Steel Accord

A religion wouldn't be a bad way to put it. Perhaps a thematic philosophy? The characters embody both vices and virtues we try to learn from and cite often. Just like how one doesn't need to be told about Noah parting the waters to escape the Egyptians, you wouldn't need to explain to a brony that Dash did the Sonic Rainboom to save Rarity. "Love and Tolerance" sounds more like a slogan than an ethos. Bronies seem to just generally promote being civil and friendly. That said, we do seem to place a high emphasis on the value of individual identity and effort. (All our fan made material, BroNYcon, unique pony avatars with individualized cutie marks and even names!) I likewise "planned" on becoming a Brony. I heard it was good from TV Tropes, which is where I go to to find new things to read and watch, and looked up the first episode. At the get go though, I thought "brony" just meant an older fan of the show, not this extended network of interconnected fandom. So I guess I can say that I wanted to be a fan, I just didn't realize just what that meant until later. I regret nothing! You KNOW something's good when the concept of short term amnesia is an exciting prospect! I only recently made my little brother a brony, so I GET TO WATCH THE WHOLE THING OVER AGAIN WITH HIM!

It's not exactly subtly put, either. When she visited Sugarcube Corner, she just wanted to get to know her student's friends better. Meanwhile the Cake's were freaking out at the tiniest inconvenience, to her! When Rarity kissed her hooves in thanks (many times) Celestia looked visibly uncomfortable. I think Royal Protocol must get a bit tedious after the second century.

Wow, those two were made for each other! I love Celestia as a character for what she stands for. Celestia is the sovereign of Equestria in both the deistic and secular sense, but unlike Xerxes (the movie version, not the real one) she is a kind motherly figure instead of an imposing overlord. (That and she's the real deal instead of just claiming divinity.) My take on the *ahem* "alternate character interpretations" of her is that some bronies are suspicious of anypony who commands absolute power, even someone good. It is common in some mythologies for the gods to be corrupt so it could be just a stigma that is hard to shake. Keep in mind that Equestria is a fantasy world, many of which slide towards romanticism, as do many fans of the genre. Historical romanticists were often suspicious of long-standing ecclesiastical institutions. I.e. the Chuch. (I'm Catholic, if it matters, which I hope it doesn't.) Celestia is a one pony church AND an absolute Monarch, you do the math. (Though technically speaking she's now a dual-arch with Luna, but that's a recent development.) Celestia in many ways resembles a post-singularity character. Which are really hard to portray as benevolent in fiction, though not impossible. See Q and The Doctor. The former being callous and playful, but ultimately supportive of the human race's advancement. The Latter being unequivocally a good guy. Those two get off easy on the audience's trust because they are funny and have a lot of screen time. Celestia is composed, though not a stiff, and we don't see a lot of her. Malevolent god-like beings are easier to understand because, in order to work, they have to be petty enough to care about opposing the mortal protagonists but not actively hostile enough to just snap their metaphysical fingers and end the story right then and there. An episode revolving around the Princess would be tricky at best, again not to say it can't be done, her nature just has to be treated carefully. Princess Celestia has been around for millenia. (Scource: Luna's imprisonment was 1,000 years ago and Discord said he was imprisoned for eons.) Any attempt at accurately portraying something of such age as an understandable, physical life-form is quite a challenge. Ultimately though, this is what makes her the archetypal Queen, God, and Mother in the Junigian sense of those words. The Princess has, in many ways, transcended petty mortal vices like envy, pride, and wrath. (Luna got jealous, but she's the younger sister. Of course "young" again in relative terms.) That isn't to say the Princess doesn't get angry. When Twilight abused her magic and caused a riot in "Lesson Zero" she was understandably upset with her student. In contrast, when Fluttershy essentially stole her pet, but otherwise caused no potentially lasting harm, she wasn't even perturbed. Celestia still has emotions, she's just old enough to know WHAT to get angry about. Still, she tries to foster good relationships between her subjects and takes time to understand and walk amongst them. Prime example; when the Smith family came to Canterlot, Celestia could tell they needed a home without them speaking a word of such concerns. What does she do? Give them an entire valley for settling, that's overlooked by Canterlot. Thus, she's indirectly responsible for the creation of Ponyville. Indirect action, in my opinion, is where Celestia's character shines. (Laugh at the pun if you must. I'll wait.) Celestia's will doesn't need magic to be evident and real. She has so much experience and wisdom that she knows how and what to say or do at the right time to get the result she wants. In the pilot, when Nightmare Moon's return was nigh, Celestia sends Twilight off seemingly unconcerned about her student's warning. When all is revealed however, it turns out Twilight's assigned task of making friends was actually purposeful instruction instead of off hoof advice. You wanna really think about it, Celestia might have recognized Twilight as the Element of Magic from her first day and took her as an apprentice purposefully to free Luna. (Though, comparatively, that's cutting it pretty close to the wire if she didn't already have contingency plan.) Then there is sending Twilight back her Friendship reports when Discord had pretty much won. Celestia gave Twilight the resolve to save the world not by direct words of wisdom but just by reminding her student what was important to her on a personal level. Considering that much of the world is directly effected and controlled by the "mortal" ponies already, Celestia's intangible influence in starting, reacting to, and changing events makes her a better metaphor for God than raising the sun does. If God, does effect the world in a story, a better way to tell that story is by having Him do it through people! If Celestia just waved her horn to solve every problem at hand, it would damage not only her as a character, but the quality of the show! In past generations of MLP and similar shows, the world is so simplistic and the characters so devoid of negative emotion that conflict is nearly non-existent. The Princess could very well invoke such a reality! She could scorch away the Everfree Forest, and remove failings from everypony's mind, yet she chooses not to. To create such a world, would make her just as bad as Discord, just by imposing absolute order as opposed to absolute chaos. No conflict, no resolution, no advancement. Complete saccharine stagnation! Celestia (like God) understands that people/ponies aren't perfect. That bad comes of free will, but if you are forced into doing good, the action looses it's meaning. Celestia knows mortals are good at heart, they just need to find their way. As one who's been around long enough to know every roadblock and how to overcome it, she's more than willing to nudge her subjects in the right direction. Princess Celestia, bronies, she would probably laugh along with the haters and encourage us to as well.

