#I should have represented…

[vulpiximisa]

>_>

[tempo-takoyaki]

"Are you satisfied yet?"

[casscainmainly]

God this panel kinda drives me crazy. From Batman & the Outsiders #17, Shiva asks Duke about his suit, whether it was his choice. And how does Duke respond? He... doesn't. He parrots what is clearly something Bruce said to him, but never clarifies whether it was 'his choice' at all. Because both him and Shiva know it wasn't. And he acknowledges that his suit, with all the Batty-ness (ears, symbol), was specifically designed to make him like Batman.

Then Shiva suggests dark red, which is what Duke wore in We Are Robin and has connotations to Robin as a whole. Duke's reaction - can we let it go? - can be read in many ways, but to me it suggests Shiva's words hit home. He does miss the Robin colours. Becoming the Signal wasn't his choice, but becoming Robin was.

(And throughout this run, Shiva says both Cass and Duke are being held back by Bruce. With Cass this is a clear allusion to being Orphan over Batgirl, so it's not farfetched to read this conversation as being about how Duke was denied Robin to become Signal).

Duke-as-Signal is a symbol of 'people like Batman', but Duke-as-Robin was a symbol of youth, of community, of diversity and of choice. He was a Robin formed without Batman. I know there's no going back, but having Bruce choose the name, the suit, and the time of day that Duke goes out makes the Signal such a fraught identity. I love the yellow, the suit, and the daytime aspect, but I just wish they were Duke's choices, not Bruce's.

[theoldkyokodied]

One wedding and three funerals

Background paintings under the cut

[hinamie]

もう一回、もう一回

[bixels]

I'm not explaining why re-imagining characters as POC is not the same as white-washing, here of all places should fucking understand.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

jin guangshan and lan qiren yaoi perhaps? since their shapes create a perfect balance?

Two old men perform worlds first successful 96.

[dykedvonte]

You ever just see a Mouthwashing take that makes you want to bang your head into a wall? I literally just saw someone claim Curly couldn't have been emotionally abused by Jimmy before the crash because he was in a higher position of power than Jimmy.

-Shrimp Anon

The mouthwashing fandom has shown me that people genuinely do believe that certain types of abuse are not as detrimental as other types especially when they deem those immune/resistant, ergo, believing one is objectively worse no matter how it affects the person nor the intersections of power, history and dynamics at play.

Get ready cause this is a yap session:

Cause like it's heavily implied that Curly and Jimmy's friendship was toxic and abusive, pointedly in the direction of how Jimmy uses Curly's belief/comfort in him. Curly wasn't forced to enable Jimmy but he was emotional and mentally on edge around him in almost every scene in some way. Mental and emotional abuse are not contingent on what positions you have at work. Yeah, he's Jimmy's boss but he was Jimmy's friend first and it's like getting into Psych discussion to talk about how social power tends to overshadow any perceived organizational power in the human mind. People are concerned about their jobs ofc but they tend to hang onto and put more value/investment into their personal relationships, hence why there tends to be laws and restrictions around mixing the two.

I always see the sentiments that "Curly is a grown ass man", "Curly is bigger than Jimmy", "Curly is Jimmy's boss", "He just needed a backbone" as criticisms of Curly and while I do agree that on the surface level all of these to be true and viable ways Curly could've taken more control of the situation, I often look at the parallels of Anya and Curly as victims of Jimmy pre/post crash.

The way Jimmy talks to Anya post crash is how he talked to Curly in the pre-crash segments. It's hard to pin-point mainly because we know he hates and wants nothing to do with Anya compared to his contrary but similarly handled obsessions with Curly. It's a weird sort of "honey-moon" effect of abuse Jimmy does in terms of emotional and mental victimization. He is always horrid to Anya, always talking down or questioning her abilities and thoughts in a situation, this of course includes the harassment and assault. However, he has a moment of attempted gentleness/conditioning when he question her about the mouthwash when she's contemplating drinking it at the table. The key difference is he has no personal investment in Jimmy outside wanting nothing to do with him, meaning there is no sort of romanticized version of him that he can condition her off of. He knows this, hence, why he always reverts to trying to make her to scared to oppose him.

This sort of give and take of "kindness" doesn't work on her because she knows he is just doing it to take more from her than whatever he could possibly give but it reflects even the "softer" scenes between him and Curly where he always rewords or rephrases Curly's sentiments and concerns to sound more shallow. He is feigning a deeper understanding by reworking Curly's emotions into something bad and needing to be hidden. Everything is laced with envy and resentment, an outburst just around the corner, I mean he even slams the table in the birthday party scene, a tactic in emotional manipulation to set the victim on edge and cloud their ability to respond. Even if Curly knows Jimmy won't get physical in that moment, the physical actions is intended to make him back down in the confrontation in case it does. This is something that is just not person specific. It ingrains itself into how you interact with the world and life and it shows in major and minor ways with Curly.

