#dimentionally?

[tearlessrain]

I want to see an aurora so bad you guys

[scalproie]

my favorite thing about kazjun is how we dont know anything about it other than they banged at one point to make jin

[aquagirl555]

the mail-person is the one really driving the plot to find everyone a way back home, because he still has mail to deliver and not the gods themselves are gonna get in his way, his family has been delivering mail since horseback in Europe,

isekai about a nyc apartment block getting teleported into a fantasy realm, and how this group of people who previously have only had incidental contact with one another come together to build a vibrant community in their new circumstances. there's a season-long arc about introducing bagels and pizza to the fantasy world that gets into the details of sourcing ingredients, developing new technologies, and learning how to work with supernatural substitutions.

[thebluespacecow]

thinking about eliza again

thinking about her meeting people she could of been

on accident, how it would make her reflect on her life, her childhood, the people and things that are now forever, just slightly, apart of her

how even though, yeah, she isn't happy, how she dosn't want to keep pushing, to leave her childhood bed, it's suffecating warmth, that at least, dosn't matter if she wants to die, she isn't a monster

dosn't think herself god

[sanpape]

I've been playing guitar since I was 8 and drawing seriously since I was 12. and you would think this familiarity would transfer over somewhat and I'd have no problem drawing guitars but they're my truly archilies heel. too many curves, too many weird angles, weird varying three-dimentionality. they're the horses of instruments.

[batsarebetterthanpeople]

🍺 Jamie, we need the full unabridged Calico Jack essay you certainly have.

Ok so here's the thing. I've already made a lot of the meta about him that I need to make so I'll just link some and give you director's commentary. This is in reverse chronological order of when I posted it so my understanding of my evil alcoholic meow meow has grown more complex and nuanced the farther down it goes.

The full throttle Jack apologia I was on before the canyon materialized - I understand why this one has 7 notes and three of them are from me. I really do. However I stand by most of what I said here. I don't stand by my relative minimization of what Jack did do wrong (Being homophobic, being a bad friend to Ed and saying that they're not friends, Being manipulative instead of just warning Ed and letting him make the call about Stede). I think that what's missing from this little essay is that Jack is, as a narrative tool, trying to pull Ed back into his old life that he hates. His fundamental narrative purpose is to show what Ed's life was like back when he was shitty. Now I think from this perspective that Stede is just as culpable for doing that to Mary but it's not Mary's story any more than it's Jack's story so I am reading against text in this meta. However what you have to understand is that in may of 2022 when I published this thing that Jack was universally hated. I personally saw him as a sympathetic and wrong character where as the general consensus back then was that the dalliances he talked about with Ed had to have been non consensual if they were real because why would Ed ever have sex with a guy like that. Which is a take I have a lot of problems with but the main one is that it denies Ed agency to have sex with a guy that rubs you, the viewer the wrong way. So basically, I agree with this post but I would not make it in the current relatively Jack friendly climate of the fandom. Nor would I make it in a post canyon enviornment where the homophobic masc white guy apologia has reached a fever pitch just because I don't want to be associated with that. Also I'm a lot less charitable to Stede than most ofmd fans for personal, non jack related reasons. Also I want to make a note here that I should have made in that meta but will make now that I'm not saying that Stede is terrible and you shouldn't like him, my argument was essentially that seeing Jack as one dimentionally evil is kind of weird when you're willing to completely write off Stede's misogyny era as an oopsy. I like Stede. Most people like Stede. I stood alone in also liking Jack at the time.

