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#anti kataang
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There is no K/A or M/Z in Ba Sing Se. Katara amd Zuko just had one of those rad Ghibli romances where it's not exactly romantic, but they're spiritually bonded for life.
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the-badger-mole · 3 days
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So I’m a Zukka shipper not a Zutara shipper and I’m not as anti-Aang as you are but I love following you because you aren’t afraid to engage with the flaws in Aang and the source material. Like it’s an amazing show but it’s not as perfect as people make it out too be and several of those flaws come from how Aang’s flaws are never truly addressed
Like people claim that Aang overcomes his running away impulse to defeat Ozai and I’m like - did we watch the same show? This boy left his friends scrambling to come up with a brand new plan on the fly with mere hours to go before the genocide of the earth kingdom because he had to run away and try and come up with a solution that didn’t compromise his 12-year-old understanding of his cultural values.
Anyway - thanks for your thoughts, I don’t agree with all of them but they are always refreshing
Thank you! Glad to have you on board, differences and all.
Honestly, most of my outright hatred for Aang came in the post series when he didn't change or grow in the comics and Bryke and all the Aang stans were out not only excusing his flaws, but treating them like he was right all along! I have literally had someone come to my page and tell me that Aang didn't have to grow because he was supposed to have a flat arc, and then also defend his worst moments because he was a child who didn't know better. Which is it? Is he wise beyond his years and the only voice in the show we should trust? Or is he not responsible for his actions because he's...12 (and still should know better)?
I'm going to blow your mind a little and say him disappearing the night before his fight with Ozai wasn't completely his fault. Then I'm going to fix it by saying, it was the fault of the writers because they knew they didn't want Aang to kill Ozai, but chose not to address it until they'd literally painted themselves into a corner where killing Ozai was the only choice that made sense. Because of their refusal to make Aang grow and learn and be an active participant in ending the war, Aang looked selfish, short-sighted, and criminally, dangerously naive, and the only way to get out of it was TWO dei ex machina. Why would they not show their hero contemplating his duty and wrestling with it before the second to last episode? No idea. But it is Bryke's fault that I hate their pet character so much
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illycanary · 3 days
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What Aang’s Relationship With His Kids Tells Us About His Relationship With Katara
Bumi: “Oh, boo-hoo. Must've been real hard for you, flying around the world with dad, riding elephant-koi all day.”
Tenzin: “Oh, so that's what this is all about.”
Kya: “That's what it's always been about. You think you're some savior who has to carry on dad's legacy.”
Tenzin: “Who else is going to do it?”
Kya: “How about all of us?”
Bumi: “Yeah, we're Aang's kids too.”
The whole problem with this family is, Aang didn’t believe that.
Aang has a long, undeviating track record of never questioning anything he believes about the Air Nomads. Who the hell has a perfect and complete understanding of their society, government, international relations, education system, religion, morality, genetics, and reproduction at age 12? According to Aang? He does. 
The entire lynchpin of Aang’s Book 3 arc is all about how Air Nomads are pacifists and cannot ever under any circumstances harm a life. (We’re going to ignore the body count Aang’s already wracked up over the first two seasons for the sake of preserving his feelings because those were soulless NPCs or something.) 
And yet Aang never questions this…
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Monk Gyatso’s bones surrounded by a pile of Fire Nation soldier bones. The picture doesn’t fit Aang’s image of Air Nomad peace and harmony, so he ignores it entirely. It NEVER comes up despite its overwhelming relevance to Aang’s internal conflict and the sorts of advice he seeks from authority figures in the third season (despite Monk Gyatso being the penultimate authority figure in Aang’s life).
Another thing Aang never questions?
There’s no such thing as a non-airbending Air Nomad. They’re just all born that spiritual. And spirituality is the golden key that unlocks bending. (Because Bryke said so.)
Despite Guru Pathik not being a bender. Despite the fact that Zhao, literal spirit murderer, is one. Despite Toph—the most un-spiritual, cynical, feet-on-the-ground-head-nowhere-near-the-clouds member of Aang’s friend group—being the most powerful bender of the lot. Despite Hama being a waterbender equal to none but Katara while completely cut off from her culture and turning her back on everything we believe about water bending’s inherent ties to community, connectedness, and love (Iroh’s words). Despite Azula mastering the god-tier lightning technique BECAUSE she’s practically dead inside and values life least of all things. Despite the fact that Princess Yue has the literal MOON SPIRIT THAT IS THE SOURCE OF ALL WATERBENDING living inside her, and yet she still somehow manages to not be a bender.
