kageyama mischaracterisation

I know this discourse seems to appear like clockwork and has once again been coming up a lot lately (especially on tiktok and twitter) but i’m so so sick of people misinterpreting kageyamas “he’s [hoshiumi] better than hinata” line, and spewing around the narrative that this means he wants to “replace” hinata. it is not some act of betrayal, or a shallow insult — it was objectively true. stating a fact doesn’t mean he “favours” hinata any less. people are also blatantly forgetting that kageyama literally says this because he views hoshiumi as a “reference” for how hinata can improve, in turn creating the “you can fly even higher” scene we all know and love.

i know haikyuu fans, especially on tiktok, have a bit of a reputation for lacking media literacy, but it still baffles me how much kageyamas words (and actions) get twisted and then those misinterpretations being largely seen as the truth. I partly feel like shipping plays a big role in this, and people viewing characters positively acknowledging and/or having a bond with another character as a wedge between their favourite pairing, and so scenes like this then feel like the most outrageous thing ever. now, i’m the biggest kagehina shipper - truther - whatever you want to call it, but i seriously think a lot of kagehina shippers need to put down AO3 and think critically. put down the corny tiktok slideshows, lower your pitchforks and /please/ re-read the manga.

i’m aware nothing is that deep and i’m not saying twisting scenes in order to create angst is a bad thing; it’s normal, do what you want because at the end of the day it’s just fiction. go crazy. but it does irk me how much we seem to not be able to separate what furudate clearly intended vs the perception we created.

stop attacking hoshiumi, stop attacking kageyama, hinata is fine.