Here's a much more reasonable strain of Jack apologia that I've settled on - In the early days I bounced back and forth between "he literally did nothing wrong except kill Karl" and "He's the worst guy ever (affectionate)" but eventually I saw how the wind was blowing on people who said "he's never done anything wrong" about Izzy and I was like, I'll dial it back even though I'm not throwing Ed or Stede (generally unless I'm also defending Mary B in the same breath) under the bus to say it. You'll notice it's pretty much the same thesis except for instead of being phrased as "Stede was out of pocket and Jack did nothing wrong and you're all highschool brained" it's phrased as "I think this is what happened but these two other things could also be the case and I would still like him. This is the clear role he plays in the narrative giving it to someone else annoys me." Also Beardy is what I started having my Jack tulpa call Ed before season 2. I've explained why Here on the @ask-calico-jack sideblog where I'm the mod because I got an ask about it and I decided to address it out of character. Also I'm Not Going Anywhere is a Jack apologia fic I was writing at the time which I have since abandoned. Basically I whumped him into submission.

My Evidence for Jack being willing to risk his life to save Ed - more apologia that I stand by. Once again I want to reiterate that in 2022 everybody hated that guy and most people still hate him which is fair and natural but enough people have come around that I'm now willing to ignore the haters because I have to fight with the people who like him wrong.

this was part of an ask game asking me what I thought about ships and I went off about Ed and Jack

I learned that Calico Jack was named after calico the fabric and I made this because I'm still on my Jack/Ed enemies to rivals who fuck shit - Not sure about Ed's skin here, is he too orange? depends on whether you're on desktop or mobile.

Calico Jack penis discourse - This one is integral to my view of the pissing scene. I love the pissing scene it's one of the only scenes of tv ever.

Jack is cute he would kill me for saying it but it's true 2 3 4

Brief asside that I feel like I have to put in and here's probably best: At some point in late 2022 early 2023 Jack stopped being so villified and people started to think he was kinda fun. After this the CJizzys attacked. I used to passively like the concept of CJizzy because in my head they were the worlds worst guys being terrible together. It was giving Izzy a pirate captain to obsess over the way he obsesses over blackbeard, except the pirate captain actually liked being a pirate captain so it was healthier than what he has going on with Ed, and also it was like if that one straight couple that are together but hate each other because she's a nag and he's a slob were gay pirates who partake in unsafe bdsm. Then a bunch of people started writing and drawing this wildly out of character CJizzy stuff and I got turned off of it completely because they would hollow out my favoriate little villain to turn him into the perfect white masc boyfriend for their little guy because they cant enjoy a show if there aren't masc4mascs in it, and now because of that I hate the ship. I just can't stand people giving Jack emotional intelligence without him being wrapped in a blanket and socialized by force first. It's not that I don't like woobifying him it's that you're woobifying him wrong and above is the way you ought to do it. anyway, onwards.

Anon asks me how I think Jack felt about being rejected by the crew - I stumble upon an interesting potential motive for him faumenting mutiny against Stede and potentially evidence for him telling the truth about having been mutinied three times.

Ed has a type - I added Frenchie in here because I'm a serial shipper and I stand by that decision despite Frenchie being different from Jack and Stede in most ways but I genuinely think that Stede and Jack are a very similar type of guy

Jack is not a frat boy - this one is me being a dick again but also I'm right.

Jack calls Stede slurs, this is funny - note that Stede also calls Jack "calico" as if his first name is Calico and his last name is Jack and that historically Jack was called "calico" Jack because some guy writing a salacious book about pirates wanted to make him seem gay so to me Jack's nickname for Stede is Fairy and Stede's nickname for Jack is Fudgepacker. This to me is both amusing and homoerotic.

Fic rec - What I think Jack and Ed were like as kids, there's a one paragraph meta and then below it a link to a 2k word fic

Jack has a type - Anne and Mary came out and I love them

Jack fucks - This has always been my take but I think there's a lot of people on here who thinks he doesn't fuck well and all of them are wrong, and more importantly, have not had sex with as many bisexual 50 year old alcoholic perverts as I have, so they don't know what they're talking about. Jack would try to sell me meth on grindr.

