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Are you also a shipper?


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Raftina



Joined: 15 Mar 2011
Posts: 3282
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 4:46 am Reply with quote
Shipper, supposedly short for relationshipper, is a person who is a proponent of a romantic relationship in a fictional work.

You may have spotted shippers as people who spout a surprising amount of vitriol against certain characters who are seen, correctly or not, as threatening the supported ship. The Macross Frontier discussion thread provides some examples of the comments one might expect from avid shippers directed against the rivals of the ship.

But Macross Frontier is too tame of an example. Actually, shipping is often wishful thinking, and my personal perception is that the amount of shipping going on is inversely proportional to the importance of romantic rivalry in a work.

But enough explaining shipping. The writeup is for the rare people who are shippers without knowing about the term. Now for the question: Are you a shipper in general? Have you participated in any shipping historically, and are you participating in one now? How did you enjoy the experience? Do you have any patterns in selecting your ships?

As for me:

I became an avid shipper from the time when I participated in extended arguments in favor of Forestshipping--civilly with the Ranchshippers and not so civilly with the Sageshippers. I, as a good shipper, of course blame the Sageshippers for the rudeness. I have since then generally favored the childhood friend for my ship. The only exception that comes to mind is Infinite Stratos, where I ship IchikaxCharles. Of course, the fact that IS has two childhood friends most likely blunted the impact of the characters. I disliked Houki intensely for the flat tsundere characterization, and the dislike was enough for me to turn against the other childhood friend as well.

The simulcast I had been following recently does not admit of shipping. Thus, the latest ship I've supported was AoxFleur. It is yet another example of betraying my beloved childhood friend ships, but Naru and Truth were such awful characters that I find it difficult to support Naru in any fashion. The discussion for that series turned so much on the supposed failure to live up to its predecessor that it never got around to shipping, so I have nothing to report there. Actually, because I don't follow a lot of simulcasts, and the remainder discussion for older series is generally not as heated, the last anime shipping in which I participated extensively was as an AsuMey shipper. Naturally, I place the blame for the vitriol of the discussion entirely on the crazy AsuCaga shippers.

Maybe anime viewers are just not as militant about shipping as gamers. As a FeMCxAigis shipper, I'm still fighting FeMCxShinjiro and FeMCxRyoji shippers two years after P3P was released.
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marie-antoinette



Joined: 18 Sep 2005
Posts: 4136
Location: Ottawa, Canada
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 9:55 am Reply with quote
I would consider myself a shipper but I despise ship wars. I think they are ridiculous and have been known to disassociate myself from people who ship the same things as I do because I can't stand their attitudes about a perceived "rival" to their pairing of choice.

This is probably helped by the fact that I will frequently ship one character with multiple other characters (to use an anime example, I ship Haruhi from Ouran Host Club with Hikaru, Kyoya, and Mori).

I don't think there is much of a pattern to my shipping, aside from the fact that one character involved will usually be one of my favourite characters in the show independently, though frequently whoever they are being paired with isn't.
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naninanino



Joined: 18 May 2008
Posts: 680
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 10:16 am Reply with quote
Well, I would probably lie if I said I never thought of the possibilities. It can be fun as long as one doesn't go overboard and remembers that most romance in anime and other related junk is just an added spice.
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rosebrook11



Joined: 20 Mar 2011
Posts: 1181
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 11:13 am Reply with quote
I would consider myself a shipper, but like marie-antoinette I can't stand shipping wars.

I just really enjoy the idea that different relationships in anime can be expressed in multiple different ways.
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Kruszer



Joined: 19 Nov 2004
Posts: 7981
Location: Minnesota, USA
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 1:10 pm Reply with quote
If it's actually relevant to the shows genre such as a romance series, yes, I do play favorites. I'm not the type to be irrational about it though.
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Veers



Joined: 31 Oct 2008
Posts: 1197
Location: Texas
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 1:30 pm Reply with quote
Sometimes, and it doesn't depend on the genre, but it does depend on original work having evidence supporting said shipping arrangement so that it does not require much of a leap to arrive at, and even then it's not something I care enough about to spend much time thinking about, much less arguing about or taking very seriously.

spoiler[Oh, and by the way Totori & Mimi OTP.]
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EricJ



Joined: 03 Sep 2009
Posts: 876
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 1:52 pm Reply with quote
I just watch the shows and leave the shipping to Federal Express.
At least they guarantee it'll finish overnight. Wink
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Tris8



Joined: 30 Oct 2009
Posts: 2114
Location: Where the rain is.
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 1:53 pm Reply with quote
Raftina wrote:
I became an avid shipper from the time when I participated in extended arguments in favor of Forestshipping--civilly with the Ranchshippers and not so civilly with the Sageshippers.
What's Forestshipping, Ranchshipping and Sageshipping?