Despite the fact that Air Nomads roam all over the world, sewing their wilds oats throughout every nation, yet no airbending toddlers ever crop up in Fire Nation or Earth Kingdom preschools. 
Despite the fact that non-monogamous societies where men have multiple partners father more children and boost the population faster than in societies that favor “attached” relationships, yet the all-airbending Air Nomads still somehow have the smallest population of any ethnic group in the world. 
Despite the fact that Aang’s twin, Ty Lee, is RIGHT. THERE. with her unparalleled aura-seeing, chakra blocking spirituality and her GRAY EYES in a world where color coding is ~totally~ not a thing… *sigh* 
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But nope. Air Nomad parentage = airbending child. Always.
So when Katara births a child that is… not an airbender? Not any kind of bender at all, in fact. There’s only one logical conclusion (in Aang’s mind). 
That is not Aang’s child. 
Aang never had a problem traveling with non-airbenders before. He was non-exclusionary by nature. Katara and Toph and Zuko were welcome. Sokka and Suki were welcome. The more, the merrier, in fact. Because Aang loves nothing as much as he loves an adoring audience.
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Yet Bumi never travelled with Aang.
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Bumi’s as old in this picture as Aang was in the first series. He had an entire decade in which he should have been the most important thing in his parents’ lives. His personality was already more or less formed (not completed, but the groundwork was laid) by the time Tenzin came along. Bumi’s inferiority issues began long before there were any airbending children around to siphon Aang’s attention for training purposes. 
Aang and Katara didn’t have another child until Bumi was on the verge of adolescence because Aang was convinced that Katara cheated. And I’m guessing it took Mr. “Let Your Anger Out, And Then Let It Go” about ten years to forgive his wife and give her the chance to get it right. (Which is at least four years longer than he gave her to forgive her mother’s murderer, in case you forgot.)
Acolyte: “Sorry, I thought you were the servants.”
Bumi: “We’re Tenzin’s brother and sister!”
Acolyte: “Avatar Aang had other children? The world is filled with more airbenders?!”
Kya: “We’re not airbenders.”
Acolyte: “Oh… I’m so sorry.”
The Air Acolytes—whose whole identity, purpose, lifestyle, and religion center around every detail of this man's life and beliefs—didn't know Aang had more than one child.
The best case scenario here is that Aang simply pretended his older children didn’t exist because he was ashamed of them and made Katara keep them shut away at all times. 
And maybe that could have worked… If Aang and Katara had ever had any privacy in their relationship. But they didn’t.
The Air Acolytes have been following Aang and Katara since the comics. They’ve been there at every step of Aang and Katara’s life together. Observing. Fangirling. Emulating. Diefying. Looking for weaknesses in the relationship because Katara was only his “first girlfriend.” 
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Yet, somehow, they didn’t know Aang had three children. 
I can’t imagine a way for them not to know unless Aang actively told people, “Those aren’t my kids,” and let Katara bear the shame and stigma of having the world believe she was unfaithful. 
All because Aang couldn't entertain the idea that he was wrong about some facet of a society he never understood clearly.
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forevermore05 · 2 days
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Every time I go into the mainstream fandom outside our little Tumblr home. And I happen to see Katara content..... I'm praying to not see hate for her but what do you know..... THERES HATE!
Okay and to point out..... in the comics, KA meet a bunch of girls who are Aang stans, and they built a ''air temple'' for him. Plus, one of the girls calls Katara Aang's ''first'' girlfriend and Katara has feelings of jealousy. The people in the comments were not having it at all, and were at Katara's throat.
But when Aangs is jealous (ember island players) it is all fine and good. Oh and he violates Kataras boundaries. It is all fine and good because he is the avatar.
Aang’s Personal HAREM Makes Katara Jealous | Avatar The Last Airbender #avatar #comics #shorts (youtube.com)
Also, the title of this video is so gross. Aang is a child. Why do people do this?
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rifari2037 · 24 days
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Zutara are parallels in every possible ways, yet they didn't end up together, and other shipper expect me to not upset about it?
