Just read the B/A Ship manifesto by Ducks

[liliaeth]

B/A ship manifesto

And this is the reaction I wish I could give.
Problem being, if I did post it there, I'd consider it flaming and that's really not what that community is about.
So just posting it here for my own sake and so I don't get tempted into responding ;-)



Hmmm, interesting, even if I do disagree with almost all of this*eg*

I guess my main problem is that I see B/A from Buffy's pov. (don't really like Angel) And from that pov, I just don't see them fit together. They're too alike to ever be a lasting couple. Because they'd both either have to diminish a part of themselves to be together or fight a constant struggle for control.

That, and I don't think Angel would like the real Buffy and Buffy would get a major shock if she were ever faced with the real rather pragmatic, able to do evil to accomplish his goals Angel.

They're both just so much darker than the other realizes and since Buffy only sees Angel as her childhood's dark knight and Angel sees Buffy as an ideolized innocent version of Darla. They'd both end up severely scaring one another.

Buffy is a dream to Angel, and Angel to Buffy an image, not a real person, and that's one of the biggest reasons why they'd never ever work as a couple.
The only way they could ever keep loving one another, is basically by having them stay apart, allowing them to retain their illusions about the other...

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/_emomuffin/]

Angel sees Buffy as an ideolized innocent version of Darla.

*loves you* I thought I was the only one who thought that the Angel side of B/A wasn't really about Buffy at all, but about Darla...or what he wished Darla was.

[dragonflymuse.livejournal.com]

I don't think there is anything flame-like in your response. But I suppose anyone that doesn't bow to their POV on the Duck board would be miffed at any dissenting opinions.

[frelling-tralk.livejournal.com]

At shippers manifesto it's all about sharing why you love your ship, not for people to debate the good and bad points. So for any essay we're not supposed to give a dissenting opinion.

I agree with the idealization of B/A. I thought that ever since Sanctuary when it was so clear neither of them got the other any longer. Buffy's giggling about cookie dough and splainy stood out so much in Chosen because she had really changed in seasons 5-7, and was no longer the girl that Angel had known.

[liliaeth]

Exactly why I didn't comment*g*
Wouldn't want B/A-ers to start reacing to a B/S ship manifesto either.

I think the attraction that Buffy saw in Angel in Chosen was simple, it was a return of more innocent times. Of her own childhood, which is exactly why she started behaving like her teenage self.
Cause for one moment she could go back to who she was.

[dragonflymuse.livejournal.com]

At shippers manifesto it's all about sharing why you love your ship, not for people to debate the good and bad points. So for any essay we're not supposed to give a dissenting opinion.

Thanks for the clarification.

[liliaeth]

Thing is, this isn't at the Ducks board.
It's a community build to make essays about why you love a certain ship. You're actually not supposed to post to disagree.

Which is why I posted it here to get it out of my system.

[dragonflymuse.livejournal.com]

okay.

[redwulf50.livejournal.com]

Why, why, why did you post this ::eg:: I kept ytelling myself not to look but damn I am weak. I knew it would piss me off, but it didn't I looked into the heart of a preshool adolescent and felt sorry for them. Why cause as I read every point they tried to make was echoed in my mind by the facts, the truth. By the end instead of a "Great Love" I saw a weak willed vamp seducing a fifteen year old child. I guess if this is their idea of "Eternal Love" they need help. Thanks this written manifesto was actually humoros.
Jesse

[sp23.livejournal.com]

I think if Spike had never come along, I would still be a B/A shipper, but the fact is he did and I'm not. Also, over the years, I'm come to realize that the B/A ship added to Buffy's inability to truly love anyone again.

I agree that Buffy's love for Angel is really a holding on to more innocent times for her. A time when she gave her heart freely and openly. But Angelus destroyed her innocence and Angel's inability to figure out a way to be with her without unleashing Angelus, his abandonment of her, closed up her heart.

Perhaps Spike finally opened her heart again. I wish we had more on-screen evidence to confirm this.

[shapinglight]

I didn't follow the link to read what Ducks wrote, because I pretty much know it already. Agree with the poster up above who said that in the end, B/A boils down to a vastly unsuitable and damaging relationship between an underage girl and a man way old enough to know better, which probably damaged that poor girl and made her unable to truly love another person for life.

This is why I could never be a Buffy-hater. I feel too sorry for her.

I think anyone who contines to idolise B/A after all these years, is living in their own little world of unreality.