Jack and Ed are tragic actually - they could have been highschool sweet hearts who got married if Jack wasn't a little bitch

I am shipping so hard right now - my thesis about my pet 5 way

Aro cowboy pirate- Jack and Jim also have stuff in common

Jack has dimentions don't you dare say he doesn't have dimensions - Jack actually is sympathetic Ed told me himself and he also told you and Jack also says a lot about both Ed and Stede and that's the whole reason he's there is to say a lot about Ed and Stede if you will just listen to what his presence says about the guys you like maybe you would understand him like I do. (you general not you specifically)

and finally

my writing advice.

[birdsareblooming]

watching the japanese cutscenes of sonic 06 and blaze really isn’t fuckin real huh

[aikoiya]

Ya'll, this world that God made?

It's just fantastic, man.

10/10. Would absolutely recommend.

I say this because, I was taking a shower (& I assure you, that isn't the cool part; I'm not that egotistical) & when I looked behind me, I just saw this really thin beam of sunlight shinning in from the window into the shower.

It was so cool.

It was only a couple inches in front of me & I could literally duck down under it & move to the other side of it & I could see the shape of the light changing 3-dimentionally. I could see hundreds of little particles floating through it & it was WILD!!

I did that several times &, I dunno why, but it blew me away in that moment.

So, yeah. I love life. Extremely blessed.

God bless all of ya'll reading this. Just wanted to share some of my joy with you & remind people to take joy in the seemingly small, simple things in life.

It's good for the soul.

[katapotato55]

My love hate relationship with modern Ratchet and Clank games

TW: my opinion. its ok to disagree with me and I would love to hear your perspective. please don't send me hate. thank you.

I love rift apart and I love ratchet and clank as a series. I have played it since the ps2 era and it has a very special place in my heart, I loved the future trillogy too, and I love the newer games all the same.

but also some things bother me

1- clank making a dimentionator and announcing it to the universe felt out of character.

I don't care how you spice it the entirety of ACIT had clank learning about not abusing power for selfish reasons what the fuck game.

It would have worked if literally anyone but clank did that.

2- i miss Jim Ward.

this is not the games fault I am just sad about it. Captain Qwark was one of my favorites growing up. I wish him and his family good health and fortune. thank you for making my childhood you brilliant hilarious man.

3- This entire story feels like a waste of time.

can we just END the whole thing with the lombax race already. I loved the future trilogy but its been 10 years and I want to finally move on to other stories.

either showcase the lombax race, or don't. this has been dangling so much over my head that i have to occasionally remove cobwebs from it. lets just finish this story arc and move on please!

it feels like having the boys go to a parallel "what if never met" timeline just felt… wasteful.

I love rivet and kit but they are still just genderswapped ratchet and clank. You can't really have them meet new characters because they are just meeting themselves.

Yes i know this is a stupid take but i don't care. I just feel like this story was so…. safe. nothing ground breaking or interesting and it feels a bit wasteful.

4- ratchet's personality (also a problem with the 2016 remake)

what I loved about the original trillogy is that ratchet and clank were an amazing duo.

Ratchet was gruff, a little immature, and a bit standoffish. later on he matured (probably because he was like 13 in the first game lol) but he was STILL ratchet.

this reflected off of clank being naieve but good natured and intelligent. Clank became less naieve but he was STILL clank.

but since the 2016 reboot Ratchet went from a standoffish imperfect person to a generic wonderhero every single damn hollywood protagonist has.

the problem with this is that it basically ruins the dynamic with the boys. if both Ratchet AND clank are Naive then they don't really have a lot of chemistry…

Writers: please let your characters be flawed.

I liked ratchet BECAUSE of his flaws, and it feels like ratchet's personality was sandblasted off during the movie.

5- Comedy and seriousness 2 in one shampoo.

I liked the OG trillogy for its comedy, but it had a few serious bits too, mostly in up your arsenal.

