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"Pen ruined Eloises reputation" no the fuck she didnt. Eloise faced no consequences for going to see a man of lowerclass unchaperoned (Pen wrote she was seeing political radicals), got a new friend, and was still able to hang out with the debutantes and have her reputation in tact meanwhile Eloise blabbing about polins lessons caused Pen to be shamed and have to write about herself cause everyone was making fun of her

I still have some thoughts about season 3, and I'm sure as hell gonna throw them out there.

So, after watching the new season I realised something with full force. Up until now I felt kinda bad about thinking critically about Eric's choices.

But oh, not anymore do I feel bad about it.

Because you see, seeing as his personality basically went to the shitter this season at first I thought "hey, that's so unexpected!". But then I realised, it wasn't unexpected at all.

A lot of people gave Adam shit back in season 2, because Eric cheated with him on Rahim.

But like... Eric cheated on Rahim.

It was Eric's decision to:

1. Kiss Adam during detention.

2. See him when he reached out after coming back from military school, throwing pebbles at Eric's window that first time.

And it was Eric's decision to continue meeting Adam at night behind Rahim's back, the pieces of broken porcelain on his nightstand a testament to the fact that he kept on making the choice to go back to Adam despite being in a relationship already.

And then, he said Adam's full of shame and that, essentially, he can't be with him if Adam isn't out.

So, Adam came out to the entire school, by declaring his feelings for Eric.

But it still isn't enough for Eric.

Because now he wants Adam to come out to his mum. And Eric seems to suddenly have zero idea about how strained Adam's relationship with both of his parents is. Even though in the first two seasons he seemed really perceptive when it came to Adam. It seemed he could see right through Adam's thick shell, having at least the faintest idea that there must be something more to this guy than what meets the eye.

Adam is trying so hard to be the person that Eric wants him to be. In season 3 Rahim asks Adam "and what about you? What do you like?", and honestly, I'm shocked by how refreshing such treatment of Adam was. Because nobody except Ola seemed genuinely interested in Adam himself before, in his thoughts and what he has to say. I honestly thought I could include Eric in that little group, but now I see very clearly, that I can't, and I never really could.

And then of course there's also the issue of the two of them having sex.

Eric really wants to, and Adam does too it would seem, but he has trouble voicing what it is he actually wants.

And it just worries me, because this is the second instance of Adam being under the pressure to have specific kind of sex with his partner, and he isn't given understanding or patience in the matter.

What's bad is that it also makes it seem like only the kind of sex when you're inside someone or someone is inside you is "real" sex and real, ultimate form of intimacy, and that if you don't get that in your relationship, it somehow nullifies all other instances of intimacy that aren't inherently sexual in nature.

Can we form a prayer circle with the thought that third time's the charm and that the next person Adam's dating will be patient and understanding with him in all matters, including intimacy and sex?

Eric thinks Adam is embarrassing quite a lot in season 3, and gives him way less credit than is due. Slowly I started to realise that Eric never really saw Adam for who he was.

And Adam was trying so hard. He was learning to be vulnerable and open, he said "I love you" first, he was getting out of his comfort zone to make Eric happy. But it still isn't enough for Eric.

Because now he's at a family wedding in Nigeria and he meets a stranger who brings him to a club and kisses him.

And Eric admits to it and instead of just apologising and saying that it didn't mean anything, he says that it meant something. He says that it wasn't nothing.

Adam has been trying so hard to be someone deserving of Eric's love, and yet he wasn't enough. Again.

Do you perhaps wonder whether he heard his father's voice in his head at that moment?

Do you think that the boy he loved so much suddenly reminded him so vividly of the man who by all accounts was supposed to love him, but somehow always managed to only bring him down, make him feel like he meant nothing?

Because I do.

I think that Adam's heart got absolutely shattered on that bridge.

We'll burn the bridge when we get to it, eh?

I think that he has been feeling like less than enough for so many years, and now, suddenly having this person he loved, and who he thought loved him, he saw a little light at the end of the tunnel.

Only to have this light be snuffed out right in front of his eyes.

Because I don't think Eric really loved Adam, or that he loved Rahim for that matter. I think that perhaps Eric knew what kind of love he wanted in theory, so he was following a script he has written in his head. But when reality sets in and he gets bored, or he realises that his boyfriend isn't the way he would like him to be exactly, he goes and cheats, feeling no remorse whatsoever.

