This is for the benefit of the ML.


        First, I want to thank you for your extensive C&C, so no hard
feelings there, and I felt I had to reply to your statements....

  For Ranma to respond to any advances by Ukyo would possess much of 
the damning quality "being out of character," not least because, out 
of habit if nothing else, he still views her to a greater or lesser 
extent as a boy. Any advances she makes alarm and embarrass him, as they 
would if (say) Ryoga tried something on him.
  My apologies for invoking that mental image. :)

        Apology accepted.

        I would like to point out that in Desperately Seeking Shampoo, Ranma
asked Ukyo if she still loved him.  Would Ranma do the same thing to, say,
Ryoga?  (do not include the "Koi no Fishing Rod" incident :) )

        And another point.  Any advances Shampoo or Kodachi makes toward him
(Ranma) alarm and embarass him, too.

        And yet another point.  Viewing Ukyo as a boy may have been a matter
of perspective, but ever since Ukyo revealed herself to be a girl, it is no
longer such.  What bothers me is that she STILL wears boys' school clothing
once in a while, and I have never been able to understand that.

        Remember how Ranma was attacking Ukyo all out when they first meet
as teenagers?  The truth was exposed (forgive my pun) and Ranma, realizing
that Ukyo is a girl, treats her as such.  He beats the hell out of male
characters without turning a hair, but he won't lay as much as a finger on
female characters - and I do believe Ukyo qualifies as one. 

  Just how good a person Ukyo really is is debatable, at any rate, and
has been very much debated, on the Fanfic ML and in other fora. Suffice >to

say it's not at all obvious Ukyo would be that nice in the situation. 

        I understand your point of view but, like you said, it is debatable.
I believe that the interpretation of Ukyo's character ultimately rests with
the individual.  

        Ukyo is a controversial character.  Remember the part when Ukyo got
sick and Konatsu offered to run the business for her?  Near the end, when
Ukyo wakes up from her fainting spell, Akane is seen taking care of her.
Would Akane do the same for Shampoo?  Or Kodachi?  I do not believe so.
Reciprocity must have something to do with Akane's reaction to Ukyo's
sickness, or events in that part of the manga would have been quite different.

        Ukyo is not blameless.  In Akane and her Sisters, Ukyo tried to hurt
or seriously injure Akane with various flying objects of increasing weight.  

Some less charitable interpretations would have her rub Akane's face in 
the fact that Ranma was there (and half-undressed to boot!). It would 
have been clinching proof to Ukyo (and to Akane besides!) that Ranma 
didn't want Akane after all.

        Clinching proof?  So....following your line of reasoning, a naked
Shampoo intimately hugging a fully-undressed naked Ranma, in the bath to
boot, is NOT clinching proof?  As I recall, Akane was angry for the rest of
the night and the day after, but nothing further was mentioned of the
incident.  

  Neither is it obvious that Ukyo's perfect for Ranma. On the contrary. 
Ukyo's been raised to play the role of a man, the dominant role. I find
the idea that Ranma "Wild Stallion" Saotome would willingly play what is 
generally a woman's role perfectly absurd.

        I have to agree with you on this one.  So Ukyo is NOT perfect for
Ranma after all....

  To remind Ranma of his responsibility. Sense of duty towards someone 
is not love, you know. If he loved Akane, as you believe he does, he 
would have at the very least told her to stop the moment she did 
something untoward ("Aw, come on, Ucchan...I hate it when you act all 
weird like this!"). I can quite easily see him giving her a good hard 
slap and leaving for greener pastures forthwith.

        But the two weren't acting weird....in their minds, that is.  They
had thrown away their adult roles and assumed their old mantles as the
Ranchan and Ucchan of a decade ago.  They forgot that things were different
now than they were ten years ago.  

  Love is not doing one's duty and doing what one likes after that; it 
is complete selflessness, the complete purging from oneself of all desire 
contrary to the interest of the beloved and the relationship with the 
beloved. Your Ranma does not love Akane at all.

        According to your definition of love, a relationship along these
lines would be dull beyond belief, not to mention unrealistic.          

        Where is the fire of individuality?  It is known that Akane and
Ranma do their own thing, but they still love each other.  One of Ranma's
interests is not to be smashed by Akane, but he still gets it anyways.  One
of Akane's interests, no matter how repressed, is to be treated nicely by
Ranma, but Ranma is not so docile and passive (and he gets smashed because
of that ^_^).

        Do you deny that Ranma and Akane love each other, despite their
obvious disregard of your concept of 'love'?

Love : Caring for another person.  Respecting their personalities and
learning to work with them, not against them.  A committment to share the
joys of life with them together, to stand up to trials and tribulations
together - as a couple.

Acknowledged that it is a somewhat undefinable concept.  

  It was Ranma's even considering cheating on Akane that ruined the 
story for me completely. He really does come off as a complete bastard.

        Perhaps he forgot about Akane in that moment that they shared,
enveloped by music and their nigh-forgotten childhood memories of playing
with each other.

        He didn't even consider once cheating on AKane.  NOT ONCE in Namida
did he even think of that.  In fact, up till Ukyo play-wrestles with Ranma,
he was brooding on and on about Akane.  Then you see how fast he jumped off
Ukyo when he heard Akane, and remembered about her.  Ranma simply didn't
think.  He acted.

  The reason Ukyo never gets Ranma is simple--he doesn't want her in 
that way, at all. Just how he does feel about her is uncertain. I 
believe that he doesn't know what to think or feel about her. This will 
become a real problem after the end of the manga. But he desires her not 
at all.

        Perhaps a combination of factors, which have been mentioned here and
there throughout my reply, contributed to his 'unexpected' behaviour.  

  I wish I could say I liked your story, sir--it was quite well written-- 

        Thank you.

but I fear that after weighing in the scales of Right Characterization 
it has been found too light. Please reconsider it before the real 
anti-Ukyo forces start moving in on you. Miss Seawright can be quite a 
punisher, far more than I am.

You mean Caroline Seawright?  Anti-Ukyo forces?  Bring them on.  

PS I should add I can't help sympathizing with Ukyo either; but her 
tragedy, so to speak, is not the one you've described. But that is 
another story.