I need to make a confession

I genuinely do not understand Buggy simps

Like I thought y'all were joking with the whole rooting for Buggy-thing but. No. People are actually seriously rooting for him. And I just don't get it.

Like. I can't tell if I'm missing something or if people are somehow completely misinterpreting his actual character. Like clearly it's meant to be one or the other and I can't tell which and I feel like I'm losing my mind because of it

'Cause the thing is that. Like. Until now, Buggy has been a pure gag character. He's no different from characters like Ceasar Clown and Spandam in that sense, he's just nowhere near as vile a human being as those other gag characters so he's marginally more lovable in what a pathetic fuck he is. But in the end, Buggy's just been there to be a punching bag (quite literally), because it's funny as hell to watch him eat shit And the reason it's funny IS because Buggy is a piece of shit. Again, not nearly as bad as Spamdam and co, but he's still a lying, cowardly, spineless douchebag who uses others for his own benefit and is willing to ditch anyone to save his own skin. Like Buggy was going to ditch his entire crew and flee by himself when the Shichibukai System was taken down and the Marines came for his head. He was going to leave his crew to die by themselves, without participating in the fight at all. Buggy was the one telling them to do the hard lifting while he'd escape, while the crew had no idea their beloved Chairman was going to abandon them. Literally the only reason Buggy failed to do that was because he was too slow and Crocodile got there before he managed to skedaddle.

He is essentially Usopp if Usopp wasn't willing to get beaten to death to protect his friends and their honor. Even fucking Luffy thinks Buggy is a pathetic idiot, and Luffy is the biggest indicator in the whole series on how to tell whether or not the readers should like a character or not. Not to mention, all the in-universe Buggy simps have been portrayed as (precious) idiots who can't see through Buggy's bullshit. Like every step of the story Oda has been trying to tell us that Buggy is an absolute loser.

So when people are like "Mihawk and Crocodile are going to see Buggy's ambition and become full Buggy supporters themselves!" I just

Are we reading the same comic???? HELLO????

Like I'll give you this, it would be objectively the funniest fucking outcome imaginable, which would be on-brand for Buggy and his trend of falling upwards.

But between Mihawk respecting people who are willing to abandon their honor to protect someone dear to them, and Crocodile's deep trust issues (possibly rooted in being betrayed in the past), I can not fucking fathom the two ever genuinely siding with Buggy the "I will leave you to die by yourself to save myself" Clown. Not when the two (and most other characters, including fucking Galdino and Daz) have been able to judge Buggy's character accurately (like how Crocodile was like "I thought you'd have ran away by now" when he arrived at Emptee Bluffs, and Buggy was like "yeah no shit")

Not unless Buggy grows enough of a spine that he'd be willing to sacrifice himself for someone (or at least get hurt on someone else's behalf to protect them), more specifically Mihawk and Crocodile. And let's be real, right now, Buggy probably wants nothing more than to run away from the two before they do actually kill him.

I just

Buggy simps. I do not understand you. I don't understand how you've reached your reading of the character.