#fiction does affect reality but not in the way antis think or on a 1:1 basis
Text
I'm going through the proship tag and I see this take:
And I just -
'putting characters in the same traumatizing situations that you went through is not okay'
Like-
Ma'am, Sir, other, what have you; that is a fictional child you're angry about.
I normally just ignore and block anti posts but this one just got me cause it was too funny.
And this is also why it's important to learn actual red flags, abusive patterns and tactics that abusers and predators would use to lure in victims, and also to learn internet safety. Teach children and others these things to be safe. Censoring, banning and prohibiting art and writing won't accomplish anything and will affect the most marginalized and vulnerable groups like poc and the lgbt community as history continues to show to this day with things like on going book banning in the U.S.
#fiction does affect reality but not in the way antis think or on a 1:1 basis#I just#LMAO#proship#antis dni#proshipper#proshippers please interact#proship safe#ableism#tw: shaking gif#anti censorship
55 notes
·
View notes
Text
I find it funny how people (antis usually) think that discourse regarding fiction and reality is a recent internet phenomenon. The terms "proshipper" and "antishipper" are relatively new, but the basis of it all has been going on for way longer than that.
In the novel "Madame Bovary" (1856) by Flaubert, the anxiety that readers, specifically women, would be brainwashed by fiction is channeled by Bovary herself, who "made her hands dirty with books from old lending libraries". With the "books" in question being romance novels, Flaubert not so subtly implies that works of fiction are the reason why Bovary ends up idealising her idea of love to the point that she commits acts of adultery in attempt to escape a reality that had become monotonous as a result of her novel reading.
Even in "Northanger Abbey" (1817) by Jane Austen, the protagonist, Catherine Morland, has a warped sense of reality, and it is said that it's because of her love for Gothic novels. Different from Flaubert though, who seemed to discourage women from reading romance novels altogether, a major plot point of Austen's novel is how Catherine needs to learn how to separate fiction from reality, meaning that a good relationship with novels can be achieved if only they aren't seen as a blueprint for living life. She also mocks her fellow authors who belittle their own readers while still publishing the books they strive to censor, and blames the reader's ability to differentiate fiction from reality, rather than the novel genre itself.
While terminology might have changed, the topic has remained about the same at the bare essentials, which are perfectly reflected in what both antishippers and proshippers argue about on the regular. The former believing that fiction affects reality on a 1:1 basis and that problematic elements must be identified as such so not to brainwash the reader into romanticising them, while the latter sees a distinction between fantasy and action, thinking that it's not the piece of fiction that perpetuates misconduct, but that the responsibility lies within the reader and their discretion.
The fact that this discourse now happens online rather than in the novels you study in class, does not take away any validity from it. Fandom spaces and ships are treated no differently than how novels were in the 19th century, with antis doing anything they can to censor whatever they deem to be problematic, as they fear that readers may glorify the (fictional) abuse irl, similarly to how Victorians censored works in order to "shelter" women.
At the end of the day, it's not only about being an antishipper or a proshipper, it's whether you consider yourself to be pro censorship or pro artistic freedom, and there's simply no other way to put it.
736 notes
·
View notes
Text
Anti-Arguments and Rebuttals for them
Things to remember:
Antis usually want an easy target. Freelance artists/writers, small businesses, etc.
But it's easier to get angry with a smaller entity than one you know you'll never be able to do anything with/about.
A lot of antis just deeply enjoy the thrill of witch hunting. If you pay attention, you'll notice a lot of them engage in cancel culture and make memes about the topics they call themselves taking a stand for or against.
Antis will almost always use a strawman argument. Most things on this list will consist of these sorts of arguments.
1. Fiction affects reality.
The funniest and most ridiculous thing about this argument to me is that it always comes out of nowhere. No one ever says anything that implies this isn't the case, yet antis seem to think everyone except themselves are woefully unaware of this fact.
If fiction didn't affect reality, then people wouldn't use fiction to work through trauma. Obviously, fiction does affect reality.
But I somehow doubt you'll ever come across an anti who wants to ban all violence and/or disturbing content in media. No one wants Fortnite, GTA, Mortal Kombat or Call of Duty to be taken off the shelves forever. No one wants Tokyo Ghoul, Attack on Titan, Death Note or Dragon Ball to never be available to watch again. Yet all contain negative content. Negative content that is consumed by kids daily.
If an anti was really concerned about fiction and the fact that it can affect reality, they would be tackling these bigger problems. Some of these games and a lot of violent or disturbing media in general have been linked to real life attacks. There are so many more.
But I'm not gonna end my argument there and just say, 'Since antis are okay with this wrong thing, then they should be okay with that wrong thing.'
No. At the end of the day, it comes down to the person. Educate children on safe ways to consume media. If someone shipping two cousins together somehow influences a person in the real world to do something terrible, then there's something wrong with that person.
If an SA victim is dressed a certain way and get's SA'd would you blame the SA victim for how they were dressed or the perpetrator? You also have to realise that by placing the blame on fiction, you're enabling similar behavior.
Because too many times throughout history we've seen a murderer get the 'benefit of the doubt' because they were inspired by some form of media. That's no excuse.
2. If you read/write something you must condone it.
Okay, lets say I'm writing a story wherein the protagonist is assassinating a Hitler-like character or entity. The character describes their murder as though they are completely happy about it. Everyone in the story continue on with incredible lives, something that would not have been possible if not for the murder.
Let me first ask, what do you think about this? Do you hate or at the very least disagree with the way the murder was glorified/romanticized because you think that murder is reprehensible no matter what? Or do you think some form or semblance justice was served?
Neither is wrong or right. Not in fiction. Objectivity would come more into play if this were a real situation, though.
But just because I, the author, decided to write it from the character's prespective doesn't mean I condone murder. That didn't mean that I didn't get to acquire any insight on the possible prespective of the character. But even if I did, I could flat-footedly disagree regardless.
