fall apart and redefine

pairing: shane/ilya rating: t wordcount: 5.6k

It was important, his mom had told him. Kids would be looking up to him. He didn’t know who all he was reaching, but he did know that he’d be one of the only people that looked like him they would see. There still aren’t that many Asian players in the league. Whatever he’s done, his whole career has been about setting an example. About making sure he’s someone people can point to fifteen, twenty years from now and herald as an example of a successful Japanese-Canadian hockey player. A story to tell little Japanese-Canadian kids and something concrete for the naysayers. Proof that people who look like him have talent, have the ability to succeed. Proof that they’re worthy of being in the rooms. It’s a lot. Some days, Shane wishes he didn’t have to be bigger than himself. But events like this still mean something, even if they stopped meaning much to him years ago. It’s a good thing for him to show up. If the photos reach even one kid, that’s one kid who maybe feels less alone, less hopeless about their future. or, shane attends an event for asian professional athletes

similarly myshane can be wrong and self destructive sometimes but he is not the only one and this does not make him inherently selfish or a bad person. and he in fact does notice when his partner is sad, he is canonically kind and caring.

idk I dont have to like or agree with everyone's interpretations of the characters I just prefer it so much when they're allowed to both be whole people with depth and struggles of their own without being either babied or demonised.

yes exactly this! i really wouldn't want a sanitized depiction of ilya dealing with depression because it is messy and difficult and it does significantly impact peoples' lives. i think showing that is important. but it's also important to highlight that it can't be used as an excuse the way that the narrative seems to want it to be. i would have no problem with ilya's actions in tlg remaining as they are, if the narrative were to frame him as in the wrong and having made mistakes.

tlg is kind of a masterclass in what perspective can do to perception, because yeah, exactly. ilya has a lot of not great moments in tlg that the reader is more sympathetic toward because we're in his head, we see how much he's struggling, how depressed he is, etc.

but the way people talk about it is really really telling because like....

(this is chapter 12, not even 100 pages in) shane notices. he brings it up and he tries to get ilya to talk, brings up even seeing a therapist, and he gets shut down and insulted. personally, if my partner reacted like this when i brought up mental health and potentially seeking help, i'd be hesitant to approach the topic again. and i'm not trying to minimize the effects of depression, i'm not saying this would have been easy and uncomplicated for ilya to talk about, but rather that i just find the fandom perception of shane in tlg to be so informative about the double standard.

because these moments aren't talked about. the snarky, mean comments ilya makes aren't discussed. the way he shuts shane down when he tries to help isn't discussed. tlg is framed as a book where ilya suffers in ottawa and shane has no idea and is too wrapped up in himself to care. a lot of that is rachel reid's doing, because this narrative is extremely unbalanced and frames ilya as right and correct no matter what he says to shane, but i also think some of the fandom does shane such a disservice by uncritically accepting her framing. people frequently talk about defending shane in tlg, finding explanations for his wrongs, but there's never a need to explain ilya's wrongs. the narrative never frames him as wrong for any of it, and a lot of people just go along with that.

there's just this weird fixation on shane having made mistakes that he learns from and people can explain for whatever reason or another, but the things ilya's said not even registering as mistakes. not even registering as things he's done wrong that he may need to apologize for. if people don't even know what he's said, i question why. why don't people bring it up? shane's missteps are constantly brought up, even by people who are defending him, but ilya's just kind of fade into the background and don't get talked about.