little-cyes-2:

brichibi:

gavinserection:

Remember when

• Smuts were known as lemons
• Yaoi Warnings ( Don’t Like, Don’t Read! )
• Character x Character instead of Character/Character
• Every Time We Touch videos, and the forgotten  Listen To Your Heart videos
• Numa Numa
• Naruto Phase

The Linkin Park phase.

The Evanescence phase.

The blanket fics (aka: It’s so cold omg but there’s only one blanket guess we have to share).

Using numbers to represent characters (1x2 = Heero Yuy x Duo Maxwell).

When we started combining names for pairings (SasuNaru).

When ff.net was o.k. with lemons, then not o.k. with lemons, then switched to ratings that went as high as M.

Depending on AMV.org as the only place for amvs before Youtube happened.

Gravitation being the end all be all for canon yaoi.

BeBeautiful being THE yaoi manga provider.

Suncoast/Sam Goody/FYE being THE store for anime even if it was spendy.

The Sci-Fi channel’s Saturday morning anime block.

Fox airing anime and cutting it like crazy (Caaaaaaaard Captors, the mystic adventure~)

Buying your manga from Walden Books.

(am I the old lady in your fandom yet?)

As far as I see…

Naruto is still going, but the fans seem a little more tamed
And people still mix names together when it comes to shipping them

Back when I was in the Naruto fandom, the fans were SCARY!  I still remember a community I was on having a huge, HUGE fight over who was on top: Sasuke or Naruto?  It got really, really bad.  It’s good to hear that they’ve calmed down.

brichibiwritesthings:

huntersseries:

I was going through my writing groups today and stumbled upon someone asking how a fanfiction of a popular book managed to get published and why people would either bother writing fanfiction in the first place. 

The responses on the thread ranged from curiosity to unbridled hatred of the ‘crap’ and ‘horrendous quality’ of fanfiction out there.  No one defended fanfiction on the post and it bothered me.  A lot.

I love fanfiction, and seriously, honestly, can I just put out there that it’s not the end of the world if you write fanfiction? You are not cheating!  In fact, fanfiction can help you practice and can be used as a tool to become a better writer.

Seriously, hear me out.

1. Fanfiction can help you write. You’ve joined a fanfiction community, you start writing and nearly all communities have ‘review’ functions.  There’s a ready made option for people to read your work and critique it.  Even the little comments help, even with no substance.  They build thick skins, they may you think and they make you consider how to draw an audience and more reviews.  You can only pass your story to so many friends, but posting it on the internet for all to see, opens the door to anon critiques that can improve your writing.

2. Fanfiction can help you write characters.  The show/book/movie/fandom gives you set characters and the point is to remain ‘in character’ or true to who those characters are.  That’s a challenge!  Because the minute that Captain Kirk, or Sherlock or Bilbo acts differently readers will call you out.  It forces you to think about the character - or ignore them and justify why you did what you did.

3. Fanfiction can help you create your own characters.  Mary Sues and Gary Stews are the horrible horrible things about the fandom right?  Putting your own original characters into a story is the way you’re not supposed to go.  But step back and realize that the Mary Sue is a practice of putting your character on stage with the others.  They are ‘horrible’ because they aren’t as well thought out.  Putting them with the other characters can force you to add more detail, to flesh them out and make them fit in.  Sure the critics are mean, but that too is helpful.  It’s very easy to learn from your ‘Mary Sue’ and develop her until she fits in and is accepted as a simple “OC” (or original character).

4. Fanfiction can help you create a world and give it a test run.  Creating a whole universe for your characters is hard and it takes a lot of work.  However coming up with a plot and universe and putting fanfiction characters in it as an AU (Alternate Universe) can be a way to give that universe a test run and make sure it works.  You want a world where characters deal with war and death?  Sure, use fanfiction to take characters you know really well (after all you watch them every week) and make them deal with that world.  You want to explore sexual fantasies that you yourself might not be willing to try?  Fanfiction lets you do that and it lets you expand your horizons.  This lets you learn about that world and test it out.  So the next time you create a universe it’s better and better.

