i never liked soulmates. i think it feels cheap, to some degree, if there is someone or something out there that picked you out and declared, “this is the one. there is only Them.” - i don’t want to love if it’s pre- determined or foretold or in any way guaranteed. i want a mystery. i want to be able to hope. i want to look at you and say, “i am choosing this on my own. i am the one who decides to love on purpose, and nobody told me to love you, and nobody taught me how, and that is the sublimity of it: i love you because we are not destined. i love the choice of you.”

no hate to canonically soulmate couples, some of my favourite fictional couples are, but honestly i love the idea that you find someone and care about them and decide to love them and make it work much more romantic then being 'destined' to be with 'the one'

also i wrote this poem down years ago and i cannot find it anywhere online if anyone knows the author please tell me!

Fun moments in the YOI fandom I remember

Gore from the antis in the otayuri tag

Violent death threat inducing arguments on who tops in Victuuri

The amount of ptsd from Dreaming Goddess

Full blown discussions on the average dick size in Kazakhstan

Tumblr making fun of that one post asking how Yuri can be real

FAWL

More porn of any series that I've ever seen on this hellsite, thanks for cockblocking us tumblr

People using the age of consent in the Philippines to justify any Yurio ship

Tumblr was not yet at the threshold of being the annoying shithole it is now, and I would do anything to go back

That one time the fandom broke Tumblr when the last episode aired

Everyone thought Victor was going to die for some reason

Did I miss anything?

Please stop, I beg y'all.

Aaaaarrghhhhh....

I've been seriously considering blocking some Anons, or closing my inbox to Anon asks. I don't like doing that to turtles, but I'm getting past frustrated and feeling drastic about it. A huge percentage of asks I've been getting are from turtles who do not curate their online experience and who constantly bring Twitter drama and anti messages to my doorstep and I'm tired of saying the same things over and over again.

I can't believe the volume of asks I've gotten about this stupid F'n Douban page, which tells me 100% that a decent number of you are not staying in your own lane!! The only people talking about this (fake BS) are antis!! Stay out of solo hashtags on Twitter!! Yes, that includes GG and DD's individual names. BLOCK AND IGNORE.

If you can't curate your online experience, that's your problem. Don't make it mine, or anyone else's on Tumblr.

You know what bugs me the most, is that some of you seem to put a lot more weight to what those antis who are trying to hurt you say than you do to anything me or @accio-victuuri or any of the other turtles who try to help you are saying. Why do you bother asking any of us anything if you're going to ignore the answer?

Look, antis are liars. I've said this a thousand times.

Douban is a USER EDITED site. Don't let yourself be trolled by haters. Stop buying into their narrative. They're trying to spin a negative story for you and you're getting sucked into it, and it's so frustrating.

If people keep writing me about stuff like this I'm going to close my inbox, or else take my own advice and use the block button. Stop hand-wringing about what idiots are saying on Twitter, or if you're going to do it, please don't do it in my inbox.

Focus on GG and DD and their works. Isn't that what we're all here for? Fandom should be fun!

Whatever you focus on, that's what your experience will be. Just remember that. Choose wisely.

For the next couple of weeks no one is allowed to send me negative asks. If you have any happy, positive questions related directly to GG and DD or their works, please feel free to send them in.

The ship of the day: Victuuri

Names: Viktor Nikiforov and Yuuri Katsuki

Ship Name(s): Victuuri

Original Content: Yuri!!! On Ice series (2016)

Ship info:

Yuri!!! On Ice is a series which follows pro figure skater Yuuri Katsuki, who is on the verge of retirement, on his route back to pro skating and recovering his competitive abilities.

Yuuri K returns to his hometown after a string of losses within competitions, going back to his family’s hot springs. World renowned skater Viktor Nikiforov, Yuuri’s long time motivation for skating and childhood obsession (?), crush (?), wins his fifth consecutive World Championship, inspiring Yuuri to practice the routine he used to win. Unbeknownst to him, his performance is recorded and uploaded to the internet, going viral, and causing Viktor to travel to Japan to request to be Yuuri’s coach for the next Grand Prix series- baring in mind said conversation takes place in the hot spring, with Viktor as naked as the day he was born and Yuuri as red as a lobster. Yuuri accepts and so starts the series of Viktor training Yuuri, growing closer as he realises its Yuuri’s emotions, not his physical abilities which make him struggle in competitions.

