XenaGabrielleForever

How to say Xena is made by women and for women:

A quick aside about Xena

Toris to Gabrielle: Xena's doing to you what she did to our village!

“One of the primary reasons Xena: Warrior Princess is such an exceptional show, even sixteen years later, is because it isn’t afraid to make Xena a bad person and, more importantly, it’s not afraid to make Xena a confident woman using everything at her disposal to get what she wants. In this episode, Xena lies and manipulates and beats on people to accomplish her goals. She uses her wits, her strength and her sex appeal. And she’s unapologetic about it. She also has a vicious temper and isn’t punished for it. When she kills the Villain of the week, that might have been a dark note on another show. It’d be a moment to show the hero falling from the grace they’ve worked so hard to earn. Not on Xena. It’s perfunctory and I adore that.”

yes, I’d love for my ship to be canon too, but I feel like fandom culture today focuses too much on “my ship must be canon or else I will be a bitch and harass people about it” energy that we’ve lost the main point of shipping two fictional characters together, why we do it in the first place, which is that it’s fun. it brings us comfort and joy. and even if the ship isn’t canon, we have fan contents, so many amazing fan art and fanfics. you can create whatever you want about them. make them kiss. make them yearn for each other. make them confess their love under the rain.

people are confused “unsolicited criticism in fanfics is rude” with “fanfics are above criticism.” no one says fanfics are above criticism. what we’re saying is that, unless an author specifically asks for feedback and criticism, unsolicited criticism is rude, because unlike anything else that you pay to consume and therefore can rightfully be criticized, fanfics are free and they are someone’s hobby. authors are kind enough to share what they write as their hobbies with you for free. you don’t have to like these fics. you can click away from a fic you don’t like at any point you want. but—again, unless specifically and directly asked by an author—it’s rude to tell someone, who is kind enough to allow you free access to their house, their art, that their fics should have been xyz.