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burst-of-iridescent · 8 months
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i will always hate that katara never came to terms with her bloodbending. especially given that it’s a symbolic representation of her own “darker” side, the fact that she was never able to find the good in it and accept it as just another aspect of her element, instead outlawing and demonizing it forever, makes me so sad because it perfectly encapsulates the person she herself ended up as: the shallow, shining trophy wife on aang’s arm, locking away everything he didn’t want and was never able to understand to become his perfect, flawless forever girl for the rest of her days.
and it’s so much more frustrating knowing that zuko — who knows exactly what it feels like to wield an element that can be destructive and violent, whose own arc about the duality of fire would have made him the perfect person to help katara understand that there is no such thing as inherently good or evil bending, only the bender who makes it so — was right there! yet instead of letting them have even one conversation about it, we got bloodbending being villainized till the heat death of the fucking universe and katara left forever unable to accept the complexity of her bending (and metaphorically, the complexity within herself) even though she had the exact person she needed right at hand to help and support her through the process… god it just drives me mad
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ecoterrorist-katara · 29 days
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the anti-Zutara criticism that “Zutara shippers are teenage girls who only like the ship because they self-insert as Katara” is actually so funny because how does that delegitimize the ship? So…girls who relate to Katara like Zuko, and they think Katara would like Zuko, and that’s bad because…girls are wrong? Girls are shallow? Girls don’t know what’s good for them? Anyway if I were a grown ass man who created a fictional teenage girl that lots of real teenage girls relate to, and these girls believe she would like character B instead of character A, I hope I’d have the humility to say to myself “hmm I wonder why people who relate to this character’s feelings and motivations think she would react this way” instead of jumping straight to “these girls are doomed to like toxic relationships”
(And I know Zutara shippers like the ship for many different reasons, and self-insert is not the most popular by a long shot, I’m just saying that the criticism of self-insert stems from dismissal of what teenage girls like, and that feels kinda misogynistic to me)
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darklinaforever · 15 days
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Katara could have ended up with Haru, and Zuko could have ended up with Jin, which I would have been happier with than canon Kataang and Maiko. The added irony that Zuko and Katara both flirted with people from the Earth Kingdom.
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johnskleats · 16 days
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is anyone going to tell the kat@angers that it's not feminist activism to argue Katara's arc in LOK is fine on the grounds that "some women want to be homemakers and that's okay!!"
Like you're not helping real women that way. In fact, most antis for the cannon ship ARE women. Many are homemakers themselves.
Katara is not a real woman. She is a fictional woman written by men.
Can the sensibilities and wishes of a girl change by the time she is a adult? Yes!
But as this is a textual character who, as per the text, rejects the societal structure of her fictional world (which mirrors our own) that women are and can only ever be docile homemakers (i.e. I don't want to heal, I want to fight; I will never turn my back on people who need me; let's start a prison riot; let's engage in vigilante ecoterrorism; let's pitch an absolute fit because the boys are not pulling their fair weight in the homemaking; let's confront my mother's killer at the absolute rejection and condemnation of the male figures whom I am to respect; etc) it is perfectly reasonable to argue that this end was not a natural course for her character.
Fictional characters are not real people. This means that they do not change their mind off screen. That is not an acceptable argument. That is called a "plot hole", which is a nonsensical change made at the convenience and contrivance of the writer(s), who in this case are men exhibited to not care for women or girls all that much. It is within THEIR character to write this way.
Regardless of who, if anyone, Katara ended up with, Katara tolerating disrespect, neglect, abuse of her children, giving up all of her former aspirations to live in the shadow of men, and dying as a mere footnote in history (and being alright with it!!) is not surprising given the absolute vitriol Bryke has shown toward female fans of their "creation". It was supposed to be a "boy" show. It was always supposed to be a "boy" show. The creators of Supernatural and Game of Thrones did the same thing. ATLA just did it first.
Arguing "not all women" is not activism in the face of what is really happening in this discourse. Sending death threats to real, actual women with feelings in defense of a fake pretend woman's fake pretend autonomy is performative activism, and worse, hypocritical.
Not all women agree with you. Not all women feel represented and find the outcome of Katara's story satisfactory. If y'all care about feminism and respecting women's choices so much, lay off the real life women you're so fond of harassing. Our views and opinions, while opposing your own, don't affect you.