5. Fanfiction can help you build self confidence.  There is nothing scarier to a introverted teenager then putting themselves in the front of a room and expressing a new idea that’s their baby.  Believe me, I know.  But fanfiction lets you do this, from a safe area.  Your original idea is couched between well known characters and ideas and can be handed out to the internet as a whole or a couple select fans.  This lets you hand your idea out and get feedback.  Done enough times and survived through enough ‘flames’ and ‘trolls’, you can come out the other end confident in your ideas and your ability to express them.  This can give you the confidence to stand in front of people and present your original work for others to see how good it can be, without you even realizing it.

6. Fanfiction can help you network.  In the publishing world, you have to send off your stories to thousands of people and hope someone likes it.  You need to edit and you need to sell yourself.  Fanfiction presents you with a world of feedback (reviews), editors (beta readers) and fans across the world that couldn’t be more readily available.  Use this to your advantage.  Seriously, it can become a secure support for jumping into the world of original fiction and sometimes, that’s what you need to get your story right, especially if it’s not readily available next door or down the street.

I know there are other good things about fanfiction, but these are the ones that meant the most to me.  These are the ones that have helped me get to this point and I’m not ashamed of it.  

I am not saying that all fanfiction is good.  Just as not all first drafts are gold.  But they are stepping stones and they can be used to create better things or they can be amazing on their own.  

Do not judge the entire subject by a single book that got just a bit more attention then the rest.  Fanfiction isn’t evil, it isn’t stealing and it isn’t crap.  There are fanfictions out there that are better then some of the best published works and there are plenty of writers who started in fanfiction, whether they admit it or not. 

I admit it.  I started in fanfiction.  And it made me the writer I am today.  I am proud of that fact, thank you very much.

Let’s be honest with ourselves.  At some point, in our lives, we’ve written a fanfic, or pretended to be in someone else’s universe.  We’ve played pretend, or wondered, “What if this happened at the end of the movie/TV show/anime/video game/comic/whatever instead?”  There’s this stereotype with fanfiction being terrible, or, “Ugh 50 Shades was a fanfic,” and suddenly it’s this terrible thing.  

People don’t seem to realize what fanfiction does for writers.  If it weren’t for fanfiction, I wouldn’t be where I am today.  Fanfiction kept me writing when I stopped.  Fanfiction kept me writing when I thought I couldn’t get anywhere with writing.  Fanfiction showed me that my “hobby” could actually be a “career.”  The writing degree and the classes helped, but fanfiction helped too.  I’m not ever, ever going to deny that.  I treated it like practice, be it keeping characters in character, trying to write their motivations, trying to flesh out the AUs or even the canon universes in ways that the series didn’t.  Not only did writing fanfiction help, but reading it helped, too.  Seeing other people’s writing styles, leaving reviews, talking to the writers, all of that is part of the writing community.

It kills me when people treat fanfiction like this terrible thing.  I, for one, wait for the day when one of my books has a fandom, has people writing fanfiction, or drawing fanart, or cosplaying, or whatever.  Is there bad fanfiction out there?  Of course.  Just like bad movies, or bad video games, or bad books, it’s part of the community.  Does that mean every aspect of that community is bad?  No, of course it doesn’t.  Not every book you read is good, hell, not every book by the same author is good, and not every book in the same series of books is good.  But do you bash books in general?  No. 

And let’s talk about the reviews you get.  Nothing prepares you for the reviews your book will get like fanfiction.  You get a wide variety of reviews, from one sentence, to paragraphs, to pages, and not all of them are good.  They prepare you for the good and the bad, but especially the bad.  Sometimes you get that “ugh why is this character gay” review, and sometimes you get that review even with the 700 warnings of, “gay characters ahead, don’t read if you don’t like.”  Other times, they’re well thought out negative reviews that actually help you improve your next fic, and the next one, and the next one.  There’s no way I’d be prepared for the “not everyone will like your book” road without fanfiction and the reviews I’d receive.    

