Kait

Go Piss Girl This blog is for my wife

[kg-day]

I don't know why anyone even bothers main character-ing anymore. Edward Elric already perfected it. I fear that we peaked there 🤷🏻‍♀️.

[kg-day]

What do you think of Azulaang?

Well, I truly don't ship Katara and Aang with anyone but the other. However, from a completely fanon perspective, I can appreciate some of their other ships. Like, there is no way I think Azula and Aang would or should be together in the canon universe (even post show), but in a very (very) alternate universe, I could see the appeal. But overall, I don't really have an opinion of them other than "absolutely not" in canon and "okay, I'm not mad at it" in fanon.

[kg-day]

Isn’t (or wasn’t) only 3 maybe 4 out of 13 writers that wanted the you know what ship to be canon instead of Kataang?

Yeah, I believe so. At least from what I have seen/heard. But I don't have 100% confirmation of that.

[kg-day]

I think Warren and Zuko having powers related to fire is another reason why people compare Layla x Warren/ForestFire to the you know what ship.

Oh yeah, 100%. I was mainly focusing on the enemies-to-lovers aspect of it because that tends to be what most people focus on. But Zuko and Warren both being fire users also adds to the idea that they are similar ships with a similar aesthetic, which is a very shallow reading of both dynamics.

[kg-day]

Okay, but honestly why does it feel like Zu/t*ra fans have such victim complexes over liking their ship? Be so fucking for real, their ship is the most popular ship in the fandom by a long shot. It sometimes feels like they're punching down when hating on Kataang and Maiko because those ships already aren't as popular as Zu/t*ra and Kataang and Maiko shippers have had to deal with both of their ships being hated for years ever since the show ended. It's especially annoying because Zu/t*ra shippers can not stay out of the anti tags for their ship and then act as if they were the ones who were personally wronged.

Well, for starters, I think it's because they see themselves as victims, period. Victims of the canon. Victims of Bryke. Victims of the fandom. They have so thoroughly convinced themselves that "they were robbed" of something that no one actually owed them in the first place. Do I recognize that Nickelodeon was baiting shippers when the show was airing? Yeah. But regardless of promotional material or whatever else led Zutara shippers to think that they were in any way in the running, they never were. It doesn't matter if there were writers on the team who wanted it. It doesn't matter if there were voice actors who wanted it. You know who didn't want it? The people actually creating and directing the show.

But, they have taken that victim complex and associated it with every aspect of being a Zutara shipper. They have crafted a narrative in which everything Bryke ever does is meant to spite Zutara shippers. Every post against Zutara from other shippers is just us being bitter or hating for no reason. When the reality is that, for most of us, we actually have no problem with Zuko and Katara's canon dynamic. The problem has always been with their shippers and their absolutely vile behavior.

Now, I fully recognize that there are plenty of people who ship Kataang who can be just as vile/problematic. I also do not condone/support that behavior. I don't think any of us need to be in the wrong tags or be bigots or anything else. I will be the first to acknowledge that fandoms always have a toxic side (and it usually involves ship discourse), and, once again, I am not naive enough to think that Kataang stans haven't been exhibiting the same behaviors since the fandom's inception. But the reality of being in this fandom for most of its "life" is that Zutara stans have been acting like that since the show aired. So, this revisionist take on what it's like to be in the Atla fandom has been truly coocoo bananas to witness.

People are as nasty as they are about Zutara because of its shippers and the constant harassment most of us have faced from them. I've said it multiple times on this blog, but I truly enjoy Zuko and Katara's canon dynamic. Am I a diehard Kataang? 100%. Would I still side-eye someone for shipping Zutara over Kataang? Most definitely. But if all it ever was was a preference for one over the other without all the disrespect, I would just think that they are wrong and move on. However, we all know that isn't the case.

So, to answer your question. I think that it really boils down to two things. The first is that they have always perceived themselves as the victims because they didn't see the ship they prefer become canon (despite there never being any indication that it would be within the show itself). The second is that they are truly delusional as to how their own side of the fandom acts (and always has). I attribute this to the 2020 revival of the fandom after the show was added to Netflix. The influx of new shippers who have no idea of the history has bolstered that victim mentality on that side. They just think the behavior of Kataang and Maiko stans (or other anti-Zutara shippers) is baseless hatred for something simply because it wasn't canon, and people like it. It's easier to pretend that only one side is the problem than to recognize the behaviors of those around you as being equally bad — or even more so.

