Anonymous asked: how come when you say damon doesn't have character development it's bc 'he was bad then did something to redeem it but then repeated the same mistakes so doesn't have development' but stefan does exactly the same thing - in s1 he has the blood issues, then he tries to fix it but then in the later seasons he basically just ends up repeating the same mistakes. Kind of just seems like you're biased

Kind of just seems like you don’t really take context into consideration and this is my issue because it’s not simply that Stefan just makes the same mistakes he is forced into situations that require him to sacrifice his best self for other people.



In season 1, Damon comes to town and he turns Vicki



because he’s sad about Katherine



and he kills Lexi on Stefan’s birthday because he wanted to get the council off their backs:

even though the only reason why the council was alerted to their presence at all is because he comes into town killing people and then in season 4 it’s revealed that he killed Lexi also because looking at her made him feel guilty about what he did to her in the past



He also abuses, rapes and emotionally manipulates Caroline for his own goals and attempts to kill her when he’s “done” with her:

And tries to kill Bonnie:

How does he redeem himself for these things? How does kidnapping Elena and not compelling her despite kidnapping her equal redemption? How does him stepping in for Stefan during the Miss Mystic dance redeem him from the carnage he caused?

In season 2, Katherine comes back and says she always loved Stefan so he goes to Elena’s house and tries to force himself on her and when she says it’s always going to be Stefan

he kills Jeremy.



That seems like exactly what he did in season 1 when Katherine made him sad and he turned Vicki because of it. How did he grow from that moment?



Season 2 he also uses Andie as a distraction from “loving” Elena, he compels her and uses her to his will

that seems like what he did with Caroline in season 1, how exactly did he grow from that moment?



He also tries to kill Caroline when he think she’s inconvenient to him



kind of like how he tried to kill her in season 1 the minute she became inconvenient to him,



how did he grow from that moment? Is he redeemed because Elena stepped in front of him and he won’t kill Elena? How? He doesn’t think trying to kill Caroline is wrong,he just won’t kill Elena that’s not redemption.



When his emotions get too much for him because Elena hugs him, he kills a random stranger because he’s going through some shit



that kind of feels like when he saw Lexi and he killed her to get rid of his guilt. Where is the redemption in that?



Whereas in season 1 Stefan was taken hostage because Damon created a mess that he got in the middle of and when he was about to die, even in that moment he tells Elena to run. And then she tells him to drink her blood, this isn’t his choice, this isn’t his mistake, this is something he was encouraged to do in an impossible situation



And then when he gets so out of control, he has a moment of weakness in which he decides to commit suicide but Elena tells him to fight:



So that’s what he does in season 2. Katherine comes to town and she tells him she built up her tolerance to vervain by drinking a little bit everyday and Stefan and Elena decide that he should do that with blood too, Stefan decides to become a better, stronger, more adept vampire

that is learning from what happened the season before, not repeating past behaviour

Not to mention in season 2, he saved Caroline and trained her to be a better vampire:



Saved Jeremy:

Tried to save Jenna:



Not trying to score points, not trying to play the hero but because it’s the right thing, Stefan’s very existence is redemptive.



And then what happens in the finale? Damon gets bitten by a werewolf and Stefan sacrifices everything that makes him happy to make sure his brother will live



he is again put in an impossible situation, another life and death situation but instead of his life, it’s worse [to him] but his brother’s so he does the selfless thing and become a ripper so his brother can survive

that is not repeating a mistake.

Then you have season 3 where Stefan is consistently combating his worst nature because he’s fighting against the impossible situation he’s in, whether that’s calling Elena:



Or saving Damon:



Or fighting compulsion:



He’s fighting to retain the person he wants to be for himself, for Elena and for the betterment of everyone around him (so they don’t die) because Stefan does not want to be a bad person

And he fights not to be.



His humanity was ripped away from him:



That is not repeating a mistake.



Not to mention that within season 3, when Stefan crosses a line



he immediately works at making it better:

And it should be noted that this does not just stay at Elena. He and Damon were responsible for Abby becoming a vampire and what Damon does is try to justify it:

What Stefan does is convince Klaus not to kill Jamie and then thanks Bonnie for her help:



He is actively trying to make up for the destruction he caused, not justifying himself, not asking her to get over it, he’s atoning, that is redemption.

