I was scrolling through some videos of a Let's Player I've been keeping up with for over a year now. Looking through at his older stuff from back when I first got into him...then I realized something.

 

I've come a long way in the past year.

 

No, really, I have.

 

 

 

Fine, don't take me srsly, I'll only cry 4 about 20 minutes or so

 

I'm just going to drop a big wall of text about this

 

 

It all started with this video. It's the let's player I mentioned above playing (and failing pretty humorously) at the second case of the first Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney game.

 

I was intrigued by the series. I wanted to know what happened, why Gumshoe was such a tool, who the murderer was, etc. I looked it up, and stumbled across the wikia for it. Through that, I found my way back to a dude playing through the whole series minus the commentary and watched it

I was still new to the internet, but I had found my first fandom

 

At the beginning of my time in the Ace Attorney fandom, I was frequently bored. I had little to do, honestly. I didn't even know what a "forum" was, and I didn't bother to look one up. I usually just read through wikia articles about each character, each case, etc.

 

I was reading through Ema Skye's profile when it started talking about her and Klavier Gavin's playfully volatile relationship; I immediately thought "what a cute couple" and Googled that stuffz.

 

I stumbled across a small fanfiction group on fanfiction.net that was filled with one-shots and what not of the two; I didn't know what in the blue hell a fanfic was, so I clicked on one of the 10 stories the group had to see what exactly was being held behind the blue link.

 

I read and read and read and read; Ace Attorney was the only fandom I was in, and, I must say, they don't really belt out stuff like this fandom does, and there's years between releases of the games. Fanfics were my saving grace in that fandom, and I read and read and read and FINALLY, I wrote my own

 

It ended up being a slashfic between two female characters of the show; one the domineering Franziska von Karma and the other the meek Adrian Andrews. Not going to go into detail given the circumstances surrounding it, but I had a lot of fun writing it. I threw references to my favorite bands in there, what drinks I enjoyed drinking, and just building up a relationship that I felt I did a good job of writing smut with a story (for whatever that's worth.)

 

I developed Franziska's relationship with her adopted brother, Miles Edgeworth as a side-story, but that ended up taking control of the story and I immediately began working on an Edgeziska fic after I finished up my very first foray into the fanfiction universe.

 

The Edgeziska fic, titled "The Road Paved in Blood and Tears," was met with near instant success and remains one of the most popular reads in the Ace Attorney section of fanfiction.net.

 

Link: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/9387354/1/The-Road-Paved-by-Blood-and-Tears

 

After the success of that one, I began belting out fic after fic after fic...and finally, I was tired.

I was tired of Ace Attorney. I had over exerted myself, and managed to burn myself out before I could even witness any new canon content from the series.

 

I ditched my fanfics I was working on and ditched that fandom.

 

It wasn't for a while until I discovered MLP. Afterwards, a member of these forums who just came back today and changed his username into something funky that I can't remember how to type out, cheating himself out of a mention, and a friend of mine in real life, had a My Little Pony notebook.

 

I had seen bronies getting thrashed on the interwebz, namely Youtube, and was well aware of their strange little culture. I had always found it somewhat fascinating, and I had the opportunity to watch MLP episodes/fan vids several times towards the end of my fandom of Ace Attorney, but, I ultimately shyed away from those videos out of fear it'd kill my current fandom (which, of course, should let you see the shape it was in.)

 

After seeing that notebook, I finally threw my arms in the air and decided "What the hell? I'll give it a shot."

 

And that was the end of my activity in the Ace Attorney fandom.

 

Meet the Waifu:

 

 

I remember watching "Hurricane Fluttershy" as my first MLP episode. It was a pretty powerful episode and a great way to introduce me to the fandom. Of course, the thing was, no Rarity

 

I didn't have a set best pony yet, but I was leaning towards Fluttershy.

 

After watching that, I went to a party and got mega-smashed. I still had a bit of popularity in my school (which is gone now), I wasn't very mature and threw caution to the wind when it came to my heart defect (which I'll delve into later), and, quite frankly, I had nothing better to do.

 

I got home much, much later, slightly hungover. I had been gone from my house nearly 12 hours and damn, did I feel sick.

 

As ill-advised as it is, I wasn't in the best state of mind for a 16 year old and decided to dive right in and watch Equestria Girls.

 

That's where I first saw her:

 

Rarity.

 

It feels so awkward posting an EQG pic, but whatever; I was introduced to her through that movie, so I'll just drop this here

 

I was instantly captivated by her. Love at first line, so to speak; I remember just waiting, watching, lusting after her to re-appear in the movie, and, when she did, I was not disappointed; she was everything I thought she would be.

 

I had to have more of this goddess of all things fashionable! Rarity had me trapped inside of her little white hooves, and I had no intention of escaping her clutches

 

I ended up powering through episode after episode, keeping note of which ones didn't have Rarity because I refused to watch those (silly, I know.) and just finding a lot of enjoyment and groveling beneath her. She was perfect, and the passion I feel towards her character has been unlike anything before it.

