wisdomseulogy

[wisdomseulogy]

THE CURSE OF THE SUN GOD - Part 1

Vampire!Bruce Wayne x Priest!Clark Kent

TW: internalized homophobia, being gay seen as a sin, lots of religious imagery and actions (Clark is a priest), mentions of suicidal ideation, no smut but very suggestive (read at your own discretion), blood drinking, angst

Rain pelted down on the streets of Gotham. Bruce’s cloak was completely soaked; water dripping down his face as the silver dagger in his hand glinted in the moonlight. He had gotten word that a low level vampire was terrorizing people in the industrial area and he was ready to put an end to the monster.

The sound of something getting kicked alerted Bruce that his target was near. He gripped the dagger and quickly turned the corner stabbing the vampire in the chest before the man even knew what was coming for him. The vampire’s eyes widened and he hissed. As his body turned into ash the vampire smirked. “Traitor,” were his last words.

Bruce himself was also a vampire. He came from an ancient lineage that allowed him to hide in plain sight. Normal vampire weapons didn’t work on him and he could go out into the sun. But his parents were killed by an ancient vampire who didn’t like how much power the couple had in the undead community. No one knew that Martha and Thomas had a kid. They hid Bruce really well, since a new born vampire was always a target.

They wanted him to at least be able to grow up like a normal child. Not having to worry about the politics of the aristocratic vampires that ruled over the world away from the public’s eyes. And it worked, until they died. Leaving Bruce with one of their thralls to take care of him and teach him everything his parents didn’t.

Alfred was an amazing teacher and was very knowledgeable on vampire society and ancient vampires. He had been turned into a vampire by one of Wayne's descendants centuries ago and worked as their diligent servant ever since. He had lived through many ages and era, standing tall through wars and innovation. But nothing could have prepared him for taking care of a born vampire on his own.

Born vampires were very rare and were much stronger than any regular vampire. They could only be killed by someone stronger than them. Regular tactics like silver daggers, wooden daggers, garlic, holy water, sun exposure, etc. never worked on them. They could disguise themselves as a human and live amongst the people.

They were gods amongst their own people. But as the world became more commercialized, some were able to rise up large empires while others fell to the wayside. A war broke out amongst the ancient vampires and Martha and Thomas were a casualty. They always stayed neutral, but people didn’t like how much money their business was amassing. Some felt it was unfair.

By the time Bruce became an adult he searched down the vampire that killed his parents and killed him. He thought it might heal something in him or give him closure. But closure is just hoping for a different ending to something that cannot be changed. He felt nothing. He had spent years becoming strong enough to enact his revenge and it all culminated in something very anti-climactic.

The war had cost many noble vampires their lives, meaning that the man that killed his parents no longer had anyone to help defend him. And when he died, he smiled. Finally able to experience death.

Bruce didn’t like it. He wanted there to be a huge fight. He wanted to have to defend himself against an army of thralls and come out victorious so that the years of honing his skills could feel worth it. But it was none of that. The man never even putting up a fight.

“Did you get him?” A voice asked through an inner ear communication device. Clark.

After getting revenge, Bruce decided he would take out all vampires for good. He joined the Order of Justice, a group of very skilled vampire hunters masquerading as priests and clergy. Though some of them had really been ordained, like Clark.

“Yes,” Bruce said in a gruff voice as he watched the rain drops mix with the pile of dust on the floor. Moonlight filtered through harsh rain clouds. He stared up at the moon, his black hair reflecting the silver shine. ”I will be on my way back.”

”That’s good. Be safe,” Clark responded over the coms.

When Bruce first joined the order he learned of the divine being from outer space named Clark Kent. The man radiated sunshine which made Bruce’s skin feel prickly and his body feel sick. But Clark wasn’t like the others who wanted to kill every vampire and rid the world of their evilness. Clark wanted to find a way to cure vampires and return their humanity.

It sounded too good to be true. Vampires were cursed long ago by the sun god. And the curse continues to be spread from one vampire to the next. Never being able to go out into the sun, being forced to live forever by constantly killing. Vampires didn’t have the luxury of pacifism or mercy. They were beings bound by the shackles of instinct and desire. Never being able to break the chains of either.

