tracyalexander:

stealthboy:

the fandom was okay with pearl being coded as mentally ill when she only showed “good” symptoms. her desire for neatness and symmetry was funny! her nervousness was cute! we could laugh at those and enjoy them perfectly fine. with only those, pearl was allowed to be mentally ill

but now pearl is showing “bad” symptoms. she has obsessive behaviors. she has little to no self worth. her handling of grief and trauma isn’t pretty, it’s troubled and unhealthy. and now it’s no longer fun for her to be mentally ill. it can’t be laughed at, it isn’t cute, so now the fandom no longer wants her to be this way. now it’s unacceptable

pearl is a wonderfully written mentally ill character and this fandom really needs to realize that mental illness doesn’t only come with the symptoms that you can easily accept or make a joke out of. acknowledge your ableism already and learn from it

Oh my god, someone finally put into words exactly what had been naggling me about the whole thing for a while. I couldn’t get why people were apparently suddenly down on her since her characterisation seemed very consistent to me. She’s doing her best, people.