#like I don't get how cruel some men can be in fact quite a few men but I said what I meant here

[ventbloglite]

It is vital to understand that men do care about women. Not [adjective] men where the adjective indicates a circumstance or factor that must be present in order to magically get past the 'evil' that comes with being a man, men[period)]

Men that are abusive are not looked upon as "normal" or "good" by most men.

Most men want women to be safe. Most men are involved in laws to protect against common violences against women, or crimes that overwhelming affect women more than men or anyone else.

I just took a course about domestic abuse led by a man who has spent his whole life supporting women in domestic abuse situations.

There are experts in all fields of protection and bodily autonomy for women and feminism that are men who did not need to be told by a woman to care, that did not need to be reminded that they have family who are women to care, that did not need to experience anything on a personal level at all.

They care about women because women are people, and men are people, and people care about people.

It can feel like it's women versus men all the time and that can make you as a woman feel extremely afraid of men, maybe even to the point of either hiding to your own detriment or turning that fear into hatred against the male sex and/or gender which then leads you vulnerable to radicalisation and less likely to heal or make any meaningful contributions to feminism and changing how things are that led to that fear in the first place.

Don't quote stats at me, I know. But I'm telling you for every one man who hates women, there's another who does not and thinks that guy is a misogynistic asshole.

I know you're hurt, you're hurt bad and it's only come from men or feels like it at least and I can't change or really apologise for that but I promise it's behaviour not a gender/sex that's caused that hurt and it's dangerous to view someone as biologically imposed to be dangerous to women, or socially imposed if they're trans men.

You can be safe around men. You are safe around most men. Most people are inherently good. Women and men are all people and people overwhelming do care about people.

[parrythisucasual]

OMG OKAY SO,

can u do a Jax x reader, but Jax is like extremely rude to everyone but when reader comes along, he for some reason melts like puddy around them. ALSO, reader is like a femme fatale , she views men as below her, but she sees Jax as her lover. She’s like I hate all men! Except for u jax my love 💗(MWAHAHAH)

I'm sorry this fic is so short, I made it to the best of my ability! Course, I don't have any idea what femme fatale is so I just used context clues, ahhh! If it's bad I'll rework it! I actually made a lil doodle to make up for the shortness!

Adoring! Jax x Femme Fatale! Reader

You had that boy wrapped around your finger. He was so smitten, you could tell him “Bark” and he’d respond “How loud?” It was extraordinarily satisfying. Not that you didn’t care about him, no, that would be cruel. In fact, he was the only man you’d ever harbored such a soft spot for. Isn’t it just perfect he’d be so… well… adoring?

Speak of the devil, you suppose. You glance around the corner, getting a sight of what he pretended to be when you weren’t around. Jax, standing tall and imposing, was staring down at Ragatha. You weren’t close enough to hear what was being said, but from the fury in her eyes and the smile on Jax’s face, you could gather a small idea.

You stepped into the room, “Oh, Jaxy, dear…” His head shot up at your words, the fake grandeur melting away like butter in a microwave, “I do hope you’re behaving yourself?” His expression changed from "high school bully" into “lovesick puppy” in an instant, nodding as he responded, “Yeah, course I am!”

You make your way over, motioning him to come to you with one finger. Jax hurried to your side, and you offered your hand to hold. He gladly took it, his thumb running over the back of your hand in small circles. You smile to Ragatha, “Sorry about him,” you apologize, and she just rolls her eyes, returning the grin, “It’s okay. I think he just missed you.”

“Did you?” you turn to Jax, chuckling a bit, “I was only away for a few hours to nap?” His grin turned awkward, “Well, I mean… I really just… er…” You use your free hand to pat his hand you were holding, “Don’t worry, love, I missed you too,” you reassure him.

“Anyways,” you glance back to Ragatha, “he’s going to apologize too. Aren’t you?” Jax, without hesitation, pipes up, “Sorry, Rags, it won’t happen again. Promise.” She shakes her head as she walks away, “Sure it won’t. See you around!” she adds as she makes her way over to Zooble and Gangle.

Jax glances at you, eyes hopeful, “Alright, big guy, come here.” You pull him down, pressing a gentle kiss to his lips, “Now quit being so mean, honey, the others don’t deserve it. Besides, I’m getting tired of having to apologize for you.” 

“No more being mean, got it,” he nodded, leaning in for more kisses. You comply, a chuckle rising in your throat, “Cute.”

[jesteriajunovix]

(Spoilers) Just a Reminder to Curly Sympathizers

Jimmy and Curly are not "Problematic Favs". They're literally thematic vessels for THE problem.

CW: Mentions of SA, and Abuse

Curly (And Pony Express as a Company) Never Cared to give Anya Pysche Evals. Curly only started to care for that when it doubled as an occupational hazard to him and his image.

Curly actively vouches for Jimmy as a crew member despite his "struggle" on earth. I don't see how it'd be far-fetched to assume that involves some form of Misconduct with the fact Curly literally says

"You've gotten through difficult situations before" RIGHT AFTER talking to Anya the actual Victim.

Curly doesn't understand why Anya was talking about the locks on the sleeping quarters and moves past it to reinforce the company's logic. [The Company and Curly can not be bothered to consider or provide actual safety for women. It is an afterthought that resembles a cruel apathy towards women's perspectives in a corporate work environment.]

Would Curly have given the gun to Anya if she asked? Probably not. While that is somewhat debatable It rings to the shitty isolated environment where Anya would have to take up such a mindset. Not to mention Curly is clearly super pals with Jimmy, so if that was a concern he'd probably take Jimmy's (and the rest of the guys) side considering he later took jimmy's side under the fact he sexually assaulted a woman.

