‼️New Alert‼️
Hello friends, it has been a big while since I last posted here. I just wanted to let you know that, I am transforming this blog into a space for my content mainly related to my activism and special interests. You might had known me from my days of posting and reposting Attack on Titan fandom content.
I just want to let you know that, Attack on Titan will still always has a special place in my heart because it’s the anime I truly watched growing up and until now, can’t bring myself to watch the last half of season 4 (last season) due to such emotional attachments to the characters.
However I acknowledge and oppose the problematic aspects about both the manga/anime itself and the fandom. Our fandom didn’t do quite a good enough job in being a conscious, considerate and supportive ally of marginalized communities. I think that of the many reasons was that we were mainly teenagers and/or highly influenced by the main narrative of the story without analyzing enough into the morals or the message.
I do not tolerate AOT fans who ignore or disregard the opinions of Jewish individuals who expressed discomfort about Hajime Isayama, a Japanese man with no Jewish ancestry writing a story highly based on the series of events that (mainly) Jewish people historically underwent without any help or co-writing from Jewish writers. I also disagree with the usage of the yellow and red Eldian armbands in cosplays of the characters. I believe that trauma and systemic oppression shouldn’t be something you can dress up as and take off at the end of the day, and this particular armband does resemble the historical badge that Jewish people were forced to wear.
I don’t agree or think it’s the right time to use Attack on Titan as a comparison with the situation of Israeli settler colonialism in Palestine. We must understand that Attack on Titan is fictional and fictions are inspired by real life experiences, not the other way around. To compare a real, fatal and cruel genocide in Palestine with what happened to a white-adjacent fictional race in the anime can feel extremely desensitizing and condescending. And please do note that I still don’t tolerate any forms of Anti-semetism. Jewish identity/Judaism is NOT equal to the state of Israel. Any form of anti-semetism, from micro aggressions to blunt racial violence threats will be immediately reported and blocked, absolutely no tolerance for hate here, so don’t you dare step here with your Anti-semetic Annie nose joke.
I don’t support the decision of Hajime Isayama to create characters around such violent war criminals without being critical of it such as Dot Pixis who was based on Akiyama Yoshifuru, a general in the imperial Japanese army. I am Chinese descent and even have at least one family member who was murdered by the Japanese Imperial Army and I recognize the harm caused by Japanese Imperialism to China, Korea, Taiwan, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Burma, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos ,Cambodia and the diasporic communities of the people who have roots in the following countries. I don’t tolerate the glorification of Imperialism of any kinds.
I don’t support the fans who romanticize wars and military training or military violence or genocide. War serves the few elites and harms the most vulnerable of our societies. And many military training still continues to use abuse whether physical, verbal or emotional in name of discipline up to this day.
I don’t support and won’t interact with people who hold inaccurate or prejudiced views on the character Mikasa Ackerman. In our fandom, she is largely misrepresented as a masculinized desperate woman who only has Eren on her mind, which that doesn’t reflect her full potential and her goals. And the treatment towards Mikasa, whether the masculinization or full on fetishization and misogynistic degradation is inherently connected with the prejudices that Asian women and fems are subjected to. And I don’t agree and don’t support the attempts of representing or casting a white person with no East Asian ancestry or a very white appearing person with East Asian ancestry as Mikasa.
I don’t support people actively enforcing genders onto Hange Zoë and ordering other people to follow their interpretations, Hange is canonically confirmed to have gender that is up to the viewers and hence no gender is the “right one”.
I don’t agree and think it’s harmful for fans to fully ignore or sugarcoat the abusive or violent aspects of the characters to admire or “glaze” them.
I don’t support shipping an underage character with an adult. I will not be replying to any asks about why so as I am uncomfortable interacting with discourses surrounding the Proship/Darkship community and I rarely find that most discourses end or are led in productive and respectful manners. I am also a survivor of multiple online child grooming and I find the said topics triggering and/or extremely energy draining.
I don’t support and condemn the immaturity and harm caused many people in the fandom. There’s a certain reputation associated with the fandom, from sending death threats over unconventional shipping, incel behaviors, misinterpreting the anime and using it as an outlet for real-world nationalism, exclusion of BIPOC, 2SLGBTQIA+ and Disabled people, stalking content creators, mass bullying, Yeagerist discourses to making jokes about traumatic scenarios such as the sexual assault that Armin Arlert went under.
Thank you so much for supporting me since the start. I appreciate that greatly. And if you hold similar beliefs or are interested in what I have to offer in the future, why don’t we stick around?
