Told you I'd get this done eventually! Long post warning... Could be sensitive to some readers, but it seems fine to me. Spoilers to people who never read HoO/new to the series
Lecture 1.7: Calling out Piper-Haters
---
It’s a new trend; everyone’s arguing about Piper’s personality and how they hate her character arc. I, in my opinion, don’t agree with those claims and my reasons will be following this post. Let’s try not to get to any big arguments in the comment to avoid this getting locked. While I will talk about why I don’t agree with their claims, keep in mind that there are some claims that I agree with, so don’t get the wrong idea about the following information. I love Piper and all, but there are some faults in her that cannot be ignored. This post will only be telling why I don’t agree with the claims and how I positively feel to her.
This. Is. All. Opinion. And. Theories. If you don't agree with me, I don't care.
Without further ado, let’s get this post started.
---
She claimed Jason and is obsessed with him.
Let’s get one thing straight: the main reason why they say that was when Piper threatened Drew saying “Jason is mine” without them talking it out clearly. To answer that claim, Piper was defending herself. Even if they haven’t talked it out properly, Piper was angered by Drew’s manipulative ways to the cabin. If it’s a lie, fine; but Piper was trying to tell Drew that it was not OK for her to act like that. The main reason why she said that wasn’t because she was trying to say “hey hon, Jason’s mine, so f*ck off or you die”, it was just a way to say that you can’t have everything you want, like Jason for example (Drew kept trying to hit on Jason). But yeah, Piper was implying she 'owned' Jason, not if I could help it. I could be wrong, though, as we don’t know the background of what Rick was meaning to write.
While it’s true that their relationship was born on lies and Mist, throughout HoO Jason and Piper seemed to have a steady relationship, and they didn’t break up even after they knew that Hera had meddled with their memories. Before they broke up, they were pretty happy together (although in BoO, they were at their peak) As for being obsessed with Jason, I don’t agree. I don’t see any major sign of her being obsessed with Jason like Leo was to Calypso. I was extremely hurt when I read a fandom message from a while ago (2018) saying that “she only cared about Jason, she nearly killed Percy by using Jason, doesn’t care about her friends at all, etc etc”. First of all, was that person trolling? That is BS and definitely not true, she cares about the 7 a lot. And for the MoA incident, she was swayed by the choice; Jason, her boyfriend and the person she cared deeply about, or Percy; a guy she just started travelling with but couldn’t help but feel like they’ve been working together forever, he was like a brother to her. Even she had the thought “she could attack Percy with her knife, but that didn’t solve anything,”, that was not so that she could choose Jason and skip away with Jason hand-in-hand, but to stop them fighting. Obviously, she dismissed the thought and found another way to stop them: her charmspeak. More on that later...
---
She has horrible character arcs/development.
Not. Everyone. Has. Perfect. Arcs.
Most of the 7 have similar arcs: tough childhood, redemption in their teenage years, success in the future. Piper’s arc is different: tough childhood, confusion and redemption in their teenage years, and following a new path in the future. People weren’t used to this change, dubbing her ‘a horrible character arc’. While this isn’t the main factor that they use to argue about Piper now, it’s (my opinion) pretty dumb. Rick purposely chose a diversity of arcs and characters, so the small smudge in her arc doesn’t mean she’s a bad person; it’s just how he meant it to be.
On his Goodreads, a popular question was ‘why did you add an LGBTQ+ character in PJO?” and he said that he wanted diversity and different characters, moods, and personalities.
The book was not aiming for everyone to have a perfect mix of personalities, but a group of different people from different backgrounds, even if Rick didn’t always execute that perfectly (e.g. South Asian representations)
---
She is rude and annoying.
I took a 20-minute break from writing this to research if there was any sign of Piper being whiny or mean- nada.
Sure, she could be blunt and sharp, but that wasn’t toward her own friends. I’m giving this a thumb down for this one. By herself, she is sweet and stands up for herself. One example was with Dylan and Drew, and she’s kind and respectful in Argo II. Annoying? That’s your personal taste and opinion; I felt like her diversity and difference from the group made the book interesting and a good read. And yeah, annoying is subjective, so I can't say anything about it,
---
She hates stereotypical Aphrodite girls ‘girly girls’.
People dislike Piper because of her mother, but that’s just Aphrodite’s problem, right? Instead of addressing the goddess of love, they put their resentment to Piper. Weird, but ok...?
Another claim: Piper judges by looks. That means if she met someone with an unstable life (poverty, etc) she would criticize him or her and leave them in the dust. I don’t think that’s how she acts, as she doesn’t seem like one who would act like that. CHB has a diversity of people from Hong Kong, America, Latin America… the only people I see Piper wrinkling her nose at is the Aphrodite children.
That… leads to the next item.
