sandy

Shane starts getting grays at 35, so by 45 he is a salt-and-pepper kING. It makes for a distinguished photograph on his memoir. He has a ghostwriter, obviously, how do you expect him to just sit and write all day? He writes the chapter about his and Ilya's rivalry though, only at the end of the chapter is he like "And we were married in the summer of 2021 with a honeymoon in Spain. He's the best person I know." after just a dry comparison of all their stats Pre-Centaurs.

One child. Boychild. Shane's genes and a Russian name. Conceived via surrogacy after Ilya retires first due to busted ass knee syndrome. Child enjoys hockey. Not great at it. Looooves playing the oboe in school band. Shane checks it out and AS IT TURNS OUT the oboe is a difficult, competitive instrument. They proceed with characteristic intensity, as if this was athletics. Son, you're gonna win at the oboe.

Ilya needs glasses. He just steals Shane's off his face and it's a whole ritual that ends in them kissing. Boychild is mortified every time they're trying to read a take-out menu.

Shane gets into hockey commentary/podcasting and is notoriously. Um. Not Nice. A lot of "What?? What did I say??" It's never personal though. Just about players' shitty game.

Ilya is Big. Chunky. He's glorious. Muscle that now has fat over it. Arms like tree trunks. Torso: round. 100% Naturalized Canadian Citizen Beef. Hair, everywhere. Shane must BITE to check it all out and make sure everything is in order.

Shane gets really into individual athletics- rock climbing, marathons before he also gets busted ass knee syndrome, biking, swimming, anything where it's like testing the limits of his body against himself. Ilya is like a "fifty push-ups every day keeps me in shape enough to fuck you right" kind of guy, but he joins in sometimes just to make Shane get furious with competition

New rookie/juniors player billeting every year once boychild goes to music conservatory so they build a whole separate wing for the youngsters so it doesn't interfere with empty-nest fucking

Once they hit 50 they do get up stupid early like old men do and have old man coffee shop time with David Hollander (professional boring old man) at their favorite diner. Shane really cherishes this time with his dad and makes it a point to do it as often as they can. Conversely, they build Yuna a mother in law house when David passes away (death comes for us all) and she becomes crazy hockey mom to all their rookies.

Meanwhile, if we’re going to play tit for tat:

Who was raised in a maga city with maga family? Connor. Who also made an active choice to be racially insensitive on more than one occasion? Connor. Whose social circle was and still is predominantly white? Connor’s. Whose glam and career team is predominantly white? Connor’s. Who chose to blatantly deny supporting a statement denouncing the racism happening within his own fandom, coming directly from his fans and targeting his Asian best friend? Connor. Who, between Connor and Hudson are less outspoken about their views on racism and discrimination? Connor. Thus, who between Hudson and Connor is the one to have more “evidence” favoring him toward holding racist views?

Exactly. Neither one of them appear to be bad people, and it is easy to create the illusion of Connor being racist or at the very least uncaring about racial injustice, but he is white, so he gets the benefit of the doubt. He is also presumably gay, which somehow convinces people that he can’t be an oppressor, yet Hudson is never afforded the same grace since at the very least, he is an ethnic minority.

Y’all take whatever is said about Hudson and push it as true, but if I were to start saying I think Connor might be diet racist, in that he isn’t actively slinging slurs, but probably doesn’t care about non-white people, I’d be in the wrong. I’d be called out for harassing a gay man in defense of a straight man, even though the same is not allowed to be said about the people using racially insensitive means to harass Hudson. Pointing that out is considered infantilizing.

And before anyone jumps into my inbox crying about how I hate Connor and was waiting for a moment to show it, no, I don’t, which is the point. Hudson has made two questionable choices regarding racial insensitivity, while Connor has made three. The cornrows, the “Native” photography, and the lack of support for the statement. However, they both had seemingly similar upbringings.

Odessa and Kamloops are both conservative small towns, they both grew up around racist people, both knew at a young age they wanted to become actors/filmmakers, both had to essentially bite their tongues when it came to expressing themselves. Difference, Connor seemingly made the choice to be out or out adjacent, whereas Hudson conformed (whether queer or not) to masculine ideals. Upon turning 17/18, both chose to pursue acting and filmmaking and got in close with the queer communities in their respective cities.

Y’all can yap all day about how Hudson is oh so obviously not a good person, but if he’s a piece of shit because the people in his past did wrong or questionable things, then so is Connor. But if you can believe Connor is an artsy kid who grew up around bad influences, yet did his best to survive until he was able to go his own way, then how come the same can’t be said about Hudson?

Chapters: 2/? Fandom: Heated Rivalry (TV), Game Changers | Heated Rivalry - All Media Types, Game Changers Series - Rachel Reid Rating: Explicit Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov Characters: Shane Hollander, Ilya Rozanov, Yuna Hollander, David Hollander, The Metros Additional Tags: Panic Attacks, Stalking, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Dom/sub Play, Dom/sub, Oral Sex, Anal Sex, Protective Ilya, pre-Shane’s injury and them getting properly together, Escalation, people-pleaser Shane, stalking-induced paranoia, before the cottage, brief scenes with Shane’s eating disorder, Stalker fic, Rutting, Shane rutts against Ilya’s foot Summary:

Fan mail isn’t exactly odd for Shane, he’s a well-known professional athlete after all. But when they start getting a little (more like a lot) personal, Shane starts to wonder if it really is just a fan, and if it is, how far they’re willing to take things.

