroha aren’t even together for a good chunk of them; they’re in entirely different filler storylines. That time would’ve been better spent bringing Rin into the picture. An entire arc where they work together to bring Inukag back (who should’ve disappeared at the beginning of the story not 14 years earlier and should’ve been captured by Kirinmaru not trapped by Sesshomaru LIKE COME ON). They could’ve connected and built up a relationship. Like just imagine a bunch of episodes where demon hunter Rin and the girls travel together. That could’ve been so fun! In the show, Setsuna goes through her first human night (and not with Towa, with Hisui, of all people, like, come on) and as I was watching it I couldn’t help but be like “OK, what if Rin and Towa were here, and Rin stayed up with them in solidarity.” That would’ve been a great bonding experience for them, and richen her relationship with her daughters.

Plus, when Inukag meet Setsuna and Towa, Setsuna apologizes for what her father had done. But if that had been Rin doing that instead, it would’ve given Rin much more depth and given insight into how she feels about all of this. Now it’s just “Sesshomaru knows best, better listen to him”. Like there are so many moments in season 2 where I was like “OK, what if Rin was present for this conversation”.

Rin has to be two very different things for her individual daughters. For Setsuna, she has to prove herself as someone who can be depended on and let Setsuna work through her abandonment issues. For Towa, she has to give her space to be completely herself and be what Sota/the Higurashis couldn’t be for her. It would also be a chance to let Rin grieve her loss; raising her children. She missed everything. Their first steps, their first words, the chance to show them how to hunt or fight or do anything. She didn’t get to sing them lullabies or tell them stories or help them with their problems. I can’t imagine the pain a mother would go through in that situation. In all honesty, I really do believe that Rin would be such a good mom. She’d be the kind of mom who’d get down with her kids in the dirt and go on adventures with them. Like she’d be such a fun, imaginative mother.

And the worst part is that while she couldn’t be there for them, she had zero control over it, Sesshomaru also wasn’t there for them. Like not even in a “Sesshomaru is an important lord” way. He literally did not know his daughters. At all. When they heard his name for the first time, they had no idea who he was. While I guess you could argue that sending your kids away to be trained was normal for noble families, EVEN THE MOST CONSERVATIVE NOBLE FAMILIES STILL KNEW EACH OTHER AND WHAT THEY LOOKED LIKE! SESSHOMARU DIDN’T VISIT SETSUNA ONCE IN A DECADE!

I’ve been pretty forthcoming over the fact that I don’t like Sesshomaru. I used to say I was neutral towards him, but going to watch Yashahime has reminded me of how much I disliked him in the original. And it comes down to this:

Sesshomaru is not a guy who has really been held accountable for what he has done in the past up until now, not really, and if he ever were to have a partner, it would have to be someone who was willing to tell him when he fucked up. While Sesshomaru is definitely out of character in this series, I don’t actually find all of his actions entirely unbelievable. Like his insistence of doing things by himself and doing what he feels he has to do to protect his loved ones, even at the cost of others. And his egomania. And his terrible communication skills. My god, his terrible communication skills. I could absolutely see Sesshomaru struggling to be in a romantic partnership because of this.

Rin should be angry at him. I am angry for her. I wanted her to throw something at him. And it wasn’t just her who was impacted, it was her daughters. It was Inuyasha and Kagome, who lost their daughter. It was her niece, who had to struggle without her parents to love her unconditionally. It was Kaede and Kohaku, who had no idea of what happened to her. Taking the time to establish that grief and anger away from Sesshomaru, to work on the relationship she had with her daughters outside of Sesshomaru, to struggle through the guilt she feels over all of this happening because she was stupid enough to get cursed, would’ve worked a lot better than just throwing them all together at the end and expecting it to just work because biOloGy.

There’s a moment in season 2 of Yashahime where Sesshomaru looks like he’s going to die. Rin’s reaction would’ve been a lot more gut wrenching if they had established how angry she was with him. If they had given me even the smallest glimpse into a healthy relationship as a married couple before all of this happened and given me a reason to care about getting those crazy kids back together. If they had shown me what was was lost when Zero put the curse on Rin and what it was that made them fall in love in the first place. Then maybe I would’ve cared.

Now, Rin has to get her daughters to help her protect him, and that brings them together. Then Sesshomaru is forced to C O M M U N I C A T E with his wife about Kirinmaru. The last part of the season is about Sesshomaru learning about his daughters while taking down Kirinmaru. Them working together. Rather than the random scene we got at the end with him suddenly good with them. The closest thing we get like that in canon is when Sesshomaru distracts Kirinmaru while Moroha, Setsuna, and Towa go inside the pearl. And maybe I’ll make people mad when I say this:

I really want to see Sesshomaru as a father. And not the way he is now, but as going out of his way to attempt to be a dad. His relationship with Rin could be analysed as a father - daughter relationship (if you want) but in the original text it was so vague that it could be construed in a variety of ways. I’ve always seen it as more older brother - younger sister/unwilling guardian - unwanted charge relationship, less about him being a directly parental figure and more about him just letting her hang out. I don’t believe that he doesn’t have power over her, because regardless, he is still an adult and she is a child, but I don’t see him as her father. Even so, there is a certain distance between him and Rin.

For Rin, he never had to work at their relationship. She just listened to him without question for the most part. No temper tantrums. No arguing. Nothing of the sort that suggests “parenting”. With Towa and Setsuna, that distance would have to be significantly smaller. To be a father figure to them, he would actually have to work at it. It won’t work like it did with Rin with a child that he decided to be a father to. He would need to reach out to them, because why would they trust him after all of this? You’re asking them to invest in a man who has never done the same for them (which is a common tactic used to dismiss children whose parents have abandoned them when they say they want nothing to do with them; “they’re your father, you should be the bigger person and reach out”).

Like imagine Sesshomaru actually teaching Setsuna and Towa how to control their powers (at the end of season one they were saying Setsuna had an energy whip and I just wanted ONE SCENE of Sesshomaru telling her she’s using it wrong and she’s like “fuck you, you abandoned me in a forest fire” and Towa going “I’d normally be the peacemaker but she’s right” and Rin just files her nails in the corner). Having him actually have try and establish a relationship with his daughters is what I’m looking for. Being a source of comfort for them and trying to understand them.

This makes Towa’s decision to stay much harder for her because she suddenly has a place where she can be totally herself and Setsuna starts to learn how to depend on having adults who actually give a crap.

ANYWAY THE POINT IS: it doesn’t make sense. Don’t even try. It’s pointless. Could’ve been a really interesting look into adoption and knitting back together a broken family, instead it’s an oversimplified “they’re my biological family so they’re better”. All of the emotional baggage is put onto Rion and Kirinmaru, which is an extremely basic “I love you but I can’t support you” storyline, rather than where it belongs, which is on Towa, Setsuna, Rin, and Sesshomaru. My conclusion is this: it’s not “wrong” for Towa and Setsuna to call Sesshomaru and Rin mother and father. It’s just badly developed.

Like they haven’t even had the “what do I call you” conversation yet, which is probably the closest thing to a universal experience that adopted children have where you have to ask your biological parents or the people who have just decided to let you into their family “hey, what do i call you”.

I normally wouldn’t make a pages long analysis on “this is what they should’ve done” but this series is so boring and not deep in the least that it’s very hard to not come up with “what if” scenarios because of I was dumb enough to make that first video and HERE I AM. I’M WELL AWARE THAT I’M PUTTING WAY MORE THOUGHT INTO THIS THAN SUNRISE EVER EVEN HAD THE CHANCE TO.

(I am trapped. Send help.)

36 notes · View notes

pop-punklouis · 3 years

Note

Hi hope, sorry this is a bit of a rant so feel free to ignore if you want, I just am feeling like H is kind of out of touch with the fandom atm, it’s not the stunt stuff bc I know he doesn’t ‘choose’ to do it, it’s a product if his closeting and his contracts, but just like doing the whale at his concert and talking abt the pandemic like it’s in the past just doesn’t sit right with me. So many ppl are still struggling. I’m struggling and I don’t even have it that bad compared to others but like his pandemic and my pandemic are NOT the same thing. And he says “you’ve changed my life” like thank you fans for making me rich and famous... like that’s not why I love your music dude, that’s not why I’m a fan and why I support you. Sigh, sorry love I really like your blog and always enjoy your take on things and I really don’t wanna bum you out, but anyway thank you for listening 💕

hi bb.

you can rant to me whenever! x i totally understand this stance and frustration. many people have been feeling distant from harry, lately. in my opinion, 2020-2021 has been a year that has caused him to be incredibly separated from the fandom. his impersonal persona has been building for a while, but i firmly believe that this year has been the tipping point for many fans. and i think a big portion of that is because of how he’s come off during the pandemic which has been insanely disappointing. he’s come across as an entitled, rich brat much of the time that hasn’t been counterbalanced with seeing the other side of him many people know and adore. only seeing this one side for over a year will weigh on anyone, and i don’t blame them. i’ve had my fair share of upset with him and complete and utter confusion about certain decisions he’s made. and that’s perfectly fine to admit. i’ll be honest, i never though harry would be the one who would’ve been the most careless during a pandemic out of all the boys, and yet here we are 18 months later. on top of what you mentioned, i also was highly uncomfortable with the poem by charles bukowski that seemed to be narrated as harry’s intro to his tour. featuring a poem that has a line that reads “To do a dangerous thing with style is what I call art” in the middle of a pandemic that you’re touring in and putting even more of your fans in danger feels so far out of touch with reality it boggles my mind. i understand what he was going for regarding the tour intro— and i would’ve been inclined to not think much of it if it had been in different circumstances. but, dude context is key and it seems like a lot of his decisions lately that have upset people in this pandemic is because he hasn’t thought about the context of those actions in a pandemic.

like you said, most of the frustration doesn’t come from his stunts or what he’s contractually obligated to do. no one is pointing a finger at him for things that he could be barred from changing. the upset comes from the other actions that we’ve continuously seen, unfortunately. everyone knows i don’t hate him— and criticizing any of the boys should never equate to thinking someone hates them. i absolutely adore harry, but i haven’t felt connected to him in a long while. ever since march 2020, i’ve seen a steady shift in what people expect out of celebrity and how they engage with celebrity. it’s gone past the mold of traditional promo and branding, and it has become almost expected for an artist to feel authentic to who they are for there to be a much bigger connection to them and their work. harry styles™️ works under the old, traditional mold of celebrity and that just doesn’t cut it anymore. they have to evolve and stop believing this foundational rockstar approach is going to sustain him indefinitely. it won’t, and the cracks are only getting bigger. i’m hoping with whatever dates he does do with this tour, that that changes the perception a lot of people have started having about him as tour!harry is where he feels the most personable to his fans instead of a corporate machine. yet, the first show back felt stagnant and rushed. so, beyond anything, i hope it doesn’t stay that way and there’s that genuine warmth we all know of harry onstage going forward *big shrug*

#grey

60 notes · View notes

palms-upturned · 2 years

Note

the thing with ruka apologism that i don’t understand the most is that… like, with touga or saionji it’s like, you end up eventually feeling some sympathy towards them bc of the time the story spends with them & you understanding their motivation/stories/problems more & seeing that they too are tragic characters (not to say this excuses either’s actions at all — just to say that feeling uh. sorry that they’re stuck in All This and are acting Like This while still thinking they’re both acting in horrid ways towards others is possible/understandable imo) BUT RUKA. ruka “appeared in two episodes to be homophobic and leave” tsuchiya does not have any complexity to him at all. he Only exists to be entitled & homophobic. if with other characters you get the feeling that they not only embody something about prince-adjacent entitlement & violence but also are children stuck in hell who are hurt in many ways by this ideal, ruka Just appears to be entitled & homophobic while believing he’s a savior / tragic hero figure and leave. like it’s hard to find a character who’s less of a person by himself than ruka, if you take away the entitlement & violence there’s straight up nothing left.

anyway i uh. this got long and not very coherent. apparently i’m a more passionate ruka hater than i thought.

