#i have 3 papers to write

[abstractfrog]

Happy 1 year anniversary to Mr Sherlock Holmes! Here's a litttleee celebratory comic from me

[scissorcraft]

art for the first chapter of my fic!!! link [here]... -pokes my fingers together-

[gazpachoandbooks]

Currently imagining Arthur + Gwen + the knights asking someone (maybe druids?) who this famous "Emrys" is and they proceed to do a version of "We Don't Talk About Bruno" while Arthur, Gwen and the knights grow increasingly more distressed with each line and Merlin hyperventilates in the background

[rapidhighway]

pages 3-4. woah. part 2 of this

Next

[narwhalsarefalling]

todays herbarium story: new fucking way of dating things to confuse future archivists. someone wrote 66-1-3 as the date on a specimen. obviously i assumed 66 was the year and either the day was January 3rd or March 1st. put “1966” for the year in the file, marked as needing confirmation.

anyway one of the historical archivists went back and used the guys name to figure out about what month he confirmed it? and it was fucking 1866. the guy who cataloged it died in 1920.

i inadvertently handled a specimen thats older literally everyone i know and love and my only thought was mild irritation because it was dated weird.

we still dont know if it was found in January or March.

[quicktimeeventfull]

ANYWAY final thing on this. there are no magic bullets with writing — you can’t buy a device then suddenly be writing consistently with no difficulties — but i do think it’s helpful to have something you’re comfortable with which you can pull out and begin immediately writing on & which you can use on the go. it can be an alpha or a phone with a keyboard or a paper notebook but you’re kind of fucking yourself over if you have nothing.

[spaceorphan18]

The Lady Whistledown Papers : 2x02 Off To The Races (Part 1)

Welcome back, Gentle Readers, to The Lady Whistledown Papers, where I’m taking an in-depth look at Penelope Featherington and Colin Bridgerton’s character arcs and romance within the show Bridgerton!

For previous issues, follow tag : The Lady Whistledown Papers

Colin is back! Which means we have a lot to talk about :D

A Return Home

Before I get into the crux of this scene, I want to make a quick note about the opening Lady Whistledown narration -- which is mostly there to provide context and reiterate what happened in the first episode. But what I find most amusing is the commentary in relation to Penelope. Despite the fact she has some rather choice words to say about both Anthony and Kate, the amusing part is that she mostly doesn't seem to care all that much about it, and is just hanging out on the side of the wall with her bowl of popcorn ready to watch some drama that she has zero part in. Most likely unintentionally, it's also a nod to the fact that Penelope is even more removed from the main story than she was in Season 1.

Anyway, on to the scene at hand! We get Penelope coming to hang out with Eloise. And the first thing I want to note is that Violet is there -- and incredibly at ease with her. I believe, even though we have seen Penelope in the drawing room before, at dinner, and crossing paths with the entire Bridgerton family, this is the first time we've seen her exchange dialogue with Violet? But it's nice to see the comfort in which Violet has with Penelope. Not only does she seem like she's used to Penelope's presence, she even thinks Penelope would do some good in getting Eloise to think about things like marriage. It's a shame we don't get to see more of Penelope engaging with other Bridgertons, but at least there's some precedence to be had here.

When Penelope gets in, the first thing she does is note that Eloise is reading LW, and she's almost smugly amused by it -- especially when Eloise had claimed she was done with it. Violet then jumps in, encouraged that Eloise might be interested in finding a husband -- and I LOVE Eloise's line about how there's no other clever way to say 'no'. Claudia Jessie's delivery cracks me up every time.

So, they get into discussion about LW's slight change in writing - Eloise reiterating that she appreciates that LW stands up for women, and is somewhat less shallow than previous entries. Eloise is sure she can get LW to do more if she only had her ear, and Penelope, interestingly, states that maybe LW is content in how she writes.

Which kind of leads us to a big difference between the two. It's a continuation from the conversation they had in the previous episode. Eloise is is passionate about women's rights and independence, and her drive and desire to do more than settle down and get married. While Penelope, who does agree with Eloise that women she be allowed to do and be more, doesn't mind as much the whole getting married and (melo)drama of society.

Eloise is independent because she wants to be. Penelope is independent because she has to be. It's a subtle difference, but speaks volumes about the two women, and not only how they look at the world, but how the world has treated them, too.

I love the look on Violet's face when she jumps back into the conversation -- claiming that what Eloise really needs is happiness and that she could find that with another person - preferably a male person with whom she could marry. I love that she thinks that Penelope is going to be the one to help her convince Eloise to try.

Penelope says she could find happiness, not with LW but with someone like... Colin. Colin?! (Eloise's face when she says -- my brother -- mortified. I love it so much.)

Colin is back! Whoooo!

And of course, pointing out the obvious but not only is Penelope first to notice him walk into the room, but the first thing he does (even before that someone ridiculous push in with the camera) is notice her sitting there. It's not even a cursory glance, either, he full on stops and turns his body towards her (granted she is saying his name at that moment but still interesting to note).

(Eloise is smiling as she gets up to hug him - might be the one time she's actually happy to see him, lol. He is, after all, about to get in her way a lot more.)

So. Here's the fascinating thing about Penelope. In the previous episode - we've seen her at the top of her game, confident as LW and loving every second of it. And at the top of this episode, she's relaxed, assured, having fun coming between Violet and Eloise. And the second Colin walks into the room -- she is flustered and tongue tied and really unsure what to do with herself. This poor girl. Excited, thrilled that he's returned, especially after the correspondence they had while he was away. There's an intimacy they've shared already, that is just between the two of them, and of course, her deep feelings that have always been there. But now she's out of her element, and this is family time, and on top of the awkwardness, there's this sense that she's impeding the family space.

