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As a relative newcomer to this community, it’s the first time that I’ve really encountered such a passionate fandom such as this, but I must say I’m not a shipper and don’t think I ever will be, I enjoy the show for what it is, but am I the only one ?
[adrotate group="5"]You’re not the only one. We’re just quieter than the shippers.
I have to think carefully about how I want to say this because I don’t want to be mean to the shippers….Okay, here goes…
I get the impression that shippers are more interested in the destination than the journey. They seem to want tensions between their favourite characters to be resolved now, and all for the good. I like to see what happens to my favourite characters, but I want them to experience strife as much as joy. Even if a character’s story ends on a sad note, it’s the string of words that’s important, not the punctuation at the end. I’d feel differently if the characters were real people, but their reason for being is to be good entertainment, and that requires surprising the audience, not following along with the audience’s expectations.
Gaultheria's fanvids: http://youtube.com/sagethrasher
Overall, the reason I love OUAT is the whole story, and I agree @Gaultheria, I love the trials and tribulations that all of the characters go through. Regina and Rumple’s struggles between being ‘good’ and ‘bad’ are always amazing to watch. The show would be boring if we were watching nothing but a bunch of couples getting together and living in bliss. I like the mix of big bads and grand storylines and character development. I don’t think about who gets what amount of screentime or what character/pairing the show is focusing on because in general, I sit down for an hour every Sunday and love the ride OUAT takes me on!
Though I consider myself a CSer, it wouldn’t be the end of the world if my ship hadn’t/doesn’t come to fruition. I like that romantic pairing but I definitely do not watch simply for that couple. Actually, Emma isn’t even one of my favorite characters! And I hate the term ‘endgame’. I could care less what happens to my ‘ship or when, as long as the story is good.
I get the impression that shippers are more interested in the destination than the journey.
That’s probably true for some but not all. When I started watching OUAT, I wasn’t heavily into ‘shipping. What drew me was the story and how these fairytales were being re-interpreted. I care about Rumple, I want Regina to be happy (something I wouldn’t have said two seasons ago but I like her character now). I like Belle too. I like Emma and Hook as characters, not just because I like them together.
I like seeing the journey since I’m pretty sure about the destination 🙂 I’m not really worried about end game never really was o it’s fun to see them find each other.
Yea Im not a shipper either.
I like to think, and sometimes refer to myself as being a boater- I love sailing around the OUAT Lake and take in the scenery 😉
I think shippers are more visible around the forums because they get into fights with eachother (shipper wars) over differences of opinions more often then the non-shippers.
Shipping is really a very strange and interesting phenomenon (shippers please dont take that as an insult, it is not ment to be) As an outsider on the shipping thing, it sometimes seems like a Ship is to a Shipper what a religous person’s faith is to them.
No, you’re not the only one being not a shipper.
But maybe we have to talk a bit about defining shipper? And I might say some things some people are not going to like. To quote Wikipedia:
“Shipping … is the belief of (or desire for) two people, often fictional, to be in a romantic relationship. It is considered a general term for fans’ emotional involvement with the ongoing development of romance in a work of fiction. “
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shipping_%28fandom%29
Or in other words, shipping means to want two people to be together or belief they will be together at any point of their fictional lives (keeping it to fiction here). I would add: It involves frequently the belief, that there is only one true love, one true pairing possible, that any other relationships one or the other in that pairing has are wrong, meaning at best only transitional or shouldn’t be at all, it is often exclusive. Shipping usually has the tendency to wish for a particular romantic relationship to be the endgame. The romantic relationship becomes the defining moment for the (story of the) two people envolved, whatever else is happening becomes minor matter or is even only perceived as something there to support the development towards the ship or/and a happy ending, and practically blanks out other aspects of story telling and character development. In the extrem version anything questioning the possibility of the wished for pairing (including non-canon ships) or on the show happening pairing (canon ships, sailed ships) is declared to destroy the show, claimed to significantly reduce the quality of writing on the show and means ignoring what THE audience wishes for, assuming that ratings will have to majorly suffer because of it.
Risking a bit of a stir here. Dear shippers, semi and fulltime, you are nice and great people – when you’re not talking about your ships, which though is a rather tough and nearly impossible task for you. Even more of a challenge on this show, as it is so much about love. It’s okay, you are emotionally involved in your ships, emotions are easy to stir and by definition irrational. But for some people, things are different, and we have not an easy time understanding each other.
The past couple of days I thought about starting a general show discussion topic with strict non-shipper policy, becauce I keep my opinion out of the shipper threads, though I do read in them occasionally, as much as I can bear to do so at the moment, but feel a growing urge to be able to talk a bit even against some ships without any shippers throwing in their opinions as well. I don’t expect shippers to explicitly stay out of any other topics besides their shipper ones, though I am thankful when they tune down things a bit for example in character discussion or episode threads. But occasionally I get the urge to have one topic to go to, where I could feel free to question any ship without worrying I might cause personal mayhem (and that goes for Swanfire, CaptainSwan, SwanQueen, Outlawqueen, Rumbelle alike – to name the most active and prevalent ships in the fandom). I am coming close to turn from non-shipper to anti-shipper in some degree at the moment, and yes, there is a difference.
Right, I am discussing at the moment in one topic possibilities for a queer representation and that means showing a queer relationship on the show and not just hinting at the possibility (Mulan is out as queer, lesbian or bisexual woman, pointing out for a reason that Mulan could as well be even a transgender person, but her love to Aurora is unanswered and even still unnamed, only strongly hinted at, but not right away outspoken), so one could say I am shipping queer ship, whichever couple it will be, but usually ship means championing two particular people in relationship, which I don’t do.
I like this community, this forum, but it is one with strong shipping, no offense, an observation. Not the only forum where I am discussing OUaT though, and that is what has been practically keeping me from venting out loud here so far, it is a tad less shippy on another forum. There is not just a rift between shippers in the fandom, there are people being put off the fandom (not necessarily the show) because of all the shipping and shipping wars going on.
It’s not easy to find a place without it, or one with at least a niche for non-shippers, or where one can find in the big loud concert of shipping voice those non-shipping voices. Though TWoP sadly closed it’s forum doors a few days ago, looks like there still is another place to go to, so refraining for the time being from a strict-non-shipper thread here. But it means I will still hold back with some stuff on here.
@sauronbaggins. (Late) Welcome to this community! By the way, thanks for the apple turnovers, delicious! Nice try, but I’m immune against sleeping curses and potions 😛¯\_(?????? ?)_/¯
Actually, I brought up something similar recently, @Myril. I really would love if, in addition to ‘ship-talk, there were more threads devoted to the non-ship aspects of the show – in particular, when talking about specific characters. I used Neal as my example, because I’d love to have more SF/antiSF-free discussion about him, but question where to go with such conversation, because I want to get opinions of all members, shippers & non-shippers alike. RG did make the helpful links thread but I’m not sure if everyone knows the character threads are in there?
MAYBE we should just put NO SHIP as part of the title… then everyone would know that the discussion is about the character, the plot, theories but NOT in the context of ships… more in the concept of individuals. I think if we let it be known this is a non ship thread (not for bashing) but for discussion this would be respected by shippers and they would not come except to comment in the context of NON SHIP.
NONNIE
BTW… I have pretty much agreed with everyone here … thinking the same but unable to find the words without being offensive.
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RG did make the helpful links thread but I’m not sure if everyone knows the character threads are in there?
Link to links.
The character threads are in there. They DO exist just been out of commission because this forum turned to plot/spoilers/shipping more over the past few years–not a bad thing, but not necessarily a good thing. So let’s not go making 10000000 more unless it’s really necessary.
"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"
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