SKSHSJDJDJDJDJD WE LOVE TO SEE RUKA HATE! but yeah i think you p much nailed it, touga and saionji are at least compelling in the sense that they give u some things to sit with/chew on regarding why they’re less sympathetic than other characters beyond just “because they’re boys,” i feel the show does a decent job of avoiding gender essentialism that way by showing that the girls also are complicit in upholding certain power structures and just as guilty of lashing out violently to maintain what power they have, and that on the flip side, the boys are also victims of the system, and that what specifically makes touga/saionji in particular so terrible is that they have a degree of awareness and understanding of it all that most characters don’t but still actively choose to take advantage of the power dynamic between them and girls like anthy, nanami, and utena 😒 and so u end up genuinely hoping for them to escape akio and ohtori at large but also seeing something super damning in the fact that saionji is capable of being selfless and understanding in order to help touga but only ever heaped more abuse onto anthy, for instance.

with ruka he’s entirely a victim of his own worldview LOL he holds violent beliefs that lead him to inflict intentional violence on others and then he’s like :( too bad i have to make juri hate me in order to help her 💔 the fact that he comes back to school because end of the world called him back says it all, i think.

i wonder if the sympathy comes from how the manga version of him was played more straight since manga juri is an entirely different character kshsdjjd his side story is kind of just classic shoujo silly melodrama and mostly serves to tie up the loose end of juri’s “crush” on touga, but since anime juri is gay, they took that story and had a v interesting conversation w it and some of the ideas in it… and then after the revolution sort of tries to merge the two versions of ruka and casts him as the drowned boy. but i feel the anime version of the story intentionally divorces itself so much from the manga that u can’t really map any of manga ruka’s sensibilities onto anime ruka sjsbdjcn if anything the anime is v critical of those sensibilities. like u said, once u take away ruka’s entitlement, there’s nothing really left…

ig it’s probably also bc ppl likely agree with ruka about shiori being bratty and cruel djsbdjxb and that juri’s feelings for her were something she genuinely needed to be freed from… but i don’t really see how u can watch either the scene of ruka stealing her locket or the moment that it was shattered and walk away from it thinking it was for the best or that ruka wasn’t entirely motivated by homophobia and entitlement jdbsjsxbxn he wasn’t trying to help juri re-examine her feelings for someone who was hurting her, he just was mad that juri was in love w a girl instead of him 💀 plus the episode even ends with shiori finally working up the courage to approach juri again, and then in the epilogue she’s joined the fencing club, which speaks volumes about shiori’s efforts to change in just like two seconds of footage jdgsjdbx so the anime doesn’t even posit that ruka was right about shiori to begin with, or that she deserved what he did to her… idk there’s just literally nothing admirable in anything he does kdhsjdbxnxcb i just really don’t get it

i do find him complex but more in the sense of like… how he seems to genuinely see himself as a tragic figure, like wow, ppl really do think like that 💀 it’s kind of the hallmark of a certain brand of homophobia, isn’t it? to be so cruel and bigoted that u bring yourself to the point where “you hate me more than you can stand, don’t you?” but still see yourself as the tragic martyr of the situation because you’re right and it’s all for the other person’s own good. and i feel like ikuhara’s episode commentary is very sad in that regard, the incident he describes of projecting a more charitable narrative onto someone in their absence. i think it’s easy to do that, esp with people you were once close to… idk it’s just very sad to me hdshjdhxb

anyway tl;dr ur so right bestie rest in piss ruka 💙

#asks #anon #rgu #he sucks so bad god bless

22 notes · View notes

notsolong-pause · 3 years

Text

ship requests

“Hey 👋 . Can I get a male HP ship (from both eras if possible) pls . Thank u so much ! . So I m a Gryffindor (with a bit of Slytherin ) . In my free time , I would love to read fantasy or sci-fic novels or facts maybe , listen to music , research about anything I want to , do something my parents denied me off maybe . If my friends are available , I'll also go downstairs with them and play . I m not as such interested in sport but I love to play cricket and badminton . My hobbies are dancing , horseriding , reading , researching , cyber and swordfighting (I haven't done it yet tho). I love the trope of fake relationship or enemies to lovers

Next is my personality . Well , I can be shy if I m not comfortable with the person , but if I am then I am very talkative . I don't trust ppl at the beginning until they prove themselves . I m very reliable and trustworthy but I tend to hide my emotions . I like my privacy, I don't even share that with my bestie sometimes . I come off as a rebel and I can get annoyed very easily . I love to organise a room . Everyone comes to me for advice . I also have a very good sense of humour which comes out in front of ppl I'm comfortable (they say I never used to fail to surprise them with my hidden qualities) . I m also quite modest . I m a risk-taker and I always stand up to my friends , I also have their back sometimes . I can also be a bully to my enemies or my friend's enemies but only if they start it first . Idk what is it , but ppl tell me I carry a powerful aura and many boys get attracted to me . Also , the popular ones used to attract to me a lot because I could be seen as a quiet nerdy girl . I come off as very unique at first meeting . I m practical with my decisions but as said , I hide my emotions or else the emotions would have led me. I m also a human lie detector , or that's what my family tells me . The thing that stands out in me isy dressing style . I am very curious. I m also very much mysterious . I m loyal to a fault . Now my flaws are that sometimes I don't believe my friends at all and it hurts them since they ask me to be honest and I tell them the truth . I can be blunt and cold without realising it but I don't mean to . I am an extrovert so keeping me from doing something can make me insecure . I m sensitive to criticism . I can be super suspicious, like a looott . I hate when ppl try to control me, even my parents so I end up going against them or I follow their instructions half-heartedly . I can be very very stubborn . I also get many intuitions but I ignore them . I hate when ppl are unreliable , everyone's lazy but atleast they should do their work after some rest . I also hate arrogant boastful PPL . I hate when someone disrespects me and I immediately cut them off from my life . I hate lame excuses given by the ppl whom I expect something to do and they didn't. I am very patient but once they cross their lines , they wish they hadn't . I guess this is too much ? (Lol sorry but excited ) Thank u so much for ur time dear 💗”

a/n: Hi! Thank you for so many details!! It’s lovely. You also asked for TMR ship, so I’ve decided to do a HP form one era and one for TMR. Hopefully, you are okay with that:)

p.s.: sorry for being a Draco slaughter. i’m also doing all the other requests, thank you for them!! they are going to be trade in a day or two. sending love <3

Harry Potter:

I ship you with Fred Weasley

(so badly, you’re a perfect match)

First of all... being stubborn and taking risks is something that you probable have in common, which is going to create a perfect enemies to lovers dynamic. Maybe academic/prancing rivalry?

You constantly mocking each other, but not meaning any harm or anything, even though others might think that you hate one another

Him always helping you to break the rules if needed, but still making sure that everything is alright, and everyone is safe. And you would keep an eye on him back, supporting him when he doesn’t know what to do

He would be surprised when you started to open up, and crack jokes, but would love them so badly. And he definitely is very grateful whenever (and if) you chose to tell him something private, and wouldn’t tell anyone else even if he was tortured

You would always give amazing ideas for the shop products. And he would be like: “Where do you know that from?” “Don’t know, just thought it was interesting and decided to investigate”

You were walking in the dull lights of a corridor from the late detention in the Snape’s dungeons. You got this one for arguing with a certain Weasley. This was entirely his fault, though, but he didn’t get caught, and you could still see the stupid smirk on his stupid face when you were assigned to come down here after classes. The Slytherin do was just nearby, and you heard a couple of voices around the corner. You were hopping these were some of your friends from Slytherin, but as you listen closely you herald none other than Malfoy. “These Weaslebeeys are ignorant trash just like their father. Who’s would willingly study what muggles’ life’s are like? That’s just dumb”you didn’t know whether he was just showing off in front of his friends or if he was being serious, but you were furious at the moment.

“Malfoy!” - you energetically approached the group.

“Another gryffindor”, - he smirked. “Why don’t you spend an evening at your dorm or some other lame place?”

“Cut it. Take it back” - you face was almost stone cold. Eyes glimmering dangerously in the flickering light.

“Are you defending the Weaslebees?” - he grimaced, being so proud of himself for no reason.

“It’s not their name, and they don’t need any defense. You’re being an arrogant prick towards my friends, and I’m not going to tolerate that.” - you were stiff, your fists clenched in order to hold back the anger. How dared he speak in such diminishing manner about people 100 times better than him!

“What are you going to about it?” He replied cheekily, stepping forward.

“Well... I don’t know, how about TheLocomotor Wibbly!” - you were gripping tightly onto your wand, and Draco suddenly fell to the floor. His legs turned to jelly.

“You little...” one of his friends pointed your wand towards you, opening his mouth to jinx you back. Suddenly there was a loud bang, everything was covered with the thick smoke, and you were pulled to the corner. You instinctively pointed a wand on the person in front of you, still unable to see anything.

“Easy, lady” you recognized the voice. “Fred? What are doing here?” you were genuinely surprised, and started wondering how much has he heard. “Came to rescue you from the Snape’s claws” he smirked. “Why?” you didn’t understand a thing. “No fun being brilliant if you can’t see that and get jealous” - he cocked his eyebrows. You huffed back. “Well, thank you, I suppose.” “Oh good, I thought I’d never hear that”. You surprised a smile. “Let’s move already”.

“By the way”, he stopped you, “did I hear you calling me a friend?” You nudged his shoulder. “Don’t think too much of it, Weasley”.

The maze runner:

I ship you with Gally

He’s the one to understand you not opening up fully and immediately and keeping things to yourself for 110%. He’s mysterious himself, and he can give you every time in the world (sorry, i’m love him sm)

Again... the enemies to lovers dynamic, ESPECIALLY considering the whole thing with him killing Chuck (still hurts, though).

He can be very protective from time to time, so you can have “Because I care for you!!” arguments when you’re being reckless and decide to risk in order to save him.

He's honestly the sassy king of the show. Taking your sense of humour in account, I belive that he would really appreciate that you have it and can back him up. So you would exchange jokes back and forth

He's also absolutely giving you every freedom in the world not even attempting to control you or tell you what to do, he would only give out advices. And as far as he realises you're sensitive to crticizm, he starts to control himself in order not to hurt you.

"Please, never do that again". You and Gally were walking around the Last City, back to the shelter.

"Do what?" You asked, raising your head to the boy slightly ahead of you.

"You know what I'm talikng about". He turned his head to you, and stopped in the shaddow of the narrow street between the houses. His gaze was pretty serious, and both of you were extremely tired after yet another mission in attempt to undermine the existing regime.

"I don't think I do". You looked up at him with the confusion in your eyes.

"What you did back there was very risky, and you could have not make it. Don't risk like that ever again".

"But the cranks would've gotten you then". You protested. In your opinion, what you did was the only option.

"I appreciate the concern, but I could I handle it". He was starting to get stubborn, while you were getting angry.

"That's not true. One of them was hanging on your throat. That's not something people cal 'I handle it'". You threw your arms in the air, gesturing.

"I'm not letting them take me instead of you!" Gally was almost shouting at this point.

"Well, I'm not letting them take you either!"

"Great!"

You both went silent and were walking angrily towards your shelter, turning, sneaking, and hiding.

"Gally". You called in a few minutes. "It's just that I really care about you".

"I know". He told you, looking back again. "Just promise me, you're going to be careful".

"You know I really can't promise, but at least I'll try".

#ship requests #reader #reader insert #x reader #y/n #the maze runner #tmr #gally #gally x reader #the death cure #hp #harry potter #fred weasley x reader #fread weasley #weasley twins #fred and goerge weasley #golden era #hp x reader #submission

23 notes · View notes

evilvarric666-archive · 3 years

Note

This is gonna be long, so sorry in advance, but as someone who enjoys long fics here are my two cents:

I get why some ppl may not want 75 tags in fics, but this is gonna hurt long fic writers. On a long fic there are probably gonna be more relationships that are central to the plot that aren't the main ship. And side pairings that may be a squick to some ppl. Not to mention trigger warnings and tone tags.

For example: a long fic with the pairing Y x Z. Z had an abusive relationship, and that's gonna be explored. So the author tags abusive relationship, bc that's a trigger, but an explanation next tag saying "not current ship" or smth.

Then Y has very important friendships with some of the cast. These are central to the plot so they're tagged too.

Turns out, character W is controversial in the fandom, but they're central to the fic too. The author is gonna tag after the character tag W positive/negative; so ppl who don't wanna see positive/negative things about W can skip this.

And guess what? Ship A x B appears in this fic too. Maybe it's not that central, but this ship is also disliked by some people, so the author will tag it, so ppl can filter through.

Another problem is with media that has different mediums, like, the media Y, Z, etc are from has movies, and books, and games and a tv show. All these things actually have different stories, different enough at least that ppl may only want to see fics written for the movies! But the author wants to take plot from the movies and the books. So instead of just tagging the all media tag for that media, they also tag media (movies) and media (books)

These tags end up accumulating. And especially in long fics. The author could make the first chapter a list of tws and stuff that they keep updating, but that destroys the purpose of ao3 tags: you can't filter content like that, you can only filter tags.

I honestly think they should just find a way to delete the fics with the trolling tags, or make a readmore thing so it doesn't hurt the browsing. At the very least make the tag limit longer.

sorry in advance that this is going to be rambly and weird. I have a lot of thoughts.