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Katara: "I knew you wouldn't understand."
She fucking knew that Aang wouldn't be on her side in The Southern Raiders. How telling is that one line? That not only does Aang not understand Katara, but she knows that he doesn't.
If we would have seen Katara's side of kataang we would have seen a very different story than, "durr water tribe girl purty."
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longing-for-rain · 5 months
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what exactly is Aang's toxic masculinity that you're talking about? there are no examples of such behavior on his part in the show. he is not an ideal person, he is a child who sometimes behaved incorrectly, just like all the other children in the show (Katara, Toph, Sokka), and this is normal.
in addition, we see how he regrets some of his wrong actions and gets better, while Zuko does not regret his toxic behavior, doesn't apologize and doesn't face the consequences of his behavior (racist jokes about Aang, demands that Katara forgive him as if he has the right to her forgiveness, an attack on Aang to "teach him a lesson" and many other things).
Hi anon, thanks for the ask! This is a very good illustration of what I was talking about in this post when I mentioned that I feel toxic men are overlooked more often for appearing “nice” than they are for being conventionally attractive.
No examples of toxic behavior in the show? What do you call this then?
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I know what I (and the law) call it:
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But you see, he’s “nice” right? This is just a misbehaved child, as you put it? Yah, no. He knew better and still did it because he was possessive; this whole interaction started because he was jealous that an actress playing Katara was interested in men other than him. And the show proceeded to frame the situation in a way that made Aang sympathetic, despite being the aggressor and the one behaving irrationally. How much more “toxically masculine” can you get than that? But he put on a flower crown once so we’re supposed to think he’s a soft uwu feminine boi (even though he was absolutely enraged that a female actress played him).
I also find it very interesting that you describe Katara and Sokka as “children” while Zuko is omitted from that list despite being the same age. Are you admitting you agree he’s more mature, or are you admitting that you hold him to different standards?
But, anyways. You asked about toxic behavior on Aang’s part, which I’ll get further into now that the most egregious example is out of the way.
Let’s break down what you consider unforgivably toxic behavior on Zuko’s part and compare it to Aang’s behavior in similar situations.
1. “Racist” jokes
I’m guessing this is made with reference to the “Air Temple preschool” comment. How exactly is this racist? In context, Aang is the one trying to force his beliefs on others, and Zuko makes this comment to a) tell him to back off and b) point out that Aang is, in fact, a child who doesn’t have any business telling Katara how to feel.
This point is particularly interesting to me, because it implies that the simple fact that Zuko doesn’t agree with the philosophy of Aang’s culture makes him racist. By this logic, Aang is also racist against Katara’s culture, because he clearly disagrees with her philosophy and is openly telling her that his culture is morally virtuous over hers. And well. That’s even more believable considering Aang’s previous reactions to Water Tribe culture.
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Ah, yes. Playing with a cultural artifact like it’s a toy because you were upset about not being the center of attention for once, and telling everyone how disgusting you think cultural food is, what great ways to show the supposed love of your life how much you respect her culture!
I know your response to this point would be something like “uwu but he’s a kid he didn’t knowww” ok well. The same logic can be applied to any alleged “racism” on Zuko’s part.
2. “Demanding” forgiveness
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Zuko: What can I do to make it up to you?
Ah, yes. How demanding of him. He’s clearly so self-centered and only thinking about his own values and agenda here.
It’s not like he…
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…told his friend how she’s allowed to process her grief and try to impose his own morals…
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…or demanded to know if his crush liked him back, wouldn’t accept “no” as an answer, and forced a kiss on her…
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…or told an abuse victim he was wrong to want to kill his abusive father for trying to commit a genocide…
…oh, um. Yeah. Sorry, but after actually watching the show it’s very clear to me which character doesn’t seem to regret or see the flaws in any of his actions at the end of the show, which is when all of these examples took place.
3. Training in the finale
“Attacking Aang to teach him a lesson” … wow, that’s a very dishonest way of phrasing that situation. I’m impressed, I have to say. I’ve seen lots of dumb takes from Aang stans over the years but this is a new one.
Well, luckily I actually watched the scene in context, so my reaction was the same as all the other characters’ reactions in canon when they learned the context behind this “attack”:
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They agree with him. Yeah. Obviously, when nobody is taking training seriously when the world is about to literally go up in flames, you might need to do something to get their attention.
