I Think That Kishimoto Is Certainly Capable Of Writing Women (and To Pretend Otherwise Feels Like I'm

SouHaru Week | Day One: Firsts & Childhood

the first time sousuke beats haru in a race, he plops his head on haru’s lap. haru just hopes sousuke doesn’t grumble about his bony knees.

im not ok. this ship and this au got me in a headlock

sometimes you can tell when somebody who likes a ship just likes one of the characters and is simply using the other half as a vaguely ooc vehicle to make content for their fave which is whatever. not against the law. until the other half theyre using as a vehicle is YOUR fave. and then you want to explode them with your mind

Please remind me to not get into it over Scott McCall on fandom secrets, because several users there should have degrees in being wrong all the time. 

They’re so sure that because THEY hate Scott and they know THEY’RE not racist, and because “they didn’t even know Scott was anything but white”, that racism plays no part in how Scott was treated by the fandom at large. Scott’s just a terrible character, they cry, bringing up how he was a little sidetracked by Allison in S1, how he never wanted to be a werewolf in the first place, and oh, of course, that old chestnut, what he did to Derek in the finale of S2. 

Apparently, Scott is never punished in the narrative the same way Derek is?! Did you know this? Because, like, I seem to recall him breaking up with his first girlfriend because of werewolf things, that first girlfriend dying in his arms, him being repeatedly hunted by Peter and Hunters, his autonomy being snatched away from him by Peter, trying to commit suicide, being stabbed by the Nogitsune, being straight-up murdered at one point… the list goes on. 

Babes. Babes. You, as an individual, may not be racist. But when that large a number of people are willing to write about a character one way, to constantly invalidate their pain, to never show sympathy or empathy for them, to spin them as a villain for trying to do the right thing, and the only discernible difference between them and all of their other co-stars at that point are their features… could it your brain is being a bastard and loading you with unconscious bias?

The level of vitriol that is leveled at a character who is no worse than any other, who makes the same mistakes as the others, who suffers just as much (if not more!) than the others, who overall is trying to do the right thing is just… horrible. The trends in the fandom of how Scott was and is treated always say a lot more than the individual actions of fans.

I’d like to say that these trends don’t have any basis in racism, but fandom is as fandom does, and fandom unfortunately reflects a lot of the macrocosm of the world – which is racist.  It’s worrying, and frankly a bit horrifying, but many white people are preconditioned to dislike/mistrust people of color - to notice darker skin and features and mentally ascribe personality traits to those people - and not even register that they have done so. And people in fandomsecrets kept telling me they didn’t even notice that Posey is a person of colour, but that is why I say ‘unconscious’; because like it or not, sometimes that’s what’s at work. Brain processes your conscious mind would be rightfully disgusted by are going on! (And then, one person said ‘I don’t hate Scott just because he has more of a tan’, and I decided not to reply directly to that person because what the actual fuck.)

Once again, I don’t think every single person who dislikes him hates Scott for racist reasons. Like, sure, maybe you find him annoying because he tries to do the right thing but in ineffectual ways, or because he wants to be a normal teenager and does dumb teenaged shit. Or because he rarely apologises for his fuck-ups and they tend to get glossed over. But how does that make him different from any other character in this show? Why are you so willing to put aside any kind of empathy, why do you want to see him suffer so, why do you label him a bad friend? Why do you always point out how shitty the writing is in regards to Scott’s characterisation but none of the others? 

Do you hate him because he’s the main character and it’s perfectly normal to hate the main character? - that’s why no one in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer fandom likes Buffy and only a vocal minority like Harry in Harry Potter, and no one has fucks to give for Dean and Sam in Supernatural — oh. Wait. [For the record, I know there are some fans who hate Buffy, Harry, Dean and/or Sam. They’re just not usually thiiiiiiis loud, y’know?]

