#homestuck trickster role system

[gender-mailman]

Finalboyhometrick!

A gender connected to being a final boy trickster, or a trickster final boy; this gender is connected to final boy, final boy aesthetics, trickster mode from homestuck, neon or bright colors, candy and sweet foods/drinks, and being chaotic. can also have ties to romanticism or sexuality, but doesn't have to

Coined by me. Requested by no one. Tagging @en8y

[en8y]

[IMAGE ID: three horizontal flags with nine stripes. the middle stripe is twice as large as the rest of them, which are equally sized. the first flag has these top three colors: yellow-orange, bright yellow, and medium orange. the second flag has these top three colors: bright pink-purple, light cool pink, and warm purple. the third flag has these top three colors: hot pink, peach, and bright blue. each flag has these bottom six stripes: dark grey, off-white, dark grey, medium-dark grey, light grey and medium-light grey. END ID.]

prospitian system (-spitian): a gender connected to being a/an [xyz] prospit dreamer, or a prospitian [xyz]; this gender is connected to [xyz], [xyz] aesthetics, prospit itself, lightness and protection aesthetics, shades of yellow, and chess.

dersite system (-dersite): a gender connected to being a/an [xyz] derse dreamer, or a dersite [xyz]; this gender is connected to [xyz], [xyz] aesthetics, derse itself, darkness and destruction aesthetics, shades of purple, and chess.

homestuck trickster system (-hometrick): a gender connected to being a/an [xyz] trickster, or a trickster [xyz]; this gender is connected to [xyz], [xyz] aesthetics, trickster mode from homestuck, neon or bright colors, candy and sweet foods/drinks, and being chaotic. can also have ties to romanticism or sexuality, but doesn't have to.

@radiomogai @liom-archive @obscurian @gendersystems @role-systems

[the-meat-machine]

#see as a post canon enjoyer i agree with all of this#see a lot of people make the mistake of saying fascist jane is “out of character” or “does her dirty”#but from day ONE that side of her was foreshadowed#the epilogues and hsbc highlight what would happen if that side of her was unchecked and amplified#not only is she becoming increasingly alienated from her friends and support systems#but she's also being actively corrupted and manipulated by gamzee#whose WHOLE THING#is bringing out the worst in people#ostensibly for the sole purpose of tainting the story#(he realized he was meant to be a joke character and makes a joke of the story)

(tags from @gem-tavvy)

Omg, I never even thought about Gamzee's role in this, but you're so right. He's actively pushing Jane to be worse.

And yeah, I deliberately tried to keep everything in this post rooted in canon, because I wanted to make the point that all of this is already there in Homestuck proper. The foundation for what Jane becomes in the post-canon was all there right from her introduction.

I also want to make the point that I don't think this is the only way Jane's character could go, and I don't think the Epilogues/Beyond Canon are saying that either. The Candy timeline in particular is explicitly a highly improbable timeline. Candy Jane doesn't represent Jane's destined future—she represents Jane's worst possible self.

(I also wonder how much Candy's Trickster-like focus on BABIES EVER AFTER reinforces Jane's existing tendency to see having children with Jake not just as something she wants, but something she needs to make happen at all costs. Which digs her deeper into the, uh, rapey tendencies she showed when she went Crockertier.)

Anyway! All that is to say, I don't think Jane is destined to have to end up as a fascist dictator. But I do think that any post-canon take on Jane needs to reckon with the ideology she's been brainwashed with from birth. I believe that she could learn and grow from it, if she tried. But she'd barely even begun the process of questioning her upbringing as of the end of Homestuck proper.

An examination of Jane's Crockercorp brainwashing

You put on your highly fashionable UNREAL HEIRESS THOUGHTWAVE TIARATOP and flip it on. It immediately hums to life as its blazing fast processes mingle with your thoughts. It is the most efficient computing technology in the world by far, as long as you don't wear it for too long. But aside from a few migraines, you can't possibly imagine any OBEY drawbacks that CEASE REPRODUCTION could come with SUBMIT merging CONSUME your thoughts with EMBRACE YOUR CULLING experimental technology CONFORM TO SOCIAL ORDER from an STAY ASLEEP extremely powerful DIE corporation, wait what?