I liked the Future trilogy for its serious bits, but it had comedy bits too sprinkled here and there which was a nice way to blow off tension.

for the most part sometimes it feels like this series doesn't know if it wants to be serious or joke-ey and so its kinda neither. Its just there. it exists.

please let the writers have fun with this man. It feels like a lot of the newer stuff has a corporate stranglehold on this series so its too afraid to alienate anyone.

as they always say: to appeal to EVERYONE you end up standing out to no one at all.

why am i making this post?

because tbh I don't want ratchet and clank to turn into bland safe mush that is designed to appeal to as much people as possible.

i love this game

But also this game only really brought me neat alt characters. I like fancy brit nefarious but thats about it. nothing really stands out to me about this game beyond it's premise.

it all feels too…safe?

That's why the lombax civilization story line didn't end, its because its too dangerous to ACTUALLY explore that anymore. that is why for some bloody reason characters keep randomly pointing out how lombax ratchet is being a lombax and that is what he is.

I am not angry, but that is EXACTLY my problem.

I WANT to be angry and upset

I WANT to have my ideas challenged

its more interesting that way! I remember way back in the day people were complaining about the tonal shift in the future trillogy and how they didn't like that.

more of that please! do interesting things with the characters I love! don't just sit on all these good ideas damnit!

anyways give me your thoughts. thank you for reading my lazy weird nerd rant. I stayed up late last night playing shadows of doubt and I will probably regret posting this once I get a full nights sleep lol. oh also shipping ratchet and rivet is weird. stop it I don't want this to be another sans self incest thing. It isn't as ungodly and terrible as the Allistor and Ratchet ship but its still weird as fuck. sorry not sorry please insomniac let women in this series exist for longer than 2 games at least so that the fans can be less emotionally starved. canonize relationships you cowards.

[arnaultdorothea]

FE Engage thoughts so far

I recall saying I wasn’t going to play Engage, but the need for a new FE game was too great so I got it. It’s very... Lackluster. I still don’t like the past hero incorporation (it feels too much like FEH minus the gatcha aspect) and the characters suffer the same one dimentionality (it’s a word now, ok) that the Fates characters did for me.

My least favorite part, however, is how the skirmishes scale to be a few levels above your highest units which makes the gap between your stronger and weaker units even greater. I did find that skirmishes located in The Divine Paralogues are at significantly lower levels at least, but unless you get the expansion pass then I’m not sure people have access to that nor skirmishes there. I know that in earlier FE games you’d always have your strongest units and very weak units that you’re too far into the game to ever use, but I like being able to bring everyone fairly close in levels and switch out units more easily depending on what enemies I see on the map. Also it’s an easy way to grind for supports.

The best part about the game is the map designs and how diverse they all are,. I did miss that a lot in Three Houses. And the art is really nice overall.

My main team is currently: Alear, Etie, Chloe, Jade, Diamat, Ivy, Yunaka, Citrinne, Alfred, but I’ll probably end up swapping out Jade for Saphir and if there’s room stick Merrin on.

Minor spoilers for the very beginning of the game under the cut and ramblings about my faves and RIP to Camilla’s voice.

When Alear’s mother died I laughed but in an exasperated way because of how the parents always die. The scene reminded me first of Byleth and Jeralt with the whole positioning and everything.

My favorite is Ivy but that’s because she’s like a Camilla 2.0 with a more detached, calmer personality. I also really like Etie (wish her supports weren’t all about working out and muscle gains though), Chloe, Jade, Goldmary, and Diamat. Yunaka grew on me a lot more than I thought she would, but I still find her voice kind of grating. From what I’ve seen of them I also really like Saphir, Merrin, and Seadall but I’m not far enough to have recruited them -- I got distracted with skirmishes and now everyone is over-leveled in their advanced classes. I spoiled myself and saw a little bit of everyone’s S-rank conversation but it doesn’t change the fact I’m marrying Ivy. Or the equivalent since there’s no real marriage in this. I would’ve loved a more romantic S-rank with Saphir, but I’ll take what I can get. I know Alear is like... 17? 18? And she’s 35 so that would’ve been weird. If only Alear (and everyone else) were older.