It makes me sad that we never really got to see what the dynamic was like when Penelope was over visiting the Bridgertons during season 1. Sure, we had the one family scene near the end of the season where she's there to spend time with Eloise. But it does make me wonder what Penelope and Colin's dynamic was like while she was at Bridgerton house -- because even here, their dynamic has shifted from what it was in Season 1. Ah well (I suppose that's what fanfic is for.)

But let's back up and talk about Colin's entrance for a moment. Because there's a lot to unpack in about a five second span.

Colin strolls in that room with a sense of confidence and positive energy. While we won't get a ton of details from the Greece/Mediterranean trip, but he's in good spirits, so we can only assume it went rather well. But Colin's first comment, noticeably, is that things haven't changed. This is somewhat directed at Penelope and Eloise still chatting away, but also that Violet is still sitting there doing her needlework, Benedict is just lounging around -- even though we are in a bright, new season, with the exception that Daphne is not there anymore, family dynamics really haven't shifted all that much -- and he has changed more than everyone else.

He's excited about his travels, and everyone is pretty much right where he left them. And there's some comfort in that -- returning home (and he has missed home) and finding that relief and comfort in everything being the same.

(It'll be an interesting contrast to when next season he returns, and everything is different.)

Also, let's talk about Colin's look for a moment. It's funny that people talk about the Season 3 changes, as if there weren't changes here, too. (I'd almost argue that Season 1 and Season 3's looks actually have more in common, and Season 2 Colin seems like an interesting detour.) The thing is Colin comes in looking much different than he had the previous year -- the hair is shorter, there's hair on his face, and doesn't look as boy-ish as he did in the first season.

(Btw - I did google Greek Fashion of the 1810s, just to see if his travels had any influence on his clothes, and my five second search didn't turn up any interesting results, so I can't talk to Colin's exact fashion here.)

The thing that interests me is the fact that (kind of like Penelope) this is that young adult stage -- that awkward (said affectionately) time between being young and looking it to looking like an actual adult. Part of it's make up, part of it's clothing, part of it is acting style (I mean, Nicola is a pro at being able to make herself appear nearly any age she wishes) - In Colin's case, in addition to all of that, we're watching Luke go from his mid-20s towards his 30s, and it kind of adds to the visual of Colin growing up.

Colin jokes that they should put aside the latest family squabble and embrace him. And it's nice to see that Colin has retained his lighthearted nature. In fact - after the amount of drama that happened to him in Season 1, it is nice to see such a beaming Colin return.

After Eloise, Violet hugs him next - and says she's surprised to see him back so soon. Which is interesting - what is the timeline here? How long was he gone? Why did they expect him gone longer? What is the norm for any of this? i have no idea. He does say that he misses them, and I have no doubt that he does. Family is a huge component in all of the Bridgertons' lives, and as much as I'm sure they all like to leave time and again, their familial bond is a strong one.

(And on a tangent, I kind of love that they keep picking up strays along the way.)

Anyway - Benedict is up next, happy to see his brother return - but it's Benedict gives him a curious look -- noting the physical changes, but we'll get to that comment in a second.

Time to talk about this infamous moment...

Penelope first... the moment he looks back to her, she gets excited - she's so giddy like -- here is her chance to possibly, maybe sneak in some physical contact. Which does make me wonder, they have danced together, held hands, he has brushed her arm. Has he hugged her before? She isn't his sister, but as we'll get into later in the episode, he doesn't think of her on the same lines as all the other women of the ton, either.

And then, oh, the awkwardness of her outstretching her hands just a little bit as if to receive a hug, only for the little Bridgertons to come racing around the corner. And she backs off immediately, not wanting to draw attention to herself, nor wanting to put her desires on display.

I also want to mention, cause I'll be digging into it more with Colin, that this is the first time they're seeing each other since writing to each other (for however long that was). And it's implied it wasn't a small or short correspondence either. I mentioned intimacy earlier, and yes that, but that means they now share something with each other that the rest of the world hasn't gotten to see. And that's special. And whether it be romantic or not, the fact that they've opened up and shared a part of themselves that they haven't with others is really important to their story. Penelope feels that connection - she always has, in a sense, or has always wanted that connection, but she now knows there is a reality to it.

Meanwhile. Colin. Dude. This is in an intense way to look at someone. He definitely did not look at any of his siblings or his mother this way. It's almost as if - when he sees Penelope, really looks at her, he sees her in a different light (and I'll define that more in a second).

There's no doubt, based on what we saw in the first season, there was care and affection from Colin to Penelope. But there was distance there as well. Not only was he too wrapped up in Marina, she was also Eloise's bff, another girl around, one whom he enjoyed and found amusing to be around sure, but he didn't really notice her.

So they've had this written correspondence and she's is now divorced from all the other connotations she has -- childhood friend, Eloise's bff, girl next door... She is Penelope - he sees her as a person in a way that he hasn't before. And -- we all know Penelope is better in written word than in person, so I'm sure those letters were delightful (and abundant), a way to keep him connected to home more than his own family, and as he's finding, she's someone he truly does like being in contact with. She's smart and witty and clever and manages to get him (as we'll see) when a lot of other people don't.

And all of that comes into play during this one moment. Where he looks at her and it's this kind of -- yes, good, Penelope, I need to spend more time with her.

Which brings me to a conversation that may be best to kick off here. I've often seen discourse about how and when Colin actually fell in love with Penelope. And -- I think trying to pinpoint an exact moment is something we can’t do with Colin. Because it wasn't one moment that made him fall in love with her.

