Holaaa Ciel, Hace mucho que no te veo conectada 🥺 espero estés bien
omg holis,,,no me morí!!! me mudé a twitter porque ya no estaba hiperfijada en moomins y queria cambiar los aires :') me hice un nuevo tumblr porqueee siento que aunque volviera a conectarme, este tumblr ya no me...representa(?) anyways ahora ando por ahí como viejarobaflores !! es bueno volver
If working for a brief time with neurodivergent kids has taught me something is that most of the time the biggest problem comes from people treating them as if they were stupid. Babyfying their feelings and behaviour and not allowing them space to do the tasks they feel capable of doing is just as wrong as forcing them to fit the neurotypical standard with no consideration for their needs and limitations.
An Analysis of Sniff and the Fandom Around him; a long, casual essay.
I think the issue with Sniff and thus his fanon depictions is that while yes, he is riddled with various flaws unique to each adaptation of him and can all too often be depicted as annoying in 2 of the most popular shows, the fandom doesn't seem to treat him very fairly or even dare to propose rationalization of or forgiveness for his behavior unlike Snorkmaiden who was treated very poorly for being "an obstacle" and then turned around once the fandom became a little more self-aware of their blatantly misogynistic actions.
Sniff hasn't gotten much non-shallow positive representation/discussion or sympathetic analysis like Snorkmaiden; this has severely disrupted any fan's possibility of actually enjoying him. As much as one rewatches or enjoys the source material, they're not going to think deeply of certain elements if the fandom content they consume doesn't hype up details or characters, they're not going to look for enjoyment in Sniff if nobody points out what to enjoy in Sniff or try to take scenes and rationalize his behavior which would give greater meaning to the scenes with him.
A lack of a true (male) partner to ship him with also contributes to a lack of positive fan content, nobody really pointed this out but it seems a alot of likeable Snorkmaiden content often contains wlw ships with her, with Little My or otherwise. Being (queer) shipped also seems to give easy leeway for certain behaviors or actions for the character(s) in question, e.i: Moomintroll seems to be often depicted as soft, protective and full of admiration in the fandom because there's Snufkin for him to act like that with, when in canon his behavior (especially in the comics) can often be rude, incredibly sheepish/cowardly, spiteful and disloyal, or Snufkin is depicted as yearning, self-conscious, thoughtful and wisdomous (or if we completely ignore canon, feral, sarcastic and having a general aura of coolness) when in canon he can be very avoidant (straight up ditching situations he finds unappealing for him), self-righteous, judgemental and often disliking being around other people.
Negative depictions of them are quickly rejected or otherwise overlooked because of these idealizations of the characters, even when the canon depicts them with these flaws, OR they get twisted with sympathetic explanations for their behavior, like Snufkin being justified in committing terrorism against a park and physically harming its keeper(s) because of headcanonned childhood trauma when it could more easily be explained as him being self-righteous, petty and generally anti-authoritarian. (And to clarify, I'm not really slandering Snufmin as a ship [in fact I do enjoy it], it has its bases and they do seem to really find eachother special. I'm just using it as a popular example to illustrate my point of shipping creating what I call "likeable mischaracterisation")
There's also the severe roadblock of Snufkin and Sniff's natural idealistic rivalry, Sniff being a materialist and Snufkin being... The opposite of one? Non-materialist? And most of the fandom seems to often kin or otherwise project onto Snufkin because of his seemingly idealistic lifestyle backed up by the previous cottagecore phase of the internet which integrated the Moomin franchise into its ideology, even though Snufkin's ideology has its own flaws, Sniff "represents" the now terribly daunting capitalism that crushes us daily. But one thing has to be understood; Sniff is a traumatized child aswell, orphaned for who knows how long before being adopted by the Moomins and always unrelatable to his friends, much like how the fandom often views Snufkin.
Sniff isn't capitalism itself; he is a victim of it as much as anyone (or I guess moreso since the Moomins don't seem to be terribly bothered by it often), it's just that he's trying to fulfill his needs in a materialistic way instead of withdrawing into isolation from society, he's trying to game the system to fulfill some kind of non-obvious and unconscious need he has that he can't get an opportunity to express.
