I really try not to be a conspiracy theorist but I’m seriously flip flopping on whether or not I believe Luigi Mangione actually did it, on one hand this guy’s digital footprint is too vast to not be a real person with real motive, but on the other hand the circumstances of how they caught him are so odd that it just doesn’t add up, like, he wore very nondescript clothing and a mask the day of the shooting, suggesting he doesn’t want to be identified, despite this they were somehow able to identify him at a hostel in different clothing without a mask, he not only fled the scene but allegedly fled New York with a fake ID that the police recovered, several days later they found him in Pennsylvania carrying around all of the evidence in his backpack, including a manifesto, gun, and fake ID, the police also claim he had somewhere between $8,000-$12,000 in his bag, yet when asked about it Luigi claims he had no idea where the money came from and suggests it was planted (which raises several more alarm bells because if this “evidence” was planted then what else could they have fabricated to “catch” this guy?)
this not mentioning the fact that I find it really odd that this guy didn’t digitally publish his manifesto and instead chose to carry a physical copy of it around for days
this all could mean that he wanted to get caught but if that’s the case why go to Pennsylvania at all? why not just stay in New York?
I will say, though, that I think some of this can also be explained by this comment on Reddit:
regardless, the circumstances are suspicious as hell
edit: I realized I forgot to mention this part but it’s also so suspicious how everyone, the police, the media, whatever, are all 100% certain that Luigi Mangione did it, I’ve seen so many high profile cases where cops do press conferences and say “this is America, the suspect is innocent until proven guilty!” yet they’re not even calling Luigi a suspect, they’re outright saying he is the shooter and that he did do it, that’s just weird to me
personally, I think people are allowed to ship a “toxic ship” as long as it’s fictional and they can separate fiction from reality. shipping a fictional “problematic ship” doesn’t mean you’re “abuse apologist” in real life. the same way people who enjoy fictional villains are not “murderers” in real life.
it’s okay if you think this ship makes you uncomfortable and so you personally dislike it. what you can and should do is avoid their contents and refrain from interacting with people who do ship them. that mute and block buttons are your friends.
what you shouldn’t do, though, is harass people who ship them and brag about how they’re “red flags irl” and how you’re “morally superior” simply because of fictional characters.
I promise you, minding your own business and not caring about what ship strangers on the internet ship will make your fandom so much less toxic and a whole lot more enjoyable.
billy: *beating the shit out of demos*
also billy: heyyy demogorgon thingy i have a snack for you. aren't you hungry? wouldn't you like a big yummy human to eat? i have the perfect meal at home and his name is neil you just have to promise to behave
the local demogorgon cornered by billy: *sweating buckets*
The S1-S2 party: “Steve has always taken all this stuff so well.”
The kids (mostly Dustin): “He’s practically invincible.”
Nancy probably: “He’s too dumb to be affected by Trauma.” (The rest of the party hates that but Dustin’s the only one who argues)
Robin not even a week after star court: “Steve is traumatized and hurt, he just tries to hide it, and he’s not even that good at it you guys just don’t care enough to notice (Dustin is offended; he does care he’s just a kid and Steve is actually pretty good at hiding it.)
Eddie a week out of the hospital: “Steve, you're not very good at advocating for yourself." (Steve didn’t get his injuries attended to because he thought he could handle it and ‘the others needed him’)
Steve: “I'm supposed to be advocating for myself??"
The entire party (minus Dustin) after Robin and Eddie scream at them for over an hour about Steve’s condition (they’re a little nicer to the kids it’s not really their fault): “Oh shit, we fucked up.”
Steve after people start being nice to him all of a sudden: “There’s an imbalance in the universe, am I being Vecna’d? Did he not really die? Shit. What is happening?”
Eddie and Robin: *crying*
Steve and Robin should always be on the same shift. It will annoy all their coworkers for sure but it won’t annoy them as much as when Steve and Robin are not working together.
pulled an all-nighter and then promptly passed out, i drew this sometime and have no recollection but i think i get what i was going for
steve teaching robin his evil white boy ways is very important to me. he's boosting her up into a girl's window. she's wearing backwards baseball caps and popped collars and sunglasses inside. sitting on the roof in lawn chairs. throwing random stuff off high places.
the first time she does a keg stand, he cries.
Elias Walker father of the year
“this ship is not canon” babe, they’re fictional characters. they’re not real. they’re literally dolls we play with. we don’t care about whether or not these fictional characters’ love story is canon in this piece of media that is also entirely based on fiction. I mean, sure, canon would be lovely, but it’s a bonus. it’s not necessary. what we care about is the fun of talking about these 2 idiots being in love.
we don’t give a fuck if they didn’t kiss in “canon”. they had raw sex in thousands of fics about them though. and I’d say that’s more than enough to make people who ship them happily ship them even harder. happy shipping!