Everything starts from something.  Everything is inspired by something. There’s nothing wrong with that.  You see people say it all the time.  ”I use to read/watch this thing, and it inspired me.”  ”I created this character because I was inspired by this.”  ”This is based on this.” Fanfiction is no different to me.  Fanfiction means that I’m so invested in a character or series that I feel the need to write more for them, beyond what the creator has done.  To be able to inspire people in such a way with my writing is a dream.  That means they’re still thinking about your book, or movie, or whatever you create.  That means it’s still on their mind.  The reason why Persona 4 is still popular for being a game from back in 2008 is because we still love the characters, we still want to continue their story, we still want to take that journey with them.  The reason why Night Vale has taken off so quickly is because the fandom took to it.  Once upon a time, CLAMP was a group of doujinshi artists, drawing comics from other series.  Now they have a bunch of series of their own that people love. The reason why Free: Iwatobi Swim Club even EXISTS is because fans clung to that 30 second promo video.  Had they made that promo and we hadn’t given a shit, it wouldn’t be going right now.  Had the fans not taken to Harley Quinn in Batman: the Animated Series, she would’ve just been a random Joker henchwoman.  That’s it.  It’s because of fans that she has her own comics, her own following, be in the video games, none of that would’ve happened without fans.

Without fans, your story will never live on.

And that is what we, as writers, want.

And if my creation inspires someone else’s creation, by all means.  Let the creativity flow from person to person.  If I ever go to a con and see fanart or cosplay from one of my books I will absolutely die of happiness. If the series my partner and I are creating ever has a section on ff.net, or any other fanfiction place, that means that our books have left that much of an impact.  Do I want to write?  Yes.  But I also want my books to mean something to people.  I want them to mean so much to people that, 5 years later, there’s STILL a fandom for them.  People are still talking about my characters, or a scene, or anything I wrote.  

Fanfiction means that this has happened, and there’s nothing wrong with that.  Fanfiction is not garbage, it’s not a cop out, it’s a part of the writing community.  Don’t ever be discouraged because you write fanfiction, or use to write fanfiction, or anything like that.  Ever.  

The part where I encourage fanfiction, because it’s important to the writing community.  

There’s a story my mother once told me that I’ll never, ever forget.  She told me about how she took me out one day when I was little, and I would point to things and say that I wanted them.  You know, a toy, or ice cream, or whatever.  She told me how annoying it was, and how I was acting like a brat and how she was starting to get irritated with me.  Just as she was about to raise her voice she realized… 

… I was acting the way she use to act.

I was doing the same things she would do, so how could she get mad at me for, well… acting like her?

I just realized that this is fandom for me.

Sure, I reblog things that say, “You shouldn’t do that,” and I agree with them.  No, you shouldn’t judge a person based on their ship, or their favorite character, or series, and things like that.  But I just realized, while I was talking to a friend about it, that… this is something we’ve all done, at some point.

We’ve all judged a person based on their ship.  We’ve all thought that our ship was the greatest ship and if you tried to tell us otherwise, you were dead wrong.  We’ve all hated a character for getting “in the way of our ship.”  It’s… a part of fandom.  

I use to do these things.

Back when I was into Gundam Wing, I was 16.  The pairing to ship was Heero and Duo (1x2) and the character to hate was Relena.  And I did it all.  I hated that girl something fierce and I wrote those fics, sometimes bashing her.  And there was no ship greater than mine, if you couldn’t see the love between Heero and Duo there was something wrong with you.  And if you shipped something else you were shipping wrong, because YOU HAVE TO SHIP THESE TWO O.K.?!  And if you shipped them with someone else… heaven help you.  I would point out those promotional pictures with something simple, like a hand on the shoulder, or that one scene in that one episode that one time that, clearly, showed that they were in love.  I did all of that.

Now, I could care less who you ship.