Whereas Damon is just being Damon. Every time he finds out that Stefan saved his life, his response is to make a move on Elena like in 3x02 when Stefan saved him from a hybrid

or in 3x10 when he found out he stopped him from killing Klaus to save his life:



Or even 3x08 after Stefan saved him from Mikael:

After trying to kill Caroline twice, after abusing her and raping her, he tries to kill her dad:



Elena hurts his feelings in 3x14:

And his response is to lash out:



There are no extenuating circumstances like with Stefan, there is no other reason for Damon to act this way other than the fact that Damon just doesn’t grow the fuck up and what, Damon re-gifted the necklace to Elena so he’s redeemed now? Mmm, no, I don’t think so.



Then you have season 4. I mean you can really sum up how Stefan is a more developed and evolved person than Damon with these two gifs



This time around, Elena is the one with Damon and Stefan is in need of distraction but instead of compelling himself a newsreporter, a high school girl or a sorority he just has consenting sex with Rebekah



When Elena and him break up and he finds out she’s with Damon, he wants to drown himself in bloodlust but what he does instead is workout



That is development and the eternal difference between Stefan and Damon. Stefan is a ripper, he’s addicted to blood, antis don’t seem to realize that addictions are life-long that’s why there are NA and AA meetings etc. because it’s a constant battle and Stefan is choosing to battle it here, there is no circumstance pushing him to be a ripper or to turn off his humanity so he doesn’t do it.



Meanwhile, sure, Damon doesn’t sleep with Elena when he finds out she’s Sired but people seem to forget that in 4x02 he manipulates a half-starved, frantic, desperate, newbie Elena into feeding from him. She doesn’t know what it means and he doesn’t tell her, he just tells her that it’s kind of personal, she doesn’t know it’s sexual, she doesn’t know the implications of what that is but he chooses his words carefully to extort pleasure from her. It’s not compulsion but it may as well be.



And then Damon applies his methodology onto Elena:



With disastrous results:



And he’s not even the one who cleans up the mess afterward:

I bring that up because how has Damon developed from the impulsive guy who makes awful decisions by this point, just because he doesn’t go around killing people at random (in this season) doesn’t mean that he grew because he does the same shit in different ways like this, he still manages to ruin SO many people’s lives just by being himself and he doesn’t learn!

Season 5. I mean do I REALLY need to go through season 5?



WHERE IS THE DEVELOPMENT? How is this not exactly the same as Damon going on a bender and killing people because of Katherine in season 2 and then Elena in season 3? How does he atone for this? Does he apologize to Jeremy for kidnapping him and ordering Enzo to suffocate him? Does he do something for Aaron’s family, the family that he was systematically killing for generations by the way? How does he atone for this? By fessing up to Elena that she in fact isn’t a murderer?



Meanwhile Stefan is confronting his abuser, a woman who has consistently caused him pain and ruined his life, and shows her an amazing amount of compassion and empathy

Instead of, you know, torturing her like Damon did.



He backslides when he has no memory and attacks Jesse, this is true, and I would’ve preferred if he made it up to Jesse but that’s actually an isolated incident because he never freely chooses to drink from a human before or after that. Even when he gets out of the trunk in 5x03 and he’s nearly dead and could’ve lost control, he feeds from a waitress and tells her to run:

Once again, development.

Not to mention that he had the choice to turn off his humanity to make it through the pain of dying but he chooses to hold onto himself, he won’t take the easy way out:



Season 6.

OK so what happened in season 6 for Stefan to turn off his humanity?

Caroline coerced him into turning it off by compelling Elena’s ex to torture and then kill his niece. That is not making the same mistake! It’s another impossible situation in which he has to sacrifice his better self for someone else’s life and once he turns on his humanity, he doesn’t go around killing people because he chooses not to, he doesn’t gorge on blood because he works not to.



Damon on the other hand is not killing people randomly this time around, no, he is lying to Elena about the cure, which keeps in line with how he manipulated her in season 4 and lied to her about Stefan in season 5:

He attacks Bonnie when she tries to put herself first because it doesn’t align with his interests:



Intentionally triggers her because same thing:



which keeps in line with:



Are we supposed to believe he developed because he now sees Bonnie as a friend? He still treats her like shit. He’s still lying to Elena because of his insecurities, nothing about Damon has actually really developed, nothing about Damon has actually been redeemed.



Season 7.



Same Bamon shit:

Same Delena shit. Oh no, I think I killed Elena so obviously I’m going to go on a killing spree!

While you know, Stefan gets angry



Then kills Julian because he deems him responsible for everything and then helps Damon despite, you know, being angry with him which only leads to him sacrificing for Damon again



And then I breakdown season 8 here: http://zalrb.tumblr.com/post/158510598480/did-damon-have-character-development-now-with-the

You legit wanna sit here and say I’m being biased? Damon is a consistently trash character who actually never changes his trash characteristics. Full stop.

