*shakes head* · 11:02pm Feb 6th, 2021
So, recently, I've seen *several* stories about Trans ponies get downvote bombed. To the downvoters, I say this.
Y'all are cowards, hiding behind a computer screen and not even having the guts to post a comment and reveal to the world yourselves as you truly are. It's... honestly pretty sad, and I'm speaking from a position of a former bigot. It's... well, even looking back I can't pretend to understand the world of hate you envelop yourselves in. Never having the courage to think about the friends you could be making.
It's just really sad that our supposedly 'tolerant' community is filled with so many hateful cretins. If anything, this show has taught us there's no wrong way to be a girl so the fact that this message is honestly lost on so many people... it's pretty disheartening.
Honestly, please do go give these stories some love. They kinda deserve it.
Yeah, I noticed that too. The hate on March of Pride seems baffling, but I haven't read it yet to be fair.
Well said, Bricklayer. Very well said indeed.
Transphobes are cretins, scumbags, and I have no patience or tolerance for any of their cowardly, bullying, hypocritical bullshit.
Thanks for sharing the links. I'll see what I can do to check them out.
I read This Union last night as it was crossing the 10-Thumbs barrier. Admittedly, it was a bit "raw", for lack of a better word, so while I did enjoy reading it, I thought I understood why its reception had been so mixed up to that point.
Given what just happened to March of Pride and what's continuing to happen to Union, I can safely say that my previous assumption was, in large part, completely incorrect.
How much d'you wanna bet that at least 3/4ths of the downvoters barely even read the fics?
This is why I say why I downvote a story. I want to tell the author why I gave them it and any constructive criticism I can. One author I follow did a story that I did down vote for reasons and explained why, their next story was faved and given a thumbs up. Still I think this may be a reaction to the rumor going around that G5 MLP is going to be more inclusive and tackling more “real” world issues. I say if the story doesn’t look like something you would like to read, don’t read it. Read what you enjoy.
aaaaand Late_Night's in the March of Pride comments section now, this is going to be fun
5449163
That's a sucker's bet and I'm not even taking it.
5449168
Yes, see, this is exactly why I love comments. They tell you what you're doing wrong and possibly how to address the issue.
That... could be it, at least in partial.
5449160
Yeah, it uh... honestly makes me nervous. Like, if I was ever to hypothetically come out for any reason, this would be the exact reason why I wouldn't. The site's bigots.
5449172
it always baffles me how many people can watch this show and not learn a single damn thing from it
5449172
I understand that. I really do. >_<
It fills me with a deep, deep frustration, that a fandom that billed itself as being about love and tolerance has such a deep core of hypocrisy and intolerance to it. Just... Christ. I may not be trans myself - I'm a white male, sometimes wonder if I might be aromantic, possibly - but for the love of God, I don't see what the big deal is here! It should not be a problem, because whatever one's orientation, they're still a freaking human being. That's the important thing here, at least in my book.
5449177
now try explaining this to Derpibooru
tbh I think Wootmaster said it best
friendship is magic... unless you're a PoC or LGBT+
5449186
That's a big part of why I stay the hell away from Derpibooru, to tell the truth. Almost nothing I've ever heard about it has filled me with anything like confidence or faith in the people there.
Ohh, that's a good quote. Nice, thank you for sharing it.
Honestly, I got into the fandom late and missed the initial fallout from the /mlpol/ incident. I didn't really think there was a problem until earlier last year when I found out we were filled with a crap load of literal Nazis. It still blows my mind that there are so many intolerant sacks of entrails holed up in these parts. Fuck that. Fuck them. Fuck bigots in general.
As for the stories, I've been meaning to give March of Pride a read, but God Bless this Union was getting left alone because I am genuinely kind of tired of seeing Shining Armor get the japanese-light-novel-gender-bender-sitcom treatment. It's just not my cup of tea. I wasn't one of the downvoters, I just was going to leave it be. The hate-bombs, though? That makes me want to see more of them just to torque off the haters.
5449163
Hell, I'd bet 3/4 didn't even try to read it, just had someone tell them about it and went and slapped a downvote on the story.
... Wow.
I ju... wow.
I left for only an hour and then this happens! >.<
5449186
I love Wootmaster so much. Can’t wait to jam with him more once conventions start happening again
5449177
Well, if you're right and you're Aro, I support you!
waves pride flag in solidarity of my peeps
5449173
Aye... Oh well, it's those who did learn something that do count.
Hm, I never pegged you as someone who once had bigoted ideas. I don't to imply anything negative from that, you obviously seem a lot smarter and wiser than you were once before if you don't mind me saying.
Recently, I've haunted some of the more "conservative" corners of the Internet, and some of the transphobic shlock that they spew is downright rancid. They try to paint themselves as victims against some big bad guy using "science" and morality", it's despicable! I know that every fandom will have their toxic sides, but this hatefulness is something we cannot tolerate.
5449335
some of the "anti-woke" squad on Derpibooru hate his guts because "waaah he exposed nazis in the fandom and now people think we're nazis we just want to post swastikas and not face consequences for it, I don't want to reap what I sow, fuck black people they ruined everything"
honestly one of the only reasons I'm still on that site is for the art, not the ever-growing minority of inbred bigoted manchildren who can't count to five on their hands without having a brain aneurysm
5449362
it's funny how they claim to want unity in 2021 when for the past four years they've wanted everything but that - I guess that little stunt on January 6th really shook them up, at least those who realized that "oh shit there are consequences for my actions? DELETE EVERYTHING I SAID DON'T INCRIMINATE ME I DIDN'T MEAN IT"
Honestly hate of LGBT is something I simply can't understand.