And just, I hate that. I hate that so much.

And I most of all hate the girlbossification of the moment right after he broke up with Adam. It was framed by the narrative as some sort of triumph, an "everybody makes mistakes" kind of moment. A "we're wild, young and free, let's live our lives and think of the consequences later". Not to mention that it was mixed with the atmosphere of the end of Otis' arc this season, which was feeling very life affirming given that his mum was on the brink of death, but she was now okay, and he also had his newborn little sister.

But Eric Effiong is not Hannah Montana.

He has now hurt two people in a very similar manner, all because he has not taken the time to know himself or know what he truly wants. In the end I would not be surprised if it was Eric that is actually full of shame that is just laying unresolved and covered with obscene amounts of fake confidence.

But we will see about that, won't we?

In the end, both Eric and Otis have hurt some people really badly this season, and making it feel appropriate to end the season on a high note with that thought in mind is just in poor taste in my opinion.

I really, genuinely hope that Eric will get his shit together in season 4. Because as of right now, I really cannot stand him. He used to be who I considered to be the best character on the show, but now I can say with full confidence that he is not.

Finding yourself should not be an excuse for treating people like shit. You can really do that without breaking hearts.

But I guess Eric doesn't know that, does he?

The groups at the finale

I'm to this day very confused why the groupings of the Gaang where what they were at the end of the series.

It's time for the ending Avatar, and the Gaang has almost always split up for the season finales. It would not have been surprising if in this case they did not, and this was even teased with the idea that the entire Gaang would roll up and defeat Ozai together. Then they split apart even more so than before. Aang departs (in his sleep lol), they remainder go together only to split apart to have each of their own big moments in their separate groups.

But, I'm left wondering, why are Katara and Zuko practically attached to the hip during this? From the southern raiders onwards, those two are practically always next to each other, and interacting. Ember Island they sit together, from the moment Aang walks away and Zuko holds Katara back they're together including sleeping next to each other (while Sokka and Suki sleep next to each other a bit away) and share their story climax together. This kind of closeness and consistency in being together must be taken as a sign of them having a close relationship as otherwise its unclear why they would be together so consistently. Zuko interacts with the others, but the majority of his emotional conversations and support, from his end and hers are with Katara.

So, why do the writers go so far to establish a close relationship like this between Katara and Zuko? They did not really need to, and in fact with regards to the pairings at the end of the series it even comes across weirdly. It all comes down to the age-old question. Why was it Katara that Zuko dramatically chanced sacrificing everything for? I think even if it's not shipped, Zutara very much has presence in the original work in the sense that once these two characters get along, they very much connect deeply and would spend a lot of time together when they can.

i think we are all forgetting something when we talk about how toxic patrick, tashi, and art are — or when we decide one is “worse” than the other. they all have moments of seeing right through it, seeing each other’s toxic behavior for what it is, and STILL want and need each other in this possessive, envious, visceral way.

1. in the way beginning, tashi is clearly flirting more with art than patrick, and patrick is visibly annoyed. art sees right through it and even challenges him like “okay, let’s leave”, and has this little smirk on his face because he knows patrick won’t give up on tashi.

2. tashi immediately sees the visible tension and love between art and patrick, and literally orchestrates their first kiss. she sees right through their repression, and even calls herself a “home-wrecker” but still entangles herself with them, especially patrick because he’s clearly the better tennis player at that point and that is tash’s ONLY true love. tennis. that’s what she desires most in him, and patrick knows that. he even calls her out on it in the dorm room scene. but they have this mirroring fire in each other that neither of them can give up, not until patrick breaks the balance and bails — tashi’s injury is literally a metaphor for the balance shattering between all three of them when patrick leaves her.

3. before this, patrick sees right through art trying to break them up, and even admires that quality — maybe even feels smug and flattered because art is jealous and feels left out from both tashi and patrick. patrick has known this all along, we saw it in the “tick-serve” scene, where he even swears to tashi he won’t tell anyone but he still tells art, who is desperate to feel a part of them and patrick wants that, too — even keeps that close intimacy with art that we see in the churro scene (swoon swoon swoon).

