he’s so distraught because he’s certain xiao jiu will never kiss him again and it feels so bad to want— to desire— something so intensely. it was so much easier to hold back when he didn’t know how it felt to kiss him, when he didn’t know that sqq would dig his nails into yqy’s shoulder blades whenever yqy pressed soft little kisses trailing down his neck. how sqq purposefully yanked on his hair to get yqy to open his mouth so he could slide his tongue inside. how yqy so easily relinquished all control to sqq, and how good it felt.

They are basing their opinions off of the circumstances/scenarios of the story, not the actual characters involved.

Shen Jiu's circumstances are tragic and his outcomes are miserable. He lives a terrible life, is thoroughly misunderstood, gets replaced by an imposter who everyone likes better, and then dies and is largely unmourned (in part because no one knows he's gone, but mostly because no one cares that he's gone).

This is like, primo angst for a certain inclination of person. Hits all the buttons for those feelings of "no one would even care if I was gone and all the world has wronged me". So reinterpreting the story in that light, with Shen Jiu as an ultra victim and Shen Yuan as a callous and cruel monster who doesn't deserve to be liked better, who should be revealed as a fake and then ostracized to create a fantasy where Shen Jiu gets to live happily ever after, really appeals to them. They make Shen Yuan out to be way more of a villain than he ever is because then they can refute the idea of him being better than Shen Jiu, and they defend Shen Jiu and ditch his actual character in order to lean into the narrative of him being wronged at every turn.

He did not care Binghe lived in poverty his entire life. He didn't care his mother died a miserable death and he's an orphan now.

It's the same with Liu Qingge. Shen Jiu hates him for three reasons:

For being talented.

For having living parents.

For coming from a rich household.

It's said in the extras that ANY of these would make Shen Jiu despise someone.

He does NOT actually care all that much about background or personality or behaviour. He just assumes that someone has had a better life than him and therefore doesn't deserve to be happy or successful. Reminder: his definition of better life includes "has a parent". Completely ignoring, once again, that he is now one of the richest and most powerful people in the world and thousands WISH they were him and they will never be.

Shen Jiu clings to hate, bitterness and violence as coping mechanisms despite the fact that those cause qi deviations. He is walking a path of self destruction.

This is what abuse can turn people into and it does not make them any less victims of abuse.

Shen Jiu deserves happiness?

The concept of having to earn happiness (through suffering or otherwise) is already fucked up on its own.

The fact that most of Shen Jiu's personality and actions get erased by the people saying that is just proof that no, they do not think he deserves happiness. Because Shen Jiu is not the perfect victim they want him to be.

Nothing is going to simply make him happy! He needs to WANT to be happy, he needs to WANT to HEAL! And that's not something you can force on someone. It's something they need to want on their own! He needs to decide that he does not want to live with resentment and bitterness anymore. He needs to decide that happiness is something he wants!

But that's not simple. It's not black and white. It takes time.