Hi Anon,

First, I hope you and your loved ones are staying safe and healthy, and that you all haven’t been impacted too badly by what’s going on in the world. This is a pretty terrifying time for all of us, so I hope you and your people are doing well.

Second, I know I don’t owe you an answer, but your ask was pretty intent on wanting to hear from me. And since I think there’s been some unfair finger-pointing at and grouping of fans who are really disappointed in his choices with people who are the TRUE trolls and scum in this fandom, I feel like I need to say something.

It seems like you follow me on Twitter because of your ask, but just to correct your ask - I don’t post about Sam every day, or talk about how much he sucks or make fun of him. If this is some backhanded way to get at my friends who have every right to their own opinion about him and his behavior, then take it somewhere else. I don’t speak for anyone but myself, so please take your concerns to the people whose tweets you have an issue with.

I stand by every thought I tweeted. I didn’t insult him as a person or wish any ill will towards him. He is almost 40 years old, he’s a grown man, and instead of taking this pandemic seriously, he did the following: (1) tweeted an article about how the coronavirus “was just like the flu”; (2) booked a vacation after Paley was canceled because the virus had already proceeded to worsen worldwide; (3) traveled to said vacation, putting other people at risk if he was asymptomatic; and (4) has been nothing but defensive in his responses and has blocked fans who have reasonably asked him why he didn’t go back to the United Kingdom like his other co-stars did. (Yes, Richard and Sophie went to Australia - but my understanding was that it was work-related, and were able to get back to their locations in time and have been quarantining).

And why do I expend so much energy on him? I don’t think I really do when you add it all up, since I don’t talk much about him otherwise, but this pandemic has taken over our lives. People have lost loved ones, jobs, gatherings with loved ones, and that’s only the surface. When a celebrity willingly ignores guidance and chooses to go on vacation, then they aren’t protected from reasonable criticism.

I’m also a fan of Outlander, and have enjoyed being part of the fandom. I don’t think I really owe anyone a reason for why I may comment on how disappointed I am at times, but his work as Jamie Fraser is how I found out who he is, and I am grateful for the work he’s done on the show but that doesn’t take away my right to say what I want to say. I consider myself respectful but honest.

Also, Sam should probably consider apologizing, because he’s the one who’s put others at risk with his behavior.

And finally, as one of my friends said - if he could come apologize to me at my front door, that’d be great, but it would also violate shelter-in-place directives, so no. That would not fix things.

I hope you have a good evening and rest of your week, Anon.

I cancelled Starz two weeks ago because this season has been so abysmal. And I think one of the biggest issues I’m having is that they all HIGHLY misconstrued what this season was about during promo. Everything we were promised was not given to us consistently throughout S4. We got one episode of Jamie and Claire establishing the Ridge. We never saw them get their settlers, or settle into life themselves there. We had no real love scenes between them. No passionate kisses. So many of the beautiful book scenes between them were never even written into the show (thermodynamics, where you go I’ll go, Claire telling Jamie he’s the best man she knows, the constancy dialogue during the strawberries on the Ridge, their worry that they’ll tire of each other, the scene where Jamie throws his back out and she finds him in the snow, your face is my heart and love of you is my soul, the longhouse scene, THE LIST GOES ON). They spent SO MUCH time apart this season.

Instead what we got was a shitty character (looking at you, Roger) and a shitty, unbelievable couple with no chemistry shoved down our throats. So how could I believe anything they say about S5 when it’s time to lure us in for that whenever it airs? They’ve lost credibility — all of them. They talk a big game because they have to, but what they say is in a season is not there. I don’t trust them. I’m tired of paying for disappointment.

| blood of my blood |

What a lot people think is their relationship

What other people think about their relationship

What some people think is their relationship

What I think is their relationship 

No. Can I shed light on this? Sure.

WE ARE A LIABILITY. “Aggressive” shippers in this fandom — particularly those of us on tumblr — do not play by their rules. We do not take things at face value. We do not accept whatever they tell us as truth. We do not read and watch and vote and spend money and move on. We look at patterns and social media times and paint colors and reflections and behavior and then we go back and make timelines and call out their bullshit.