Between this, Yuuri and Viktor grow close and, within episode 5 (following his win at the Japan Figure Skating Championships) Yuri announces his Grand Prix programme theme to be ‘Love’, inspired by his feelings for Viktor. Despite feeling the pressure of expectations following his good performance in the first Grand Prix assignment, Viktor is able to help reinstall Yuuri’s confidence as he promises to have faith in him and to not worry about his own reputation. During his skate, Yuuri changes his final jump to Viktor’s signature move, a quadruple flip. This surprises Viktor, who runs to Yuuri as he leaves the rink, tackling him onto the ice and kissing him in front of everyone ‘because it’s the only way to surprise him back’. Later on, at another competition destination, Yuuri gifts Viktor a gold ring which matches his own- later on, Viktor refers to them as engagement rings, though its unclear whether this was in jest or meant seriously. He also states that he and Yuuri would get married when Yuuri won gold at the Grand Prix Final.  After this, they invite the other skaters to a dinner, where it’s revealed that during the previous year’s GPF banquet Yuri got drunk and started a dance off, also begging Viktor to come to his family hot spring and be his coach- though Yuuri had no memory of this event.

In the end, Yuuri and Viktor agree that whilst Viktor would return to skating for the next season, he would remain as Yuuri’s coach. With hat, they perform a pair ice dance edition of Viktor’s routine in the GPF exhibition event. Following the event, Yuuri moves to Russia to train alongside Viktor, finishing off the series there.

Type of Ship: Queer

The fandom at large regards the kiss, rings, and marriage comments as confirming their relationship canonically and I am inclined to agree, kissing someone is a bit extreme as being purely for a surprise without any romantic involvement- especially considering Viktor is representing Russia, which is known for its anti-lgbt+ views. Hence, I believe this relation is canon queer due to the actions of the pair throughout the series, which could be argued to not be platonic from the get-go, as Yuuri ran to see Viktor in a hot bath, which are traditionally enjoyed naked.

Thanks for reading!

Admin🦇

https://www.tumblr.com/olderthannetfic/748698755825582080/since-weve-been-on-the-same-topic-for-quite-some?source=share

From my experience, it's both the projection stuff + cis writers responding to what's popular in fandom, but I also think some of it is because when trans fic started getting really popular, you had a lot of trans BNFs in various fandoms who insisted that writing these characters a particular way was THE right way to do it or you're offending them personally. I think that tends to be disproportionately likely with people who prefer pre-op or non-op vs. prefer post-op or don't care, both because if you care more you're angrier about it, but also people in the first category are more likely to be newly out (and thus in that obsession with their identity stage that plagues every LGBTQ+ person when we first come out) and younger and more online. So they're more likely to fit into the demographic of "people who obsess over what fic other people are writing" or "antis" in general.

I remember in Yuri on Ice fandom circa 2017-18, there was this one newly out pre-op trans guy who projected hard on to Yuuri and therefore insisted that any fic with cis Yuuri was hurting him personally. But it went beyond that.... Yuuri also had to be a bottom, because he was a bottom, and also this guy seemed to think that having a vagina meant you were automatically a bottom if your partner had a dick? Which made the whole thing kind of funny in a way... imagine declaring yourself the spokesperson for all trans men in your fandom (which he clearly did see himself as that, he clearly saw what he was saying as the One Right Way To Do Transmasc Rep) and yet being seemingly unaware that strap-ons are like, a thing that exists in the world, lol. That pegging exists. (Or at least, it would've been funny if he wasn't an obnoxious anti who harassed people, and had this parasocial fixation on someone who wrote a lot of bottom Yuuri and age-reversal Victuuri which he decided was the absolute worst thing for some reason.)

So just from that, I do have to wonder if some of these patterns in writing trans fic are just more popular vs. they're baked into fandom because some obnoxious individuals in a variety of fandoms (because he definitely wasn't the only person and YOI wasn't the only fandom where I saw that shit, though he was the worst) at a particular time were insisting that was the one right way to do things.

I was able to resist what he was saying even though I'm cis, just because I've had enough trans guy friends IRL to know that what he was describing as the One Right Way to Write Trans Sex is suuuuuper dysphoria inducing for a lot of trans men. Like, a lot of people who write M/M trans fanfic would be floored at how many pre-op trans men find that PIV is just completely off-the-table for them. They don't want to be penetrated at all, at least in the vagina. So much trans fic treats PIV as the gold standard. Like, it's weird to think gay trans men wouldn't be into butt stuff as much as cis gay men are? Am I the only person who thinks it's kinda weird how often that's assumed?