Piper doesn’t like Aphrodite’s ‘girly-girl’ ways, which I cannot deny no matter how much I tell myself the opposite. But, we know for sure that one reason she despised them was that she didn’t agree on the ‘break a heart to become a true child of Aphrodite.’ She looked at them as if they decided that heartbreak and bullying others in looks and dating was a good thing, which is obviously morally wrong. We all have grudges, like how Annabeth hates Juno, and how Leo despises Percy (yes, that’s true) and how Frank disliked Leo in the beginning. I don’t see a rant about how Frank’s a bad person because he was a bit scared of Leo, or how Annabeth’s a bad person because she hates Juno. Although yes, Juno was a bit… ambitious in her plan to stop Gaea.
---
Doesn’t go through as much as the rest does.
How to be a proper hero:
-have a horrible early life as a child
-go through a change in your life (redemption)
-have your as* bit off by Gaea or some god
That’s real bs, there’s no requirement to be a hero. She went through trauma from her father, but no one needs to go through criteria to save the world. People feel like a trauma with her father vs having their mother killed in a car crash and their mother stuck in the Underworld makes Piper look like an attention seeker and someone who doesn’t fit in. Again, BS. If she goes through less, so be it, but she was decent enough to help people go over their own loopholes in their life (MoA).
If she has it easier than others, she at least helps others find a shortcut to success.
---
She’s powerful.
Yes, this is a reason.
"We have another beautiful, powerful, brave girl in the story, hurrah.”
Sure, Piper is attractive and extremely powerful (she put Gaea to sleep) but how is that a reason to diss her?
Brave people are actually harder to find. Put yourself in Piper’s shoes; would a normal person like you (or me, whatever) be able to flood her emotions into words, restoring health to the Muses without killing yourself, or be able to survive a whole life of attention?
It may seem lame and easy at first sight, but having the full story opens the eyes to a commoner that she’s different and special. Another sub-reason was that HoO was already full of pretty, powerful girls (Annabeth, Hazel, Reyna, Calypso, etc), but I don’t see a post saying why Annabeth’s a bad person because she’s attractive and powerful. Piper’s not the only girl in town.
---
Claims I didn’t answer (standby list):
“She didn’t like Percy”
“Stuck up”
“Obsessive with Jason” (kind of answered already?)
“Didn’t do a lot to help the 7, was like an unhelpful 3rd wheel”
“Manipulative with Jason and her friends”
“Abusive with charmspeak (to friends and stuff)”
“Bisexual” (like wth-? hom*phobes?)
“She made people look like Jason ended things first”
“Got over Jason’s death quickly (3 months)”
“Blamed Apollo for Jason’s death; blames people for random things” (i’m sorry girl but why-)
---
Ha, you thought I would really stop there? Too bad, I’m here for one more. Got this from a beautiful comment I found on Fandom…
"She's boring and unrelatable, and did I mention boring? There's like nothing interesting about her at all."
First of all… ok? Boring? As I stated above, Rick wrote her like that to be different from the 7. He made it so that she was like the ‘eyepopper’ of the crew- her backstory was so much different than Leo’s or Jason’s or Hazels.
For boring and ‘nothing interesting about her’, she hated the attention of her father so much she cut her hair in a choppy way to get attention. Attention as in not a way to be a prat, but so that her father could care about her more.
---
Credits
websites i used because my brain was empty (click for better rants, info, ‘n fun!)
https://www.quora.com/Why-some-fans-hates-Piper-Mclean-from-Heroes-of-Olympus 👀
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ ✌
https://www.reddit.com/r/orangeisthenewblack/comments/948mzg/why_does_everyone_hate_piper/ 🙄
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/1522458-why-does-everyone-hate-piper 😩
https://riordan.fandom.com/f/p/3148420114022401501 😔
https://riordan.fandom.com/f/p/3343172654596333979/r/3344233352137367790 😢
https://www.deviantart.com/thatu/journal/Oh-Piper-Sue-McLean-I-so-hate-you-223089584 🔪
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4BrUj5bc6E 😜
All writing was written by me manually.
---
One thing I know from my year’s debate boot camp is that no one can change sides easily, especially in this fandom group (fighting that never ends. hope you’re happy, mars/ares). I’m not trying to persuade everyone that Piper is an angel that should be worshipped everywhere, but I’m trying to say that people’s claims are shortsighted and not thought clearly with enough evidence. In the end, I am supportive of Piper but will not turn a blind eye to
the points that negatively affect Piper.
Anyways, time to work on a Caleo rave. Have a nice one.
thanks for reading,
audy
---
Edit: the comments make a fair point; and I did acknowledge them! this post was just to point out some good points to piper, but yes, there are some bad parts of piper that can't be ignored, like stealing cars and stuff- I'm not saying piper's perfect