The first thing Curly says to Jimmy after trying to consolidate Anya is "I Can Fix This". Curly enables Jimmy to find ways to get out of taking responsibility for the harm he did to Anya.

Curly buckles to the fact his mind is more focused on his position and reputation as a Captain rather than the personal impact Jimmy's harm has caused Anya. This issue is an occupational obstacle to him first and foremost.

Jimmy: "This can be remembered as a tragedy".

Jimmy: "The Tuplar crew was never found."

Jimmy: "You're standing at the top. Feet in cement. Right?"

Curly: "...Right."

And his complacency and dissonance of that truth leads him to do absolutely nothing.

I have seen so much art, and discourse treating him like he wasn't an active enabler. You know what. Fuck it. Half of this is going to double as an Anya Post. thinking about how people disgustingly twist her character to redeem two shitty men who are completely at fault irks me so much.

Anya

The fact that Anya doesn't really get to build herself as a character outside of the scenes that reinforce her tragedy, and antagonist environment feels super sucky.

The purpose of such a narrative direction is of course meant to feed into Jimmy's resentful apathetic attitude towards her, and emphasize the cold unfeeling corporate entity that hired her to be on the tulpar, but as a narrative choice, it still feels rather cruel to take in. Jimmy literally erases her personhood from his mind and only internalizes her presence as a threatening womb while taking the rest of the games runtime to focus on himself and the other men on board.

I see many renditions of Anya in fanart. Adding to her character in ways people weren't really given the time to appreciate or take in during the actual game due to how little she's left with.

I find her canon resolution both annoying and interesting due to this type of interaction where the fans are being pushed towards an interpretive play pen where they are motivated to give Anya more characteristics, quirks, and perspectives than she was allowed to have or emphasize within the game.

Using such field of creative deliberation to redeem the men that actively harmed her is such a gross way to use that play pen.

To get into some interpretations

A pretty important moment occurs after Anya runs out of the medical room during the painkiller scene with the thought:

"I have to believe that our worst moments don't make us monsters"

I think there are quite a few different ways to take this line in this moment, but to share my own perspective I believe it most likely stems from these potential factors:

Anya is trying to maintain a metric of empathy and trust to continue to control herself in the current conditions and stresses she's under at this moment. The needs of the crew can not be upheld without this kind of thinking while under the orders of her abuser.

Anya still cares for Curly and is disconnecting the harm he caused from the rest of his humanity as a person who is also suffering.

Anya is reflecting on her own legitimacy while the internalized trauma she went through makes her feel alienated from herself. Accepting the actual piece of shit that is Curly allows her to hold faith in herself as a person through the shared correlation of pain and "mistakes" as she percieves it bonding her with Curly.

While somewhat ambigous I think its important to generally understand these types of potential layers when interacting with the themes and subjects presented by Anya as a character. Ideas which are critical and dissective of Anya as an actual Subject above a simple generalized understanding of her peripherally as a victim.

also Idea 2 doesn't make Curly vindicated. Curly was the only member that Gave Anya some sense of care (As ingenuine as that care was). That dependency is toxic and was unfortuately potentially of mental necessity to Her. To reframe it as a point for Curly to show he was better than what he presented himself to be so deeply annoys me with how uncritical that reframing is when addressing the actual faults and mentality that led him to his bedridden state. With how little Anya is already focused on, it feels like that interpretation and dynamic hands Curly the position of "Subject" while Anya still remains an "Event" to some people.

That kind of thinking not only significantly reeks of a lack of indulgence in actually trying to further interpret the facets presented in Anya's character, position, and mental state, but also dilutes the meaning to be had in analyzing Curly as an enabler. The framing of Curly as an "Enabler in Rehab" or "Tragic Casualty" feels so utterly ignorant, redundant, and enigmatic to my senses when he is so utterly undeserving compared to Anya who barely gets any other elaboration or analysis from the community outside of "awww wasn't that sad" or sensationalization around "The Event".

I WOULD go into Anya's logic leading up to her death, but thats a post and analysis for a different tumblr user to take care of. I honestly just gradually have developed new ways to hate the Mouthwashing fandom, so I really needed this to make mental space for the next few horrible bizarre takes i'll inevitably see about this game.

[enigmatist17]

Fox is a baby okay

Sequel to this fic

----------------

Being on Coruscant was a dream posting for some clones, if you asked around. Being around so many different natborns was an exciting concept, as most hardly interacted with anyone that wasn't a fellow clone, so the city planet seemed like a dream.

The dream dies down awfully quickly when you're subjected to more paperwork than you've ever seen in your entire life daily. Those exotic bodies with their differing hair color, eyes, and body shapes, all lose their luster when clones are either ignored or treated like the lowest droid malfunctioning in an alleyway, or worse.

The Guard was one of the most restricted groups, Fox is coming to realize, making his way around The Negotiator. Everyone here seemed freer, helmets hanging from their belts unless needed for their task, joking and laughing as they work. Most of them don't register the commander, and those who do greet him warmly, albeit nervous to have someone of such high rank on the ship. On Coruscant, Fox and his men were only allowed to interact in their shared barracks, and they hardly did, knowing they were closely monitored by everyone and everything. It was so isolating, and a lot of the time they all wished they could be fighting with a Jedi, instead of drowning in paperwork and dealing with people who viewed them as objects or worse.

The man eventually wanders onto the bridge, and watches as Cody and Obi-Wan crowd around the large pedestal by the door, quietly talking about something.

He knows what they're talking about, and eventually, Cody feels his eyes on him.

