I'm Not Sure That How Purple Meant

It's so, so distasteful how the only 2 canonically referred to female characters are there to provide and cater to a family/male partner; nothing more than a counterpart. The entire "I don't want to introduce major female sticks into my writing because I don't want to include romance within my characters" bit is misogynistic. Nothing more, nothing less, and I wished the fandom would say it how it is. I'm tired of people trying to march around eggshells and thorns with the wording. It's okay to criticize your favorite. You need to say it.

the problem with mitsi (or as i like to call it. mitsogyny)

(context: this was written under a youtube video, which i'm sure most of us have at least seen pop up in our recommendeds, in response to many people taking criticism against the new episode. it has been edited a little to be more cohesive as a somewhat-essay)

ok, i wanted to write out a rant/essay/ramble/whatever sort of summarising the criticism against mitsi's plotline because a lot of the people here seem to be misunderstanding the fundamental issue that people have with it, including some of those people themselves.

first off, an analysis that i think tell both sides of the argument very well which i feel should be read before reading the essay: Mitsi: What Makes A Fridged Character (and why y'all are wrong about it) | an AvA essay by InksandPensblog. i will note: i don't care to discuss whether mitsi was fridged or not and that won't be of much importance in this post. the above link gives some insight into some of the fandom's criticism of mitsi and how she was "fridged", defining common tropes for examples. that's what's relevant to this post.

the main issue with mitsi, in my opinion, is less with the fact that mitsi's a girl and moreso the fact that she's one of the only female-coded character in the series, and that her character's main purpose was to further victim's own development. the other arguably female-coded character in the series is pink, who (like navy) only really exists to explain purple's motivations. i don't have much of an issue with that since they're not meant to be important or sympathised with at all. that's not their job in the story.

with mitsi, i've seen people point out that she has more character to her than just victim's love interest and supporter: she invents rocketcorp, she's smart, she's kind, innocent and helpful. narratively speaking, she shows other creations' relationships with their animators, parallels her innocence with victim's trauma, and introduces victim to the outernet (as most fans call the stick realm).

but most of this things imo are either stretches or invalid arguments. she's not really a 2/3-dimensional character in any way; her main character traits boil down to the fact that she likes to be in service of others with no nuance behind why she likes helping people. she hypes up victim for the villagers, she starts a company with him to share his talents with the world, and she helps him overcome his trauma from alan's torture. all of her main plot beats center around victim: and while technically the sticks are genderless and free to be interpreted however the viewer wants, alan and most of his team see all the main characters as male, and that subconciously affects how they're written. mitsi, the first major female-coded character, spends most of her storyline in service of victim, a character not written as female.

there's also the issue of her being victim's canonical love interest. i feel like this statement from alan is important to keep in mind (don't mind the sound effects and edits, this is the only isolated clip i can find at the moment). in particular:

"i just assume that [the ava/m characters] are just a bunch of bros]. i haven't thought of adding any female stick figures but i think it'd be good. i don't want to introduce any romance though, i don't want that to be a theme."

he seems to have changed his mind on that last part, which is fine, but the notable part for me is that he seems to associate female characters with romance from the getgo. before anyone misinterprets this, i'm not trying to call alan sexist or anything. but there's a common issue with women in stories being reduced to just a romantic partner for the male lead, and mitsi falls under this, with her entire character existing to serve victim. (not to mention people will make things about romance whether you like it or not. that's just basic fandom. search up grapeduo or chodark.) even her death is to put victim on the path of vengeance--- it doesn't need to happen to show the extent of tco and tdl's destruction, because that's already made pretty clear in ava s2 the flashback and the earlier scenes showing various characters escaping burning buildings. when you write a female-coded character whose only purpose is to serve a male character, you're contributing to sexist narratives.

a counter i see many people point out with the idea that she has no character is that she does have character traits, it's just that they're generic ones like "kind" and "innocent". the issue is that she has no flaws to counterpoint this; it's not that she didn't have enough screentime. in ava4 for example, we see tsc's flaws pretty clearly; they can be very mean when they want to, they're petty (albeit for a fair reason), they're a little impulsive. this is shown in 11 minutes (from the moment they come alive to the end of the video).

with mitsi meanwhile… she doesn't seem to have any flaws? she helps victim whenever she can. she's nice to all the villagers. her customers all like her and she's a great leader at rocket corp (to note, specifically as part of a pair with victim. they're a power couple, she's barely given credit for her work alone). she has 13 minutes of screentime, or 10 if you count from her waking up in the outernet. there's plenty of opportunities to show her having flaws; maybe she acts a little selfish during tdl and tco's attack, only wanting to help herself and agent smith, or maybe she overworks herself, or feels awkward at having too much attention (and that could also be why she redirects so much attention to victim, she's shy). you could argue that the episode needs to develop victim and agent smith too, but ava4 shows that's easy to do too: just a few seconds dedicated to showing rgyb fighting over who leaves first shows that they can be selfish and childish. it's very easy to insert a moment like that for mitsi.