It started small, with my partner, because she shipped Wufei and Duo, which… I found kinda weird, but… I really liked talking with her, and she also shipped Heero and Duo (which was like, “whoa wait you can have multiple ships?!”)  Then there was Yu Yu Hakusho, with the Mukuro bashing, and I couldn’t see why she was hated so much because I thought she was awesome, but “she got in the way of the Hiei/Kurama,” and… I started to see something wrong with that.  But I think it was the Naruto fandom that made me really change.  There was so much hate for Sakura for “getting in the way of the SasuNaru,” even if she had moments of wanting to help bring Sasuke back for Naruto’s sake.  Then I realized that no one obsesses over Sasuke as much as Naruto, and if he were a girl, we would be calling “her” an idiot for trying so hard on a guy who could care less.  And then, the SasuNaru fandom itself started arguing over who was on top, and it got pretty nasty, and just… I realized… why?

But I need to stop denying that I use to be “that person,” and getting angry over “that person” is a bit hypocritical of me because, once upon a time, that was me.  It’s just a part of fandom, it’s something that happens, and years ago I was that girl.  Yes, I think it’s silly now, but it took me a while to reach this point, because honestly, at this point, if I hated everyone who shipped differently from me or liked the things I don’t like, I wouldn’t have very many friends.  Like, I’ll casually say how I hate Twilight, and I have a couple of friends who kinda squirm a bit because they like it.  Years ago, I would be bashing them until I lost my voice, but now I’m like, “… oh, well hey that’s fine,” and we proceed to talk about something we all like.  

But, for a moment, I forgot that I use to be “that person,” and that’s my fault.       

… oh god this revelation is just like my mother’s revelation am I turning into my mother?!

kaiserneko:

Inspired by a real life encounter where a girl who was with us at a guest dinner began FUMING when a girl, who shipped her “most hated ship", nearly sat at her table.

If she sees this: That was obnoxious. We already have way too many goddamn things that divide us. Let it go.

Yes.  Just.  This.  Please.  Also, if someone pairs your favorite character with someone you don’t agree with, let that go too.  Please don’t badger them with “evidence” from the series, to try and make your ship more canon than their ship.  People will ship what they want, whether it’s canon or not, or whether you don’t like the ship or not.  That’s no reason to be rude to a person, because seriously, if you base your opinion of a person you don’t know on how they pair fictional characters, then as this post says, you need to reconsider your priorities.  Don’t glare at them, or say rude things, or attack them in any way, whether it’s with shipping, or a person liking a character you don’t, or liking a series that you don’t, just… stop.  

For example, I’m not into Homestuck, but I’ve heard horrible stories of people actually walking up to cosplayers and breaking the horns they wear.  Or people bashing and physically attacking furies, or people who cosplay villain characters who are attacked by people who hate that character.  Just… no.  The thing that makes fandom so great is that there’s plenty of room for all of us.  If you don’t like a pairing or character or series then there are a million other things out there for you.  Stop bashing people and hurting people over something so trivial.

homosexualpancakes:

when someone tries to argue with you on a subject you clearly know more about

This is especially irritating if it’s fandom related.  I actually had a girl at a con try to out Persona 4 knowledge me.  It’s not a contest, we should enjoy the fandom together, yes?

but since she insisted on making it a contest I totally won, especially since I went to E3 and played Arena before it came out.

brichibiwritesthings:

huntersseries:

Back when I was to college, I was part of a Gundam Wing yaoi mailing list for Heero Yuy and Duo Maxwell (1x2x1 ML forever!)  On that mailing list was a girl who called herself snowtigra.  We started chatting over IRC (yeah this is how long ago this was) and ended up doing a fic together that was a terrible Resident Evil/Gundam Wing crossover that’s still on the internet somewhere, I’m sure.

Anyhow, long story short, we’re still together after 11 years somehow.  

