Midnight
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Midnight
One of the most generally useful things to come out of Hbomberguy's plagiarism video and Todd in the Shadows' similar video on misinformation is how they bring transparency to the internet phenomenon of "I made up a guy to get mad at".
Seriously, I've seen people make up a lot of stupid shit on the internet over the years and it's often just a manipulative attempt to paint a group of marginalized people in a bad light.
That's the TL;DR version of this post.
ANYWAY here is the long version
Those videos are mostly about James Somerton's plagiarism of other queer people's work. However I'd like to talk about that 20-30% of Somerton's original writing- and oh boy. It's mostly about complaining about White Straight Women and misgendering well-known trans creators such as Rebecca Sugar and calling Becky Albertalli a straight woman while it's pretty common knowledge that she was forced to out herself as bi because she received so much harassment over "being a cishet woman who appropriates LGBT+ stories".
One thing that irks me especially is how in his Killing Stalking and Gay Shipping videos Somerton brings up how straight women/ teen girl shippers exploit gay men for their personal sexual fantasies. This gets brought up several times in his videos.
Being all up and arms about Somerton being a "White Cis Gay Who Hates Women and Queer People tm" is not that useful because the kind of rhetoric he's using is extremely common in fandom and LGBT+ spaces on Tumblr, TikTok and Twitter. We really don't need to bring Somerton's identity to this since he is in no way an unique example.
It's hypocritical to make this about an individual person when I've seen A TON of posts, tweets and videos where queer people talk about these Sinister Straight Women who are supposedly out there fetishizing and exploiting queer men. It's pretty clear to me that this is just an excuse to shit on women and queer people for having any sexual interests. At worst these comments are spreading misinformation about BL, a form of media that has been excessively studied by both Asian feminists and Asian queer women.
This all sounds really familiar and I think it's good that people are calling it out as what it is: misogyny and transphobia. I'd also point out the potentially racist motives behind being this hypervigilant about Asian media.
People can absolutely be misogynist regardless of gender or orientation. I really don't know why we need to create some kind of made up enemy to get mad at. I actually think it's almost sinister how "anti-fujoshi" people call Slash shippers and fujoshi misogynists or claim that they have internalised misogyny while being dismissive about women's interests and creative pursuits under Japanese obscenity laws, China's censorship, book bans in American schools and various other disadvances that are part of being a queer and/or female creator.
I think we shouldn't be naive about the bad faith actors who want to turn queer people against each other. For example Fujoshi.info mentions anti-gender (TERF, GC etc) movement using this kind of rhetoric as well.
Anyway if you want to read more:
- about the false info around BL fandom fujoshi.info
-There is the scholar Thomas Baudinette who studies gay media in Japan. Here is a podcast with him and the scholar Khursten Santos
-James Welker is a BL scholar as well. Here is a podcast interview about the new international BL article collection he edited.
-I've already talked about this Youtube channel by KrisPNatz and his great Killing Stalking video that actually engages with the themes of the manhwa
- There is also HR Coleman's thesis DO NOT FEED THE FETISHIZERS: BOYS LOVE FANS RESISTANCE AND CHALLENGE OF PERCEIVED REPUTATION where she interviews 36 BL fans and actually breaks down why fetishization has become such a huge talking point in the fandom discourse. Spoilers, it's mostly about young queer people and women being worried that they will get judged and pathologized for their interest in anything sexual.
-Great podcast about Danmei and censorship with Liang Ge
The end of TDP was so chilling.
Aaravos saying he doesn't want to lose another daughter again referring to Claudia.
Is Aaravos manipulating Claudia again or telling the truth about his genuine feelings towards her? I'm not even sure which option is worse at this point. Or does any of that even matter anymore.
I was going through my various TDP folders and found this picture titled "Wizard Gender Chart"
like wtf even is this lol- I assume there was supposed to be more wizard characters included or smt
Since The Dragon Prince is ending (or at least the second arc is ending) in December I'll celebrate that by listing the funniest things I've witnessed in the fandom during these years:
-The Great Aaravos Thirst of 2019.
-Knowing The Thirst™ had been even greater if Tumblr wouldn't have banned porn just a year earlier.
-Aaravos' character designer being very happy with all the thirst posting.
-The Great Virst of 2019 that was balanced out by the people who thought Viren was a total troll.