And, I mean, before I get more into that I need to say this -- love isn't a definitive thing. It can be on a spectrum. It can take different shapes and forms. It can be romantic and it can be platonic and it can be familial. It can be casual, it can be intense, it can be easy, it can be difficult. There isn't one type of love. And I think me hammering this point in is just that this is one reason I really love the Polin story so much. Because it isn't about bam! in romantic/sexual love. It's about growing together and changing together and discovering love that's always been there.

Colin, in this moment, loves her. I don't think he necessarily recognizes it as that. And I don't necessarily think it's a romantic love, either. What he does know - and what this look signifies, is that he's coming back from his travels knowing that this person has changed his life, and he wants her in it more. She had bared herself in those letters, but so did he. And she saw him, too - which will be important as we go on. She is special to him. So even if it isn't romantic or sexual, it doesn't matter. They're connected in a way that they aren't to anyone else in their lives, and that's the important thing.

And... we're back to reality. Hyacinth and Gregory push back to jump on him as little siblings do. Benedict and Francesca tease him about his looks. It's also very much on brand for families (and I love it!).

Penelope, of course, gets that little sneaky line of stating that he looks distinguished -- not only defending him, but taking a rare moment to comment her admiration out in the open. Not that anyone notices her (and I think she's alright with that), but again, it's funny at how much she's backed off from the confidence she was showing in the first episode.

We don't get to see Colin make any kind of acknowledgement of what she said. The little Bridgertons are too busy arguing about their height (which, again, is such a sibling thing).

And, of course, we wrap the scene with the return of the 'intrepid viscount'. Eager and ready to take us to the next portion of the plot -- which happens to be a family outing to the races. And Colin is such an after thought, it's almost funny. Yo, Colin's back, great, I have to go best a girl, everyone to the races!

Colin doesn't get a moment to breathe (or unpack) -- family outing! Now!

Changes at the Featherington House

Penelope returns home from the Bridgertons to find that they've got some new decor at home. Jack has put up his musket rack, and the women of the Featherington house seem a bit (hilariously) perplexed by it.

Penelope calls him 'cousin Jack' and Portia is off-put by that. It's too familiar for her liking. Penelope calls her on it, wondering if Jack is bothering her, but Portia claims that it's fine. (It's not.)

Penelope almost doesn't know what to do with any of it. There are a lot of guns and a lot of deer heads and, you know, nice to have a little of that Americana pop up in this hoity British story (said with love). Jack comes in - claiming that there's a lot more decorating to do. Portia wishes he'd leave it to his own room, but Jack's like - nah.

Penelope goes from somewhat disgusted to intrigued very quickly. Her asking about whether or not he's shot them all feels -- a little crude and blunt, but also kind of hilarious for the moment. Jack tells her there are a lot of adventurous stories to tell -- and we all know Penelope loves a great adventurous story. She is still all in on Jack, despite Portia being pissed about all of it.

Jack tells them to all get ready, because they, too, are off to the races! (I love that this scene is there to somewhat tell Jack's backstory, but to also give them a reason to be at the races so they can continue with plot.)

And here we stop for now, first toe dipped into an episode that I really enjoy. :)

[cisthoughtcrime]

.

[foreststarflaime]

I think all of October should be a get-work-and-school-off holiday

[outfoxt]

Another Käärijä Research Project

aka: käärijä style-shifting project

as a preface, here are my (non) qualifications for this project and the circumstances under which it happened:

I am a linguistics student, and this past semester I took a course on sociolinguistics. the goal of this project was to become familiar with the concept of and analyze style-shifting (it's more commonly known as code-switching online but theres a difference and this is style-shifting), specifically by analyzing the speech of one person. We had the option to study oprah or to have someone else approved by my prof, so you know I had to ask my prof if I could study jere. This project is solely my intellectual property; even though I had a tutor help me a lot, everything written in this paper and on this post was my work alone.

now, on to the actual findings! the full paper and transcripts will be linked at the end :D

the actual variables (words or sounds) that I studied were the pronunciation of r, and use of the word "the".

to make things a lot easier from the get-go, i'm going to introduce you all to one of my favorite websites, ipachart.com (the international phonetic alphabet [ipa] chart is a big chart with an entry for every sound that exists in a language. this handy dandy website has an audio recording for each one of those sounds).

go to this website, and then scroll down to the table. go to the column labeled "post alveolar" and then click on ɾ and ɹ. those are the sounds i studied in this paper! ɾ is the finnish r and ɹ is the american r :)

so basically what i did to find instances of my variable was i just looked up a bunch of esc interviews and listened out for use of the different r sounds. i also transcribed the entire dinner date live because i love torture apparently :) the specific interviews and lives/stories are in the bibliography of the paper :p

after i transcribed all the interviews and lives/stories i went through and highlighted every instance of the r sound. then i calculated the ratios of ɾ to ɹ based on the context they were spoken in. the two contexts i looked for were formal contexts (sit-down interviews) and informal contexts (literally anything else).

i found that jere uses ɹ WAY more often in formal contexts than he does in informal contexts, and the same in reverse with ɾ.

i then went back to the transcripts and looked for all instances of the word "the". i also looked for instances where i thought it should be present, but was omitted. i calculated the ratio of present vs omitted "the"s in formal vs informal contexts and made some charts.

the graph with the smaller black section is "use of 'the' in formal settings" and the one with the smaller green section is "use of 'the' in informal settings" (the images are transparent, sorry)

i found that jere uses "the" WAY more often when in formal settings! there were also some instances where he added a "the" where it was unnecessary, which is studied at length in this wonderful paper by @alien-girl-21

something i also noticed that i elected not to study because this paper took enough energy on its own was that in formal contexts, whenever the "or" sound came in the middle or at the end of a word, jere wouldn't pronounce the r. it stuck out to me mostly because i heard words like "performance" turning into "perfomance", which i thought was an interesting quirk.

unfortunately i was somewhat limited by both my brainpower and capacity to do more work on this paper in the relatively short timeframe i was given (2 weeks) and the fact that i was given a 5 page MAX for this paper (not including a bibliography). i had a lot of fun doing this though and am definitely planning on studying jere for for academic credit again in the future if given the chance!

also i would like it to be known that i spent an hour searching for that 5 second clip of the urheilucast where jere said that he used to sell kitchens and understands english better than he can speak it.

link to a google drive folder with the actual paper i wrote and the transcripts of the interviews with notation:

please feel free to send me asks and dms with questions or comments about this paper! i absolutely love rambling about linguistics :3!!