Sorry but I'm not gonna read those stories, I prefer to keep anything G and T related away from my life.
5449383
I mean, to be fair that's the main point of the site
5449362
Uh... yeah. It's not really something I'm really proud of for obvious reasons. I wasn't super super bigoted, but Transgender people weirded me out just a little. I wasn't going to spew hate speech or anything, but I was noticeably uncomfortable. Nowadays, with a bit of help from Perfuma and Double Trouble that's changed. (That's why shows like She-Ra are important and why I hold them in high regard, they change lives!)
5449399
It is, but it;s got a few nutballs that really need to go.
5449279
Again, sucker's bet~!
5449403
Life is a learning experience for all of us, my friend. Doesn't matter how long it took you to climb the mountain, only that now you're on the top of it now and see clarity. Take solace that you're better than those who actively refuse to climb or even dig themselves deeper.
Though I am a mere humble scribe, I'd be glad to shake your hand.
5449403
Hey, I used to think that being gay was an abomination in the eyes of God and now I fucking love sucking dick. It's always a joy to see people change for the better.
5449172
Well, late to the party as usual. But, if I may, one thing in particular stuck out at me immediately upon reading it. That's what I'd like to spend the majority of this post talking about, dissecting why I believe one of these stories in particular is so controversial.
The ratio on March of Pride speaks for itself. Lofty's other stories have solid ratios, so this one seems one-off, and what you said would apply. And, it is the less-downvoted of the two. So on to the next story.
As for the second fic, I think it's the title: God Bless this Union. As one as-of-yet undeleted comment on the story points out, why invoke the name of God at all when "the gods" would do just fine or, in my opinion, even better. (I prefer not to mix ponies and real-world religions in my writing as much as my cultural upbringing will allow.) A significant portion of the Christian faith consists of "God doesn't make mistakes, so trust him. If someone's wrong here, it's you." That would include the gender identity of any practicing Christians. Being Christian and being trans are therefore, in my understanding, mutually exclusive.
Then comes the marriage. In Christian marriages (the ones God Blesses, hence relevance to the topic), there is a lot of religious symbolism. The man represents God and the woman represents God's people, first the Hebrews and later the Christians (sometimes called "the bride of Christ"). This leads to stories like that one prophet who was told to marry a whore, and when she went out with other guys, he still loved her and went after her, thus the prophet-whore couple was a symbol showing that no matter how unfaithful God's people are to him, he still loves them. God isn't so in love with himself that he leaves out the church (gay), nor is should the church be in love with itself so that it thinks it doesn't need God (lesbian). As all of that relates to the title, the marriage between cis (male) Shining Armor and trans Cadance (still male in the eyes of the Christian G--oh for fuck's sake. We're trying to figure out whether the Christian God blesses the union of two fictional ponies. Just change the title from "God" to "the gods" and stop appropriating other people's religions. If you're writing pony fanfic, you don't need to (and I would argue you shouldn't) appeal to the Christian God or to the traditional, cookie-cutter, church-instituted lines the minister reads at every Christian or vaguely religious wedding.
That's why I think most of the downvotes are there. I had some other points as to why the upvotes were maybe a little low, but it's late, so here we go, briefly and in no particular order: The author's other 3 stories only have 11 votes in total (2 stories with 0 votes), so we're talking very little established reader base; there's no cover art, and an author whose Discord I'm in swears by having cover art or advises those without it to at least put something up (he publishes to FimFiction almost daily and writes as a day job, so I'd assume he knows what he's talking about); the author is self-admittedly, and I quote "a kid," and while I haven't read the story yet, I remember how bad my own writing was when I was younger.
The other story may be suffering from the backlash generated by GBtU, or maybe it's a late victim of the Cuties backlash since it has foals and is tagged romance. Or, possibly actual bigotry. Likely at least some of each.
I understand this post may garner some amount of heat, particularly in the form of angry red downturned thumbs, so I'll be around for a bit tomorrow to clarify anything that probably needs clarifying due to my being half asleep already as I'm writing this. I want to be clear though upfront that what I said about views on LGBT individuals applies to what should be the Christian view on those in the Christian faith following the Christian holy book, and does not apply to those outside the Christian faith, as they have not artificially limited themselves by Christian rules and teachings, and therefore should not be judged as though they were.
5449446
A lot of trans Christians, including at least one on this site, would beg to disagree.
5449477
5449446
Given this is, uh, going into religious territory and that tends to get pretty heated I'd like y'all to take this elsewhere if that's okay?
5449622
Well, here's the thing. As I said in the comment that you (I'm guessing it's you) deleted, I've blocked Super Trampoline. Which, granted doesn't appear to actually do anything on this site since we can both see each other and mutually ping each other. I suppose I could go into DM's (which probably still functions just as if I hadn't blocked him), but the interest just isn't there for me. I've said my piece, and if anyone besides Super wants to read that comment that's been deleted, PM me.
Agreed. One of the driving themes of the show from Day 1 has been tolerance and inclusion of those different to yourself. Quite how so many people in the fandom have managed to miss this message is beyond me.