I don't feel as though I can explain this. It's something you have to understand. But I'll post this link and hope you can put at least some of the pieces together, https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MoralityTropes
3. It's okay to harass someone because shipping something that problematic is just wrong.
The point is, no one in fiction is sentinent, except for in our minds. Morality is much more flexible.
It throws me that animals are sentinent, yet we'll know this and eat them regardless. We're hard-pressed to value animals above people, let alone put them on remotely similar levels.
But somehow their is a group of people out there who are condone harassing or threatening people because a completely non-sentinent being is being hurt from their prespective. Really??
Humans go by a general consensus. That we won't put animals above humans. Yet, we're willing to put invisible, fictional entities above humans? This sounds eerily similar to radical cult/religous groups. The only difference is that antis (hopefully) know for sure that a fictional characters aren't real. Most religious people at least have an excuse, even if it's a terrible one.
4. Aging up Characters is wrong
The most unbelieveable argument, but I'll bite. It's not. It's not pedophilia. By Google definitions, pedophilia is a sexual attraction toward children. A pedophile is someone who is sexually attracted to children.
This is not pedophilia. Characters have been aged up in media ever since media has existed. You are not sexualizing a child by aging them up, even if said drawing is suggestive.
When you incorrectly use this term, you make it harder for real victims to be believed, you trivialize the struggles that actual victims have/are going through. If it's weird and suspicious to you, then fine.
5. All proshippers are pedophiles/condone pedophilia.
Firstly, please stop saying this as a lot of proshippers are minors. You are further spewing misinfo on what a pedophile is toward someone who is still developing and may meet an actual pedophile but aren't able to properly identify them because some stranger in line kept insisting an artist who aged up a character is one. Minors are very easily influeneced by the internet. Being harassed does more damage than shipping something they will likely grow out of.
And those who are not minors usually are survivors of CSA/SA and cope with their trauma through drawing or writing certain content. They get to rewrite or redraw what happened to them and give themselves a better ending.
You don't have the right to tell them how to cope. Fiction is supposed to be a safe space, thus, why it is a medium recommended by therapists and has been for centuries. This shit has literally been researched.
Secondly, adult proshippers usually have something along the lines of 'Minors DNI' on their pages. I notice that even antis who post explicit/NSFW content don't, though. Which is ironic.
And the 'not all victims cope this way so they don't have to cope this way' argument is valid.
6. Well, I wouldn't attack them if they weren't public with it.
That's no excuse. You have entirely too much time on your hands, first off. Be hateful towards a person who actually deserves that hate.
Secondly, as long as they have proper warnings on their page, it's their shit. You can't tell them what to do with it.
Lastly, I've never met a proshipper that forced an anti to interact with them or their content. I've never met a proshipper who can somehow resist being blocked by the complete stranger who happened to stumble across their page.
Generally speaking, I don't believe in the 'don't like, don't interact' thing. Not with video games. Or TV. Or social media. You have the right. But when it's another human being, I highly doubt that's something that can't be accomplished.
This also sounds weirdly familiar to the, "Well, if gay people weren't throwing it in my face, I wouldn't have anything to say about them!" Antis are oddly authoritarian.
In Conclusion:
There's no excuse to harass anyone over fiction. And if someone has a very difficult time seperating fiction from reality, I highly recommend therapy in all brutal honesty.
Nothing will ever make telling a suicidal person to kill or hurt themselves okay.
Nothing will ever make falsely telling a survivor that they are their abuser or like their abuser okay.
If I tell Charlie Brown to kill himself right now it won't matter.
If I tell a real person to kill themselves, my words can and just might have real, lasting, effects.
If I tell Percy Jackson to kill himself he'll be okay and we know this without question.
If I tell a real person to kill themselves because they told me they ship Percy with Hera or whoever the fuck, theirs no way of knowing. And if you're fine with that - if you even so much as defend that - then maybe you should engage in something less hateful.
How about worshipping a flying spaghetti monster (since you may as well be)?
#antiship#proship#proshipping#anti shipping#antishipper#proshipper#fandom#fandom culture#fandom discourse#fuck antis#cartoons#anime#books#shows#tv#video games#games#media#pop culture
436 notes
·
View notes
Note
Hello! I'm thinking of making a video about proship and anti talking points from an unbiased point of view as possible (I think there's some arguments on both sides that have merit) so to allow people to come to their own conclusions, and I was wondering if you know of any posts or sites or whatever that have proship (and/or anti!) arguments that you would consider sound to source? Or just have any general ideas/recommendations? I'm not super invested in either community so I'm still figuring out where to start researching. (I'm on anon because this is... really just an infant idea percolating in my brain at this point)
--
@fiction-is-not-reality2 is the place to start.
This is a fool's errand though. The fact that you've presented it this way means you haven't actually dug deep enough to be competent to make this video.
"Community"? They aren't communities. They're philosophical standpoints.
Some people who hold these views group together into communities, and I hear proship twitter is full of hypocrites who betray their own stated values all the time, but for the most part, these are two deeply unequal camps of thought.
Antis operate on appeals to emotion and junk science of the type behind anti-video game panics of the 1980s. They prioritize "protecting" fictional characters over protecting real people. They treat thought crimes as serious business. They condone bullying. They push the same kind of conservative agenda as anti-porn Christian groups and as TERFs.
Proship arguments are that fiction does not affect reality in a 1:1 direct and clear fashion. Thought crimes are not real. Bullying is not acceptable. Other people's fiction tastes are none of your business.
These are not equivalent sides.
Any superficially sensible argument antis make is either disingenuous or involves strawmanning the opposition and stating something everyone agrees with.
665 notes
·
View notes
Text
What Smoking Entails in Manga
Last year, a survey was given to Japanese manga publishers about what top 5 manga to recommend for 2023 and the number one title was symbolic of many things related to Japanese culture - one of which was smoking.
