Edit: I quickly realised how vague this post is on specifics about what happened. I've now added more information, so here's the facts as I understand them.
What Happened:
In this recent ScreenRant article, "Paramount+'s Criminal Minds Format Change Finally Backfires", the reporter criticised the new format of CME only having 10-episodes per season. They mostly discussed how Evolution keeps falling flat in terms of plot, because it keeps introducing too many characters and subplots without actually having the time to wrap everything up nicely.
Paget saw this article, then, completely unprovoked she got on Twitter to publicly belittle and insult the reporter who wrote the article. [She later deleted the tweet, but here's a screenshot]
This immediately caused an outrage from a lot of people who follow Paget. Yet, not everyone was upset by her comments. She's always had absolutely unhinged stans (who think she can do no wrong), and those people not only backed her up, some of them allegedly started sending the reporter hate mail & threats. (If people have sources for this, let me know and I'll add them)
The controversy ultimately led to Paget posting an apology on Twitter [X]
Following this incident, multiple entertainment news outlets picked it up and began publishing articles about it. Which, only added more fuel to the fire, by spreading the incident and it's controversy beyond the containment of Twitter.
Reports: [Variety], [Deadline], [The Wrap], [TMZ] (there are so many more than this)
My Thoughts:
Paget's mean-tweet and the subsequent fallout are just another reminder of why I still believe in drawing a line between fandom and the Powers That Be (PTB).
With the rise of social media over the past 20 years, it's now become the norm for actors, writers, showrunners, etc. to publicly interact with (and in this case, lash out at) fans. Call me old school, but I miss when those interactions were extremely frowned upon by both the fandom and the PTB.
While fandoms have never been able to prevent the PTB from seeking out our creations, at least back then, the PTB didn't advertise/ comment on the fact they were lurking in our spaces. I miss being able to scream online with fellow fans, without the constant fear of the possibility of PTB entering the chat. š«
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Okay we talk a lot about Morgan's deeply unhelpful advice to Reid in 2x16 when Reid confides that he's traumatized by the whole Tobias experience and keeps seeing himself in the photos of crime scene victims because that was almost him. We talk about how empathy is never something Spencer Reid has lacked. But can we talk for a second about how really fucked up Derek Morgan's week has been when he gives that advice?
He's a biracial (non-passing) ex-cop, son of a black cop, tossed into a case that's a racial powder keg. He tries to stay out of that and go with the profile instead of the delicate racial dance. We know he hates when cases get political. We know he tends to stick to the sidelines on cases with a racialized component. He and the black detective go out to 'do real police work' - read: get out of the station where Gideon is fighting with the white chief and mayor about whether a profile can include race, all while the pastor (who Morgan has no love for in general) makes proclamations about how the FBI only cares once a white boy gets killed. It's pretty clear he sees similarity between himself and the detective: black men in law enforcement who are really sick of being asked to represent something, who just want to be judged by the work they do and the content of their character.
And then the detective is shot and killed in front of him because a white guy - whose family was *never* in danger, since the UnSub was only going after black teenage girls - saw a black man and assumed "that's the bad guy!" and took it upon himself to shoot him. A black cop, shot and killed by a white guy, leaving young kids behind.
Who's that sound like? How many times has Derek stood over that body before?
How many times has he been assumed to be the UnSub or the bad guy in general because he's a 6' tall black man in a world that makes assumptions? He was in juvie when he was freaking 11 years old because of a racist cop who keeps climbing the ranks and recently arrested him for murder. He was identified as a potential killer by his freaking *boss*, the same guy back at the station arguing in favor of putting race in the profile.
How does he keep moving forward? How does he keep showing up and doing his job - a job he believes in, but also a job where he gets used as bait for racists a lot more often than he should? How does he "pull himself out of the gutter"? How does he keep from pummeling pedophiles into the dirt?
He tells takes the terrible shit he never should have needed to go through, and he lets it make him better. A better person. A better profiler. A more precise, more insightful, more empathetic, stronger person. He embraces "that which does not kill me makes me stronger" and tries to channel it into something useful, because the alternative is to let it fester and turn into anger and resentment and he knows that won't serve him.
So when Reid admits he's struggling...so is Morgan, that week. For the past two months, really, since Chicago. And he gives the only advice he can, the only thing that's gotten him through all the bullshit. The only thing he can tell himself after watching a good black cop get killed by some paranoid white moron and leave behind a little boy: turn this awful feeling into something positive.
It's not helpful for Reid at all, especially not the implication that he isn't empathetic enough. But it's giving the kid the only answer Morgan has that week.