[rosieparker1856]

I was dead asleep and woke up like a fucking zombie with the thought of “I wonder if when people go to Danny’s Grave to offer their condolences or whatever people do, if Danny can only hear it when he is a ghost.” I’m imagining it like an answering machine, you don’t actually know the message unless you play it back. This idea has probably been said before, but it’s 4 a.m and I’ve written 6 college papers in the last 24 hours. I wasted good sleep for this random bunny.

This premise lies solely on the fact of Danny actually having a grave stone, for people to go to.

That being said, a lot of people don’t go to Cemeteries every time they think of someone who passed away. Personally, with my Great Grandmother, when I want to remember her I bring out her old cookbooks and make her favourite recipes. And I talk to her the entire time I’m cooking. Especially during Harvest Fest.

So, in that mindset, can Danny hear everything people say when they’re remembering him? Cause that could get really annoying really fast for a boy who’s still half alive.

Like he’s partnered up with Wes on a Chemistry project and all that’s going through his head when he’s fighting a ghost when they’re supposed to meet up is “Danny Fenton, Danny Phantom, why isn’t he here already? I didn’t see a ghost on the news” or something like that. Don’t judge the dialogue literally have had 2 hours of sleep the last 3 days cause of work and classes.

Someone please, if this is a thing and there are fics about it drop them in the comments. Is that pick me? To ask you to comment? Anyways, i should try and get back to bed.

This is not proofread and I didn’t even put on my glasses for it, so if it’s clunky/there are misspelled words, no there aren’t.

[toiletpotato]

hello music enthusiasts of tumblr!

does anyone happen to know of any academic sources that discuss specific styles of hip hop and rap (such as: how early 80s hip hop is has its own distinct style when compared to that of the 90s and that of the 2000s and into the 2010s) as well as any sources that discuss the global diffusion of rap, (and, only if you happen to know of a source) how it got to South Asia

for those that were in tune with the pop culture and music scene of the 2000s/2010s, how would you all classify Akon? Would it be best to describe him as a rapper popular throughout the 2000s, or more so late 2000s/early 2010s?

thank you in advance!!

[aresianrepose]

Before the semester kicks off and murders me, @disniq​ asked for my essay on Jason Todd and hysteria. So, without further ado, here is an actual essay (fucking dissertation) because I refuse brevity. It is extremely long. I’ve split it into sections so you can find the section header and read what you want. This does not encompass all the narrative trauma themes and lived experiences that this boy holds, just specifically hysteria. 

Jason Todd, The Hysteric & Bruce Wayne, The Batman

I think it’s a common reading that Jason Todd is girl-coded and the patron saint of victims, at least within the circle that I’ve fallen into within this fandom. There are plenty of meta discussions on why those readings stand, so I’m not going to reiterate them. A pillar of him being girl-coded and someone trauma survivors have latched onto as one of our own has to do with being written in the context of hysterical femininity. And let me just say, I don’t think that writing was done in a way that he was intentionally coded as hysterical, but it is a function of our patriarchal society that this coding was used on him albeit without the explicit purpose of writing a hysteric story. 

For the purpose of this post: the word woman includes ciswomen, transwomen, and any person who is socially positioned as a woman regardless of gender identity. I include the positionality here because anyone can experience misogyny and sexism depending on the perception of the perpetrators either interpersonally or systemically. 

The History and Context of Hysteria

To understand the context, we have to look at the history and oppression of hysteria. Hysteria (in the modern context of psychology) emerged in the nineteenth century and is difficult to define by design and often applied to traumatized, unruly, and broken women. The main patriarchs who contributed to hysterical study were Jean-Martin Charcot and Sigmund Freud. I only mention this because it’s important to know their names moving forward for any of this to make sense. The beginning of this started with Charcot literally putting women whose lives had been marked by rape, abuse, exploitation, and poverty on display in his Tuesday lectures (which were open to the public) to show his findings on hysteria. This was actually seen as restoring dignity (fucking yikes) to the women because before Charcot these hysterical women were cast aside and not treated at all. In Charcot’s work, the women’s speech was seen as simply “vocalization” and their inner lives, their stories, their words, were silenced. After hearing a woman cry for her mother during one of the public sessions Charcot remarked, “Again, note these screams. You could say it’s a lot of noise over nothing” (Herman). 

This led to Freud, Charcot’s student, wanting to surpass his teacher by discovering the cause of hysteria. This was disastrous. Freud started with listening to the hysterics. In doing so, he learned and believed them about the abuse, rape, and exploitation of their pasts. He then published his work and gave a lecture on it. The work rivals even contemporary psychological work on trauma in it’s level of compassion, understanding, and treatment of survivors. However, he was then labeled a feminist (this was all happening during the first wave of feminism) and professionally ostracized. How in the world could these aristocratic French men be sexually abusing their wives, sisters, and daughters??? Insanity, truly. And... This always fucking gets me. He recanted his work and then told his patients they all imagined it because they wanted to be sexually abused by their husbands, brothers, and fathers. This set back the study of trauma by literally a century. One colleague called his work “a scientific fairy-tale” simply because he had the audacity to believe victims. Also, I want to point out that the famous hysteria case during this time was the case of Anna O and she was ultimately villainized by the entire psychological community for going into crisis after her care provider abruptly ended their therapeutic relationship after two years of DAILY sessions. 

