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One of the most interesting developments is the rise of the eeveelutions into the mainstream. A big part of that rise was the Vaporeon copypasta and the powers of memes but it's something that's really surfacing. Not only reflected in smash or pass polls but also in general popularity among even the general image boards. There's also the fact of people being open about that attraction in big social media sites and in open spaces with lots of people. I've always said that the way Pokémon is constructed leaves very little in terms of "moral" superiority because of the series lack of distinction between Pokémon.
What prompted this post is the fact that Vaporeon overtook Gardevoir as the most upvoted Pokémon post in r/rule34 with 9k upvotes. I've mentioned that this is a place where there's over a million subscribers and where people constantly upvote girls cosplaying so it's a very vanilla sub. I've pointed out how results in other general imageboards are pretty close when it comes to Pokémon, even Gelbooru shows Pokémon clumping together in what is a imageboard geared towards anime fans. For example Lopunny being the most popular image of a Pokémon there. It shouldn't be a surprise because smash or pass reveals small differences between Pokémon in the upper echelons but what is surprising, at least to me, is the rise of the eeveelutions even outside of the pokephile sphere.