I get where you're coming from but I also still disagree. Like it's definitely going to change the way longfic writers tag, but I really don't think it's going to hurt them. I think it's going to encourage more effective tagging and that that's going to be better for everybody in the long run. If anything, I think that overtagging is what's hurting longfic writers, it makes their works look unappealing, and actually important information gets buried in a wall of text.

i will admit though that I do understand better now why less room for trigger tagging is going to be an issue. My preferred tagging style is "General/umbrella warnings in the tags, with whatever elaboration/specifics the author deems necessary in an author's note/author's notes at the beginning of each chapter" (example: "animal death" in the tags, so that the filters catch it + people who can't handle the subject At All know to keep scrolling, and then the author's note specifying that its in the context of game hunting & not a pet death, so that people who were uncertain and needed more info could click in and get the specifics.) and I thought that preference was pretty universal? But apparently a lot of people use the tags as an exhaustive list of warnings, which I didn't know because when I see a work with more than, well with more than 75 tags, I just start scrolling until it's gone.

(this is a tangent and I get that my experiences are not universal. but I genuinely dislike full warning lists in the tags because, for me at least, it makes it harder for me to figure out if the story is something I can/want to read. The things I Really Do Not Want To Read about are rare, and rarely tagged the same way twice, so the exclusion filter isn't really helpful for me. I have to actually read the full list of warnings and if the things I'm looking for are sandwiched inbetween a bunch of trope/character tags in a big wall o text I am going to miss it. This has happened to me multiple times.)

I think that that's an ineffective tagging style, basically. Lots of tags is kind of the opposite of useful tags, imo. Short, to the point and consistently worded warnings are better and I think having less space will encourage people to do that. I understand why people do this other style, though, and also why it would frustrate them that they can no longer do that. I think it really sucks that ao3 let everyone wild west their website for so long that it managed to spawn like three distinct groups of people who all use the website in completely incompatible ways, and now it's at the point where any new rule implemented is going to screw a lot of people over no matter what. But I digress.

Anyways, as long as someone isn't putting Revolutionary Girl Utena levels of warnings in their tags (and if your fic needs that much... maybe you should just put yur top 10 biggest warnings on there and slap a Dead Dove Do Not Eat on the end there, yknow?), I think that 75 tags will fully accommodate them. I get that tags start adding up, but also I think a lot of people are underestimating how many tags 75 tags is.

Like to just add up how many tags are used in your example: three / pairing tags, lets go crazy and say three more & pairing tags, tag every character tag in those pairings that's twelve, #abusive relationship + #not main pairing tags, three fandom tags bc multiple source mediums, a #[controversial character] positive tag... that's 24 tags. Like all the necessary character & pairing tags are handled in less than a third of the space given (and personally I consider this slightly over tagged. I think the only character tags you should put on a fic are the very mainest/pov characters, but yknow) and honestly if you can't then figure out a way to communicate the rest of the necessary information about your fic in 51 tags and a 1250 character summary then I really don't know how to help you. I personally would have to really push myself to figure out how to put more than 75 tags on one fic, regardless of the length of the fic. And I can't help but notice that a lot of the fics I could find with over 75 tags while searching last night had a lot of... unnecessary duplicate tags, often for information that could've been easily otherwise intuited (tagging #mandolorian #mandolore #mandolorian character and #mandolorian culture on a Jango Fett pre-series fic, for example)

I do have some criticisms about the current change though. I think it would've been better to have individual tag number limits for each individual field (x number of fandom tags, x number of character tags, etc.) instead of a 75 tags over all limit (or make a "warning tags" field that's separate from "additional tags" but that's a separate essay and would... probably mean overhauling the whole site. so not very practical.) A readmore option would be good too, and I'm not sure why they didn't go for that? I also think that this change will be most effective if done in combination with other changes. Like posting very loosely or not at all enforced official tagging/style guides for the site. I really think that even a tepid attempt at standardization will increase the site's usability like, A Lot.

I'm not sure how cohesive that was. TL;DR I appreciate hearing your thoughts, mine are that I still think this is a step in the right direction. And that cutting back on overtagging will lead to more concise, effective tagging which will make browsing and filtering easier in the long run.

#ao3 tag

10 notes · View notes

tequiladimples · 3 years

Note

I hope this doesn't come off as rude, but I saw that you dislike when collision is branded het cause you're not het, but no one's talking about you personally? like for me, I really like collision but I can understand the criticism in a way and that isn't an attack on you (or an attack at all lol). again hope I'm not rude but idk it seems unnecessary to get upset, it's better to take it as constructive criticism

sigh i don't think ur rude but it simply isn't constructive.

look i’ll talk abt this one more time n then i Beg we can put it to rest! (this is gna be a lot of word vomit but if i'm elaborative now i hope i won't have to talk abt this ever again)

i’m deeply insecure abt many aspects of collision. i don’t really keep that a secret. i also know some ppl don't like fantasy, some ppl don't like the kinds of dynamics i like, some ppl don't vibe with my style of writing (hell, i barely vibe with my style of writing). those things are fine. i can't control that and i don't take that personally. the reason why this is the one critique i do take personally is because it genuinely presumes wrongful, harmful things about me and my values, especially when i've made deliberate efforts to avoid writing the exact flavor of fic they're accusing me of having written. just because people don’t mean for what they say to reflect back on me, doesn’t stop it from doing so.

the thing about calling something a “het fic” is that the term brings along certain connotations which i don’t stand by at all and feel deeply uncomfortable and distraught to possibly have created. i’ve gone over this godforsaken story again and again just to be absolutely sure i didn’t actually do so. when people say “het fic” they generally don’t mean “boy meets girl and they fall in love”, they mean “super rude and mean boy meets uptight virtuous girl and makes her fall in dependence with him through manipulation and treating her like shit until she behaves how he wants.” and that is straight up not the fic i wrote. i’m not stupid. i know the dynamic i went with is widely and easily misused and there’s a lot of fiction depicting really bad, uneven, unhealthy relationships through it. i knew this going in, and i’ve tried persistently to avoid making those same mistakes.

skipping over the fact that they’re both boys (bc duh)--harry doesn't exhibit any real manipulative power over louis. collision harry is a grumpy, fruity little nerd who happened upon a really unfortunate lot in life and managed to trick himself into believing he's evil for like half a second of the story and his resolves crumble like a danish pastry the moment he receives his first hug. he's kind of aloof and arrogant, and understandably hardened from his past, but he's not bad. he's just lost. that's the basis of his character arc. now on the other hand, louis has harry wrapped around his finger starting like chapter 4. harry’s the one who opens up emotionally first, harry’s the one desperately seeking louis’ approval and caring about his opinion, harry’s the one who makes himself vulnerable continuously throughout the entire story. the only time louis makes himself vulnerable on a comparable scale is during the smut scenes, and even then, harry is gentle and attentive and puts louis first. louis is less experienced than harry in that area, but he isn't scared or intimidated by harry, and he has full reigns of the progression and nature of their relationship as a whole. that’s kind of how it needs to go with tough x soft dynamics for the power balance to not feel uneven, and i wrote the story accordingly. if you then happen to still be so blindly determined to associate soft/small with weakness (and thereby uh, womanhood ig) that you still felt like louis had an inferior position to harry solely because he is indeed soft/small, that sounds quite frankly like a you problem.

now, the whole point of louis’ character is that he’s underestimated. sure, he’s naive and self-centered and sheltered from the real world--that’s the basis of his character arc. those things all change. but louis isn’t ever weak. like idk who apparently needs to hear this but you can be small and simultaneously not be a pushover. the two aren’t mutually exclusive. there isn’t a single time louis takes shit in this story, especially not from harry; he gives back as good as he gets every time. oh! and then he literally saves the entire universe and the execution of that whole thing was his idea alone. i tried really hard to underline how strong-willed and full of grit he is to contrast what others think of him. if you think he’s portrayed as a meek and frail damsel, you missed the point. once again, i feel like we circle back to this misconception of louis being kind of naive and physically small = louis being inferior = louis being female. just do some soul searching.

(i could also get into the fact that for a bunch of people who don’t know these boys personally (no matter how much we like to think we do), this fandom is weirdly opinionated about characterization. especially regarding sexual stuff. i know creating a version for ourselves of who we think these boys are based on things we recognize in ourselves or things we find endearing is part of the comfort with loving them. but that doesn’t really equate to actually knowing them, and besides, this is fan fiction; no one’s opting to write a biography, anyway. being experimental and explorative and putting different aspects of their personalities in different lightings is what makes fic fun. if someone’s writing harmful or one-dimensional characters, that’s one thing, and preferences is again whatever floats your boat. but the “out of character” argument feels mostly really strange to me. this is a bit of a tangent, though.)

lastly, the thing is that i will and i do take it personally if someone insinuates that a character--a gay character--that i, a lesbian, construed is a secret vessel for expressing heterosexual attraction. if someone calls louis a “self-insert”, that does reflect back on me. and to elaborate on that--i don’t particularly love to bring it up, but it's quite disheartening to pour personal PTSD experiences into a character and rly put effort into doing it right and justice and underline growth and healing, just to find out people disregard all that completely in favor of declaring that my self-projection lies in the attraction to a man--which is to say, the one thing i couldn’t possibly feel more estranged from. it's so incredibly tactless. i feel thoroughly whiny at this point but how is that not supposed to make me a little sad?

anyway. none of this is to say that you can’t dislike or critique collision. you can. sometimes ppl don’t like things. but i hope i’m clear about where i’m coming from with my discomfort now. people’s preferences and dislikes are indeed not mine to be hurt by, but these things are. this definitely got unnecessarily long and i probably look like i take myself unbearably seriously (i promise i don’t), so i’m sorry. but at least i've said everything now, and if i encounter this sort of rhetoric in the future, i have something to redirect people to. also anon, none of this is directly pointed at you, i know you mean well. take care <3

#look away this is so long #also @ my non fic mutuals scroll past it pls #it’s not that deep i’m just tired #ask

28 notes · View notes

chocopvffz · 4 years

Text

My Problems with Fandom

It’s been a while since I’ve kinda just let out my thoughts and feelings on this stale hell site. It’s just now more than ever I’m having the weirdest realizations while I’m participating in any Fanbase. This topic may piss ppl off. But to that, I say fuck it, I’m gonna do it.

Around 2 years ago I took a backseat to actively participating in fandom. So I’d be more of an onlooker rather than someone who contributed. Just reblogging stuff rather than making my own content. Usually in fandom, things are said in the heat of the moment, with little thought and more emotions. Taking a step back I started to realize that while that’s fine in and of itself, You’re entitled to what you like and what’s interesting to you, but I’ve realized that people kinda settle for the bare minimum. Especially now that representation for marginalized groups is becoming the norm. Which is great, but there are still problems that plague us as a community.

I just finished watching Unicorn of War’s video on RWBY, and they delved into the absolutely garbage writing that surrounded The White Fang subplot. I highly recommend you watch the video, it’s about the bad representation of minority oppression and how it relates to RWBY as a whole. While this post doesn’t stem from that in particular. what did was though is how UoW confessed that they were guilty of completely ignoring how harmful the writing was for pocs, as well as downright silencing and downplaying poc that had a problem with the writing. Unicorn of War is not racist, the fact that they realized the type of systemic racism they’ve been inadvertently spreading is so harmful is a a step in the right direction. Here is where the problem lies. UoW said that they were a perpetrator of this because they were to focused on the representation the show did give the fans. They said that they lumped all of the genuine criticism of the problems with homophobes and bigots because they didn’t want to hear any of the criticism at all. RWBY has some pretty shit representation in ever field. UoW said that they were settling for the stuff they did get because they get so little, and their whiteness blinded them to listening and trying to understand why so man poc had an issue with the show.

Basically what I’m trying to say is that, a lot of the time In Fandom, ppl would rather settle for what they do have and what caters to them, rather than criticize a product of its faults and ask for more.

I’ve been scared to talk about She-Ra because the fandom is pretty scary. I liked the show. To me it wasn’t anything special. But it was a fine show, and I can’t wait for what the crew does next. But here’s where a lot of the issues come from for me. There are some problems both w/ the show, and the representation. Catra and Adora have been queercoded up until the very end where it does get revealed that they are in fact lesbians. Which is great and all but at the end of the day. They kiss at the very end of the last episode, nothing was explicit before then. But the thing is that Catra is an abusive manipulative person, that kinda just gets a pat on the back, and all is forgiven when she realizes she’s alone(both in the fandom and the show). I mean glimmer got more hate than Catra. The point I’m trying to make is that I’ve seen way to many ppl ignore the fact that they side stepped the development of Catra and Adora, and kinda get mad at the ppl that criticize that we could have gotten better rep. For a lot of the fans, at least from what I’ve seen, yall are okay with the problems the show has as long as you get some form of rep. Which is valid, but when that complacency spills over into silencing ppl with criticisms. This usually happens when someone has had another experience with the show where the thing that represents them isnt done as well. it rubs me the wrong way. Someone could see Catra’s behavior, liken her to a toxic person they knew, criticize how the show kinda ignores that. I can bet that some ppl would tell this person that they’re wrong, because she ended up where she did at the end.