So, here's a fact: Jane has been brainwashed with Crockercorp propaganda from childhood.

Here's another fact: Jane is the heiress to Crockercorp and is being groomed to take over the company once she comes of age.

With that in mind, I'd like to take a look at the subliminal messages Jane gets brainwashed with. I want to consider what these messages mean both on a literal level and a broader societal level, as well as what they mean to Jane, specifically, as the heiress to Crockercorp. Because when Jane takes in these messages coming from Crockercorp, they don't just apply to her. They also represent the ideology she'll one day be expected to enforce once she takes over the company.

I'll organize this into sections based on the commands, grouping a few similar commands together.

SUBMIT / OBEY

The literal meaning of these commands is straightforward: submission and obedience to a higher authority; specifically, Crockercorp.

More generally, these commands are about the importance of hierarchy. They tell the listener that there are those in this world who must be obeyed without question.

These commands teach Jane to submit her will both to the Condesce and to the advancement of the company as a whole. Being bombarded with endless messages of SUBMIT and OBEY is presumably part of what made her susceptible to having her brain hijacked by the tiaratop entirely.

However, since Jane is the heiress to Crockercorp, these messages are also subconsciously teaching her that one day, she'll be the one people submit to and obey. She's being primed to be a leader, and an autocratic one at that. After all, a corporation isn't a democracy, least of all Crockercorp. The CEO gives the orders, and everyone else has no choice but to OBEY. The only thing the leader serves is the brand itself.

CONFORM TO SOCIAL ORDER

Self-explanatory. Jane is very, very good at this one. She will bury all of her desires deep within the darkest recesses of her brain in the pursuit of conforming to social order. In fact, she's so good at conforming to social order that she has managed to convince herself, her friends, and the entire fandom that she's "the normal one." Incredible.

She also tends to urge her friends to conform to social order, for example by pedantically correcting their grammar. As the future leader of Crockercorp, she'll one day be the one enforcing social norms, and I think she's a natural at it.

One other thing to consider with this command is whether the "social order" that the Condesce wants humans to conform to is actually the social order that humans will be picturing when brainwashed with this command. The Condesce wants humans to be more like trolls. But I highly doubt many humans would hear "conform to social order" and interpret it to mean that they should organize society by blood color and leave their children to be raised by wild animals!

CONSUME

The literal meaning of this one is to buy and consume Crockercorp products. And we see throughout the story that Jane is all-in on the Betty Crocker brand, even in cases where she knows that Betty Crocker products are inferior. She even directly acknowledges it at one point, admitting that BettyBother is significantly worse than Pesterchum, but that "brand loyalty is a powerful thing". I bet it is, Jane!

But beyond that… what this command teaches more generally is that unchecked capitalism is the highest virtue. And, look, I think there's a lot of evidence that Jane buys into that philosophy wholeheartedly.

Now, I wouldn't presume to know where exactly Jane stands politically. But it's hard to deny that she is, at the very least, fiscally conservative. She has no problem with the idea of society being under the control of a powerful corporation, as long as said corporation is her company. Crockercorp has wormed its way into all aspects of life in her world, and that's just peachy as far as Jane is concerned.

In fact, Jane wants Crockercorp to seize more power! Within a few days of her introduction, we see both that she wants to privatize the post office and that she's a believer in millionaire philanthropy. Obviously these pages are both presented as jokes, but I think they speak to her mindset. Jane is a wealthy girl who has never had any reason to question the privileges her wealth gives her or the power she's set to inherit.

And this mindset is reaffirmed in the credits, where Jane decides to reestablish her beloved Betty Crocker brand in the post-scarcity paradise she and the other kids created. It seems that she believes the only problem with Crockercorp was that there was a bad person running it, and now with her in charge instead everything will be hunky-dory! She doesn't appear to consider that there could be any systemic issues in having a god-run monopolistic corporation set up shop in utopia.

STAY ASLEEP

Metaphorically: stay ignorant. Don't pay attention to what's going on around you. Don't notice what Crockercorp is doing to you and to the world.

