How to Write a Good Fanfic

9.0 - Myth: All Ships are Valid

Myth: All ships are valid.

When I started seeing the phrase "all ships are valid" I found myself bothered. I knew people were attempting to say "let people ship what they want to ship", but I always felt there was something more to it.

The first time I saw the phrase was also in the Voltron fandom. It was said by JDS and LM who are now known for purposefully tanking the series and trying to make their OTP canon. For LM this was Lotor/Allura and for JDS this was Lance/Allura. Not only were these ships majorly toxic, they're prime example of ships which aren't "valid" beyond the fact "they dated". Specifically they never stopped fans from attacking each other and claimed non-disclosure, yet openly admitted one of the ships fans wanted was never in the plans. LM has also openly admitted Lance raising Allura once regressed to infant hood despite having romantic feelings for her was "okay".

This made me of course question the phrase even more.

I think people jumped on the phrase "all ships are valid" because "let people ship what they want to ship" doesn't mean not criticizing people for invalid shipping concepts. The phrase "all ships are valid" openly declares all ships are valid, yet this is far, far from true. Specifically, we come to the answer when with the definition I found when I looked up for the word "valid". In fact, there are two definitions from Merriam-Webster which apply to this situation – the other two do not.

The first is, "a: well-grounded or justifiable: being at once relevant and meaningful // a valid theory; b: logically correct // valid argument, valid inference." The second is, "appropriate to the end in view: EFFECTIVE //every craft has its own valid methods." A few people will want to argue, "but my ship is relevant and meaningful to me". This is where the word used in context helps as it gives us an actual understanding regarding what is meant by those words, but we also have the definitions of these words to consider.

Relevant means according to Merriam-Webster, "1a: having significant and demonstratable bearing on the matter at hand; 1b: affording evidence tending to prove or disprove a the matter at issue or under discussion //relevant testimony; 1c: having social relevance." The definition for meaningful is rather straightforward and some would argue that simply having meaning is enough despite the fact the definition uses the word "and" rather than "or" meaning that you can't remove the word "relevant" from the equation.

A few will argue that one's shipping choice has social relevance as a part of fandom culture and thus should not be subjected to any further analytical inquiry, yet they don't actually examine the social relevance of their ship and the fact there are ships which are in fact toxic in nature. This isn't to say one shouldn't ship toxic ships, but more of that one shouldn't ignore the toxic part of the ship as that's simply being in denial regarding ones shipping choice, but the toxic element in the ship should never, ever be romanticized.

Of course, there are those who claim whether they romanticize subject matter such as *cough* rape *cough* is there choice as a writer and does not reflect negatively on them within a social context when in fact it does. The act of romanticizing – well, the Oxford Distionary says, "deal with or describe in an idealized or unrealistic fashion; make (something) seem better or more appealing than it really is." That's what we specifically mean in writing but making things like rape seem better or more appealing trivializes what the victims go through along with the social implications.

As such one can argue a ship is not valid based on logical analysis of the ship. For example, let's examine the two ships which JDS and LM tried making canon.

Lance/Allura – The guy in the relationship is possessive but openly comments about being good at winning things indicating he sees Allura as equivalent to winning a prize, but in one of the statements he openly admits he is actively looking for the perfect trophy wife. He also effectively wears Allura down from her stance of not liking him until she gives in – sort of. When he asks her on a date he doesn't tell her it is a date, but even the first two kisses she's never really allowed to say no to. Her confession of love comes after being possessed by a dark entity, yet Allura was struggling at the time with knowing what lay in her future and effectively jumped on the first option because she was desperate. Lance utilize the way he feels to manipulate her into apologizing for the way she feels, yet is openly jealous of any potential rivalry from Keith who is effectively up until now been end game for Allura.