Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-107.161.128.14-20170519174115/@comment-26500342-20171231050612

JCB95 wrote:

Thewritersdiary wrote:

JCB95 wrote:

Thewritersdiary wrote: Sometimes I come back on to look at the wiki just to see whats going on since i left it almost two years ago and it never fails to give me a good kick when I see how completely incompetent y'all still are when it comes to the EXTREMELY simple concept "ship and let ship". You'd think on a community of ten (fifteen tops) self-proclaimed "drama-free" fans you'd be able to reel in some of the judgement and ridicule directed towards fans simply for their preferences but instead this community has become even more poisonous and unbearable to spend time in than Tumblr. There's a reason it's basically dead and so many of the old members of the wikia have left (including some I still talk to on other platforms).

It's a TV show. Some people ship. Some people don't. Everyone watches for their own enjoyment.

Clexa. Bellarke. Braven. Something else. Nothing.

Honestly, who even cares?

It's not that deep, my friends. I agree the amount of shipping the fan base dose is ridiculous. Even shipping characters that shouldn't be together. It's like they see 2 characters have a heart to heart to learn something and it's like they just had a moment so they have to get together. The ship for Raven and Luna is a great example of this or the ship for Bellamy and Echo. Or the fact that fans think Miller and Jackson should get together just because Jason said the look they shared was more than just a a look. I appreciate the sentiment but this wasn't really what I was getting at. I was more saying that people should just let people ship what they want to ship without feeling the need to make them feel bad about it. Like I don't personally ship Becho but I don't care if someone else does, and I don't feel the need to put them down for it either. I mean, it's not like someone shipping two characters actually hurts anyone else. I just don't know why people always feel the need to make a comment to put down other shippers for no other reason than to feed their own superiority complex. I wish that the fandom could finally figure out that people watch The 100 (and other shows) for their own reasons and their own enjoyment and it shouldn't really make a difference to other fans. Spread positivity, not hate. My only problem with fans shipping characters is that this shows creators in particular seem to listen to fans too much. It's ok for creators to listen to fans, but at times it seems that they have a really harder grip on the show than the creators do. Like the ridiculous blowback the show got after Alexa's death. Now it feels like the creators are too scared to kill off LGBT characters like Bryan and Niylah who should be dead in my opinion. I also blame fans for way a lot of the main cast is still alive now going into season 5. For example Raven. I also say fans make minor characters like Jackson bigger than they should be. To a certain extent I get this but at the same time I just don't really understand why this is such a big deal. Like, its not like people getting excited about Jackson's hinted sexuality has made it so that Jackson has more screen time than he used to. And even if you think Bryan and Niylah "should be dead" but aren't due to fandom stuff I just don't see why it matters? Its not like either of them have been given a significant amount of screen time or have become such a huge part of the show that its detracting from the story in any way (nor - imo - would that even be a bad thing). Lexa's death obviously hurt a lot of people, and for good reason. Wouldn't you rather that Bryan be written off the show in the way that he was rather than killing off another LGBT character in a way that - in this case - wouldn't even elevate the plot in any way? At a certain point, it just becomes insensitive.

And, honestly, I wasn't even addressing the way shipping affects the creators of the show - we don't have any actual control over the way they write their story. By putting down fans for their shipping/character preferences you're not going to end shipping/fan culture. Saying "I hate this relationship" isn't going to make anyone stop liking it. Its not going to suddenly make the internet go "hey I'm going to stop expressing my like for this character because I don't want the executive producer to be influenced by my opinion in his writing".

There's nothing productive or logical about telling another fan that what they like is dumb or that you hate it or anything. All it does is create animosity among the people within communities - it doesn't change anything else. It's just hugely disheartening to the people who are consistently put down because they dared to feel something for a certain relationship.

Obviously the person who started this discussion ships Bellarke. They wouldn't have started it otherwise. So when people come into the forum to say things like "I hope Bellamy dies" or "I hate Bellarke" it just feels like people are turning up to another person's party and trashing it. For no other reason than to be like "you like this thing and I don't so I'm going to ruin it for you ... because".

It's like if someone was wearing a purple shirt and you hate the colour purple and just decide to go up to the person and be like "that shirt is ugly". You would never do it. So why would you enter a forum clearly directed towards people who enjoy a relationship just to tell them that - essentially - you think it sucks?

I don't understand this attitude. If you don't like something, go make your own post. There's no need to hijack someone elses.

And this doesn't just go for this discussion or for Bellarke, but for any other relationship or character. Everyone is allowed to have an opinion but it's one thing to state your opinion and quite another to invade another person's space and actively try to put them down simply for thinking different than you.

I've seen it all over the wikia - not just here. For instance someone will write "I love Bellarke" in the comments section and then another person will comment "I hate the idea of Bellarke getting together romantically; they're obviously platonic and it's never going to happen - why do people have to make everything about romance".

Like ... there wasn't a question mark at the end of that sentence? They didn't ask for your opinion? There's no need to attack another person for liking something you don't. It's easy to just leave it. On Tumblr there's this unspoken fandom rule that if you - for example - don't like someone's shipping preferences, you make your own post about it. You don't hijack theirs. It's common courtesy and prevents a lot of conflict.

So if you all really hate Bellarke that much, go make your own post about it. If you really just hate it THAT much that you NEED to shout it into the void because its just too difficult to talk about things you like rather than dwell on the things you don't - if you're that desperate to hate on it, there are other ways to go about it. You don't have to tell a shipper how much their ship sucks directly to their face.

Don't like, don't read. It's an easy concept.