But Clark didn’t see them that way. He believed that he was sent here to help the vampires, not destroy them. However, his divine power ended up killing the vampires instead of freeing them. So, he set out on a personal mission to discover the way to break the curse. Traveling the world and reading as many ancient tomes and books as he could. Learning everything he could about the nature of the curse and why the sun god turned his back on those people.

It was slow at first, Bruce just showing a slight interest in Clark’s study. At times even secretly funding his research and spending millions on ancient texts. Scouring the desert for any buried libraries of antiquity. Hoping that maybe this time it would give an answer.

His help did not go unnoticed. Clark started to find it suspicious that texts kept getting delivered to him and every time he mentioned wanting to find someone who could translate a text he’d get an email the next day of an eager scholar wanting to work with him. The public still didn’t know about the existence of vampires so Clark would call himself a researcher of esoteric religion.

There was only one person that could have been helping him from the sidelines. Someone with lots of money and power and instead of using any of it was spending his days fighting vampires.

Clark was the first to ask. He invited Bruce to join him on hunts, or during his travels. Bruce kept denying his involvement at first but eventually agreed to join the priest.

“Though Bruce, I have a question about this most recent…text,” Clark said over the coms as he looked down at a very dilapidated collection of papyrus. “How did you get your hands on this one? Please tell me it wasn’t-“

”It wasn’t grave robbing,” Bruce said with a huff as he made his way toward the train station.

“Because last time you told me that I found the person who was hired to help you. You know it is very unethical to go into tombs and take things without permission,” Clark scolded him with a smile as he gently touched the papyrus.

“Is there anything in there?” Bruce asked.

“About vampirism or the curse of the sun god? No. But this is a very beautiful religious text. You should probably give this to a museum or a college or something. Preferably anonymous lest they find out you-“

”It wasn’t grave robbing this time. Or at least I didn’t do the robbing. Some rich guy had it sitting in a safe.”

”And I am sure you asked nicely for it,” Clark asked with a glint in his eyes. Clark and Bruce couldn’t have been more different, and yet they worked so well together. Bruce was efficient, so much so that the others in the Order of Justice were scared of his brutality. He killed quickly. Clark would try to purify the vampires yet it would always end in their death.

“Believe whatever you want. He won’t come looking for it, that much is true.” Bruce entered the train station and pulled out his ticket to Metropolis. Like clock work, the last train of the night arrived and Bruce stepped on.

The average onlooker would assume he was some priest of a monastic order. He wore a black cassock with a large cross necklace over his chest. In order to hide his identity while out hunting, Bruce added a large hood and a mask that covered the lower part of his face.

Someone had taken a picture of him and posted it online asking whether he was a monk or a priest and the internet was in a frenzy trying to figure out exactly where the outfit originated. Bruce, however, made sure any mention of him while he is hunting is swiftly deleted from existence. The public couldn’t know that the elusive billionaire was actually a traitorous vampire hunting his own kind.

Not even the Order of Justice could know that. He knew they would kill him instantly. Diana and Clark might hesitate momentarily, but they would eventually do the right thing. He was sure the others wouldn’t hesitate for even a moment. But he wasn’t just any vampire, the only one of them that could succeed in killing him was Clark.

Bruce was sure that even Clark would do it. Even if as a way of testing whether he could rid Bruce of the curse. One day those soft uncalloused hands would be placed on him and he would be filled with the intense pain of divine power. His body burning from the inside out as if consumed by the sun.

To any normal person, divine powers could heal wounds and if he used all of his powers he could even raise someone from the dead. The public saw him as a hero. A saint sent to the world from heaven to help the needy and heal the poor.

Bruce looked at himself in the reflection of the train's window. The black eyeliner that he used to disguise the visible portion of his face was running down in streaks from rain and sweat. His black hair and robes clung to his skin like one big oil spill.

In order to be better equipped and ready to help the order, he moved into their quarters. A coed rectory set up behind an old gothic cathedral in Metropolis. Some of the members of the Order of Justice, like Clark, were more public and would often be out helping people. Bruce wasn’t like that at all. No one even knew that the elusive billionaire was a part of this secretive order.