Recently saw a rerun of CM 7x5 "From Childhood's Hour" and my brain feels like it's on fire from how the show writes the first child victim as such a crystal clear narrative mirror for Spencer and then just. Ignores it.
Like, imagine being Spencer, you're on the job and walk into a virtual stranger's kitchen and see the way it's set up to prioritize access for a child and you recognize that fact because the kitchen in the house you grew up in was probably set up the exact same way. And the memory surely must thrust you back in time, back to being an alone 10 year-old child who has to take on the weight of the world, cooking and cleaning and taking care of your mentally ill mother all on your own. Hearing others criticize your mother and not being able to defend her, because while you love her fiercely and with every ounce of devotion in your body, you know that a mother-son relationship should not be like this. You do everything in your power to convince outsiders that everything is okay because you know that if they knew the truth, they'd intervene and things would only get worse. But you want someone to intervene, to help, to make things better. You need that someone. But that someone never comes.
I think one of the most tragic things about Jemily in canon for me is that thereās always a sense that both women know. JJ and Emily are both aware that something almost happened between them. They know that thereās tension, that they love each other. JJ knows why Emily keeps leaving and Emily knows why JJ has to stay with Will. Every time they talk about how hard the past is, or how happy they are to be reunited, thereās such a sense that things could be different.
If theyād made a different choice somewhere along the line, then this reunion would be something else entirely. They may never have been separated at all. The sad look on Emilyās face when she pushes JJ toward Will. The little headshake JJ gives Emily when she tells them sheās leaving and Emily says āyouāre too goodā. JJ and Emily on the plane to Paris, JJ and Emilyās look at the wedding, the constant checking in later as they try to be close and keep their distance all at once. They know how great they could have been and they know they missed their chance.
Bless you, anon, for asking about it. Apologies in advance for wonky tumblr formatting. My response is uploaded on my ao3 here and is probably easier to read there.
This Is Calm And Heās A Doctor
Fandom Ableism in Criminal Minds
So this is a response to my post here which is talking about ableism in fandom spaces. The most major trend in the CM fandom (not the show ā the show treats anything that isnāt depression or anxiety as Horrifying Serial Killer disorder because itās 2000s copaganda) is the infantilisation of Reid.
As an autistic person myself, to be honest, I find it really uncomfortable.
Disclaimer: this is a trend Iāve noticed and is not about any one person in particular. Just want to make that very clear. Also yes, I know this is fanfiction, people do this for fun, they owe me nothing. And this isnāt me telling people not to write Reid or that they should only do it one way. This is me explaining my discomfort. That is all.
Reid is incredibly smart, not only in achieving his PhDs at his age but the outside knowledge he has of just about everything due to his eidetic memory. Heās also good at making connections between items of evidence and picking up on patterns in the geographical profiles. Since the start of the series heās gained more confidence in social interactions and heās shown to be able to fend for himself in interactions with unsubs both in interviews and out. He carries a gun after he passed the qualifications for it early on in the series. He often gives clear lectures on topics heās an expert on in front of full auditoriums (and OK, his jokes might not always land but thatās hardly a professional impairment). He is at minimum competent and most of the time far more than that. And heās autistic.
Though itās never confirmed technically, itās a popular interpretation followed by a lot of people, and a lot of those people write autistic!Reid as a dedicated tag. Due to CM being, again, an early 2000s TV programme, he is never allowed more clear identifiers but itās generally agreed he is autistic, whether thatās the main plot point of a fic or not.
Yet there is a trend in fanfic where Reid is treated like a child. An adult autistic FBI agent with multiple PhDs treated like the baby of the team because he is autistic (or displays autistic traits) and as an autistic person, itās uncomfortable to see happen. Even on a less personal level, the portrayal of Reid as relying on the team as opposed to being supported by them, like the rest of the characters are, is just out of character. This is the same man who had to take care of his schizophrenic mother after his father left. Beyond his addiction, he is never shown to be unable to take care of himself. I donāt doubt part of the infantilisation comes from the addiction but thatās not a topic I know enough about to have much of a take on, which is why Iām focusing on the autism instead.
I want to make it clear that this treatment of Reid is not automatically the same as fics with him being more āopenlyā autistic or having higher support needs. Itās a venn diagram with some overlap but itās not a given thing. There are plenty of really good fanfic out there that doesnāt infantilise him. Nor am I saying the people who do infantilise him do it out of malice or on purpose.
The difference is in the approach and intent.
