OK, shippers need to stop obsessing over canon

[cashew]

When I was young, it felt absolutely essential "proving" my ship was canon. Because it felt like if only I can just convince other fans to view the canon through my shipping lens, then my ship will become more popular. Or something. I don't know, I was young and stupid.

Nowadays, I realized trying to argue a ship is "canon" is not only stupid but at best pointless and at worst driving the ship I like further into the ground.

Because here's the reality: the most popular ships are predominantly NOT CANON.

Yes, yes, I'm sure Kirk/Spock slashers are frantically gesticulating, but no, that's called a slash ship for a reason. And you know what? That's perfectly fine.

Because the reality is that the canon romance is almost never as interesting as the non-canon romance. Popular media has become formulaic when it comes to romance (gay, straight, queer, or whatever). Yes, that's right, even the LGBT+ romances are dull and clichéd. Popular media is too profit driven to deviate from a fixed, preset monotonous formula when it comes to romance regardless of the permutation.

So I'd rather have some good ol' bromance, brothers-in-arms, ya ya sisterhood, childhood friends, etc. types of relationships and leave the potential for romantic development for the shippers to explore in fanfic.

In other words, leave the romance to the shippers. Let canon focus on telling an interesting relationship (whatever type that may be) and fans should stop worrying about whether their ship is supported by canon and just ship if the dynamic is engaging. Because in all likelihood, your ship is probably not going to get validated by canon, but why care? Most popular ships aren't canon anyway.

Ship and let ship. Find the ship circle of choice and ignore everyone else. All this internet bickering about whether a work is or isn't BL because a ship is or isn't canon is so, so pointless. Queer works aren't going to become mainstream. That's why it's called queer. Accept the reality and stop demanding other people creating works that you want to see. Instead, roll up your sleeves and create the work you want to see.

We'll all be happier that way.

...

Still won't stop me from bitching about how crappy the writing is, tho'. Bad writing is still bad writing; if you don't want to get criticized, don't publish.

Comments

[tanithryudo]

I am pretty sure that most normal people are aware of the reality that their mainstream fiction isn't going to ever officially legitimize BL pairings. That's true of EN or CN franchises, simply because of marketing needs. For games, it's a step further, and they're not likely to officially legitimize any romantic pairings, even BG ones, because they need the market segment that prefers to self-insert themselves with the characters. Even for TV works based on BL stories, IMO they're not going to go all the way to explicitly confirm BL pairings, because of CN censorship.

So I have a hard time taking shipping battles seriously. But the fact they exist is probably because anywhere you have a large fandom, you unavoidably get people who conflict with each other. And it might as well be this kind of conflict wrt the fanfic population.

[cashew]

I am pretty sure that most normal people are aware of the reality that their mainstream fiction isn't going to ever officially legitimize BL pairings.

That was my assumption, too, until I realized people are trying to argue over whether a show "is mainstream" or "is BL" because they've convinced themselves that their ship is canon. Like, the amount of people who try to deny the canon pairing in X (by CLAMP) is Fuuma/Kamui by arguing X is a mainstream work was...shockingly large. (The fact the work went into hiatus due to the magazine it was published in went bust does not scream "mainstream"...but some fans can't seem to accept reality.)

Meanwhile, CN fans are literally coming up with conspiracy theories trying to explain why 君子盟 is actually secretly a BL work meant to appeal to the BL crowd and the author only labeled the original work as no CP because there isn't a mystery section on JJ... These are the articles coming up on Baidu, so like...either normal people are more deluded than I think or the weirdos have taken over the search engine algorithm.

Fandom needs gatekeepers is what I'm saying. Clearly fandom cannot be trusted to moderate themselves... -_-

[tanithryudo]

I guess...you shouldn't put too much hope in humanity? I mean, it's the same with CN censorship banning historical alteration fiction genre (like 步步惊心) because some people took it as real history. Or the various scams and fake news online that plenty of adult people still buy into...

[cashew]

(T_T)

I just want humanity to spend their energy writing ship fic instead of fighting ship wars. Is that so much to ask?

Ok, and maybe to stop shipping psycho characters...

[tanithryudo]

Unfortunately, it is probably too much to ask... :(