I miss Camilla’s original VA from Fates though the one she has in Heroes was fine, and apparently it’s the same VA in Engage (as in Heroes) but it sounds off this time around. Rosado reminds me of Forrest (Fates) a lot and at first I thought he was a woman with a really deep voice.

[bwabbitv3s]

Danny: Hi, so I did not think the non-emergency line would be the right one as well it not an emergency emergency, but it is sort of is urgent depending on the time dilation between this dimension, and my dimension. Cause it is 10pm here in, uh, give me a moment, Gotham, and the Booo-merang™️ has not hit me yet. Which has me worried about my parents reaction.

Hotline Responder: I am sorry but being temporally or dimentionally displaced is listed one of the options for the non-emergency Justice League hotline. Being late for curfew in a different dimension is not enough to call the emergency hotline, unless you are in immediate danger at this moment. I am sure your parents will be understanding of this.

Danny: See I get that, you get that, normal people get that, it is just my parents don't really have a great sense of appropriate response to this sort of thing. They kinda have done the whole punch a hole into another dimension before in the basement. Along with storm a government stronghold and raised it to the ground thing. So it kinda has me worried about how they will take the whole me being yanked through a weird portal in front of them.

Hotline Responder: . . .

Danny: It is not my first time being kidnapped, or the first time they know about me being kidnapped, but they have been a little over protective after I told them everything. They understand that I can take care of myself, but they still are getting used to it. So I sort of don't want to let them have enough time to contact Fright Knight or Frostbite to try and go after me. I really don't want them to punch a hole into another dimension.

Hotline Responder: . . .

Hotline Responder: Do you know if it was magic or technology that caused you to be dimentionally displaced?

Danny: I am pretty sure it was magic going by the weird circle, candles, and cultist dudes dressed up in robes. Whatever they were trying to do pretty sure they messed up and got me instead.

Hotline Responder -alarmed- : Are you safe right now? Do you need assistance escaping?

Danny: Huh, oh no I am good. They were just like normal dudes dressed in robes. I left them in the creepy basement and am using the payphone I found outside. Which by the way is kinda neat as I have not seen an actual pay phone booth before.

Hotline Responder -concerned-: That is good that you are safe. Can you see any addresses or street signs from where you are? If not check the pay phone for the ID#. It will allow us to get the location to send someone out to help you.

Danny: -rustling sound, creaking hinge squeaks, grunt, lingering silence- So good news, bad new.

Hotline Responder: . . .

Danny: Okay good news first while there is no street signs out here I did find the ID# on the phone booth. It is #66523-D12. Bad news I also found what looks like a cartoon tnt bomb attached to the back of the payphone. It has this weird clowns face on it and an actual alarm clock hooked up to it ticking away.

Hotline Responder -very alarmed but not letting it show in their voice-: I need you to stay calm, things are going to be fine. I am routing in a response team for the hero's that are in charge of that sector. Can you please tell me your name and a quick description to help them locate you? After that I need you to leave the phone on the line but walk away from the phone booth and behind a sturdy building.

Danny -Who was about to just phase the bomb apart while intangible-: Oh, yeah I should have started with that. My name is Danny, I have black hair and I have a NASA hoodie on right now. So you want me to just leave the bomb where it is?

Hotline Responder: . . . Yes. Please leave the bomb alone. It will get taken care of by the local team.

Danny: Okay. I will just wait on the building across from the booth.

Short DPXDC Prompts #1012

The Justice league gets a call on their emergency hotline. The call is from a teenager who says that “he was summoned to this plane by a bunch of  amateur cultists and doesn’t know how to get back to the infinite realms.” Justice League Dark is called. They are tasked with bringing this ghost kid named Phantom back home.