I have no idea what the state is like for trans women in F/F - even though I read a lot of F/F, there seems to be way less trans fic for whatever reason, even the stuff written by trans women IME seems to prefer to focus on cis women or at least women who both have vaginas - but while I've known fewer of them than trans men who just really don't want to use their vaginas during sex, a fair number of trans women just really don't want to use their penises during it either. Like, people, there's a reason that "bottom surgery" exists.

--

Thanks for answering my ask.....if you don't mind me asking (again), who are your favorite romantic relationship's couples in books/ manga/ anime/movies/tv series (can be canon or non-canon)? Why do you love them? Sorry if you've answered this question before......Thanks....

Hi! Thanks for another fun ask! I actually have one post up about some of my favorite OTPs from books from a little while ago. All are canon couples from book series. But you can find that here in this post:

But why would I NOT take the chance to share more OTPs that I love, especially if I can dip into some of my favorite non canon ships too and now ive got some new ones and from other media as well. 🤣 the limitations of only 10 though is always hard. Here are another 10 of my current favorite ships I obsess over. I won't include any from the post above though even though I'm still in love with ALL of them too. Some of my favorite couples, 10 of them, in no particular order:

Victuuri (Yuri On Ice, Anime)

I watched this anime and fell in love with it and their chaotic but adorable and sweet relationship SO HARD. And the relationship is right there in canon which is SO NICE to see in anime where it's just another small portion of their lives. The way they are both obsessed with each other too 😍

Edwin and Royai (FMAB, Anime)

Both canon. Royai is canon, argue with the wall! Lol I guess Royai is like half canon, but whatever. Explicit confirmation is not needed to know those 2 are married. Ed and Winry are the peak childhood friends to lovers arc in the most adorable. Plus she is a badass mechanic. HIS badass mechanic. The way their love grew organically is adorable and so sweet. They take such good care of each other. And Royai are the epitome of a married couple. They also are both so equally badass and have such infinite and complete trust in each other?? It's AMAZING. The way they literally trust each other with their lives and their mental well being. The way Roy literally trusts her to be his eyes when needed also? He literally calls her his queen. I love them so much

Clexa (The 100, TV Show)

CANON yet they did us dirty with the bury your gays trope. But like the "I'm only soft for you" bullshit they had going on. UGH I ate it up so hard. Lol they are both such extreme badasses, morally Grey anti heroes. OF COURSE THEIR RELATIONSHIP WAS INTENSELY PERFECT TOO! I love the bellarke ship with the best of them too, but out of all Clarke's relationships, the best and my favorite will always be with Lexa. She loved her SO MUCH and the way Lexa always protected her 😭

SasuNaru (Naruto, Anime)

Not canon, I know, but I'm obsessed with the ship anyway because it SHOULDVE BEEN CANON. I could write whole essays over how painfully gay and queer coded these 2 are. Canonically soulmates and everything. Lol their characters and their relationship was the most flushed out in the show and therefore, them being shipped together just makes sense. Especially with how homoromantic and angsty half the shit they did was.

Shakadolin (Stormlight Archive, Book)

Not canon, but the author said it would've been in a different timeline and that even in the current on, Adolin and Shallan (the Canon couple) probably would've been willing to go for it. Lol you can't convince me otherwise thay they aren't both lowkey in love with Kaladin. They invite him to be their bodygaurd on all their dates for a reason! 😂

HuaLian (TGCF, Donghua)

I've read these books for the first time recently and now these 2 live rent free. Like honestly, the OBSESSION with each other. The adorableness. The respectfulness of boundaries. The ICONIC one liners dropped. The do anything cross any line be wherever you need devotion. The way one of them is the sweetest human alive and the other embodies the "I hate everyone but you" trope. Lol the awkwardness of the positions they find themselves in. The jealousy of each other that they make up themselves. Lol the slow burn is painful!! It's been literally 800 years just tell each other you love each other and get married!!!!

So many ATLA ships lol but I love a good Zukka, Sukka, Zutara, Kataang, Korrasami, Rangshi, Suzukki as my ot3 love too lol (TV Show)

There is a good mix of canon and non canon ships here lol what can I say, I'm easy to please! But I will say that it speaks to my Sapphic soul in the best way that the wlw ships are CANON! Thank you ATLA universe for that blessing. And they are canon in the most amazing of ways. Korrasami will always be my favorite. The bi icons those girls are and they way they are EVERYTHING and are so freaking sweet and cute and BADASS.

