wait a minute is this the person who asked if jesus was a tits or ass man
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Dragon Hoard- Apollo.
She’s a tricky one who doesn’t like being near the populace, She has a heart of gold and a flare for magic.
LOOK AT THIS ADORABLE KEEPER OF DICE!!!
Hiccup, the Doctor, and Role Models for Boys
I absolutely adore the How to Train Your Dragon franchise. Both movies are full of heart and have some of the most fascinating, nuanced, well developed characters I’ve ever seen in a movie targeted at children. Also, they have dragons. Really, they could’ve stopped after animating Toothless and I would’ve been happy.
But for those of us who are hyper aware of gender dynamics in media, HTTYD is an absolute delight. The entirety of the first movie was a subversion of gender tropes in media from start to finish. The movie showed us an egalitarian society where men and women were considered fully equal without making a big deal of it. Astrid was clearly the most best fighter of the group, but no comments were made within the movie about how she was exceptional or rare as a woman for this trait.
The relationship between Astrid and Hiccup also defied traditional gender dynamics in media. Astrid occupied the traditional male movie role: she was the strong fighter working to overcome her fears, develop her skills, and become the most powerful warrior in her village. It’s Hiccup’s job to teach her the value of empathy and compassion, and he ultimately encourages her to accept her village’s traditional enemies: dragons.
The second movie was equally as good as the first. Five years after the first movie ended, Hiccup is still viewed as an unconventional leader in his community. While everyone around him believes war with this movie’s villain, Drago Bludvist, is inevitable, he still attempts to negotiate for peace.
Drago is presented as a dark parallel to Hiccup. Both grew up viewing dragons as their enemy, and both have been hurt in various ways by dragons. But while Hiccup reacted with empathy, attempting to understand and befriend dragons, Drago reacted with violence. He dominates and controls them through aggression and brute force. Without giving too much away, Hiccup is ultimately able to defeat Drago by displaying the trust and love that he and Toothless have for each other.
In short, Hiccup and the entire HTTYD franchise challenge ideas about masculinity and femininity. Both men and women can be strong warriors, and both can be empathetic and gentle. Hiccup is a hero because he is thoughtful, intelligent, compassionate and kind, not because he is violent and aggressive.
All of this is a very long, roundabout way of saying that I don’t buy the argument that the Doctor should only ever be portrayed by a man because the Doctor is the only positive role model for boys.
The typical argument asserts that the Doctor “is the only non-violent ‘superhero’ male role model" because he solves his conflicts by being clever and kind, not by being violent or aggressive. I’ve always found this argument to be a bit perplexing. Sure, the Doctor is a wonderful role model in this regard. Steven Moffat (and yes, I do think he sometimes says wonderfully brilliant things), summed it up best when he said:
When they made this particular hero, they didn’t give him a gun, they gave him a screwdriver to fix things. They didn’t give him a tank or a warship or an x-wing fighter, they gave him a call box from which you can call for help. And the didn’t give him a superpower or pointy ears or a heat ray, they gave him an extra heart. They gave him two hearts.
These qualities make the Doctor exceptional, but not necessarily unique. Most of the media I grew up with featured a male protagonist whose strength came from compassion and love, and who defeated his enemies by being clever and kind instead of being violent. And this type of model is increasingly common.
One of my earliest childhood heroes was Luke Skywalker. I remember being stuck on a long camping trip as a kid with nothing but the original trilogy to entertain myself and watching those movies a dozen times each. I would play at being a Jedi at every new campground, waving around a tree branch like a lightsaber. But I remember being struck by the fact that in the end, it wasn’t Luke’s strength or skill with a lightsaber that made him a hero. He threw down his lightsaber, refused to fight, and was saved by his father’s love. His strength lay in his ability to empathize and love.
It wasn’t long after I started watching Star Wars that I began reading the Harry Potter novels. Harry rarely tried to solve his problems with violence, and when he did, it was always shown to be counterproductive and regrettable. He was ultimately able to defeat Voldemort not because he discovered a super powerful spell or became the best wizard ever, but because he understood the power of love better than Voldemort ever could. Harry cast a disarming spell, and Voldemort’s killing spell rebounded on himself. Voldemort was killed by his own act of violence.
Around the same time I was reading Harry Potter, I was watching Avatar: The Last Airbender. Aang was the most powerful kid in the world, the only person capable of bending all four elements. He spends the first three seasons mastering all of the bending styles in order to defeat the Fire Lord and save the world. But by the end of the last season, he begins to question whether it would be right to kill the Fire Lord, a man who committed genocide by killing Aang’s entire nation and plunged the world into a massive war. Aang solves this conflict creatively, refusing to kill the Fire Lord and instead learning an entirely new bending style to disarm him.
All of these characters had the ability and skill to solve their conflicts with violence, and they aren’t above fighting to defend themselves or others. Even the Doctor, who is held up as the ‘only nonviolent hero’ for boys, isn’t above using violence when there is no creative solution and his adversaries refuse to negotiate or back down ("No second chances. I’m that sort of a man").
