Du

This whole rr hates shane thing is just pathetic, she didn't portrait him as selfish or a "villain", that's just how you guys read it cause 1 you babyfied him so much and 2 you can't read anything that goes one cm deeper than a perfect moral archetype. He was worried about loosing everything career related if he came out and he was proved fucking right in the book, what more did you want?

"Oh but she made it like shane was hurting ilya!", he was hurting ilya. In no moment any character but shane uses the word selfish, and when he does is clearly in a self-loathing moment, do you guys really take everything the characters think as inescapable truths? Or like it reflects the author's personal views? But when you're in a relationship and your partner doesn't react the way you wanted him you get hurt, does that make ilya selfish or the "villain"?

"The real villain should be homophobia!" And it is, there's a whole deal in which they decide to stand together against the institutions that represent that, it's there, in the fucking book.

I hate how people are acting as if all tlg problems are moved by Ilya's inability to communicate, as if it's his fault for not saying what he wanted clearly to Shane and that's justo so crazy, I'll make this argument in three points.

First, if you read the book and doesn't let fanfiction blur your vision you'll know that Ilya may be at fault for a lot of things, but not knowing Shane isn't one of them. If he sat down and told him, let's say at the beginning of tlg, that the plan wasn't working for him anymore Shane would undoubtedly freak the fuck out, and here we can argue if he would end up picking Ilya or hockey but it's undeniable that it would put Shane on a lot of stress and that he wouldn't handle it well.

Second, miscommunication is such a problem not only cause Shane isn't very good at talking or even understanding himself, Ilya is also from a culture (and, more importantly, from a family) that treats open communication, specially about things such as depression, as a weakness. Ilya's not a liberal boy from a loving home somewhere in western europe (or canada for that matter), it's unfair to his character to expect him to act as such.

And lastly, because that one tt got me really mad and started all this, I do think that it's your responsabilidade in a relationship to try and understand your partner and think about how your actions are affecting them. I say that to in no way put the blame on Shane, I honestly think that person or projecting saying Ilya "should communicate" when that's not a part of his character (yk, since he isn't real!) but if one talk about characters as if they're real people that should be blamed for not acting in a way you consider "healthy" their point would still be void because in those terms I still believe that in a real life relationship you own more to your partner than what he explicitly asks, and if you don't agree go listen to Olivia's begged.