The title was called Smoking Behind the Supermarket With You by Jinushi. I got a chance to read Volume 1 recently and it's a very fascinating romantic comedy about a middle-aged salaryman and a early 20s' female convenience store clerk and how they're bound by their love of smoking. The author made a comment saying that their admiration of how cool smoking was in fiction was a huge inspiration in creating the story.
Which got me thinking about how much smoking is prevalent in the anime and manga worlds and how much characters who smoke are beloved by many.
When I was still exploring new titles to follow in my '20s, one that stood out to me was Great Teacher Onizuka. The main character was someone who was a total idiot, but was pretty badass. Oh yeah, he smoked. I later got into Rurouni Kenshin and fell in love with Saito Hajime. Oh yeah, he smokes. A LOT. It's funny because I got into comics because of X-Men and the characters Wolverine and Gambit smoked quite a bit. I liked both, but not as much as the anime/manga characters who smoked.
When you think about it, there's a lot of anime/manga characters who smoke. Sanji from One Piece, Revy from Black Lagoon, Nara Shikamaru from Naruto, Toshiro Hijikata from Gintama, several adult characters from Cowboy Bebop (like Spike Siegel pictured above) - I could go on.
In video games, there's Yakuza/Like a Dragon characters and one of my favorite heroines ever, VA-11 Hall-A's Jill Stingray, smokes.
I love how cool all of those characters look when they smoke and I don't even smoke. I don't want to because of all the health risks smoking entails. My father used to be a smoker, but quit before I reached junior high school because he was having health problems.
At the same time, I do something a bit silly. I pretend to smoke with the air around me. I like to pretend I'm holding an imaginary cigarette to my mouth and inhale/exhale oxygen when no one's looking. It's a habit I've built from following my favorite characters who smoke.
Smoking is indeed something that shouldn't be romanticized. But I think about why people smoke in the first place - particularly my dad and Chinese people (particularly men) smoked. I remember one time when I was at a Chinese doctor's office, there was a video played for Chinese people addicted to smoking. There was a doctor in the video who said when Chinese people immigrate to the United States, they're often exposed to a lot of stressors (usually related to acculturation) that weigh a ton. Smoking is one way to help process and relieve their stress. They're coming from a country where smoking is definitely the norm in their culture.
There's a lot of talk about smoking being a sign of maturity and surviving through tough times. I decided to look up the relationship between smoking and mental health/illness. It's not surprising that there's negative effects. People with depression and anxiety may smoke a bit more than those who aren't affected by them. What makes it really hard for them to quit is that smoking has social benefits. Nicotine can help calm nerves and make smokers feel more confident in behaving in a proper social manner.
When I think about the many characters who smoke, smoking does help them before they get ready to take on a big task involving other people. It's literally the calm before the storm. Hell, I do "oxygen smoke" as a way to feel calm before facing reality or having big conversations with my friends. But I was drilled so hard by United States anti-drug programs (when compared to Asia) that I didn't want to feel like I was dying. That's why I never took the plunge despite the coolness of smoking found in Japanese media and try to encourage anti-smoking measures. Plus I think it helped that I wasn't super-stressed despite my mental illness to the point where I resorted to substances. Plus I had people who genuinely cared about my well-being and a somewhat optimistic belief in the best of humanity.
While Japanese media (and other Asian media in general) continues to showcase smoking to a decent degree, there's contentious pushback in America over the portrayal of smoking in their media. Yet smoking rates in Japan have gone down though quite a bit over the years due to anti-smoking measures. It's not as low as health organizations would like, but progress is progress.
The only thing I think we can agree on is that the world is so cruel and there should be wider acknowledgement of how the bad parts of life can lead people down to dangerous substances in order to cope. I think this is what creators intend to show when they have characters who smoke. Yeah, they look cool, but they're flawed people trying to find some sense of meaning/connection to worlds that disappoint them over and over again.
We're just trying to find ways to breathe life into inner peace, whether it's with oxygen or smoke.
8 notes
·
View notes
Text
What exactly does "proshippers dni" mean? /gen
I'm not doing a semantics thing and I won't "correct" anyone's answer, I genuinely just want to know what type of person most antis are referring to when they say "proship/proshippers dni".
Because at first, I thought it was just... anyone with any type of dark kink or ship, or who believes that fiction does affect reality but just not on a 1:1 scale, but I think I've been mistaken about what antis generally want to avoid.
So I wanna know, because I want to respect people's dnis and I want to understand antis more!
The antis I have spoken with have given me the impression that while they may disagree with milder proship stances, what they REALLY hate is stuff like "Fiction never has an impact on people in any way!" or "If you don't like my kinks, you're inherently sex-negative!" or "MAPs should be accepted and trusted uwu" or whatever other frankly awful and untrue things they might say.
And it's like, if an anti hates those things, but is okay with milder or neutral stances, I would like to know. Because unfortunately I've been led to believe that most antis would consider anything that's not aggressively anti-proship to be just fully proship, so I just completely stay away to avoid causing any discomfort or trouble.
Anyways, feel free to reblog or reply with your personal feedback, and please be nice to each other. ^^ I don't intend to try and convince anyone of anything in this post, I just want to understand people with different perspectives. :)
Thank you!
#gonna cross tag because I know there are neutral-shippers and even a few “proshippers” who use this dni#please be civil I'm scared and just want to learn 🙏#antiship#antishipping#antishippers please interact#proship#profic#proshipping#proshippers please interact#neutralship#dnis#shipping discourse
66 notes
·
View notes
Note
In the context of fiction and media, everything is so sexualized especially when I think of shipping. Even ships with underage minors and adults are popular and why?? Fiction directly affects reality does it not? Why is it okay to show that?