An adult with high support needs is still an adult. You wouldnāt treat them like a child because they are an adult. If someone had trouble with auditory processing or following instructions and required clearer and simpler phrasing, you might talk to them differently but you would still not talk to them like a child ā an adult with specific needs. You wouldnāt be talking down because you are aware youāre talking to an adult. To automatically talk to the adult as you would a child is ableist. To view them as less capable of understanding is ableist. The entire concept of āmental ageā is bad, though other people have written far more about that in disabled circles, because it often leads people to treat disabled adults as children.
There is nothing inherently childish about disabled adults or anyone with higher support needs. And autistic people are autistic but we are not only autistic.
And this is where I think people can go wrong ā even and especially people with good intentions! In not erasing Reidās autistic traits itās easy to get caught up on focusing on him being autistic. And that isnāt inherently bad.
But when the writing or narrative starts to treat him like a child, thatās when it becomes uncomfortable. Because it strips away his agency and erases who he is as a character. It suggests that autistic people and/or their needs are childish just for being autistic. Infantilisation is a very real thing for many, many autistic people so to see it in fic over and over again, especially for Reid whose character epitomises intelligence, can get incredibly wearing.
For example, this ask highlights that the language used can be condescending:
I think the other thing Iāve seen (as an autistic adult very close in age to S1 Reid) is that the other characters (particularly Hotch) will call Reid ābuddyā
In canon, the only person Hotch ever calls buddy is Jack, and Jack is four-five in most of his appearances. In his last appearance, heās about ten. So that is just something that kind of infuriates me. In a lot of interactions people write between the team and autistic Reid, it sounds more like the interaction should happen with Henry or Jack, when Reid is a fully grown adult.
When the interaction between an autistic adult and his colleagues who have the same job as him can be imagined between a child instead, it comes across as incredibly infantilising. We do see Morgan call him ākidā in the show but that comes across as light teasing, more because Reidās the youngest and (at the start) newest member of the team, sort of like siblings.
Another example of the wider treatment of Reid in the fandom, not just limited to fic, is the way other characters are often demonised for interrupting him when on the job. I love Reidās infodumping and it is genuinely endearing. Iāve also been in similar situations where I either do realise I need to stop or someone gives me some cue to. But Reid has a job to do ā generally a pretty urgent one. Yes, the others can be more polite in cutting him off, especially in the earlier seasons. No, I donāt think it is as rude as some people do. They do need to move on from topic to topic, especially at a crime scene with a lot of evidence and clues to process, and Reid would know that the job involves that. Sometimes it is necessary to move on and the team often does this with just his name ā which is not a particularly negative cue in itself.
This often ties in with the belief that heās unable to stick up for himself if he did see it as rude. As Reid mentions: he was in LA public schools at nine and he is an adult during the series, albeit a young one. I doubt he completely lacks the ability to ask someone not to interrupt him ā the same colleagues heās comfortable enough with to mess around with physics tricks. If it is shown they address him as Dr. Reid deliberately so local police know how to address him, I believe the show might have shown if he was uncomfortable with being interrupted.
As the show goes on we also see this become more casual and more easily intuited by Reid, which suggests itās not something he is opposed to. This interaction between him and Hotch in 7x07
Ā Ā Reid: Iām rambling again, arenāt I?
Hotch: Yes.
is presented naturally in the show, and Reid himself being the one to ask Hotch shows that he does not mind being told when he is rambling. (Also, I firmly believe this is one of the most autistic interactions in the entire show from both sides but thatās neither here nor there). A few episodes later in 7x11 Reid calls out someone faking their cousin being the unsub for attention in front of many people and news cameras so I think itās fair to say by this time in canon heād be confident enough to speak to the team about his infodumping.
In 7x21 this is even more casual, where Hotch lightly taps Reid on the arm again implying that it is a relatively common occurrence. Even in an early season (2x13) Hotch does it with the dialogue āReid. Stop, please.ā and itās worth noting that beforehand, Prentiss was engaging with his infodumping, not discouraging. In another episode it is āReid. Reid. How do we find them?ā which arguably redirects him to explain how his observation is linked to the case rather than cutting it off completely.
Therefore I find that the impact of the team interrupting or redirecting Reid is often not as large as many people insinuate or, to phrase it better, the intent and execution of it by the team as less mean. Again, autistic people are not children: Reid is more than capable of (a) dealing with hurt feelings and (b) speaking up about hurt feelings and is never shown to dislike the team for it. While this can be a painful experience for autistic people in real life it is not presented as such in the show and implying it must automatically be for Reid erases his agency and ability to handle such situations and/or emotions on his own.
As an aside, the belief that Hotch is mean/cold/unemotional is often evidenced by his lack of expression and affect. I have no problem with that belief based on canon evidence. What I am not a fan of is this idea that if you donāt perform emotions correctly ā i.e. the way society at large decides people should ā that you lack them entirely.