Death's steed is named "Binky"? Well he certainly wouldn't be out of place in Equestria.

I personally think they are in their late teens or early twenties seeing as they all have jobs and live alone. Plus with custody of younger siblings as is the case with Applejack and Rarity. Their sometimes childish behavior is simply mortal failings. (Haven't we all met people that acted like they were ten?) They were meant to be role models that the girls who watch this show could grow up to be, but also demonstrate that nopony's perfect. That's a very cynical way of looking at it. Cynicism! On a brony forum!Braeburn: Shame on you. I do think they're at least 18, but because teenagers don't live by themselves. I'm 20 and I still act like I did when I was 14. (Albeit, that means I'm still an introspective stoic. So I might be a bad example.)

I don't presume to be 100% correct. My theory was an attempt to explain my own feelings, anypony could be different from what I've said and probably is. I think it is possible for someone to be like both. Somepony could be supremely confident when doing something like gymnastics, motocross, race car driving, or something similarly "extreme" (even doing Rainbow-like self narration), while still being cripplingly shy in social situations. Or vice-versa!

Thanks, I'll check that one out.

I'm actually not as worried about this as I once was. -On Wednesday January 11, 2012, Equestria Daily reported its 100,000,000th pageview, and the ticker is still climbing. That's how awesome ponies have become, in just under a year-and-a-half. -In adition, my friend is an artist who frequents deviantart. She said the day Derpy spoke, there was sketches updated every half-hour of her! -Star Trek premiered on September 8, 1966, the first convention was hosted in January 1972. Now how long did it take for BroNYcon to become a reality? -Fan artists like Acoustic Brony and Beatle Brony put out songs faster than some professional bands have in the past. -The entire creative team, including Lauren Faust herself, have talked to the fans and responded with enthusiasm. The posts Lauren herself responded to have ranged from major topic discussion, to just complimenting fan art, to actually comforting bronies talking about traumatic life events! -The adobe flash animations, Epic cupcake Time and Luna's Lament could easily be mistaken for episodes in their animation and voice acting quality. (Even if the former, is a parody, it still captures Dash's attitude and Pinkie's manic behavior.) Bearing that in mind, if the show is ever cancelled. It might be possible for a group project to MAKE THEIR OWN! -According to John de Lancie, "Roddenberry warned me that I had no idea what I was getting into with Star Trek. Someone should have warned me about My Little Pony! Egads!" . . . Bronies out-fanned Trekkies! The youngest brony will be an old man by the time it dies down, and by then it's impact will have been felt. We will tell our children these stories of how we actually made friends and became better people because of this fandom. We will show them Equestria through the official material and the beautiful creations of our little circle. All in all, I think we're in it for the long haul. What do you think? Big Macintosh:"Eeyup."