"Sleep well?" Fox just joins the two, and the Jedi gives a soft smile.

"We've been speaking with some of your men, and we were going to fetch you actually." The commander shoots a confused look at Cody, but straightens with his arms going behind his back.

"What do you need sir?" Kenobi eyes the stance with a slight frown, but says nothing.

"Oh, I don't need much, just your help in doing something that is most likely treason."

Come again?

"Sir?" Fox blinked, wondering if he had misheard. "Treason?"

"Yes, you heard me." Kenobi gives him a warm smile, which is absurd from the news he just dropped on the Guard leader. "I've been going through some reports and, quite frankly, I apologize."

"To who?" Fox blinked and watched as the Jedi gestures vaguely around the ship.

"To all of you? To everyone? To be honest I'm not sure." Fox does not miss the hand Cody pus on the general's shoulder. "Now that I have the information in front of me, it's obvious who Chanc-Palpatine really is."

"A Sith."

Every clone was taught the basic differences between a Sith and a Jetti, and with Ventress and Dooku, it wasn't hard to get the knowledge as a cruel reminder. How many have fallen to their blades is unknown, but to realize the one Sith no one has seen is just...running the Senate? Pulling a friendly mask over the darkness he oozes? The darkness that has been used against Fox, scarring his mind in a way he was unaware?

"What do you need from me?" Fox straightened, clasping his arms behind his back to hide the fact he was slightly trembling.

"You are the only one who has the best access to Him. I cannot ask you to do anything you're not comfortable with, but we cannot allow him to remain in power." Kenobi frowned, weighing his options. "If you can get us the code to his private chambers, it might be the best way to get to him."

"I can do that." Fox should feel like he should protest, that he's going against the Republic...but he doesn't. Taking a long and slow breath, the trembling seems to stop as he looks out the main window at Courscant stationed to the right of the ship.

It seemed so small from up here.

"I need to go before he starts looking for me." Fox sighed after staring without a word for a few minutes, and the others nod. "I will contact you when I can."

"Any time, day or night, I will answer." Obi-Wan crossed around the table to stand beside the trooper. "I have also placed a small mental sort of shield so that if...there is an incident, he will not find what we have discussed today."

"...thank you, sir."

The shuttle that's offered to Fox gets him back to the planet quick enough, but he pauses after exiting onto the landing platform. He's not landed back near the Senate building, instead having gone down several levels into the planet, where he knows the Senator does not observe. It's weird temporarily shedding his armor, but the civilian clothes that each shuttle has in case clones need to hide in the populace make him feel a little bit more protected, and he's soon lost in the crowd. Fox knows exactly where to go, and knows exactly what to purchase before he returns to his shuttle, and back to the building he now felt nothing but dread at the sight of.

Kenobi isn't going to need his call.

[longitudinalwaveme]

So ummm… do you think you can do the other Rogue’s personality and fighting style?

You have done Golden Glider or the Original Trickster ( James Jesse). I’m having a bit of trouble with writing them. So I’d thought maybe I should do some practicing by doing a few short stories. Fixing anything I get wrong as I go along.😅

Sure!

Golden Glider (Lisa Snart): The Golden Glider, alias Lisa Snart, is somewhat difficult to explain insofar as her character has changed rather significantly over time. Lisa was originally very hard-edged and quite scary; more recent writers tend to make her a lot softer and nicer than she ever was under her creator, Cary Bates (who is, for my money, still the best Golden Glider writer to date, even though the last major story he wrote for her was published in the 1980s).

Lisa is, of course, the younger sister of Leonard Snart (alias Captain Cold). She appears to be about five to seven years younger than he is, and they shared the same rough upbringing under their violent alcoholic father. The two of them were extremely close as children and still have a fair amount of affection for one another as adults (one of the few modern additions to Lisa's character that I do like), but their relationship has become somewhat strained due to a variety of situational factors, including the fact that Leonard left Lisa behind with their father when he ran away from home (as he'd already started hanging out with a crowd he thought would be dangerous for her). Despite this, and her father's abuse, Lisa managed to become am Olympic-level figure skater. She toured the country with the Futura Ice Skating company and seemed to be very successful.

However, she was still connected to the underworld, and to the Rogues, through her devoted long-term boyfriend: Roscoe Dillon, better known as The Top. The comics don't go into great detail regarding how they met, but he somehow became her personal, private figure-skating coach (he taught her how to spin in ways not possible outside of comic books) and from that they became a very devoted couple. Roscoe actually followed her around the country in disguise and attended many of her skating performances. There's no indication that he ever involved Lisa in his life of crime before his death, which occurred as the result of the Flash's super speed clashing with his newly-acquired mental powers and giving him brain damage. Though Flash (specifically, Barry Allen) hadn't meant to kill Roscoe, he had inadvertently caused his death, and Lisa swore revenge, becoming the Golden Glider in order to punish the Flash for killing her lover. This fact is probably the single most important key to understanding the Golden Glider.

The Golden Glider is, quite frankly, one of the most formidable villains Flash has ever faced. She's intelligent, driven, determined, and utterly ruthless in her pursuit of revenge on the man she blames for the death of her lover. In her attempts to gain her revenge on Barry, she targeted his wife, Iris, and his parents, Nora and Henry Allen (this was before the backstory retcon that had Nora murdered by Reverse-Flash when Barry was a kid), and she was also able to deduce Barry's true identity, making her the first of the Rogues to pull off this hat trick. In her first appearance, Barry actually went so far as to compare her to "Batman--the avenger!", and the description is quite apt. Golden Glider is absolutely brilliant, and she's completely single-minded in her quest to make Barry Allen pay for the wrongs she believes he has done her. She was more than willing to allow Barry to kill her in order to obtain her revenge, and she at no point shows any fear of anyone. In her mind, she has nothing left to lose, and that makes her extremely dangerous. Lisa is not nice, and she is not in any way soft. When angered, she is cruel, vindictive, and cold-blooded, and this is what many modern writers seem to get wrong about her.

