Pokémon Theories or Headcanons you Despise

[Poke Dragon]

This isn't exclusive to the Pokémon fandom by any means, but I'm not really a fan of the drive to turn canon friendships into headcanon romance ships. It seems like it happens to every friendship (unless they're related or have a substantial age difference), which sort of creates the impression that friendship is worthless on its own and has to be "upgraded" to romance to be meaningful. Which is sad and just not true. I know that's not the intended message 99% of the time, but still...not my favorite type of headcanon.

I completely agree with this one, I have seen a fair share of ships that really don't have a solid foundation for them to even be plausible, Pokemon or otherwise. Honestly, I don't know why two very close characters can't just be best friends. There are already examples I have seen where two characters who formed a bond became best friends and that's it.

 

[Herbizarre]

This isn't exclusive to the Pokémon fandom by any means, but I'm not really a fan of the drive to turn canon friendships into headcanon romance ships. It seems like it happens to every friendship (unless they're related or have a substantial age difference), which sort of creates the impression that friendship is worthless on its own and has to be "upgraded" to romance to be meaningful. Which is sad and just not true. I know that's not the intended message 99% of the time, but still...not my favorite type of headcanon.

I get what you mean. The word "shipping" in this context almost always refers to romance between character, even though the word "friendship" ends with, well, ship. Both are still relationships, but somehow, only the romantic part is taken in account for those types of things despite both contexts being perfectly valid.