*Bows respectfully*

If by "taking the time and going through all this" you mean "re-state preconceived assumptions" than your welcome. I'm no psychologist, I just do way too much reading and thinking. Yeah, like I said, not a clopper myself. Which is what I found odd because I shared their enthusiasm, just not that particular way of . . . expressing it. Lastly, thank you so much! I wasn't expecting to get ANY positive feedback, let alone comforting and teaching people!

I don't enjoy Rule 34 art either, but I found SOME humanized versions of the ponies quite enjoyable if the artist carried their features over well enough. An odd thing to observe is making them too realistic. It once again plummets to the uncanny valley, whereas human, but still stylized versions don't strike as being out of place in your brain's recognition of the character. Take these for example: Pinkie- http://browse.deviantart.com/?qh=&section=&global=1&q=Human+Pinkie+Pie#/d3ioqnl http://browse.deviantart.com/?qh=&section=&global=1&q=Human+Pinkie+Pie#/d48r8f4 Twilight - http://humanized-mlp.deviantart.com/gallery/32801608#/d4mdejh http://humanized-mlp.deviantart.com/gallery/32801608#/d4ljt28 See what I mean? If you were to see a perfectly translated pony to human, your brain suddenly sends up neuron red flags marked "not human" because your already familiar with what that character regularly looks like and whatever feature they have that isn't normal sticks out. Whereas the stylized versions retain the exaggerations that make them different but still identifiable as "people." To say there is more behind every clopper's fantasy would be foolish, but to some this is just the case. Another example. When that clip of Fluttershy saying "Mama's so proud." in a somewhat suggestive voice played. Many claimed that Fluttershy had never been sexier or something similar. Others objected because they thought such slander was disgusting, I was among them, but not for the same reason. I was offended, because that wasn't Fluttershy. Without her grace, demurity, and kindness she was just a cruel little creature and not the woman I had feelings for. As for the OCs . . . I got nothing. *shrug pony*

Well that's good to know. I've never heard the term, or at least I didn't know what it referred to. In terms of anime characters, the only one I felt even the slightest hint of a crush was Princess Euphemia, but I always played as Suzaku in my head so I guess I didn't realize the attraction. Then Fluttershy came into the picture and there was no male partner for me to use as a facade. (Cue freakout and subsequent revelation.)

Aspects on my ideal lady indeed. I do admit there is a bit of "hints" my brain is giving me sometimes when Rarity poses . . . or upon reviewing Spike's flashback of Rarity's kiss. (Where were you for me that time, context?) But as I've stated, my brain treats attraction a bit wonky. (Having something close to Asperger's syndrome might have something to do with it.) Demisexuality: Basically I don't experience physical desire unless I'm actually interested in the person themselves. I'm not making this up, at least not the idea. http://www.asexualit...itle=Demisexual So, as stated in my theory, since the mane 6 do a fantastic job of exemplifying feminine qualities they cause my brain to "take notice". I compare it to the reaction you get when the tomboy cleans herself up for an event and THAT'S when you "take notice." Oh Celestia I'm starting to creep myself out! Feel free to pump those shotguns.

Waifu huh? I learn new terms everyday with this fandom. If you want to introduce somepony to the Internet without scarring them for life, show them bronies!

So they have not completely abandoned you. Good, if worse comes to worse, stop watching. Be kind of hypocritical to sacrifice your friends for the sake of "Friendship is Magic."

I told my brothers when asked and then carried on with the task at hand because we were busy. One kind of was stunned, incidently, he's the one who is now a brony himself. My parents were pretty nonchalant about it too. So no over the top reactions, just varying levels of interest and indifference. Once I showed my Mom Ballad of the Brony and told her about BroNYcon, she was excited that I found something fun for myself. Well yeah, but even by anti-brony standards getting angry at your friend crosses a line! At worst scornful mocking.

Shrugging off or mocking I understand, but mad? Why?

Trust me in my school, it's like living with Pinkie Pie, after a while you just smile and let it happen.

I also don't believe any single event will give me a pass. I know what you mean, I wouldn't STOP being a good person in Equestria. It's more to myself than anypony else, Equestria doesn't need as much "help" as Earth. (No I don't believe Earth is a crapsack planet, it just could be better.) I know me well enough. If I were to take a dive, I would toss and turn in my bed in Coudsdayle or Canterlot for about a week to a month before pleading for the Princess to send me back.