I Just Read Your Civil War Discourse Post And, Honestly, You Get The Biggest Round Of Applause. I, By

I just read your Civil War discourse post and, honestly, you get the biggest round of applause. I, by no means, hate Tony for the side he chose and I love him just as much as I do Steve, but Steve always gets a bad rap for his role in CW because everyone just wants to boil it down to him trying to protect Bucky. I think if most people had actually paid attention to that movie and what agenda the accords were hiding, no one would’ve signed them! Thanks for coming to my TED Talk. -🅱️

I also don’t hate Tony! I think he’s a complicated, fascinating character – though I confess I am a little frustrated with the direction the writers took with his character by undoing a lot of his growth in Iron Man 3 (which I thought was a good movie) in order to shoehorn him into the center of AOU and CA:CW, though that’s my own personal peeve. But man, I remember watching Iron Man (2008) a gazillion times when it came out and loving it to bits! And I love the ways in which he is the model of an Aristotlean Tragic Hero Archetype. RDJ’s performance is spectacular to boot. 

And you’re spot on about people boiling things down – inaccurately – into being about Bucky. Part of the problem with the CA:CW discourse, I think, is the amount of focus on fandom around Stucky – and this isn’t a criticism of Stucky! Just about how fandom distortions around ships can alter perceptions:

There’s this myth in fandom that 100% of everything Steve does and thinks is completely about Bucky all the time. And while Bucky is absolutely an important part of Steve’s life, they are both individuals with their own priorities and their own choices. Steve has a strong sense of right and wrong, and a lot of experiences with corrupt institutions outside of Bucky on which he bases his decisions. But the fandom echo chamber reframes everything as being Bucky-centered in CA:CW for the romance of it, when…. that isn’t really accurate. And so Team Iron Man folks who are also exposed to this fanon then frame Steve as acting irrationally and making everything all about Bucky, because that’s the exaggerated fandom shipping narrative dominant on tumblr, despite that not being what happens in canon. 

The thing about the Accords is – I don’t think ANYONE thought that some kind of agreement for ensuring More Bad Shit didn’t happen was a bad idea. Steve makes it clear that the structure of this specific law – which completely deprives the Avengers of any agency while putting dangerous amounts of power in the hands of a few countries’ governments (mainly the former-imperialist nations who have permanent seats on the UN Security Council) and denying human rights to Enhanced Individuals – is not something he’s comfortable with. And then there’s no compromise available, because the thing is being railroaded through with no time for deliberation, amendment, discussion, or even a fucking lawyer to look it over. This is misrepresented by the other side as Steve refusing any kind of oversight ever. 

And part of the reason both sides end up talking past one another is that one side is arguing about whether or not the ideal of legislation like the Accords – and what they are allegedly supposed to accomplish – is right, and basing a pro-Accords argument on that, while the other is arguing against the reality of the Accords – and the agenda Ross actually designed them to accomplish – to point out that the actual implementation of the Sokovia Accords is an Authoritarian disaster. And those are two different conversations, and two positions that can be simultaneously right. The idea of some kind of legal framework that the Avengers should have to abide by in order to defend the rights of nations and individuals isn’t a bad one. The Accords are also not the right framework to make that happen.