Sexuality is a very normal, healthy part of human behavior. While some people are asexual and that is also normal and healthy, the majority are not. Most people like sex, find it fun and meaningful. All human experiences should be reflected in art (what else is art for?), so sexuality should be reflected in a lot of art.
Unfortunately, we live in a culture that paradoxically both idolizes and shames sexuality, and this is as prevalent among the fundamentalist religious as it is among leftist spaces. So when art ignores sexuality completely, or ignores certain types of sexuality (see, the female gaze, or queer expressions of sex) fans will create that art themselves--such as via shipping. Shipping is simply "there's a story to be told here" and that story may or may not involve sex (most often does) and even in some cases, be primarily about sex.
Fiction is both shaped by reality and can shape reality, but that's not the same as saying it's a 1=1 mirror of reality where you can exactly correlate A cause with B result. Like, look up the anti video game movement of the 90s, the Satanic Panic and the way emo music was blamed for tragedies like Columbine, and ask yourself why people who like detective mysteries aren't murderers.
Yet, there is nuance here for sure. Like, I'll just bluntly state moral policing is a boring way to engage with art and fandom, and that goes beyond just sexuality. However, that isn't the same as saying take off your critical thinking hat, anything goes. Criticism is a very necessary part of fandom and engagement, and must be allowed (shakes fist at toxic positivity). But criticism as a field is designed to open doors more so than close them. It's a discussion more than anything else (note: discussing does not mean conclusions can't be drawn; they can). I have called out the real life implications of different stories before, and I'll do it again.
Me saying "moral policing stories is boring" also isn't me advocating for amorality. Not at all. Ethical questions posed by works can elevate a work to the realm of a masterpiece. There's a reason The Brothers Karamazov is considered top-tier literature. But ethics and morality are best explored not through statements, but through examination of what someone means when they say something is wrong or right. Fiction is a fabulous way to do this.
Let's use the example of minors and adults. Sad face, because "minor" in fandom can mean anything from "short person" (yes, really, I've seen that argued that someone who is short is "minor coded") to "17 year old" to "five year old." Shipping a 17 year old and an 18 year old is way different than, say, a preteen and a person their parent's age.
Like, in real life, people do not have a magical switch in their brain when they turn 18. An 18 year old dating a 17 year old is normal. It's not ethically dubious. An 18 year old (legal!) dating a 40 year old? Is ethically suspect to me, even if it isn't illegal. Ages are the best ways we have to protect children and keep them safe, but there's a reason most laws allow for an 18 and a 17 year old to date. At the same time, no one in their right mind would object to the moral statement "minors shouldn't date adults" (unless you're Matt Gaetz) with a "WELL WHAT ABOUT" because basic guardrails can't be built around exceptions, and the alternative is so horrifying that the guardrail exists for a damn good reason. But real life or fictitious, an 18 and 17 year old is not really sketchy.
Plus, I caution that the portrayal of a thing isn't necessarily the endorsement or "normalization" of said thing. Framing matters. A story can be used to powerfully show the pain of entering a relationship in which a young person is in way over their head. In fandom specifically, the shipping "story" people are interested in, regardless of ages or whatnot, might not be a happily-ever-after one, and might be a way to process their own abuse. I think there's a famous queer author who got "cancelled" for this, but she was processing her own experiences and framed it as negative, which is very sad.
There are other considerations too. For example, the medium of a story also matters. Film (and theater) inherently muddy the fiction and reality discourse dilemma in a way that written or drawn mediums do not: they use real people, so there are multiple layers in which this discourse can be discussed. Fandom and shipping, however, does not (on the whole) use these mediums.
I also know some people age up characters or de-age them to ship them at the same age, because they like the dynamic but do have ethical concerns about ages. I personally feel squicked out when there's a power dynamic like minor/adult (as in the paragraph above), teacher/student, or mentor/mentee, even if both are adults. And yet despite this I still like stories like Scum Villain's Self Saving System which are literally designed to provoke questions about shipping and fandom and morality, because they make me use my critical thinking and are aware of the problematic aspects of their works and precisely explore what makes it problematic, and what makes it not. SVSSS approaches it like:
A teacher who abuses his pupil enters into a relationship with him when they are adults, no grooming when kids. Sounds ethically suspect, right?
What if it's set in an ancient fantasy world where people fly on swords and live as immortals?
What happens to the idea of age (past a certain point in development) when you're immortal and stay physically young? (We don't have a real-life starting point for this.)
What if said teacher is literally no longer the same soul, but has been swapped for another soul?
What if the new soul is forced to be unkind under pain of not just death but soul obliteration?
What if age becomes speculative because the new soul isn't necessarily older than the pupil?
You see, there are a million angles from which SVSSS approaches this question, and ties these questions in with themes about individuality and presuppositions (essentially: see the individual more than the "type" of character). It's not mocking the questions. It's genuinely exploring them.
So, ethical questions can be very interesting in stories, and in terms of how fans interact with fiction as well. But not in terms of preaching, but in terms of interaction, in terms of making you question things--which is not the same as tossing aside all principles of morality.
#ask hamliet#i'm sure i over simplified something here#so feel free to ask follow ups#to a degree#fandom#diskhorse
68 notes
·
View notes
Note
hi! i have a few questions about proshipping.
what is it, exactly? most of the stuff i've found is from an anti perspective and i want to hear from a pro perspective
also, is it kind of like pro-choice where you can respect peoples right to do something while not doing it yourself? so like respecting people for reading/shipping whatever they want while you might not ship those kinds of ships/engage in the content?
like for me, my trauma definitely impacts the content that i engage in, but i understand that people deal with trauma in their own way and that can come in proshipping (not that everyone who is a pro shipper has trauma)
sorry if any of this is worded wrongly and/or offensively. thank you for taking the time to read this and if you answer this :)
Hello there, Anon! ♡ Questions are always welcome!