[kg-day]

Just saw someone say that zk "haunts the narrative," and I have to laugh. In what way, shape, or form did Zuko and Katara genuinely change each other, let alone the narrative? What impact did they, as a dynamic, have on the story? Was it none? Because I think it was none. I don't even mean this in a way to ignore their canon dynamic. I've stated plenty of times before that I like their platonic relationship. But let's be so fucking serious right now. Zuko literally never even thinks about Katara outside of when they are interacting or she has just yelled at him.

The cave scene? Yeah, he only remembers it because of the healing water and it's relevance to Aang. Outside of that they truly NEVER think about the other in any meaningful way when they aren't together. I can't even think of a single thing they have in canon that is not shared with one of the other dynamics in the show. Saw some good in him? Aang did that first. Enemies to friends? Sokka and Aang also have that dynamic with him. Red and blue? Zukka is there, too. Fire and water? Sure, I guess in the way that Katara is a bender, but Sokka is also a member of the water tribe who was affected by the war just as much as Katara. Going on a field trip with Zuko? Yeah, Aang and Sokka did that, too. Losing their moms? Yeah...Sokka and Azula are right there. You have her helping him fight Azula, which I agree is stooped in symbolism, but it's actually mostly because of the Azula/Katara foil (and obviously Zuko and Azula's relationship).

Do we know what haunting the narrative means? Zuko isn't subconsciously driving Katara to be a different person, and she isn't doing that for him, either. You know who is, though? AANG. (And even then, that's also not what haunting the narrative means).

Anyways, I just had to laugh at that because truly, wtf are we talking about. Mind you, this was on a post that was all about how Kataang wouldn't have fans if it wasn't canon because Kataang fans always use the "they were canon argument," which then means that the only reason we ship it is because it's canon. Once again...no. I ship Kataang and it's canon. It's not canon so I ship it. I was shipping it before it became canon!!! If zutara had been canon, I would not suddenly decide to ship it. I would probably be PISSED. And the main reason Kataang fans even say that it's canon all the time is because PEOPLE CONSTANTLY SAY THAT IT SHOULDN'T HAVE BEEN. 😱 Shocking, I know.

[kg-day]

https://www.tumblr.com/zutaranti/817575939021176832/sorry-to-burst-your-bubble-but-zuko-paid-more

https://www.tumblr.com/iwillpunchyouinthenose/817559328047398912/all-zutaras-are-damn-weird-and-acting-like-aang

Listen I don’t like ZK either, but can we not put anti posts in that ship tag? We hate it when they post anti posts in the Kataang tag, so we shouldn’t do that ourselves.

I agree, but neither of these posts are mine, so I'm a bit confused on what this has to do with me? I make sure to explicitly tag all my posts "antizutara" even though most of them are more about addressing common anti-kataang arguments rather than even being anti anything other than shippers.

[kg-day]

hi. which friendship is stronger: zukka or sokkaang?

In my personal opinion, it's Sokkaang. But I also believe that, with the exceptions of Toph (simply because I think that she has an equal relationship with Sokka, Aang, and Katara) and Suki, every member of the gaang's closest relationship is with Aang (and obviously Sokka and Katara have a close relationship as well, because duh).

But specifically for Sokka, I think that it boils down to Sokkaang being brothers and Zukka being besties (or lovers 👀).

[kg-day]

You can always tell when Gaang fanart is made by someone who ships zk because they always make Aang look SIGNIFICANTLY younger than Katara, and Katara looks borderline older teens to make her seem closer in age to Zuko. They just love to exaggerate the age gap to make it seem like more than it is. And EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. Without fail, whenever I see a fanart that depicts Aang as being 11/12 and Katara as 15, I just know who made it.

[kg-day]

The concept of hating Kataang but shipping Dramione

[kg-day]

I've been thinking a bunch about how Zuko doesn't have a scar on his chest in the new AtLA movie, and I figured I'd share my thoughts here.

So, at first, I was also confused and a bit disappointed that Zuko didn't have a scar. However, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that (and please correct me if I am wrong) there is no canon material that depicts him as having one. To the best of my knowledge, the only time we see Zuko with a chest scar is in fan art. The wound he has directly after redirecting the lightning is not actually a scar; it's a wound.

