Yeah, about that...
Came across this passage in an article on Sasuke’s character: “ Sakura spent pretty much her entire childhood pining for Sasuke, so it’s a nice reward for her that Sasuke did eventually return her affections. It’s a bit of a letdown for some fans of the relationship that he left (again) to travel and atone for his sins once they got together. “
Rhetoric like this makes me literally want to vomit. Why is chasing after someone, almost to the point of harassment, then deciding to kill them when they don’t hew to your viewpoint, something to be rewarded? Why is Sasuke’s love something Sakura “deserves?” If love is something that a girl earns from Sasuke, because he’s clearly so messed up and wrong inside that he couldn’t possibly be trusted to make his own decisions (snark), then Karin--not Sakura--deserves it more.
Karin’s behavior with Sasuke is gross, but it’s the logical extension of Sakura’s behavior with him prior to his defection. Moreover, Karin loves Sasuke because she sees both the good and the bad within him. Her affection for him makes her stronger, unlike Sakura, whose endless pining for Sasuke weakens her (so her character only progresses in his absence). I mean--look at how Karin took out the wooden statue when she thought Sasuke had died.
Like Hinata’s love for Naruto, Sakura’s love for Sasuke is shallow and self-serving. When she accosts him as he is leaving, the points she makes are all about her, Sakura, not Sasuke. Even Naruto has good reasons to give to Sasuke against joining Orochimaru; “his power won’t come for free,” “He only wants your body.” Sakura’s reasoning? “I love you and want to be with you.”
Sakura has zero empathy for Sasuke, which she demonstrates time and time again--most vividly when she decides that she’d be kind to kill him before anyone else could, and ends up nearly killing Naruto in the attempt.
I like Sakura as a character, in many ways. But this reasoning, both in canon and in fanon, makes me retch. Love is not a reward. It’s something to be given freely. The fact that it’s not just highlights how fucked up the shinobi world was--and makes one sympathetic to Sasuke’s ideas of revolution.