@Fwelin  
>implying the show means we have to abandon headworlds

@LanceOmikron  
So you’re so desperate that not only would you ignore the show’s clear implications on two occasions that Applejack doesn’t care about her hat, as long as she has one, but you’d also bank on the low chance for the alternate possibility?
 
Sometimes you just got to know when to fold when it comes to headcanons. I know I’ve certainly had to abandon some of mine.

@Fwelin  
But the chances of that being the case isn’t 100%. That’s the key.

@LanceOmikron  
Which means that it is more likely than not that the one destroyed in this episode was that hat.

@Anon-a-Miss  

 
Come to think of it, G.M. Berrow actually threw us a bone in that regard with the Applejack chapter book. It mentions that while she has lots of hats in the hats and bows closet, there’s still a specific hat that she favors.

@Scrounge  

 
That’s why I said “on their own”.
 
 
@Fwelin  

 
I live on a farm and things do break all the time but that usually means we have to spend money for tools and equipment even minor things when they break we have to get a new one which costs money.
 
What I’m saying is they have a lot of work they have to do and their parents if they are still alive (which I don’t think they are) have done nothing to help let alone even show their faces to their family. @Scrounge said they might be hospitalized but I’m certain we would have heard about that by now they have been gone since AJ was little and if they were trapped somewhere that would imply they have no contact with anyone and most likely no escape which implies no food so either their dead or they are really shit parents.

@Scrounge  
The town may have been built around the farm but at this point I think that the town could survive without it. Though I don’t think anyone would be very happy about it.

@Pagan  
Things break on farms. Having to fix them often doesn’t mean that they’re not decently off, and you don’t need to be Filthy Rich status to not be hurting for money.

@Pagan  
Wasn’t the whole damn town built around this farm? If it was really that dire, I’d think somepony, anypony would be worried about the domino effect.

@Scrounge  
Actually it’s heavily implied that the farm only ever makes enough money to keep the farm alive hence why they aren’t as well off as filthy rich and in this latest episode AJ states she’s always fixing stuff around the farm so they are only just getting by on their own.

@Pagan  
Fluttershy never had parents. She was found as a yearling in the center of an abnormally large violet.
 
And technically, we have seen RD’s dad, though only in flashback.
 
 
@Pagan  
If they’re not dead, they could still be comatose or otherwise hospitalized on an essentially-permanent basis. To name just one reason living parents might not be able to come home.
 
And Sweet Apple Acres has, IIRC, been implied to have financial difficulties all of once, way back in “Best Night Ever”.

@Spritejunkee  
That’s actually a good idea. Everytime AJ goes on a dangerous mission she wears an expendable hat from the hats and bowties closet. Definitely a better way of dealing with it than crying “Muh head canon!”.
 
@Background Pony #BA17  
If you’re getting angry because your head canon got reject you have nobody to blame but yourself. I like the idea of her hat being a gift from her dead parents, too, but you don’t see me ranting about ruined fanon. Something being a popular in the fandom is no guarantee that it will make it into the show. People need to accept that and not threat their head canons like their personal holy grail.

@Fwelin  
Well for now there is more evidence that points to them being dead rather than just not in the area so until the show provides concrete evidence that they are somehow alive then they are going to be considered dead.
 
Also I really hope they are dead cause if they aren’t they are the worst parents ever they left their daughters to their elderly mother to take care of on a barely profitable farm that they constantly have to renovate and have never once showed up to their reunions or helped on the farm they had better be dead.

@Pagan  
Do I think that? No, I think they’re very likely to be dead, but it’s still a possibility that they’re not without the writers contradicting themselves.
 
That’s the thing about symbolism; it’s never concrete. All we know is that they’re not at the farm, and have not been for a long time. They could have gone missing, or been out on a long-term mission, or any number of things; it’s not like Twilight ever referenced Shining on-screen until the episode he showed up.

@Fwelin  
So you think that the stars are nod to her living parents who we have never seen and has no reason to have a nod given in the first place, so why haven’t RD, or Fluttershy gotten something like that? We have never seen their parents or heard them mentioned but they don’t get any symbolism.
 
You don’t make a metaphoric scene for no reason either they are dead or she never had any parents to begin with which makes no sense.

@Pagan  
It’s ALSO used as a gesture to pay respect or acknowledge someone who is alive. It’s not a term solely used for dead people.

@Fwelin  
Um yes you can it’s actually a solem gesture to pay respect to the dead.

@Pagan  
Well, technically, all she confirmed was that they’re a tip of the hat to her parents. You can tip your hat at non-dead people.

@Telaros  
No the show writers confirmed the falling stars were a metaphor for AJ’s parents being dead.
 
They gone.

@Pagan  
Give it time…  
squints eyes
 
It’s never been confirmed in the show. If they can do this crappy running gag of her hat, it could just be hints they might one day want to reintroduce a AJ’s mom and pop episode. Hasbro doesn’t go by the Word of Faust like some of the fandom.

@KentuckyFriedScootaloo  
And yet, the show never had a single shred of evidence that it was the same hat in every episode.

@fl0wenol  
The “Indiana Jones” was one of the earliest fanon for applejack’s hat’s origin.  
 

It isn’t just about some potential backstory, I liked the idea that the same hat was in every episode (it was there for Nightmare Moon, it was there for Discord, etc.)
 
That’s what made it significant before these revelations.

@Anon-a-Miss  
She never takes the real hat too far from home for fear of losing it, in fact she mostly only wears it when doing farm work.

@redness  

 
And Indy wore a fedora, not a stetson. I mean come on.