This brings me to my last example, during my watch of Infinity Train, I started getting a little bit more involved in the fandom; reblogging, commenting. During the show I noticed a small amount (larger than I would have liked) making passive aggressive remarks toward Grace (the only black girl and protagonist of the season). They were all in regard to her having a redmeption arc. At first I was kinda in denial. Like most ppl are immediately after suffering an injustice, cuz despite her being an awful person at first. She gets better. And there are so little black women that are protagonists. I felt represented. But then I’d see ppl demeaning her in order to make her friend Simon (basically the antagonist) more sympathetic. Mind you he’s white. And after the show ended I had a weird encounter. There were many posts about how enthralling it was that Grace, a black women, telling Simon, a white man, that his problems were his own, and she doesn’t have to be the one to fix them. Most of the ppl that made these posts were woc. The show isn’t about race, but the fact that the character is black resonated with a lot of ppl.

Under ever single one of these posts, I saw multiple people, getting weirdly angry at them. Like “this has nothing to do with race, why are you bringing it up here.” Which I guess is fair, but no one says it as much to ppl when the post is about sexuality. So getting fed up, I responded to one of these ppl explaining how odd it is that the characters that get really popular are always of the same archetype. White Sad Boys, it’s the same with ships. Instead of critiquing the show or anything I wanted to call attention to subconscious biases in fandom. The person accuses me of calling them racist, tells me that race isn’t an issue in fandom, and tried to gaslight me into thinking that what I was talking about doesnt apply to how ppl choose who their favorite character is.

This issue here isn’t about the race, or the actual content in the show. It was about the person telling me that the empowerment I and other woc experienced while watching infinity train s3, doesn’t exist and we shouldn’t criticize ppl putting her down in order to uplift the antagonist.

Which leads back to the point I’m trying to make. So many ppl in fandom settle for whats there instead of trying to make things more representative of everyone. Representation can always get better, we just have to stop fighting ppl that give constructive criticism to the things we like.

And I’m completely guilty of this too, that’s why I took a step back. I don’t like silencing ppl when they try to criticize something that resonates with me. So I try to sit back and let them tell me what can be done better based on their experiences. I’m still struggling. I’m pretty sure I was ultra defensive with the person telling me that race doesn’t matter.

This happens a lot more with white ppl than it does with people of color. And this isn’t a dig on any white person at all. It’s just that white have a vastly different experience than a poc. A white LGBT person is going to have a completely different experience than a black lgbt person. Just like a cishet white person is going to have from a poc cishet person. And since we have different experiences, there are aspects of my life you won’t understand and vice versa. An abuse survivor is going to be more equip to tell us what works better than other things in a story that tackles those subjects. You see what I mean.

I just want everyone to take a step back and consider the criticism that is being made. And try to understand why this person may see it that way.

TLDR; We need to stop silencing marginalized ppl just because they criticize things we relate to, especially when it pertains to their experiences. It’s settling for the bare minimum when we deserve better. Just because we’ve got a gay character doesnt mean the show is perfect. It happens way more than we think. Especially now more than ever.

Sorry this is so long, and full of typos. I just needed to rant.

#she ra spop #spop spoilers #she ra princess of power #infinity train #infinty train spoilers #rwby v7 #rwby volume 8 #rwby #queen of typos #just getting my thoughts out

80 notes · View notes

normal-thoughts-official · 3 years

Note

Oooh yeah the first time I was playing as a female mc because I wanted to romance ava and I usually go male mc if I want to romance a man and female mc if I want to romance a woman (and I think there was one book with where mc could be non-binary so I picked that one but I didn't finished the book), and Stacy's brother felt Hetero™ in a way, like Hollywood ish (? Honestly like cinematographicly bad hetero) but I ended up really loving Andy too, and Stacy felt a little flat but also I really liked her potential, like go crazy girl, and the mom issues.

Apart but holy shit you're 10000% right about that teacher like who inmediately threatens expulsion just like that for something not violent ??? And to an honor student with way too much on his plate ??? Obviously it would have been bad with any student, but you have literally the reason of why he's doing it and as a teacher HE LITERALLY COULD HAVE HELPED WITH IT ??????? Like something teachers can't really help students because it's a family thing only or is a financial struggle or etc but it was literally because of school (and his family, but the teacher could have heloed him with the school part)

(Identity thief anon (also I go by any pronouns ahhshs))

ur valid! that's lowkey what i wish i'd do (picking female MC if my fave LI is female and the other way around, i mean) but unfortunately i always go into the stories blindly having no idea what i'll find </3 so i cant really do that doiajdiosa and then i get attached for the MC i picked so i feel bad about changing their gender/name/appearance when i replay. so what i usually do is that i pick a male MC when i get the option because A- u don't always get the option, so i end up being male half the time and female half the time either way; and B- i feel slightly more comfortable with a male identity than a female one. like i'm still nonbinary and i wouldn't consider myself male aligned or within the gender of Man, but like... when i first came out i went by any pronouns but then because im afab everyone was like "cool, she/her only it is" so i was like fuck that and stopped using she/her. so i feel slightly more comfortable with a masc MC and end up going with that

there's also the fact that it always feels slightly genderfucky to have a male MC because choices is so sexist and also always writes the stories assuming ull pick a female MC, even when they give u the option not to. so when u pick a male MC he's very like not toxically masc and some things they add to make a QuiRkY MC that are very white woman and would feel annoying are actually kind of subversive for my black and brown male MCs. so like another win for queerness /j

ILITW MC in particular i feel has HUGE nonbinary vibes like no reason at all he just does <3 maybe it's just that for once the male clothes for ILITW actually fUCK. i wanna dress in that goth outfit <3 so gorgeous ugh. i love him even tho he's a fucking dumbass

also there's a book where an MC can be enby? worm? ive only ever read one book in choices with any enby characters at all (america's most elligible, books 2-3) but they weren't even a LI which is disappointing cuz they were a billion times superior to any of the LIs. sorry america's most elligible LIs fans

also oh connor IS the epitome of white cistraight man even when u play as a man tbh, like he was just so cistraight to me daouhdsaojdasij he kind of annoys me but also i forget that he even exists until he shows up onscreen and choices starts trying to push me into his lap and i'm just like, ugh, not again

and yeah i think i feel a similar way about stacy. i don't dislike her as a character and i don't feel like she as a character felt flat, her growth was very interesting and i loved seeing her start to challenge her mom like YESSS GO GIRL GIVE US EVERYTHING, she just felt flat as a LI to me ig? like idk i didn't feel chemistry between her and my MC personally, but also like, stacy girls are valid u know

right exactly. like i don't think ppl really understand that a school that doesn't drive people to cry during finals week and feel absolutely crushed by having to be there and that makes ppl feel like they're stupid, not enough, and overwhelmed IS IN FACT POSSIBLE and actually pretty easy to make when we stop treating students like statistics that will get the school more clients/funding (depending on whether it's a private or public school). and like as a teacher getting my degree in brasil it just feels completely surreal to me that anyone would see a student who's so overwhelmed by the amount of extracurriculars and responsibilities he feels like he has to take that he starts taking drugs to help his performance despite it affecting his health, and see that as like... something morally reprehensible? like it is bad that it happened but it's not the student's fault, what's morally reprehensible are the circumstances that led to his decision, not his decision

and like it is very much a systemic problem, more and more kids are taking focus pills to be able to survive the pressure of school and have a shot at a future, either on their own or because we are actually medicalizing not existing to be productive. and if it's a systemic problem then the fault is at the system?? and like holy shit i legit don't understand why choices gave us options like being like "it still isn't enough" when lucas gets rid of his pills, what do you mean it isn't enough??? enough for what??? to FORGIVE him???? for something that only hurt himself??? for something that is very much a systemic problem and therefore NOT HIS FAULT????? literally what the fuck even is this, lucas doesn't have to "make up" for a single thing, he needs to be HELPED is what he needs

like idk i know that the school system in the US is...... extremely backwards lmao which is not a term i like to use because it usually implies imperialistic views but the US is the height of world imperialism so like actually idc. brasil has a pretty progressive constitution and as a teacher my whole education was focused on being critical of the school system, particularly the productivity obsession, and drilling into us again and again that we aren't supposed to just be teaching subjects, we are also supposed to be teaching how to be a citizen, be a critical human being, work towards building a better future, and learning and growing AS A PERSON to be healthy and happy are values of the school system

like that's easier said than done when schools are under insane amounts of pressure by companies in practice to be productivity-driven, and most teachers who actually want to do a good job end up having to live at the edge of the knife and constantly fighting back outside pressure, but at least it is very much a mandatory part of our education to become teachers and also like literally part of the constitution. so i just... i can't fathom reacting the way mr cooper did? like as a teacher i felt BETRAYED, i felt like he shat all over my profession because that is the opposite of what we should be doing, this is a kid who needs help

and just like hOLY SHIT HE DID NOTHING WRONG, what are you punishing him for??? it's not even a like, stealing bread to feed your family situation, because what he did HAS NO VICTIM OTHER THAN HIMSELF, and therefore HE IS THE VICTIM NOT THE CULPRIT. he doesn't have to repent or atone or answer for a single fucking thing, he didn't victimize others, he doesn't have to apologize, there's nothing to punish him fOR??? like i don't believe in punishment anyway cuz im a prison abolitionist but doDAUSDJADASIJDAS???????????? HE DIDN'T. HE DIDN'T DO ANYTHING WRONG. WHY IS THIS WHOLE GAME ACTING AS IF HE WAS IN THE WRONG. OH MY GOD

it's like saying that someone needs to be forgiven for self harming????? like how is it that someone has been hurt continuously until it led them to hurt themselves and then they have to? make up for it to a bunch of other ppl? my god it makes me so mad and i genuinely don't understand the logic, like usually when i see someone doing fucked up shit i can see the logic but i don't agree with it, but this time i genuinely DON'T SEE THE LOGIC. my USan friends said it was because he was technically doing drugs but like i legit still don't understand

anyway any school that drives a student to do something like that needs to rethink their entire curriculum and the psychological effect it's having on kids, because lucas is 1- not even the first one according to mr cooper; 2- even if he was, that'd be the only one who got CAUGHT; and 3- even if there was really only one singular student who went tHIS far, i doubt the others weren't feeling that same pressure and dealing with it in other similarly unhealthy ways

i know that's probably easier in brasil than in the US even if it's by no means easy here because here at least in public schools the curriculum and political-pedagogical plan has to be agreed on by the school community (teachers, parents, students, workers, and anyone who lives in the area of the school) and it's updated every year, so like, you have more means to do something to change the school in a deeper way, altho of course that still has to mean swinging the rest of the community, but still. but at the very least he could have looked for counseling for him? tried to find a way to take some of the workload off his shoulders? given him some more time on assignments? motioning for all the clubs he was the president of to have co-presidents so he was less overwhelmed?

like there was just daodsao he could have done so many things and he justs DIDN'T he chose to not only punish him instead but quite literally THREATEN HIM WITH DEATH because that's what calling the police on a latino student over a drug charge is. like he might've survived but the possibility that he would fucking DIE was very much there, and i know choices didn't think of that because they'd rather die than think about the racial implications of anything but holy fucking shit. and im not even getting into how mr cooper is BLACK because then ill just start biting people like thanks for putting that threat on a black character's mouth choices. if u need me ill be foaming at the mouth

anyway SORRY god why is it that i always get to the salty part within 2 seconds of joining a fandom i promise that i actually like it lives and the way they handled most of their plot, i genuinely think it's a very well written and actually worth ur time story but i just doadosaida like i said particularly as a teacher in the context where i'm being taught, plus with all my political beliefs, i just can't let it go aaaa

also ty for telling me ur pronouns! idk if i assumed them at any time, i don't think so but i might have done so without realizing and if i did im really sorry. also sorry for the gigantic salty reply daojdsaojdaisjsajdoadsaodasj rip me i never shut up

#it lives spoilers #ilitw spoilers #it lives #salt #long post #drugs tw #cops tw #police brutality tw #racism tw #victim blaming tw #anti connor green #ilitw #lucas thomas #ask #identity thief anon #self harm tw

5 notes · View notes

symptoms-syndrome · 3 years

Note

I’m the gatekeeper in a recently prof DX’d system, and our host prefers not to publicise our diagnosis, which I entirely agree with, but I grieve frequently for my past and my own life so I thought I might make my own account to help ease that a little and learn more about dissociative spectrum disorders. Do you have any tips on how to simply- get started?