[opposumghost]

sour spray is the key to four dimentionality

[fiovske]

everyone’s getting a character development at the cost of Dany’s character, Benioff and Weiss are truly shit writers, just another example of why men should be banned from writing women forever

[idreamtofmanderleyagain]

Hot takes about Severus Snape are a wierdly decent glimpse into how a person with progressive values analyses things. Literally every time someone talks about Snape, it’s like this tiny window into how one-dimentionally people actually think.

Recently saw a twitter post that was a fantastic example. Here’s how it goes (paraphrasing):

Person A:“Snape is POC and Queer coded, that’s why you guy’s hate him uwu lol.”

Person B: “Actually I hate him because he was mean and abusive to children under his care uwu but go off I guess lol”

Both of these takes are designed to be dramatic and/or reactionary. They each use partial truths to paint very broad strokes. These are get-em-in-one-hit quips. This is virtue signalling, if you’ll excuse that loaded phrase. Nobody had a substantial conversation, but now everyone who sees their statement knows the high ground they took.

At least a hundred other people chimed in to add their own little quippy hot takes into play, none of which add anything significant, but clearly made everyone feel very highly of themselves.

So many layers of nuance and complex analysis is completely lost in this kind of discussion. On tumblr, you get more of this kind of bullshit, but you don’t have a word count limit, so you guys just spew endless mountains of weak overblown evidence backing up your bullshit arguments, none of which was really about engaging in a real conversation anyway.

Here’s the thing about Snape.

He is a childhood domestic abuse victim. His abuser is a muggle.

He becomes a student at a magical school that takes him away from his abuser and immediately instills in him the idea that being a part of this magical world is a badge of self-worth, empowerment, and provides safety and security - provided that he keeps in line.

There is a war is being waged in that world over his right to exist (he is a half blood).

He is a marginalized person within the context of the narrative, forced to constantly be in the same living space as the children of his own oppressors who are being groomed and recruited into a hate group militia (the pureblood slytherins). They are in turn trying to do the same to him.

He is marginalized person bullied by children who are also part of his oppressor group, but who have “more liberal” leanings and aren’t direct about why he’s being targeted (the mauraders are all purebloods, Sirius, who was the worst offender, was raised in a bigoted household, the same one that produced Bellatrix.).

He had a crush on a girl who is a muggleborn, and therefore she is considered even lesser than him and carries a stigma to those who associate with her. That girl was his only real friend. In his entire life.

For both Snape and Lily, allying themselves to a pureblood clique within their own houses would be a great way of shielding themselves from a measure of the bigotry they were probably facing. There would have been obvious pressure from those cliques to disconnect with one and other.

Every other person who associates with Snape in his adulthood carries some sort of sociopolitical or workplace (or hate cult) baggage with their association. Some of them will physically harm and/or kill him if he steps out of line. He hasn’t at any point had the right environment to heal and adjust from these childhood experiences. Even his relationship with Dumbledore is charged with constant baggage, including the purebloods who almost killed him during their bullying getting a slap on the wrist, the werewolf that almost killed him as a child being placed in an authority position over new children, etc. Dumbledore is canonically manipulative no matter his good qualities, and he has literally been manipulating Snape for years in order to cultivate a necessary asset in the war.

He is a person who is not in the stable mental state necessary to be teaching children, whom has been forced to teach children. While also playing the role of double agent against the hate group militia, the one that will literally torture you for mistakes or backtalk or just for fun. The one that will torture and kill him if he makes one wrong move.

Is the math clicking yet? From all of this, it’s not difficult to see how everything shitty about Snape was cultivated for him by his environment. Snape was not given great options. Snape made amazingly awful choices, and also some amazingly difficult, courageous ones. Snape was ultimately a human who had an extremely bad life, in which his options were incredibly grim and limited.

In fact, pretty much every point people make about how shitty Snape is as a person makes 100% logical sense as something that would emerge from how he was treated. Some if it he’s kind of right about, some of it is the inevitable reality of suffering, and some of it is part of the cycle of abuse and harm.

