Reader-inserts are definitely not for me either. I’m not interested in kissing these canon characters which is… mainly what OC stories are about, unfortunately. I want to see what canon characters do in their world and how they react to each other. Sometimes I’m okay seeing how they react with OCs, but for the most part? It’s not why I read fic.

I did write a second person fic recently, where the perspective was from a canon character. I enjoyed writing it, but I was under no impression it would be for many people (even if it wasn’t in a relatively inactive fandom). Using “you” for a canon character has echoes of writing in first person, but is very, very different. An interesting challenge.

I’ve heard similar said about younger readers and self-inserts, but I can’t wrap my head around it. Even when I was young, I never read those stories. I did read a lot more OC centric stories back then, but I don’t know if it was because I really liked those or I was a bit stupid and didn’t understand how to search for anything else, so I just clicked on what came up.