Anyway. We can see how the power of these men over vulnerable women silenced, pathologized, villainized, infantilized, and used male ‘logic’ to completely destroy their credibility and lives under the guise of care and hysteria. Even when credible men lend their expertise and voices to the victims, their voices are silenced. This particular iteration of hysteria lasted over a century, and we are still dealing with the consequences of these actions and ideas within our social construction, medical and mental health care, interpersonal relationships, and more. Patriarchal pillars such as hysteria don’t die. We saw it move from hysteria to schizophrenia (which used to have the same symptoms of hysteria before the diagnosis changed in more contemporary psychology) after this which led to widespread lobotomies and electroshock therapy (my least favorite case of a lobotomy being done is on a woman who was diagnosed with LITERALLY ‘narcissist husband’) to depression in the 40s-50s with the over prescription of benzodiazepines to house wives to keep them in a zombie state (these prescriptions were sometimes double and triple what we take today with the intent of medical catatonia). In my opinion, as well as other counselors within the feminist therapy theoretical orientation, we are currently seeing it with the emergence of borderline-personality disorder. Think about how BPD is treated and demonized for a second. I professionally know therapists who refuse to work with BPD clients due to this villainization and just fucking gross perception of victims.

These are just the highlights, but it shows the history of hysteria. There have been centuries of women being marked as hysterical and the cures have ranged from lobotomy to bed rest (which sounds not so bad but read the Yellow Wallpaper and get back to me on that one). While the Yellow Wallpaper is fictional, the life behind it was not. After the traumatic birth of her child the author, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, was remanded to bed rest by the authority of her husband and doctor. Within the sphere of medical control, hysterical women are often treated as children while their doctors make decisions for their mental well-being without consulting them, or they hide the truth of their procedures for “the woman’s own good” and because “she’s hysterical and wouldn’t comprehend the logical need for this.” She then had a mental break due to the treatment. Again, we see hysterical women being silenced, infantilized, discredited from their own experiences, and under the narrative control of male logic and voices. 

Hysterical women have often historically been seen as beneath men, except for when they’re dangerous. Listening to victims is inherently threatening to the status quo because all trauma comes from a systemic framework. The framework that upholds patriarchal power. It’s easy to see why that would be seen as dangerous to powerful men. We saw this with the European witch genocide in which oppressed women were targeted and wiped out under the excuse of what was considered women’s work. (Before this time, witchcraft wasn’t tied to any religion and was mostly just seen as women’s work. It was targeted specifically to have an excuse to persecute widows, homeless, disabled, and vulnerable women who no longer had men to reign over them during a time of political unrest and scarce resources). This time period saw hysterical and traumatized women demonized as dangerous, evil, immoral, hypersexual, and supernaturally wily. A threat to the moral fabric of society. 

(Interesting history side note: this caused the view of women’s base traits we have today. It stemmed from the Victorian era that came after this time period in which women learned if they behaved a certain way, they would be spared the stake. For example, before the witch trials, women were actually seen as the ones with unsatiable sexual appetites, something we culturally prescribe to men now.) 

Notice how none of this has to do with the actual abuse that happens to the women, but instead the labeling and treatment of women when they are already showing the symptoms of abuse, trauma, control, exploitation, and rape. 

Jason Todd, The Hysteric

So, how does this relate to Jason Todd? To say that Jason has experienced trauma would be an understatement. Extreme poverty, loss of parent to death and addiction, loss of parent to the justice system, parental abuse, manipulation, witnessing violent crimes, witnessing the aftermath of sexual abuse and assault, arguably (not explicit in the text) his own sexual trauma, witnessing the dead bodies of victims, a violent death, and subsequently a violent resurrection. There’s also an argument to be made for being a child soldier and how that is romanticized up until he dies, but the text does not treat this as traumatizing.

Now, I’m not going to dive into the trauma he experienced. The purpose of this is only to look at how he’s framed as hysterical in the narrative, and as I stated, hysteria was a word slapped on women after they tried to talk about their trauma or exhibited symptoms (or were just unruly women). Jason does embody many facets of the victim experience and this is just one of them. 

Feelings vs “logic” - Firstly, it is really hard to talk calmly about things that you carry, your experiences, your trauma, and things that specifically harm you. It is easy to talk calmly about things that don’t. This is why there is an abuse tactic of gaslighting or silencing victims by framing their very real reactions to harm or their triggers as abuse, this is known as “reactive abuse.” This tactic is also employed in oppressive settings where the privileged group will often default to ‘winning’ a debate by being able to remain calm while the marginalized group whose life, personhood, etc is being harmed by the things being discussed and are unable to have a sterilized, emotionless debate. 

Both of these settings fit Jason nicely within the moral context of vigilante comics. He fought back, he didn’t lay down, and he will do what he deems as necessary to protect himself and others from his fate. This, however, is framed by Bruce and others as being just as bad as his murderer or even just as bad as Joe fucking Chill. To put this in perspective of a real world equivalent. Combine every billionaire on this planet into one person and instead of their shitty business practices murdering people, they did it with their own two hands. And due to their resources and political power, they would never, ever stop killing or be reasonably contained. More people would die with absolute 100% certainty. Would killing that one person make you equally bad as that person or violating the sanctity of life? That’s the moral question that Bruce puts onto Jason. While the moral question inherent to Jason is actually, is there a line worth crossing to provide reasonable safety (for yourself or the nameless community)? There is actually a difference between those two questions and the reactive abuse framing is certainly a choice. Also, it is funny to me that a man with the amount of power Bruce has (and frequently misuses) can lecture a murder victim on the misuse of power and morality. Are we supposed to be agree with his stoic, philosophical lecturing to a marginalized, abused, murder victim? (yes, we are). Bruce leverages (personal) philosophy against victim’s voice for their own safety, and take a wild guess which one is framed as logical and reasonable.