If you hate Scott for how he treated Derek, do you hate Derek for how he treated Scott? Boyd? Erica? Isaac? Or do you recognize that Derek was floundering around in the dark and dealing with deep-seated trauma? And if you recognize that in Derek, why can’t you recognize that in Scott who at this point is 16 - 17 at the most? If you hate Scott for how he stole people’s autonomy, do you hate Peter for the same deal? Peter – an actual show villain, who I haven’t seen anyone actively hate, I don’t think? If you hate Scott for mooning over Allison and getting distracted by her, do you hate Stiles for being the same way about Lydia? If you hate Scott for thinking he knows what’s best for others and choosing not to let them in on plans, do you hate Chris Argent, Noah Stilinski, Derek once again? 

I 100% think that a bunch of people need to examine their unconscious biases and try to watch the show putting themselves in Scott’s shoes. Genuinely imagine how it would feel to be in his position. They seem more than capable of doing that with the others, so give him that same consideration. 

One of the stupidest things ppl respond with is "instead of complaining about your character of color's lack of popularity why don't you make stuff for them instead?"

It’s a horribly shitty thing to say because I only got to the point of pointing out racism in fandom because I’d noticed it for years. I have spent YEARS in fandom. My contributions to this blog are from personal experience. I didn’t write mod R’s super popular post but that’s just because I’m not great at distilling my observations down like she is but I agree wholeheartedly.

I started out in white fandoms almost a decade ago because back then the shows I liked had been predominantly white. You know the type, they had a recurring character who was a WoC and several poc villains and I thought wow great representation! But I was young and dumb and hadn’t finished college yet. As time went on I noticed how my new fave Ugly Betty was still featuring a lot of abuse towards its woc lead. It relied heavily on the white savior trope weekly (Daniel would save the day with money for her family problems) Wilhelmina another woc was the villain (she ended up having a great arc but did they have to pit the woc against each other so much for so long?). I was afraid to join the fandom because occasionally there were problems with the show I couldn’t articulate. (Why did Betty only date white men? Why weren’t there more poc in the office? Why did it have to be called ugly betty in the first place?).

Eventually I became more involved in fandom and this process I’d gone through with Ugly Betty started repeating itself with different shows. I started noticing that stanning for my faves wasn’t easy because fandom was incredibly typical in its preferences. I started reading meta and noticing horrible patterns. I’d already been a feminist but being a feminist in fandom and seeing all the shitty ways fans belittled MoC reminded me of the shitty treatment my father gets just because he’s a brown immigrant. Seeing ppl constantly cry for equal rights and mysteriously only stan for white cis het men made me realize that intersectionality was missing in fandom.

White ppl forget that a poc growing up in the States don’t automatically get when something is racist. Because here colorblindness ideology keeps our own white friends treating us like tokens and using us as “proof” against their racism. So in fandom when all the love goes to white cis het males we’re expected to ignore the fact that our characters of color are not loved the same way (and instead are villified needlessly). Or when we talk about it you respond with things like, “well then make stuff for them” (maybe I did and fandom can’t wait to tear it apart because a PoC can’t possibly be “that awesome”) “my preferences don’t make me racist” (discounting whole races because you don’t think they’re beautiful IS RACIST) “I like villains they’re more interesting” (simple q & a: why are they all white villains who get complex stories? Your media is fucking racist).

To the ppl who feel the need to defend themselves as not racist: stop acting like you know a damn fucking thing about racism, if you’re white you will never truly understand.

Feelings, what wretched things.

Thank you to @manysad for the brainworms.

lot of people take the idea they might be an oppressor like it's some kind of curse or marks them or makes them fundamentally irredeemable.

this means whenever someone suggests they might have structural power over some group, rather than being normal about it and going "oh yeah i should be mindful of how i act so i don't abuse that," they take it as a personal attack, and either jump to defending themselves by denying it, or start lashing out.

this makes 99.99999% of all conversations on this website completely fucking unbearable.

wave cape 🌊

Pre-menstrual depression is always depicted as like "He He! I had a box of icecream bars and cried while watching the Titanic!" But in reality, it's more like, "I'm standing the edge of an abyss. There is nothing good inside of me, I'm filled with rage and desperation."

It's crazy that being told how to deal with that is never a part of anyone's menstrual sex education.