But these heroes are more well known for their empathy, compassion, cleverness, and their desire to avoid resolving conflicts with violence. And they all share many traits in common with the Doctor. Hiccup is intensely curious about his world and is constantly trying to learn more. Luke tries to understand someone who most people assumed was fundamentally evil and gave him a chance to change himself. Aang is unironically enthusiastic about everything he encounters and isn’t afraid to show it, even if it makes him appear odd.
And Harry, who even years later is still in many ways the lonely boy in the cupboard under the stairs who would rather do whatever dangerous thing must be done alone, needs his friends. They keep him grounded, they keep him from brooding, and they encourage him to talk about what’s bothering him. He is better when they are around.
The Doctor is not the lone positive male role model for boys, he’s one of many.
I’m not convinced that letting a woman portray the Doctor would “take away” this positive role model for boys. First of all, her presence wouldn’t negate the impact of the twelve men who preceded her. And I think such a regeneration would do a lot to challenge ideas about gender in media. It would teach young boys that certain character traits and behaviors aren’t inherent to any gender, but are learned. It would teach them that they can look up to women as their role models, instead of shaming them for doing so.
So lets talk about how the Doctor does and does not defy traditional models of masculinity. Let’s talk about his value and importance as a character. Let’s talk about how the character of the Doctor can be a role model for little boys and little girls, regardless of gender. But let’s not hold the Doctor up as an ideal, dismiss and ignore other characters that don’t fit the traditional mold, and use this argument to derail conversations about whether the Doctor should ever be portrayed by a woman.
- Skyrim: runs at dragon, screaming
- Dragon Age: runs away from dragon, screaming
- How to Train Your Dragon: runs with dragon, screaming
- Httyd 2: swings stick at dragon, screaming
- The Hobbit: runs around dragon, screaming
- Dragon Tales: Dragons, screaming
- Bad Dragon: shoves giant dragon dongs in ass, screaming
Alexandra Khitrova
raspberry dragon
blueberry dragon
cherry dragon
grape dragon
cloudberry dragon
!!!!
not to Discourse but I’m a cis man and my partner is an afab enby and if you call us a “straight couple” I will personally come to your house tie you to a chair and make you listen to a podcast about gender identity on endless repeat
this is specifically @ the people who saw us at pride together and saw them wearing a “THEY/THEM” button and still referred to them as my “girlfriend” you’re all cancelled thanks
it’s called respecting queer people juice
y'know the really amazing thing about the notes on this post - apart from just the sheer number of people who are, like, viscerally terrified of the existence of a person who isn’t cis - is how many of them are responding to things that aren’t here. specifically, you’ll notice I said nothing about my sexuality. I didn’t say I identified as non-het, or that I considered myself part of the LGBTQIA community. on the flip side, I also didn’t give you any reason to believe I’m not bi, or that I’ve never been in a relationship with a cis man. y'all know nothing about my sexuality from this post and you don’t need to and I’m not going to tell you about it now because! this post! was not! about me!
it was about respecting my partner’s identity. and the fact that they don’t get that respect from people in the exact community that they should be able to count on getting it from.
ie, you.
they are not het or cis, and no relationship they are in will ever be a “straight relationship” because they. are not. het. or. cis.
everyone in the notes gatekeeping me because I’m “not oppressed”? I never said I was. the person you’re really attacking and invalidating by shitting on this post is them, a pansexual nonbinary person who is unerasably queer.
huh. it’s almost as if the whole “we can’t let straight men use queerness to worm their way into our community” discourse is just an excuse to hate trans people, isn’t it.
Hey OP? You’re great, and I hope you and your partner are doing great.
No a sheep hoarding dragon
That sheep’s not doing a very good job of hoarding, it’s just got the one.
[Description: An illustration of a flock of pale colored sheep; right in the middle is a spiky bronze-colored dragon, his tail tucked under the neck of one of the sheep. The joke is it’s meant to be a “sheep-hoarding dragon” but I misread it as a “sheep, hoarding dragon.”]
Imagine a dragon at Antiques Roadshow, appraising its hoard
Imagine the dragon hoards monetarily worthless things like newspapers or old bones and the person appraising it getting more and more nervous about telling the dragon their stuff isnt worth anything
Imagine that the dragon knows this and just likes watching the person squirm.
The dragon actually hoards uncomfortable situations
I just love it when people come up with random weird animal or dragon things and iguanamouth illustrates them just because.
OH NOOOOOOOOOOOOO
;-;
Anyone crying over this needs to think about how insufferable a dragon raised by a seagull would be
SEAGULL: What’s wrong, Tommitta?
DRAGON: MOM, MOM, THERE’S A THING, A THING, IN THE PUDDLE, IT’S SCARY
SEAGULL: WELL LETS GO FUCK IT UP THEN
DRAGON: THERE, THERE, THAT, FUCK IT UP MA
SEAGULL: YEAH SWEETIE LETS Oh, oh no, oh dear, uh oh