Jason’s morals come secondary to Bruce’s philosophy in a universe where there is still harm being done (but it’s an acceptable harm). Why is killing the line? Bruce is regularly destroying families and lives by feeding them into the prison industrial complex while supporting it with his whole chest. Or he’s disabling and seriously maiming people with the level of violence he uses. 

Crying - Throughout the entire story of Under the Red Hood, we never once see Bruce emote while interacting with Jason outside of tight grimaces. With the exception of the shock he shows at the Joker’s life being threatened, which... Okay, suuure. We never see him cry during any of their interactions, but we do see Jason cry. Specifically, we see him crying when he’s at his most emotionally vulnerable and physically dangerous to the toxic male power fantasy. This kind of vulnerability is rarely shown by male characters, and when it is, it’s usually done with a mist of a tear in their eyes or their face is hidden. There are a few narrative devices that allow men to cry, but they are the exception rather than the rule. Usually, it’s to play for laughs, infantilize, or emasculate. Here, we see Jason combine the violence of a bad victim, bucking the system of power, and fully crying. Just slide right into that hysterical coding like a glove. Jason often shows his feelings entirely. Time and time again, the readers have seen Jason have breakdowns, cry, and be overcome with grief. This is tied to his portrayal as hysterical and unstable in the narrative, but in actuality it shows his capacity for love and how vastly impactful his death was. 

This fits nicely with the next point that Jason fits into the hysterical box. Love is framed as one of his key faults. A son reaching for his father. 

Love - One of Jason’s defining features is the amount of love and compassion he holds. He’s willing to put up with any treatment, shoulder blame, and sacrifice himself for others to almost an unhealthy degree. However, this doesn’t extend to what he defines as his baseline safety. This one line of safety is the one thing that can’t be crossed, even with all of the love he feels for his father. He desperately wants to feel connection, have a family, and be loved in return with the same unwavering ferocity love that he gives. This is such a fucking key part of the victim experience, especially victims of childhood trauma. The desperation to just be chosen. He’s raw and honest with his reasonable expectation for love to provide safety for him and that is framed as hysterical, needy, unstable, naive, and fucking childish. Victims know what they need to have safety, and this framing as Bruce knowing what’s best for Jason and literally giving a cold shoulder to his needs is disgusting. 

Less than - Jason is portrayed as less powerful than Bruce even though they have similar expertise. There are so many instances of this that if you just open any media they both appear in, you can close your eyes, point, and land on an example. It makes me die laughing every time I remember that the Arkham games made Jason just one inch shorter than Bruce. Like, they can’t even be the same fucking height, that’s the level of insecure masculinity surrounding this relationship. Jason cannot and will never be able to be on par with Bruce because of his hysterical femininity and the power of Bruce being the self insert for the toxic male power fantasy. This power dynamic applies to the other batkids as well, but specifically in Jason’s case there is an element of hysteria. The reasons change because he’s so inconsistently written but usually he can’t surpass or even meet a stalemate with Bruce because he’s too emotional, he’s unstable, traumatized, and simply Bad. It’s even explicitly stated by Alfred in Under the Red Hood. 

Victim blaming - Jason deserved to die because he didn’t follow orders. Jason deserved to die for not following his training. Jason deserved to die because he was an angry Robin (oh no a child had an appropriate reaction to sexual violence). Jason deserved to die for being human.

Infantilization - Jason is repeatedly infantilized in contrast to Bruce. When given the ultimatum at the end of UtRH, Bruce speaks to Jason like a child, or a bad dog. Ordering him to do things like, “enough!” or “stop this now.” Bruce knows what’s best for Jason (and for everyone in the entire world), we should really just take his word for it and not the victim’s. Imagine staring at a 6 foot wall of a man and scolding him like a child. Beyond that, as mentioned above, his views of love and safety are framed as childish. Even though they are actually leaning more toward collectivism rather than the rampant individualism that Bruce so strongly defers to. (also, just a side note, collectivistic methods in healing from trauma is actually the only scientifically reliable way to heal. Every other method has absolutely abysmal results and higher rates of relapses.)

Silenced and Safety Villainized - Jason is silenced in his own story, acceptable and honored when he was dead and met with vitriol in life. All of the love given to him as Robin turns to ash as soon as he collides with Bruce’s power and morals. I think any survivor can relate to the experience of being told that what happened to them was a long time ago and it’s time to move on. Or even that they’re leveraging their own safety to get what they want in a manipulative way. Regardless of whether or not there was any accountability or justice for the harm done to them. Alfred asks Bruce if he should remove Jason’s memorial in the cave like two seconds after learning of his resurrection because Jason’s methods of securing safety for himself and using his own voice to define his story. Bruce was able to tell Jason’s story when he died. He was able to memorialize, grieve, and ultimately define Jason’s story because Jason wasn’t there to speak for himself. When Jason does speak for himself, he is villainized and literally stripped of his past significance as Robin (or a good victim) by Alfred within seconds. This is reflected in real life with adoptee advocates speaking about how adoption is unethical/harmful/traumatizing and subsequently being framed as ungrateful, selfish, etc. They were little perfect victims without voices before they grew up and could speak for themselves.

Erased - Gestures at the entirety of how Jason is either talked about or completely erased during the 90s Tim Robin run. He wasn’t convenient to talk about, as victims rarely are. This also ties into how Steph’s death was erased and Babs was written like she “won” at trauma by simply... beating it??? 