I guess not really for me. I had no idea 'shipper' came from 'relationshipper', but that makes a lot of sense. My attitude towards romance in anime tends to boil down to 'what will be will be'. A lot of the romance in anime (in particular harem shows) is just a tease anyway. There are some exceptions though, when I get really invested in the characters and want a particular couple to work so that they get the happiness they deserve =]. The biggest example of that is probably Princess Tutu. After time for reflection I'm very glad they ended it the way they did but I originally really wanted spoiler[Duck and Mytho] to get together.
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RGaspar



Joined: 04 Oct 2011
Posts: 235
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 2:33 pm Reply with quote
I've been a shipper for years before I knew the TVtropes label.

It's not something I'd think about if the show doesn't have romance as the main theme, or at least, romantic overtones. For example, there wasn't any "shipping" in Death Note.

But I was totally "shipping" while watching RahXephon lately. For anyone interested: Very early in the series, I was all for Ayato spoiler[& Quon] since she gave me good Rei vibes; Then it was spoiler[Ayato & Megumi (she's a lovely tsundere)], and in the end I wanted spoiler[Ayato X Haruka and that's what we got! Yay!]

While I don't really like "Shippers Wars", and I find them silly; I'd get mad at some shows if the definite couple feels forced (Manga example as of late: Welcome to the NHK's spoiler[Sato X Misaki], anime example: Clannad's spoiler[Tomoya & Nagisa.] Sometimes, the best girl/guy for a given character seems to be somebody else.

With that said, not every character that gets rejected is the "perfect" candidate. I can't picture Goku with Android 18, or Shinji getting Misato, but I so want to see Shinji X Rei in the new Evangelion Movies Razz
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Vaisaga



Joined: 07 Oct 2011
Posts: 13224
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 2:38 pm Reply with quote
I'm definitely a shipper. I just get invested in the relationship between two characters and want to see them hook up. Sometimes it can add to the fun, though it can be disappointing if they don't get together at the end (it helps that the winner is usually obvious at the start so you can prepare yourself). Still, it becomes that much more enjoyable when you encounter fan art or fanfiction of your prefered couple.

Of course the ship wars are pretty terrible, especially with how down right vicious some attacks can be. The worst I've had the displeasure of encountering is in the Nanoha fandom. You can't even say anything remotely nice about Yuuno without all the rabid yuri fans going after your blood. Canon status or not, people have the right to ship whatever they damn well please without being hassled about it.
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Hitokiri Kenshin



Joined: 14 Feb 2012
Posts: 291
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 2:54 pm Reply with quote
I kinda ship at times, but more so when at cons and taking pictures of cosplayers as some I ship like Ash/Misty and Naruto/Hinata. And sometimes I take pictures of some that will definately not happen but as in-jokes like Sasuke/Temari and if I were ever to see them Agumon/Lilymon. And with those I sometimes have to explain on why they're together. Ones I won't do are yaoi/yuri shipping when the characters don't flow that way. No matter the gender of said cosplayer.
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Raftina



Joined: 15 Mar 2011
Posts: 3282
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 7:12 pm Reply with quote
Tris8 wrote:
What's Forestshipping, Ranchshipping and Sageshipping?

Forestshipping=Link x Saria
Ranchshipping=Link x Malon
Sageshipping=Link x Zelda

They're all Zelda: OoT ships.

Quote:
I guess not really for me. I had no idea 'shipper' came from 'relationshipper'

I should've said ship comes from relationship, and the various ship related terms derived from that, because relationshipper and relationshipping are not words, standard or slang.

RGaspar wrote:
I've been a shipper for years before I knew the TVtropes label.

The terms have also existed for years before the TVTropes label. I am quite sure the term existed long before I came across it.