In the short story Cedric (in Tales From Moominvalley, a collection of short stories by Tove set in Moominland) Sniff gets extremely depressed after giving away his prized and beloved toy dog who had topaz eyes and a genuine moonstone on its collar, Cedric (after which the story is named after), to a brat referred to as Gaffsie's Daughter by the instruction of Moomintroll who assumably had the good intention of teaching Sniff how to share and the warm fuzzy feelings that come with it, but it obviously backfired entirely. Sniff is described to having become so depressed that he couldn't sleep, eat or even speak, Moominmamma asks why Sniff gave Cedric away to Gaffsie's Daughter and he explains, Moominmamma is left unable to respond and goes to bed to try and think it over. Sniff goes outside to have Snufkin tell a story about his own aunt and Sniff keeps responding to this story like he's had similar ones told to him before, trying to predict what happens and saying that Snufkin is just like Moomintroll.
In an author's note for the chapter, it's said Sniff finds Cedric in the rain with his jewelry missing and Sniff continues to love Cedric the way he did, unclear if a lesson was truly learned. What I find strange about this is that Tove describes Cedric as bald and love-worn but that Sniff seemed to possibly care about Cedric because of his jewelry despite Sniff having become legitimately depressed and regretting giving him away, and afterward she says she thinks Sniff is nobler for loving Cedric despite his lack of jewelry. This should be true in any context but this feels demeaning for Sniff, who hasn't even mentioned the gems in dialog or described thoughts.
This leads into Sniff's general mistreatment in canon, particularly in Moominvalley 2019, but I'm not going to get into that at the risk at making this the length of a book. I'm just gonna say; if you're going to rewatch the series, remember that Sniff is supposed to be 12-14 years old.
He also gets really unlikeable in the Tove comics then Lars tried to soften him in his own run, so that's something. But you have to give credit to that version of Sniff for actually being mildly more competent than many characters in the strip unlike his fandom/2019 depiction as being a failure and a far worse idiot than everybody else.
Anyway, what was I saying? Ah yeah.
What I'm saying is that there is a likeable version of Sniff to look into if you try. There is a tragic one where he is slowly but surely left behind by his friends who he cared about only to be left with Stinky, an actual, despicable criminal and attempted murderer, there is a Sniff that can be loved and cared for by his equally broken parents, there is a version of Sniff who freaks out when he finds out he has a brother named Fuddler and doesn't know what to do about it.
There is a Sniff that has a cool story to tell, to have what-ifs that he learns from, to be a child trying to navigate things in an unhealthy way he knows but can't help, to be an adult that has to kick Moomintroll into not being a doormat, to be desperate in filling a void with material, to hope but ultimately have to settle with something better for him in the long term.
Make a medieval AU where he's a clumsy but lucky street rat ffs, don't make him a pathetic one-off joke or a smalltime villain. There is something he can teach others that isn't just not what to do by example, make him realize that Moomintroll is kinda crap for never addressing his feelings when he pours his heart out over a stuffed animal he just got a few days ago that makes him feel more special than anyone ever has. LET HIM BE HUGGED BY HIS PARENTS. PLEASE. SNUFKIN GETS HUNDREDS OF REDRAWS OF HIM HUGGING JOXTER BUT I HAVEN'T SEEN ONE OF SNIFF JUMPING INTO MUDDLER'S ARMS. LET SOMEBODY FILL HIS PATHETIC VOID WITH THE PLATONIC/PARENTAL AFFECTION HE HAS NEVER RECEIVED IN CANON AND DON'T MAKE IT COME FROM STINKY HE IS AN ENABLER AND WOULD BE A TOXIC FRIEND.
Do you ever read or hear someone talk about something nerdy and scientific they know a lot about and you’re like. This is so fuckin sexy please tell me more about impression fossils in sedimentary rocks
obsessed with people who stan side characters it’s so funny like you’ll see them talk endlessly about count gobbledegook IV and then you go to wikipedia and find out they’ve been in five episodes total across a 300 episode series
Boosting donations since I haven't had anything to eat since yesterday and need to pay for the room tmr so msg me for my cashapp if you'd like to help me out 👍