That being said, she does have a softer side. As mentioned, she is absolutely devoted to Roscoe, her boyfriend, and the two of them have a shockingly healthy and happy relationship (given that both of them are rather unstable supervillains). The two of them dote on each other and have a completely equal partnership, and neither of them ever expresses any doubt as to the loyalty and faithfulness of the other. Further, Lisa is generally fairly polite and friendly to those who don't provoke her wrath---notably, she was very fond of Wally West in spite of his relationship to Barry Allen. When Barry died, so did her hatred of the Flash, and the two of them actually worked quite well together on more than one occasion. And, of course, later writers (especially Geoff Johns) have made her close to her older brother Leonard as well.

Leonard and Lisa's relationship is, however, complicated by a few factors. Aside from his abandonment of her as a girl (which he clearly harbors a ton of guilt over), Leonard has mixed feelings about Lisa being a part of the Rogues. He doesn't really seem to want her involved in a life of crime (notably, in her very first appearance he tried to dissuade her from becoming a criminal), and on some level he also was reluctant to let a woman, any woman, into his boys' club. However, the single biggest issue between the siblings is Roscoe. Captain Cold hates the Top with a burning passion (and vice versa), and, since the two of them seemed to get along fairly well in their earliest team-ups together, this mutual dislike seems to stem from the fact that Roscoe started dating Leonard's little sister. Add in the fact that Roscoe sees Leonard as an uncultured boor and Leonard sees Roscoe as a stuck-up snob, and you have a recipe for constant conflict. We usually don't get to see much fallout from this (usually because one or both of the lovers have been dead for large portions of their canonical history), but if you're going to have Lisa, Len, and Roscoe in a story together, the tension between the three of them is going to be a major factor.

In addition to all of the above, Lisa is a very beautiful woman, and she knows it. She loves jewelry, makeup, and fancy clothes, and she is also very fond of attention from men (she is, in fact, a bit of a flirt). She's had a number of boyfriends (although only when Roscoe is dead), and she is quite willing to comment on the attractiveness of other men even when Roscoe is alive. (Roscoe, for his part, is utterly unbothered by this.)

Finally, it is worth noting that Len's perspective on Lisa is perhaps a bit skewed (something that is relevant given the fact that we often hear about her from his perspective). He sees her as being a lot sweeter, more innocent, and more passive than she really is, and I find that a lot of writers fall into the trap of taking this view of her as well. It makes sense for Len, who's probably always going to see his little sister through rose-tinted glasses, but there's a lot more to Lisa than being his sweet little sister (especially since she's nastier and scarier than he is!)

The Golden Glider's main gadgets are her ice skates. These gimmicked skates constantly produce sheets of ice that let her effectively skate through the air, and, as a champion figure skater, she is able to use them to great effect. (Captain Cold was the one who built them, though why he did this is a bit unclear. Maybe they were a birthday present for her?) Golden Glider is a ruthless and aggressive combatant, and, since weaponizing figure skating is an unconventional tactic to say the least, most opponents don't really know quite how to handle her. Golden Glider also invented her own series of jewel gadgets, which can do all sorts of things, including hypnotizing people, inducing illnesses, causing pain, and firing like ballistic weaponry. Like her brother and boyfriend, she has quite the inventive streak. She also frequently uses Rosoce's weaponized tops, and she seems to handle them every bit as well as he does. Finally, she is apparently a skilled lip-reader.

In the New 52, Lisa gained the ability to astral project and lost all of her tech-based weaponry. This is an interesting powerset in its own right, and wouldn't be at all incompatible with classic Lisa, but it is a relatively new thing and seems to have been at least partially phased out in recent times. The New 52 was also what gave us her relationship with the Mirror Master (Sam Scudder), which I like to pretend never happened since it was basically just a worse version of her relationship with the Top. That being said, a bit of flirting between Sam and Lisa would be perfectly all right (it's well within character for them both).

When working as part of a team, Lisa is a bit of a wild card. While she and Roscoe complimented each other perfectly, and she works well with Len, she's frequently pursuing her own agenda, and if the goals of the group come into conflict with it, she will chase her goal and abandon the group. Her tendency towards rage can also make her short-sighted and potentially unreliable. Still, she is a powerful asset to the team, and she can certainly work well with the other Rogues when she chooses to do so.

As a last bit of writing advice, it's important to note that Lisa had no criminal record prior to becoming the Golden Glider. She did not commit crimes with Roscoe before his (first) death, and she likewise didn't commit crimes alongside Len. Traditionally, neither one of them influenced her choice to become a villain at all, and the subsequent additions to the lore that suggest that Captain Cold substantially influenced her decision to become a criminal weaken the character (at least in my opinion).

Trickster I (James Jesse): The first Trickster, James Jesse (real name Giovanni Giuseppi) was the son of Italian tight rope walkers who traveled the country as the part of the very creatively-named Big Circus. (Different versions of his origin differ regarding what his parents were like, though the most recent version, which makes them outright abusive, is not the backstory I prefer for him.) He wanted to be a part of their act, but he was afraid of heights (or perhaps more accurately, of falling). To this end, he built himself a pair of shoes that used compressed air jets to let him walk on air. Now assured that he would never fall, he became the highlight of his family's tightrope act. He also loved to read, and was especially fond of books about his "reverse namesake" Jesse James...something that would inspire him when he grew bored of the circus and decided to seek out bigger thrills. Jesse James had robbed trains. James Jesse would do him one better and rob planes...as the Trickster!

