âShane Hollander deserves to crash out at Troy Barrett-â NO HE FUCKING DOESNâT-!? Guys are we serious? Are we being fucking fr!? Okay, first of all, they barely know each other, they only know each other because Troy Barrett is Ilya Rozanovâs best friend eventually and he was invited to their wedding. Second of all, Shane Hollander does not GAF!! He literally does not care about this man, beyond the support he gives his husband, and a little jealousy he gets to play on the same team with him and stuff. Third, Troy Barrett was not âallowed to be angry and then got a cute little redemption arc like that fixed everything-â he was FORCED to be homophobic and that made him angry, but he wasnât ALLOWED to be angry at his teammates or his dad or whoever else, so instead he channeled it into something his teammates would respect and leave him alone about; so he wouldnât GET DISCOVERED AS GAY!! Aka, being a rude asshole, chirping and the occasional casual (he pretends, it is SO not casual) homophobia. Because what I think a lot of people forget, is that Troy Barrett, contrary to every other eventually out queer player, not only does not initially have a support system (barring his mom, whoâs literally on a vacation around the world with Troyâs money, which, good for fucking her, but sheâs not actually THERE), but is in an environment that is possibly the most actively homophobic team, with possibly the most homophobic asshole EVER, his best friend. Dallas Kent. WHO HE GENUINELY CARES ABOUT PEOPLE!! And letâs not forgot the dad who, oh yeah, what was that, loves Dallas Kent more than his own son and is ALSO clearly homophobic and looking down on him even without that. And wow!! Look, itâs a cheating boyfriend!! :D!!
Look, I love Shane Hollander, and Iâm not saying his life wasnât hard, but Troy Barrett gets out of his toxic environment, with his toxic team, toxic bestfriend, toxic bf to be constantly reminded of and eventually his toxic dad and into a supportive environment, with good energy and a nice crush, eventually boyfriend. And look at that!! He stops being homophobic (letâs be real, he never actually was, but he stops being it at other players without constant pressure to BE IT/DO IT!!) and tryâs to unlearn being an asshole, and is an incredibly nice, supportive boyfriend and a good teammate and people really like him, and he apologises to the guy he especially messed up with (Ryan Price, sweet guy) and takes accountability and doesnât expect to be forgiven??
And even beforehand, it was picked up by people (everyone say thank you Eric Bennett) that he was (at least mildly) uncomfortable with Dallas Kent and trying his best to be nice and supportive to the only active gay player in the league out yet, Scott Hunter.
Guys. Pack it up. Itâs not a competition. But if it was? Between Troy Barrett and Shane Hollander? Iâm pretty sure Troy Barrett wins. Considering oneâs team, parents, best friend, and boyfriend were all initially supportive of him. Okay, scratch that, his team wasnât, but they were willing to TOLERATE (ffs Montreal Metros, sybau, okay? Fucking casually homophobic LOSERS) him, which is much, MUCH more than Troyâs team would ever do for him, and well. Yeahhh-âŚletâs not talk about the rest of that-though at least he has his mom, yay!!
Ahem, anyways: thanks for coming to my TED talk, please stop acting like Shane Hollander is some kind of moral superiority or smth, itâs icky. Love him, but disgusting to see the fans who act like that, bsffr.