“But it was dangerous!” you might argue. Well… yeah. When magic and bending is in the equation, training in the Avatar universe has been shown to be somewhat dangerous at times. As an example, from this very same episode, Toph very nearly smashed Sokka with a giant flaming rock. That was way closer to hurting someone than Zuko was in this incident. If you’re going to fault characters for making their training exercises too dangerous, I guess Toph is mega cancelled.
Now back to Aang. What was his reaction in this situation? How did he react to the end of the world being days away? He ran away with absolutely no plan. Just like he did at the very beginning of the show.
I mean, think about it. This is a critical flaw (and toxic trait) in Aang that is literally never addressed, because he starts and ends the show the exact same way: he’s faced with a problem, he runs away from it, then he’s saved by an in-universe equivalent of an Act of God. Wowie, such great character development. Not fixing your core flaw and having a mythical plot device materialize into existence to solve your problems for you. Aang’s whole arc is a big blah, because the writing fails to address any of his flaws or have him meaningfully question any of his values.
Meanwhile, Zuko has consistently been a fan favorite because he’s the opposite. His flaws are meaningfully addressed, he does admit he’s wrong and fix his flaws, and his character shows a critically acclaimed change throughout the show. His arc is written so well that despite being a cartoon character, Zuko is widely considered the poster child for a good redemption arc across all forms of media.
So anyways, miss me with the double standards… there is a reason why Zuko is the fan favorite, and it’s not just his abs 🔥
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starlight-bread-blog · 7 months
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Katara's other canon love interests give her agency, and her pov.
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And gets a moment where the two connect over similar losses.
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Except Aang.
Kataang is framed entirely from Aang's point of view.
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Even when he violates her boundries.
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And is unable to handle Katara's grief.
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But Zutara?
We get Katara's pov, and give her agency.
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He saw her at her very worst, and wasn't at all hostile.
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And Katara opened up to Zuko in the most significant way.
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the-badger-mole · 2 days
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As much as I do not dislike Aang. I like him very much (maybe because I have a little brother). However, I hate the fact that the fandom cannot accept that Aang is above criticism. If it was any other show people would cancel his character for kissing Katara without consent. But with him, it's all fine and good because he is the avatar and Katara is his forever girl so it's fine (sad). In fact, the amount of criticism he should be getting carries over to Katara. Oh my goodness, that girl gets the heat Aang should be having. Oh my goodness, I have so much to say but it would take all day. I would love to sit down with you to discuss Aang's lack of criticism by the fandom. And by extension, people have this idea this show is so perfect and cannot be criticized. No media is above criticism.
All of this! Part of engaging in fandom is being critical of the properties you love. Heck, fanfic wouldn't exist if everyone thought their favorite stories were perfect as is.
Avatar: the Last Airbender is a good show. A great show even (at least in the first season and a half), but it's not a perfect show. Aang is...well you know how I feel about him, and I don't want this to be a long post. Bottom line is, part of the fun of fandom is picking it apart, the parts you love, and the parts you love less.
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illycanary · 22 days
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Katara's Story Is A Tragedy and It's Not An Accident
I was a teenaged girl when Avatar: The Last Airbender aired on Nickelodeon—the group that the show’s creators unintentionally hit while they were aiming for the younger, maler demographic. Nevermind that we’re the reason the show’s popularity caught fire and has endured for two decades; we weren’t the audience Mike and Bryan wanted. And by golly, were they going to make sure we knew it. They’ve been making sure we know it with every snide comment and addendum they’ve made to the story for the last twenty years.
For many of us girls who were raised in the nineties and aughts, Katara was a breath of fresh air—a rare opportunity in a media market saturated with boys having grand adventures to see a young woman having her own adventure and expressing the same fears and frustrations we were often made to feel. 
We were told that we could be anything we wanted to be. That we were strong and smart and brimming with potential. That we were just as capable as the boys. That we were our brothers’ equals. But we were also told to wash dishes and fold laundry and tidy around the house while our brothers played outside. We were ignored when our male classmates picked teams for kickball and told to go play with the girls on the swings—the same girls we were taught to deride if we wanted to be taken seriously. We were lectured for the same immaturity that was expected of boys our age and older, and we were told to do better while also being told, “Boys will be boys.” Despite all the platitudes about equality and power, we saw our mothers straining under the weight of carrying both full-time careers and unequally divided family responsibilities. We sensed that we were being groomed for the same future. 