Traitor

Bruce ran a hand down his face as the vampire's words ruminated in his mind. For a slight moment, his iconic blue eyes glinted red.

Word spread fast in the undead community about an ancient vampire that turned against his own people. Batman, they called him. He would swoop in through the shadows and kill without mercy.

His coms crackled.

“Have you had dinner yet? Hal and I made this stew. And you…I think it’s pretty good. Might be nice to have something warm with all the rain.”

Warm.

Bruce sighed. He had become so accustomed to the cold that he couldn’t even tell the difference.

“Don’t worry, I was watching him the whole time. I was a bit surprised myself,” Clark said as he set the papyrus in a protective box that he would soon ship off. The corners of his mouth upturned.

“I can have a little bit,” Bruce replied awkwardly. He didn’t want to get too attached to the others. But it would be suspicious if he constantly ignored them, he reasoned with himself.

Clark smiled and mouthed a silent ‘yes’. Clark’s goal was to get the enigmatic man to open up a little to them. Or at least to him.

When Bruce returned to the rectory, Clark was already waiting for him at the main door with a bowl of stew. He was going to hand the bowl to Bruce but then saw just how soaked the man was.

“Oh wow you need to get into something dry,” Clark said as he practically ushered Bruce to his room. “You could get a cold if you walk around with wet clothes like that. I’m telling you, you should really get your cassock at least lined with something waterproof if you are going to be going to Gotham all the time.”

“I’m fine,” Bruce said in a gruff voice as he grabbed the bowl of stew from Clark's hands. Clark gave him a slight glare before pushing him into his room.

Bruce’s room was simple. He had his clothes, his weapons, some books, and a laptop. You wouldn’t even know it was his room if it wasn’t for the plaque outside.

Bruce sat down on his bed and took a tentative bite of the soup.

“Ugh,” Clark groaned. “You are going to get your bed wet too if you sit on it like that. Here,” Clark grabs the bowl back. “Get changed and then we can eat.”

The two men had a staring match, but Clark was not letting up. He was practically the mother hen of the order and he wasn’t about to let anyone get sick. Though, he could just heal them if they did.

“Fine. Leave.” Bruce pointed to his door.

“I’ll just be outside.”

“How was the mission?” Clark asked. They had moved to Clark's room, on his insistence, since he had a hearth. Bruce sat at the very edge of Clark’s bed as he slowly ate the stew that was now just barely lukewarm.

”Fine,” Bruce said in-between chews. “Hal made this?”

Clark smiled and rubbed the back of his neck. Hal wasn’t one to cook. Or clean. ”I helped, but it was his idea.”

”Not bad.”

A silent victory. Bruce never praised anything and hearing him praise something that Clark had a hand in making made him feel…fuzzy. Almost jittery. Like his body could explode into a million pieces.

Bruce was an enigma. Broodish. Dark. Silent. It made Clark want to know more. Want to get under his skin and read his mind. See the world from the perspective of a billionaire whose parents were killed by vampires.

Clark clears his throat and focuses on the fire, taking long deep breaths to return his composure. “Apparently Zatanna has been on the case of this ancient vampire. Tracking their magic signature. Apparently, they are getting close to Metropolis. Might even be here now. Barry, Diana, Hal, Zatanna and I are going to try and track them down. I know you don’t like doing things involving ancient vampires but-“

”Not interested.”

”-it would be great having your help,” Clark finished. He knew Bruce would not want to join. Bruce rarely ever worked with anyone. Always wanting to go alone. Be the lone wolf as the others called it. Sometimes, if Clark wanted to try a new technique for removing the curse then Bruce would join him, but he always stuck to the shadows. Never engaging. Just there to watch.

”I work alone.” Bruce glared at Clark knowing the priest should already know this.

“Right. Yeah. Well, I’ll tell you how it goes.”

Bruce opened his mouth to say that Clark didn’t need to tell him anything, but he decided against it. Like the sun and the moon, Bruce and Clark were completely different. Clark was optimistic. Trusting. Hopeful. And Bruce…he was the opposite of that.