James (as he generally calls himself) is a charming con-man with a silver tongue and the humor of an eight-year-old. He's energetic, cheerful, and always eager to put on a show or face a challenge. He isn't interested in money, or power, or revenge. What James craves is the excitement of matching wits with the Flash; the delight of outsmarting others; and the joys of generally being a mischievous scamp. As he himself puts it, he's "not a mean man", and has no interest in seriously hurting anyone; in his mind, crime is simply a grand game, and his general high spirits are a reflection of this. He's also one of the most moral and least malevolent Flash villains, and is one of the few to have never killed anyone in any capacity. Perhaps unsurprisingly, then, he is close friends with the now-reformed Rogue Pied Piper, and has himself reformed several times (partly out of fear for his immortal soul---he outsmarted the demon Neron twice)!

In spite of his apparent childishness, James is extremely intelligent. He's the best con artist in the DC Universe (he's outplayed Catwoman, no small feat), and he's very good at reading people. Further, he's an skilled inventor, having created a huge number of trick gadgets, including, but not limited to, boxing gloves, sneezing powder, itching powder, yo-yos, dart guns, hand puppets, rocking horses, surfboards, and rocket-powered tricycles. He uses these gadgets to do...well...pretty much whatever he feels like. Sometimes, he robs banks. Other times, he outwits mobsters, sends them to prison, and then donates their ill-gotten loot to charity. As his nome de guerre perhaps implies, you never quite know what you're going to get from the Trickster. Even his closest allies always have to be on their toes around him.

James also has a son, an eleven-year-old boy named Billy Hong, who has only made one appearance (in the Rogues: New Year's Evil). Billy is the conduit for a huge amount of godly power and is also an important religious figure in the fictional DC country of Zhutan. How James and Billy's mother, Mindy Hong, met each other and produced Billy isn't entirely clear, but I suspect that it may have happened while James was still with the circus. James and Mindy have a surprisingly good relationship with one another, and James would likely be quite fond of Billy, who inherited more than a little of his father's cleverness.

James is not, however, particularly fond of his successor, Axel Walker, who stole his gear and declared himself the new Trickster without James' permission. James does not like this more violent, less clever pretender to his title and has made that fact abundantly clear. James is also substantially more experienced than Axel and defeated him quite handily in their only proper fight. That being said, if you wanted to have them both as Rogues at the same time, there would be ways to work around their mutual hostility to one another (especially since Axel, on some level, does seem to have some respect for James' work and legacy).

James is a very sly, clever combatant. He's very good at getting his opponents to turn their own strength against themselves, and his wide variety of trick gadgets are quite formidable. His airwalker shoes also usually give him the advantage of the metaphorical high ground and enable him to launch attacks from directions that the Rogues' opponents might not be expecting. Further, they make him very difficult for most enemies to close in on, allowing him to stay at a distance from stronger opponents. That being said, if someone does manage to close that distance, James is usually put at a disadvantage, due to a noticeable glass jaw (he really can't take a punch)---but he may also use this apparent weakness as a ploy to disorient his opponents.

James works well with the other Rogues on heists, and his cleverness is a huge asset to the group. However, his ever-changing loyalties and his mischievous sense of humor mean that he can't always be relied upon to follow through on what his allies want him to do. Trickster by name and trickster by nature, James is always working his own angle---and woe betide anyone who forgets that.

It's also worth noting that comic James is neither a homicidal mass murderer (as seen in the two live-action Flash TV shows) nor suffering from psychosis (as seen in the Justice League cartoon). He's weird and flamboyant, but he's not particularly malevolent, and he doesn't suffer from any obvious mental illnesses.

The Top (Roscoe Dillon): The Top, alias Roscoe Dillon, is one of the most powerful and dangerous of the Rogues. His backstory is a bit hard to piece together thanks to limited information, but from what we can tell, he was a rather odd little boy who absolutely loved tops and played with them frequently. His parents were evidently cold and demanding, insisting that he honor the family name and demanding that he be perfect---or as near to it as he could get. Roscoe, of course, could not meet these demands, and seems to have been, to some extent, rejected by his parents because of this. Also not helping matters was a rather serious mental illness that was brewing in the wings. Comic books are notoriously bad at properly representing mental illness of any kind, and Roscoe is no exception, but if properly written he would probably suffer from a particularly severe case of Bipolar 1 disorder (as this is the closest match to the symptoms we see him canonically display).

What happened next is hard for me to work out. Roscoe is very intelligent, wants to be seen as educated and well-bred, and seems likely to have come from a much wealthier background than most of the other Rogues, but we do know that he was arrested at least twice prior to becoming the Top, and in one story he claimed that the streets of Brooklyn hadn't educated him well enough for him to run as president. (That particular story wrote the Top quite badly, so I'm inclined to discount that line, but the two arrests before he becomes the Top are harder to reconcile with the general sense I have of him being from an upper-class background---though admittedly, we don't know exactly what those arrests were for.) Regardless, at some point in his early adulthood, he suffered from what seems to have been an especially intense manic episode and properly began his costumed criminal career as the Top. He created a whole slew of weaponized tops, taught himself to spin in circles at super speed, and then went out to commit crimes. After some early success, he built an atomic grenade (which also spun like a top), and told the entire world that he would blow up half the globe with his grenade if he wasn't made king of the world. Roscoe himself, of course, would be safe on the other side of the planet when the bomb went off. (You can see why I question his sanity in this story....) Luckily, the Flash stopped this insane scheme of his, and after this he generally stuck to robberies (like the other Rogues).

