inbox is open :)

🪻Her full name is Kate Eliza Hayes

🪻She is asexual biromantic

🪻She suffers from photophobia, a condition that makes her eyes sensitive to light

🪻She is autistic

🪻She is the host of chaser, a type of demon that was forced to be an employee of the Slenderman

🪻Chaser acts as Kate's protector, and can easily be provoked/get aggressive if you present even a minor threat towards her host/friend

🪻Having Chaser has allowed Kate to have minor shapeshifting abilities (mainly in her hands and legs, even sprouting extra limbs) 🪻She holds a fondness for flowers because she likes the textures of their petals

🪻She is half Japanese, but only knows a little bit of the language

Creepypasta Fandom is infamous for many reasons. The stabbings, the edgelords, the shipping, the predators- It has many reasons for people to turn their nose up at them or make fun of them but one I feel like gets ignored the most until recently is The Misogyny.

What do I mean?

Let's first start with Female Creepypastas.

When Creepypasta first started, there was a wide array of characters, yet somehow female characters ended up either being criticized to hell and back or straight up ignored. You'd be more hard pressed to find a female Creepypasta that wasn't used in shipping, and the biggest way some of them became well known and popular were two factors:

Good Art.

Shipped with a Male Creepypasta

I have made note of this in a reblog on a confession, but female creepypastas who become well known more often than not are carried that way through their association with a male killer in some way. Maybe it's not intentional, but the CrP Fandom, like many others, is also nepotistic. Be friends with the right people back then, and your character could shoot up. Ship your character and have them agreed upon to be in a relationship and you're made.

Here is a list you can make just on the basis of being associated with a male killer in some way:

Jane the Killer - Jeff the Killer

Clockwork - Ticci Toby

Nina the Killer - Jeff the Killer and Eyeless Jack

Judge Angels - Bloody Painter

Nurse Ann - CrP Masky

Laughing Jill - Laughing Jack

Suicide Sadie - Kagekao

It doesn't even have to be shipping; They could be rivals, enemies, just friends- Regardless back then if a female character was a male character's arm candy or even had the POTENTIAL to be shipped (Which veterans of the fandom would remember JanexJeff....) they got shot up. And this is bad.

It's bad alone since characters should be able to stand on their own merit, but if you were like me, a kid in this fandom, what it taught you was: "The sexier the better. Female Characters only matter if they look good with a Male Character."

Which brings us to another issue: Sexualization of Female Characters.

There was a common trend mentioned in another confession that I feel has to be brought to attention that most Female Creepypasta Characters were not allowed to look homely nor have different body types. They had to be curvy, they had to be pretty, and they had to be edgy. It's hard to discern why this is, but from what I've gathered and noticed, there were three big reasons for this:

Sex Sells. - It just does; they had to be Hentai Bait because, as we know in this fandom, art does better than writing; Get an artist to draw smut of this character, and she will be known. People will want to learn about her, and people will like what they see.

Shipping - The Fandom only cares if they look hot together. Shipping was pretty shallow back then. It was about the aesthetic not the connection- Hell look at Ticci Toby and Clockwork - "The Ticking Clock" shtick they had- Yeah they had to look hot together but (in my perspective) they had no grounds to be a good ship (at the time and likely even now) and that's sort was the female character's point when standing next to a male killer; be sexy and make them look good.

Slut Shaming Loophole - This is a theory of mine, if you agree let me know, but I am of the belief that the Creepypasta Fandom encouraged people to create 'sexy' female characters just to have a reason to criticize them. It confined people to a box wherein you could only get noticed if your Female Character is sexy/has a great design BUT is still able to be talked down to and looked down on because of these attractive features. Essentially, they wanted it both ways; They only cared if the character looked hot so they could shittalk them to high heaven. There was no winning with a female character.

What this ultimately did, is it put us into a box where, while it may not be intentional, the fandom encourages people to create a male character more than a female character. Ironically, it perpetuates the idea that your female character has less value than a male character or even that you shouldn't even waste your time creating characters unless it's a semi attractive male one.

