Help.
Are there pills? Or am I sullied forever?
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I am actually very susceptible to moe and I am never sure how I should feel about that. Itâs not usually for characters designed to be super moe, and as someone with three sisters who had few friends growing up and has trouble not treating friends as siblings, I think itâs probably not worth worrying about.
One time a dude in another painting group that used to occasionally share space with mine was giving his theory for why girls donât play 40k (and it was somehow not, 'because Games Workshop has literally stated that they donât want women playing (itâs been softened to âweâre not interested in making any effort to court that market segmentâ)) and he was all, âMy girlfriend is a psychologist and therefore what I am saying is science and not just some bullshit, I promise.â Basically he said there was a theory about how boys and girls interact with toys and that boys like to imagine themselves as their toy whereas girls like to imagine their toys as being their friends. The point being that space marines would make shit friends but dumb nerds want to be space marines. My response was something like, âI would 100% love to have a Tyranid best friend,â but itâs something I have thought about since because it kind of sounds like he was saying that girls like moe and girls donât like 40k because it it not moe enough.
Weird stereotypes aside I do sometimes work out when I respond strongly to a character if it is because I want to be them or if I want to be friends with them (wanting to fuck them is probably another axis but is n/a for me). It can be decently informative.
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Like, if we are going to have a moe thread, I guess
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I donât think Iâve ever felt moe for an anime chracter, because the cute ones are too concentrated and derealized a rendition of human vulnerability.
And generally, I think kids who are in danger in fiction can take care of themselves, because thatâs usually the point of the story. Like, Iâm not worried about the toddler in Poltergeist or that Torrence kid. Theyâll be fine, and I guess supernatural horror isnât relatable enough for me to want to protect them.
But it turns out that seeing a kid whoâs stunted by child abuse is pretty feelings-inducing for me. And Iâm sure Elâs giant doe eyes âhelpedâ with that effect. Like, I basically wanted to reach into the screen, and be like, âNo oneâs gonna hurt you again; you get to be a person now.â And I wanted so bad for everything to turn out okay for her, moreso than with any other fictional character I can remember.
I remember podcastingâs Jesse Thorn felt the same way about the kids from season 3 of The Wire. You take seemingly innocent children and say, âYeah, weâre gonna pit these kids against societyâs monsters, and theyâre equipped only with the psyches of children,â and it just brings out all those feelings of wanting protect kids from the horrors that have already bruised our lives.
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Isnât moe more about wanting to protect someone thoughânot just being friends with them?
My go to for charcters I wanted to be friends with in fiction is Lt. Gaeta from nw BSG. He was just such a chill nerd and had a slight sense of humor that slipped through at times. Iâd probably hang with Baltar too.
I also shipped Jeff/Britta pretty hard for the first season of Community, but I was very lonely at my parentsâ house for a college summer and recovering from a break up.
i feel moe for some forum members but mostly anime characters
Thatâs dated as shit man, get with the times!
You must look in your heart, to discover what moe is to you!
See earlier where I describe the manor in which I treat friends.
Ah, okay.
Iâll add Stranger Things to my queue to see what happens. Itâll likely take a while for me to watch; Iâve been really careful with what I watch and when, because The Depression has been pretty bad, and when Iâm having insomnia watching Weird Stuff doesnât help with the Inevitable Nightmares.
Last night, I had a dream that companies were selling clones of my mother to the military. I was a doctor in charge of removing the clonesâ living organs and replacing them with more efficient synthetic parts. The clones were conscious through all this and glared at me the entire time.
I believe moe has been with us throughout history, and its understanding and resulting commercialization doesnât necessarily have to cheapen that. Weâve all felt like weâve wanted to protect something innocent at times; itâs that very emotion that allows motherhood and fatherhood to exist, rather than all parents to suddenly resent that their uncontrolled sexual urges mean they canât have nice dinners anymore. So whether youâre soiled, first, you have to ask if youâre a pedophile. If you arenât, youâve dodged a huge bullet there. Whew! Second, you need to look at yourself in the mirror, and question if, deep down, you care about this character because of their character, or because it makes you feel superior in some wayâpsychologically, sexuallyâthat this character is weaker than you? The protective urge is natural, but seeking dominance isâwell, thatâs natural, but itâs natural in the âour ancestors committed genocide as sportâ sort of way.
Thereâs also the brand of moe that results from having a poverty of experience during your teenage years, you know, the Peter Pan sort of thing, but thatâs a different psychological issue from what we would normally be talking about.
Watch Oreimo, and send your soul to Perdition, but perhaps gain the Answer you seek. May Jubileus, the Creator, grace you.
nobody watch oreimo
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I think you might really enjoy the show, because itâs Good Fun, well done, and despite everyone claiming itâs âET meets Steven Kingâ (which it is), its most shameless influence is actually Elfen Lied, which the creators have confirmed. (If that wouldnât have been obvious to you, I recommend not researching it before watching, because it could kill the magic a bit. Not in a spoiler way, just in a How the Sausage is Made sort of way.)
On the other hand, it could be a depression trigger for you. One of the main characters is a super-stressed out, poor, single mom who reacts very poorly when her kid goes missing (not a spoiler). And thereâs a deadbeat dad in the picture. Heâs not abusive; heâs just a jerk.
Also there are nerdy best friends who play DnD together, which could be bittersweet if youâre feeling lonely, plus the moe Iâm referring to is not really a fun kind of moe.
I wouldnât describe it as a downer show in general, but there could be triggers for you. I shotgunned the whole show in two nights, and really missed the characters afterwards in a way that could have been a serious depression trigger if I were at a bad point in my life. But I donât know that youâll have that reaction. Iâm particularly prone to missing characters.
Anyway, I like knowing that youâve actually thought in detail about the hazards of moe. I was mostly just being fascetious as a way to state a revelation I had about my fandom for this show. I was basically like, âOhâhahaâthis is totally moe, right here.â But Iâm not really worried about it. Iâm pretty secure in it being compassion for an abused child, though if Iâm being honest I think the fact that itâs a doe-eyed little girl doubles the effectiveness, thus the true moe-ness of it all.
pennsatucky from oitnb is moe
didnât they retcon out the super badass female space marine army or something? i think i heard that somewhere
I wish
If I had the money, Iâd play a Sisters of Battle army.
Itâs like they made Catholicism Metal.
Huh.
I mean, maybe itâs obvious to others because I have a chip on my shoulder about ârelatableâ media but I donât respond to characters in shows in either of these ways. I donât wanna fuck any of them either.
Thereâs literally only one kind of character that I seem to respond to, and that is a bad person trying to be good, or trying to figure out what it means to be good.
There was no character like that in Stranger Things (I guess El thought she was like that, but she wasnât actually, she was just moe.) so while I had fun watching the show, I canât say I had any kind of emotional reaction to the characters.
The D&D scenes sucked though. I donât get why people liked them. That wasnât how anyone ever played D&D.
Were you eally into the Zuko redemption plot? I canât remember. When Uncle tells Zuko that heâs not a fuck up because he had to work hard and earn his redemption and therefore heâs proud of himâI tear up every time.
This thread could also become a âWhat makes you tear up in media?â Thread.
Yeah, aside from what I consider to be missteps later on (that fucking beach episode where all the semi-villain characters have bad-writing conversations where they enumerate all of their beliefs and feelings) I liked Zukoâs arc.
The second Earthsea book is a great example of this character arc. I love the way the main character changes over the course of the novel.
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