[insert title]

This part. This is the part I’m talking about

This is not a woman falling to pieces because her father won’t let her marry a man she just met.

This is a woman born to a life she has very little say in. She has never had a genuine friend (besides a tiger). She is facing a marriage to a man she doesn’t know and doesn’t like but duty (and the law) demands it. So she took a risk, ran away, ran to a world she doesn’t know or understand and when she landed in trouble (serious, serious trouble) a stranger came to her aid. She finally (finally!) made a real connection with someone but they didn’t get much time together before the guards showed up and she had to reveal who she was.

This moment when she’s crying her heart out? It comes after she’s been told that the first person she ever connected with, the first person to be genuinely interested in her for who she is and not what she is, the first real friend she has ever made, was executed… because of her.

One of my fandoms has, in the last few months, had an incident of an openly proship artist grooming multiple people on discord (confirmed by other trustworthy accounts), another proship account defending them by casting doubt on and demeaning the victims, and at least one other artist being driven out of the fandom by proshippers sending them explicit content. For context, proship in this fandom is usually about a specific incestuous ship, though it probably isn't limited to such.

So far, I've taken the personal stance that all these incidents are caused by shitty people who just happened to be proshippers. Proshipping is also generally hated / not a common opinion within most circles in this fandom, with most defaulting to disliking this incestuous ship and having a clear DNI for proship in general, so it wouldn't be illogical for these incidents to be specifically unfairly highlighted just because the perpetrator was proship.

However, because the perpetrator allegedly used fiction as a vector to normalise predatory behaviour in their relationship with the victims, there is genuine proof that even if 99% of people wouldn't think e.g. incest is okay just because GOT did it, there is absolutely still someone out there who got groomed into it because of their media preferences, by someone else taking advantage of them.

Even if proship in itself isn't morally wrong, I would respectfully like to counter the claim that it doesn't affect reality, because it can, especially if used by a terrible person with enough parasocial influence.

It's okay if proshipping is a little bit immoral, but it's disingenuous to pretend that people who are repulsed by the concept, because of this kind of personal experience, are the devil and oppressors who hate freedom of speech. Maybe, if they genuinely don't interact and request that this avoidance be mutual, and you still interact with them anyway, that's on you for being an asshole.

What is your take on the situation?

whether or not someone is a predator has nothing to do with whether they’re proship or anti. I’ve never said “every single person who is proship is a good person”. there are predators hiding in the proship community, and there are predators hiding in the anti community. if anything, I’ve had people open up to me about being groomed and abused by people who claimed to be “anti ship” more times than I’ve had people open up to me about being groomed and abused by people who are proship. but the bottom line is that being proship or anti doesn’t have anything to do with being a predator. if someone is a predator then they’re a predator.

and also, I’ve said this so many times that at this point I just copy and paste from my previous responses: if someone lets fiction affect reality so much to the point they believe bad things in real life are okay because it’s portrayed as such in fiction, then chances are that they already have issues — issues they should work on and yes, they absolutely should seek help — with or without the fiction they consume. the problem is not the fiction when the majority of people can separate fiction from reality, and creators who make taboo contents / people who enjoy taboo fiction are not anybody’s babysitters. it’s not their responsibility if someone is troubled and unable to understand that “bad things in fiction are okay only because it’s fiction”.

Like, we can talk about how people in positions of authority are able to abuse people under them, but it would be insane to conclude “and that’s why it’s inherently immoral to be a doctor.” We can talk about abusers manipulating their victim’s love for them or of friends/family members to keep them from reporting the abuse, but the takeaway from that should not be “love is evil.” Not even the most hardcore stranger danger people, whose only understanding of abuse is the stereotypical child predator offering candy from an unmarked white van, are waging a moral crusade against candy because it can be used as a lure.