I got super duper excited as a fandom researcher when I saw this post because it’s such a great illustration of culturally determined moral relativity in tumblr fandom.
OP writes that “the only shippable characters are Callum, Rayla and Claudia […] being in the same age group”, which has me convinced that OP is American. Even though the age of consent varies between states in the US, most Americans participating in tumblr discourse set it at 18 and thereby create a “shippable” mid-teens age group category which includes Callum, Rayla, and Claudia.
In most European countries, however, the age of consent is 16, which splits the American “shippable” group with Callum (14) and Rayla (15) below the age of consent and Claudia (16) above. By European moral standards, Callum/Claudia would be a morally questionable ship of the kind OP argues against (although, due to Romeo and Juliet laws, it would not be illegal in real life), whereas Claudia could technically be shipped with any adult character (maybe Gren?) without violating European laws of consent. Personally, as a European, I find a 14-year-old dating a 16-year-old (what OP suggests) much more problematic from a protect-the-children point of view than a 16-year-old dating an 18-year-old (although, these being fictional teenagers, y’know, ship whatever).
[Spoilers below this point]
Even more interesting, OP includes Claudia in the shippable group with Callum and Rayla even though Claudia is nominally a villain. She is a dark mage who uses what the show in-universe has established to be “evil” magic, and her mission, to steal back the dragon egg, is shown to be an evil act. It is not at this point possible to imagine a canon-compliant Callum/Claudia ship that is “healthy” or “morally right” in the way OP demands of fandom ships. Not only is there a power imbalance in that she is older and a more experienced mage using dark magic, but her brother and father are actively trying to kill Callum.
OP’s post highlights, once again, neo!fandom’s laserbeam focus on “shipping morality” to the complete exclusion of other, weightier questions of morality the show ought to inspire in its audience. It is a kids’ show that is surprisingly dark: it has parental death, violent threats and murder attempts on children, on-screen torture, and explicit animal cruelty. According to UN definitions, Rayla qualifies as a child soldier and Xadia is guilty of both war crimes and crimes against humanity by sending her into combat. The moonshadow elves’ mission to kill Ezran for his father’s actions would also be a war crime and a Human Rights violation, had it succeeded. There are potent references to real-life racism, sexism, and ableism, to name a few. The emergent fandom’s insistence on policing shipping to ensure only “morally right” ships is completely at odds with the canon’s very dark themes and numerous dysfunctional family relationships which are already carrying over into canonically dysfunctional romantic relationships (such as Callum’s crush on Claudia, which is not - by neo!fandom standards - mutual, balanced, or healthy).
Personally, as an adult and a darkfic writer, I came away from the first season with a very strong affinity for Harrow/Viren, which is absolutely a dysfunctional, unhealthy, unhappy relationship despite being, y’know, neither incestuous nor paedophilic (and no, Viren claiming that Harrow called him “brother” does not make the ship incestuous just as it doesn’t make Viren king. Seriously. Antis, do not.) Exploring the background for Harrow and Viren’s complicated, broken relationship would definitely be of interest to me despite (because of!) the fact that it’s not a “morally right” ship in any way.
@unpopularfanopinion, @chaotic-good-discourse, @thisiswhatyousoundlike, as fellow discoursers, your thoughts?