At some point, he met and fell in love with Lisa (teaching her his spinning techniques in the process), and the two began a long romance that would extend beyond his first death. Ironically, this death occurred as the result of Roscoe's burgeoning mental powers. His newfound telekinesis (activated by all that spinning he taught himself to do, which allegedly increased his brainpower) did not react well to the Flash's super speed, and the backlash killed him, though not before he set up a bunch of bombs with which he intended to blow up Central City, a plot that was foiled by the joint effort of the Flash and the other Rogues, who didn't particularly want their home city to be blown to smithereens. Roscoe is far too fond of explosives.

But he wouldn't be gone for long. Roscoe, as it turned out, had also developed the power to return from the dead by possessing the bodies of the recently deceased, a trick he would pull several times (the most notable case of which occurred when he possessed the body of Barry's father, Henry Allen, whose heart had briefly stopped in a car crash). He would also have several more manic and depressive episodes, one of which was severe enough to induce long-lasting psychosis that took years to recover from. But recover he did, and he then attempted to wrest control of the Rogues from Captain Cold. This failed, and Cold executed him, but he's since spun his way out of the grave yet again.

With that very long and complicated backstory out of the way, we can now turn to Roscoe's actual personality. Roscoe is, not to put too fine a point on it, very difficult to get along with. He's arrogant, standoffish, ambitious, power-hungry, dismissive of others, and a bit of a snob. He looks down on the other Rogues as being unsophisticated and uneducated, and this naturally serves to make him rather unpopular with them. That being said, these traits do seem to wax and wane over time; he was actually very polite and friendly towards the other Rogues when he first joined the group, and it seems that his coldness towards them didn't come to the fore until after he started dating Lisa. This, in turn, caused friction with Len, and, combined with their vastly different personalities and life experiences, led to the mutual disdain the two men have for one another.

However, Roscoe displays none of these qualities with Lisa, his beloved girlfriend. With her he is polite, supportive, affectionate, loyal, and seemingly dazzled by her charms. He doesn't seem threatened by her potentially wandering eye or her many other boyfriends, and he is perfectly happy to have her working alongside him as an apparently equal partner-in-crime. In fact, she seems to be the only person in the world with whom he has successfully maintained a healthy relationship. Just how he managed this feat is beyond me, but Roscoe is actually an ideal boyfriend as far a supervillains go. It's also noteworthy that he seems to have very little interest in women other than Lisa (especially given the skirt-chasing habits of the other male Rogues); he has a one-track mind when it comes to romance and it's entirely focused on her.

The only thing that comes close to matching Lisa in Roscoe's affections are his beloved tops. His interest in tops is so intense, and so all-pervasive, that both @gorogues and I interpret it as an autistic special interest. He has been fascinated with them since childhood, reads and researches about them as an adult, builds hundreds of weaponized tops to aid him in his crimes, plays with them in prison, and literally dresses himself like a giant top. The word "top" also pervades his language; the number of stupid top puns he's made over the years is frankly astounding. The man loves tops.

This leads me into a not-strictly-canon but nevertheless important aspect of Roscoe's behavior. @gorogues and I are both on the autism spectrum, and, as the mention of his top fascination as a special interest suggests, we believe that Roscoe makes a lot of sense if you read him as being autistic. Indeed, in my fanfics I explicitly write him that way. It would explain his deep love of tops, his general awkwardness and utter inability to read social cues, his somewhat depressing habit of driving away the people he wants to be friends with because of his inability to understand how he's frustrating them, his rather odd speech patterns, and even his ability to spin himself as effectively as he does (some autistic people have a very high tolerance to dizziness, which would explain why he's so good at it). He isn't usually depicted as being sensitive to sensory stimulus such as lights or sound, but I often write him as being sensitive to noise and being rather touch-shy around most people. Similarly, he hasn't canonically been shown to engage in much stimming, but I do sometimes write him as rocking when stressed, and @gorogues usually portrays his spinning as a calming mechanism as well.

We also try to write his "comic book crazy" mental illness as bipolar 1 disorder (again, as noted above); researching the symptoms of that disorder might well be helpful in writing Roscoe in the midst of one of his episodes, which are so severe as to sometimes cause psychosis. (Both manic and depressive episodes can become psychotic.) It's also a good idea to write Roscoe at his most sympathetic when he's actively in the middle of one of his episodes, as this helps avoid the unfortunate implication that his mental illness is responsible for his criminality. Roscoe is not a good person....but he would be just as mentally ill if he had never become a criminal.

Roscoe is extremely intelligent, and, like many of the Rogues, is a talented inventor. He has created an enormous number of weaponized tops (blacklight tops, machine-gun tops, black-out tops, paralyzing tops, explosive tops, bolo tops, streamer-shooting tops, image-producing tops, sonic tops, and many more), and he was also somehow able to build a top-shaped satellite, stuff it full of money, and get it into orbit. He also appears to be well-read and is at least highly self-educated (which he will brag about to anyone who will listen, and anyone who won't).

Roscoe is apparently something of a wine connoisseur (a fact of which he is immensely proud), and I think we can assume that he, unlike the other Rogues, generally doesn't drink too much beer, as it doesn't fit with his upper-class attitude and ambitions. He also likes to discuss literature, and, in doing so, was able to form something of a bond with the equally bookish Weather Wizard (Marco "Mark" Mardon). He desperately wants to be seen as sophisticated, and it's probably no coincidence that his diction has become increasingly formal as he has become more ambitious and distanced from his fellow Rogues. He is one of the few Rogues who is probably unlikely to use slang or much improper grammar, and his florid speech patterns rub Captain Cold the wrong way.

