This seems like, to me, a lot of people looking at the story through baggage-filled lenses and heaping their own complaints onto a story that was never meant to hold them.

Washington Post had a great counter argument to this:

With hair that made Janeway’s bun look casual.

You’re a monster, I love you.

You guys are all focusing on the (possibly) zombie squid when there are a whole bunch of (obviously) still alive fish being filleted, fried, descaled and eaten just below it! What is the East’s obsession with torturing these poor animals?

because of one gif? Seriously? Unsubscribe from a website I’ve been following for years and really enjoy and leave because of one gif in one article? Unsubscribe and leave instead of voice my concerns about something being inappropriate? Seriously?

luckily the kids in the sweatshops have you to care for their well being and seed the internet with righteous indignation on their behalf. I will stick with the squid, as you are doing such a great job of eliminating sweatshops.

Yeah, no.

I would never have clicked on it, MY WHOLE FUCKING PROBLEM IS THAT THE GIF IS VISIBLE ON THE MAIN PAGE.

Octopi indeed do have brains.

That is exactly what I mean. I find this equally disgusting as if it were a dog.

You bring up an interesting point. While that might not look that gory at first to our mammal-centric perspective, it’s no different in principle than seeing a land creature struggling after its stomach cavity had been hollowed out. And it’s not like cephalods aren’t intelligent either.

because it shows a dying animal in horrible pain in a trivial la-di-da way and that shit is not something that should be normalized.

I have to agree, the gif really isn’t something that should be the main page image.

YEAH, HOWSABOUT REMOVING THAT DISGUSTINGLY CRUEL LOOKING GIF AT THE TOP, I DON’T WANT TO SEE THAT SHIT EVER AGAIN BUT PRESENTLY, I DON’TT WANT TO SEE IT WHEN I’M LOOKING AT THE IO9 MAIN PAGE.

We are truly a sadistic species.

I wouldn’t say it made me feel bad about liking the series, but I feel like the idea here was “Wait, what if instead of being a wizard who does detective work, he’s a detective who... kind of does magic? Like, sometimes?”

This abomination:

Way to miss the point, you Dutch weirdo.

‘Nuff said.