Why Do Creators Hate Shippers?

[HGohwell]

I've noticed a trend coming up on a lot of creative forums and servers and discussions. Fandom in general, but specifically shippers, are getting a lot of derision from creators. Even indie creators like here on Tapas who kinda need a supportive fanbase.

So, specifically on shippers, I've seen it here too, although not as prominently as other places, but there seems to be a growing idea that shippers are trouble. Now, obviously, a lot of this can be put down to those typical rabid shippers, and no one denies they are out there, but I often feel like people who put shippers down as misunderstanding your story, or that it's somehow a bad thing, don't actually understand how shipping actually works. As if shippers are somehow degrading your characters and story but wanting to pair them off. And I understand to an extent, if your story isn't about romance or love or whatever and people are trying to make it about that, it can be frustrating, but is it really a sign they're disrespecting your characters and your story to say that they think these two characters would be good together?

And to those people who genuinely seem to think shippers are trying to disrespect your story, often even more targeted at BL shippers specifically, I like to direct them to this specific bit of Nozaki-kun. Because actually, this is how most shipping happens. Out of love of a character, not out of disrespect.

So, I'd generally like to know. Why do creators seem to have decided that shippers are trying to ruin their story? Is it really just a few bad eggs that have given everyone a bad reputation? Or do some creators really not understand that it comes from a place of love? Is it just me overthinking because lockdown is driving me crazy and it's actually only me who's noticed this?

[Random_Guy]

Honestly I think part of it is just a few bad eggs. Some shippers can go absolutely nuts over their, uh, lemme just check the notes here.... OTP? OTP. Although according to these very official peer reviewed studies the same is true with all fandoms.

Additionally, I believe some creators just aren't okay with fans trying to "change" the already decided pairings or even just focusing too much on the pairings when that really isn't the message.

[Kann]

I think it's just a few bad eggs.

Or maybe the fact that you cannot really deal with shippers in a way that won't make you look bad in the end. You could say something about the rabid ones if they make you angry, but what do you do with the ones who just happen to ship something in your story that just doesn't sit well with you?

[IdiotWithPencil]

Is it really just a few bad eggs that have given everyone a bad reputation?

this^ I mean just to list a few:
Clance almost got an animation studio fired for Voltron
Fujoshi's paired 2 IRL brothers as lovers and almost ruined their relationship
Shippers of Tokyo ghoul harassed the creator to the point they had to leave twitter and go into hiding
Reylo harrassed the actors of fin and Kylo and in Kylo specifically, they attacked his wife and son.
Magi Shippers attacked the Creator for the Alibaba and Morgiana relationship

and these are only from the top of my head, can you really blame people for not liking shippers when this is what most hear about them?

Or do some creators really not understand that it comes from a place of love?

Love my ass, they do it cause A) it's fun (even I talk to my sister about ships I like and we discuss on why one works and the other doesn't) and B) Most really just want to live vicariously from their ships (I mean if they really come from love then why the fuck would they pair so many toxic abusive and horrible ships, looking at you dekuXtodoroki and the super illegal KeithXShiro <-<)

yeah ships can be fun but don't say it's an act of love at most it's you saying this character should date this other one cause you like them together disregarding if the relationship would actually be good for said character

[phoenixrenaissance]

I for one don't care which of my characters people ship with others and I do enjoy drawing "crack ships" of my own characters but I do worry that people won't be satisfied with how the relationships finally turn out at the end.

I do think it is mostly a problem of bad eggs not respecting the choices of the creator especially when they choose to direct their complaints at the creator.

Either way, creators and readers should respect one another. The whole point of shipping is to play around with different possibilities, not to create like, "a better canon" or something.

[joannekwan]

I don't mind shippers, let them have their fun!

BUT a line does get crossed if shippers harass a creator to make their OTP canon. I can also see them coming across as annoying if all they do is comment with 'So when are X and Y gonna bang??!!' and stuff of that ilk. OR if they ship like a character who's a minor with an adult character, yuck.

[indagold]

I've seen it here too, although not as prominently as other places, but there seems to be a growing idea that shippers are trouble.

You make it seem like shippers are discriminated minority group lol a creator can choose to not like them, they don't get any special privileges from any other fan. I can see why shippers are more annoying than other fans cause other fans headcanon important plot points the author has been teasing and working on while shipping its clear their headcanons are just for their own needs and not the plot. Especially if the story is not a romance story, shippers can be very annoying I imagine.

