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hi everyone !

i'm lucie (@ pvreheroines) and for the past year(ish) i've encountered, endured and come out the other end of the shadowhunter chronicles fandom. i'm making this post on my second account because i don't want to be reminded of all of this all the time on my main because of social anxiety.

before i proceed with this post, i don't want you to send hate to me because of it. this is my opinion that i am allowed to share, and i've encountered enough people who have gone through some similar experiences (of whose names i shall not disclose) to feel confident in sharing my experience.

if problematic people are allowed to share triggering and offensive content, then i feel that it is well within my rights to create a post that highlights it. if you decide to send hate to me as a result, you are merely sinking to their level.

as well as this, some language or experiences may be triggering to some (tw acephobia, homophobia, transphobia, whitewashing)

KEY:

bolded = important/relevant segments

indented = main point of the paragraph

red bolded = triggering content

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initially, the tsc fandom was a fun experience for me, but as time moved on, i had some incredibly negative experiences, including anonymous hate, rude users and dealing with relentless negative discourse in the fandom.

the first and main one that i encountered was that of user rinadragomir, of whom this post will be centered around.

despite rina being a good friend to me in the beginning, as time moved on, rina became slightly aggressive and rude towards myself. i didn't really think of it that much initially, as i had left tumblr for a month long period of time and thought it may have been from that, but as time progressed, and i began to make edits, i noticed that rina kept unfollowing me, and every time i notified her, she'd act like it was a mistake (something i didn't realise until later). eventually, it went to the point she ignored my asks, messages and mentions. and i began to see i wasn't the only one.

as i began to test the waters a bit more, trying harder to get a response, i began to notice some things that she did:

- rina will only answer asks that praise her or compliment her or that relate to things that she takes interest in.

- her language is offensive and problematic and sometimes triggering, including the use of 'faggot' in a post about matthew fairchild, a bisexual character.

- people who rina feels threatened by will be blocked for no good reason, of which rina tried to cover during one circumstance by saying that those people whom she blocks continuously go on rants about characters and books, which, in my opinion, is a weak defense and not at all true.

- rina will try and force the centre of attention to her in a forceful manner that many find confrontational and way too dramatic.

- she defended problematic topics that she could not have a full insight of, such as the white washing of cordelia carstairs, a persian woc, in which she spectacularly messed up and showed her true colours by defending the racism.

personally, i found this behaviour offensive to myself, as well as some of the matters (although some had not yet occurred) and did not continue to try and contact her and decided it best to block rina in return to avoid the drama as much as i could.

after contacting other users, i found that it was not an isolated incident, and that others had experienced similar things where rina had blocked them for calling her out, or had ignored them for no good reason.

below are some screenshots, which i'll detail.

after a conversation with friends, it became clear three of us had been blocked before. as time moved on, and that group grew, we found almost all of us had been blocked for no apparent reason, even if they had been close to rina and had talked to her, she had still blocked them for weeks at a time. we were all appalled at the childish reaction of it all and the immaturity in the action by choosing to block others who might just be right or might just be better at editing that she was.

in her eyes, rina does not do anything wrong, and even though we all believe at some point that the words we say are perfectly accurate, we can still recognize where we have stuffed up and need to work on. for rina, she merely acts like it never happens and attacks you if you try and bring it up.

above, we see rina trying to justify why she blocks people after i sent a message asking why she blocked me about two days before this post was made.

despite being a bisexual woman, rina has displayed lgbtqphobic comments towards others. below is another example (tw acephobia, genderphobia)

we see here that rina is almost forcing her own opinions on others, saying that people of that age can not, essentially, know their sexuality by then. different generations experience different things, and some people do know who they are and how they feel sexual attraction or do not feel sexual attraction at that age sometimes.

as well as that, rina does not acknowledge that anna lightwood is a genderqueer character. while cassandra clare is problematic in her own rights, she has in fact, confirmed anna IS genderqueer, which makes rina's ignorance obvious and blatant.

below (tw f slur)

here we see rina using the f slur, and using it rather freely. no trigger warnings, no apologies, nothing. only after some people sent her asks that she did not post did she edit it, but the stain remains, and so does the problem from it.

the next major problem that relates to our first problem of blocking other tsc creators is rina copies other creators.

you can clearly see rina is copying the idea of what dani has done, almost saying the exact same phrase on her 5th dot point.

other instances include copying an edit style almost to the letter. this instance has occurred only once, where rina ended up deleting the post. still, it was seen, and people don't miss nor forget those sorts of things.

not long after i tried to contact rina about blocking me, i started adding a gradient text to my captions (i was still creating tsc edits at this time) and not long after, it was bought to my attention that rina was doing something similar.

yes, it's only text, but the sentiment remains; she blocked me - still has me blocked - doesn't respond and then copied something as small as that. and people see that; it's happened in a few instances where she'll copy things.

in the next point, we explore rina's disrespect of asian culture, particularly amongst chinese and korean faceclaims.

on multiple instances, rina uses korean singers as jem faceclaims, such as below:

where we see rina use taeyong, a south korean singer as a faceclaim for jem, a half chinese man.

as someone who is half chinese myself, this in particular gets under my skin because it is obvious that this is NOT a chinese man. mixing it up can be avoided and in my opinion, this is blatant ignorance to an obvious issue one may see in using these pictures and this particular faceclaim.

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to summarise, rina is one of many things that make the tsc fandom toxic, overwhelming and triggering. i've seen friends deactivate and leave because of the tsc fandom, i've seen people intimidated by behaviour such as rina's and people who have been hurt by it.

i'm glad i've made this post, but i'm also scared to make it, because i know that there are still people who will jump to rina's defence and ultimately go after me for it. but, i know people are just as fed up and i want this behaviour to be highlighted in red flashing lights that let people know what kind of person rina is, because bottom line, she's not a nice one. she treats people like shit, says fucked up things on matters that she should either stay out of or research before she inputs on them as well as gaslighting those who try to point out problematic things.

here are a few links below that explore the issues further than what i can take them here:

- rina defends cj along with a friend while ignoring the main theme of the issue, that being the whitewashing and overfeminisming of persian woc, cordelia carstairs | here.

- rina's take on the whitewashing of cordelia on another post | here.

- '13 year olds can't know they're ace at the age of 13' debate | here.

- calling matthew fairchild a f****t | here.

- the post that came after user youngreckless' post addressing the white washing and rina trying to defend her own words | here.

- rina includes a south asian singer as a faceclaim for half chinese jem | here.

- cc confirms anna IS genderqueer | here.

if you have anything else you want to add, please reblog it with links or screenshots. anything to help bring this behaviour to a stop.