Solangelo (PJO, Book)

Loves of my life, this relationship is grumpy x sunshine trope personified. They are so sweet, so cute, so perfect for each other it hurts. I clearly have a dynamic I love here. Lol because they are also both insanely badass. Plus the ghost king who controls death and his medic doctor boyfriend? Yes please. Literally made for each other and the way they help each other heal and be happy 🥺

The Iron Triangle, aka Yizhi, Shimin, and Zetian (Iron Widow, Book)

Love triangles done correctly and ended perfectly, aka bisexually. Lol to quote the author, "Iron Widow is just 400 pages of Zetian and Shimin suffering nonstop while Yizhi has the most bisexual time of his life." Lmfao. They are the morally Grey anti heros and lowkey villains in love badass scifi/fantasy cast of characters who ALL fall in love with each other and are only stronger for it. And it's a true triangle, where all 3 are in love and feel more complete for it. There is no choosing.

Darrow & Virigina, and Sevro & Victra (Red Rising, Book)

Unhinged characters falling in love. What could be better. They both match energies so well, bring out the best in each other and fight so hard for each other or sometimes fight each other too. These books are so good, but so brutal. Lol the relationships follow suit. But I freaking LOVE them. I cried so much reading it all and yet I'm obsessed and have been since I first read them. It'll probably never stop.

(prev anon here. First of all, thank you very much for their sources! It definitely made a bit more at peace. Second, I am very sorry if this goes very long, or if it makes you uncomfortable (feel free to ignore this if it does, I am just kind of venting))

Okay so basically. I finished yoi like a couple of weeks ago and I was so giddy with happiness! (Though there were a few things I could have wished went differently, overall it was such a pleasant, feel good show) HOWEVER I made the mistake of searching for meta on tumblr because I wanted to see what other interpretations were. Because I came across a lot (and I mean A Lot) of posts form when the show aired (2016-18) about people either being disappointed by it being a queerbait/ multiple posts saying it was y//a/o/i fetishizing everything/about how it was just a generally shitty/mediocre show and that it's fandom was delusional or whatever and like. On one hand I do understand that the rep isn't perfect, and that there were various fandom drama that resulted in the wank (namely the crunchyroll award thingy, kubo's confusing interviews(?)) But also it's just. I was obviously not there so I still do not know the full context and it was all OVER years ago and presently, the show is mostly remembered by people with love and nostalgia. But now, I guess I just read too many negative comments about it and I just. Am very upset since I feel like I've lost the happiness the show gave me when I first watched it? I just don't know how to or what to do to like. Not take them seriously?? Obviously people have different opinions, they HAD different opinions but it also feels very draining to read something very, very negative about something you are emotionally connected to. On my first watch, I was almost 100% sure victuuri were canon? (Especially with Yuuri saying he's going to show his love to the world multiple times, and just. The whole show with every episode) and on one hand I get that people wished they could get explicit confirmation, an on screen kiss without it being hidden and everything but I just. I feel so confused and low-key stressed about this, especially since I KNOW all of this discourse is in the past and the fandom doesn't really have any of it now?? And it's been seven years since everything happened and it's over!! But. I just. I saw you've been here right form the start and I really wanted to know if you really had any advice (in lack of a better word) on how to just get over all of this? (Again: please ignore this ask if this is kind of out of nowhere because I am *this* close to chickening out and not sending it fjdgd. But I think I really need to talk about this and put it down because it's bothering me too much:( )

OKAY this is super long. tl;dr corporations and some fans are evil and homophobic, Kubo and Sayo are queens, and YOI is and always will be 100% canon gay.

First and foremost the main reason that the show is remembered largely fondly now and that all those meta about it being queerbait and all are ignored now is because 90% of them were bad faith criticism. There were a fair amount of people who REALLY hated this show, and most of their reasons were pretty petty (seriously I remember them calling themselves the YOI salt squad? lmao)! And they wrote really disingenuous meta that has not stood the test of time because of that. So I know it may be hard and some of their posts might get to you, but do your best to ignore them. They're not done in good faith. They're not done because these people legitimately care about representation. Most of them were done because a show they didn't like was popular and was being heralded as very special. There was actually even a big anti-Kubo movement on 2chan Japan that aimed to basically destroy the popularity of her work and of YOI by doctoring fake tweets, making accusations of plagiarism, etc. Mind, this was not just because of YOI. Before YOI, Kubo did a popular radio show with her best friend, who is one of the most famous trans women in Japan, Mineko Nomachi. She also occasionally discussed lgbtq+ rights in the workplace. You can imagine this annoyed the very conservative users of 2chan.