[HGohwell]

I always think it odd shippers get a bad name for the minority who do bad things but if we applied the same to creators, well, we'd all be accused of some awful things, right?

Love my ass,

Yeah that's the kind of attitude that I tend to direct towards that video because that is how most people ship. "I love this character they deserve to be happy who do they have the most chemistry with?" And most the time it will be chemistry with a basis (which as has been noted many times is where shounen anime hits a rock with BL because a lot of shounen anime girls might as well just be rocks and the chemistry is all poured, sometimes a little too much, into the best friends and rivals).

(I mean if they really come from love then why the fuck would they pair so many toxic abusive and horrible ships, looking at you dekuXtodoroki and the super illegal KeithXShiro <-<)

Everyone buckle up because I'm about to explain some heavy stuff about how shipping has evolved and modern culture doesn't have nuances anymore. And...

Modern fandoms and creators have lost the original difference between ships for romance and ships as short hand for relationship. The original meaning of a ship was that you were interested in the relationship between them, be it sibling, platonic, romantic or otherwise and that is why there were terms like OTP, BroTP and NOTP, all to denote different forms of relationship. For instance BroTP is your favourite friendSHIP. Unfortunately as fandoms have evolved and terms haven't ship became synonymous with romantic relationships rather than any relationship and "I think it would be interesting to see how these two would interact". The best remaining piece of that sentiment is the crackship, to be honest, saying "these two who've never met could be interesting" as a joke and then by exploring the characters deeper realising that actually they have a lot in common and could work. And honestly, saying people can't ship bad stuff is ridiculous, because that's like saying no one can write about murder because murder is bad. There are nuances. As creators we should be more aware than anyone that there is a place in fiction for exploring the toxic and illegal. And perhaps that is how some people show their love for a character? I love this thing so I will do an in depth character study of them in hard times? I'm sure you love your characters, does that mean you've never done anything awful to them ever? If loving a character means we can't ever put them in unhealthy situations, I think a lot of us really hate our own creations. This also becomes more complicated with the fact that fandoms are now starting to interact world wide, there are different standards for different countries, different practices on how to deal with things and different customs within each section of the fandom for how seriously they take "fiction=reality" vs "it's just fiction chill" and all the area in between. And that not even going into questions like well what if you don't know the characters age but then it comes out they're way older/younger than you thought, or their siblings, or a rather hilarious one I once saw of "well he's just been revealed as the younger brother of the original girl with only 5eps to go, so shipping him with the reincarnation's big brother is incest and everyone who did so for the past 100eps is now retroactively an awful person" type conflicts that have arisen out of fandom policing.

All that was a long ass way of saying that there is no grey area in fandom for anything but "if you ship it you must want them to be endgame" and unfortunately there are some people who do ship things that are problematic without even realizing that (or do and somehow think that's still romantic???) But, as I have said, that's usually not the majority.

yeah ships can be fun but don't say it's an act of love at most it's you saying this character should date this other one cause you like them together disregarding if the relationship would actually be good for said character

And as I said above, anyone who has majorly shipped something for the sake of liking them as a couple rather than wanting to explore something, the sort of thing most people would be happy to call endgame, does usually take into account what canon has given them and does usually come from consideration of what would be best for a character they adore.

You make it seem like shippers are discriminated minority group

I asked a question about a trend I have seen growing in the years I've been in creative group. I wanted it to remain specific, so picked the one that I've seen the most without delving into the regular debate on BL. Would you like me to widen it out to why do some many creators seem to show contempt for their fanbases in general while still trying to keep them sweet because they know they need their support? And again, I feel this sort of attitude is rather sneering and taking into account only bad eggs who make a noise rather than the majority and I've already made my thoughts on that clear. Also the implication that you can't be a shipper and be interesting the plot is rather insulting, don't you think? Or do you think everyone interested in romance between characters has no interest in plot?

[rajillustration]

I feel like it's a pretty small percentage of creators that hate on their shippers. Most of them don't mind or just pretend like they don't see it. If you have creators that do mind, well then--that's a creator who minds. There's no concrete rule that says you must love it when your characters are shipped by rando's on the internet, and for some creators they have a very deep and personal connection with those characters.