Post-crash, the abusive nature is more in tandem to the physical victimization Anya went through and the stripping of voice and autonomy we see take place. Like the parasite in HFIM, Jimmy speaks for Curly most of the time and puts words in his mouth, similarly to how he takes Anya's plans as his own. He very commonly, with the both of them mind you, supplements the worst aspects of himself into them; pettiness, selfishness, lack of understanding... And tries to cover himself with their best qualities; kindness, planning, initiative, etc...

These parallel are just to say that positional power has little to do with if a person can be abused and how it can even be flipped to further the abuse. There is no doubt that Curly could've picked up on Jimmy's envy of his position hence another reason he never confronted him as a Captain but as a friend as doing so would immediately put Jimmy in a space to be confrontational/combative.

I think the disdain some people have when they talk about the heavily implied if not implicitly stated emotional/mental abuse Curly experienced being Jimmy's friend is when treating it as an excuse to why he didn't do more. I can understand that completely because it is not an excuse to why he didn't do more but is a very real reason people in his position in these scenarios can experience whether in the context of a work or social environment. However, I also think the way people talk about it really does demonstrate a bigger problem when talking about abuse when somehow who is/was abused is either part of the issue or enabled it.

Harkening back to the sentiments about Curly's inaction regarding Jimmy, I think the exact phrases I used/have seen show how there is an inherent belief that it is easier to overpower the effects of emotional/mental abuse that go in tandem with the perception of Curly as someone who should be able to. There is not an age you suddenly stop being susceptible to abuse nor a set point or low where you realize how it has affected you. You don't suddenly know to stand up or put a face on to face your abuser nor admit that you inadvertently enabled them to subjugate someone else to the same treatment. Maybe it's my psych brain but their is this growing belief that direct action is somehow easy or always the best method with the game shows you instances where it is not always the case. In real life that rings true too. He should have done more, but it's not impossible to see why he struggled to find a way or didn't even if it makes us mad.

It's not easy to suddenly gain a "back-bone". You don't immediately want to resort to aggression, especially if it mirrors the type you were a victim to. You don't want to believe you allowed yourself to be treated this bad, let it get that bad or allowed something bad to happen to someone else. It is easy to be in denial, to retreat to your thoughts or make excuses to avoid the painful truth. It's frustrating but in a way we know is relatable. It why we both hate and love Curly for it. We know we'd be better, we think we'd be better, we like to think we wouldn't falter in the same ways but it's always easier to say that from the outside looking in. It's easy to see what he was doing wrong because we are seeing it, not him, but the game really does make you picture what you would do if this was your raw reality and it's why this debate about Curly seems so never ending/contradictory. We can all say what we'd do but bottom line is that's much different when you're in the moment with all the emotions and human feelings attached.

I personally think Mouthwashing tackles the themes of rape culture, enabling, toxic masculinity, types of abuse and patriarchy in ways that are meant to deconstruct the typical straightforward views we mostly have of these concepts and how little subtilities of them are just as, if not more, detrimental than the overt/obvious parts. The game deals with the idea of little details and bigger picture in a way to show that sometimes the bigger picture is not the issue but the little details that make it up. It's why I have a personal dislike of depictions of Jimmy as the typical horrible person who would of course do something like this because the game is about noticing the little warning signs, the foreshadowing and foresight.

It's why I dislike the typical discussion of "bro code" and "boys will be boys" for the game because the game makes a point to avoid the standard depictions of such. It is about the type of men who still enable despite not condoning, agreeing or even perpetuating harmful beliefs because they can't see the little details or the ways it seeps into their everyday. The severity is not obvious to them as it was not obvious to Curly, Swansea or even Daisuke the way it was to a woman like Anya. There are little details about Jimmy that should ring alarms but if you are too naive like Daisuke, too distant like Swansea or too conditioned like Curly, they are just off markers.

There is 100% more constructive/concise ways to say "Curly was a victim of Jimmy's abuse on an emotional and mental aspect that clouded his judgements and perceptions in the scenario" while also critiquing on the side of "Curly still had a responsibility to protect Anya as a crew mate and Captain that he failed to do due to biases and stigma's he failed to surpass" without the weird condemnation people give him about should've knowing better than to let himself be manipulated by a person he considered a close, if not family/best-friend and had his own reasons to trust initially. Also stop being weird about victims of abuse in general with this fandom, like sorry not everyone has a like social epiphany the moment someone's nasty to them. People are treating it like you immediately know when you are in a toxic relationship immediately or comprehend when a person is actively dangerous and either it's your fault for not knowing how to leave/cut them off or you deserve it. Like the hypocrisy of people believing how certain fans treat the story reflect their irl views but not their own is crazy.