Secondly, one thing that caused issues in the fandom was mistranslations. There were two translators famous for taking interviews with the creators and basically 'no homo-ing' them. If you ever see translations floating around from Tora on Ice or K@rice, please just ignore them. Even the translations they did that weren't inaccurate, it's not worth digging through the mistranslations to find them. The problem with this ended up being that their mistranslations upset A LOT of people. People ended up really heartbroken over them because YOI and Victuuri meant a lot to them, and though it's mostly ebbed by now, there's still some damage caused by their homophobia.

Just to give perspective, K@rice said that if Victuuri were ever 'confirmed canon' (because according to her, despite making out and getting engaged they weren't canon), she would sell her blu-rays and leave the fandom. Well, I don't know if she sold her blu-rays, but when Otsuka said that quote I linked in the previous ask, where he used the indisputably romantic word 'renai', she did make a post about how 'disappointed' she was and never talked about YOI again. Both of them had a history of doing this in canonically lgbtq+ fandoms before, and have continued to do it in other fandoms since. But yeah, they caused a lot of damage.

Next up, CENSORSHIP.

When Sayo Yamamoto pitched YOI, she couldn't find a studio to take the project on. Although she was considered somewhat of an auteur, neither of the anime she'd made before were hits, and she was trying to sell a show that no one thought that would be popular. Studios that were interested in the project suggested she make it about teenagers in a high school club, which she refused to do. She brought Kubo on to help, and eventually they were able to get Mappa to take the project. At the time Mappa was considered an experimental studio that took on really creative, inventive projects that other studios might consider too risky. Otsuka (Mappa's second in command) at the time thought the show could be a hit, but probably not many other people felt the same. Indeed, there was almost zero buzz for the show before it aired in Japan. They always do big polls for most anticipated anime of the season, and YOI didn't even rank in fall 2016.

So Sayo and Kubo wanted it to be a romance, but Avex (the parent company above Mappa) didn't want this. She had to push for it, and she said that 'all parties' tried to stop her from putting the kiss in, but she insisted. To note, as a woman in the anime industry without any popular shows under her belt, this is hugely badass of her. She and Kubo both could have lost their jobs and lost control of the show they wanted to make so easily. She would NOT compromise. It was amazing of her.

YOI comes out and ends up being like... the biggest hit ever in both Japan and internationally, but while Mappa is pretty happy to embrace the gay (which you see with all the merchandise they directly produce; it's very overtly romantic), Avex gets cold feet (I'm assuming BECAUSE it's so popular). They want this to be a super marketable franchise, but because they are stupid they don't grasp that the romance is part of what makes it that. They stop doing a bunch of magazine spreads of just Victor and Yuuri looking romantic, and start shoving Yurio in there as an awkward third wheel. They try to market the series as a cast of bishounen where you 'pick your fave boy' instead of focusing on what fans are wanting. It's all very messy.

And then, this might not be Avex's fault, but magazine publishers get in on the censorship. In order for YOI art to be accepted in these magazines, they force Mappa artists to remove the rings from Victor and Yuuri's fingers. Although this at first is excused by fans because 'well the rings are spoilers', by a few months post series, fans begin to outcry, and even Japanese fans are growing very angry. One Mappa artist comes forward after the spread she drew is criticized for lack of rings, and says 'she never would have left them off, and that they were there when she submitted the art.' And this is how fans find out what's happening. This happens again when YOI animation director Noriko Ito expresses surprise that the design page for the rings is not included in the YOI setting book released by a publisher, because she knows it was supposed to be in there. The publisher removed it. Later art, as in post 2018, has more often featured the rings, but there's so little of that art that it's hard to know if it would be a permanent thing if YOI ever continued. Plus, that art has been specifically for YOI collabs and merch as opposed to magazine spreads.

After that we find out that Kubo and Sayo are being censored in interviews. Please don't criticize Kubo for being 'vague.' She did the best she could in a situation where she wasn't allowed to talk super explicitly about the romance. We know for a fact that when Kubo and Sayo were interviewed, Avex SPECIFICALLY told interviewers that they were 'not allowed to be asked questions about lgbtq+ aspects of the series.' I know! It's so upsetting. We also found out that Kubo and Sayo brought character designer Tadashi Hiramatsu on the project because they did not think they were being taken seriously as a team of two women (no hate on Hiramatsu though, he's amazing and he totally loves YOI). Avex didn't believe in YOI as a romance, even after it proved so successful. It's the saddest thing on earth.