Vaisaga wrote:
Of course the ship wars are pretty terrible, especially with how down right vicious some attacks can be.

You people are too peaceful. Ship wars are fun, and I enjoy being in them, though not to the extent that I would try to start one. The arguments are amusing enough that I'd gleefully join one where it starts, though.

It's hard here because nobody else is hardcore enough to start those, or at least in the topics I tracked. >.>

Quote:
You can't even say anything remotely nice about Yuuno without all the rabid yuri fans going after your blood.

Psh. Yuuno is just not manly enough.
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Vaisaga



Joined: 07 Oct 2011
Posts: 13224
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 7:43 pm Reply with quote
Raftina wrote:
Ranchshipping=Link x Malon


Hm, guess I'm this then.

But what's Link/Ruto called?

Raftina wrote:
You people are too peaceful. Ship wars are fun, and I enjoy being in them, though not to the extent that I would try to start one. The arguments are amusing enough that I'd gleefully join one where it starts, though.

It's hard here because nobody else is hardcore enough to start those, or at least in the topics I tracked. >.>


Maybe if people were doing it for the fun, but no, when both sides get super defensive and actually take offense that some one dare not accept how wonderful and pure, and etc their prefered pairing is, no one is having fun then.

Also, here we have mods to prevent that stuff from happening. And I don't think any of them would solve the problem by just banning the people who don't support their ship as some other sites tend to do.

Raftina wrote:
Psh. Yuuno is just not manly enough.


Heh. That's the funny part. There's lots of Chrono/Fate and Erio/Fate stuff out there but no one raises a stink about that. Bring Yuuno into the picture, though, and it's all "How dare you destroy Nanoha and Fate's wonderful lesbian family!!!"

It's whatever's convenient for them. Some may go on about preserving the canon, but I bet those are the same people who'll go around and make Yuuichi into a monster so they can pair Mai and Mikoto together.
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rheiders



Joined: 05 Jul 2011
Posts: 1137
Location: Colorful Colorado :)
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 9:29 pm Reply with quote
Shoujo lover that I am, I guess I do ship some pairings. But it never really escalates past squealing over a cute bit of fanart or whenever they're on screen together for me. However, I hate shipping wars and don't read fanfiction so I don't really consider myself a "shipper." I don't hold any ill will towards people who don't like the pairings I like, or characters who get in the way of my preferred pairing. My friends who are very hardcore shippers sometimes get a bit annoyed at me for not getting all that into it.

Also, I usually ship canon pairings because they usually make more sense within the narrative. If a non-canon pairing makes more sense than the canon pairing, unless it's a situation where the mangaka probably wasn't allowed to write the pairing s/he wanted to (a lot of gay pairings fall under this umbrella, unfortunately), then it is usually a fault of the writing. For example, I ship Aya x Yuuhi from Ayashi no Ceres because I think they have a lot more chemistry than the canon pairing.
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Ferian



Joined: 10 Feb 2009
Posts: 162
PostPosted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 9:53 pm Reply with quote
Confused Mai x Mikoto only makes real sense in My-Otome. Mai is too straight in Mai-Hime. Then again, most yuri ships make more sense in My-Otome since that show is far more fan-catering.

On topic,


Basically, my story in a single picture.

Regarding other ships from that series, unlike some people, I am a NanoFate purist, and an equal opportunity hater of all other pairings as such - Fate/Chrono or Fate/Erio are just as unacceptable as Nanoha/Yuuno. A ménage à trois with Hayate is about as far as I am willing to go. More seriously, though, as far as I know, most people's problems with Yuuno are 1) he's not badass enough and 2) it's an actually plausible pairing, not to mention a ship that hasn't been sunken in canon. Both silly reasons in my opinion, though most other reasons I've heard brought up are sillier still.

Negima was probably the series that cemented my status as a shipper, with several visual novels and Lucky Star being important stepping stones on the way. Negima is the first series that I have taken part in a shipping war over as I tried to sink as much of Negi/Asuna as I could. Good riddance that crowd somewhat quieted down after spoiler[the revelations about Asuna's ancestry and age] For a while, I mostly kept to anti-shipping, with KonoSetsu being a prominent exemption, but in the end I ended boarding Negi/Yue with Negi/Eva taking place in a remote future.
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