Seiji Matsuri

Hm... I'd wager: Good heavens, where does that idea ever come from? Not a single hater is making you guys feel shame in bring a fan of My Little Pony, or Littlest Pet Shop or Spong—Actually. That last one you should be ashamed of. The only person capable of making you feel shame is yourself, and judging by the vast majority of these "I'm so scared of coming out of the closet" posts/threads (Which come staggeringly close to making me feel shame for even being here) the stink of fear and shame is heavy in these parts.

This, I completely agree with. Rather than flesh our anything as complex as femme, butch, tomboy, gay, straight, transgender or the whole mess of things, what could really help girls, in the original vision of the series, is to portray boys in a neutral, equal light. That young boys can, and very much do go through the same issues that girls do, that growing up sucks and that we're not "boys" and "girls", "fillies" and "colts"—but "people" and "ponies".

No. Just no. Angry mom's didn't cause the "Derpy" thing. You guys did. No doubt that a few suburban parents take things like all easily freaked suburban parents do, but the ones who threatened Hasbro's bottom lines are the Bronies themselves. For once, I'd much like you guys to take a breather. Get a snack. Maybe even a shower. Loosen up and then take a step back and look at the fandom, the whole fandom, subjectively. See it from an outsider's perspective. Subtle nods and in-jokes are one thing, but they took a leap and made a shout-out to a group of teenage boys and grown men who can hardly control themselves and if they don't come off as socially maladjusted (I'd argue the fair majority)... They come off as chimps slinging excrement at one another (the imageboards).Whether or not you think this isn't true doesn't matter. Your image does, and I'll admit I'm quite disappointed in how the fandom turned out. On topic? No. The show will not get "more mature". Because just what is considered "more mature"? We have characters that are young and hold down jobs. We have others who keep their word, pay what's due, apply honor and self-sacrifice for the sake of friendship. We have ponies who have lives actually in their hooves; children. Unless of course you mean themes target to an older audience like actual crime and punishment instead of lessons on friendship, "I'LL MURDER YOU" instead of "I'LL DESTROY YOU" (Or, if I'm even more correct: ZOMG GRIMDARK DEATHKILLING MURDER-CRUSADE) and otherwise prodding an open wound life tends to be? To which, I'm not going to respond.

Quick show of hands—how many of you guys live anywhere near the East Coast of the United States? I was born, bred and subsequently grew up in a region that is a major thoroughfare between New York, Philadelphia and New Jersey. In a state that has the nickname of The Keystone. While I find Babs' accent adorably... uh.. "off key", I don't find it strange at all. It's like she's internally arguing if she wants to be Bronx or Bella Vista. (Personally, I'm a fan of the latter because if you're Philly, you're family.) However, I don't find it understandable that she's immediately assumed to be a colt because she speaks differently, and, of all things isn't feminine in color. Seriously? Didn't we just have this issue years ago with, y'know... Friendship is Magic? On a lighter note, I agree with the prospect of having a transgender character shown in a completely positive light, but Babs was not properly set up to be one and I feel really shouldn't be the one to do so, especially since you're all so quick to immediately lay judgement of masculinity on her. Which, for that matter, shouldn't even come up until you guys can get the haranguing notions of what makes boys and girls out of your tender little minds.

I get the feeling of regret for being associated with the fandom more often than not when I see members of it post. More often than not, usually here. As old as I am combined with the time served an interest in Friendship is Magic leaves me feeling quite like a boss surrounded by employees that... Well... Here. I'll let Doug do the explaining. Edit: Spelling errors due to tablet AutoCorrect.

I've bit the bullet for getting warned and my post removed from this thread and acknowledged it to return my ability to post. Something about "vulgarity". Whatever excuse gets you to sleep at night. Since my vulgar post is hidden in spite of previous bouts of profanity, I'll see if I can come to terms with this in a fun way! :3 I find people who worry about being in some imaginary pony closet/stable less than pathetic. In fact, pathetic implies an attempt to be something other than that. You aren't scraping the bottom of the trough. You're not even below the trough. You don't deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence as troughs. There may be a day that comes when people will finally let go of gender stereotypes. But the day will never come when fans of My Little pony are subject to actual discrimination.