Hm. I'll make this a multi part answer. I hope it doesn't get too long. I also am going to assume that by dissociative spectrum disorders you mean DID/OSDD, since I assume you're asking about system things? Most dissociative spectrum disorders won't cause dissociated parts the way DID/OSDD do.

Also obligatory "I'm not a professional or a scholar I just read books."

Firstly, I think it's important to identify why you want to learn more, because different reasons will make you want to take different approaches.

Do you want to learn to better understand yourself? If so, you would likely want to look into healing-focused, patient-directed resources. You don't totally need to understand how DID works on a whole to better understand and improve yourself, especially considering how different DID can be for everyone.

Do you want to learn to help others? Definitely more complex. Know and understand that you will not be able to help people you don't know (or people you do) responsibly until/unless you go through a lot of school.

If you want to learn more in order to like, connect w ppl w DID online or something I'm afraid you're SOL. Online DID communities are pretty atypical overall, a lot of the stuff people talk about on Tumblr or wherever are more? Community oriented things than clinical.

I don't know anything about your age, background, education, etc. But if you are going to venture past patient-focused self-help books and into clinical books and research papers, it's very important to learn things like how research is conducted, how those papers are written, and for what purpose. A lot of academic papers in general are written with the assumption you know that sort of thing, and people reading research papers without that context often leads to misunderstanding and misinformation.

For example, with DID, a lot of papers will talk about broad, overarching themes instead of specifics. You aren't likely to find papers specifically about, for example, fictives and source memories, but you might be able to find papers about introjection and substitute beliefs. Additionally, a lot of these papers are written with the intent of treating patients. If something isn't like, an issue that's negatively effecting a patient's life, there's less likely to be research about it. I suppose I might compare it to reading tarot, in that pulling a some card isn't going to tell you there's mold in your fridge, but it might tell you to be more concious of your environment? Bad analogy but hopefully you get my point. The assumption is that you'll be able to use the broad information in a paper and figure out how it applies to your specific patient, since they can't possibly write about each and every individual thing/way something can manifest in a disorder as complex and as personal as DID. You, being a single person, are a small minority of the people who have DID, so no paper, book, or resource will explain everything you have going on completely without having a lot of stuff that doesn't apply to you. There's a lot of common threads of course, but just keep in mind that just because something is written somewhere, doesn't mean it has to apply to you specifically. No one person can have every symptom presented every way.

Also with a disorder as complex as DID, it's best to start small. Learn about trauma first, PTSD/CPTSD, et cetera. There's a lot that probably won't be relevant to you specifically, but it's an important background to have. Like how if you want to learn architecture, you need to learn materials science first, and if you want to study bugs you need to study biology. It's all necessary background information that'll help you parse the information you learn about DID in a way that makes sense, because research papers aren't written for laymen and they're sort of written with the assumption you know the basics. This applies more the more and more specific you get.

Also, of course, papers/books/etc about trauma often have nitty gritty details and case studies. Be prepared for that and take breaks/make sure you have a support system as needed.

Lastly, and I don't know how to put this delicately or in a way that won't make people angry, but prepare for your research to be not at all aligned with your experiences on Tumblr, and sometimes even contrary to them. The way people talk about DID on Tumblr, especially the way a lot of popular blogs talk about DID on Tumblr, is definitely not the most common way it manifests or the most common way people are encouraged to treat it. This isn't to say that it isn't a genuine experience, it just isn't the most common one, and it certainly isn't a clinical one. A lot of intra-community issues are so specific that you aren't likely to find books or papers about them. Some things that are incredibly common sources of conversation in social media (such as pseudomemories, introjects, headspaces) aren't really talked about a lot in books and papers. The primary focus of the research field is the treatment of trauma, so things that aren't necessarily directly relevant are less likely to appear in research.

Be open to being wrong, being corrected, and learning. Just as with any other kind of learning. Nobody knows everything and it's okay to be wrong.

As for resources, I believe the most common books people read about DID specifically are

Coping with Trauma-related Dissociation (patient-directed) and Treating Trauma-related Dissociation (therapist-directed) by Kathy Steele, Onno van der Hart, and Suzette Boon

The Haunted Self by Ellert R. S. Nijenhuis, Onno van der Hart and Kathy Steele (therapist-directed)

There are a wide array of books, I obviously have not read them all. Be more critical of books the older they are, and be aware of when someone is talking from personal experience vs when someone is talking from clinical experience. They both have their usefulness and neither is to be dismissed, but they shouldn't be confused.

Sorry this got very long! I tried to keep it as short as possible, but learning about this sort of thing is really complex overall so it can be hard to be concise.

#actuallydid #dissociative identity disorder #asks #ask to tag #also for fucks sake stay away from YouTube channels and Tiktoks and the like #there's no way to condense something as complex and variable as DID down to cute little videos #they can be useful for personal experience but also due to the nature of. making money off clicks theyre usually at least a little #dramatized conciously or unconciously

11 notes · View notes

theharlotofferelden · 3 years

Text

So I checked back in on the notes of this post where OP has threatened to commit suicide to see if there was an update (seems like their sister popped on to say they’re fine but that they indeed tried to commit suicide) and just decided to do a long blockchain because I honestly don’t want any of these people interacting with me, and saw someone claiming that I’m a “mommy blogger who compared LGBTQA+ issues to people being persecuted for pedophilia”. Which like....

Even if I was a mommy blogger....what’s wrong with that? Like, how can you be someone that purportedly stands up for social justice issues when you pull misogynistic crap out of your ass like that?

I’d honestly rather be a mommy blogger than among the 17-20 year old people in the notes of a suicide note roleplaying specifically to drive up the notecount. I don’t know what delusion you guys are living, but you’re not the good guys in this scenario. You literally cannot spin trolling in the comments section of someone’s suicide note as a good thing.

And with regards to the claim that I compared LGBTQA+ issues to people being persecuted for liking pedophilia, I’m assuming they’re talking about this post, and no that’s not what I said. How the fuck are some of you 20 when your reading comprehension and critical thinking skills are so poor that the moment you’re confronted with a nuanced subject you automatically default to “SHE COMPARED LIKING PEDOPHILIA TO LGBTQA+ DISCRIMINATION!!!!”

It’s funny because I literally pointed this out in my first reply that this shit is what derails the conversation about online harassment. You can hide behind caring about pedophilia and racism all you want, but at the end of the day, you’re trolling the notes of someone’s suicide note. You don’t do something like that if you genuinely care about those issues.

Ostracizing someone over a Bad Take doesn’t help anyone. Like, not only do you make it more difficult for other people to talk about the issues you claim to care about, but in this case specifically, what could have been a learning experience became a traumatic event. And even considering that “they could be faking it!” You have created an environment in which OP, after trying to explain and apologize, could not handle the public scrutiny of people they used to consider their peers. I’m sorry, but you don’t foster a supportive community based on understanding and respect by harassing someone; you’re just stewing in your own toxicity while simultaneously masquerading as someone with High Morals.

And here’s a news flash for you: I also think incest, pedophilia, abuse, rape, etc. is bad. I mean, most people do. It’s just most of us understand that a) we have other things to worry about besides people consuming/creating media subversively, b) know it would be a futile effort even trying considering not every person who does so does so publicly (so what are you gonna do about those ppl, break into their house?) c) don’t know and/or don’t want to know why someone would be interested in that content, and d) have the basic understanding that this kind of behavior gives license to other bad faith actors to do the same thing to other people who don’t consume subversive media.

The fact that a bunch of 17-22 year olds are incapable of understanding this because they’re too hitched up on Problematic Works or that some rando did an Oopsie On The Internet is pretty appalling. If you really cared about all the issues you claimed to care about, you would be spending your time trying to educate people. Fostering community and understanding is the best way to do that, but that takes time/energy and work. Why bother with the difficulty and discomfort of having conversations about racism, when you could just harass someone to death for One Thing they said.

#personal: rant #//tumblr is wild y'all

7 notes · View notes

rizahawkais · 3 years

Note

I LOVED season 1 and 2 of the crown but found season 3 quite dull and difficult to get through. I'm enjoying season 4 (still havent finished bc I watch with my family and we're rarely all together) but I think that the earlier seasons were a lot better in my opinion

hi! i completely agree w you!

I AM SO SORRY FOR THE LATE REPLY! I replied to this the day you sent it but my laptop crashed and I lost everything I wrote so I put off till now!

All in all, the writing for the first two seasons were WAY better. My ranking is s2 > s1 > s4 >>>>> s3. In my opinion, season three was kind of terrible.

hahaha this is so so long.

In the first two seasons each episode’s mini story for the day was actually INTERESTING. Like, I loved where one episode was about the Mountbatten name and then the next was about the Great Smog! But, there was always an overarching plot and it always added up in the end. S1, S2 and S4 all had an overarching plot that worked! S1 was balancing family and the crown. S2 was balancing prime ministers and her husband. S4 was the downfall of Margaret Thatcher and Charles/Diana. S3 LITERALLY HAD NO PLOT! It was just a bunch of stories put together. The finale for season 3 was about the end of Margaret’s marriage! And although, it is an important event in the family’s history the fact that it was the finale episode????

Anyways, Season 3 genuinely just sucks. Season 4 is REALLY good. Yet, it still doesn’t leave as much of an affect on me like the earlier seasons. AND LIKE I KNOW BECAUSE I’VE REWATCHED THE FIRST THREE SEASONS SO MANY TIMES. I’ve only seen the fourth once because I’m too busy and it’s also too early for me to rewatch it. So, maybe my opinion of season 4 will change!

Now, because I am extra 😈😈 and crazy I will talk about every single episode IN ORDER. hehehehehehe. feel free to hate me

SEASON ONE

101 Wolferton Splash - 10/10 this episodes just sets everything up! we see how happy the marriage is and how loving king george is and we also see the FORSHADOWING!! we see lilibet and phillip making their life thinking they had time when we know they don’t and it’s just :( AN AMAZING PILOT EPISODE WITH AMAZING QUOTES!

102 Hyde Park Corner - 1000/10 this episode needs no explanation. the suspense and DRAMA right before lilibet finds out about her dad ALWAYS gets me!!

103 Windsor - 10/10 I hated this episode the first time I watched it! I didn’t understand the importance of her uncle and I didn’t understand the complexity behind the episode. I was 14 when I saw this episode for the first time! So, mind you I was quite ignorant. but, david basically represents the audience in the show for those who hate the monarchy and call them out on their hypocrisy. BUT DAVID IS A TERRIBLE PERSON! FUCK DAVID! i understand hating the monarchy and for him i know it was personal but the way he talks about his family in the letters UGHUGHGUHGUHGUHGUH this man is evil! there’s also the other story in the episode about the mountbatten name which is so brilliant!

104 Act of God - 15/10 this episode was boring on first watch but I WAS FOURTEEN! this episode took a break from the monarchy and concentrated on a british national horrific event THAT WAS IMPORTANT and i liked how it connected throughout the episode and all that and the CINEMATOGRAPHY OMGGGGG! anyways, something that pisses me off about this episode is that the crown kind of has the same kind of audience as euphoria! they only care about a hot actor or iconic character or the aesthetics AND THAT MAKES ME ANGRY! bc those are the ppl who call this episode the boring fog episode and the latest episode of euphoria a waste of time! they don’t understand the importance of what their watching. an event that killed hundreds by something that could have been avoided bc of science and for euphoria an ongoing pandemic of an ugly world and its affect on ppl not wanting to go on! IM SORRY THIS TURNED INTO A RANT but this episode is important in reminding audiences that disasters can be avoided but also once they happen anything can happen THIS WAS A SAD EPISODE OKAY AND I LOVED VENETIA SCOTT!

105 Smoke and Mirrors - 100/10 THE CORONATION EPISODE! Phillip tries to bring it to the common public and all the fighting between them just makes the coronation even more impactful when we watch it!