The Top is a formidable opponent. In addition to his many weaponized tops, he is also a metahuman (the only consistent one amongst the Rogues). He has the ability to spin at speeds so high that he can outpace the Flash and deflect bullets, and, more dangerously still, he has impressive mental powers. His telekinesis is powerful enough to ripe spires off of buildings and levitate huge chunks of Earth, and, as if that wasn't enough, he also has the ability to induce vertigo in his opponents. With enough effort, he even has a limited ability to control and manipulate the minds of others (though since this power has only ever been used to justify a really stupid retcon, I generally downplay this particular ability substantially when I write him). Roscoe is, in short, overwhelmingly powerful, and, while his arrogance is a notable weakness, he is a very tough nut to crack---especially since he can also return from the dead.

The Top's ability to work in groups is variable. If he's mentally stable and not in a snit about anything, he is an incredibly powerful and useful member of the Rogues. He can work well with the group---the problem is that he often doesn't. He's notorious for offending his teammates, and equally notorious for deciding that he should take over the Rogues himself (in spite of the fact that he isn't particularly well-suited for leadership). This, naturally, can severely hamper the Rogues' ability to get things done. About the only person he can consistently be counted upon to work well with is his beloved Lisa, who is totally exempt from his usual arrogance and general inability to get along with people.

It's also worth noting that Roscoe, to some extent, prefers to work alone. In his mind, it's because he's better than everyone around him and is better off without them dragging him down, but in actuality, it's because he's frustrated by his inability to get along with the other Rogues and largely completely confused as to why they don't like him. It's rather lonely at the top.

Thanks for the ask! I hope this helps!

[saintsenara]

My favorites of yours are absolutely, hands down, are Nor All That Glisters Gold, Ecclesiastes 3, and Inhuman Resources.

I just love the way you write, it's so descriptive and moving, and I love the characterization of the Black sisters when you write them. They're incredible.

And I just love how everyone hears Umbridge in "inhuman resources." Everyone despising that women is my jam.

thank you very much @thecasualauthor18 - this is lovely and i really appreciate it.

nor all that glisters gold was a fic for @womenofthehouseofblack fest on the basis of a prompt about what sirius and bellatrix's life growing up together would have been like.

i'm extremely fond of the idea that - whatever he says to harry - the two of them were close when they were young. they're very similar, particularly in the contradictory fact that they're both incredibly cruel and incredibly loyal, and they provide one of the better examples of the harry potter series' central thesis on the importance of choice, and how choice transcends things like blood or background.

so we see here how the two begin to drift apart, as sirius realises he can't maintain a relationship with someone who seems hell-bent on being a terrorist. his decision to choose james - which i hate seeing undermined in fics which opt to portray him as a drawling aristocrat - is extremely brave of him, but once he makes it there's no going back.

we also see an area of bellatrix's radicalisation that i'm convinced of, but is quite oblique in canon - that the pureblood world's obviously restrictive gender roles led her into voldemort's path, since he is one of the few men of her acquaintance who are willing to offer her the (relative) freedom she desires. poor rodolphus gets a bad showing here, as in so many of my works, and so do cygnus and orion black, and their desire to keep the three sisters confined within the gendered expectations of their mothers and grandmothers. it ends badly...

then, to ecclesiastes three

as anyone who follows me will be aware, i hate characterisations of sirius which focus on him feeling more comfortable around his 'own class' - i.e. those which have him tense at having to mind his tongue about wizarding traditions around lily, but perfectly at home with lucius malfoy or the lestrange brothers.

i feel the same about andromeda. there seems to be so often in writing about her the idea that she would regard her life with ted as a downgrade from what she would have had if she'd chosen the same path as her sisters (or, at least, as narcissa, i think we can all agree bellatrix shouldn't be anyone's standard for a fulfilling life...), and that - always missing the world of her birth - she would easily forgive the sisters who cut her off for the crime of falling in love the moment the war is over.

that really annoys me - not least because, as per canon, the estrangement is something both bellatrix and narcissa enthusiastically agree with, and i don't see why andromeda should have to get over that the minute narcissa is rattled by the fact her other sister is dead and her husband's very probably going to prison - and so i wanted to give andromeda a story in which she very much does not regret her life, in which ted is a total dilf, and in which her rage at her sisters does not subside just because narcissa would like it to.

of course, there's some complexity - this fic explores one of my favourite headcanons: that bellatrix asks voldemort to leave ted and andromeda alone - but andromeda still manages to be spectacularly pissed off throughout all of it. and good for her.

[i've written about inhuman resources here. the tl;dr is that everyone despising umbridge is my jam too.]

[journalosi]

About Sarcarsm and Passive Agressiveness (I asked a question to some friends about how they can tell the difference about this, and these are some of my thoughts)

Ok, so the reason why I asked that question was because “Setting Boundaries” has become a big conversation on social media over the last few months and I've been thinking a lot about the distinction between both terms and their impact in the way we establish and build connections with other people.

During these last few days, I went through a rabbit hole on tktk where people were discussing the problematic behavior between couples and the way they treat each other. Whether it's grooms humiliating their brides on their wedding day, celebrity couples trolling each other (which to some, has become a pattern and not just a one time event type of situation) or the red pill “bro” podcasters. And the common conclusion is “Do these people really even like each other?”, “Do these men really care, love and respect their girlfriends/spouses?”

