So Wrong It's Hot

[redbrunja]

Okay, so in one of the ZILLION top 5 question and answer session running around on my flist (and seriously, I don't check my flist for a couple of days and I'm at skip=300, my god you people type like maniacs), the_sun_is_up  asked okroginator  for her Top Five Ships That Make Me Feel Like Kind of a Sicko for Shipping.

Which was such a great question that I just had to answer it for myself (I hope I'm not stepping on anyone's toes.)

Snape/Hermione (Harry Potter)

First of all, all the actual teacher/student power differential that pairings like Kakashi/Sakura avoid are SO FREAKING present with Snape/Hermione. Plus, he's such a bastard.

Nathan/Shilo (Repo: The Genetic Opera)

He's her father. Enough said.

Winry/Roy (Fullmetal Alchemist).

And when I say 'Winry/Roy' I mean anime Winry/Roy where he's the one who executed her parents and she discovers this and is trembling in Gracia's living room and crying and going 'that is so... that is so...' because she's not about to make Gracia's life harder?

Harper/Tolliver (The Harper Connely series)

They were raised as step-siblings, were basically the parents of their blended family, and now travel together using Harper's supernatural abilities to find out how people died. The fact that it's canon doesn't make it not deliciously twisted.

Haruhi/Kyouya (Ouran)

Thanks, beach episode, for making what had been a perfectly awesome ship suddenly horribly problematic.

Comments

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

If I ship Hermione with a teacher, it's Remus. Not for any particular reason, but just because I looked into the pairing for about 2 days a couple years ago.

I can't ship Snape with anyone. I find him physically unattractive and morally unattractive. He's interesting enough as general characters go but totally unshippable to me. At best I ship wee!bitty!Snape of pre-school with wee!bitty!Lilly of pre-school.

Thanks, beach episode, for making what had been a perfectly awesome ship suddenly horribly problematic.

I had issues with the bedroom scene. I felt like they were trying to do something interesting and pro-empowering with it, but ultimately it did what a lot of anime or manga does and justified bullshit about "kindness." So, I just pretend that episode didn't happen, and everyone goes back to being awesome in my head, and Haruhi's awesome remains untarnished in my mental recall. If it weren't for the beach ep, I could totally ship them just for the episode where he forces her to take him shopping.

And when I say 'Winry/Roy' I mean anime Winry/Roy where he's the one who executed her parents and she discovers this and is trembling in Gracia's living room and crying and going 'that is so... that is so...' because she's not about to make Gracia's life harder??

You know what's weird? I find the Roy-Winry connection to be so blindingly tragic that mixing it with shipping just seems...inadequate. Usually, the fandom attitude is that you can take any gen relationship between characters and make it more dramatic by adding sex, love, or both. Since I am an active participant in fandom, I frequently partake of that philosophy. Except in rare cases like this one, where I think it's already as fucked up as its going to get and shipping can't hold a candle to what's already canon. At the same time, it's fucked up so I totally get why people do ship it.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

If I ship Hermione with a teacher, it's Remus. Not for any particular reason, but just because I looked into the pairing for about 2 days a couple years ago.

Honestly, I think Hermione/Remus would be too functional from the word 'go' for me to be really interested in shipping it.

I had issues with the bedroom scene. I felt like they were trying to do something interesting and pro-empowering with it, but ultimately it did what a lot of anime or manga does and justified bullshit about "kindness."

I am much more critical of it. Honestly, I have no idea what they were TRYING to do, but they ended up pulling so much gender!fail that I can't even been to dig through the pile of shit to find out why they were trying to say.

ivy_chan does an fierce job of laying out the fail here:

http://ivy-chan.livejournal.com/170748.html

You know what's weird? I find the Roy-Winry connection to be so blindingly tragic that mixing it with shipping just seems...inadequate. Usually, the fandom attitude is that you can take any gen relationship between characters and make it more dramatic by adding sex, love, or both. Since I am an active participant in fandom, I frequently partake of that philosophy.

Honestly, I agree with you there. It's one of the few cases (like Wallace and Veronica's friendship) where I feel like making is sexual would... at worst cheapen it and at best not really add anything.

[arquileon.livejournal.com]

sigh sigh I like sshg too and I'm totally ashamed to admit it to basically everyone. u_u;

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

Don't worry, this is a safe space.

[arquileon.livejournal.com]

hahahahah >>;

[teh-amazing-one.livejournal.com]

Interesting. When the beach episode happened, that's what made me sort of ship them.

