We all wanna be good people; I get it. More importantly, we want to look like good people. On the internet especially, I think most of us want to look educated, woke and like we’re fighting for social justice. But unless you actually bother to unpack your own internalised biases, you might go so far left you fall down that alt-right pipeline.
We all remember candybbug’s video, right? If you don’t, here’s some context: in June, a creator named candybbug posted a video criticising Genshin Impact. Some of her takes were stuff that fans had been complaining about for years; others were so downright awful it even had Honkai Star Rail players and Wuthering Waves players defending Genshin.
Like most people, I’m sure candybbug had good intentions: to call out Genshin’s misogyny and other issues. So what made her one of the most hated creators in the gacha community?
Female Characters’ Outfits
The way Genshin has portrayed its female characters has been an issue for a while. Every time new female characters get released, it’s always the same design; choker, detached sleeves, short skirt and long socks. It’s a stereotype at this point.
Yes, Genshin’s female character designs lack diversity and tend to be revealing. Hoyoverse knows what designs are gonna sell; sexy girls that appeal to their largely male audience. It’s understandable for female players to want more diverse female character designs, I do too. So what made candybbug’s take so awful?
Here’s what she had to say about Navia’s design; “This design is basically a sluttier version of a traditional French aristocratic gown”. Key word: slut. Y’all…words have weight to them. “Slut” is a derogatory term describing a woman who has a lot of casual sex. Calling someone a “slut” or an outfit “slutty” puts blame on the person themselves or the outfit itself, rather than those sexualising them.
Also, what’s so bad about clothes being revealing? Revealing clothes themselves were never the real issue here; it’s the fact that most of the female characters have the same revealing outfit. Yet somehow, the clothes being “revealing” was made into the main issue.
“Predator” Allegations
One of the biggest reasons candybbug’s video flopped so hard is because she implied Linnea was a creep, which upset a lot of neurodivergent people. Linnea is headcanoned by many to be neurodivergent-coded due to two main reasons: her origin story and her behaviour.
Linnea’s backstory is based on changeling myths, where a baby gets swapped at birth by a changeling, leaving the couple to raise a non-human child while their real child has been stolen. It’s been theorised that these myths were used to explain the behaviour of neurodivergent children. Linnea is also seen displaying behaviours that a lot of neurodivergent people identify with, such as having trouble with boundaries, special interests and masking.
So yes, Linnea can be interpreted as neurodivergent-coded. So what does candybbug say about this? “She fantasises about being rubbed up on by Sigewinne who, again, looks like a child […] It reads as extremely fetishistic to me which is a problem when the people she’s fantasising about look like children”.
That is a wild accusation! Again: words have weight to them. Yes, Linnea has issues with boundaries when it comes to living creatures, but implying that these behaviours automatically mean someone is “pedophilic” diminishes the weight of what actual pedophiles do.
Too Far Left
I could go on and on about candybbug’s other terrible takes, such as her double standards when it comes to the male characters vs. female characters and her racism towards Natlan characters, but this isn’t about that. This is about how someone who wants to be radical and alt-left goes so far left they end up alt-right.
At some point, “not all female characters need to wear revealing clothes” became “female characters should not wear revealing clothes”. “Neurodivergence isn’t an excuse for bad behaviour” somehow became “neurodivergent behaviours are bad”. These are not the “woke takes” you think they are.
While people did call candybbug out for her critiques, this is not the end. Fans have been complaining about Genshin’s issues for years and with younger Gen Zs caring more about virtue signalling than actually calling issues out, takes like these are just gonna get worse and worse until we fully circle back to 1800s beliefs.
Seriously, y’all; check yourself. Think to yourself: why do I believe this? Where does this idea come from? Do I actually care, or do I just want to punish someone? If we actually took the time to look inwards before blindly believing takes online, we might actually be able to fight for social justice.
Jenpai's Corner 
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