So the end conclusion is that Kubo, Sayo, and yes Mappa (though I have plenty of criticisms of them now) were pretty cool about YOI. Kubo and Sayo pushed for and wrote a gay romance into a sports anime, something that had never been done before, at constant risk of losing their job and status in the industry. They were badasses and they're both writing heroes of mine because of that, and it actually makes me love YOI more knowing how much they cared and how much they were willing to risk to tell the story they wanted to tell, that of a romance between Victor and Yuuri. And it is a romance, indisputably so, and anyone who disagrees is frankly giving them a slap in the face.

Umm hi ૮꒰˶ᵔ ᵕ ᵔ˶꒱ა

🪻I’m Lavender or Lav

🏳️‍⚧️My pronouns are he/him and I am a certified femboy

♊️18+

😍Likes: Writing, art, YouTube, video games, board games, character design

🤮Dislikes: Green beans, certain buggies (ants, spiders, and cockroaches are biggest nopes), clowns, getting wet, the sound of chewing

⚠️Triggers: S/A, S/H, people touching their eyeballs (it freaks me out), vomit, bugs

🖋️What/Where I write:

Newsies on here

Marauders on Instagram

Working on getting an AO3 account

🚫DNI: TERFs, -phobes, racists, anti-, ableists, etc etc just don’t be rude

🪭Fandoms: Newsies (Livesies, 1992, I have never seen uksies but I wanna know more), Harry Potter, My Hero Academia, Yuri On Ice, 9-1-1, DnD, She-Ra, Animal Crossing, Legend of Zelda (very casually), Demon Slayer, Beetlejuice Musical, Steven Universe, Coraline, uhhh there’s probably more

🎶Favorite Music: Melanie Martinez, Alec Benjamin, Doja Cat, Dixon Dallas, Todrick Hall,Teddy Hyde, Lizzo, Beetlejuice Musical, Newsies, lots more

📢👤Characters that I could talk about forever: Any newsie (but especially Race, Crutchie/y, Davey, Romeo, and Darcy Reid), Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, Xenophilius Lovegood, Benjy Fenwick, Tilden Toots, Kingsley (from HP, I don’t like using his last name), Denki Kaminari, Hawks, Toga, Hanta Sero, Mina Ashido, Yuuri Katsuki, Viktor Nikiforov, Yuri Plisetsky, Leo de la Iglesia, Phichit Chulanont, Double Trouble, Adora, Entrapta, Coraline Jones, Miss Spink, Miss Forcible, Tanjiro, Inoske, Peridot, Lapis, Connie, Garnet, Henrietta Wilson, Maddie Buckley, Howie “Chimney” Han, Athena mf Grant, lots more tbh

📢💏Relationships I could talk about forever: Spralbert, Javey, Blush, Xenora, Wolfstar, Hot Wings, Seroki, Hen and Karen, Maddie and Chim, Buddie, Athena and Bobby,Victuuri, Otayuri, Stevonie, Lapidot, Link and Prince Sidon, lots more tbh

🌈Fun facts:

I do the art

I make lots of ocs

I’m in PST

I have anxiety and depression, and am working on getting other diagnosis (including autism)

I really want a pet bird so I can have a lil buddy that will sit on my shoulder

💭Current hyperfixation:

Newsies, ASL, junk journaling, Sims 4 (specifically horse ranch), making ocs/designing characters

5, 6, and 20

hmmmmmmm these ones are challenging...

5: has fandom ever ruined a pairing for you

kind of??? like my own interpretation of characters hasn't been ruined but there have definitely been times where i like a ship but a large proportion of the fanon characterization/headcanons/dynamic give me the ick and i don't really interact with it. take victuuri from YOI for example. why the fuck are there so many A/B/O mafia AUs in the ao3 tag. just. why. even within the byler fandom there are times when i start feeling less enthusiastic abt the ship and then i realize it's bc i don't like the bit of fanon i'm seeing and not bc i stopped liking the actual canon dynamic.