106 Gelignite - 8/10 I DESPISED MARGARET IN THE FIRST SEASON i saw her as a spoiled brat who wanted to marry her dad’s assistant! AND ALSO HOW DID SHE NOT REALIZE THERE WAS DEFINITE GROOMING INVOLVED! this episode is generally very good but margaret just pisses me off a lot! however, her not being able to marry peter boresend shouldn’t have been because of his divorcee status but bc he simply was a predator in anyone’s clear eyes IM SORRY IF YOU DISAGREE BUT SHE MET HIM SO YOUNG NO WAY THERE WAS NO GROOMING good episode but pissed off at margaret’s lack of critical thinking besides but I WANT HIMMMMM LIKE I WANT EVERYTHING

107 Scientia Potentia Est - 11/10 hated this when i first watched it! but now one of my favorites! lilibet feels dumb and needs a tutor! prime minister and wannabe prime minister have health problems and keep it from her! lilibet finds out by accident and they all get yelled at! I LOVE WHEN SHE YELLS AT MEN!

108 Pride & Joy - 10/10 this episode is just adds on to the overarching plot of the season: balancing the crown and family. margaret says disrespectful things to ppl who don’t deserve it in place of lilibet while she’s on the commonwealth tour fighting with her husband! then lilibet scorns margaret and we see an ugly papa loved me more argument! absolutely brilliant!

109 Assassins - 1000/10 hated it the first time but now I LOVE THIS EPISODE! it’s the painting and porchey episode and churchill leaving episode. It’s so so so good! i honestly have no words to describe the brilliance of this episode besides the acting done by almost the entire main cast CLAIRE WOW! MATT WOW! STEPHEN (THE PAINTER) WOW! JOHN WOW! HARRIET WOW! when we see the painting getting burned coincided w the downing st dinner GETS ME EVERYTIME I LOVE IT SO SO MUCH!

110 Gloriana - 100/10 the climactic fight between the crown and family! which will lilibet choose?? and the foreshadowing to suez MWAH!

SEASON TWO

201 Misadventure - 100/10 LOVE LOVE LOVE THIS EPISODE the cutesy lilibet and phillip until it all goes down WOW! and the suez stuff i love it all

202 A Company of Men - 100/10 this is where i think mike’s wife starts snooping or it’s the next episode BUT THIS IS WHERE SOMETHING BEGINS FOR SURE first of all it foreshadows the episode later in the season about philip’s childhood AND MATT’S ACTING!! it’s too good for words!

203 Lisbon - 100/10 i like it when they fight lol that’s the only way i know how to describe why i love it LILIBET WAS EXCITED TO SEE HIM AND SO WAS HE but then mike ruined it by being a disgraceful and dishonest man RUINING EVERYTHING

204 Beryl - 10/10 i start to like margaret bc i feel bad for her! she’s suffering she’s sad that her lil predator boyfriend is no longer w her but look who it is MATTHEW GOODE! he not suspicious at all but the writers are like here take 20 minutes of perfect chemistry between the actors!

205 Marionettes - 100/10 I LOVE THIS EPISODE basically someone who loves the monarchy insults the monarchy and lilibet actually goes to listen to them! w resistance of course but she still took everything he said to fix the monarchy !

206 Vergangenheit - 1000/10 one of my favorites! i didn’t know about david’s nazi past so when i watched this episode for the first time i was completely baffled! another episode where she yells at a man!!!! i’m always annoyed in this episode tho by all the talk from the priest about forgiveness bc im like why would u want to forgive david for being a nazi?? but i think it was intentional by the writers to show the importance of understanding forgiveness and the grounds for it! THIS EPISODE IS JUST PERFECT IM ANNOYED BC I DON’T WANT TO FORGIVE HIM

207 Matrimonium - 9/10 this episode is amazing BEFORE you’ve seen season three bc you root for margaret and tony! but, also throughout the episode there’s all that tony and family and his gf and bf stuff that you think is going to lead somewhere but doesn’t??? like what was the point of introducing his mother and his relationships if it was going nowhere and not even mentioned in season 3??? LIKE WHAT WAS THE POINT WHAT WAS THE REASON? but, also there’s lilibet and phillip fluff in this episode I LOVE

208 Dear Mrs. Kennedy - 10/10 this episode is fun as an american bc i think jackie kennedy and jfk are so idolized here in america it was so interesting to see this other pov! BUT I ALSO REALLY LOVED LILIBET DANCING W NKRUMAH! I THOUGHT IT WAS SO CUTE AND THE MARTIN CHARTERIS STUFF LEADING UP TO IT WAS SO FUNNY!

209 Paterfamilias - 100000/10 no words. IT WAS SO SMART TO PARALLEL PHILIP AND CHARLES this has a lower rating than the previous episode which makes no sense but only goes to prove the idolization of jackie and jfk

210 Mystery Man - 100/10 EVERYTHING FROM THE FIRST EPISODE IS ADDRESSED IN THIS EPISODE THE SEASON COMES FULL CIRCLE JUST LIKE SEASON ONE DID AND SEASON THREE DID NOT DO THAT AND SEASON FOUR DID IT TOO BUT NO WHERE AS GREATLY

every single episode of seasons two has a 9+ rating from me!

SEASON THREE (worst season)

301 Olding - 5/10 weak starter but good for introducing olivia as lilibet and harold wilson and departing churchill BUT THAT’S IT! like the whole spy thing just went bleh LIKE IT HAD POTENTIAL but it needed early seasons writing not third season writing techniques TOBIAS DID A GREAT JOB THO IN THIS EPISODE HE WAS A GREAT RECAST FOR PHILIP

302 Margaretology - 6/10 okay. just okay. margaret kind of bratty but you actually feel bad for her then she gets bratty again and then you feel bad for her again and the scenarios in the episode just didn’t feel real like the whole lyndon b johnson was so jealous of jfk that he was rude to the queen so they sent margaret JUST DIDN’T MAKE SENSE like i know this show is fictional but the fiction tends to be believable until i research the episode afterwards BUT FOR THIS it just didn’t make sense

303 Aberfan - 1000/10 ONE OF THE GOOD EPISODES OF THE SEASON! those first fifteenish minutes??? TEARS! i never knew about aberfan until this episode and seeing this episode made me cry!

304 Bubbikins - 10000/10 THIS EPISODE IS TECHNICALLY NOT AS GOOD AS THE ABERFAN EPISODE BUT THIS IS A PERSONAL PREFERENCE we meet anne and alice in this episode AND I LOVE BOTH OF THEM (erinsdoherty is my current url!) this episode is so sad and sweet at the same time and loving bc i’m a sucker for philip’s back story!

305 Coup - 8/10 this had potential I FEEL LIKE IF THEY WROTE THIS EPISODE DIFFERENTLY LIKE HOW THEY WROTE ONE OF THE SUEZ EPISODE IT WOULD HAVE BEEN SO MUCH BETTER the fact that it all went to nothing and nothing basically happened WHAT WAS THE POINT

306 Tywysog Cymru - 1000/10 this episode made me like charles! what a horrendous statement! but, like i thought his relationship w his tutor was so heartwarming and he actually seemed to care and all that and it just all in all MADE ME HAPPY like this episode isn’t sad it’s a happy episode until the last scene w lilibet BUT YEA they gave us this one good episode until we hate him which i appreciate makes the story telling better

307 Moondust - -100/10 hate this episode LIKE GENUINELY HATE IT HATE HATE HATE and tbh im generally very very nice w my opinions ANYWAYS I WAS SO EXCITED FOR THIS EPISODE BUT IT WAS SO STUPID LIKE THE ASTRONAUTS BEING ASSHOLES WAS STUPID PHILIP BEING AN ASSHOLE TO THE PRIESTS WAS STUPID LIKE PHILIP IS AN ASSHOLE BUT IT’S BEHIND PEOPLE’S BACKS AND THEN THEY KILLED ALICE OFF SCREEN I HATE THIS EPISODE

308 Dangling Man - -1000/10 HATE THIS ONE TOO this episode convinced me that the writers for the first two seasons to this season has changed all of a sudden we forget that david was basically a nazi and the charles we met two episodes ago sees him as exactly like this uncle who he swore he would be nothing like to the people of wales??? LIKE WHO WROTE THIS THEY WERE DOING CRACK WHILE WRITING THIS EPISODE and i felt NOTHING during the lilibet and david goodbye WHACK EPISODE TERRIBLE JUST BAD TERRIBLE

309 Imbroglio - 5/10 episode started off good but then just went a lil too crazy by making it seem like a whole secret spy mission going behind lilibet’s back

310 Cri de Cour - 4/10 bad just bad HBC GOOD ACTRESS AMAZING ACTRESS given bad material like NONE OF THIS FEELS CONNECTED THIS STORY IS ALL RANDOM AND WE HAD A WHOLE EPISODE ABOUT MARGARET AND TONY AND WE DON’T EVEN MENTION ANY OF THE CRAZY STUFF FROM THE LAST SEASON BUT WE CONCENTRATE ON MARGARET BEING A SUGAR MAMA MAKES SENSE YALL

once again i hate season three

SEASON FOUR

401 Gold Stick- 8/10 written weirdly but had GOOD SCENES such as meeting thatcher and diana! BUT THE SCENE STEALER WAS OBVIOUSLY MOUNTBATTEN’S DEATH AND PHILIP TELLING CHARLES THAT HE BECAME DICKIE’S SON INSTEAD OF HIM SAD STUFF so like the death was sad and dramatic and I FELT BAD but like i shouldn’t bc im south asian and mountbatten did bad stuff to us BUT IT DOESN’T CHANGE THE RIPPLE WE FELT

402 The Balmoral Test - 9/10 funny episode but needed early seasons’ writing

403 Fairytale - 9/10 good episode but needed early seasons’ writing BUT ALSO THAT SCENE BETWEEN CAMILA AND DIANA MWAH CHEF’S KISS THEY BOTH DESERVE ALL THE AWARDS but needed early seasons’ writing

404 Favourites - 7/10 this episode is good but frustrating bc u finally realize how terrible of a mother lilibet is BUT THE ANDREW STUFF WAS GOOD I AM GLAD THEY PUT THAT IN! i liked seeing thatcher’s non-existent relationship w her daughter NEEDED EARLY SEASONS’ WRITING

405 Fagan - 10/10 GOOD EPISODE I LIKE HOW WE WERE EMERSED IN FAGAN’S LIFE AND I LOVE THE ACTOR FOR FAGAN TOO AND I LIKE HOW IT WAS CONNECTED TO THATCHER AND FUELED THE OVERARCHING PLOT OF THE STORY!

406 Terra Nullius - 100/10 GOOD EPISODE CLOSEST TO EARLY SEASONS WRITING THAT’S WHAT MADE IT GOOD seeing them not get along and then get along and then not get along again through a series of montages made the episode brilliant!

407 The Hereditary Principle - 6/10 this episode. how do i explain? the material for this episode was absolutely perfect for the writers of the early seasons! POOR EXECUTION

408 48:1 - 100/10 i like the political episodes more than the family episodes SO THIS EPISODE IS SO BRILLIANT BC OF THE BACK AND FORTH AND I GOT TO SEE CLAIRE!!

409 Avalanche - 7/10 early season writers would have shown the arguing before the avalanche and diana’s reaction JUST SAYING

410 War - 9/10 THIS EPISODE HAD THE YELLING AT EACH OTHER SCENE THAT WAS SO GOOD BUT ANYWAYS THE PROBLEM W THIS EPISODE WAS THAT IT DRAGGED I FEEL LIKE THIS EPISODE AND THE ONE BEFORE SHOULD HAVE BEEN ONE EPISODE TOGETHER

ALAS, what i would like to say is that i feel that season 4 shouldn’t have been so diana centric! it was diana from the beginning of the season to the end! not, that i don’t love the whole diana story but it was dragged and i think she should have been introduced around the third/fourth episode of this season the same way tony was in season two! camilla should have arrived at the beginning of season 4 so that the intensity between camilla, charles and diana was more believable! if we season three wasn’t so spread out they could have had more brilliant episode.

OK HAHA I AM SO SORRY FOR THIS VERY LONG RANT ABOUT THE CROWN PLZ FORGIVE ME! AND IF U READ ALL THIS WOW! IDK WHAT TO SAY I THINK I TALK TOO MUCH HONESTLY :( anyways thank you for talking to me :)

#the crown #queen elizabeth #prince philip #princess margaret #princess anne #princess diana #prince charles #margaret thatcher #asks #i talk too much

8 notes · View notes

the-lightning-strikes-again · 4 years

Note

Hey Lightning, I was wondering if I could get your thoughts on something. One take that seems to keep returning every once in a while is the "Allura fell for Lotor only after he revealed his Altean heritage," but I know u and others have disproven this many times, which does reassure me. While I love Allura, I definitely think one of her weaknesses was her devotion to Altea and singing Alfor's praises, which sometimes became too much. At the same time, it bothers me when I see some ppl (1/?)