I'm a Roy/Winry shipper, too! I mean, I like the canon, and I wouldn't ever bash Roy/Hawkeye, but something about W/R is so disturbing.

I guess I'm a sick person.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

I'm a Roy/Winry shipper, too! I mean, I like the canon, and I wouldn't ever bash Roy/Hawkeye, but something about W/R is so disturbing.

I know! Riza/Roy is my OTP, but there is something very, very interesting about Roy/Winry.

[nephthysmoon.livejournal.com]

Really? You feel like a sicko for shipping Kouya/Haruhi?

I feel like one of the only ones that can see through Tamaki's BS because I ship it. LOL

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

That scene in your icon? Bothers me epically.

[nephthysmoon.livejournal.com]

Interesting. Why?

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

BECAUSE HE THREATENED TO RAPE HER TO SHOW THAT SHE WAS VULNERABLE TO MEN AND SHOULDN'T HAVE TRIED TO PROTECT THOSE GIRLS EALIER, NO, SHE SHOULD HAVE LEFT IT TO THE BIG STRONG BOYS.

[jade-sabre-301.livejournal.com]

well, part of it was the fact that she was going to end up in the same position as those girls because she doesn't have the physical strength or any sort of training to go up against them, and once she throws the pail at them, she's out of weapons. (I mean aside from eye-scratching-out and stuff.) She did end up falling off a cliff.

I also don't think Kyouya would have actually raped her.

Anyway, I ship them more in spite of that scene, but also viewing that scene as an important one--I mean, it happened--in showing how Haruhi deals with him. And how he reacts to that.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

well, part of it was the fact that she was going to end up in the same position as those girls because she doesn't have the physical strength or any sort of training to go up against them, and once she throws the pail at them, she's out of weapons.

So instead of going 'hey, Mori, teach her how to to defend herself' they punish her and act like SHE own the host club an apology? Because her feeling about the whole situation are so much less important than theirs.

I also don't think Kyouya would have actually raped her.

Just because he didn't follow through on his threat doesn't make it ANY better that he still made it.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

Yeah, they took something that was traumatic for three women and made it all about their man-pain. God, the more I think about that episode, the more pissed off I get.

[parallactic.livejournal.com]

Thanks, beach episode, for making what had been a perfectly awesome ship suddenly horribly problematic.

I got through the beach ep by pretending that Haruhi was ready to knee him in the nuts but held off because she was curious over Kyouya's motives. Because she's blase about self-preservation like that.

That still leaves me with a Kyouya who's a bastard, and who shouldn't be left alone in the same room with a female character.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

That still leaves me with a Kyouya who's a bastard, and who shouldn't be left alone in the same room with a female character.

Yeah, there's really no way to make that scene okay. And I say this as someone for whom Kyouya is her favorite character. I remember finishing the episode and having this huge block of 'does not compute' in her head.

I am forced to mentally erase the beach episode from canon, like I ignore the first four episodes of Gossip Girl with regards to Chuck's characterization.

[parallactic.livejournal.com]

I have sympathy for anyone who likes Kyouya, or Haruhi/Kyouya, but hates the beach scene, because I've come across fic that portrays the beach scene as romantic.

Since Haruhi is one of my favorites to the point of irrationality, I needed to personally spin it so that she wasn't really endangered. I also like the nakama dynamics in the host club, so I gave Kyouya a pass there. I also make some exceptions to fic writers depending on how they treat Haruhi, but I usually end the fic feeling weird about Kyouya.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

I have sympathy for anyone who likes Kyouya, or Haruhi/Kyouya, but hates the beach scene, because I've come across fic that portrays the beach scene as romantic.

Fandom seems to think it's their big romance moment and treat it as such.

And I realized that the big difference between that scene and the tree scene in Avatar was that Zuko tying Katara to a tree was, first of all, not sexualized, and most importantly, he was CLEARLY a villain at that point, if a sympathetic one. The narrative wasn't acting like Zuko was behaving OKAY and IN THE RIGHT.

[okroginator.livejournal.com]

Haruhi/Kyouya (Ouran)

Shit, I forgot I ship this! (or rather, that it can be considered problematic, because I associate the pairing with the mall episode primarily and not the beach episode orz orz orz) I could have put it on the list and bumped one of the lamer ones off.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

I know! The mall episode is so adorably shippy and says so much about their characters and is adorable.

Unlike the super-creepy beach episode.