Dangerous - Jason is framed as threatening the basic fabric of society (in a story with vigilantes this is hard to do, so they have him oppose the no-kill rule, and then doubled down on Bruce’s characterization of no-killing). Anything that bucks the status-quo is usually marked as villainous in mainstream vigilante/superhero comics, but this is a step beyond that into the interpersonal and political sphere. Hysterical women are often framed as dangerous, villains, snakes, and treacherous (the other side of this coin is weak, pathetic, and pitiable) because they are victimized and then have the audacity to do something to the system about it. Whether that be the system of their immediate families or the political sphere. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Jason was paired with Talia in Lost Days to hammer this point home to the reader. It could’ve just as easily been anyone with access to the Pit that rescued him, but no, we had DC’s favorite brown, treacherous, venomous, female punching bag. 

Bruce Wayne, The Batman

Bruce fits well into the father, enforcer, and logical man slot in Jason’s hysterical story. There is a history of ownership throughout women’s history when it comes to their subjugation to men. Women actually couldn’t be put on trial before the witchcraft genocide because they weren’t seen as legally a person. Their male owner would be put on trial instead. Women would go from being owned by their fathers to their husbands after entering marriage, the most dangerous woman being one who isn’t owned (orphaned, widowed). Bruce does treat (and even thinks) about Jason like he’s something that he owns. He’s his protege, his son, and his responsibility. 

The narrative function of Bruce as a perpetrator in Jason’s story. 

“The perpetrator asks the bystander (reader) to do nothing. He appeals to the universal desire to see, hear, and speak no evil. The victim, on the contrary, asks the bystander (reader) to share the burden of pain. The victim demands action, engagement and remembering” (Herman). 

Bruce does remember what happened to Jason. He keeps a permanent memorial to his dead son. However, this doesn’t translate into any kind of tangible action. He doesn’t do anything to actually stop the murderer who took his son’s life and he continues to throw child soldiers at the problem of crime (how many children have died for the sake of his no-kill rule at this point?). When met with the reality of his inaction, he fits into the perpetrator’s role like a glove:

“In order to escape accountability for his crimes, the perpetrator does everything in his power to promote forgetting. Secrecy and silence are the first line of defense... If secrecy fails, the perpetrator attacks the credibility of his victim. If he cannot silence her absolutely, he tries to make sure that no one listens... From the most blatant denial to the most sophisticated and elegant rationalization... One can expect to hear the same predictable apologies: it never happened; the victim exaggerates; the victim brought it upon herself; and in any case it’s time to forget the past and move on. The more powerful the perpetrator, the greater his prerogative to name and define reality, the more completely his arguments prevail” (Herman). 

I think it is simply fact at this point that Bruce is the head patriarch in Gotham if not, arguably, in the entirety of DC. That level of power in the narrative cannot be ignored, especially when faced with the very real, screaming voice of a victim that Bruce uses all of that power to silence. Bruce, because of his status as patriarch, default protagonist, and self-insert for the toxic male power fantasy, has the ultimate power to name and define reality. Especially to the reader. Bruce doesn’t deny what happened to Jason, because that’s physically impossible to do. But what he does do is ensure that no one listens to Jason, discredits him, and rationalizes his own inaction, actions of violence towards Jason, and victim blames.

Here’s Bruce using the most base form of denial and victim blaming:

After this panel, Bruce also revokes Dick’s access to his childhood home simply for asking a question.

This theme extends to other members of the batfam because of Bruce’s narrative power over them. It’s why we can’t have Dick, Steph, Babs, or even Damian step in and relate to Jason’s trauma or vindicate him. Even when we, the readers, can see parallels and wonder why these conversations or bonds aren’t forming. Jason HAS to be a lone wolf because he is hysterical and a threat to the system of power. This also shows why most of his runs in group settings outside of the batfam fall apart or fall flat. If he was humanized by any other character or had his trauma validated in any actionable way, it would be recognizing the failure of the toxic male power fantasy. The readers are not supposed to see the flaw in this system that allows the bodies of children to pile up and sympathize with one of their voices. It would be a crack in the system of power that exists not only in the source material, but very much within our real world.

Side note: Jason is allowed to interact with others in a wholesome and validating way when he no longer threatens the systemic power of Bruce. When he is silenced by the writers and plays the “nice victim” (like Babs does), he is allowed connection. Only when his healing is done in a way that doesn’t demand action and is only his personal responsibility (gotta love the rampant individualism). If he is hysterical, demands action, and asks for someone to be held accountable for his death, he is shoved away into a lone wolf box. Examples: Gotham Knights (from my very basic understanding, I haven’t played the game, only seen play throughs) and WFA. Victims are acceptable if they do their healing in a neat little box and stay there, but hysterics are the ones who step outside of that box.

Red Hood, The Political Voice of Hysteria and Trauma

Red Hood is deeply political in terms of hysteria and trauma. Herman stated that victims and those that authentically care for them or listen to them intently (whether that be interpersonally, clinically, or professionally) are silenced, ostracized, and discredited. Survivors need a social context that supports the victim and that joins the victim and witness in a common alliance. On an interpersonal level this looks like family, friends, and loved ones. However, trauma is systemic and the social context mentioned above must also be given on a wider social scale. For this to be done, there had to be systemic change and political action. Jason had the interpersonal social support and witnesses to his trauma ripped from him by Bruce. So, we see him move onto a systemic level of addressing trauma in his own political way. He literally cannot escape Bruce and this constant trigger because of Bruce’s philosophy and just... fucking power to define reality... being re-enforced constantly in DC no matter where he tries to go. So, he tries to heal by taking the systemic issue of perpetrators who cannot be held accountable or have fallen through the cracks of accountability into his own hands in a very personal way. A one man political movement.