And we saw ourselves in Katara. 
Katara begins as a parentified teenaged girl: forced to take on responsibility for the daily care of people around her—including male figures who are capable of looking after themselves but are allowed to be immature enough to foist such labor onto her. She does thankless work for people who take her contributions for granted. She’s belittled by people who love her, but don’t understand her. She’s isolated from the world and denied opportunities to improve her talents. She's told what emotions she's allowed to feel and when to feel them. In essence, she was living our real-world fear: being trapped in someone else’s narrow, stultifying definition of femininity and motherhood. 
Then we watched Katara go through an incredible journey of self-determination and empowerment. Katara goes from being a powerless, fearful victim to being a protector, healer, advocate, and liberator to others who can’t do those things for themselves (a much truer and more fulfilling definition of nurturing and motherhood). It’s necessary in Katara’s growth cycle that she does this for others first because that is the realm she knows. She is given increasingly significant opportunities to speak up and fight on behalf of others, and that allows her to build those advocacy muscles gradually. But she still holds back her own emotional pain because everyone that she attempts to express such things to proves they either don't want to deal with it or they only want to manipulate her feelings for their own purposes. 
Katara continues to do much of the work we think of as traditionally maternal on behalf of her friends and family over the course of the story, but we do see that scale gradually shift. Sokka takes on more responsibility for managing the group’s supplies, and everyone helps around camp, but Katara continues to be the manager of everyone else’s emotions while simultaneously punching down her own. The scales finally seem to tip when Zuko joins the group. With Zuko, we see someone working alongside Katara doing the same tasks she is doing around camp for the first time. Zuko is also the only person who never expects anything of her and whose emotions she never has to manage because he’s actually more emotionally stable and mature than she is by that point. And then, Katara’s arc culminates in her finally getting the chance to fully seize her power, rewrite the story of the traumatic event that cast her into the role of parentified child, be her own protector, and freely express everything she’s kept locked away for the sake of letting everyone else feel comfortable around her. Then she fights alongside an equal partner she knows she can trust and depend on through the story's climax. And for the first time since her mother’s death, the girl who gives and gives and gives while getting nothing back watches someone sacrifice everything for her. But this time, she’s able to change the ending because her power is fully realized. The cycle was officially broken.
Katara’s character arc was catharsis at every step. If Katara could break the mold and recreate the ideas of womanhood and motherhood in her own image, so could we. We could be powerful. We could care for ourselves AND others when they need us—instead of caring for everyone all the time at our own expense. We could have balanced partnerships with give and take going both ways (“Tui and La, push and pull”), rather than the, “I give, they take,” model we were conditioned to expect. We could fight for and determine our own destiny—after all, wasn’t destiny a core theme of the story?
Yes. Destiny was the theme. But the lesson was that Katara didn’t get to determine hers. 
After Katara achieves her victory and completes her arc, the narrative steps in and smacks her back down to where she started. For reasons that are never explained or justified, Katara rewards the hero by giving into his romantic advances even though he has invalidated her emotions, violated her boundaries, lashed out at her for slights against him she never committed, idealized a false idol of her then browbeat her when she deviated from his narrative, and forced her to carry his emotions and put herself in danger when he willingly fails to control himself—even though he never apologizes, never learns his lesson, and never shows any inclination to do better. 
And do better he does not.
The more we dared to voice our own opinions on a character that was clearly meant to represent us, the more Mike and Bryan punished Katara for it.
Throughout the comics, Katara makes herself smaller and smaller and forfeits all rights to personal actualization and satisfaction in her relationship. She punches her feelings down when her partner neglects her and cries alone as he shows more affection and concern for literally every other girl’s feelings than hers. She becomes cowed by his outbursts and threats of violence. Instead of rising with the moon or resting in the warmth of the sun, she learns to stay in his shadow. She gives up her silly childish dreams of rebuilding her own dying culture’s traditions and advocating for other oppressed groups so that she can fulfill his wishes to rebuild his culture instead—by being his babymaker. Katara gave up everything she cared about and everything she fought to become for the whims of a man-child who never saw her as a person, only a possession.