6: has fandom ever made you enjoy a pairing you previously hated

well, i used to be a byler anti (/j i had no idea why people shipped it bc when i was 12 i didn't understand that u could ship things that weren't either currently canon or super obviously going to be canon) and now look at me. that wasn't rlly the fandom tho that was canon.

i think fandom tends to influence my opinion on ships more negatively than positively bc even when fandoms have good takes they're usually still not as accurate as people think. if i start liking a ship bc i enjoyed the fanon of it then i probably still dislike the canon yk.

20: what is the purest ship in the fandom

uhh, in terms of chastity then duzie. 14yo edating mormon nerdgirl x mom friend nerdboy... in terms of "bapy 🥺🥺"-ness though, i know i'm biased but it rlly is miwi. early canon m!leven was cute at the time but looking back, even then there were iffy aspects i just ignored

squishycake 🍰

squish • she/her • 30+ • writer • artist

fandoms: sk8 / naruto / trigun / free! / yoi / various other anime

fav ships: rekimiya / langiya / renga / tadaai / sasunaru / gaanaru / itasasu / itanaru / kakanaru / rinharu / kagehina / victuuri / otayuri / kv / bradvash / blueknives

sals / kinktomato / don't like; don't read

🧁 ao3

🧁 twitter

antis will be blocked 💕💋

Yibo on charity and helping people 💚

Vict//uuri bc it was shoved in your face as lg/bt rep and even if you suggested you found the show boring, or suggested Vict/or or Yu/uri were anything other than gay, you were called a homophobe.

-

yeah,,,

Why hasn’t ice adolescence released yet? I’ve been thinking about this at lot, because there’s not much of a reason as to why they haven’t released it yet.

“Are they still making it?” I don’t think so. This is Mappa, and they’re a pretty huge animation studio + they probably would’ve given some priority to yoi as well, considering it’s very popular.

“Are they still researching it and trying to make it better than before?” Honestly I don’t think so, mainly cuz the original Yuri on ice only took like 2 years to research and make. I don’t think a movie which is 1/3-ish the runtime of the actual show would take more time to research.

“Is it delayed due to covid?” Again, I don’t think so, because this movie was set to release in 2019. COVID wasn’t there in 2019.

The only reason I can think of is that it was delayed due to censorship laws. Same-sex marriage isn’t legal in Japan yet. (Kinda sad, but based on my research the movement is apparently gaining traction so let’s hope for the best) My theory is that once gay marriage or pro Lgbt+ laws are implimented in Japan, that’s when ice adolescence will release.

(Also I’m hoping that this means that we’re getting a Victuuri wedding in the movie)

Is anti Victuuri still a thing??

1) Don't worry, I (aka the anon who started it all) don't think your reply came off as hostile at all. It's just so tiring when you want to get some things that bother you off your chest and then the obligatory 'but not all xyz do this or that' happens. Yes, I do know that, but it's a generalization. Not all, but enough to make you think it may even be the better part of the fandom. That being said, I agree with all your points against YOI. OK, so the victuuri relationship may be a cute and

(Rest under the cut) (I also hope no one will lynch me for being lazy and putting this out without doing anything about censoring shipnames but I’ll spam it with all the possible anti tags, fear not)

fluffy one that makes you feel good and warm inside or whatever, but is there really a need to write essays analyzing every single gesture or facial expression and then feel proud of your analytical skills, as if you've just discovered a new planet? No, there is not. It's not that deep; it's actually as straightforward a show as it can be. The bashing of otayuri and pliroy is one thing and it has more to do with the general moral poilce anti trend that is spreading everywhere, so I wouldn't attribute it solely to the YOI fandom. Now on the other hand, the bashing of pliroy just because it's contradictory to otayuri, one of the holy doublet of YOI ships, is something that bothers me personally. It's almost as if shipping anything that directly contradicts victuuri/otayuri is a blasphemy in this fandom and generally looked down upon. I've actually seen someone outright ask why would anyone ship pliroy when otayuri exists/is canon/is clearly a better and more healthy option for Yuri etc. So, this and the constant victuuri/otayuri wank, while all the other characters/smaller ships are mostly a background noise to it; it really seems to me as if 5 fanarts out of 10 on my dashboard would feature victuuri, 4 would feature otayuri and there's only one left for other pairings (one-track-mindedness at its finest). And there's of course the fact that most YOI fans seriously think that victuuri is the first canon gay couple in the history of anime, that the anime itself is revolutionary and progressive, that victuuri is a prefect representation, that YOI is the actual anime of the year, because popularity doesn't lie, and if you dare to disagree with all of those, then you're clearly homophobic and whatnot. Plus, there's the invading of the tags unrelated to YOI (not even for the purpose of recommending other titles but to say something along the lines of 'if shit like xyz got a second season, then YOI deserves at least seven' - actually seen something like that with my own eyes) or hijacking of the serious topics (like the oppression of sexual minorities) and making them all about YOI. And that's just the top of the list of what the YOI fandom is guilty of. But hey, it's alright, because it's 'not all' YOI fans. Siigh. Sorry it got so long, but ugh. Sometimes I wish someone would just delete YOI from existence so that we would be spared of all this saltiness. As for 91d, you're probably right about everything but still, I'll never be able to understand why anyone would just voluntarily turn off their thought processes and comprehension skills just because of some personal biases, especially when it comes to a show such as 91d, that requires at least the bare minimum of thinking and analyzing. But whatever, I guess people nowadays are just too used to having everything spelled out to them and handed on a silver plattter (ex. they should've had it explicitly stated on-screen that Avilio and Nero didn't hate each other).

