My open letter to the Moomin fandom
cw: swearing. Not a lot of it, but it's there.
I don't know if I'll ever actually post this, but I need to get this written down because I just can't with this fandom anymore and I need to get my emotions out somehow.
Before I actually get into it, I want to make one thing clear. This is not a personal attack against anyone. You are allowed to have your own opinions, to ship who you like, to do whatever you want to, really (try to stay on the legal side tho), just like I have the right to the very same things.
You can disagree with me, you can even tell me just how much you disagree with me, as long as you stay kind and respectful about it. That's just how people work. We're not gonna agree on everything, and that's fine. Great even. Otherwise the world would be a very boring place.
Mostly, I love this fandom. The people are very open and welcoming and the vibes are absolutely top notch. There are a lot of very skilled and passionate people here who fill this fandom with joy and life and creativity.
But ever since I first joined this fandom, there has been a certain attitude on here concerning Snufmin, the most popular ship in this fandom (for understandable reasons), that has irked me every time I came accross it in any form.
"Well, obviously they're more than just friends, you have to be blind not to see that."
I hate that fucking phrase so much.
Now, before I start going into my biggest problem with this wide-spread attitude, I'm gonna look at that expression for a second. "more than just friends."
Usually I try not to get snagged on phrases like this, because it's really just a common expression (even I use it occasionally. probably.) and people probably don't mean it that way, but in this specific case it's actually relevant to the larger problem, so bear with me for a bit.
"More than just friends" explicitly implies a sort of ranking or hierachy. That romantic love is inherently more valuable than platonic love. It devalues platonic relationships despite the fact that they're actually equal to romantic relationships.
This is a very important point here. Equality. I am not trying to put either of them above the other. In my opinion, neither of them is more important than the other. They're just two of the many ways you can express your love for someone. Both of them can be equally deep and important.
Okay, it's time to finally take a look at the actualy contents of this phrase. The part of the attitude that has been chipping away at me for the past few years until the dam finally burst.
It's not a secret that, while they're incredibly close, Snufkin and Moomin are not canonically a romantic couple. Now, would Tove have made Moomintroll and Snufkin explicitly a couple if she had lived in a time where that would have been possible? Maybe. We'll never know, since we can't exactly ask her anymore.
But regardless of Tove's intentions, what we ended up with is this beautifully ambigous relationship, that could be anything, really.
The relationship is beautiful. It's close and trusting and endless and admiration and adoration and written in the fabric of the fucking universe. But it's not defined.
It's very fitting for a relationship that serves as an allegory for longing to be that way.
Longing isn't defined, it's complicated and deep, and everyone feels it differently and it can be felt regardless of what kind of relationship you have with the person or the place or the thing you're longing for, which is why the ambiguity of their feelings for each other and the deep love and complex emotions they feel is a perfect representations of a very complicated emotion.
Now, to make one thing clear: I'm not bashing anyone for shipping these two. Again, the relationship is ambigous, and a romantic reading of the source text is just as valid as a platonic one or everything in between.
There's a lot to like, and they make for a very compelling ship.
My problem is with the people who act like Snufmin is the foregone conclusion. The only valid interpretation.
The people who don't tag their fanfics as Snufmin because "It's basically cannon."
The people who post stuff about how you have to be stupid not to see that they're obviously a couple. How the people who prefer a platonic reading are willfully ignorant or blind to the elephant in the room.
Maybe it's the aromantic in me, the person who was told growing up again and again that that you had to find romantic love to be complete, that was made to feel like something was wrong with me because I didn't.
The kid who was told "they must be more than friends."
Who was made to feel like platonic love, the only kind of love I felt, was inherently less valuable, less cherishable than the romantic kind.
So yeah, maybe it's the aromantic in me, but I haven't been a huge shipper ever since when I was around 18. I'm not anti-shipping, but when I'm in a fandom most ships just end up on a scale from vaguely positive to vaguely negative for me, with most of them ending up in the neutral zone.
I'm not gonna seek out any content of the ship specifically, but a good piece of fanart is a good piece of fanart and a fanfic with an interesting storyline intrigues me, regardless of whether or not it has a ship in it.
Snufmin was on the upper end of this scale for me when I first joined the fandom. Not even neutral, but vaguely positive. They're really cute together, to the point where I'd actually seek out content specifically for it being Snufmin (There's some really cute animatics out there. 10/10. would recommend) and even came up with an entire AU based around the ship.
But as the years went on, and the comments and untagged fanfics and this fucking attitude in the entire fandom went on and on and on, it all started piling up. Chipping away at me. Discomfort started to settle in, and I felt more and more uncomfortable, less welcomed in a fandom that used to be a source of comfort for me.
I started to hate this fucking ship. Genuine hatred, which is a rare thing for me. I guess I blamed it for the loss of something dear to me.
It got to the point where I left this fandom almost entirely, only staying tethered to it through the fact that I still enjoyed and consumed the source material.
I've been getting better about it recently, slowly finding my way back through the things I originally found joy in while trying to avoid everything else best as I can, but that's my personaly journey and I'm not going to bore you with the details. Just know that the hatred is gone, with only occasional annoyance left.
The attitude that caused it though, isn't. It's still there, just as it was back then.
Again, I'm not telling you to stop shipping Snufmin. I get it. It's a great ship and I'm glad you find joy in it.
But the next time you post about it, try not to devalue the just as valid platonic love these two can feel for each other.
I'd appreciate it, and while it's probably not the most popular opinion, I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one.
Thank you if you read this basically-a-breakdown until here. It genuinely means a lot to me.
PS: Tag you fucking fanfics. Please.
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