stranger theories

14. That one thing I see in fic... Firstly, Robin saying dingus all the time. I read a lot of Ronance and sometimes it feels like every piece of dialogue by Robin is like "hello dingus, you're looking very dingus today. How dingus are you on a scale from 1-10?" and I am not a fan. I think it can be good in minimal usage and only with Steve. And secondly, in Byler fics I see a lot of Byler getting Murray'd and it can be good but I kind of hate when he's really harsh about it like he was to Jopper and Jancy because I feel like it's a different sitch and it also risks outing them so generally I prefer it when he Murrays them separately.

13. Worst blorboification is easily B*lly for me. Trigger warning for racism and abuse from here on out. I'm censoring so it doesn't appear on search, partially to be nice but also because the last time I said this I got called a bigot...against B*lly stans? Please don't send me asks, I get finding the writing interesting or finding Dacre hot but you can analyse his character without excusing racism and abuse.

Anyways, with all that out of the way, I hate how people have turned him into some babygirl who's just a bit sad and forgetting the whole racism and abuse of it all. I think people massively miss the point of his character by excusing his actions because in my opinion, he was clearly meant to represent the cycle of abuse and how he'd become what he was scared of.

The end wasn't a redemption, it was him realising that he's become what he's scared of and trying to end the cycle once and for all, hence the whole vision with El beforehand. Not a redemption, not an excuse, just an explanation. You can have abusive parents and not abuse. You can have racist parents and not violently attack a black child because he hung out with your white sister. Not a babygirl or a misunderstood boy, he's an abusive bigot who was so horrible his child sister prayed for him to die and felt relieved when he did.

Thanks for the ask (in reference to this post)

Yeah people really don't get nuance. Plus white supremacy isn't something that should just be thrown around as some sort of gotcha because it's a really serious issue. This issue with complexity is on both sides. I've seen people saying that Jason did nothing wrong because his girlfriend died and he murdered him which is completely wrong. And then on the other side I've seen people like the ones you're talking about saying if you attempt to understand his actions, you're condoning them. People really see stuff in black and white, when in reality the character is meant to be more of a grey area.

Because yes, his girlfriend was brutally murdered and in his mind he wants justice. That's an interesting motivation. But it's also not a justification for his actions. He frames a bunch of innocent people, is incredibly violent and encourages his friends to be violent too. Even before Chrissy's death, he used the mass death of people in order to encourage people to cheer for his basketball game so he's clearly very manipulative and wants his way. But you're not erasing any of that by trying to understand the character and his motivations and his pov.

I think this moral purification in the fandom is kind of weird. Like every character is either this or that with no room for nuance. I got an ask saying that Eddie is a horrible person because he did bad things, but he's clearly way more complex than that. He's not perfect, but that was the whole point in his character arc and he was always a good person deep down. It's so weird to me how people are faster to blame him for dealing drugs than they are to blame Billy for being a racist piece of shit.

TW for abuse and racism at this point! Speaking of him, I've seen this a lot with Billy. Billy was a racist abusive piece of shit. His mind was warped as a child due to his desensitisation to violence and due to the cyclic nature of abuse, he became a bad person. But people think that a sad backstory is an excuse for his behaviour, when it's clearly not. Because people really struggle to understand that just because a character is complex it doesn't mean that they're good. Same thing goes for Brenner. Like wow he cares for his little lab rats that he manipulates and abuses, he's so great!

And just for the show in general. Does the show have problematic elements? Absolutely. It's treatment of queer characters and characters of colour as well as it's use of holocaust imagery and a fucking Nazi prison camp as a set (seriously fucked up) and queer baiting is disgusting. But I do not think that means the show is now entirely awful and if you watch it or enjoy it you are awful too. It is really important to critique media, but things aren't as simple as 'this is problematic and this isn't' because most shows probably have issues. As a fan, it's important to critically consume the show and to call it out and hold the creators accountable. We need to encourage the show runners to make a change and start trying to make good representation to make up for their prior mistakes if they even can be redeemed instead of just writing off the whole show.

Don't know if this is what you wanted, but thanks for the ask anyways (: hope you're doing well