Post by Lady Ten on Dec 17, 2012 19:49:07 GMT -6
A continuation.
In the last thread, I complained about how shipping romanticizes and sexualizes interesting, healthy relationships that are canonically platonic. Those relationships, in canon, may be friendly or unfriendly, but ultimately, the characters are still of a disposition to treat each other with decency.
This complaint is about ships where that is not the case.
Now, obviously, there are some ships that romanticize/idealize abusive and disgusting behavior in an already-canon romantic couples, and that speaks for itself.
That's not the problem under scrutiny here, though.
Time for an anecdote. Before I went to see the Avengers, I remember seeing allusions and references to it and its ships all over the internet (or at least, the parts that I frequent). I'm not a comic nerd, so I could see characters' names combined as a ship name and it would hold no meaning for me. I didn't know who these people are. It meant nothing.
When I finally saw the movie, I was surprised how much I felt an emotional connection with Bruce Banner. Seriously. Coming in with low expectations for the character based on one clip from the trailer, I got hit hard with a platonic squish on this guy... because, what it boils down to is that not only is he adorable and awesome, but... I could see myself in his shoes. It wasn't just sympathy, it was sincere empathy. He was so relateable. I felt what he felt. And when Tony Stark badgered and pestered and harassed him about keeping a level head, trying to upset him for the sake of it, trying to provoke him, trolling him, mocking him in a way that expressed some dissatisfaction with calm, reticent, introverted personalities as a valid style of existence, that resonated with me. It would have been enough that Stark is all about extravagant arrogance, which I hate anyway -- now, by belittling Bruce, he was also coming off exactly like the people who've treated me the same way. People who were never anything but bullies.
And then I got back on the internet, and I saw that people were shipping them.
This isn't about ships that are unlikely, or imperfect, or not to personal taste. This is about ships whose very existence hurts.
In the last thread, I complained about how shipping romanticizes and sexualizes interesting, healthy relationships that are canonically platonic. Those relationships, in canon, may be friendly or unfriendly, but ultimately, the characters are still of a disposition to treat each other with decency.
This complaint is about ships where that is not the case.
Now, obviously, there are some ships that romanticize/idealize abusive and disgusting behavior in an already-canon romantic couples, and that speaks for itself.
That's not the problem under scrutiny here, though.
Time for an anecdote. Before I went to see the Avengers, I remember seeing allusions and references to it and its ships all over the internet (or at least, the parts that I frequent). I'm not a comic nerd, so I could see characters' names combined as a ship name and it would hold no meaning for me. I didn't know who these people are. It meant nothing.
When I finally saw the movie, I was surprised how much I felt an emotional connection with Bruce Banner. Seriously. Coming in with low expectations for the character based on one clip from the trailer, I got hit hard with a platonic squish on this guy... because, what it boils down to is that not only is he adorable and awesome, but... I could see myself in his shoes. It wasn't just sympathy, it was sincere empathy. He was so relateable. I felt what he felt. And when Tony Stark badgered and pestered and harassed him about keeping a level head, trying to upset him for the sake of it, trying to provoke him, trolling him, mocking him in a way that expressed some dissatisfaction with calm, reticent, introverted personalities as a valid style of existence, that resonated with me. It would have been enough that Stark is all about extravagant arrogance, which I hate anyway -- now, by belittling Bruce, he was also coming off exactly like the people who've treated me the same way. People who were never anything but bullies.
And then I got back on the internet, and I saw that people were shipping them.
This isn't about ships that are unlikely, or imperfect, or not to personal taste. This is about ships whose very existence hurts.