Jane does tend to reject facts that seem outlandish or improbable to her, and specifically spends a long time rejecting the notion that there could be anything sinister going on behind the scenes at Crockercorp.

Literally, this command could be a message directed at Jane specifically: stay asleep on Prospit. Don't wake up and see the portents in the clouds of Skaia, portents that may reveal things the Condesce doesn't want her to know.

EMBRACE YOUR CULLING / DIE

Literally, these two are directed more at the human populace of Earth: humanity is done for. Don't resist when the drones come to kill you.

Applied to Jane specifically, there are two possible literal interpretations. One is that she's being encouraged not to resist the Condesce, in case one day they end up fighting and the Condesce has to kill her. The other is that she's being encouraged to embrace death so that she can go god tier, which helps Jane herself level up while also being instrumental to the Condesce's plans.

Being constantly bombarded with messages telling her that she should die probably didn't do great for Jane's self-esteem! The Maid of Life's drive to survive can't be eliminated that easily, though.

On a broader level, these commands teach Jane that Crockercorp decides who is permitted to live and who deserves to die. Corporate control over life and death as the natural endgame of the corporate state. And of course, this means that as the head of Crockercorp, Jane will one day be in a position to decide whose lives are worth living.

CEASE REPRODUCTION

This is an interesting one when you look at the literal meaning. Because no matter how you think this command affected Jane, one thing it decidedly did not do is rid her of the desire to reproduce. Deep down—as revealed both in Trickster Mode and Crockertier—Jane really, really wants to have Jake's babies.

Personally, my headcanon is that this command left Jane with a massive breeding kink. For nebulous reasons she can't explain, she feels that reproductive sex is horribly taboo, more so even than sex in general. Meanwhile, she's desperately in love with Jake, and wants both to have sex with him, and also to have a nice heterosexual nuclear family with him (conform to social order!). And she's too repressed to express any of this to anybody, so it all builds up into this big impossible taboo fantasy of BABIES BABIES BABIES.

I also happen to think that the Condesce explicitly considers Jane an exception to this command. I've argued before that the Condesce is sincere in wanting Jane to be her heiress. She even goes so far as to allow Crockertier Jane to kidnap Jake with the intention of using him to sire children. And why not? Her heiress has gotta be able to have heiresses of her own. The royal line must go on. As is implicit in a lot of these messages, those who are in charge have the privilege of being exempt from restrictions that apply to everyone else.

There's also a broader implication to the CEASE REPRODUCTION command, and it's this: there are people out there whose uncontrolled breeding is a threat to social order. In this sense, it's a blatantly fascist message.

And… look, I've been avoiding referencing anything from the post-canon in this post so far, but if you'll allow me to dip into the Epilogues for just a moment: this, perhaps more than anything, is where the Condesce's attempted brainwashing of Jane really backfired for her. Because I would assume that one of the Condesce's goals is to perpetuate the troll race. And yet she allowed her human heiress to internalize the message that there are other people whose unnatural and disgusting methods of reproduction should be banned. Filtered through Jane's human mindset… well, from her perspective, it's probably trolls who have a bizarre and repellent way of reproducing. Seems like that might not work out so well for the trolls if Jane ends up in charge! Certainly it doesn't in Candy.

Conclusion

So there's the overview of what I believe are all the commands we see Jane get brainwashed with in Homestuck. If I forgot any, feel free to let me know.

Now, a lot of these messages are things Jane would have been internalizing regardless in her upbringing as a corporate scion. Hell, some of them are things that everybody in 21st century American capitalist society is going to be marinating in to some degree or other. And for some of the commands, like CONFORM TO SOCIAL ORDER, it's hard to tell how much is the brainwashing and how much is just Jane's natural personality.

But I do think all of these subliminal messages are very revealing in what they say about Jane's mindset, ideology, and unexamined biases. Because frankly, Jane never really reckons with any of this in canon. She never questions whether there was anything wrong with her upbringing. She continues to embrace the role she was raised to fill. Even after coming out of Crockertier, she's ashamed of how she behaved but never seems to examine why she acted that way. Instead she just goes right back to repressing everything.

