Was Listening To Now Or Never By Elvis And Had A Rather Angsty Thought, So I Made This

Was listening to Now or Never by Elvis and had a rather angsty thought, so I made this 💛

(I have a thing for drawing song lyrics and I got two more things like this but they're l o n g e r)

A friend and I made spidersonas!!! So- this is Sunspider, she prefers night patrols and quiet/sneaky missions! My girl keepin' it lowkey B')

This is everything I've never been able to find the words to say every time some asshole tells me kids in shows shouldn't be shipped, because kids in my kindergarten class, in fucking KINDERGARTEN, had crushes!

Shipping doesn't have to be inherently sexual, stop assuming it always is. And kids can have crushes, kids can have complicated thoughts and complex relationships, kids can be smart (we only assume they aren't because they haven't had the opportunity to absorb as much information as we have). Let kids be HUMAN, stop assuming they are lesser and that they can't be just as fun to talk to (or that you can't be friends with someone younger because that's Creepy, which yeah there are Creeps, but you can also appreciate what someone younger than you has to say, and you can help push them in the right direction to becoming a better person :c).

It always messes with me that I went from shipping people my age, to now, people thinking it odd I ship them because I'm older, but I started shipping them when I was that age. And knowing how important it was for me to see those types of relationships, and conflicts and characters reaching mutual understandings- just let people be. Just let them enjoy things because it's more than just "kids" or "ships".

(I won't start in on the "just friends", because I've been repetitive enough as is, I'm just glad I got to read your response, since I felt a little shut down when I first read the ask)

Aro culture is not participating in Avatar: The Last Airbender shipping discourse bc honestly? They're just kids and they'd be better off just friends

... wait there’s actual discourse? man do i follow the right people then. all i get is like, “each ship has valid points but really most would be a train wreck”. however.

I do not support the idea that “they’re just kids and they’d be better off just friends” for a variety of reasons, beginning with phrasing it as “just friends”, like romance is a better form of friendship. i’m answering this rather than posting it as a submission because it actually bothers me quite a bit. this is NOT directed at you as a submitter. this is directed at the societal ideals behind it.

these shows are made for kids, and the characters are at the ages where most alloros HAVE begun to experience crushes. iirc, Toph is the youngest, and she’s 12, which is actually past when kids in my school began to date by about 3 years. i don’t personally ship any of them, but honestly? i think this is a toxic thought to allow in a-spec spaces. people are allowed to have ships, and kids may not be the most emotionally mature, but they will never know better how to have a respectful relationship with its bumps (because relationships are not going to be perfect and it’s best to depict that and conflict resolution, which atla... does a lot of?) if we refuse to allow them media that includes their age groups interacting respectfully.

as a current adult that started reading fanfiction around the age of 10? I honestly learned a lot more about the inherent messiness of relationships from people shipping the harry potter characters, who were children. I saw people who were only a bit older than me having fights and avoiding each other. but i also saw them discovering that the only way to resolve a conflict was to be emotionally vulnerable if you were the aggressor, and that the person being apologized to didn’t have to accept it. i learned that sometimes, fights occur because neither side understood where the other was coming from, and that placing the “fault” on either side isn’t a perfect yes/no answer.

I learned that my feelings of wanting to avoid conflict were normal, that sometimes people mess up but that it doesn’t have to be the end of a friendship or relationship, and that if someone does mess up again and again without wanting to be better, that was a sign that it’s time to let go, and that’s okay. these were all crucial for me. and, as a bonus, i didn’t have to sit through a lesson by adults who viewed me as totally incompetent pretending to know how I felt.

think about it like sex ed for a second. kids never being shown dating in media is the equivalence of no sex education. kids only being shown in completely perfect relationships is like abstinence only sex ed. kids being shown in relationships via things like fanfiction is like kids learning about sex ed from the internet - yes, it’s not exactly ideal, and it’s rife with misinformation, but goddamn it, sometimes it’s all we had, especially as a queer individual.

overall: two main phrases here that i hate. “just friends” and “just kids”. both imply a sense of being “less”. just friends disrespects non-romantic relationships. just kids disrespects the fact that kids have feelings too, and that we treat children dating like its a given without teaching them healthy boundaries (and then act surprised when the rates of abuse in teenage relationships is high). so. i don’t like this submission.

I took a long time debating what starters I wanted. I definitely wanted two that I could draw this time.

My first two were a vulpix and bulbasaur, both of which pokemon I struggle to draw :'3 So these were some doodles I made of the ones I liked!

(Below is another sad attempt of my old duo)

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

A GOOD GIRL!!!! THE BE S T

@asteraes-aster

(Part 2/2)