One day, while chatting over IRC, we started roleplaying with anime characters.  They came from all sorts of series, from Gundam Wing, to Yu Yu Hakusho, and we just… kept doing it.  We started calling it “dating.”  She lived in Minnesota and I was in Iowa for school, so we were long distance, but every night we’d get online and “date.”  This involved coming up with random plots for these characters, and as we got into more anime series and video games, more characters would show up.  Like, “Hey, Gaara is really cool, we should put him somewhere,” or, “I’m really obsessed with Kanji and Naoto right now,” or, “Sebastian and Ciel, please.”

When I moved up to Minnesota, we got an apartment together.  One day, after she picked me up from work, we found out that our apartment had been broken into.  This included our laptops, which had the file on it we used to roleplay.  So, we had to start all over again.

That’s when things changed.

Suddenly characters were changing.  For example, we would think, “This would be awesome if it were a female lead,” and so boy characters changed to girl characters.  Then we came up with the concept of “The Storyteller,” a creature who lives in a library full of books, each book depicting someone’s life.  At some point we realized, you know, these Naruto characters aren’t really the same anymore.  We sort of… created our own characters.  Like we were still using the name “Haku” but it wasn’t really the same person.  

Then, about two years ago, she randomly wrote up a teaser chapter.  The characters were renamed, no more Ky Kiske or Gaara, no more heartless or Netherworld, because those things weren’t those things anymore.  Then I added a bit to it.  Then we sat down and made an outline.  The outline ended up creating seven book ideas.  She wrote the first one for NaNoWriMo two years ago, then I read over it and added things/took things out and jazzed it up.  

We realized, “Fuck… we have a story here.”  So she sent it to publishers.

Now we’re signing a contract with Alpha Wolf Publishing.

And thus became the dorkiest love story ever told.  The Hunters series started with us being in a long distance relationship where we would roleplay every night to talk to one another.  

To all of you roleplayers, fanfic writers, fan artists, and all that’s in between, here is my message to you.  Keep doing what you do.  Because you never know what it will turn into.  This is what it did for me.

Oh, and “Treat Me Kindly,” the book I’ve written on my own?  Use to be a Naruto fic that I never finished.  After dissecting the fic I kept the first sentence, one of the original characters I created, and two of the animals.  

Reblogging because not all of you follow my writing blog, but I wanted to share  :)

queenofshenanigans:

ranwing:

viewtifulash:

areyoutryingtodeduceme:

JFC NOSTALGIA.

OLD SSSKKOOLLLL

Shit… this really does date me.

All these kids on tumblr right now wondering what lemons and limes have to do with anything. 

IF YOU ONLY KNEW KIDS. IF YOU ONLY KNEW. 

And lemon like covered all kinks.  All.  There were only two settings: lime for cute and kissing and maybe a bit of fooling around, lemon for EVERYTHING ELSE!  I MEAN EVERYTHING!  You kids are spoiled today with your y!gallery that has you mark off each kink one by one, and your ff.net that lets you mark off what characters were in the story and all genres.  I use to have to hand type the pairings one by one, not click on a box.

… god I’m old -_-  

silvermoon424:

special-snowflake-hall-of-fame:

abhortion:

atheistrose:

domesticabusewillsaveusall:

So awkward.

I walked past a cemetery when I was walking home and like… I’m alive so… yea.

It was so awkward when I was walking home because I walked past a nursing home and like….I’m not old so….yea

It was so awkward when I was walking home because I walked past a river and like….I’m not a fish so….yea

It was so awkward when I was walking home because I walked past a car dealership and like….I’m not an automobile so….yea

It was so awkward when I was walking home because I walked past a pet store and like….I’m a human so….yea

It was so awkward when I was walking home because I walked past a cat and like… I’m not Souji Seta so… yea

xanatenshi:

The misogyny that is thrown at female characters on Supernatural is disgusting. Some people need to check at how they’ve internalized the patriarchy that they would rather have female characters dead in order to further their feelings about a fictional friendship between two male characters. I’ve got a post-bubbling on the stove about the appropriation of queer identity by straight women who only want to see two fictional men get together and can’t fathom that perhaps two men, of any sexual orientation, might love each other but not want to have a romantic relationship with each other.  