Me personally I don't give a damn about any shipping at all, but some creators are sensitive souls and they're allowed to complain.

[IdiotWithPencil]

look even if it comes out of love, they still are the most toxic part of every fandom, When was the last time you heard of a fandom going after the authors family cause they failed at a story twist?

Even the GoT fandom only attacked the directors and left their family alone, but shippers? Nah fam they go to the friend's families hell even the children aren't safe.

not all shippers are crazy but all crazies come from shippers, is how I see it =P

Also let's get something straight here Shipper=/= Shipping I ship characters that doesn't mean I'm a Shipper, if you ship and aren't actively debating/Defending it then I don't think you're a shipper you're just a regular fan, a shipper defends their ship to high heavens against others is how I see it.

Edit: I don't mined that they ship I mind that they cross the line >=/ like seriously some people need to get a life

[vothnthorvaldson]

I can't speak as a creator because my comic is so small, but as a reader:

Aside from the illegal or very disturbing ships (and obviously harassment of IRL people, but I never saw that in works I read), the other kind I really don't like seeing (and find somewhat disrespectful to the creator) is when they are so OOC that they make no sense at all. It makes me think the person did not even read the story, or is superficially reading with one only purpose: finding people to ship with no concern on plausibility.

Otherwise I don't mind non-canon ships. Sometimes, when they are plausible, they can even be the contrary, a nice hommage to the creator ('we like your story enough to build more on it, and know it well enough to build logically).

[Inspector_Spinda]

I'm sort of the opposite personally x'D when there's a fandom I like and people just ship randomly all over the place, it's pretty annoying. But if people started random shipping my characters I'd think it was hilarious. But I do get those who hate it. They're your creations and sometimes it's really uncomfortable to think of them in ways you don't want them to be. It's like losing control of what you're suppose to be in control of.

[Freemints30]

Its seems to be less shipping but the actual shippers themselves. Like I have rarely really seen people actively hate shipping itself, with exceptions of of a few creator who hate any same-sex ship(thou in danny phantom's case the biggest detractor was a fan who harassed anyone who ship same-sex ship ) or when the ship is adult/child.

Like most shipper are cool people however the small minority tend to lead to the most toxic shit or the ones who make the head lines(eg, tokyo goul, voltron, starwars, ect).

I remember my brother and several others went from indifferent to actively disliking harry/Heromini in harry potter simply because the shipper were that crazy, with fanfics and rants and all sorts of shit(mrs scribe story is an oldy but most insane of them all) especially after the book ended. To the point people who like that ship but are not crazy actively separate themselves from those people with a diffrent name. (one fanfic I read as a joke had pedo apologia and I was grossed out).

Really I think creators just find it dumb when people act this way towards a relationship compared to reacting this way due to lore. Still dumb but not as dumb.

Me I'm fine with shipping and I do it myself, but I do not care if its one I dislike as long as the creator isn't a dick. But really I have baaaaaaaaad experience with fanatic shippers and fujoshis . Like people in general should just chill on this.

[indagold]

You say shippers "are in trouble" like they're a precious guild of dedicated scholars dying out and not a bunch of people who just wanna see two characters bang XD Your words not mine.

And so what if I don't really care about shippers? Why is that so important? They're not the creators of the piece of work, they're the fans riding off the coat tails. You assume I am bringing pitch forks out and getting ready to burn down all the precious shippers because some are crazy when in reality I couldn't give a damn about it whether its the crazies or normies, I never got the appeal of shipping and frankly most of it has very little impact on the plot of the story, i'm sorry but it seems rather pointless why I can totally relate to creators getting sick of it. The more popular your work gets, the less canonical and less sensical the ships are to the point you know its just people wanting to live out their fantasies.

[Kann]

I feel the same way about shippers when it comes to my stuff. As long as people respect each other, it's fine even with the crackiest of ships.

[kimketli]

As a creator I don't mind shipping. I like they invest energy into my comic. I also would be happy to make illustration for them on my Patreon about these non canon ships.
This far I only got one comment what bugged me what was like:
"If you don't do the ship I want, I'll call your comic queer-baiting." (It was phrased more passive aggressive but I don't remember exactly)
It made me think WOAH!
It's hard to imagine it came from pure love. :DDD It was more like a blackmail.