Continuing anon message: “ say that she thought Alteans were superior to all other races, and that when the colony plot twist happened, she became repulsed by Lotor's Galra side, which is why she rejected him. For them, that's why she forced violent memories onto an uncorrupted Zarkon, but somehow "saw the good/redeemed" Honerva, the Altean. I can kind of understand where they're coming from, but for me, it just didn't make sense that Allura suddenly had a change of heart considering for most of s8, she was angry and dead set on going after Honerva. Even with that, I think to a lot of her fans, s8 made Allura so ooc that she became unrecognizable, which hurt to watch. I guess for me it's hard seeing antis and people who don't like her claim that that's just how she is and has always been. Haha sorry for rambling, but I'd love to hear your thoughts on this, since your arguments ease my mind on a lot of things when it comes to Allura :)”

Hi, anon. Wow, thanks for your extended note! I don’t know anywhere in canon that Allura champions Alteans as a superior race. The definition of racial supremacy is a belief that inherent genetic differences between races determine cultural or individual achievement, with social/governmental policies championing intolerance of other races. To get Allura to fit into such a label:

1. A viewer has to ignore or undermine all the evidence available about who the main-universe Alteans really were before main-universe Zarkon’s massacre of them.

2. A viewer has to ignore or undermine how Allura actually responds to a variety of different races in the show, including her own.

So let’s start with issue one. To support an “Allura was a racial supremacist” opinion, a lot of antis (and even non-militant, average viewers) are favorable to the opinion that Alteans as a group, including Alfor, were actually evil and violent colonizer elitists before Galrans killed them off. In other words, they question Altean victimhood, and this allows the militant antis to poison and undermine scenes of a woman mourning her home and her beloved family. And it just gets to be a really unsettling conversation, to listen to someone actually try to justify genocide. They’ll also have suspicions that all of our foundational backstory in the s3 finale was just “cleansed” propaganda from Coran. So if antis can undermine Allura’s entire race and family as corrupt, then they can intentionally undermine any of her canonical statements about or efforts toward peace. Which is hilarious, because this racist tactic applied to Allura is actually what a lot of antis accuse Allura of doing with Lotor.

For the record, I don’t think the show production team actually intended the subliminal messaging/cognitive dissonance that I’m about to discuss. The people who designed and developed this show are fans of robot kitties and aren’t PhDs in social issues. But I think there is a very serious issue about the portrayal of genocide victims that feeds into some very real problems in our world, especially regarding the concept of racial supremacy and conspiracy theories about genocide victims.

VLD tried to play with both genocide politics for edge™ points while ALSO playing with shatterglass theory (shatterglass meaning an AU where the heroes are villains and villains are heroes). Combining these two concepts into the same universe creates some incredibly disturbing subliminal messaging about Alteans that very closely mimics ongoing neo-Nazi propaganda against Jews. Nazis and other anti-Semitists justify their hatred of Jews by equating them as terrible villains out for world domination via some underhanded shadow control of the mass populace. It’s an incredibly malicious form of propaganda, because it works so terribly well. And what do you know, VLD plays right into this kind of propaganda. In the season 3 episode, Hole in the Sky, we��re faced with team Voltron confronting an Altean Empire that was actually evil and out for multiverse domination. And oh by the way, they’re using malicious shadow tech to control a mass populace.

It’s like someone on the production team read the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and then just copied/pasted that incredibly damaging and widely accepted conspiracy theory right onto Alteans for s3 funsies because edge content.

This is incredibly punishing, for the narrative to wave the carrot stick in front of genocide survivors that maybe some others survived—and then to suggest that Alteans were the evil ones all along. A shatterglass twist worked very well in Captain Marvel (2019) for a lot of reasons, for example, but it just doesn’t work well in the VLD universe given that the show explicitly portrays the genocide victims as evil and validates this concept. And this episode unfortunately feeds ongoing cognitive dissonance in antis that if AU Alteans could be so evil…how certain are you that they aren’t in the main universe too? On the reverse side, the main-universe goes out of its way to portray that not all Galrans are evil, and even that Galrans were the primary resistance (BOM). But in this singular episode, we see a united Altean empire. And the only Altean who moves to stand against it once the shine wears off…is Allura. There is no AU Altean actually shown in the Guns of Gamara. So Allura stands alone as an Altean against her own people.

For this reason, this episode doesn’t function very well as a shatterglass AU either, because the moral “flip” isn’t a mirror balance to main universe. The Alteans of the AU world appear as fully united in their evil plans. And then, no doubt, anti-alluras point out other quirky things about main-universe Alteans throughout the show—the violent language-learning system that scares Pidge, and the ancient Altean terraforming technology that Haggar activates, and the fact that Oriande is a hidden place that keeps out the less magical with a violent guardian. These details, when removed from main-universe world building, create a cognitive dissonance about whether main-universe Allura and Alteans were actually genuine in how they depicted respectful “peace and diplomacy.” So anti alluras who believe Allura was a racial supremacist really rely on this s3 episode and these details to uphold their conspiracy theory.

So let’s focus on Allura in this episode, because it says a lot about who she ultimately is as a person, and people have forgotten how she actually responded in this episode. Allura is unquestionably hopeful at the thought that her and Coran might not be the last Alteans alive. Pretty understandable. If I were the last human, I’d be darn excited to find out there’s more of me left, lol. So her experience as a genocide victim initially blinds her to the evilness of these Alteans. You can even see the ache on her face, of how badly she wants to believe their narrative of peace.

So Allura is initially star-struck that she and Coran are not the last Alteans, yes, and that somehow they’ve achieved a “peace.” She is also not afraid to admit that they would be valuable allies in the war:

And she’s not wrong there, considering that they have what appears to be extensive military resources and a robot force of their own. But she makes a critical mistake in assuming that “these are my people” means that they share main-universe cultural sentiments. The instant Allura hears Slav (so not someone of her own race) call these Alteans out as actually evil colonizers turning people into slaves, she begins to question the narrative she’s received.

In this instance, she actually affords the Alteans the same courtesy she afforded Lotor—the opportunity to deny the accusations.

But in the AU Altean’s case, they try to turn blame back on other parties. Allura listens to Keith when he grows increasingly fearful of what the Alteans might do to the others, and she tries to plead for actual peace:

And actually, this is a pretty interesting moment for Allura. She tries to salvage an alliance…until she realizes that their differences are irreconcilable, and that their definition of peace is inherently different from her own. This probably sets the stage for why Allura was so triggered by Lotor talking about peace while also killing people—because she’s seen people misappropriate that term before. And also probably informs why she trusts the information of both Keith and Krolia (both of whom have Galran blood, btw).

Ultimately, Allura turns against her own people. Violently:

When they get angry about her wanting actual peace, Allura draws a weapon against them and rejects them from her people. This mimics how she spends several seasons fighting an Altean Haggar/Honerva for her crimes, and how she turns against Lotor too.

So case in point here, Allura loves her people, obviously—but she also is holding them to moral standards regarding their behavior, which is something that a genuine racist doesn’t do. As a matter of fact, Lotor is the only person of Altean blood that Allura genuinely bonds with ever again in the series. She’s distant with Romelle, she’s distant with the s8 Alteans… In s8, Allura even says this about Luca, which refers back to her own mistakes she made with initially being star-struck by the s3 AU Alteans who came in “peace”:

Allura herself had been manipulated in s3, wanting so desperately to not be the last Altean alive that it initially blinded her to how Commander Hira was manipulating her. The plight of the s8 Alteans who are deceived by Honerva is inherently frustrating to her, because she can see herself in them.

Absolutely none of this correlates with Allura seeing or perpetuating Alteans as a superior race. At every turn, her own people continue to disappoint her, and she increasingly and progressively separates herself from them in hopelessness, because they’re so brainwashed that they can’t see they’re just cannon fodder for someone else’s military agendas. Not exactly a ringing endorsement for a superior race, lol.

So let’s think about anti accusations here. Allura is a racial supremacist…but she’s arguing against her people who believe unquestionably in Honerva, another full Altean like herself? Nothing about that accusation makes sense with her actions.

The fact is, consistently from season 3 and onward, Allura is faced with her own people morally disappointing her.

The good news for the s8 Alteans like Tavo is that Allura is able to remove the dark entity Honerva is using to control him. Which allows other Alteans to “wake up” from being manipulated and try to make amends.

Regardless, Allura makes a very clear line that simply being Altean doesn’t make someone “right.” She sees herself fully at odds with her own people who are drawn in by Honerva’s lies. And she experienced well back in s2 (revealing Haggar as Honerva) and s3 (evil AU Alteans) that any given race, including her own, can house people who do bad things.

The fact is, she’s consistently and willingly drawn weapons against even her own people when they didn’t meet her moral expectations. So her response to Lotor isn’t particularly out of line there. She’s repulsed by a moral flaw.

And actually, Lotor himself wouldn’t have known this, but he very oddly echoed the AU Alteans by getting angry that Allura was angry over the means through which he was trying to get peace:

So Lotor actually reverts to the same logic of the AU Alteans—peace at any cost, just look at the results—

And keep in mind that the AU Alteans also manipulated Allura’s excitement about them, to get her to make the transreality comet usable so they could go into other realities. So Allura has felt betrayed and used before, by her own people.

So when she says this:

Yes, it’s a reference back to how Zarkon manipulated his friends in order to get access to the quintessence field, at the explicit cost of potentially killing his own people. But it’s not without understanding that yes, Alteans can be just as manipulative and betraying as Zarkon. Because she’s experienced it, again and again.

As a matter of fact, six out of the eight seasons of Voltron: Legendary Defender feature villainous Alteans/Alteans on the wrong side of the war, and we continuously see Allura punished again and again for wishing that Alteans still lived.

No wonder she wanted to die.

This is something that I find uncomfortable about the narrative of the show. Previous iterations of Voltron did in fact have a “blood on everyone’s hands” perspective, such as within the ages 16+ Dynamic Comics. However, Arusians/Alteans in those old Voltron narratives were not victims of genocide. VLD turns Alteans into victims of the worst racial crime possible and then also consistently portrays them as inherently antagonistic to genuine peace efforts in some way, instead of focusing on the evil of the oppressors.

And this is such a double whammy for Lotor’s characters as well, given that he was abused by his parents and threatened with slavery via his Galran culture, and that he was half-Altean too trying to connect to his lost culture.

As a matter of fact, the larger show’s narrative interest in “victims as antagonists” makes it such that when we see victims try to enact actual justice, it feels almost jarring. Let’s look at that s8 Zarkon moment you brought up as an example, where Allura destroys his innocent perspective by showing him his evil deeds.

The s8 Zarkon is a weird topic because 1) This Zarkon actually doesn’t exist outside of Honerva’s mind, so how he has any kind of actual free-will is beyond me, unless someone wants to argue that Honerva actually cursed his true soul just as she cursed the other paladins. It’s hilarious too, because Honerva-mind-Zarkon also calls Honerva a psychopath, so I guess now Honerva is psychoanalyzing herself using her dead husband as the vehicle, while also discreetly helping the paladins to stop herself—

ANYWAY, using this Zarkon as a “proof” of Allura’s “racism” is also cherry picking in the weirdest of ways. Is she angry about his horrific and incalculable crimes, including even how he betrayed the OG paladins and ruined his own planet? Absolutely. Does she want him to be aware of his crimes instead of having to pretend like nothing’s wrong? Yes.

But notice here, this Zarkon actually shows remorse. He is actually crying over those memories and recognizing that he had done something wrong. And Allura can work with that. In fact, out of everyone standing around and doing nothing, it’s Allura who gives him a second chance and offers an alliance with Zarkon in order to stop a crazy Altean:

Keep in mind too, Honerva didn’t have memory loss at the end of s8. She knew exactly what she’d done and had given up and had to actually be convinced to do anything halfway constructive. That’s a very different circumstance than mind-Zarkon had, who jumped at the chance to do something to fix what all had happened, and gets even morally righteous about it, calling his own wife a psychopath, lol.

So generally, antis who believe Allura was a racial supremacist haven’t watched the show holistically. We see her hold the same standards to her own people as she expects out of others. This show would look incredibly different if Allura were a true racial supremacist.

Ah, you ask. Okay, so we’ve refuted the big pieces of “evidence” used to incriminate Allura. But what about all of those weird details about ancient Altean history? The violent language-learning program that scared Pidge? The violent terraforming tech that almost kills Voltron? The concept that Alfor tried to play “police” over the Galra and actually blew up their planet? The Alteans’ ongoing discussions of “peace and diplomacy” and spreading it throughout the universe while they happen to sit on a massive load of ancient power?