This goes for all the ‘not all’ arguments; the important thing is, as you said, how widespread a behaviour is statistically within a community, but also whether the other members acknowledge that it’s happening or not. I know it’s easy to take it personally when you hear someone complain about a fandom you’re in, but at that point it really only depends on wording (which is deliberately harsh when someone is just venting, it’s just the way it is). 

About meta; yeah, I find a lot of it superfluous as well, as I’ve said before. And by this I don’t mean it should be eliminated from the face of the planet, just that I don’t personally put the 2934892348th detailed explanation on why vn and yk love each other so much in the same ‘tier’ as, say, speculations about the second season or character parallelisms and stuff like that. It’s shipperwankery in the end and I don’t think me making fun of it harms anyone? The only thing I worry about is that it’s hard to separate banter from an actual serious opinion from time to time (could be about how I express myself? Probably yes). No, for the record, I don’t want to exterminate anyone who makes extensive posts about vn’s lustful glare. It’s just... There’s too much of it. Way too much. By the way, the ring controversy and the reaches made there will never not be funny, sorry not sorry.

A bit of a tangent on the otayuri-pliroy conflict; it always seemed so weird to me how similar the two ships are aesthetically? (Considering people keep confusing the two on fanart, I’d say that’s a major fuckup in terms of JJ’s and Otabek’s character design, but that might just be me). I keep getting the impression that they wanted the pliroy bait to go somewhere but then changed their mind for whatever reason and created otayuri as kind of a ‘tamer substitute’. But this is besides the point; it all brings me back to my personal beef with this tendency of positing ‘sugary sweet’ as the only acceptable standard for a relationship because... people are more sensitive nowadays? I can only guess. Viktuuri and otayuri got tied together for some reason, it’s like they come in a package and everyone who ships one has to run with the other as well. 

I grieve for the background characters and smaller ships as well, anon. Just imagine the sheer crack potential; and instead, everything gets pushed in the back in favour of the same things over and over. The things that could’ve been: victurio (the underage ship that tumblr will fucking lynch me for), emil/michele, sara/mila, georgi/yurio (yes I do love my crack), chris/victor, chris/that guy we saw in his room, yuuri’s sister/literally anyone (because I like her) and the list could go on and on. But this is not even always about the ship itself; it’s the dynamics, those are what popularizes things. Even when there are ships in other fandoms that have been popular for a longer time, there’s a tendency on tumblr to make them very mild and fluffy. I’m not saying there’s anything we can do about this, nor that something should be done about it, all I’m in opposition to is people who claim it’s the ‘right’ way to do shipping because it’s ‘healthier’ or something, as you put it.

Because popularity doesn’t lie

Thank you, this is exactly how I’d word it as well. The crux of this issue isn’t yoi being objectively good or bad, it’s whether popularity implies that something is good, or not. Or what ‘good’ even means in this context. My personal (salty) opinion is that there are anime that could be enjoyed just as much as (if not more than) yoi if only they got more exposure. I’m not talking about 91d either because I’ve already explained in detail what the problem with advertising it was in the previous post. And yeah, I’m pretty sure you’re talking about that certain addition to the Chechnya post. I can see it was well-intentioned but it was... well... a little bit out of place, to put it in euphemisms? ‘Too soon’, as they say? But, in the end, I’m sort of glad that yoi exists because if not anything else, it can be considered a massive social experiment, an example of fandom behaviour. And if it made some people happy, then I wish them all the best. The fixation with it will go away with time too, eventually.