Reidās canon snippier or badass moments, such as 3x14, going into the train to talk to the psychotic unsub, talking down numerous other unsubs and more I havenāt even seen yet (as of early Season 9)Ā ā many of them except the iconic āThis is calm and itās Doctor.ā ā are often overlooked to feed into this narrative. Reid is highly capable and itās proven many times throughout the show. His performance only really suffers during/after the Maeve ordeal, his dilaudid addiction and the migraine arc, which are all reasonable circumstances that any person would find it hard to work well through.
And this idea of Reid being more fragile than he really is in canon has a tendency to extend to fic via his hurt feelings being used as a plot device for members of the team to have to help or āsaveā him as if he couldnāt do those things if they werenāt there to remind him. Full disclosure here: this includes a couple of my own fics too. When the plot hinges around Reid, who is more than competent, being unable to deal with a few mean words and relies on the allistic (non-autistic) people rescuing himā¦ it can feel demeaning.
That isnāt to say he canāt ever be fragile or hurt. Thatās not to say those things canāt ever bother him because of course they can, and the team should be there for him. But like the rest of the team, he is fully capable of holding his own. If nothing else, to say he isnāt is out of character.
Another area in which the infantilisation becomes quite clear is in shipping.
Again, Iām going to add a disclaimer that no ships, tropes and/or dynamics themselves are inherently the problem. That just isnāt how it works and to claim otherwise would be wrong and also erasing all the works using those things which do portray Reid well in character.
Most Reid ships using D/S or omegaverse dynamics place him into the traditionally submissive role as the smaller, more āinnocentā character. Admittedly this will have a lot to do with the stereotypes of masculine behaviour and appearance and there are people who can articulate that far better than I can. However, the choice frequently made to have the autistic character fill this role is worth questioning as I believe his autism plays a significant role in the decision.
There is a common stereotype of autistic characters being asexual and inexperienced with sex, or overly āinnocentā and pure despite being adults. Itās worth saying that there is nothing wrong with asexual autistic characters, especially when they are made or headcanoned by autistic and/or autistic asexuals, and asexual autistic peopleās existence is not fulfilling stereotypes. The innocent perception comes from the idea autistic adults are unable of comprehending or enjoying sex, a blanket stereotype which can be harmful to real life autistic people.
In Reidās case, heās an adult who works for the BAU. He has seen incredibly graphic crime scenes which often involve sexual components and he is not shy about discussing the significance of the sexual elements. I would not say this makes him new to the subject even if he has not had or does not have sex. And though his awkwardness is often used as something of a joke, heās shown at multiple points throughout the series to display romantic interest and have people be interested in him (Reid getting phone numbers and being propositioned, for starters, as well as Maeve) including Lila.
Yet many fics like to portray him as immature and completely new to the idea of sex to contrast him with someone more dominant and experienced who can show him the ropes, pun not intended. Heās hardly Derek Morgan but he is not completely unused to the idea of romantic and/or sexual relationships and the automatic assumption he would be ā that his lack of major interest is an inherent quality in him rather than a choice, like with any other adult ā reinforces the idea of autistic adults as innocent and childish.
(Note: itās the idea of innocence vs the role of submissive that Iām questioning here. There is absolutely nothing wrong with autistic adults, real and fictional, taking on submissive roles. Itās just about being a constant pattern in fanfic.)
This is overwhelmingly present in Hotchreid fanfiction, though definitely not all: a tendency for Reid to be stripped of his wit, his immense knowledge and his confidence to fit neatly into the mold of almost helpless, āpureā man relying on Hotch. Because it is almost always Reid forced into this role.
Why canāt Reid be dominant? Why canāt Reid enjoy sex just as much as other characters? Because he doesnāt have to talk about it all the time to do that. Why is it so often Reid being lead, Reid being new, Reid in that submissive role? I believe sometimes it is a good thing to question why we write what we write.
Of course, I see the appeal of Hotchreid and I see why people ship it. Iāve got nothing against it as a ship ā the whole younger/older man thing? Yeah. Itās a big draw. And Iām not saying Reid is only ever put into that more submissive role because heās autistic, because he isnāt, but I do believe it is a factor.
(A quick mostly unrelated tangent: Hotch married his childhood sweetheart. For most of the series he has only ever had two partners ā if either of them are going to know the intricacies of BDSM, Iād put my money on the single avid reader. But thatās the fun of fiction, playing around with stuff!)