Whether his methods are moral or ethical doesn’t really matter in the overall framing him as hysteric. He simply has to be opposed by the male power fantasy in some significant way. This shows that the goals, needs, and work towards victim’s and the marginalized’s freedom is dangerous, doomed to fail, and ultimately unethical if the victim is framed in a villain light instead of the more pathetic/pitiable iteration of hysteria. 

You can see how this is not only problematic but also reflects the real world values instilled in arguments against human rights movements (which are intrinsically tied to victims rights). Defunding the police is dangerous, the MeToo movement is dangerous, abolition is dangerous, trans rights are dangerous, etc etc etc. Think of the victims voices tied to each of these movements and how they are integral to the real change offered by these political movements. You can’t have human rights violations without creating victims. And you can’t have political movements surrounding human rights without listening to victims.

We can also see how the individuals within these movements are ostracized, villianized, and often silenced (sometimes ultimately silenced with death) because they rally against the systems of power that victimized them. The framing of traumatized, vulnerable people as hysterical is integral to upholding the system of power that traumatizes and harms them.

A popular comic book movie adaptation that highlights the importance of Jason’s hysterical framing and how it impacts the political narrative/how he is written is V for Vendetta. To be fair, it received an insane amount of backlash by conservatives (not within leftist or liberal spaces) for V’s methods in over throwing fascism, but only because of the movie’s release date being so close to 9/11. V and Jason have many parallels, it’s only the lack of hysterical framing that makes V more palatable to the viewer. We are told, not shown through behavior, that V is traumatized by his past and he does not pick a fight with the protagonist that functions as a toxic male power fantasy. He is the protag, with his version of Bruce being men who are not framed in a sympathetic, heroic, or relatable light. 

Additionally, there is literally an unemoting mask standing between the viewer and V, whereas Jason takes off his helmet to allow the reader to see every aspect of his trauma and pain. V readily dehumanizes himself into an idea, rather than a person. Whereas Jason screams to be seen as a person in a very hysterical way. So, we can see how the framing of Jason as hysteric against the logical, heroic man greatly impacts how the audience reads him when contrasted by a very similar political story/character who uses similar (and arguably more violent) methods to meet his ends. (This just made me realize that I would die for a Jason adaptation written by the Wachowski sisters). 

Jason’s work as Red Hood is seeped in leftist, victim, and community centered politics. His portrayal as a hysterical antagonist (at best an anti-hero) is rooted in misogyny and upholding patriarchal, capitalist, and the prison industrial complex systems of power. He is the righteous embodiment of “the personal is political” for victims. Even his Robin run draws attention to and shows correct, angry reactions to the system of patriarchal power in sexual violence.

Patriarchal Writing and Enforcement

Jason is girl-coded and hysterical because he’s supposed to be emasculated, discredited, and disliked by the reader. He serves the narrative function of boosting the toxic male power fantasy of Bruce and in doing so, the writers use one of the oldest tropes in the book (one that we have all subconsciously been taught since birth) to get the reader on their side. Make him a hysterical woman. 

References: for anyone interested in furthering their understanding of any of the concepts mentioned above and to, you know, use sources for my own writing.

Barstow, A. Witchcraze

Bondi, L., Burman. E. Women and Mental Health: A Feminist Review

Freud, S. The Aietology of Hysteria

Gilman, C. P. The Yellow Wallpaper

Herman, J. Trauma and Recovery

Ussher, J. The Madness of Women.

Van der Kolk, B. The Body Keeps the Score

Wilkin, L., Hillock, S. Enhancing MSW Students’ Efficacy in Working with Trauma, Violence, and Oppression: An Integrated Feminist-Trauma Framework for Social Work Education

[what-even-is-sleep]

Danny Phantom Prompts

Who: Dash Baxter

What: chilling in the bathroom

When: during schooltime

Where: the bathroom

Why: He’s just taking a bathroom break, fuck. He’s liked by the teachers, it doesn’t matter if it goes a bit long. And there’s some mold in the corner of a mirror that looks like it’d be more interesting to scrape off than him going back to the classroom and facing chemistry equations. He’ll have Fenton fake the work for him anyways. 

Dash is distracted by the mold. 

Danny ends up running into the bathroom and shutting the door behind him, taking a moment to catch his breath and immediately noticing Dash. 

Dash just stares at him for a moment, then his mouth begins to slide into a sneer. How could Danny do his homework if he was also skipping class? Danny breaks eye contact like they weren’t about to have a stare-down, which is stupid, because Dash was about to threaten Danny to go back to class.

______

Dialogue moment: Dash says, a lil caught off guard, “be quick about it.”  

______

Who: a ghost boar

What: running amok in the Casper high hallway

When: right now.

Where: unknown. It seems to like the smell of blood, since it chased Danny when he accidentally sliced his finger in science class.

Why: There was a fucking tac in his desk drawer when he’d tried to grab the textbook.  Danny had raised his hand to go to the bathroom and wash it off and Mr. Lancer let him go with reluctance. His ghost breath went off a moment later. The boar had been charging towards him when Danny walked out the classroom door. Danny thinks he may have distracted it by running (read: being chased) past the cafeteria, which was preparing to serve lukewarm-dogs to the L1 students. 

[sillyfudgemonkeys]

FC Yee really looked at Korrasami and said "Wanna see me make it better?" And then DID. And then looked at Kataang and said "Wanna see me do it again?" And then DID! TT0TT

Please ATLA writing team, keep this guy on as an advisor TT0TT Please let him write some Korrasami and Kataang I beg.

[compacflt]

some more attempts at the top gun class of 86