They — TPTB, yes I’m saying it — know that, and they don’t know what to do about it. They don’t know how to get rid of us. They tried with Shamuso and it didn’t work. Instead of destroying us, we morphed into fans who still ship, but are smarter and far more disillusioned than we were before.

Every time they gaslight us like this, we dig in deeper.

Here’s a pro tip for Starz: you will never get rid of us. Putting out articles like this for the sole purpose of discrediting us will not work. It’s going to make that aggressive shipping even more aggressive. We are stubborn.

Do you both believe in love at first sight?

DAMAGE CONTROL??? REALLY?

They sat together in a room two years ago and said fans were confused about them being together - knowing damn well why shippers shipped and believed - and said it’s just not real, people are confusing us with Jamie and Claire.

And NOW she’s saying they act like a married couple because they play one onscreen?

REALLY?

R E A L L Y????????

And then something happened and they were forced to push the wrong trigger button. It has been a steady decline for over two years now. Sometimes it feels like they, particularly Sam, are fighting to bring it back to even ground or what it was before but then they turn right around and do something else to blow that to hell, too.

I used to feel genuine love and admiration for them. I didn’t tweet about their charities for attention or likes or retweets - I didn’t stan or ship them for any of that either - but it seems to me like a lot of people now pretend things haven’t happened the way they have, or ARE NOT STILL HAPPENING the way they are in order to maintain fandom friendships. I don’t know many people who can honestly say these two haven’t done incredibly problematic things which led to incredibly damaging treatment for some of us.

- Cait in gym with Sam and his friends

- Sam liking the tweets about being lured in by Caitriona and kale after the BAFTAs

- Cait cutting her own bangs in SA as her own personal rebellion because everything else is controlled

- Cait tweeting that song about dumb blonde girls who don’t work because they just date men instead and tagging Sam saying it was his song

- Cait chopping off her hair and bangs after getting engaged

- the Rupi Kaur book trolling

I have stuck around through months of crap, and I’ve done it for several reasons. I wanted to still ship. I hoped things would get better. I felt like I helped sustain the shipper portion of the fanbase and I didn’t want to walk away from it. I didn’t want to give antis the satisfaction. I hoped things would get better. And most of all, I love this portion of the fandom and I don’t want to see it die. I don’t want to lose the connection I have with so many of you.

I can’t do it anymore. It feels so toxic and abusive to be here. Seeing pictures of any of the four players involved in this game makes me feel physically ill. They think we are unintelligent and they treat us as such. This latest stunt after 4-5 months of radio silence is beyond embarrassing. If there is a level below the gutter, they’re all in it.

They’re leaking information to Purv. That became obvious a while ago, but especially after Purv got the “anon” that saw Sam and MM at Dear Evan Hansen (without a picture of course) and then the next day she posted the playbill. Sloppy. Purv and Paul Camuso have admitted they work together. Purv, who has been digging and data mining and pulling bullshit since DAY ONE in this fandom. That is the level these people, these supposed professionals in their late 30s, have sunk to. I also believe Starz/the show is working with Just Jared. I thought it was just Sam’s team until Cait won that best actress poll when no one knows who she is and they started covering Outlander filming. Makes the MM push from them more interesting, doesn’t it?

Regardless of whatever the truth is, the situation is not going to get better. Sam and Cait as we used to know them are gone. They do not exist anymore, at least not for public consumption. Sticking around to talk about the glory days is not how I want to spend my time anymore. They do not deserve to have this portion of the fandom anymore. They don’t.

I hope that one day in the future I’ll be able to come back to this blog. But I need actual distance right now. I need to not see Outlander pics or gifs on my dash. I don’t want to see SamCait stuff right now. I need some time to reflect and heal and I can’t get that on this blog.

I love all of you SO MUCH. I truly mean that. Interacting with you has helped me more than you know. If you want to stay in touch, I’m still on Twitter @ crownqueenkate and I’ll be on my new blog.

Ditto and co-sign.

For anyone interested you can find me in two places:

@giventousonlyonce (armie + elizabeth shipping)

@words-with-black-friends (hodgepodge)

WISHING ALL OF MY MUTUALS AND FOLLOWERS WHO CELEBRATE A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

For the Row (2013)

Roland & Mary || Something never changes