when y'all come for stricklake, THEN you can talk to me about ~normalizing abuse.~
you're not going to, though, because what you care about is having an excuse to harass people. y'all will literally harass and attack people for saying--without even judging the shippers--that stricklake is fucked up, because it's the popular ship, and attacking people who dare criticize it gets you clout. this has been done a number of times by the exact same prominent BNFs who go after less popular Bad Ships(tm) which are easier targets, it's transparent as hell, and it's fucking disgusting.
(and no, if you try to crawl onto this post saying stricklake as portrayed in canon isn't fucked up as hell you will get a long fucking response, by god.)
and for that matter, hoo BOY are you poking a hornet's nest if you dare criticize barb's behavior toward jim. this entire fandom talks constantly about what a great mom she is, when her treatment of jim is abusive, and not only that, but in specific ways that many, many csa survivors have been harmed by. i have literally been told to suffer and that i, an abuse survivor, don't know what real abuse is (because op ~is writing about it, they should know~), and have been openly mocked in the tags multiple times by multiple BNFs, for talking about it.
and for that matter, while we're at it, how about strickler explicitly telling jim he was worthless for anything but protecting his mom, and that he couldn't even do that right? you know, the exact same thing everyone hates merlin for?
do people like me, who are immensely triggered by this shit, not matter? do people who are, by your standards, having partner and child abuse normalized for them not matter?
the answer is no. we don't. not to people like you. it only matters to you if the characters kiss, because that's easiest to weaponize disgust against for clout.
you wanna know just how much these people don't give a fuck? some of the people in this fandom who are loudest about how Bad Ships are Illegal and Deserve Death openly make content--lots of content--of adult/minor ships of their own, which are portrayed in VERY fluffy, romanticized lights. openly! in between posts foaming at the mouth about other people doing it! they're popular among the other fandom police!
all of this is completely leaving aside everything else about this discourse (which you people clutching your pearls over this shit and wailing to Think of the Children are ignorant as all fuck about and it shows). the point of this post is that y'all are fucking hypocrites and you're not even subtle about it.
don't pretend you care about kids or survivors. what you want is victims. sit the fuck down and shut up.