The post is bubbling because I want to find some citations from Ian McKellen on The Lord of the Rings and his discussions with (straight) actors on how they might show affection for each other as comrades and friends, that has nothing to do with sexual attraction. We live in a culture where physical affection from men is often read as being about sexual attraction, but could be nothing more than affection for each other as friends.   

I’m not in the Supernatural fandom, but I remember this happening in fandoms in general, making the female character just a sliver below “hell spawn” in order to push the two guys together (i.e. Relena from Gundam Wing, Sakura from Naruto, ect.)  I’m guilty of doing this myself, back in the day, but if I can credit the Naruto fandom for one thing it’s that it showed me how crazy it was to just bash the female character so much just because she “interferes with the two guys.”  Granted, there’s plenty of reason to get frustrated over Sakura in how she has moments of greatness that get shot down, but I’ll never forget the hatred people had because, “Ugh she interferes with the Sasuke and Naruto because she crushes on Sasuke so hard.”

A couple of things.

1.  She was 12.  12 year old girls get crushes on popular boys sometimes.  It just… happens.

2.  No one seemed to point out that, as the series progressed, she started wanting to bring Sasuke back not for her sake, but for NARUTO’S SAKE, to have THE ENTIRE TEAM BACK TOGETHER, not just so she could crush on Sasuke some more.

3.  No one seemed to point out how, as much as you think Sakura pines over Sasuke, no one pines over him more than Naruto.  Yaoi lenses or not, there’s moments where I know that if Naruto were a girl, fans would’ve been calling her stupid in her complete devotion to this guy who, frankly, doesn’t want to come back.  There’s a part in the manga, where Naruto is talking to someone (can’t remember who), but he flat out says something like, “I don’t care if I lose my arms, my legs, my eyes, I’ll still bring Sasuke back.”  Just… and the fandom was all, “OMG IT’S SO CANON YOU GUYS,” and I had this moment of, “… that… just… no…”  It wasn’t sweet, to me.  It was… awful, because I knew that if Sakura said something like that, the fandom would condemn her, but since it was the boy character it was like, “Guys our yaoi circle is complete!”

Yaoi or not… someone being that dedicated to someone is… scary.  Especially if said person’s response is, “Leave me alone.”  Just… yeah.  That’s called an unhealthy relationship. But somehow, Sakura was the “bitch,” and just… it made me see how much female characters are shunned for the sake of having two guys together… even if those characters really shouldn’t be together.  Sasuke and Naruto is not cute, it’s not sweet, it’s… dangerous.  Naruto is kinda obsessed (not sure if he is anymore since I gave up on the manga) and that’s not a good thing.  

linefaced:

hermitswag:

linefaced:

suckmymara:

Daily reminder that Kanji isn’t gay, Naoto isn’t trans and Rise isn’t a slut.

Like, those are the three characters the Persona 4 fandom has the hardest time understanding, even though it is explicitly stated that Kanji’s problem was with acceptance, Naoto’s was trying to be taking seriously as an adult and Rise only showed attraction towards one person.

You can like/dislike whatever characters you like, but don’t like/dislike them based on a misinterpretation of them.

okay you know what, here’s the thing:

I have my fandom opinions.  I have a lot of them.  I don’t interpret Naoto as trans, I don’t interpret Kanji as gay (nor do I interpret him as straight) but I have a lot of problems with the way this post is worded.

You are not a fandom gatekeeper.  This goes for anyone on either side of the issues here.  You don’t get to decide who likes and dislikes characters and for what reason, you don’t get to decide how other people choose to interpret them.  Everyone has their own reasons for liking and disliking certain characters and you don’t get to tell them how they can enjoy fandom.  Stop.  