Then, in her old age, we get to watch the fallout of his neglect—both toward her and her children who did not meet his expectations. By that point, the girl who would never turn her back on anyone who needed her was too far gone to even advocate for her own children in her own home. And even after he’s gone, Katara never dares to define herself again. She remains, for the next twenty-plus years of her life, nothing more than her husband's grieving widow. She was never recognized for her accomplishments, the battles she won, or the people she liberated. Even her own children and grandchildren have all but forgotten her. She ends her story exactly where it began: trapped in someone else’s narrow, stultifying definition of femininity and motherhood.
The story’s theme was destiny, remember? But this story’s target audience was little boys. Zuko gets to determine his own destiny as long as he works hard and earns it. Aang gets his destiny no matter what he does or doesn’t do to earn it. And Katara cannot change the destiny she was assigned by gender at birth, no matter how hard she fights for it or how many times over she earns it. 
Katara is Winston Smith, and the year is 1984. It doesn’t matter how hard you fight or what you accomplish, little girl. Big Brother is too big, too strong, and too powerful. You will never escape. You will never be free. Your victories are meaningless. So stay in your place, do what you’re told, and cry quietly so your tears don’t bother people who matter.
I will never get over it. Because I am Katara. And so are my friends, sisters, daughters, and nieces. But I am not content to live in Bryke's world.
I will never turn my back on people who need me. Including me.
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dyingroses · 8 months
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Avatar: The Last Airbender + AO3 tags
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lilbagdermole · 10 months
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It's common knowledge that Zuko and Aang, throughout the duration of ATLA, are a mirror of one another; a reflection of each other - not necessarily opposites but parallels.
So whilst I was analyzing the finale of the show, I noticed a really interesting parallel between our two protagonists:
Zuko was close to dying in his final confrontation with Azula and what pulled him back up, what saved him from dying was water. More necessarily Katara's healing abilities - but nonetheless, his opposing element saved his life.
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On the other hand, Aang throughout his harrowing fight against Ozai utilizes Earthbending time and time again to save himself, techniques that we've come to associate with Toph (rock armor and seismic sense). And to access the Avatar State, that had since been blocked, Earth had been the ultimate catalyst to unlocking his Seventh Chakra.
And if we take into consideration what Guru Pathik told Aang - to unlock the Seventh Chakra he would have to let go of Katara. In a sense, this could have been a visual representation of how Aang lets go of his love for Katara, and how Toph (Earth) could take up that role.
Earth, his opposing Element, saves his life.
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It's also interesting that our protagonists' conclusions and destinies are integrally tied to the aforementioned girls. Destiny and Fate are two major themes in ATLA, alonside the moral lesson shared to us by Uncle Iroh about the unity of the four elements and how each element can learn and grow from the other.
Zuko's destiny to bring honor to Fire Nation whilst also challenging his conflicting natures (Sozin vs. Roku; Ozai/Azula vs. Iroh) would have never come into fruition had it not been for Katara. Katara was the first person (other than his Uncle) to show him genuine compassion and humanity, she was the first person to glimpse into his true, kind and gentle nature. Additionally, had she not fought alongside Zuko to defeat Azula and save his life, he would have never been able to step up to the Throne and fulfill his destiny. Thus Katara is linked and bound to Zuko's destiny.
Aang's destiny was to restore peace to the world and end The One Hundred Year War. The Aang we meet during Book One - is timid and soft, a strong bender and with limitless potential, but he lacked the confidence, the back-bone, the grounding to step-up to his duties as the Avatar and defeat Ozai. Katara coddled him and never challenged him to look beyond himself. It's only after meeting Toph does Aang begin to confront his opponents with a different viewpoint, he gains a certain matureness in himself and suddenly we see him step up into his role and responsibilities. Toph's Earthbending not only saves him from death but it also gave him the strength to face his destiny. Thus, Toph is linked and bound to Aang's destiny.
It would have tied a lot of unexplored themes as well as provide a more satisfying conclusion (Aang entering the Avatar State because he followed through with Guru Pathik's lessons instead of pointy rock triggers it) and it would have been cohesive with the narrative thematic of ATLA.
I'm still astonished at how badly Bryke fumbled the bag with their romantic sub-plots. 🗿
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