(Any instances of "you" are intended as a general "you", not directed at you in particular, anon!)
Proship is, at the very core, very simple!
Ship and let ship -> a similar enough idea to pro-choice, yes! It just means that you're allowed to ship things I personally dislike, and vice versa, as long as no one is being harassed or directly, intentionally, and maliciously harmed in the process.
Don't like? Don't read. (DL;DR) -> if you know you don't like a trope/ship/character/etc., don't go out of your way to search for it, and certainly don't go around leaving nasty comments on stuff you don't like. Just close the tab, or hit the back button, and be on your way.
Dead Dove: Do Not Eat (DDDNE or just dead dove) -> similar to DL;DR, but with emphasis on tagging. Essentially, it means "read the tags and don't be surprised when you encounter said tagged topics in this particular work". This goes both ways, for author/artist and for reader/viewer. Authors and artists have the responsibility to tag their works accurately and thoroughly, and provide content or trigger warnings when necessary. Readers and viewers have the responsibility to fully read the provided tags, filter out topics they find upsetting or triggering, and to know their own limits. In the event that someone is triggered or squicked out by something they didn't realize would be an issue, it's also their responsibility to take a step back and practice some self care while they calm down. ♡
The Golden Rule -> simply, treat others how you would want to be treated. This should apply to everyday life, as well as when interacting with folks in fandom spaces.
A few more things!
× Proship, as a stance, is also inherently anti-harassment. No one should be harassed, ostracized, or abused because of their likes and dislikes regarding fiction. (However, I'm also not naive enough to believe that no proshipper has ever harassed an anti. No community is flawless, and I don't doubt we've had our share of dirtbags.)
× Not all proshippers like "problematic" ships. We all have different limits and boundaries when it comes to what we enjoy and what we are squicked out by.
× Creating or consuming dead dove content as a tool for coping with trauma doesn't work for everyone. But for those it does help, it can provide a sense of control over traumatic situations, offer a safe and controlled means of catharsis, assist in recontexualizing trauma, and help people connect with other survivors and find a sense of community. Sometimes it's nice to know you aren't alone in your experiences. ♡
× I have never personally seen a proshipper say with their whole chest that "fiction doesn't affect reality". What I have seen said is "fiction is not reality, don't treat it as such" and "fiction does not impact reality on a 1:1 ratio". Reading, writing, drawing, thinking, or creating something fictional is not the same thing as actually Doing The Thing in real life.
Also, just to clear it up: proship does not mean "problematic ship", despite what many antis like to say. The prefix "pro-" is just the opposite of the prefix "anti-".
This, uh... got longer than I intended. Sorry about that! I hope this answers your question, and if you have anything else to ask, don't hesitate! ♡
And if other proship folks have anything to add, please do!
#ask t.k.#proship#pro ship#proshipper#pro shipper#profic#pro fic#profiction#pro fiction#comship#anti-harassment#fandom discourse#shipping discourse
235 notes
·
View notes
Text
This is a message for all young antis. We can't stop you from doing anything but heres some tips to keep yourself out of trouble
1: I'd suggest not infiltrating proship servers in the first place, But if you do, Don't lie about your age to get nsfw access. That's just going to hurt you! If you say your 18 and go into the nsfw channels, That's not the proshippers fault for what you'll end up seeing. Please don't interact with any type of adult that encourages you to lie about your age to see things of a pornographic nature.
1 tl;dr: You shouldn't lie about your age to get into nsfw proship communities
2: If you truly believe proshippers = pedophiles, Don't interact with them. You wouldn't interact with people you believe are pedophiles in the real world, Don't do it online. You should treat it as the threat you think it is: Block and avoid, Don't interact with them.
2 tl;dr: If proship = pedo and your a minor dni with them
3: Don't send things like 'kys' and such. It makes your side seem bad, And it's a incredibly bad thing to do. This affects real people and someone really could end up hurting themselves from your words. Plus the only people you are actually getting to hurt themselves aren't the adults you think are pedophiles, It's the kids in the fandoms who just think ship and let ship is a good thing (such as the majority if not all of proshippers) and follow that motto. You telling people they deserved their trauma and deserve more is mostly harmful to the younger people in the fandoms and your not hurting the people your trying to.
3 tl;dr: telling people to kill themselves is harmful and someones death could be on your hands, It could be someone with a family or a kid. (I recommend reading the whole thing)
4: If you have a friend you've just found out is proship just ask them why they became proship and what they think it means. It just might save your friendship to have a nice, Calm, Non argumentative talk with them.
Proship does not mean problematic ship, It means we are for shipping. pro shipping. Comship = Complicated ship, They're different. Proship just means we block people we don't like, We don't harass them and the only reason we would fight or argue with someone is because they are messing with us, Our friends or we're trying to explain something in a calm, Orderly way on a post. If we disagree with a ship or it makes us uncomfortable we just block it. We know fiction affects reality but its not on a 1:1 basis. It affects our feelings, But so long as nobody super young and impressionable is in it (which they shouldn't be anti or proship when they are too young to see the difference between fiction and reality) everything is okay.
Tl;dr: The thing you've heard 1000 times before proship doesn't = problematic ship its pro shipping. Read the whole thing for more info
#proship#proshippers please interact#proshipper#anti harassment#antiship#antishipping#antishipper#anti ship#anti proshitter#anti profic#anti proship
20 notes
·
View notes
Note
Antiship culture is knowing several names of several groomers in the anti proship community (NAFEDUDE, Dr Pizza, princessxemnas, id0lomantises to name a few), coddling to them, thinking that the Reddit post is fake while attacking a lesbian who hid their art on a private account, stalking (in real life), deadnaming and misgendering a transgender person over a meme about fictional characters, outing a queer person to their homophobic family (in a country where being queer is illegal) over a sfw drawing of two MHA guys bathing, trivializing real child abuse by calling it child porn and not csam, trivializing the severity of it and sexual abuse in general by comparing it to drawings, distributing real csam or sending gore to people while joking about how it’s “just pixels/words on a screen”, telling a CSA survivor that they were “pedo bait” at the time of their abuse because of the way they dressed but people, including psychologists and fandom goers, who are for proper tagging, for blocking people and for upholding basic respect & fandom etiquette, for acknowledging that someone’s tastes in fiction are absolutely no indicator of their real life morals, who understand that fiction CAN but does not affect reality on a 1:1 reality are the problem and the art or fanfics they like or make has a bigger effect on reality than mainstream media.