If you disagree with someone’s interpretations, Tumblr has an ignore function for a reason.  Just let people have fun with it the way they want.  You are inevitably going to encounter people that have opinions that differ from yours, but chances are you are not going to magically change their mind, and if you take it personally if someone disagrees with you (like if you have a particularly strong connection to the character), then it’s not that hard to find people who agree with you and you can surround yourself with them on a less public social network, instead of trying to tell people what they can and can’t do with their interpretations.

Also, as a slightly more minor thing: I agree that Rise’s not actually a “slut” but I also have issues with wording that implies that she’d be a lesser character even if she was. 

I also just want to put out there that even though I personally don’t view Naoto and Kanji as trans and gay, respectively, keeping an open mind about interpretations led me to some REALLY REALLY GOOD fanfic about both situations and the struggles it causes.  So there’s that to think about, too.

So basically, they’re free to completely misinterpret these characters because it’s THEIR opinion, but when it comes to OUR opinions, we should just keep our mouths shut? Because I guess we’re not “fandom gatekeepers” or whatever. It isn’t even about interpretation as opposed to what is EXPLICITLY STATED in canon, but okay.

As long as they’re not trying to tell you that you’re wrong, then uh, yeah, they’re… free to do whatever they want.  That’s part of what makes fandom fun, is exploring possibilities.  

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not telling you you’re not allowed to have your opinions or express them.  Like I said, I have my own, and I agree with a lot of the interpretations of that post, and people are free to agree/disagree/follow me/unfollow me/block my ass for them if they feel like it.  What I took issue with is the wording, and I’m saying that going out of your way to make inflammatory posts or getting in someone’s face for interpreting canon the way they want is really pointless and doesn’t accomplish anything except making everyone involved upset for no real reason.

The Persona 4 fandom has not been convinced 100% of one way or the other on a lot of issues and it’s been around for years, so chances are they’re never going to, and it seems silly to keep repeatedly dragging out these arguments.  If you want to keep having them, that’s your deal. /shrug.

Thank you, Line  :)  Just… yes, all of this.  Guys, come on, we’ve been doing the “interpreting things as we see them” dance for ALL fandoms forever!  I’ve paired people together who speak two sentences to one another.  I’ve paired boys together when said boy was canonly with a girl.  I’ve done it all.  I’ve done the “These two boys are hot they should hook up” and the “Hey he looked at him for 3.2 seconds that means they’re in love.”  The point is to not say someone is wrong, because honestly, people see what they want to see and if you don’t agree, that’s fine.  That’s a huge part of being a part of a fandom!  

For every post you disagree with, there’s going to be one you run into that you do agree with.  There’s no point in saying, “You’re wrong,” when there’s an entire part of your fandom that agrees with you.  "It says so in canon,“ sure, that’s fine, but let the people who see other things in the game/anime/TV show/whatever have their fun.  If they see a character a certain way, let them, because trust me for all of your canon they’ll find something else in your canon to support what they want.    

And for that matter, why are we allowed to go crazy with pairings but not with characters themselves?  I mean I love Kanji and Naoto, love them all day and night, write headcanons like crazy, but canonly?  They’re not together.  No one comes to me like, "Hey sweetie, just so you know, this isn’t canon.”  Sure, there was that wave of confession posts of “I don’t like them together,” and you know what?  That’s fine.  That’s an opinion.  They never left me any messages in my box going, “Stop writing that shit it’s not canon and here’s a list of reasons why it’s not.”  I know they don’t hook up.  Not in Persona 4, not in Arena, not in the anime, not ever.  But I write it because THAT’S WHAT I SEE!  I see hints here and there, just like people see hints here and there of Kanji being gay and Naoto being trans.  If you don’t like it, just keep scrolling, the tag is full of things and I’m sure you’ll find something you like, otherwise, you wouldn’t be in this fandom anymore. 

The problem isn’t people “misinterpreting characters.”  The problem is people going, “Guys seriously stop he’s not gay she’s not trans.”  That’s the problem.  As soon as you say “absolutely not” there’s this giant war and just… stop.  Just leave the fans be.