Certain fans that irritate me? You. The lot of you. Especially here on MLPForums. Your complaints are the very thing you complain about. A cesspool of hypocritical projection of your own flaws onto small to nonexistent strawponies. "I don't see how the fandom can tolerate X but not Y. I TOTALLY HATE X!" Seriously. It gets like that. I've also drawn a correlation between the Bronies who complain about Bronies acting like Bronies to prove they're Bronies to non-Bronies to be the EXACT SAME people who complain about cloppers to make it know to non-cloppers that they're non-cloppers too. I'm only on the first page of this thread, and already I've seen someone make the argument that even though R34 exists in all fandoms, they say that we're somehow worse than the other fandoms through insane troll logic. You have no idea what goes on in the Pokemon, Digimon, Sonic... Screw it. Are you aware of anime and furry fandoms? We are not unique, nor are we the worst. By any stretch of the imagination. This isn't to say that cloppers are free of the same guilt the Brony mass shares. There's a slight problem of keeping things where they belong. Ponies in the pony fandom. Clopping on the respective pages. But making a huge deal about clopping while vigorously defending your ideals of pure magical pony waifus? Classy. The entitlement of the fans. These very same true-blooded fans; the fans that come on here to make the case that they're somehow pure. Not the ones that complain about the show, but the ones that whine if anything external doesn't fit their concept of the universe. Really. Someone is crying about how they don't like cosplay because seeing human ponies is somehow disheartening? You're really going to hold that against a fan, doing nothing other than showing their support by hating on them for cosplaying something outside your headfanon? You're all against people shoving the fandom down other people's throats. An admirable goal, and it really would help the community as a whole. But you're going to have to stop shoving your shit down our own throats. As Bertrand Russell once said, "The only thing that will redeem mankind is cooperation." Excuse me while I enjoy my Guinness Extra Cold.

Evidence points me in the direction that Alicorns are not entirely genetic (you're either born one, or not) nor are they separate from the rest of the Pony genus/species. At one point, Lauren, while still the producer of the show stated that she intended for Princesses Celestia and Luna to be the embodiment of all three races of pony. She and the show's staff have also gone on record to say that each of the three pony races were magical in their own right. These two pieces of leave us with the idea that the balance of the three are somehow in harmony within what we know as an Alicorn. Which is fitting given the central theme of harmony and magic. With that in consideration, let us look to the history of Equestria. Princess Celestia and Princess Luna have ruled Equestria for at least 1,000 years. Prior to that had been the reign of Discord. Prior to that still, Equestria was founded by the leaders of the three tribes. From what we can tell, no Alicorns existed between the founding of Equestria and the fall of Discord. Taking this into consideration... It would make sense that Celestia and Luna somehow managed to achieve an Alicorn state in the process or as a result of defeating Discord. Some inherent magic, code, gene or some sort of trigger brought the inherent "magic" of the three pony races into harmony within the two of them and triggered this change. I say this because let us take Princess Cadence. While she is an Alicorn, her mane remains tangible. Corporeal. Solid. Same as Princess Luna when she was freed from the darkness that was Nightmare Moon. Once again, Word of God has stated that she looked as such because her powers didn't come back to her yet. But! Luna's mane did return to its original intangible form once she regained her powers, and the combined magic of Cadence and her husband brought her own mane into an intangible state through the power flux only to return to normal, which helps prove that one can bridge the gap through power. So we can reasonably assume that while Cadence is indeed an Alicorn, there is still a power gap between her and Luna, and another gap between Luna and Celestia. Such gaps imply that being an Alicorn is not an absolute state such as "godhood". This all leads to interesting thoughts as to how the three kinds of ponies are interconnected and why Princess Celestia shares such a bond with her subjects.

Are people really that afraid of people knowing they watch an animated series? This is an issue that is only as difficult as you make it. Fear of being judged is no excuse to be less than what you are. A few days ago, the people of Uganda held their very first PRIDE Parade. The penalty for being gay in Uganda is death.

Excuse me while I cough, sneeze and get my general illness over this shiny board! Much for the same reasons Chainsaw shared, I dislike the term "brony", the affiliation that goes with it and how having some asinine inclusive term affected the fandom negatively. It has been brought up that the term itself is a device used to actively announce to the world that you are indeed a fan of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. This wouldn't be bad if the fandom as a whole didn't cash in on this fact and spent it like currency at every corner we could. For the longest time, i couldn't figure out why detractors of the series and its fans always whined about things like: "YOU DON'T SEE OTHER FANDOMS YELLIN G OUT BRONIE POWER" I really didn't see much of it, to be honest. At least not enough that would warrant the enormous backlash. But after a while it kind of clicked. Bronies have this habit of wearing MLP on their sleeve. And their shirt. And their heads. ...Shoelaces. For a physical comparison, I see a fan of Adventure Time with a messenger bag with a Finn and Jake button on it. More often than not, we see Bronies decked head to toe in rainbows spouting off who is best pony. It's almost a passive aura, and the above mentioned detractors pick up on it and really have just as little idea on how to explain it as we do taking it down a notch. Which reminds me. Guys. Take it down a notch. My real beef of the term "Brony" actually stems from how it has been raised as the term for the primary demographic of the show. Both internally and externally. A Brony, to me, has become a term to mean "someone who stole an awesome television show from a little girl". We are not the primary demographic. We never have been and we never will be. No matter how much you want to wish so. My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic is a young girl's series, based on an existing young girl's series based on toys for young girls. We're acting like a bunch of adults who kicked the children out of the play room just because we could and most often whining that the toys aren't good enough. Do not take this away from them. We are fans first and foremost. We love this show for what it is and what it continues to be. If you want to be a Brony, as well as a fan? Act like you've got some God damn class.