Honestly here’s some information that I think will help antis understand problematic ships a whole lot better. Most people don’t ship for aspirational reasons.
The vast majority of shippers I’ve encountered don’t consider fictional ships to be “relationship goals” or something to emulate in real life. Yes, even the healthy ones. Most shippers are just interested in telling stories or think the individual characters are attractive or want to explore new dynamics that aren’t present in canon for whatever reason.
I’ve seen a lot of antis respond to problematic ships with confusion and I think from an aspirational view of fiction that reaction makes a lot of sense. If you consider fictional relationships to be something fans like because they want to emulate, it would be pretty scary and baffling to see fans latch onto problematic ships. The problem is, most people don’t choose ships based on what they want in an actual relationship. They choose them based on what makes an interesting story or which characters they’re attracted to or even what would cause the most problems for the characters involved.
I hope this helps people understand each other better and I apologize for crosstagging, but I really think this information might help make the discourse more productive.