4. haven’t you noticed that arts desire to be great is only ever tied up in patrick and tashi? how he needs to beat patrick to win tashis affection, how he needs to win in tennis so that tashi can live through him, how he lives up to his potential in the ending only because tashi and patrick push him to it, in their little fucked up ways? he knows this — he even admits that he’s playing for tashi, that he knows she’s living through him. he even admits he’s playing a fucked up little game with patrick when they’re in the sauna. yet he still does it. again, he knows what’s happening, sees right through them — still does it, still loves them.

5. when tashi calls patrick to come pick her up he knows it’s not just to tell him to throw the match — and despite how she battles him about it, they still have sex in the car, because he already knows. he’s so fully aware of her and her game and he’s so willing to be caught up in it, the same as art.

just some examples of how they all have moments of clarity and agency and yet they still choose to be entangled in one another because they’re all fucked up in their own, individual ways, and they’re all living through each other for their own specific needs. arts is to be seen as worthy, as great, but only through their gaze. tashis is to have the career that was stolen from her. patricks is truly to be in love and in lust with both of them, because we even see that from the beginning that tashis love alone will never satiate him; it has to be arts love, too. that scene in the sauna when he thinks he’s lost it from art is the most sad and fucked up we ever even see patrick. on top of tashi asking him to throw the game — he’s so defensive of arts feelings.

in short this is an actual love triangle (and i would go as far as to see it as a polyship). you can’t erase one without the whole thing unraveling, and you can’t say one character was the “worst” without picking apart the motivations and pointing to the fact that their bad behavior was never a secret or left unchecked.

even at the end, patrick signals to art that he slept with tashi — art knows and they still have that intimate completion at the end, all three of them. art living up to his potential and embracing patrick fully (id argue this could even be a metaphor for embracing his bisexuality), patrick having both tashi and arts affection again, and tashi playing a phenomenal tennis match through her little white boys — in such a visceral, emotional way that she cries out like she did in the beginning and the last frame is her smiling.

in a fucked up way, they all get what they wanted out of each other.

thinking about how adam has been made to feel like a disappointment by his father his whole life and when he finally tries to figure out who he is without his dad’s oppressive presence he’s made to feel like a disappointment by his own boyfriend ☹️ adam finally has the chance to explore his queer identity and overcome his dad’s abuse and eric’s like ‘well if you won’t come to the gay club then i guess you’re not figuring it out fast enough for me to stay’ ☹️ and then the narrative rewards eric for this, he just leaves his bf crying on a bridge and the next scene we see of him he’s laughing and jamming out in his room while adam’s voiceover reads out a poem about how he’s never felt love like he did for eric to the extent that he truly believed himself to be a totally heartless person ☹️

No, Shipping Zutara Is Not Supporting Amatonormativity (Please Use Some Fucking Braincells For Once)

- a treatise by a severely pissed off aroace zutara shipper

since words don’t mean anything anymore (if they ever did on the esteemed piss-on-the-poor website), let’s start with a definition.

amatonormativity: the set of social assumptions that everyone prospers with a romantic relationship, thereby positioning marriage as a universal goal of adult life. amatonormativity forms the basis of several institutional structures that are built to cater to romantic bonds over all others, also manifesting in social pressure on individuals to find a romantic partner by pushing the false narrative that those who do not experience romance are automatically lonely, unhappy and unfulfilled. it is usually characterized by the prioritization of romantic love over other forms of love, particularly platonic.

the anti-zutara argument based on this is as follows: wanting zutara to happen is amatonormative because it a) devalues zuko and katara’s platonic bond b) pushes the idea that men and women can’t be friends and c) doesn’t align with the themes of the show, as romantic love was never the point of atla.

i would like to take the time today to tell you that this is some fucking bullshit, for the following reasons:

one, this may come as a shock to some of you, but zutara shippers did not invent the concept of romantic love in avatar: the last airbender. you are more than welcome to criticize the pairings of suki/sokka, katara/aang, mai/zuko, yue/sokka, jin/zuko, jet/katara, and even kanna/pakku for perpetuating amatonormativity through their unnecessary romantic subplots. and if you don’t have anything to say about any of those pairings, then here’s a word for you: hypocrite.