After all, CONFORMING TO SOCIAL ORDER is what Jane is best at.

[classpect-crew]

Classpects as Real-Life Magick: Aspect Archetypes

So, here we are again, discussing the absolutely bonkers idea that Homestuck's Classpect system could be used to form a coherent, real-life magickal system. I've talked briefly about the various Forces and Wills that affect the Homestuck universe, and how those directly translate to our modern understanding of magick, but I'd like to touch on Aspects and how one could use them in a system loosely constructed from the mythology of Paradox Space. Each Aspect can be treated as having its own Domain, which includes both concrete and abstract symbols, as well as what the Aspect itself represents in the Universe. The Aspects as they're represented in the form of universal Forces are also represented in the human form, and in following this system one can "tap into" those Forces, whether for personal development or for directing those energies outward. (I definitely draw inspiration from the idea of panpsychism for this.)

I'll begin the discussion of the Aspects by delving into their Archetypes, and will expand more upon their Domains for another post. While the Classes have obvious inspiration from Jung's primary archetypes, the Aspects can also be represented similarly. If you were to personify each Aspect, they would look a bit like the following:

Space: The Creator. Infinitely patient, Space is generally calm and collected, if a bit cold at times. Yet, it's also responsible for the creation of the universe, over which it watches with a protective gaze. If its propagation is threatened, Space is capable of an incredible fury, evoking the unforgiving chaos of a star gone supernova, or the inevitable terror of a black hole.

Time: The Destroyer. Controlling, steady, and ever-present describe Time quite well. Despite its generally destructive nature, it's quite capable of incredible works of creation, most notably in the realm of music. Synchronicities are the calling card of Time; when meaningful events happen simultaneously, take notice. Time contains endless passion and drive, its fires unquenchable.

Mind: The Actor. This Aspect embodies cognitive dissonance and the ability to completely disappear into a role. Mind appears differently to anyone who comes across it, which can make signs of its influence difficult to track down. Epiphany and synthesis are the children of Mind, sought by creatives and intellectuals alike. A deep understanding of abstract reality comes with understanding Mind.

Heart: The Romantic. When dealing in matters of the soul, Heart embraces that identity which remains stable and encourages genuine connection between people. It holds the mirror to nature and exposes virtue and flaw alike. Clear self-awareness and a complicated relationship with that self are hallmarks of Heart, as well as a tendency toward melodrama, with or without an audience.

Hope: The Storyteller. Intense euphoria, unbound by pragmatism, heralds the influence of Hope. It painstakingly crafts a story for its chosen ones, who are encouraged to submit and live fully in that truth. This Aspect lends itself to to the miraculous and fantastical, opening minds to a myriad of possibilities, and those who embody Hope can get utterly lost in its labyrinth of the theoretical.

Rage: The Satirist. Contempt and a vindictive nature are part and parcel of Rage's nature, as an Aspect that inspires doubt and insanity, as well as a refusal to engage with frivolity. It stirs melancholy in dark hearts and is manifest through gallows humor and rejection of fantasy. It is the hammer to which everything else appears as a nail, though its steadfast determination is invaluable.

Breath: The Trickster. Those under Breath's influence share its nature of playfulness and constant motion. At times, this manifests as immaturity through a lack of groundedness. Breath is prone to distraction, constantly shifting its own path upon encountering any sort of resistance or responsibility. The Aspect is self-driven and individualistic, disconnected from others of its kind.

Blood: The Wounded Healer. Much as its name suggests, Blood is fully grounded in the struggle and suffering inherent to life. However, it also embodies a profound empathy for others and an unmatched dedication to those bonds, as well as an understanding of what personal sacrifices must be made to accomplish a given goal. It is relentless and deeply dedicated to building vast networks of allies.

Life: The Alchemist. Even in the deepest cracks in the sidewalk of the Furthest Ring, Life finds a way. It flourishes in the bountiful harvest and transmutation of energy, wealth, and influence. Those blessed by its influence are durable and ever-present, making decisions that utterly transform the world around them. This constant cycling of energy is necessary to keep the universe balanced and in motion.