 

Rarity, Rarity, Rarity. Rarity was always on my mind, and damn, do I love it But why? Why do I love her so much?

 

I actually see a lot of myself in Rarity. I'm an extrovert by nature and can come across as a bit arrogant at times (something I'm striving to improve on) as well as the fact that I take a lot of pride in how I look and dress and, to top it off, I can be overly-dramatic (ask my friends from my Skype group) and I'm an artist of sorts (although, admittedly, not in the same way as her) as well as the fact that I have big dreams that I wish to achieve.

 

She's flawed in many ways like I am, but she manages to overcome it. She always tries her best, and when she fails, she gets right back up and goes to the end of Equestria to rectify her mistakes.

 

If she can do it, so I can I.

 

She gives me strength, in a sense. Strength to grow in ways I never thought possible. I began thinking of her more and more until it grew into a comfortable obsession, one that I still carry to this day, and one that I still turn to for strength in tough situations.

 

That's the kicker, though. The strength she's given me has extended beyond an emotional standpoint, but it's grown to help me physically, too.

 

I suffer from a familial form of dilated cardiomyopathy, which, you can best be described in the picture below:

 

 

My blood flow is really affected by it, to the point where I'm prescribed blood thinners. It also gives me a bit of trouble dealing with stress.

When someone gets stressed, a natural reaction is that the heart begins beating faster in an attempt to push blood through the body. Since my heart is larger than the regular heart, bloodflow is slower due to the heart beating having trouble beating and pumping blood through the body effectively, and when my heart starts beating faster, it tries to catch up and beat like a regular heart, which, isn't good and causes me a great deal of physical pain.

 

It follows me and has been a continuous source of frustration for me throughout my days, but Rarity just makes it easier to deal with.

 

I can come home and look at the pictures of her all over my room and just feel...strangely fine. Like, everything's going to be alright, you know? I question whether or not it actually will be alright, but she's my placebo, essentially, and helps me deal with the curveballs life has thrown at me.

 

That's why I love her so much.

 

When I walked into the fandom, however, she was constantly having dung slung at her for no good reason, and this bothered me. I care about Rarity a lot, and I was like her in many ways. To see her be treated this way bothered me quite a bit.

 

 

 

I started off by taking my anger out on the Rainbow Dash fans. They seemed to be a constant source of Rarity hatred, and I was pissed about it, to put it kindly.

 

I kept putting Rainbow's head to the chopping block and saying awful things about her, when, in reality, the violent thoughts were just directed at her fans rather than her.

 

After a while, however, I realized how silly I was being; it wasn't her fault as much as it was the fact that Rarity hate was due to a flat-out misunderstanding of her character.

So, what could I do?

 

Well, I could get up and try to do something about it, of course.

 

I was sick of it; something needed to be done, and dammit, if I couldn't change the whole fandom, I'd at least strive for accessibility in this corner of the fandom.

 

I started off by following every single topic with potential for Rarity hate. I quoted and quoted and worked and worked at dispelling all of the hatred of her. A lot of it was stuff that could be disproved by facts or outweighed by her good deeds, I noted, and I capitalized on every single opportunity. It wasn't about discussion. It was about change; I was tired of feeling like I wasn't as good as the rest of the fandom because I didn't like one of the popular ponies like Rainbow Dash or Fluttershy. I was sick of it. Hell, I remember getting my fimfic inbox spammed with Loli and pics of Rarity being killed by a Rarity hate group just for being a Rarity fan.

 

I was beginning to make a bit of a change; piece by piece, bit by bit, brick by brick, I was doing my best to stitch together the burden in my hand. I was fighting for Rarity and myself, and no one else, and damn, did people hate me for it.

 

I knew I was hated, and my Skype inbox from back in the early days of defending Rarity would agree with this sentiment. It was a troubling time, but people started to take notice of my work.

 

Finally, I started getting messages from Rarity fans, whether they were open about it or not, that showed appreciation for me. That's when I realized that there was so much more to be fighting for than just my love for my waifu and myself. I could help make a difference in this whole fanbase, because it bothered the majority of us, it seemed.

 

I started posting in the Rarity fan club as much as I could, to drum up support. People began flocking to her. We grew strong, and our fan club shows how far we've come.

 

You know, I can't help but feel there's been a huge shift in momentum with the Rarity fans, and, I gotta say, I'm glad to know I've helped in making it what it is; I can't do it alone, of course, but I no longer feel like rotten fruit is being hurled at me because of my best pony. I contributed to a change,a and dammit, I'm proud of that

 

 

Hard to believe all of that stems from one 13-minute long video of a dude getting slightly irritated with a videogame about lawyers, eh?

 

I don't know why I felt compelled to right a tl;dr essay about my journey on the internet, but meh

 

Stay fabulous, friends