[Cavechan]

Personally, I enjoy people shipping my characters but I could see how if someone was commenting about a clearly non-canon ship every few pages or so that could just get annoying.. unless if it were like funny or something.

On the other hand, there are certainly times when the canon pairings are clearly not working and the work becomes frustrating to read. I'm going to use my favorite example here, which I've brought up before, of Seraph of the End (spoilers for anyone not up to date with recent chapters).

Summary

You have this relationship with Mika and Yuu that has been built up the entire f'ing story. They care for each other, support each other, need each other. They get physical with each other. Their relationship very clearly goes deeper than friendship.

And then you have the author's treatment of Shinoa. I love Shinoa's character but the way she has been written recently I feel has just been a disservice to her character. I still love the manga and everything, it's just this one thing with the character that literally came out of absolutely nowhere. Where you literally have other characters telling her directly "You love Yuu." And Shinoa's just like "no" and the readers are just like "um, where did this even happen?" because there's literally been zero romantic situations with the two of them. Like not even a hinting of it. And it has no relevance to the plot whatsoever. Like everything else that has happened could have easily happened without this "development".

It's just really weird and the only reason I can see them writing it this way is because there needs to be some sort of straight love for the protag at the end? I guess.

So in this case, I suppose I would be an unhappy shipper. But even so I wouldn't go around and out of my way to bombard the author with "Mika/Yuu!!11" Like, it's their story. If they want to make a totally incomprehensible relationship, then that's their thing, but also don't get upset if people are like "Hey. You've built up this huge Mika/Yuu thing and now you're suddenly pulling Yuu/Shinoa out of your ass."

I don't mean at all that people have to obey or respect shippers, but if you pull crap like that, then you're probably going to get some flak for it.

Basically, there isn't anything wrong with criticizing the bad writing of a ship or the betrayal of a ship. What is bad when it gets to the point as others mentioned where it's constant bombardment or goes into harassment territory.

[NickRowler]

I don't mind shipper (even crack ones), however I have a low tolerance for when they get aggressive. I have seen hardcore shippers get angry at creators for ignoring their ships. And creators getting annoyed at shippers may stem from people feeling entitled to having their ship in the series.

The weirdest annoyed shippers I've seen was people who shipped the two girls from the When Marnie Was There after seeing only the trailer. Then after watching the film, they learned how wildly inappropriate that was and got angry at the film.

[Twoony]

I can say as a creator, it may also come from past experiences. I have no issue with shipping, but rather the actions of the reader about that shipping. Harmless shipping is fine, a few comments here or there about how it's cute or something, but when a creator is constantly bombarded or even attacked for a ship not happening, that's the issue. (Also, creators can't tell when people are being sarcastic through a comment. I've read some comments that seem downright cruel, only for them later to come across as joking. It's difficult to tell what someone REALLY means, but that's a whole other topic.)

As some mentioned, it's a few bad eggs that ruin the experience. Unfortunately, those past experiences can lead to many creators just tensing up at the idea of it. I had that happen to me when someone read my story, back when I didn't have much of a fanbase, and started harassing me to the point that I was crying for days on end. I couldn't get on my Wattpad account without some form of aggression from this person that I ended up muting for my own safety, only for them to make another account to comment on every single chapter again; about 200 comments that you simply can't avoid seeing even when you try. They were so angry about their ship not happening and so hateful of a particular character that I lost all joy of writing. Eventually I reported them and it stopped, but to this day I definitely tense up when I see ships that aren't the main couple in my comments, especially since I do have a much wider audience now. The paranoia is there even when I know most are all in good fun. I'm still working on this, but I won't even read the comments of that particular story anymore.

Again, it's the bad eggs that ruin it for everyone else. I've had some people ship my characters. I try to ignore those comments and let them have their fun, unless it does actually make me uncomfortable lol then I may ask them to take their discussions to private messaging or something.

EDIT: Creators shouldn't be mean to the readers though because they don't like shipping. I think it's fine to discuss, perhaps let the reader know what is making you uncomfortable and hopefully negate it from happening again while also letting them continue to enjoy their ship.

[Riisana]

A bit unrelated to the topic, but I'm really sorry that you had to go through that.

It sounds really scary. Hope you're feeling a lot better now though