When I first came to dA, I started searching for fanart for all of my favorite series and games (Fire Emblem, LoZ, Harry Potter, LotR, etc...). I also started searching for Avatar fanart.

I was overwhelmed. There is no other way to put it. The quality and quantity of Avatar fanart out there is fantastic. We are a fandom with devotion that exceeds all normal expectations.

The greatest (in number and in quality) faction of the Avatar fandom lays claim to the name, "Zutarian". I looked around the search box and around some clubs. The art was simply jaw-dropping. I read essays and fanfiction, I stayed up for hours one Friday night in October after watching one of the new episodes. I had never dreamed that such a fandom existed online.

Over the weekend I ran amok over dA looking for Avatar and Zutara pics. My brain went into overload looking at all the wonderful art. It was only on Sunday (two days later) that I saw a single Kataang piece. I was very confused at first. I wondered, 'What in the world... Katara... and Aang?' The notion was so novel and foreign to me, I almost couldn't comprehend it.

I had thought, after lurking around the fandom for many hours (trust me, I was a big time stalker) that the entire Avatar fandom was Zutara.

It is Zutarians that have made the Avatar fandom, the Avatards if you will, what we are today. I was strongly affected by what I saw when I first found the fandom. It is the passion of the Zutarians and their artwork that made me want to be apart of this. That made me want to do my own art. That made me want to be an Avatard. They are the reason that I am online five out of twenty four hours in a day. They are the reason that I joined the online fandom in the first place.

And I have joined them.

We are Fierce.
We are Passionate.
We are Tenacious.

We are Zutarians.

Do not allow this... comic book written by men who are not Mike and Bryan for six to four year olds to get you down.

Never forget who we are.