And honestly, it makes perfect sense to me that he wouldn't have one. Katara doesn't have scars on her hands from where Aang accidentally burned her, because she healed them. "But Kait, Katara healed Aang, and he still has a scar!" Yeah, because Azula straight up killed him. Aang was directly shot with lightning in the back; Zuko was not. He redirected Azula's lightning; he was also just a beat too late to fully control it, which is why it injured him. It was never a direct hit; it was a burn (from the inside?) that was healed very soon after he acquired it. And I know that we still see that it isn't fully healed by the end of the episode, but once again (as far as I can remember), there is no canon confirmation that there was a permanent mark there. Over time, it very well could have fully healed over and left no trace.

Idk, I just think it's interesting that this became so popular in fanon that we all just treated it as canon. But once you take a beat to actually think about it, it makes perfect sense as to why Zuko doesn't have a scar there. I think it's easy to try and reduce it into Bryke making a jab at shippers, but I don't think that's what it is at all. I think we all just ran with the headcanon and then got railroaded by the canon.

Edit: So there is some canon confirmation (thank you survivalove for informing me), but also, it was added after backlash, so I'm taking it with a grain of salt. I'm going to keep this post simply because I think it still applies to what we see in the movie (for now). But who knows, maybe the animators will fix that for the final release of the film (I don't actually know how much extra work goes in to the post production and if they'll be able to do that much fixing before it's released [or if they even intend to], but we'll see).

[kg-day]

Another day, another zk fan in the wrong tag playing victim and talking about why "their ship was better," but it's just the same regurgitated bs we've seen a thousand times.

[sunday-better]

kataang but they're zelink send post

[kg-day]

I saw a fan of zutara say that zuka embrace kataras darker side not because he enables it , but because he understands it , which I genuinely don't understand first of all , how katar was acting in the southern raiders episode was completely out of character and he was only doing it because he was trying to earn her forgiveness aang understands what she's feeling in that moment.And the reason why he asked her to forgive was not because the man deserved it?Because he knew it would mentally destroy her if she ever killed them.No matter how justified, like this is the same girl who cried when she bloodblend for the first time that is not who katara is

Yeah, that's a pretty common argument for them that completely ignores what we know about the characters. Listen, I love Zuko, but it's not even subtext that he doesn't understand what Katara wants or needs in that episode.

To start, Katara straight up tells this man why she hates him, and Zuko still goes to Sokka and says, "It's your sister. She hates me, and I don't know why." Yes, he then mentions that Katara keeps bringing up her mother to him, but that doesn't change the fact that he is guessing rather than fully knowing. She JUST told him why she hasn't forgiven him, and it has more to do with than just her mother. Now, I do think this was a trip Katara needed to take (obviously), and it's important that Zuko is the one who goes with her because she is conflating her anger at the FN with her anger at him. However, she still had every reason to distrust him outside of that, considering what happened in Ba Sing Se.

Now, I know that Zuko thought he was helping Katara, but he was just enabling her. They aren't even friends at this point. How is he supposed to know what Katara truly needs? He knows she's upset about her mother's death, so his plan is to help her confront the man. Sure, she needs that, but he is also doing that more for himself than for her. If Katara had forgiven Zuko along with everyone else, he never would have felt the need to take her to find Yon Rah. What Katara doesn't need, however, is to kill someone, but Zuko doesn't see that. He doesn't know who Katara is, so he doesn't know the effect that this will have on her. He just sees a way to earn her forgiveness, so he takes it. Supporting a person does not mean going along with whatever they plan to do when it will hurt them in the long run. That is quite literally enablement. He is taking her to potentially kill a man, and he sees no problem with that. And the reason he sees no problem with that has a lot to do with the environment he was raised in, the things he still believes, and the fact that he doesn't know who Katara is as a person.

Aang, on the other hand, knows who Katara is. He has always stood by her when she has stood up for herself or when she has expressed anger or rage. He cheered her on against Pakku. He committed ecoterrorism with her and helped her drive the FN soldiers out of that village. He has also seen how distraught she gets when she has to hurt people or when she sees others suffering. He held her when she learned how to bloodbend. He watched her be betrayed by Jet (which is also why he tells her that she sounds like him, not because he is trying to invalidate her, but because he is trying to express to her that she is not thinking like herself). It's the same thing Katara has done for him on numerous occasions, most specifically in "The Desert" and "The Serpent's Pass." Aang might have been too idealistic in saying that she needed to forgive Yon Rah, but he never once tried to stop her from facing him. The only thing he was trying to stop her from doing was killing him because he knew that, despite everything that she is feeling and how much she hates this man, Katara is not a killer. Sometimes, supporting someone means telling them the hard truth and standing your ground when you know they are acting out of character.