it's a little disappointing when the first major female-coded character in ava is completely flawless, with no personality outside of being nice and helpful for others.

also, slightly unrelated, check out this quote from mitsi's plushie website: "her white featureless face seems to ooze mystery and feminine power all at the same time." her main character trait, as a woman, is being feminine. it's irritating as someone who's been raised a woman to see her reduced to just her gender. she feels more plastic than a person, like the concept of what a woman should be (perfect, kind, useful) and not an actual character/person.

i would expect more from the writing in the series seeing as it's not just an independent passion project anymore, and has multiple writers that all could've worked to flesh out mitsi, or at least get a sensitivity reader of sorts to point these issues out. it's extremely disappointing and i can understand why people were upset.

tldr: the problem isn't just that mitsi's a girl, or that she's nice or dating victim, it's that she's written in a misogynistic way.

NAVHYYY navh Navy u NOPEEE nope it's not bad if you love him because HES JUST SUCH A GOOD WRITTEN CHARACTER ITS INSANE

Is it bad I like navy

Finally drawing mono 💙

these two make me so sick you have no idea

Has anyone thought of how triggering it might be for King to learn about Purple's household?

The dude attempted murder on 3 people while simultaneously passing on to illegal transactions, months of research, sleepless nights, genocide for the pursuit of his kid whom he only ever felt pure love for; I can see how he would sort of dissociate the whole time, finding it hard to believe that a parent could feel and direct anything other than that frame of mind

more half backed sonic art oof

It's very sweet to note that Purple (naturally) takes a lot after his mom and is generally more closer to her in terms of his traits/mannerism. He's a little feminine so this compliments the theory!

You know I thought my idea was a stretch and to not be literal because of the simplicity of his design, but he definitely takes after her appearence too. Fanartists human designs I need you besties to do your magic.

Pink's/Orchid's kinda official color (or at least the closest we'll have)

People, I made a very big discovery. Do you know how in Note Block Universe when they tells us about Purple's mother, all of it is shown in musical notes? This have lead to incorrect or innacurate predictions of what the true color of Orchid is. BUT I THINK I ACTUALLY FOUND IT, FROM AN ACTUAL AB'S TEAM MEMBER (second image)

I was re-watching the Dojo Cast Shuriken's vid in the morning. And they talked about Shuriken's role in Alan's vids. What happened is that they talked about this scene and how they animated the sticks normally at first but then with coding they transformed it all to the musical notes we saw. THEY SHOWED THIS

THEY DID THE SCENE NORMALLY AT FIRST. There you can see Navy/RB, Purple and Orchid with their normal appearences!!!!.

I was in doubt at first. But if you take notice they used Purple's actual color and not a modification of it for whatever reason! That means that they could've also used Navy's and Orchid's ACTUAL COLORSS!!!

NEAT (Time it's shown: 41:43)

YouTube

Shuriken - Where is he now? - Dojocast Ep.15

🔸Today's guest: Shuriken! @Shuriken255 https://x.com/Shuriken255🔸Art SpotlightAK91300 https://x.com/AK91300emberisu https://x.com/emberisu

goodnight idk I think. Hope thisbguy never wakes up

Don't skip 🚨Emergency

✅vetted by@gazavetters,(#365)✅

My name is Mahmoud Al-Halaq, from Palestine - Gaza - I am 29 years old. This message is addressed to every person who carries compassion, kindness, and love in their heart. After 470 days of war on Gaza, the destruction that has occurred, the displacement we have faced, moving from one place to another, and the loss and death of loved ones and friends, I found myself alone without a home or place, and even the prices of food are astronomical. The world has changed so much that life has become gloomy and boring. Therefore, I ask for your help in rebuilding myself, my life, and my family's life anew. You are our remaining hope in life. If there were an opportunity to work, I would not waste a minute nor ask for help from anyone, but I urgently need assistance for my family, my children, and the women to rebuild what has been destroyed and crushed in this devastating and painful war. Thank you for your time and support; we draw our strength and resilience from your support. 🍉

Please donate

✅vetted by@gazavetters,(#365)✅

Chuffed

Help Mahmoud Survive in Gaza

Hello, my name is Karina. I'm organizing this campaign for Mahmoud Alhallaq, whose previous campaigns have been shut down or have had their

some doodles recently!! :33