Art-of-Shannon-Lee

(Spoilers for Season 7 Episode 7 of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Parental Gluideance)


This episode provides evidence that our beloved bubbly muffin mare suffered a physical trauma that caused her clumsiness, 'ditsiness' and made her eye's 'derp' (as a person with derped eyes, I feel like I can say that without it being controversial lol). Of course, we, her fans, love her regardless of her condition mentally or physically. But, it makes me wonder, just how dark of a matter is MLP prepared to tackle? Was this little bit of Parental Gluideance just supposed to be a cute joke? Or is it what it looks like to me, that Derpy had some kind of accident?

So, please let me know what you think in the comments, especially if I missed any key hints to Derpy's past! Derpy suffered brain damage in her childhood, discuss.

_{MLP:FiM (C) Hasbro and the Hub. I have no affiliation with either. This is a review/critique and is also an informative/educational use of the copyrighted material and is protected under 'fair use', a defense to claims of copyright infringement.}

I'd like to see more positive representations of male masculinity in this show. It's contradictory to the feminist angle of the show if they don't bring in some strong masculine stallions who are actually useful... If you hate the f-word, whatever, call it what you want. The show attempts to portray femininity and female characters positively in order to go against the stream of shitty kids media where 'girls shows' are always boring and fashion or sap oriented. The female characters display feminine and masculine traits (eg: tomboy characters) in order to show that being who you are is the important thing and you're not any better or worse whether you're feminine or masculine, female or male, and whether you present with the gender expression that 'matches' or not doesn't matter- and that is the view taken by some (in my opinion, REAL) feminists. As controversial and widely misunderstood as that ideology is, the premise is supposed to be about moving women up because that was seen as a way to promote equality; and promoting gender equality is the more important factor in the ideology than it's title. I brought it up because the show is matriarchal, which should NOT be a feminist ideal and is an unhealthy message, but it is a muddied message because the strength of the female protagonists IS a feminist message. This also adds fuel to the fire of confusion in debates about what feminism actually is. The female characters on the show are shown to be strong because the show wants girls to feel that strength is something they can have and its a good thing. The characters' more stereotypically feminine traits which are often seen as weaknesses are also shown to be strengths, eg: Fluttershy's softness, which is a stereotypical 'girly' trait being portrayed as powerful and desirable, not a disadvantage or mere weakness. Lots of the guy characters are portrayed as feminine -which is consistent with the rest of the show and is great every now and again, just like with the girl characters which are used for  flipping gender roles-  but, instead of the role reversal being treated as reasonable, in the case of a male 'being feminine', it is treated as a joke! These instances are always expressions of hyperfemininity which is intended to look out of place, such as: Spike in a pink frilly apron and Shining crying at weddings. Its fine for those things to be funny sometimes, I mean, we had Flutterguy and that was funny... but it was about her character, not just her sex or gender being expressed in an unexpected way. There was the set up of Flutters being PARTICULARLY stereotypically girly, but Shining and Spike (and almost all the dudes) are always soft or weak. It's just that the show doesn't seem to deviate from this pattern of it being possible for female characters to be anything, but males tend to be portrayed (if at all) only as stupid, immature, irrelevant, evil, weak etc. Some people (crazy tumblr ppl) might say a matriarchal world like Equestria is a welcome escape from the real world, *cringe* however, as a woman and a feminist, I disagree wholeheartedly. It just reflects the things I dislike about some parts of the real world and not in a clever social commentary-ish way, in a tedious, plz staaaaahp way. The negative representation of masculine males (not masculinity OR males independently, together) is contradictory to the whole equality message of the show. Furthermore, all of the most politically and magically powerful and strong forces of good are female! Even Lord Ember and Mayor Mare!!! The message of equality is undermined when boys are always reduced to weakness or insignificance; and also when femininity is exaggerated only for comic relief... In fact, it feels very much out of place in this show, which aims to show femininity in a positive light. Gender swap jokes are funny sometimes, it can be appropriate because the contrast is created as a result of the expectations made by the actions and personality of the character, rather than whether or not the character is drawn with lots of eyelashes. For example: Flutterguy and Hulkershy worked and were hilarious 'coz she's super timid and soft spoken, and Big Mac cross dressing to bond with his sister worked 'coz BM is super burly and reserved normally, not flamboyant and ladylike, if they made the same joke with that trendy blonde guy who was into AJ, it wouldn't have been funny because it kindo'-sorto' would have made sense. On the flip-side, if they'd put Rainbow Dash in Big Mac's big puffy dress, wig and lipstick it would have been hilarious (even though she IS female) because she would never dress that way! EVER! XD A small bit of hope for the future is that these problems appear to be easing with the end of season 6. The coronation of good king Thorax and the sneak peak showing the return of he and, the stunning, Sunburst (ILOVEHIM) in the coming season has got to be a good sign. More guy characters yay!!! Also, despite being a naughty character, Discord has recently displayed a stereotypical masculine trait in a healthy way when he flared up with rage when Fluttershy was kidnapped by Chrysalis. He became possessive, aggressive and impulsive (typically associated with masculinity) 'coz he was prepared to do anything to protect her and that demonstrated a touching yet awesome display of devotion. Not to mention, it was nice to see a bit of dangerous Discord again! Hopefully these things are evidence that the writers have noticed that they've neglected their male characters and audience and are working towards a healthier representation of gendered behavior and expression in MLP.

Now THAT'S how to take shit WAAAAAY too seriously! What's the bet I get h8 for it, eh? XD Seriously, feel free to contradict me if you have evidence from an interview with a writer or a reference to an episode I've forgotten to show that I don't have the whole picture. I'm always happy to suck it up if I'm wrong.

Let's save a community from poverty.

TL;DR? Watch this video for a quick introduction: www.facebook.com/CAREAustralia…

I took the WALK IN HER SHOES CHALLENGE and have raised enough to send one girl to school, but with your help, I could send TWO of EVEN MORE!
Even if you can't donate anything, please share this! Please read to the end to find out how you can help me save a little kid from poverty, underage marriage and a future of inescapable abuse. <3

Donate here to save a little girl, empowering her to pull her community out of poverty: secure.carewihs.org.au/registr…

Why?
In developing countries, women and little girls walk an average of 6km a day to collect water for their families. They miss out on school and an income because they're lugging stupidly heavy water back and forth all day. It is not good for their bodies and it is not good for their futures, but they're stuck.

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I am sharing this journal because it identifies dangers which not everybody is aware of and contains extremely important information about keeping yourself and your loved ones safe while enjoying Halloween! It is so much better to be safe than sorry so please, please, please indulge me the 5 minutes of effort it takes to read the journal. Please.  I know I worry a lot and it's annoying but please just read it and then I won't bother you about it any more.

Everyone should read the linked journal here but especially under 18s because, let's face it, sometimes you're better equipped to keep yourself and your peers safe than parents are and the only way to make safe choices is to be informed!

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Be seen on the roads. Be in a group (especially when you go to public toilets)! Be wary of candy tampering. Be vigilant about drink spiking. Be responsible. Be safe.