Two weeks ago, it’s come to light that Aaron Ehasz, a head writer of Avatar: The Last Airbender and the co-creator of The Dragon Prince, has had a history of misogynistic, gaslighting, and abusive behavior (here’s another article).  While the threads are linked in the article, I’ll also link the tweet threads here: 

Diandra Lasrado’s tweet thread about working with Ehasz at Riot Games: (x)

Danika Harrod’s and Lulu Younes’s threads about working at Wonderstorm and with The Dragon Prince team: (x) (x) 

Sometime after the news came out, Giancarlo Volpe, an executive producer at Wonderstorm and also a director/producer on The Dragon Prince, not only left TDP but also Wonderstorm as well (x).  I would like to add that Lasrado has stated that Volpe’s a cool dude and a great ally (x).  Sadly, it appears that Volpe wasn’t respected when working at Wonderstorm (and after).  

Since these allegations, Ehasz came out with a statement…It wasn’t very good (if you’re doing things that are similar to what people have accused you of doing in your apology, it’s not a good apology). (x) 

Considering this tweet Harrod made, it appears Ehasz still hasn’t changed. Not to mention, these tweets made by Sheena McFeely regarding Amaya also confirm that Ehasz doesn’t listen to those that live the experiences of characters he creates:( x), (x), (x), (x)

Harrod and Younes’s responses to Ehasz’s apology: (x), (x)

Although this next part is in the second article, I’m still putting it in the post: Ehasz has also been shown chatting with a fan about Claudia’s sexuality, claiming that Claudia’s bi (x).  Harrod retweeted the thread by explaining that not only is Claudia being bi not true, whenever someone suggested Claudia not being straight, Ehasz would shut the idea down: (x). Not only is this unprofessional (Harrod has even stated she warned Ehasz not to privately DM fans (x) and Harrod herself had to ignore this fan because there’s no main LGBT rep (x)), but it’s also extremely manipulative.  

Here’s a mini thread that a fan made talking about Ehasz lying to him about the reason Harrod and Younes left Wonderstorm: (x) (for clarification: the reason for the date being in August is because the fan in question made tweets back in August wondering why female employees were leaving Wonderstorm and having concern over their well-being) 

And here are tweets explaining that Ehasz hasn’t been honest over the state of The Dragon Prince’s future: (x), (x)

Despite all of this, the women that have come forward have said they don’t want fans to boycott Dragon Prince: (x), (x), (x).  They’ve also stated many times that a majority of those working at Wonderstorm are very nice people, it’s just that there are a couple bad apples at the top. 

DON’T harass/send death threats to Ehasz and people that still work at Wonderstorm, the VAs, and people that run the official TDP twitter/Tumblr accounts Harassment and death threats NEVER do anything and just.  Why.  Why even do that? That’s not and has never been cool. 

A TDP fan has created a Discord as a way for fellow fans to discuss creating a joint statement requesting Ehasz to write a better apology and as a way to stand with the women who’ve come forward: (x), (x)

I genuinely love TDP. I find the story and characters so wonderful, but due to Ehasz’s current behavior, I think I’m taking a break until further notice. 

so let’s talk about this for a second. i have SO many things to say in reply to both what’s happened & to kuno’s post.

starting with aaron: if you’re defending aaron rn or thinking anything along kuno’s post, unfollow me this goddamn moment. pls & thanks. there are now three women talking about experiences w/ aaron and one of them is from BEFORE wonderstorm. and all of these women experienced it for YEARS. i don’t care that TDP is ‘more than one person’— there are other people on the team who are disgusting, too! giancarlo volpe, who works on the show with aaron, draws borderline nsfw art of minors. below is a picture he drew of kataara from ATLA as a hooters waitress.

that’s not one, but TWO major people from TDP exhibiting disgusting behaviour. does that not set a tone for the rest of the crew who is planning on staying despite everything that’s happened?

another thing is that there is no excusing aaron’s behaviour. we cannot allow that to happen, because even if it was ‘unintentional’ from his side, he gaslit multiple women and made them feel unsafe in the workplace. in danika’s account, lulu had to say outright that she was scared of meeting with aaron one-on-one to his face, and he still brought her to the side for a one-on-one meeting. this is not something that can be waved off with ‘he didn’t know’. according to danika, lulu, and a third woman on twitter who worked with aaron before wonder storm, his behaviour was brought up multiple times, and each time he waved it off.

regarding kuno’s point of ‘people will lose jobs over this’— people are already losing their jobs over this. danika was unemployed for two whole months after she left wonderstorm. people who don’t want to be apart of this anymore are probably already looking for other jobs, and the people who support aaron will most likely get other jobs after this. this isn’t aaron making a comment that people are taking the wrong way, this is multiple women speaking out about the abuse and gaslighting they experienced working with or under aaron.

not to go completely off in this post either, but we should not be using JKR or VLD as examples of things with problematic creators and content that people still support. JKR is highly transmisogynistic and her books contained a lot of racism and antisemitism, where as VLD intentionally baited their viewers only to bury their gays, and was full of racism that went under the radar. VLD and JKR are problematic for different reasons and are not why we should let this go. we shouldn’t let go of what they did either.

in all, there are so many reasons why you should drop TDP as soon as you fucking can. because if you’re going to continue supporting the show, you’re giving the women who have come forward a big FUCK YOU to the face. there is a reason these women are coming out about their experiences with aaron. the question now isn’t whether or not we should support them, it’s how.