-Rayla-Claudia-Callum love triangle speculations before s3.
-"Viren actually killed everyone, including Sarai and his ex-wife", speculations during s1-3.
-Aaravos Is A Good Person and a cinnamon roll -speculations.
-Fandom calling Ethari "The Tinker" before his name was revealed and also correctly predicting him and Runaan being a couple long before it got confirmed.
-Jason Simpson (Viren's VA) being grumpy about people shipping Aaravos and Viren while Todd Erik Dellums (Aaravos's VA) egged the fans on and seemed to find the ship pretty funny.
-After the Midnight Star poem's full English translation got released some fans concluded that Elarion was a human girl Aaravos once was in love with and thus Elavos was born. You can still search the ship name on Tumblr to experience the time campsule of 2019 era of the fandom. Yes, people shipped Aaravos with a literal city and I think that's beautiful.
-The drought period of 2019-2022 hiatus where it was just a couple really weird terminally online fans posting their harmless headcanons, including a small fandom of a. ten people forming around Viren's ex-wife Lissa.
-Unhinged TDP fan theories like "Aaravos is Callum's Dad" and "Callum will learn every primal source" aka wanting TDP to be Avatar 2.0 but with elves.
-The fan response that parodied these theories including "Everyone is a Startouch elf, especially Bait"
-The Great FartGate of 2022 aka all of TDP Twitter collectively complaining about the fart jokes in s4.
-These 2024 Valentine's Day posts most likely done by the lead writer Devon Giehl.
-If you search Aaravos on Google the most frequently asked question is about his gender.
-TDP wiki gleefully listing Aaravos and Viren as Sir Sparklepuff's parents after s5.
-The fandom never letting go of the "Viren imprisoned Harrow in Pip" theory.
-Which Primal Source Are You -Quiz from 2018 foreshadowing events of the show like "where would you hide a dangerous magical object" and one of the answers being "in the bottom of the sea" possibly referring to Aaravos' pearl.
-A tweet fans thought was a mistake actually foreshadowed Aaravos being a giant.
I'll add more later if I feel like it.
edit:
ok one more: behold, one of the most popular TDP posts on Tumblr
this is one of the most beautiful, heartbreaking and bittersweet lines in all of The Dragon Prince.
Definitely a good addition to the Viren as an Allegory for a Narcissistic Parent -reading of Viren's story arc. Speaking of which-
Viren's apology here is the perfect fantasy of someone who grew up with a narcissistic parent, right?
It's the ultimate fantasy of what if the person who abused you saw how unfair and cruel they have been and acknowledged the harm they have caused to people close to them? How they finally take accountability and lift the burden off their children's shoulders. Viren literally starts his apology with "I see you, Soren" acknowledging Soren's pain.
TDP is really good at making the dramatic story climax more impactful by putting a lot of focus on the slower emotional build-up before the main event. Viren dying in a moment of self-sacrifice is symbolically powerful but it isn't exactly relatable. What makes it so meaningful to me are these seemingly small, more subtle, less fantastical moments, the build-up before the pay-off. It's a good balance of fantasy epicness and realistic human emotion.
To me this line encapsulates Viren's true sacrifice. He lets go of his ego, being stripped away of his status and has to face the fact that he has failed as a protector of his kingdom and his children. It's an extremely vulnerable moment for him and it's almost painful to watch because both Soren and Viren's perspective and feelings feel very human and understandable.
THIS line feels like the true moment of sacrifice to me. Viren lays his feelings bare without any signifiers of status as a High Mage of Katolis and without the authority of a parent to shield him from criticism.
this scene from TDP but I edited my Very Beautiful & Sexy Aaravos Birthday Cake over the original image
Since the new adaptation of Black Butler is currently airing I've been looking into the Tumblr and YouTube side of the fandom and it's exactly as defensive about the show's more transgressive elements as I thought it would be.
It's so weird to hear the new female and LGBT+ fans saying stuff like: "I can't believe the yaoi fans are ruining Kuroshitsuji with their weird shipping!" And then denying the obvious psychosexual subtext of Sebastian and Ciel's relationship which has cleary been there since the day one.
Then I watch the show with my straight cis dude friends who don't give a fuck about the discourse and their reaction is like "LOL THAT Yaoi Bait Show from the 00's is still a thing?? Anyway it's pretty good."