✏️ There is no reason to assume that an author’s intention with dark elements and evil characters is to sway their audience into believing that those things are good.

✏️ There is no reason to assume that every dark element included in a piece of fiction was done from a place of desire even if the characters in the story make it seem desirable.

✏️ Sometimes stories are meant to make you uncomfortable.

✏️ You are not always going to be able to tell if a protagonist is an unreliable narrator.

✏️ You are not always going to be able to tell if the protagonist is meant to be a villain protagonist.

✏️ You are not always going to be able to tell the difference between a story that an author writes from a place of desire, versus a story an author writes from a place of pain.

✏️ You are not always going to know the author’s intention for dark elements they included in their fiction, romantic, horrific, or otherwise.

✏️ You are not always going to be able to tell the difference between a story someone writes because they think it’s fun and cute, and a story someone writes because they find it upsetting and uncomfortable.

✏️ The author does not owe the audience an explanation of why they included dark elements or a detailed moral breakdown of how they feel about the actions of the characters in their story.

✏️ The author does not owe the audience a disclaimer or assurance that they know all the bad stuff that happens in their story is bad.

✏️ Authors are perfectly capable of writing in fiction about events they would never want to happen in real life.

✏️ The author’s job is not to teach their audience morality.

✏️ It is not the author’s job to defend the moral intention of their fiction to their audience.