Race absolutely matters. Racism absolutely exists. But different racial groups are stereotyped in different ways, and those stereotypes can produce completely different social expectations.

For example, I’ve seen people criticize Rachel and Jacob for joking about Hudson being unintelligent because he’s a person of color. If Hudson were Black, I would understand that criticism more, because there is a long history of anti-Black stereotypes portraying Black people as unintelligent. But Hudson is Asian. Asian men are stereotyped in almost the opposite way. They’re often assumed to be intelligent, studious, and academically successful. The stereotype is still racist, but it’s a different stereotype. It doesn’t suddenly become an anti-Asian stereotype just because we’ve replaced “Asian” with the broader category of “POC.”

The same thing happens constantly in fanfiction with Shane.

A lot of writers portray Shane as being afraid to fight because he knows he’ll be judged more harshly than white players. I understand where that idea is coming from, but as a black person I’ve never found it particularly convincing.

If Shane were black, that analysis would make more sense to me. Black men are often stereotyped as aggressive, which means behavior that is considered acceptable from white athletes is often interpreted differently when black ones do it.

But asian men occupy a very different place in the racial imagination. They’re frequently stereotyped as passive, non-threatening, weak, nerdy, emasculated, etc. If racial stereotypes were influencing Shane’s approach to hockey, I could just as easily imagine the opposite dynamic: feeling pressure to prove he’s aggressive enough to belong. Maybe he’s fighting TOO much.

But that doesn’t make sense for Shane. He’s the league’s golden boy. He’s polite, media-friendly, and heavily inspired by Sidney Crosby. He’s a superstar. Fighting is often delegated to players lower on the depth chart whose role is specifically to provide physicality. Star players generally aren’t expected to be enforcers. Teams usually want their elite talent scoring goals, not sitting in the penalty box after dropping the gloves.

So Shane not fighting much doesn’t strike me as evidence of racial pressure. It strikes me as evidence that he’s Shane Hollander.

Crosby is a useful comparison here. For years, people mocked him for not being physical enough (and for talking to the refs too much). They questioned his toughness and masculinity. They called him “Crybaby Crosby” or “Cindy Crosby.” Fans edited photos of him in dresses or makeup. The criticism wasn’t really about hockey. The joke was that he wasn’t a “real man.”

And that’s a white player.

Imagine how much worse those conversations could become if the player in question were Asian.

That’s the kind of racial dynamic I could actually see affecting Shane, not him worrying about people thinking he’s too aggressive, but people questioning whether he’s aggressive ENOUGH.

There’s a good chance that if Shane fought exactly like many white players, he probably still wouldn’t be viewed as tough enough. Meanwhile, if a Black player fought exactly like those same white players, he might be interpreted as more aggressive.

People often criticize Rachel for not doing much racial analysis in the books. But sometimes fandom fills that gap with racial analysis that feels disconnected from both hockey culture and the specific stereotypes that affect different racial groups.

Not every POC experience is interchangeable.

A stereotype that affects Black athletes is not automatically a stereotype that affects Asian athletes. A stereotype that affects Latino athletes is not automatically a stereotype that affects Indigenous athletes.

If we’re going to talk about race- and we should- we have to talk about the actual racial dynamics at play, not just substitute “person of color” for a more specific analysis.

Then later that night you go home and before bed you undress and go to shower to wash the marker off and you pass a mirror and you see a swastika on your head. You can’t remember who wrote what where. Which white friend thought it would be funny to watch you walk around with a swastika on your head all night without you knowing? Why didn’t any of the others tell you?

Years go by. You get away from those people, that town. You make new friends who are more like you and treat you better and get on with your life and before too long you haven’t thought about that night in years.

Then you blow up over night. Everyone knows your name. You can’t even go grocery shopping anymore. A lot of people love you but a lot of people hate you, and they want you to know it. They scheme to ruin your life day after day after day for months. They call you slurs. They suicide bait you. They stalk your girlfriend, say horrible things about your mom and your team. None of your white co stars are standing up for you. When one finally does he’s more concerned with defending himself. You’re microaggressed even more constantly only now it’s from your employer and from people with influence in the industry who could squash your dreams like a bug.

And they make a fake insta account framing you as a racist and it does something irrevocable to your fanbase and so many of the people who claimed to be ride or die for you the day before have now, without a second thought, despite seeing who you are for months and what kind of person you are, decided it must be true without any fucking proof and they hate you and they suicide bait you and yeah eventually it gets out the account was fake but damage was done.

And then one day, a month later, you wake up and discover they’ve unburied a photo from that night and they’re now using it to accuse you of being a white supremacist and they’re already celebrating your downfall and sure not everyone believes you’re a white supremacist but they once again, without proof, think you’re to blame.

You must have accepted it because you were being edgy. You’re basically white so of course you’re a little racist. It’s almost, for some reason, like they want to believe this about you. You, a moc, who has faced several lifetime’s worth of racism in a handful of months and people are angrier at you for that pic and hate you for it more than they have ever fucking been angry at or hated the people who have been being heinously racist to you for the last six months. They think worse of you than the white kid who drew it on you.

Loyalty (1869)

— by Briton Rivière

Loyalty (2025)