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#9s – @vodger on Tumblr

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nierly-amazing

I know I’ve written something similar before and maybe I’m being petty and reading into shit too much, but I honestly just can’t deal with 9S haters. Like, you got the generic weeby incels that are jealous that their fictional waifu is interested in nerdy twink 9S which shatters their “feemales only go for the chads” shitty worldview. Those are easy enough to ignore because they’re just shit people in general and not worth my time. Plus it’s really straightforward and doesn’t have me sitting down thinking “why does this bother me so much?”.

But then you have another group of people that I honestly can’t stand because you look at their hot takes on 9S and think “did we even play the same game?” They reduce him to some flat one dimensional possessive/whiny man child thot boi (No I’m never gonna forget that insult because it’s horrifically beautiful).

I’ve been wondering why it annoys me so much when I don’t really care if people don’t like my favs from other stories and I think it’s a mix of a few reasons. 

One is like I mentioned above in that they get his character so wrong, it’s like they played an entirely different game. 

Another is that they act like the negative (and “negative”) things he does do is for completely no reason whatsoever without acknowledging a whole bunch of fuckshit that helps make him who he is “today”. So we just got “oh he’s possessive and violent and whiny ew” without even thinking about: 

  • All the trauma that 9S went through both before, and during route C.
  • The fact that he was infected by a logic virus for most of route C. Yes, most. I don’t remember where but it says in some supplementary material that the virus was fucking with him since way before he transplanted the arm.
  • The fact that the Red Girls and machines were tormenting him during route C and already pushing him to the extremes. Remember what happened in the Soul Box? Plus Adam torturing him about his feelings for 2B in the copied city wasn’t exactly helpful.
  • The fact that his only purpose was to be a disposable information gatherer for a pointless war. He was designed with a friendly and curious and emotional personality and was forced to work alone for a lot of his life, told that he wasn’t allowed to display those emotions, and punished with death whenever he got too curious. I’d say he gets a pass to whine about missions every now and then.
  • The fact that 2B killed him and erased his memories FORTY-SEVEN times and just because she hates doing it and he forgives her doesn’t change the fact that she did it and how much it would mess up his perception of anything really. (Bonus points if they think 2B’s some perfect stoic lesbian goddess who can do no wrong and has absolutely no romantic interest in 9S). Same with the fact that she was still cold and strict with him most of the time they were together even if he did eventually find out she’s not like that deep down.
  • The fact that 2B was the one and only constant in his life through all his resets. It would take a fucking saint to not develop some unhealthy attachment/possessive thoughts in that situation. Especially with the Red Girls tormenting him by trying to delete his memories of her in the Soul Box. Like it’s not good or healthy and even I was like “nooo 9S baby please don’t be like that” in the clone fight/his possessive monologue in the book at that point. But it sure as hell is realistic and understandable to become possessive of someone that keeps getting taken away from you. 
  • The fact that he hates himself for the way he feels about 2B. He doesn’t act on any of his feelings and always backs off when 2B says no about anything from calling him “Nines” to taking a break after a mission. He might grumble and complain a bit but pretty quickly shuts up. 
  • The fact that he lost everything he loves in the span of a few hours and watched the most important person in the world get skewered by a smelly cryptid doppelganger. (Pile on the fact that said smelly cryptid doppelganger did nothing to clear things up about it when there were plenty of easy ways to do so (don’t get me wrong I love A2, but she’s an idiot)).
  • The fact that even in his route C rampage his anger was still only directed at machines and A2. He helped other androids without complaints, even ones he didn’t know. And he was still visibly upset when he saw Pascal’s Village and Pascal’s memory loss. 

This whole nonsense reminds me of some SU discourse of people hating on Lapiz for the way she responded to Jasper’s abuse. Could she have made better decisions? Maybe. But she was trapped in a mirror for 5000 years, immediately attacked after being released, then captured and tortured again. What the hell do you expect?

And to a lesser extent, it reminds me of how people react to Shinji, calling him whiny and tell all those “get in the fucking robot” jokes. The poor kid went through so much shit comparable somewhat to what 9S went through.

I guess the thing that really bothers me is that I relate really hard to 9S and the shit he went through (obviously to a much lesser extent, thankfully I haven’t lost all of my loved ones in a horrific massacre or anything like that). But I can relate to having everything falling apart in my life and not having the support or experience I needed to get through it without fucking up a lot. 

And as an autistic person with a bunch of other brain shits, I was so happy seeing a character that was (intentionally or not) coded with these same things. So it gets me, even more, when I see people going “ew no he’s bad” because of those traits as if they expect someone with no support network or therapy to just be able to Handle It All on their own. When I see people refusing to be compassionate towards 9S for what he’s gone through, I’m reminded of people that refuse to be compassionate to good people who’ve fucked up because they’re unable to deal with it on their own. (And I sure as hell wouldn’t be surprised if they’re the same people.)

You can like a character or person at the same time as acknowledging what they’re doing wrong. (And on the flip side you don’t have to ignore the faults of characters you do like and paint them as beautiful flawless goddesses).

It’s not often you get a kind, gentle, and emotional male character that doesn’t act all high and mighty and above the female characters just because he’s a dude. It’s also not often you get the scripts flipped in terms of gender expectations as well. Give him a chance to come back and grow past all the trauma that shaped him during route C. He’s a good boy. He’s little, and broken, but still good.

Yeah, still good.

I end this with the wise words of a good friend: “9S is great fuck all yall nerds learn some goddamn empathy the end”.

#NieR Automata spoilers#spoilers#long post#SAY IT AGAIN FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK#9S#NieR Automata#queue
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