We actually saw this with Judge Angels and Bloody Painter. Both created by the same creator; A male and a female killer, yet Bloody Painter, the male killer, ended up standing the test of time and being more known than Judge Angels. To this day, you see more content of Bloody Painter than you do Judge Angels (Which is understandable given what'd come out about the creator later on) but fans drive the content and while you can argue Bloody Painter had more going for him. One was paid dust whilst the other gets attention.

This leads us to another point: Female Fans and Female Creators.

So it's no secret that the reason this fandom is still kicking to this day is the fans, and I wouldn't be shocked if female leaning fans are what encourages it. Issue is, even if you're just a fan, you're still undervalued. As a female fan, you could be backing a character from day one, be rooting and encouraging them but because of a precedent set in 2012, people are always going to see you as "the ignorant fangirl", somehow in this fandom you're punished for liking a character even if you helped with a character being well known or are supportive of them. Your value isn't in your genuine support, it's what you offer. And 90% of the time, your art skills speaks more.

And if you're a Female Creator, it doesn't matter how skilled you are as a writer, what new angle you bring to the table, what concepts you introduce, you are still undervalued because somehow, this fandom encouraged bigger male creators to be the 'Say So' on how this thing runs so if you're out of the box you're not important. And Creepypasta Fandom already has an issue with "Canon" so being a unique writer doesn't go far. Like I said, this fandom is very nepotistic. You had to know the right people, and ironically, just like real life, mediocrity and conformity sells better than genuine effort.

But that's scratching the surface; We mentioned Female Characters, we discussed being a Female Fan and Creator, but now we gotta touch on the more serious topics.

Creepypasta Fandom and The Line Between Horror and Snuff

*Warning this is a dark topic so if you read ahead be wary*

So this was actually something I've admittedly been desensitized to, but Creepypasta has been used to disguise a lot of things, and one of the biggest was perpetuating the harming of women.

I've been keeping an eye here, and according to some peeps, Creepypasta has been used as a sort of veil for dark fetishes, mainly harming/killing women. I shouldn't have to really explain why this is fucked up. It's one thing to write scary stories, have your killers be killers, and touch on these things HOWEVER it's another to draw this and get a weird gratification for it. Horror is a very tough balancing act and intentions speak louder. If your intentions go into the direction of harming women, you are contributing to a problem not assisting with it.

Women already have to live in a world where if they smile wrong at someone or use the wrong tone, they can end up on Dateline. People don't go into Creepypasta to be reminded of the very real reality that their lives are at a risk. And for some reason, it seems to always be women being killed as a prop. Kill women for backstory, for character development, to emphasize how bad a character is.

For some reason women are the currency in this fandom and they always have to be either "The Bitch", "The Lover", or "The Lost One". There's never an in between there's never a who they are, it's how they emphasize how dark and imposing someone is. And if you were to follow me on this theory; Women in this fandom are both seen as needed yet disliked. Like I said earlier, the fandom is driven by female fans yet you'd get called out being a fangirl, so in a way these drawings are also to "Put women in their place" to remind female fans who see them that: A. You like a killer and B. You're stupid for it. In a way it uses the intention of horror as a veil to talk down to female fans again.

There is no winning here.

But.... I don't bring this up to gripe and complain. We, as women in this fandom and a community as a whole, it doesn't just have to be females, can do better. Here's how:

Analyze Intentions: What is the message behind this drawing and character? Is it telling us something, or is this character being used as a prop. Is this drawing to emphasize horror or to hide the fact people still hate females. What is the message?

Be Open to Change and Improving Female Characters: If a Female Character has room to be improved on, improve her. STOP sitting on the sidelines, hoping for someone else to do it. You feel like the character can be improved, improve her. Be open to go against the grain and try your hand.

Be Inclusive: Include Female Creepypastas no matter how small, keep them in mind. We aren't kids anymore, we've grown, and it's time we stopped clinging to nostalgia or reservations about characters just because we were insecure kids. Be open to them.

A fandom doesn't change overnight, but if you are conscious and aware, it can lead to better things. Keep that in mind moving forward.