Doom: The Martyr. Limits and restrictions are just as important to the universe as negative space in a piece of artwork. Doom generally festers like a slow-growing mold, but the telltale sign of Doom's influence is a massive, unsustainable release of energy that usually results in burnout. The Aspect also has a deep connection to inorganic systems and constructs, many centered around death.

Light: The Teacher. Knowledge itself lies in the realm of Light, which is made manifest through instruction and understanding of important information. Omniscient beings receive their enviable sight through Light, which ultimately seeks to scour the universe, leaving no stone unturned in its hunger to learn and teach. It promises great fortune to those who assist in its declared purpose.

Void: The Occultist. Endless hunger and inescapable darkness are the left and right hands of Void, which offers gifts of arcane knowledge and long-hidden power in exchange for the fame and fortune many would seek with such gifts. It twists the mind and forces their student to acknowledge their Shadow. Its power is addictive and all-consuming, but well-worth the price...to the insane.

[doomsdaydicecascader]

spicy---pepper replied to your post “back in the homestuck heyday i had a mutual who really liked janetav...”

Comparing Vriska to Jane... I just cant see it

i totally can - while the circumstances of their arcs are largely different due to the cultures they’re in being different, and the path traversed by them radically changes if you give a shit about the epilogues (inadvisable, there is never anything to be gained by giving a shit about them other than spite and vitriol) 

the major themes of their arcs as they exist in homestuck (christian symbology attributed to jane aside) are pretty close to identical - raised in service and manipul8d by a big bad of the story (scratch/condesce) into maintaining the systems of that planet (alternia’s violence for violence’s sake, earth-b’s neoliberal capitalist hellscape) while working through some feelings about their session’s page and the role that page plays in the ideal they’re chasing (”being mindfang” / “a normal cishet life where the status quo is maintained”) 

and with jane, especially since the epilogues came out and everything of value was lost, it doesn’t quite read as conflicted but it does read as disingenuous a little bit - her number one exposure to crockercorp is through advertising, and her actual use of crockercorp products is framed as “not quite getting it” until the mask comes off and it’s revealed all the crockercorp stuff she owns - grist blenders and recipe moduses that show alchemical combin8ions for things stick out - are meant to help her win at sburb, in the same way that alternian society has been built from the ground up to make their people good at sburb, and it’s pretty easy to read jake being a dipshit at her birthday that kicks off the trickster arc as the thing that pushes her over the edge into self-destruction - willingly engaging caliborn on his terms and taking his shit and then kicking off the trickster arc because of how fucked it all is 

in practice jane winds up not getting nearly as nuanced as vriska winds up being by endgame, so it’s easy to backtrack on all of that, writing it all off with “oh, that was her being under her imperious condescension’s control, it’s out of character” but i think its definitely present enough to be a good parallel, and her desire to be “normal” by chasing down jake and inheriting crockercorp winds up being just as harmful to her as chasing the ideal of being mindfang is to vriska 

[botgalhs]

Hey Botgal, do you have any “Mythologystuck” ideas? Like, ideas for how the Homestuck cast would be portrayed as the Gods of some world, and their personas or roles in the pantheon?

Oooooooh boy, my friend.

Alright, so I have an as of yet unwritten fic where we have theTrolls as the Old Gods of the Earth that were forgotten because ofReasons. And I had some general ideas about what some of them wouldbe.

Aradia: Maid of Time. She is the one who created the seasons andthe passing of chronological time. Responsible for death and ageingbut also for progress. Possibly kind of a Hecate sort of figure inthat she’s seen in three different guises. Prayed to so that peoplemay use their time wisely, or that they’ll have enough time to dowhat they want to do.

Tavros: Page of Breath. The one who created the natural order ofanimals, but also the one who oversees freedom. Seen as a figure ofyouth who never gets old, and a large figure in many legends thatrevolve around young children and myths that involve flight. Prayedto when looking for favor in the natural world, or for confidence.

Sollux: Mage of Doom. Kind of Hades-ish, I think? His title makeshim sound pretty terrible but honestly he’s the one who dearlywishes he could just chill the fuck out the most out of the gods. Oneof the two ‘seers’ of the Pantheon even though Terezi is the onewith that title officially. Prayed to by those who want to know whendisaster will strike and how to prepare for it.