Anyway, when was the last time you “normal people” have looked outside of your bubbles and realized that the shit you’re doing is the same as qanon and gamergate cultists who are going after marginalized people? Same rhetoric, same arguments, same way of thinking after all. They’d welcome you with open arms…
we do not know shit abt this and barely use this acc anymore. if you can provide sources we'll happily reblog them because we geninely think everything you listred is abhorrent! please do not assume we are okay with those people!
44 notes
·
View notes
Note
Gruvians: It's just fiction! stop taking it so seriously! Also Gruvians: writes long metas on why the ship is brilliant, stalks accounts they were blocked by to bitch about said account not liking their ship, stalks posts they disagree with & vehemently reading the tags within each reblog of said posts & treats head canons such as a Gray liking Lucy & Erza first before Juvia as some sort of personal attack against them.
A large part of the GrUvia fanbase seems to be built on insecurity, and I think that for exactly the reasons you mentioned.
The GrUvia ship has come under a lot more scrutiny than most other ships in Fairy Tail, and I think it's resulted in them being completely unwilling to think about their ship in any kind of nuance.
One of our friends once mentioned that they don't support the ship in one of the most innocent ways possible, and it led to several days worth of battling with GrUvia fans and explaining her stance and why she was justified in her opinion. It got to the extent that she had to explicitly state that she would not be responding to any more asks because she didn't want her blog to become known for being anti-GrUvia. Just for stating an opinion. That is how quick the ship's fanbase are to anger.
You're either supportive and unequivocally good, or you're not and you must be attacked.
We've seen evidence that this has even extended over their ability to think critically about each other. We've received asks about how there is a psychologist in the GrUvia fanbase who thinks that the ship is healthy, and one of our admins was in the fandom when the whole GrUvia University thing went down. If I was a GrUvia fan, I would be disgusted by how they're treating people.
They cannot handle the idea that there is a space that exists in the Fairy Tail fandom that doesn't welcome them. Whenever we post things with the tagline "GRUVIA FANS: DO NOT INTERACT" we'd get at least 1 ask from a butt-hurt fan who could not find it in themselves to take our advise to block us and move on, and instead had tantrums after tantrums in our ask box.
(Hi, one of the other admins here popping in for just a second! Quick tw for a mention of stalking. I’ve been doxxed twice, I still get sent death threats, harrassed online, harassed in real life, and my stalker used this ship as an example of why I had to fall in love with him if he just kept trying. I personally am convinced that they’re too stupid to realize how hypocritical they are when they say don’t apply it to real life. Fiction always affects reality, even when it’s not blatantly obvious, and people really need to be more conscious of that and the fact that there are levels to it. A character’s favorite color may not have a big impact in real life, but normalizing abusive relationships has a massive negative impact, as seen by all the victims sharing their stories on this blog and those who share their stories elsewhere, because let’s face it, this nasty ship is not the only time an abusive relationship has been romantisized.
That being said, this does not mean all GrUvia shippers are stalkers/abusers. Fiction does affect reality, but that doesn't mean it controls reality. People have moral compasses, and sometimes they like to explore weird/amoral/dark things in fiction, and it's better to do that in ficiton than in real life. The problem lies within the fact that the vast majority of them that I have personally interacted with (<- reread the bold part and use your reading comprehension skills please) have been willing to doxx, harass, or abuse others. Pro-Juvia and Pro-grUvia shippers are notorious for these things, but some anti-Juvia and Anti-GrUvia people are too. The problem lies within the attitude of the shippers even more so than the ship itself. If we could both have conversations about it, with respect that neither side is going to change the other's thoughts and opinions, then the fandom would be a much happier and safer place.
Personally, I would love if we could just coexist and enjoy Fairy Tail together. Alas, it is not meant to be, hence the creation and necessity of this vent space)
On some level, I do feel bad for the GrUvia fanbase that they have to exist with so much scrutiny. But then I remember the content of the ship itself, and I genuinely think that they've only ever made it worse for themselves by being aggressive.
If the fandom was able to have discussions like this, to talk about ships through a critical lens and have an actual conversation about this, the ship would still be awful. But the fandom, itself, wouldn't be viewed as this group of people with the mental complexity of toddlers.
15 notes
·
View notes
Note
I feel as though this is the same anon and they're throwing a fit over you two not being flattered by their "concern."
Fiction doesn't affect reality 1:1 like these people think it does. People writing fan fiction or drawing fan art or whatever does not in any way have the same amount of influence as a Hollywood level production or mainstream TV, even if it has thousands or millions of views. Even if it did, a piece of media can't alter someone's morals that severely.
Let's use murder as an example. Murder is obviously very illegal in real life and is seen as a bad act, rightfully, but that doesn't stop people from portraying murderers in fiction, from slashers to super villains. If we were going by Anti logic, they're basically saying that any portrayal of a murderer in fiction will convince audience members to want to murder as well.
It's such a ridiculous argument and so easy to poke holes into. It reminds me of those right wing conservative types who used to cry about video games making people violent when there's no link between the two.
And then you bring up research papers or quotes from psychiatrists who have studied and worked in their fields for years who actively talk about how taboo topics explored in a healthy way is beneficial, because whether you experience trauma or not, humans are just naturally curious about a lot of things or how people who work to catch Predators come out and have to beg people to stop sending fiction in as if it's CP because it clogs the system and takes resources away from actual children and Antis just pretend like they don't hear it.
