i feel as if the atla fandom argues about a lot of meaningless shit but one of the biggest (and MOST inane) points of contention to me is that....katara didn't get a statue in lok. like. i could go on about how katara's presence in lok was way more meaningful than anyone else in the gaang appearing and how she was a steady solid presence for korra who had far more of an impact than just a quick punchy fight scene and was actually compassionate and skilled and her political presence sets SO much of legend of korra's worldbuilding up and how the fandom is really notorious for reducing katara to a poor helpless victim as much as possible because she had a complex and significant and emotional character arc that didn't always have the most "classic" #girlboss plot points but the truth is like. its a statue? its a fucking statue??? a fucking hunk of rock im sorry??? i could not care less about a piece of rock over a character's actual presence?
“LOK just reduced Katara to a healer” is such a tired take because it simply doesn’t, the fans do.
Katara is 80+ years old, she’s not going to be the frontlines of every battle anymore, and the fact she still uses her healing abilities to help those in need is nothing to scoff at because “well that’s what girl waterbenders are expected to do!”
Which yes, Master Pakku does make sexist comments about how the ‘healing huts are where women belong’, but that doesn’t mean no women is allowed to pursue healing in the name of feminism, it’s about choice. Katara didn’t chose to learn healing back then, but chose to in LOK.
And furthermore, I feel like this plays into how people buy too much into “show don’t tell” where if it happens off scene it ‘doesnt count’ which takes away from all her accomplishments that aren’t explicitly “i just took down 50 bad guys single-handedly”.
Like it’s stated, in the show, that Katara made bloodbending illegal, which at the very least implies some that she held some political power.
I just think it’s silly how people take one episode of Katara, as a teenager who’s actively fighting a war, saying she doesn’t want to be a healer, because of said war, when she’s being pushed into that role by a man and think it applies to 80 year old Katara who’s doing that role of her own volition