Even Snape’s emotional obsession with Lily makes logical sense when you have the perspective that he literally has no substantial positive experiences with other human beings that we know of, and he has an extreme, soul destroying guilt complex over her death. Calling him an Incel mysoginist nice guy projects a real-world political ideology and behavior that does not really apply to the context of what happened to him and her.

Even Snape’s specific little acts of cruelty to certain students is a reflection of his own life experiences. He identifies with Neville; more specifically, he identifies his own percieved emotional weaknesses in his childhood in Neville. There’s a very sad reason there why he feels the urge to be so harsh.

Snape very clearly hates himself, in a world where everyone else hates him, too. Imagine that, for a second. Imagine total internal and external hatred, an yearning for just a little bit of true connection. For years. Imagine then also trying to save that world, even if it’s motivated by guilt. Even if nobody ever knows you did it and you expect to die a miserable death alone.

There are more elements here to consider, including the way Rowling described his looks (there may be something in there re: ugliness and swarthy stereotyping). These are just the things that stand out the most prominently to me.

J.K. Rowling is clearly also not reliable as an imparter of moral or sociopolitical philosophies. I don’t feel that her grasp of minority experiences is a solid one, considering how she picks and chooses who is acceptable and who is a threat.

All of that said, this is a logically consistent character arc. Within the context of his narrative, Snape is a marginalized person with severe PTSD and emotional instability issues who has absolutely no room available to him for self-improvement or healing, and never really has. And yes, he’s also mean, and caustic, and verbally abusive to the students. He’s also a completey miserable, lonely person.

There are elements in his character arc that mirror real world experiences quite well. If nothing else, Rowling is enough of an emotional adult to recognise these kinds of things and portray something that feels authentic.

In my opinion, it’s not appropriate to whittle all this down by comparing him directly to the real world experiences of marginalized groups - at least if you are not a part of the group you are comparing him to. There have been many individuals who have compared his arc to their own personal experiences of marginalization, and that is valid. But generally speaking, comparing a white straight dude to people who are not that can often be pretty offensive. This is not a valuable way to discuss either subject.

Also, I believe that while it’s perfectly okay to not like Snape as a character, many of the people who act like Person B are carrying Harry’s childhood POV about Snape in their hearts well into their own adulthood. And if nothing else, Rowling was attempting to say something here about how our perspectives (should) grow and change as we emotionally mature.  She doesn’t have to be a good person herself to have expressed something true about the world in this instance, and since this story is a part of our popular culture, people have a right to feel whatever way they do about this story and it’s characters.

The complexity of this particular snapshot of fictionalized marginalization, and what it reveals about the human experience, cannot be reduced down to “he’s an abuser so he’s not worth anyone’s time/you are bad for liking him.”

And to be honest, I think that it reveals a lot about many of us in progressive spaces, particularly those of us who less marginalized but very loud about our values, that we refuse to engage with these complexities in leu of totally condemning him. Particularly because a lot of the elements I listed above are indeed reflected in real world examples of people who have experienced marginalization and thus had to deal with the resulting emotional damage, an mental illness, and behavior troubles, and bad decisions. Our inability to address the full scope of this may be a good reflection of how we are handling the complexity of real world examples.

Real people are not perfect angels in their victimhood. They are just humans who are victims, and we all have the capacity to be cruel and abusive in a world where we have been given cruelty and abuse. This is just a part of existing. If you cannot sympathise with that, or at least grasp it and aknowledge it and respect the people who are emotionally drawn to a character who refects that, then you may be telling on yourself to be honest.

To be honest, this is especially true if you hate Snape but just really, really love the Mauraduers. You have a right to those feelings, but if you are moralizing this and judging others for liking Snape, you’ve confessed to something about how you’ve mentally constructed your personal values in a way I don’t think you’ve fully grasped yet.