Even in fics without such dynamics (and I stress again the use of dynamics itself has nothing to do with my qualms here) the perception of Reid as the inexperienced partner who needs taking care of tends to bleed through. Having the autistic character seen as such where there is no reason he should be is again infantilising him, presenting him as less of an equal in maturity in the relationship.
This is my biggest reason to believe his autism can lead to the infantilisation. There is no need for someone to be so submissive out of a relationship with defined dynamics so the fact so many fics do still push elements of those tropes onto Reid is very telling. Like thereās something about Reid which makes people view him as more inexperienced and needy.
Hell, fanart often depicts Reid as much smaller in proportion to the team where canonically, there is only about an inch difference in height between Hotch (1.87m) ā the tallest ā and Reid and Morgan, who are both around 6ā1ā (1.85m) and this is in pieces which are not overly stylised. Reid might be a pipe cleaner with eyes (my favourite insult) but heās not a short one. To be clear Iām not criticizing the quality of the art, because fanartists are incredibly talented, but the decision to make Reid so much smaller.
In particular, there is often a larger difference in size between Reid and Morgan than canonically exists with Reid being smaller and Morgan larger than canon. Black fans in other spaces have pointed out trends in fandom with racist overtones, e.g:
Ā Ā Black/brown characters written or drawn as significantly larger (height and muscle-wise) than their canon self and/or a white character or a light-skinned character of color [Source]
Itās not my place to speak about this, so Iāll leave you with their thoughts and just add that Reidās autistic traits go hand-in-hand with babying him.
It extends to platonic interactions with the team, at times treating him little better than an actual child. See: calling him ābuddyā which is the term literally used about Jack. Reid may be the youngest but he is a functioning part of the team, not a responsibility, not an obligation, yet so many fics work with the framework that he is simply unable to recognise his own needs. A trained FBI agent, may I remind you. And thatās not to say that he never struggles or he should never have his friends caring for him, but that it shouldnāt be any different to any of the rest of the team being comforted.
These things arenāt necessarily a problem but when they happen over and over again, all the time, when they start to become a pattern, it does raise the question: what about this character suggests he should be treated with kid gloves?
It isnāt intentional. I will say that now and I do believe it: people arenāt looking at Reid, going āoh, heās autistic,ā and immediately deciding to put him in those roles. We are rarely so straightforward and most biases like that are completely unconscious. Thatās what makes them tricky to talk about and to understand. Furthermore, having Reid be treated that way reads as out of character at times ā this is the same Reid who has jokes made about his age, who the team go out of their way to introduce as Dr. specifically so that people know and respect him. Would they really turn around and treat him like heās incapable of independence? Would Reid want or tolerate that?
And Iām not saying nobody should write the topics Iāve mentioned. These things existing is not a problem: sub Reid, omega Reid, the team taking care of. Itās when they become the only things Reidās story is about, when the need for Reid to be infantilised is central to the story and his real character is erased, that we should question why.
Because from where I stand it looks an awful lot like his autistic traits.
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so @4x24 has this awesome hotchreid meta going around about hotch falling for spencer and i LOVE it and canāt stop thinking about it the other way around
like, youāre reid, and youāre 24 years old, and youāre used to no one taking you seriously except as a human computer or dictionary or encyclopedia. youāre so young but you feel so old, years older after being on this job.Ā youāve finally been in one place long enough for your coworkers to start to see you as human, as more than a walking stereotype, and as good as that feels... you still are, because youāre young and gay and in love with your boss whoās well over ten years older than you
and itās not just that heās older, but heās also straight and married and has a fucking baby with his gorgeous high school sweetheart, and youāre smart and you know that part of the reason you love him is because heās stability and control and everything you craved but almost never had. and you feel so fucking pathetic for it, but that doesnāt make it go away, and youāre going half-crazy with it.
you have to pretend that you can breathe when he squeezes into the jet seats next to you and your thighs touch and heās so warm and alive under his suit pants, such a contradiction to the way he never smiles, you half-expected him to be clammy to the touch. you dream about him when you manage to get to sleep and you wake up feeling cold and disgusted, like youāre invading his life without even trying. you like to think youād never be a homewrecker, but if he offered could you say no? do you have it in you to lose one more thing you wanted?
in 6x7 Hotch tells the polcie captain that abused his son "you're hitting your son to assert your dominance but you lost that dominance ,long ago" and "has he started hitting you back yet".
Idk, this is another instance of Hotch getting unproportionally angry at an abusive father. Like it's understandable that he hates that guy but while he keeps his compusre more or less this time he seems genuinely angry again.
The way he phrases it seems a bit too specific and personal, like something he expirrienced when he was younger...