So, yeah. Aang knew what Katara needed: to express her anger and then let it out. Zuko just knew she was angry, and he wanted to help her confront Yon Rah, but he didn't understand that murder was potentially ruinous for her. Once again, this isn't to say that Zuko sucks or that I hate him; I don't. But the truth is, there is no way for him to truly have understood Katara and what she needed, when a big part of why he was even doing this in the first place was to earn her forgiveness. It was inherently selfish. If he wants to earn her forgiveness, he's just gonna be a "yes, man" because it's what he thinks he needs to do to get on her good side.

Also, another reason we know that Zuko doesn't understand Katara in this episode is that, while he is obviously very surprised to see Katara bloodbend, it is his only reaction. If he truly knew Katara, he would know that that alone was wildly out of character for her, but he doesn't. He wasn't there when she learned how to do it. He doesn't know how much it destroyed her. He just watches her do it, and then still decides she's in a stable enough mind to face Yon Rah, with no hesitation or questions about whether she's sure this is the right thing to do.

Finally, Zuko himself says that Aang was right about what Katara needed. He actively recognizes that the revenge he was willing to let her enact would not help her heal; it was letting go of her anger. I also want to point out that Aang doesn't even get a little upset with Katara when she says that she will never forgive Yon Rah because that wasn't really what he wanted her to do. It was never about Yon Rah; it was always about Katara.

[kg-day]

I love that the main things to come from the AtLA movie leak are:

1. Everyone is hot

2. Kataang

3. Zukka

4. Zutoph

And that's it.

[kg-day]

"Kataang is hero gets the girl" basically translates to "I don't value Katara's role within the story and reduce her contributions to the gaang and narrative."

[kg-day]

"Katara and Aang have a mother–son dynamic"

And the evidence is:

1.) The scene of her pretending to be his mother and also SOKKA'S WIFE.

2.) The Runaway, an episode dedicated to how Katara is motherly towards EVERYONE and how she wants to not be seen that way.

3.) Katara holding Aang after he dies in the same pose as the Pieta, which is meant to invoke the death of the savior, not that Katara is Aang's mother.

Bonus examples are: any scene where Katara is just emotionally supportive.

They view all of her interactions with Aang as motherly regardless of what it is simply because she is older. But when she offers Zuko empathy or emotional support (which is very characteristic of her), they're 🙈.

Ignoring how this argument also just adultifies Katara, I want to comment on how attaching Katara's motherly nature to only being towards Aang (which is very untrue) strips the importance of why she acts like that. It takes her trauma response and makes it all about Aang. Katara is not motherly to AANG, KATARA is motherly PERIOD.

"She never treated Zuko that way"

1.) They weren't friends for nearly long enough for us to even see their full dynamic as friends.

2.) Katara absolutely showed Zuko the same empathy and care she showed everyone else once they became friends, offering him advice and supporting him (and she also extended that same kindness before, because that's the kind of person she is).

There is only one time we even see Katara nag Aang, and it was when she told him to "stop rubbing his eyes and sit up straight," which comes RIGHT AFTER she orders Sokka to answer her question about whether she's too motherly, and after TOPH gets on Katara for BEING TOO MOTHERLY. This is in "The Runaway," which is, once again, an episode dedicated to Katara being motherly due to her TRAUMA, and how she treats EVERYONE THAT WAY. But outside of this episode, when does she ever tell Aang what to do? When does she have to baby him? (emotionally supporting him is not babying him or emotional labor when he offers her that same support back when she needs it). When does she have to take care of him because he can't do it for himself? The answer is never.

Katara is someone who cares deeply about the people she loves, and she WANTS to take care of them. Warping her behavior to be about Aang and as a reason why they can't be together is a huge disservice to her. It strips her of her agency. It strips her of her personality. It strips her of her trauma.

Katara is motherly. This is how she would act in any relationship she is in. Pretending otherwise is just willfull ignorance.