End statement is: I honestly don't even know man, I've been writing this too long and just like no man on that ship was perfect or really helped Anya when it mattered and I feel like pitting them against each other in discussion on who did the least or most or how it was justified sucks cause in the end Anya always did the most and best thing for herself.

[ilynpilled]

“jaime did it mostly for self preservation” “he did it bc he was ordered to kill his father” are not only blatantly incorrect and borderline illiterate reads of what is in the text but idk why people find it unfathomable that someone like jaime would want to prevent thousands of people from violently burning alive. like it is not actually a difficult moral equation which is why it is at the center of jaime’s arc and his relationship to his society because he realizes that the ethical constructs of westeros seem to be in opposition to this very obvious moral choice as seen by how the situation could even escalate to the point that it does through the enablement of the tyrant by the respected institution of the kingsguard and the uncritical upholding of the honor system over an actual coherent moral code. same with the scorn he receives for killing what everybody acknowledges as an objectively horrid tyrant who harmed innocents and violated law that knights are also sworn to protect and uphold and actually contradict by not acting against.

[earendilsass]

I've finally finished my life series art yipee

Im so proud of these considering i've never tried anything that looks like stained glass

Theres also a Cleo one in the reblogs

As usual click for better quality

Flat colours (and me yapping about them) under the cut

These are also not edited for better colours just straight from the art file, idk i can never get colours just right so i usually edit them in my gallery app lol

The line art colour match the characters vibes they're not really lore based but you know what is

The poses. Obv grain is looking at the camera (and has eyes) cuz he's a watcher but also scott and martyn are looking to one side cuz they were happy about their win and pear and scar are looking to the other cuz they were sad/confused

None of them really have facial features cuz like they're players in a game come on why would they ever have an actual identity other than 'player'

Also look at scotts bow and scars cane please i put way too much detail into them

Okay enough yapping now (i lied theres more in the tags)

[fluentisonus]

[casscainmainly]

Though there are valid reasons to want characters to have their own identities, I think some people insist too much on the Batfamily having all individual, unique names. This is why the Orphan name persists so much in fandom, or even Wayne Family Adventures - it's a byproduct of seeing 'Batgirl' as transitory and lesser than. This is not only a misunderstanding of Batgirl, but a misunderstanding of legacy mantles. Legacy mantles aren't stepping stones towards individuality, but identities with symbolic and storied histories. Characters can, and sometimes should, end in a legacy role.

It's also interesting that this anti-legacy philosophy is exactly what DC adopted during the New 52. They destroyed virtually every legacy they could, including wiping Tim's Robin history, erasing the JSA, and deleting Cass and Steph's histories. We all agree New 52 was bad, but most people focus on the content/ramifications on a specific character, when it's the philosophy that was wrong. New 52 was an effort to diminish the power of legacy titles, and to dismiss many characters that fall under the legacy umbrella.

Some characters should grow out of their mantles, of course. But that doesn't make the mantle they grow out of less meaningful or important than the mantle they step into. If we want to leave the New 52 behind, we need to leave its anti-legacy philosophy behind, too.

[starscelly]

aren’t you tired of being nice?? don’t you wanna go crazy???

or, jason robertson set to “all-american bitch”

[nintendont2502]

john as a heir who inherits the narrative freely, doesnt even know that he has the narrative, and barely changes it unless hes being directed to by some outside force (breath as directionless, independent, detatched, free). john as a character whos never existed at the same time as an alternate version of him, a character who never has to face himself and remains largely unchanged by the end of the narrative even as it changes around him

ult dirk as a prince who destroys the narrative and destroys through the narrative, who is determined to reshape it in his own image and 'fix' it, who will make himself the villain if thats what it takes and do whatever he has to in order to help everyone, even if it means hurting them (heart as putting on and taking off masks when needed, inflexible, cold, building a coherent narrative of their own story). dirk as a character who constantly has to face himself via one of his many alternate selves, who can only gain control by uniting those alternate selves into one coherent whole

john is homestuck and ult dirk is homestuck post canon and one of the first things he does when he gains power is kill john (kill homestuck) through the narrative. destroying the (previously free, directionless, detatched) narrative and destroying that narrative through your own (inflexible, cold) narrative. theyre so yaoi

[mittysins]

The idea that trans dudes who want to/have gotten pregnant are "traitors to their transition and masculinity" is transmedicalist as fuck actually.

And for a community (LGBTQ) that emphasizes that sex ≠ gender ≠ presentation... a lot of calls are coming from inside the house.

[impossible-rat-babies]

vierapril day 26--weapon

"and failing that, i'll have my trusty warrior of light box the ears of all concerned."