I have a hard time imagining a mindset where a story like Snape’s does not move one to empathy and vicarious grief, if I’m honest. I feel like some people really just cannot be bothered to imagine themselves in other people’s shoes, feeling what they feel and living like they live. I struggle to trust the social politics of people who show these kinds of colors, tbh.

But maybe that’s just me.

[bwabbitv3s]

Oh yeah no I agree. The reason Danny knows in this instant and thinks it is obvious is because he has a couple unfair advantages and a few months of observations. First being that both Batman, Bruce Wayne, and the others from the Justice League are trying to help him and know about him being from another dimension and trying to get home. So he knows for sure there is some kind of connection between Bruce Wayne and the Justice League, at the very lest Batman has to think he is trustworthy.

Second it is kinda a bit hard to separate out the stuff Bruce Wayne secret benefactor of the Justice League who is helping a dimentionally displaced teen, from Batman the greatest detective that protects Gotham and is helping the JL in helping a dimentionally displaced teen. There is enough overlap that when concussed and sleep deprived at 7am while having breakfast with the new ward it is kinda easy to slip on a couple details.

Add in that Danny is living in the home of Bruce Wayne who needs to keep his night life persona secret from the additional blue eyed black haired teen is hard. Plus no one else in the manor has practice in keeping secrets of being vigilantes from the others living there last that long either.

It take about a month tops for Danny to get suspicious. Dealing with Vlad and other ghost overshadowing other people and messing with him means he is very sensitive to the moment stories don't line up. That along with his own experience trying to hide this sort of thing from his own family for ages helps. After that it takes another before it becomes Batman and Bruce Wayne might be the same person or Bruce Wayne is Batman's sugar daddy.

It’s been months since he’s settled into life at Wayne Manor. It’s hilarious that they don’t think he knows about their obvious nightlife (and that’s coming from someone whose hero name was just their last name spelled differently) but they don’t know anything about his own past as a vigilante. To be fair, a dimensionally displaced Ghost King wasn’t really on the board for reasonable guesses. Danny Fenton blinked innocently at Duke, blue eyes watery and oh-so-trusting of his adopted older brother when Duke claimed that his bruising came from getting caught in Ivy’s attack on the busses today.

(“Oh my god he’s so trusting and pure what the hell?” He heard Steph whisper to Dick, who nodded emphatically.)

“Oh man, you should get some rest. You guys are seriously unlucky, you know? Do you need to go to the hospital?” Danny asked Duke, his core trilling as he allowed himself to fuss over a member of his ‘fraid.

“Nah, man. I’m good. I think I’ll take a nap and sleep it off.”

“Okay. Oh, here!” Danny fumbled for his bag, grabbing his prescribed pain meds- for his chronic pain, but they don’t actually do anything for him since his ectoplasm burns away most of it- and handed it to Duke. “Take one, and only one. Those bruises look nasty.”

And then Danny gave him the puppy dog eyes and Duke folded, because Danny knew that he wasn’t supposed to hand his meds out but these situations were kind of the reason he claimed chronic pain to being with (even if it was true and his hands shook with aftershocks).

“Thanks, Danny. I feel like death warmed over.”

Danny laughed, the opportunity to mess with the family sparking in his head. “Yeah, I’ve died before. Wouldn’t recommend it.”

With that, Danny threw Duke an easy going smile and walked towards his room, bag on his back.

From his peripherals, Danny watched Jason drop his bowl of snacks, Dick’s pale face, and the concerned and shocked look of everyone else. Except Damian, who just kind of scowled thoughtfully. Tim looked like he was going to rip Danny apart like an interesting puzzle, Cass sat up straight (and he made sure every micro expression he caught on others stayed unconcerned on his own body), and Duke froze.

He snickered- well out of regular earshot- as whispers and whispered shouts rung out after he left the room.

He can’t wait to drop the “I know you’re vigilantes” bomb on them. It’ll be hilarious.

[shadowthestoryteller]

You know what?

*un-one dimentionalizes Dooku*