The s3 finale and other facts throughout the series very heavily smash the claim that our canon, in-universe Alteans were evil colonizers like the AU Alteans. The biggest piece of evidence to the contrary is that the Altea we know was one (1) planet. You counted right. One planet. Not an empire, but a singular planet. The s3 finale corroborates this, showing Altea as being largely isolationist from a military perspective while Daibazaal and Nalquod warred "for generations," right in front of their salad.

So some viewers would have you believe that Alteans were these big bad, intergalactic police state colonizers. But for all of its great power and knowledge, the singular planet of Altea didn't even canonically interfere in the wars of its own galaxy for actual millennia? And looking at the screenshots upon the stabilization of the alliance, Alfor is revealed to not have had experience with a neighboring culture. His face while exploring Gyrgan’s homeworld is an indication that it’s all rather new for him too. So again, we have evidence showing that Alteans were not colonizing or even functioning as a police state.

Note here that in the s3 flashbacks, the show confirms that it actually wasn’t just Alfor who suggested an alliance. All five leaders had common interests in protecting their galaxy from even worse threats, so all five came together at the same time. This is actually the first piece of evidence we have of Altea entering into some kind of intergalactic military agreement to stave off said worse threats.

And all of this is on top of a history where in s6, the Galran Archivist confirms that the Galran Empire had existed before Zarkon for 3,000 years, with times of “expansion.” It’s very easy to see that Blaytz’s people were actively fighting off Galran occupation of their homeworld within this past.

And that’s actually what I think makes Alfor and the OG paladins some pretty interesting characters. Here, we had colonizing Galran empire setting down its sword and accepting the value and space of its neighbors. Here, we had master alchemist Alfor giving up military power within their group by acknowledging Zarkon as the superior strategist. Here, we had Blaytz who had previously been battling Galran occupation…fully accepting the Galra?

So the OG Paladin backstory represents a pretty incredible alliance that removed a lot of intergalactic toxicity and helped heal broken bonds. But it required all five leaders to agree to that. Alfor did not throw his weight or power around within this. There were several checks and balances here.

But this backstory also helps to explain some of the quirky details about Alteans. Their planet existed within an active war zone, and it’s very likely that they’d had to fight off Galran occupation just as Blaytz’s people did. So the violent robot trainers and fear-based language learning systems start to make sense. Alteans weren’t just simpering people playing harps all day and eating grapes. They were actively prepared to defend their planet and their culture.

So when Allura says in season 1 that Alteans were “spreading diplomacy” across the universe, the only pieces of evidence we have of that is the OG paladins themselves, in which Alfor was a big part in creating that alliance—and then possibly the Alteans with the Balmerans, given their deep collective rituals with that planet while the Galra literally just came in and ripped the planet nearly to death. Allura tries to mimic what it means to accept and interact with a culture without changing it well in season 1, when she stumbles through trying to respect Arusian culture and its demands on its people. Also, there is a big fact that antis like to overlook:

The fact is, despite the untold numbers of civilizations we interact with across 76 episodes, no outside race remembers Alteans as evil colonizers. If they were really so big and bad, we would have heard it, like, “Man, yeah the Galrans are bad. Just as bad as those Alteans, back in the day.” Or something. But nope, nothing.

So I heavily question the history of Altea as an ancient colonizing race. If they were, then Altea wouldn't have just been a single planet with limited resources to fight wars in even its own galaxy. All of this supports the idea of Altean children being raised to fight--because they were preparing to defend themselves when/if diplomacy fails.... But the fact that the Balmerans see Alteans fondly and that literally every other race we run into is explicitly suspicious of Galrans and not at all of Alteans says something.

I think the only piece of evidence there might be for a genuinely colonizing ancient Altea is the use of terraforming technology, as mentioned in s4. Haggar discovers it and activates it to try and kill Voltron--and she nearly succeeds, because said tech destroys the entire crust of the planet to reform it. But you have to step back for a second and wonder--if ancient Alteans were so powerful, why was Alfor struggling so hard to even hold his own planet together in the midst of all these other cultures warring and larger threats? If they had this technology--and they did know about it because Allura recognized it right away as ancient technology--why the heck wouldn't they use it? Or were they using it, and it was to reform uninhabited planets to help sustain displaced peoples? Why is it, if Alteans were so terribly bad, we have no record across ANY of the many alien races being cautious of them? Even Galran Lieutenant Lahn snapped at Allura only because he was jealous of the general security she had back on, you guessed it, explicitly Altea. There's a lot of potential explanations for a positive use of terraforming technology, and the evidence against colonization and Altea committing omnicide against other races is incredibly more aligned with the other details in the canon.

And even Alfor’s creation of Voltron and the blowing up of Daibazaal—that’s something that antis like to position as evidence of his police-state ways to underhandedly control other cultures.

So let’s tackle those too while we’re at it.

Honestly, I know people like to hate on Alfor, and I do think his character picks up some misogynism just from the writers....But I don't think he was as much of a controller as people think he was. He was already in an alliance with four other leaders to try and stop bad things from happening in their galaxy. That meant they were expending incredible amounts of time and resources to accomplish that end—resources that were not renewable and may have been straining various planets. We know that he started building Voltron with Zarkon and everyone else's blessing because he called them "clean ships," but it's only after the rift creatures attack that suddenly Alfor's perception of Voltron moves from "clean energy" to "omg we need a more powerful weapon against this unknown enemy.”

So these are his intentions BEFORE he discovers rift creatures are a threat to the universe. While Zarkon states that these new ships are to be endlessly powerful for the Galra Empire, Alfor shames him by offering what his desire is for them:

After the rift creatures nearly destroy Daibazaal, intentions change.

So here, we see the game change in a BIG way. Voltron is not just about offering a more renewable way of sustaining peace-keeping efforts. Alfor is now adjusting and finishing these ships with the explicit knowledge that if they are not powerful enough, then Daibazaal and the Galran people will die. Alfor’s got a LOT of pressure on him now to deliver a mighty and powerful weapon to stop this new threat. So even his creation of Voltron as a superweapon involved using it to protect people from imminent death—not to police them.

And about Alfor blowing up Daibazaal—once again, it’s Alfor trying to clean up Honerva and Zarkon’s mess. Honerva had convinced Zarkon that the rift needed to be wider, and so Zarkon deceived the paladins into widening it.

So keep in mind here, at this point in time—the rift was destabilizing and eating an entire planet. The entire universe was now at stake. Alfor had to choose between a bad fix and an even worse option of allowing everyone to die, but he very clearly evacuated people before destroying Daibazaal, as part of his promise to keep Galrans safe. So that no one would have to die.

And as a matter of fact—about that terraforming technology. How sure are you that Alfor didn’t intend to use it to build Galrans a new home? It’s entirely within the realm of acceptable conjecture that he allowed for the existence of that technology because it could restore what had been lost.

And here’s where the story gets really screwy and feeds into some anti hate. Because when Zarkon wakes up as a zombie, he desires more quintessence as zombies do.

So he’s pissed that Alfor just cut off his gateway, and he manipulates his people:

And it’s here where we get the idea that Alfor was an evil controller. The idea came from Zarkon, who—we can look around pretty easily and see that he was not a man of honor, ultimately. Even if you chose to not believe the s3 finale flashbacks as being objective, there’s something wrong with Zarkon. (It’s clear that the show thought using Coran was a smart way to shell off massive amounts of info, because clearly if this were truly in Coran’s perspective, we would NOT have had intimate looks into Zarkon and Honerva’s bedroom as Zarkon is tending to her, like omg.) Numerous sources, histories, and cultures outside of Coran confirm that Zarkon hit a point of no return on the evil scale, and that he projected his own blame for Daibazaal’s destabilization onto Alfor in order to raise up his new regime in the name of Quintessence™.

So at the end of the day, even Alfor was a victim. But yet somehow, various antis choose to believe Zarkon’s victim-punishing narrative because said antis can’t or else refuse to connect one scene to another since it undermines their justifications for why they can hate on Allura. And that’s not so much an issue with the story itself as it is just poor critical analysis or malicious weaponization of content against other fans.

Now, at this point, we’ve talked about Allura and we’ve talked about Altean history. I have numerous other posts about Allura’s interactions with other races and Galrans and overcoming trauma to give the entire universe a second chance. So if there is anything in this show that suggests Alteans were in any way a superior race, then it’s probably within the show’s own worldbuilding. The show contradicts its own definitions of what quintessence even is by suggesting Alteans have “bluer/purer quintessence” in order to justify why Lotor would even be trying to sacrifice them for anything. The show-championed concept that Alteans have a bluer, purer life force above all other people, and that only Altean energy could interface with the fabric of space-time. Now, this is a problem in the later seasons’ world building itself. And you know who wrote that in? The production team. So once again, we do have racial issues in this show, in ways that shows like Star Wars desperately try avoid by showing racial diversity in who has Midi-chlorians.

That said, I’m not a perfectly woke storyteller either. I think every story and show is going to have something problematic™, but with VLD it’s very clear that its disrespectful handling of genocide politics and shatterglass conspiracy theories, on top of its weird master race angle created the perfect storm. These mishandled and quirky details have created a cognitive dissonance with the provided narrative, resulting in some people in the anti fandoms to champion what aligns very closely to actual neo-Nazi propaganda against Jews, who according to them are not victims but instead the true perpetrators of all bad things. For the sake of the antis, I’m pretty sure they’re not intentionally looking at VLD this way and are probably just looking for any easily graspable reason to hate on Allura for interfering with their ship or something.

But this kind of subliminal propaganda that undermines victims, and the effect it has had on fandom morality politics, is deeply concerning to me. I really wish that we’d had an opportunity to respectfully and critically discuss this with the production team of the show, because a Y7-FV show about “strength in unity” should NOT result in us needing to have a conversation about people walking away with neo-Nazi-ish propaganda sentiments against genocide survivors. Like. Clearly, VLD is fictional, but it’s feeding into a real-life beast that it does NOT need to feed. And it’s keeping alive ongoing conspiracy narratives against some of our most vulnerable populations on the planet.

So, we need better stories. We need a production team that, if they’re going to get paid to do something involving portrayals of genocide and politics, that they need to do their research on those topics. Nobody is going to be perfect with a creation, but VLD validated some very damaging things—and it ALL is something that could have been fixable. I think it would have been incredibly validating to hear the production talk about and accept that these were issues that cropped up unintentionally, and to hear them confirm that these issues are not the sorts of things that VLD was supposed to champion.

The greatest tragedy of all of this is the potential that this show had to really champion some great and validating messages, and the potential that we as a fandom had to come together and do something that fandom was meant to do—which was celebrate the things we love. Because that’s why we’re all here. That’s why this crazy tumblr of mine even exists. It was supposed to celebrate things.

For that reason, I’m going to end this here. I’ve written several responses now as to my thoughts on the inappropriate narrative lens of the show, its contradictory and damaging worldbuilding about the purest race, and how it champions demonizing or punishing genocide survivors again and again. Within all of that, I’ve talked at length about Allura’s character and behavior over 8 seasons and how she built even empathetic connections with militant Galrans like Commander Lahn. In fact even her own homesickness is how she emotionally connects with Lahn, because she understands that desire to call something one’s own. To have a home. A family.

I now really would like to get back to writing stories that I find meaningful to me using these characters and these worlds—and trying to find the hope in all of this darkness, haha. And maybe with any luck, I can hope to do VLD some justice, knowing that I am still on a learning journey as well.

But I appreciate your note, and I hope this very extensive response helps to settle your questions and concerns once and for all regarding VLD Allura. If you should have any remaining questions, please feel free to reach out via a private message to discuss. Thank you!

#Volron #VLD #Allura #VLD Critical #Alfor #Zarkon #Honerva #Lotor #I hope this helps explain my perspective #I think this might have to be my last refutation to the Allura as racist/racist supremacist conspiracy theory #at a certain point #people either watch the show holistically or they don't #you can't convince an anti #so this meta will probably not help an anti #but if you're sitting on the fence and felt drawn in by anti propaganda #then I hope that maybe this post provides an alternate perspective #and one that tries to be more holistically fair to all 8 seasons of the show #and to the intentions and general oversights that can occur during production #Ultimately it doesn't matter if someone likes or dislikes Allura as a fictional character #we need better entertainment that can handle these hard topics and handle them well #And we also need a fandom who's willing to look at all of the information and not weaponize it to specifically demonize and silence others #Maybe a family TV show shouldn't be appropriating conspiracy theories from the Protocols of the Elders of Zion #real-world fans are incredibly vulnerable to such conspiracy theories #and it creates a lot of real-world strife as a result

19 notes · View notes