Karkat: Knight of Blood. God who oversees relationships of allkinds, whether they be familial, between lovers, or between friends.He’s the one who has interacted with humans the most out of all ofthem, and has had the most human lovers out of the Pantheon’smembers (and that’s saying something). Prayed to by pretty mucheveryone from newly married couples, to grandparents with like 10grandchildren. Also often prayed to by soldiers who are going to warso that they can return safely to their loved ones while ensuringtheir safety.

Nepeta: Rogue of Heart. Mainly thegoddess of souls. Ensuring that all souls have safe passage whereverthey need to go when people die. Stealing them right out of the jawsof monsters if she has to in order to ensure them safety. Alsominorly known as a goddess of infatuation. Prayed to by people infear of demonic entities, those with dying relatives, the dyingthemselves, and those who are courting.

Kanaya: Sylph of Space. Goddess ofprocreation and protection. Known as a fierce warrior goddess whowill protect the young and pregnant women. In olden times, it wasbelieved that women bled in sympathy to her after a confrontationleft her with a hole through her womb (even though that organ and itsusage is a human concept). Prayed to by pregnant women, mothers ofyoung children, healers, and female royalty.

Terezi: Seer of Mind. Known for being afair but unpredictable goddess. The blind seer goddess who lost hersight to the sun, but in return gained the ability to see beyond whatothers saw. Looked to as a muse at times for artists and scholarsalike, since she was well versed in learning and arts. A multifacetedgoddess worshiped by many. Prayed to by artists, scholars, those inthe court systems, teachers, etc.

Vriska: Thief of Light. One of the twomajor ‘trickster’ gods next to Gamzee. Something of a Raven type offigure in that she was constantly stealing away important items inlegends in order to give them to humanity, all so she could bask intheir adoration. Though she made many enemies among the Pantheon ofgods, also had close connections with a few of them. Prayed to byadventurers, criminals, treasure hunters, and those seeking fame.

Equius: Heir of Void. A bit of anobscure god who was mostly known through his relation to the Rogue ofHeart. Mostly stands as a side figure in a majority of legends, yetinexorably appears in every major legend and plays some vital part init with his creations, no matter how small. Prayed to by those whowant peace and quiet, but also by those seeking lost things and thosewho create for practical means.

Gamzee: Bard of Rage. The second majortrickster god next to Vriska. Much more of a Loki figure in how heinteracts with others and humanity. Yet despite all the chaos hecauses, he’s known widely as a whimsical figure who dissipates anger,despite his title. Save for a few… unsavory events among certaingods. Prayed to by those who seek merriment and joy, but also a smallcult of his who seek to learn from the darker parts of his myths.

Eridan: Prince of Hope. Doesn’t deliverhope so much as destroys everything that gets in hope’s way. Seen assort of an Ares type of figure in many circumstances. Very war-likeand serious, but also a figure of protection.  Mainly due to anassociation with how he as a figure is known to spend much of histime warding off angels and creatures from the void with hope magic.Prayed to by the ambitious, those who seek vengeance, and those whoneed to protect places and people.

Feferi: Witch of Life. A goddess ofgrowth and change. Known as a nurturing goddess, though not in thesame way that Kanaya is. Seen as a figure of positivity and change.Often looked to by children as they make their way to puberty, and bythose entering adulthood. Seen as a goddess who encourages growth,though those who follow her the most may have some 'specific’ waysthat they think they should follow her teachings of protecting othersfrom the harms that come with growing older. Also widely known as agoddess of the sea. Prayed to by those entering new stages in theirlives, mariners, and those who raise animals.

[gender-mailman]

Finalgirlhometrick!

A gender connected to being a final girl trickster, or a trickster final girl; this gender is connected to final girl, final girl aesthetics, trickster mode from homestuck, neon or bright colors, candy and sweet foods/drinks, and being chaotic. can also have ties to romanticism or sexuality, but doesn't have to

Coined by me. Requested by no one. Tagging @en8y