@Meanlucario  
I’d be surprised if that was the case.

@Alexlayer  
Because she’s not one of the Mane Six, and is the writers’ chance of directing episodes onto lesser characters. In other words, she’s there to test the waters and see if they can give us what we want. In other words, if he episodes away from the Mane Six are received poorly, it’s back to just being the Twilight and Co. show.

@Prof.NightJack  
hence why mini-Twilight was such a brilliant moment of meta.
 
She has many of Twilight’s aspects, in many ways stronger worse.

@Prof.NightJack  
Yeah, and I was part of that mentality back then, and there were reasons for thinking so back then too. So What? Does this somehow justify going around calling people butthurts to you?

@Meanlucario  
Admittedly, that’s one of the highlights of… let’s call it, the director these last two seasons (specially this one) are taking, but I don’t see why Starlight has to or even should be the only vector for this.

@Alexlayer  
That sounds a lot like some what I saw said about Twi a few years ago.
 
I’m serious, I remember seeing the same things said about her in the past.

@Prof.NightJack  
Yeah, well, you still come off as insulting if you go around dropping words like that. And call it a personal theory if you must, but I honestly feel like that’s the case with Starlight. Her character is favored and privileged in ways no other characters have, and characterization and plot convenience often bend over backwards for the sake of her, thus why the claim of her being a Creator’s Pet is, at least, relatively recurrent.

@Alexlayer  
You are aware that we got more side character focus because of Star, right? Trixie is a recurring character, Celestia has two episodes where she got major development, and the latest final had side characters save the Mane Six. Because of Starlight, we aren’t chained to Twilight and Friends, so stop trying to underplay her importance.

@Alexlayer  
I was talking about how the statement of “someone in the staff likes her” being used as a criticism makes one come off as just butthurt, and that if you really are not then you should try not to use a statement that makes it seem like you are.  
Sorry if you read it as me calling you butthurt, I wasn’t, but as I said, unless you actually are it’s best to not use a statement that is so often used in a way that make it seem like someone is.

@Meanlucario  
I just wrote a whole synopsis on why you didn’t need ANY characters involved to run the plot.  

 
@Prof.NightJack  
Yeah, see, it’s constantly using words like “butthurt” that make you sound insulting. Yeah, I get mad when things like this happens, but I do have my reasons that I’ve explained several times. If you go around just calling people butthurts, all you’re doing is treating them as nothing but whinny kids that should be dismissed without a second thought.
 
@orbsah  
It’s not so much as “It shouldn’t be Starlight” as it is that, 1) She wasn’t needed, and most importantly 2) She shouldn’t be doing the exact same things that earned her so much hate over and over again.
 
@OneOverTwo  
Yeah, well, doing things the easy way ain’t always the right way.

@PonyPon  
Honestly I think the main reason they didn’t use Discord is because it would cause it to be more of Discord episode than a Princesses episode since he’s so self focused.
 
Regardless of how good her character is overall, the writers can put Starlight Glimmer in the main support role instead of the mainest role sometimes.

@Meanlucario  
Well people see to like it when he helps people on accident, so it’s fine.
 
and what about pity, now? Was that a big part of the story?

@Alexlayer  
I’m saying that the writer went with the easy way to do things.
 
They wanted to switch the princesses’ cutie marks & Starlight Glimmer is the character most associated with messing with others’ cutie marks.

@PonyPon  
He wouldn’t feel any pity for them, unlike Starlight. He also would do it for laughs instead to help them.

@Meanlucario  
Better question, who outside the six would?
 
First tip, he rhymes with ‘Good Lord!’

@Alexlayer  
Sorry if you feel like that, I’m not trying to insult you, but with how it’s become a default criticism when a character someone doesn’t like is use that “someone on the staff likes them, so put them in” is rather insulting, it makes it seem like the staff can’t like a character and use them, because things can turn out good when a character the staff likes is put in, but if it is good then no one cares why they where put in, but if they don’t like it “they like them so they put them in”.  
It just comes off as nothing but being butthurt to say that when you find it bad.
 
If you are saying that for nothing other then out of dislike for Starlight, then using a statement that scream buitthurt fits.  
If there is something you actually see wrong with it and it’s not out of hate for her, then it’s best not to use the butthurt statment and say some real criticism.

@Alexlayer  
But why shouldn’t it be Starlight?

@Alexlayer  
Who among the Mane Six had the balls to do what Starlight did?

@Meanlucario  
Can’t buy it. To claim that this was the ONLY was is really narrow-minded.
 
 
@Prof.NightJack  
At this point, it honestly feels like you just want to indirectly insult me, so I’m not gonna listen to you anymore. Peace.
 
@OneOverTwo  
Same thing I told Meanlucario: To claim that the only way to do it was through Starlight is really narrow minded. If you want a simple example, you could just have an episode without featuring any of the Main 6/7, or maybe just have a cameo of Twilight at first to smooth the narrative, and then follow the rest of the episode with just the princesses, who end up arguing like it happened in the episode, but then they agree on the mutual idea of switching their duties for the sake of proving their points. You then get the same shenanigans without having to waste time on Starlight, and all the dream-land stuff happening at the end can be easily brought from just having Celestia watch over Luna’s nightmares. Similar conclusion in the end, and we get even more time for the actual princesses to flesh them out and avoid things looking forced. There, I just described to you how this episode could have worked just fine, perhaps even better, without Starlight Glimmer having to be a part of it.
 
But you’re still just gonna tell me I’m wrong in every way you can think of, aren’t you?

@Alexlayer  
It called Starlight Glimmer ’cause the writer needed a plot device to make the cutie mark switch happen.

@Alexlayer  
Oh so it’s “I don;t like it, waaa”?  
Really anytime someone goes “someone in the staff likes her, so they pushed her” it comes off as nothing but butthurt from someone that hates her.  
And if that’s not the case, try not to use the default response used by butthurt haters.
 
 
Really, that was even used buy Twi haters for when she got a lot of spotlight in the past even when she was already getting a lot before they got butthurt.  
So saying the staff is pushing her because they like her is a rater stupid thing to use to complain.

@Alexlayer  
Or this was the only way to give us a Princess episode.

@Prof.NightJack  
Well, yeah, it’s all headcanon, which is exactly why I said there was no in-universe, narrative explanation for it. The only reason for which this is now happening is because someone in the staff REALLY wants to favor Starlight, and voila, this is what we get.

@Alexlayer  
There was no actully facts to say it can’t do this, so it was all headcanon.  
How can you not understand that?

@Background Pony #D16A  
I don’t see what headcanons have to do with this.