zk shippers are not introducing the taint of romantic love into some kind of wholesome platonic utopia where it never existed. when we say zutara should have been canon, it is a statement that ends with the implicit instead of kat.aang and mai.ko tacked on at the back because if we were going to get a romantic relationship anyway, it might as well have been one that was well-developed, narratively impactful, and thematically relevant.

two, saying zutara is amatonormative is fucking rich when the main “romance” of atla is a three season long struggle to get out of the friendzone. aang’s desire to be in a romantic relationship with katara is one of his primary motivations throughout the show, and not once does either he or the narrative ever entertain the thought that just being katara’s friend might be enough. to the contrary, aang’s crush and the potential of its reciprocation is a fundamental part of how the story gets its audience to invest in both his character and the kat.aang relationship. they want you to want him to get the girl, and that’s the driving force of the ship’s development from start to finish.

you can see the influence of this in the way people defend why kat.aang had to happen: “aang would be crushed!” “it would break aang’s heart!” “aang deserves to be happy!” and that in and of itself is more amatonormative than any version of romantic zutara, as if this idea that aang is somehow doomed to a life of misery and loneliness just because he can’t be with the girl he likes isn’t inherently based on the assumption that platonic love can’t be as meaningful and satisfying as romantic love.

three, let’s be so fucking fr: a show written by cishet men in the early 2000s was not “subverting amatonormativity” by not making zutara happen, especially not when they went for the fucking olympic gold of romantic cliches — the hero gets the girl trope — instead. otherwise, why did the entire show end with an uncomfortably long liplock? if romance would’ve devalued zuko and katara’s platonic bond, then what the everloving fuck happened to their friendship in the comics and the legend of korra?

it is blatantly false to say that zutara shippers are the ones devaluing their platonic bond when the creators did it first. they evidently don’t view zutara’s platonic bond as equal to kat.aang’s romantic one, judging by their treatment of both relationships in the comics and LOK and the fact that they talked about kat.aang “winning” the ship war in the first place. because if the two relationships were of equivalent standing, why would there be a winner and a loser at all?

amatonormativity is baked into the DNA of atla, and while some people choose to reject this framework entirely (zk friendship >>> ka romance anyday), it is also not wrong for zk shippers to be annoyed at the treatment zutara received within the context of said framework. since the creators clearly thought a romantic relationship was better than a platonic one, they could at least have picked the couple that actually made sense instead of adding insult to injury by making that romance kat.aang. it is not amatonormative to acknowledge that zutara was not afforded the distinction it should have been in the eyes of those who wrote it, because it’s obvious that the decision to keep zuko and katara’s relationship platonic wasn’t to respect their friendship, but to position them as inferior to kat.aang.

four, detractors of romantic zutara often argue that their platonic relationship is inherently better & i’ve discussed before why that isn’t the case, but i also hate this argument because it’s perpetuating the very thing that aromantic people are trying to get rid of in the first place: the hierarchization of love. it is not the “gotcha!” you think it is to genuinely state that platonic love is better than romantic love, because it’s still buying into the idea that there’s some kind of order to categorizing human relationships. the solution to amatonormativity isn’t changing what form of love gets to be at the top of the list — it’s doing away with the hierarchy entirely.

i ship zuko and katara because canon already gave me their friendship. i already know what their platonic relationship looks like and that gives me more room for imagination in developing their romantic one because it’s a place canon didn’t go.

at the end of the day, friendship and romance are just different avenues of exploring intimacy. neither is inherently more valuable than the other, and neither is inherently more problematic. and if you truly believe in dismantling amatonormative beliefs, you would recognize that making a distinction between the two is only perpetuating the problem, not challenging it.

exactly

good things will happen 🧿

things that are meant to be will fall into place 🧿

sorry but in WHAT world would a hall full of british teenagers think their new headteacher was cool because she danced across the stage like theresa may? everyone would eat her alive

One of the things I love about the Ember Island Players is that by trying to make fun of the possibility of romance between Zuko and Katara in the play-within-a-play, the show actually introduces Zutara as text into the world of the show, particularly in Fire Nation pop culture.

Like, there's this widely-advertised production that shows the Fire Prince and the Southern waterbending master falling in love. Then, probably the next thing the gen pop hears about their future Fire Lord is that he's jumped in front of his sister's lightning to save this same girl's life, doing absolutely nothing to beat those allegations.

There's just no way the gossip mill isn't churning. It's too juicy.