Anti Billford - Blog Posts

I have a theory.

This is going to be a long post, but I don't know how to do the "read more" thing, sorry.

Bear with me for a minute. So I realized recently that I don't actually see that much Mabel or Ford hate, it's mostly stuff I hear from other people. (What I see is generally more subtle, like I read a fic that was good, but Ford took responsibility for Filbrick kicking Stan out. What was he supposed to do? He's 17 too! I also saw someone say the apocalypse wasn't Mabel's fault, it was Ford's. I'd just like to say that it was Bill's fault and Ford was manipulated into building that portal.)

But I do see a lot of Billford. It keeps on showing up in my suggested communities and the "For You" thing, despite The Book Of Bill portraying it as a very manipulative, horrifically abusive relationship. (When I say relationship, I don't necessarily mean romantic. It could have been a completely platonic horrifically abusive relationship.) And I have to wonder if, because Bill is a triangle, we let him get away with things we wouldn't if he were a human and/or doing these things directly to Ford.

Say that there was a movie. In it, there are two human men. Their relationship is clearly built on manipulation, and when the manipulated realizes that he's being manipulated, he tries to leave. The manipulator proceeds to torture him. You see this onscreen and it's horrible. The manipulator drives a nail through this guy's hand, shoves spiders down his throat, humiliates him . . .

Would people ship these two characters? This is the main fandom I'm in, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say probably not. (I'd like to say that I don't have a problem with people who write them as together . . . as long as it's portrayed as the abusive relationship it actually WAS and not a good relationship.)

All of those were actual things that happened in The Book of Bill. I didn't even mention the psychological torture (He makes Ford forget his OWN NAME) and forced sleep deprivation.

But Bill is a triangle. Bill isn't doing these things directly to Ford. He's doing them while in Ford's body, which is arguably possibly more horrific than if Bill was a separate person doing these things to him, but it's not something that could happen in real life.

But in this analysis of Ford: https://archiveofourown.org/works/58698496/chapters/158032750 when speaking of the torture Ford endured during Weirdmageddon, Callipraxia mentions that the fact that people can't electrocute others "takes at least some of the realism and therefore some of the horror out of the situation." (I apologize if this quote is incorrect, I couldn't find the part where she says this in this quite long work.)

And that makes me wonder if, again because Bill is a triangle and the things he does are literally impossible, it makes people less inclined to see his relationship with Ford as abusive when I have read two separate analyses (one of them is the one referred to above) that straight up say "This reads like a domestic abuse situation." One of them (the one NOT linked above, I'll look for it later) says that Bill hits every. Single. Criteria. For an abuser.

Even before Ford learned what Bill was really there to do, their relationship wasn't good. Bill doesn't show up for months and when Ford asks him where he's been, Bill responds by basically gaslighting him and making him doubt McGucket.

And there's one more thing I noticed. I wasn't in the GF fandom when the show was airing, but I'm pretty sure Billdip didn't become a popular ship until after Sock Puppet Opera, much the same as Billford wasn't so popular until TBOB. It's a pattern of "Bill abuses someone, then gets shipped with that someone." It's quite disturbing.

I know people are going to ship what they're going to ship, but Bill x Pines family members really shouldn't be so popular imo.

Tl;dr: If Bill were a human and you saw him torturing Ford, would you still ship them?

I'm pretty sure I forgot some of what I was going to say, so I might edit this later or reblog it with the extra information.

I do want to say that I do NOT support being rude, sending hate comments or death threats to people who do ship this. Don't do that. Just wanted to say, just in case.

I also want to say that though I put "anti Billford" and "anti Billdip" in the tags, I'm pretty sure I'm not an anti, though I haven't been able to fully figure out what the term means.

Another addendum: I am NOT qualified to be talking about abuse.

This is just a theory.

I just realized the correct tag is "anti billford"

Every day I long to shake roughly 3/4 of the fandom by the shoulders and shout at them that any relationship Bill and Ford had was horrifically abusive

MENTIONS OF SA, ABUSE, AND DARKSHIPPING UNDER THE CUT. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

⚠️ rant post

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as a pro and darkshipper myself, it genuinely confuses me how people do not see how billford IS a darkship.

do you people forget that alex has literally stated before that he based bill off of ab-sers, such as the ones who those he knew were victims of? it is literally CANON that bill ab-ses ford and his entire family CONSTANTLY. that is ALL he does, in the show, in tbob, everywhere. there has never been one moment where bill has not been ab-sing and harming ford in one way or another - even if they were getting along in stanford's earlier years, that's still gaslighting, manipulation, power imbalance, monster x human, and a lot more. several times he uses fords body against his own will and FORCEFULLY exposes his naked body to the public, obviously, WITHOUT CONSENT. how in the world would that not be SA??

i think that even though bill is just about the fan-favorite of gravity falls, aswell with billford, trying to go against this CANON TIMELINE is blatant denial.

i am in no way saying you CANT like bill, im profiction myself. but at the least try to understand the character that he ACTUALLY is. billford is certainly not my cup of tea, but I cant stop anyone from shipping two fictional characters, especially as a literal darkshipper. do whatever with whatever character, its all fiction. point is - if you're going to swoon over a character and ship something along with 90% of the fandom, go ahead, do this, but acknowledge the fact that he is NOT JUST a precious misunderstood silly lil triangle dude. he can be those things, duh. but that's for sure not ALL he is. billford still IS a darkship, and it IS, and has always been ab-sive.

"proship/darkship dni!"

and then you proceed to ship canon abuse