Look, it's perfectly fine to be uncomfortable with certain media. I personally don't like incest fics or anything with mommy/daddy kinks, it really squicks me out, but I'm an adult who is responsible for moderating my online experience, so I just filter tags and block people if it really becomes a problem. Never once in my life have I felt the need to attack someone for the content they make just because it makes me personally uncomfortable,
Because I know the world doesn't revolve around me and what I like
This was back in August, don’t look at how slow I am with asks-
But yes, all this absolutely. It’s okay to not like something, it’s okay to cater your own space so it’s nowhere near you, it’s okay to ask people not to talk about these things to you because it makes you feel uncomfortable and expect those wishes to be respected.
What’s not okay is going after random people who have nothing to do with you and demand that they change what they like to suit your needs. Especially when your actions proceed to cause more damage than fix it.
19 notes
·
View notes
Note
I think the proship vs anti discourse is tired but the arguments that people make about it like, "Oh both sides are equally as bad" or "I'm on the fence, both sides provide valuable arguments" are fucking stupid considering that one side has a long documented history of doxxing and suibaiting people and the other doesn't.
--
I wouldn't necessarily criticize this way. Antis certainly have more of a history of bullying behavior, but there are people who call themselves "proshippers" but behave similarly.
What I would say is that the two sets of arguments are not equivalent, so the "both sides" shit is still just that: shit.
On the proshipper side, we have:
Fiction does not affect reality in a direct 1:1 manner
Dark fantasies are commonplace and not a sign that someone is dangerous or damaged
On the anti side we have:
But some fantasies/fiction/etc. are Bad and unhealthy for you regardless of what the science says!
But only when it's a sex thing!!!!
It's science and reason vs. "D&D is Satanism" and "Video games cause school shootings" Concerned Mothers of the 1980s bullshit.
If anything, I'd say there are heinous douchebags on both sides but only one side makes good arguments.
239 notes
·
View notes
Text
New profile ans I'm back to my old antics jumping into the pro/anti rabbit hole!
For anyone who can't tell, I am pretty proship. And jumping back into the rabbit hole has given me thoughts to share. To my currently 2 followers, I know you're not surprised and it will happen again!!! Eventually, when adhd allows is. Also @lightningstarborne you should get the other sibling to follow me as well so I can yell at 3 people along with the void.
Gonna be talking about the classic "fiction does/doesn't affect reality" cause it's one of the biggest arguing points with probably the most nuance.
Fiction can affect reality, but it is not in a perfect 1:1 ratio, and it usually happens in ways people don't expect. The Tetris and Jaws effects are both real, shark hunting and a fear of sharks was increased by a movie and after playing too much Tetris can make people start viewing things like pieces to be fit together until they stop for a bit.
Well let's think about those (admittedly I have seen 3 shark/underwater horror movies in 2 days and wsnt to share) starting with Jaws. The movie claims that maneating sharks are rare, especially ones of the size they had. It also pointed out how the shark was a natural part of the ocean even if it was dangerous. But people only picked up on the killer shark part. You know what parts of the movie focused on a lot more? A town focusing on making money during a holiday weekend more than caring about the safety of the people. There are arguments on screen about whether to close the beach for safety or keep it open for tourism. The movie blatantly points out how politics will bowl over things like safety until multiple people are dead. But that is not something brought up often. There are similarities with "The Meg" but those focus more on environmentalism and how a change can be disastrous. Yet people still focus on the big deadly shark aspect.
None of that is a 1:1 effect on reality. Jaws caused more people to be scared of sharks, and more people to hunt and kill them despite how low the death rate to sharks actually is. Less than 10 people die by shark per year, but across 4 Jaws movies 18 people died. Nobody was really effected by the explicit rarity mentioned in the movie, and most people don't even remember the politics mentioned. If that movie had a 1:1 effect, how did so much of the movie get overlooked?
The tetris effect is super interesting because it can happen with something as insignificant as a chessboard. Play too much checkers or chess, practice or think about the game too often? Now you're seeing images of it when you close your eyes, when things line up like the game you think of moving pieces like you would in a match? Those are tetris effects symptoms. It's been seen in people who speed solve Rubik's Cubes. With tetris, you think of fitting boxes together or of seeing them fall into place, or visualize a boarder and see pieces when you close your eyes. Being personal again, if I work security for too long and see thousands of people walking around for hours, I'll still see crowds walking around when my eyes are closed for about 2 days after. This is some kind of fiction effecting reality, but is also something that can happen with pretty much anything. See a meteor one night and think "where's the spaceship" cause you've played too many games and you've been effected in a tetris effect way. But, while these are distracting and maybe a little dangerous because of it, they're all super simple and things you can snap yourself out of with just a "wtf, I'm not playing my game" type thing. There is absolutely an effect on reality, but the extent is immediately thinking a response you would do in the thing you have literally just spent hours (minimum) doing and visualizing game elements and random times.
Violent video games are also brought up a lot. Studies are mostly inconclusive and don't always scale for competitiveness or types of violence. It's known tnag they can have an effect and for some people that is stronger. However, game companies and policies similar to movie ratings attempt to motigate this by giving age ratings. As you age, you decelope more of an awareness of reality being separate from fiction, and age ratings are a response to that. This is a part that I think is overlooked a lot. With violent video game debates, and arguments on how to age restrict some games and movies and TV shows, those age ratings are meant to be a guide for how well someone can understand and handle the content. That to some extent includes how well someone can separate fiction and reality. Using a personal example (again) my twin and I are 12 years older than our younger sisters. When my twin and I were 14, we started watching the It miniseries. My twin one day decided to rewaych it while babysitting the then 2 year old younger siblings. One of them ended up afraid of the curtains in our house because of the opening acene; being 2 she couldn't separate reality while my twin being 14 knew it was all fake.