In my personal life, my boyfriend and I like to tease each other every now and then, We both appreciate a good sarcastic moment, but in what I think is an unspoken rule: we do not do that in front of other people. My boyfriend's parents have a very dry sense of humour that reeks in passive agressiveness and I could tell from early on in our relationship, that is something that has had a massive impact in how my boyfriend approaches other people. He's very reserved, quite shy, but very sweet and thoughtful and likewise, based on my own past experiences, we both always try our best to be mindful with our words.

I agree with your answers. Sarcasm and passive aggressiveness have different undertones, depending on the intentionality of the messenger. The first can become harsh, hostile, cruel, because it's personal, and it might have (sometimes) the intention of punishing someone, which can most likely, lead to resentment, which is one of the ultimate killers of any type of relationship (couples, friends, family, etc). The second one can still leave room for an interaction, depending on how you “present your case”, especially if it uses the circumstances as a way to playfully call someone out, without making it too negative. I think there's a clear distinction between laughing "with you" and laughing "at you". And this is why I do not tolerate passive aggressiveness in my life. That is for sure, a boundary of mine.

I've also been thinking about how some of our favorite kpop idols treat each other. The fact that there's still jokes about colourism, weight, race, sexism, etc in 2023 is just... you know what I mean? And sure, it's none of our business the dynamics in their friendships since we are just spectators but I'm not gonna lie, from the outside, it gets tiresome. And since there's still a part of our society that thinks we should stay quiet and not say anything to “make more trouble” it's hard to think of a way in which we, as a collective, can change the way we treat others.

So, I don't know. What do you think?

[respondedinkind]

Yes, Khan's body indeed is a lot more efficient than the ones of human beings are, he's found out about that while reading through about five-hundred books on that tablet the other had given to him just a couple of days ago; In fact, being allowed to read - understanding the english language in return - has given Khan a lot of knowledge regarding earth as well as its inhabitants, and he is ready to take in even more whenever he's getting the chance to.

Because of that, however, he knows that humans can be just as cruel as his own kind - in different ways, granted, but also in very similar ones that had surprised Khan upon reading about the history of mankind's existence. This means that he's quite sure he'll never be truly free, he'll be watched and under some sort of control, simply because whoever this Q works for knows about him not being human - about Khan coming from somewhere else, a planet they have no knowledge of. They also know about his quite magnificent ability to heal himself much quicker than their own bodies could ever do, just as they know about his more efficient heart - and, on top of that, they also did take a few blood samples from him before. They might not tell them too much just yet, but... those samples will let them know that something is going on with him, his blood cells so vastly different from what flows within human veins.

If they were to continue to read into that, perhaps at some point ask to examine him a bit more thoroughly, they might be able to find out about just how incredibly dangerous Khan as a person is. He is so much more superior than they are, could easily take down this whole building if he were to manage to break free...

The only advantage humans have at this point is that they are many - he would be able to fight them off one by one, dozens of them, but at some point even Khan's body gets tired and they would be able to gain the upper hand, overpower him. That Khan does know, and that he keeps in mind. He's no fool, he knows how far he can push himself but also knows that there's only so much he ca do against a whole army of armed men.

It's just amusing how Q talks about Khan not being a threat... when he, actually, is very much one. They just don't know. And, if he chooses not to be, then he truly won't be one. So - that guy is right but also wrong at the same time.

Humming out a low sound, something that sounds thoughtful at the edges, Khan's gaze flicks away; His hands clasp onto the small of his back once more, spine straight, shoulders square as his eyes wander, flicking around his surroundings. Taking in the sight of the way this room is meant to look somewhat comfortable and yet it's a prison cell, perhaps somewhere beneath the earth's crust, at lower levels.

"---We both know that I will forever be connected to whoever you work for. The knowledge you gained about me - the way you have to keep those confidential so as to not have potential wrong hands gain access to my file - forces such a thing to happen. Perhaps you'll ask me to cooperate, maybe even want me to work for you in the foreseeable future, something like that. It would be truly odd if you did not; That's how society works, after all. How organizations work."

Once again, amusement returns; Khan's blue eyes flick back to the shorter one, another smirk tugging on his lips.

"Just imagine what would happen if I were to cause death and destruction - and someone was to find out about you being the cause for that, simply because you let an alien leave without keeping control over them in any shape or form. Truly devastating."

Just hypothetically speaking, of course.

The Quartermaster isn't too sure about the humming. Then again, M was probably as likely to take the humming as believable as he was to take a 'yes, I'll share everything you'd like'; Q wouldn't blame his boss for being wary but there had to be a point at which they would trust Khan.

Since the only other realistic options involved killing him (which Q would never allow) or handing Khan over to another government (which would see them butchered on an international standing should it ever come to light). Therefore, Q's argument would be that Khan had cooperated and they didn't have much of a choice anyway.

Khan snorting does surprise him since the alien had seemed so monotone during their interactions so Q's eyes immediately lost their thoughtful haze as they focused on the larger man. The speed at which the neutral returns makes Q doubt for a moment that he'd even seen, or heard, anything but Marcus is quick to confirm that it had definitely just happened.

"Again, not dissimilar to us, I suppose less than an adult male human might be recommended but your heart beats slower which suggests your system is more efficient in general which would explain the deficit." Q is not a biology nor a doctor but Marcus' random habit of learning information tended to come in handy for things like this.

The guilt must be obvious in Q's expression even before his gaze drops to a spot on the floor between them.

"I just need some time to convince them that you're not a threat and then you can come out. You don't have to trust me, I know that, and you don't have much reason to. But please give me the time to do this and then I promise I'll be able to let you out. Is there anything I could do to convince you that there is no malice in this situation? You are an unknown to us and most people are scared of things - or people - they don't understand."