Cringe Culture Stamp

I haven't made a stamp since I was a teenager, so here goes!


It's about time I said this.

Cringe Culture:
1) is immature
2) is a waste of time
3) hampers creativity
4) hurts self-esteem

Why?

1) Cringe culture is immature because full-grown adults are getting a fit over how some kid made a purple winged demon fox or a love interest for their fictional crush. Do those things hurt anyone? Not at all!

2) As illustrated above, it is also a waste of time. Why bother getting worked up over another person's characters, especially when they never asked for input or constructive criticism in the first place? Participants of cringe culture should get a better hobby!

3) It hampers creativity because you become too self-aware when you start working on your projects. This story arc you're so hyped about? Cringe. The fact that you made your OC related to a secondary or background character? Cringe. Don't even think about making a strong female character, let alone ship her with any of the main characters, unless you're totally fine with her being called a Mary Sue. See? Your options to explore and play with your works become smaller and smaller.

4) Lastly, cringe culture hurts self-esteem in so many ways. Let's use myself as an example:

I started doing self-inserts when I was 9. Then, I went on to a new fandom and made OCs for it, one of which I would ship with one of the main characters. This went on until I was 14, and learned that some people think self-insert shipping was cringey, so I dropped it.

I still did OC x canon ships until I was 17, since learning about Mary Sues and that I had some people call my character one.

My characters and self-inserts all helped me cope with the fact that I couldn't fit in with my peers, despite the fact that I transferred schools often. First fandom I did a self-insert for, was so that I can meet my favorite actors and interact with them. Next fandom after that, I wanted to see what it would be like to live as an alien from that series, and the love interest OC was made because I had a crush on a main character (who was around 11-12 years old).

I struggled not only with fitting in, but also bullying, image and weight issues. Typical tween-teen stuff.

I wasn't exactly the best writer before college, but I really enjoyed exploring new worlds and seeing dynamics between my OCs, self-inserts and canon characters as a means of coping with the fact that I am different and that I don't have that many friends IRL.

Sadly, cringe culture has damaged my self-esteem, so I am working on getting it fixed up!


Sorry if this was lengthy, but I hope I got my point across!

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