Thats why we apart to explore darker topics, in media and our own imagination, as we age. We can understand that it is 100% not real, while still thinking about ourselves or someone else in a terrible situation. We can think about how we'd react emotionally, the actions we'd take, how everything would play out, while knowing it's not real. All media does this in some way, but I think written media can be the most intense. There is more detail laid out or explained, we can have context going back decades into the characters lives, and so many writers will change the prosody of their writing just to draw you in more. The emotions you feel, no matter what genre story you are using to feel them, are real, they are fiction effecting reality. It can be standard housewife porn that you are reacting to, or some weird violent thing on ao3, or something gross and intense in disturbing ways, and you will have a very real emotional reaction. But that doesn't mean it's effecting you in a way that will make you recreate it. Housewife porn has been around forever but that doesn't mean women are going around and immediately reenacting those books. Saying that fanfiction is going to cause people to do terrible things ignores the entirety of the history of literature and people having taboo books well before the internet got big.
There is so much nuance. Something making you go "ew" doesn't mean it's immediately the worst thing ever. Especially on the internet where you can (to some extent (fucking corporations)) curate your own experience. If you don't like a blog, stop following them or block them. Don't like a story on ao3; close it and put the tags in your exclusion list.
3 notes
·
View notes
Note
were you ever a proshipper or am i misrembering? /genq. i really do enjoy your blog so i just wanted to double check before i unblock yk,, i just want to make sure i don't reblog from someone that disagrees with me fundamentally, yaknow? ty, have a nice day :)
I was debating on whether to respond to this for a while, but I really can’t shake the feeling this was asked in good faith, so just in case, I’m going to answer you honestly. It’s not a “yes or no” question though, so details under the read more. My hope is that I can provide you with enough information to make an informed decision about where or not you want to follow/unblock/reblog from my blog, because I really do value your safety and comfort.
The thing about “proshipper” is that what it actually means is different than what a lot of people think it means. Because really, at the end of the day, it’s just someone who believes that fiction does not have a 1:1 effect on reality (emphasis on the 1:1 part — pretty much every proshipper still knows fiction affects reality) and that what you enjoy in fiction does not necessarily reflect your values or desires in real life.
With that in mind:
I believe that fiction does not have a 1:1 effect on reality, and that what someone enjoys in fiction does not necessarily reflect their actual values or desires in real life
I believe that harassing real living people over fictional content is cruel and uncalled for
I put great importance in empowering people to avoid content they do not want to see by tagging things appropriately
I prefer education and self-curation to blanket censorship
I believe that fiction does not exist in a vacuum and that it's pretty much impossible for fanfiction to "normalize" anything that society does not already normalize, because fanfiction does not affect society the same way mainstream media does
I know that problematic fiction has started conversations about otherwise taboo topics that have helped people realize their own real life situations were not normal or OK
I know that censorship historically tends to hurt minority groups most, regardless of the intentions behind a given ban
I believe there is value in having a safe space to engage with darker topics in fiction regardless of your own personal trauma
Because of this, I tend to avoid interacting with people who have “proship” or “proshipper” on their DNI lists (and by extension, "anti-anti" since that's used to mean pretty much the same thing). If you ever see me reblog from someone with that on their DNI list, I either didn’t notice (in which case feel free to point it out so I can delete the post) or it’s one one the two blogs I’ve spoken with personally and found out that they are alright with me interacting despite having that on their DNI.
Anyway, if any of the items in my bulleted list are things you fundamentally disagree with, please feel free to keep me blocked.
If you’re more worried about content than my personal belief system, I can tell you that’s it’s unlikely you will find adult content in general on this blog, let alone the problematic stuff that usually comes up in these discussions.
Finally, as a reminder, you always have my full permission to “steal” any description I write and just stick it on a different reblog if you do not want to reblog from me directly. No credit needed.
22 notes
·
View notes
Text
I know I might come off as a proshipper from how I talk about purity culture in fandom a lot. I'm not.
I refuse to side with people who defend content that is undeniably rooted in pedophilia, such as loli and shotacon. the "fiction doesn't affect reality" argument isn't true- sexual content involving characters that are purposefully meant to represent children is morally reprehensible and it is just plain wrong to act like it isn't. it isn't normal to think characters that obviously look like toddlers is hot. it's not normal to think incest is hot. I have accepted that this content will always exist, whether I like it or not. but I am not a proshipper.
but I'm not an anti, either. fiction affects reality- but not in the ways antis claim it does. it's not 1:1. not all characters that are assigned an age by their creators look or act like a real person that age. part 3 Jotaro Kujo looks like a brickhouse on steroids, but he is canonically 17 for plot convenience. to call people who find him attractive pedophiles would be disingenuous because no real child looks like that. antis hyperfocus on the numerical age rather than what they should focus on, which is their visual and behavioral age.
I am not an anti because they have shown time and time again to not give a singular fuck about real, living human beings. I would rather shit in my hands and clap than associate myself with the people who I have witnessed on repeated instances harassing, threatening, suicide baiting, and doxxing real victims of child sexual assault that disagreed with them or used dark fiction to relieve their trauma. the antishipping community has never been about helping victims. every single day that very community proves I'm right in thinking that they do all this bullshit for the sake or their egos.
I refuse to take either side. nobody in either community has critical thinking skills and I refuse to be lumped in with them and their "cause."
#fandom commentary#fandom problems#fandom discourse#i hate using that word#what this site considers discourse is nothing more than children slap fighting each other until they tire each other out
3 notes
·
View notes
Last Seen Blogs
daryll-dixonn
I ❤ u 3000
timebaamboo
BAAMBOO
poqu
smallfry artist
chrispyevans
You're not a very in character donkey roleplayer
rjnkn
追憶