Ship War

A ship war is a heated disagreement between two or more groups of shippers. Ship wars are usually between fans of two, or more, ships with a character in common, for example the two ships involved in the Bellarke vs Clexa ship war had the character of Clarke Griffin in common, with both sides believing their ship was the best one. Unlike your garden variety of wank, ship wars span a long period of time (often years) and involve many people in their fandom. Symptoms of a ship war include:
*rants, both of the "we're obviously right" and "why can't we all write our porn and get along" kinds
*long-winded essays trying to prove canonicity or superiority of the preferred ship (sometimes going overboard and claiming every scene with one or both of the characters as proof, in a very convoluted, Dan Brown fashion) or pointing the flaws in similar essays by rival shippers
*a refusal to quiet down till well after the canon is closed
*anti-shipper posts appearing in that ship's Tumblr tag
*mocking the other ship, or opposing shipper groups, via graphics, like memes and manips 
* Character Bashing of the one who is "in the way" of each side's preferred ship
Ship wars often aggravate other fannish behavior such as flames ("if you like X/Y, you're Z!") and character bashing.
==Causes==
In an article The fall of fandom etiquette and the rise of the ship war writer Clare McBride posits that the birth of modern ship wars began with the Harmonians in Harry Potter fandom
Whereas the writer Sean Z believes that the prevalence of ship wars is tied to platform migration, especially the opt-in model of LiveJournal and the opt-out model of Tumblr 
In the 2010s, there has been fannish discussion about how the arguments in ship wars have changed, from whether or not a ship has canon support to whether or not a ship is morally good.See What's the difference fandom wise between today and ten years ago? ask answered by glamaphonic (31 December 2015), Anti-Shippers entry at the Fail_Fandomanon wiki. See also The Three Laws of Fandom.
==Examples==
* Bangel vs Spuffy in Buffy fandom
* Bellarke vs Clexa in The 100 fandom 
* Bumbleby vs Blacksun in RWBY fandom
* Caryl vs Bethyl in The Walking Dead fandom
* Clana/Lana Lang war in Smallville
* Gillovny vs. Gorgans (RPF) in the Gillian Anderson/David Duchovny fandom
* Harmonians incident in Harry Potter
* Kataang vs Zutara in Avatar: The Last Airbender fandom
* For a time, at the beginning of The Originals, Klaroline shippers were involved in quite a vocal conflict with other fans of the show (and the character of Klaus) due to potential love interests being introduced. This resulted in severe hate being directed at the characters of Hayley Marshall and Camille O'Connell and the actresses portraying them.
* Ichigo/Rukia vs. Ichigo/Orihime in Bleach fandom
* Inuyasha/Kagome vs Inuyasha/Kikyo in InuYasha fandom.TV Tropes had to lock the Die For Our Ship/InuYasha page, saying it "houses one of the most rabid and militant shipping wars of all time." It is the only page about shipping which receives this treatment.
* Jate vs Skate in Lost fandom
* Jonsa vs Jonerys in Game of Thrones fandom
* Kamui/Subaru vs Seishirou/Subaru in X/1999 fandom.
* Lucas/Maya vs Lucas/Riley in the Girl Meets World fandom
* Mulder/Scully, the May and June 1996 "relationshipper wars" on alt.tv.x-files. See On Relationshippers... (May 13, 1996) -- PUSHER was a 'Shipper!! *gak*!; archive link (May 28, 1996) -- my problem with the "relationshippers" (May 29, 1996) 
* Naruhina vs Narusaku in the Naruto fandom.
* Nesspaula vs Nesscas in the EarthBound fandom.
* PokéShipping vs AmourShipping in the Pokémon anime fandom, though all Ash/female companion ships have been involved in the ongoing war since Advance Generation.
* Ranma/Akane vs Ranma/Ukyo in Ranma 1/2 fandom.
* Ray Wars in due South
* Sheith vs Klance in Voltron: Legendary Defender fandom. To a lesser extent, Lotura vs Allurance.
* SoKai vs SoRiku in Kingdom Hearts fandom
* Sonally vs. SonAmy in Sonic the Hedgehog fandom
* Team Edward vs Team Jacob in Twilight fandom
* Tsukino Usagi/Chiba Mamoru vs Kou Seiya/Tsukino Usagi in Sailor Moon fandom. Recently, Senshi/Shitennou vs Kunzite/Zoisite.
* Westallen vs. Snowbarry in CW's The Flash fandom
* The long-standing Love Triangle Debate in Final Fantasy VII fandom - mostly Cloud/Aerith fans vs. Cloud/Tifa fans
* Willabeth vs Sparrabeth in the Pirates of the Caribbean fandom.
* Dozens in the Fire Emblem fandom; the most notable being Chrom/Sumia vs Chrom/Female Avatar in Awakening, Ike/Soren vs Ike/Elincia vs Elincia/Geoffrey in the Tellius duology, and all ships centered around Lyndis in The Blazing Sword.
==Meta/Further Reading==
* Pair Slamming and the God Complex ; archive link by Thamiris (February 2002)
* by Melusina (2004)
* you have got to be kidding me; archive link by seperis (2006)
* MY FUCKING FANDOM GIVES ME FUCKING FITS, part 34,849 by Hth (2007)
* Ok, well don't say I didn't warn you.; archive link; WebCite by Bokai (May 2017)
* antishipping as the cool new trend, or: why are most antis under 25 years old?, freedom-of-fanfic (June 2017)
* Could you talk some more about how current antis relate back to the LJ social justice scene and when the morph from debating fanworks to dissing people happened?; archive link, freedom-of-fanfic (July 2017)
* The ship wars: what it means when fans don’t agree who belongs together
* Welcome To Hell - Hazbin Hotel, Charlie Morningstar/Alastor, Charlie Morningstar/Vaggie, Ship Wars, Harassment, Toxic Fandoms - Bliss Fully Aware podcast (Oct 29/20)
* How bad were shipping wars in your fandom? at r/FanFiction (October 2022)
* Hobby Scuffles Week of April 17, 2023; archive link by iwasonceafangirl (2023)
==Resources==
The TV Tropes article on Ship to Ship Combat provides many more examples.
==References==
==Notes==
Category:Relationships Glossary
Category:DiscussionCategory:Fandom Wars
*Ship War