#I'll try to articulate them in text tomorrow since it's almost midnight

[varpusvaras]

Winnick will come this close to writing a good, rightfullly angry character with BPD/CPTSD and ruin it by making him his conception of "a dangerous psychopath" because dc's understanding of mental illness begins and ends with the joker.

I like that Jason was angry i'm not gonna lie I enjoy the "bad victim who doesn't accept that they were a necessary sacrifice, who doesn't think what happened to them is something they should be expected to tolerate, like fuck your greater good, you weren't there, it isn't worth this." I think even looking at Jason's past before getting adopted he has reason to be angry, like he is poor af and starving and he had to take care of his mom and his dad is in jail because he couldn't see another way to provide and he gets trafficked -he has so many reasons to be angry. And he's not, and I love jaybin, but I think there are so many ways and things he can be angry about without it feeling classist. And I love that he can't emotionally regulate, that he has so clearly BPD/CPTSD because why the fuck would he not, have you seen his life (and that's not even counting the csa hc, which i am because willfully and consistently implying csa and then not addressing it/denying it feels like feeding into a culture of taboo that ruins lives and getting away with covert victim-blaming at the same time). The issue is that they lack finesse or any kind of understanding of anger. The think anger is a personality trait. They think angry = evil. They think being angry means you're violent at and about everything, that you shoot indiscriminately even though you've known better since you were a kid, that you're suddenly treating women like shit (which, wtf seriously) which okay maybe THEY treat women shitty for no reason when they're angry, but that'd be more of a them problem I'd say. Their portrayal of anger is classist because their conception of emotions hasn't evolved since fucking Descartes. Think anger = bad = poor and not only doesn't it occur to them that this is classist, they so instinctively assign moral value to the concepts of poor and angry that they don't realise it and just conceptualise poor=angry and end up with incredibly classist portrayals of anger. You can write characters that are mentally ill and violent without being ableist, you can write characters that are poor and angry without being classist, but that requires a level of respect for people, introspection, humility willingness to learn about the sensitive topics you are exploring that is simply not accessible to Winnick and so many other dc writers.

And here comes my very hot take that I'm too cowardly to say off anon: the pit shouldn't have healed Jason's malnutrition. Like, outside of canon I love big jay, I love big men who are emotionally vulnerable and need comfort etc. but in canon? It just comes off as another way to adultify Jason, and make the horrible things that happen to him acceptable. Jason "sleeping with Talia because he is fucked up about Bruce" because they both look like adults until you realise this is actually just rape and you can't put any responsibility of Talia taking advantage of the kid under her care (very ooc of course) on the child himself. Jason fighting Mia looking like a 40 years old beating up a teenage girl when they're the same damn age. Fucking Ethiopia 2.0. And Jason's murders as well, for the matter. Like don't get me wrong the duffle bag of doom is an iconic villain move, but it's just that: a massive shock effect and a "psychopathic" move. We shouldn't need Jason beheading anyone to be horrified, because just one murder, if written correctly, should be enough. A child killing someone is a terrible thing. A child being put in a position where they think killing someone is the only solution to ending suffering (thinking about the Garzonas case) is a terrible thing. A kid trying to kill his murderer (because fuck his death has to matter it has to) and only begging to be allowed it should be horrifying. Jason, with his unhealed malnutrition making him look a couple of years smaller and younger than his physical age, should look his mental age. It should be impossible to look away from the reality of what he is: a traumatized teenager who wasn't allowed to grow up. And he has a gun. This is already a horror story.

Make utrh!Jason a villain if you must, but have the guts to sit with it. Don't shove the fact that he was a hero and a victim under the rug because it's uncomfortable. Sit with the unease that sometimes someone is doing something bad and is suffering a lot, and maybe they're doing the bad thing because they don't know how to survive the suffering, and suddenly it's not easy separating hero from villain from victim. Your imaginary lines in the sand will not protect you from the crude reality of the complicated and shitty situations you have chosen to depict; you open the can of worms now you can't look away and let the worms roam free just because you're squeamish.

How does it feel to be psychic and be in my head and write part of my essay on Jason for me? Fuck, I have so much to say about this but I need a good night of sleep to formulate it correctly. Look for a longer answer tomorrow, but in the meantime, everyone sit down and look at this and look at it hard. Thank you.