Maybe I shouldn’t be making a post about this, but it kind of feels necessary? I’ve seen some truly ridiculous and terrible things happening lately, and I hate what it’s doing for people’s perception of fictionkin, and I REALLY don’t want other fictionkin to follow suit.
Before I say this, I want to say that what happened between several people who I love and hold dear SUCKED, and I’m primarily making this post because I realize I have a voice in this community, and I don’t want anything similar to happen. I’m doing this for the future safety of others both in and outside of our community, and I don’t mean to wish ill will upon anyone who was involved. I genuinely hope that everyone involved is safe.
Fellow fictionkin/fictives/etc, listen. Because we fall under such a huge umbrella of identity, the easiest way to describe what we are is by stating that we are just interacting with and interpreting a piece of fiction in a manner that non-kin would not.
Whether we are literal versions of fictional characters or not, no matter what shape our kinship takes, we have to accept the fact that there will always be things we disagree with regarding our IDs in regards to both fandom and how our source material is written and presented by its author or authors.
What I mean is, there will always be people who have opinions you may disagree with about your character! And while some of these opinions you may rightfully call out (if they are homophobic/racist/transphobic or otherwise problematic), you can’t get in the way of other people having their opinions, thoughts, and interpretations of a character for the most part. This includes post that are pretty transparently just jokes.
At the end of the day, you are just two consumers of a piece of media with two different interpretations of a character.
And before you rebut, let me say this.
I’m a Homestuck character. I see stupid crap all the time! The fandom is awful! There is actually some really awful discourse about Jane Crocker, and I see posts about her that frankly do upset me, especially some of the running jokes in the fandom. It gets tiring. Very, very tiring.
But I’d be completely out of my lane to assail these people and tell them that their posts are a personal attack, because they weren’t. They’re interacting with the character of Jane Crocker in a way that I would vehemently disagree with, yes, but going out of my way to besmirch a person just because they made a post saying “Haha, Jane is the stupid straight friend” would be completely uncalled for, because the post wasn’t aimed at me. It was aimed at Jane Crocker, the webcomic character, not Jane Crocker, the 22-year-old gay trans girl who runs a blog and also happens to be another version of said character.
It is really, really, really and truly not ok to tell people to kill themselves about posts like this.
You know what you can do, though? Make a post about it on your blog, in your safe space! Do you know how many posts I’ve made saying “Aww, gosh, I saw this post about me that completely misinterpreted my character. Just so everyone knows, it wasn’t like that! Hoo!”? Dozens! Dozens of posts! (Without mentioning the perpetrator, though, because that would defeat the point.)
One person’s crappy opinion about your canon depiction doesn’t change who you are. There are misinterpretations of every single character in all of existence on this website, especially in the larger fandoms like Homestuck.
Feel free to block people! In fact, I suggest blocking liberally! Put up as many walls as you can if it helps you maintain a safe space, but when you’re going after other people’s safe spaces because of a harmless joke, then that’s where the line needs to be drawn.
TL;DR: No matter what shape your kinship takes, fictionkin, there is and will always be a degree of separation between you and your canon self, in terms of how non-kin view us, at the very least. You can’t expect everyone to have interpretations of your character that you agree with, and it’s not ok to tell people to kill themselves over these interpretations that clearly weren’t aimed at you directly.