Clark’s room had a lot more character compared to Bruce. The priest had stacks on stacks of books and documents. Relics and tapestries strewn about. Collections of rosaries, holy water, and silver objects. His closet was an array of white, blue, and red. He had blue and red stoles and scarves that he would wear depending on his mood and intention.

“Hmm,” Bruce hummed in response. It wasn’t a rejection, which to Clark was a win.

Trying to get the cold man to warm up was Clark’s prerogative. And every tiny step was still a step forward.

As the two men sat in silence, Clark became painfully aware of how intimate this scene was. His mouth ran dry and his heart skipped a beat. Think good thoughts. Think good thoughts. Clark repeated to himself. Think holy thoughts. He shuddered a breath.

When he made his vows as a priest, Clark promised to lead a life of chastity. Saving his body for God. At the time, it felt like the best decision to make. There wasn’t going to be anyone who could make him question his sexuality…

”It’s getting late,” Clark nearly croaked.

Bruce nodded, getting the message. He stood up, bowl still in hand.

“I can take that,” Clark said as he grabbed the bowl from Bruce. His heart beating rapidly. “It’s my turn to do the dishes anyways.”

Bruce responded with a nod and walked out, not even saying goodbye before closing Clark’s door. Clark set the bowl to the side and leaned back against his bed.

Maybe I need to go to confession again.

“Bless me, Father; for I have sinned. My last confession was…yesterday. I have come again to confess, once again, the same sin as yesterday," Clark said in a dilapidated voice. Clark hunched forward, his elbows resting on his knees as he hung his head low. His dark brown hair falling in front of his face in loose curls.

”It is better to be struggling with the same sin than a new one,” the priest responded. The two priests were sitting side-by-side in a pew. The sun shining through the intricate stain-glass depicting the resurrection.

“You say that every time.” Hues of purple and gold dancing across Clark’s skin as he looks up at the work of art before him.

“And I mean it every time.”

Clark wasn’t like the others in the Order of Justice because Clark was an ordained priest. The others took up the cloth as a way of distinguishing themselves as people who are fighting the dark demonic forces of this world.

“God does not give us a fight we cannot win,” the priest responded. He was an old man, having been at this parish for a long time. He had heard and received many confessions, he had seen the depths of human depravity and still somehow believed in a universal good.

“But what if…I don’t want to fight.”

”We are not perfect. We were not meant to be so. I am not going to pretend I know what God is thinking or why he puts us in difficult situations. But I trust God. And I trust you.”

Clark took a deep breath. “I-,” Clark paused as he imagined Bruce. Sitting on his bed. Eating his food. Warmed by his fire. His eyes half-lidded and his mouth supple.

A shiver ran down Clark’s spine. “I don’t trust myself.”

”Pray the rosary. And pray for peace.”

”Yes Father.” Clark takes a deep breath and runs his hand through his hair. The rosary around his neck dangling. It was made for him as a gift from one of the children he saved. The beads were all different colors and he had to re-string it a few times after it kept falling apart.

“My God,” Clark began the prayer.

”I am sorry for my sins with all my heart…In-“ he paused for a moment. “Choosing to do wrong and failing to do good. I have sinned against you, whom I should love above all things. I firmly intend…” he took another deep breath. “With your help, to do penance, to sin no more, and to avoid…” his mouth felt drier than a desert. “Whatever leads me to sin. Our Savior Jesus Christ suffered and died for us. In his name, my God, have mercy.”

Clark sat back up. And yet, he felt…worse than before. Like the weight of the world was pressing down on his chest and each breath was a struggle. Within his heart, he used to imagine a field of sunflowers for as far as the eye could see. But now, all he could imagine were fields of thorns. And in the center was him, broken and bleeding.

“God the Father of mercies, through the death and resurrection of his Son has reconciled the world to himself and sent the Holy Spirit among us for the forgiveness of sins; through the ministry of the Church may God give you pardon and peace, and I absolve you from your sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit Amen.” The priest laid a reassuring hand on Clark’s shoulder.

“Amen,” Clark whispered.

“So, how has the good fight been?” The priest asked.

”We are tracking an ancient vampire that has recently been detected in the city. We will be going out tonight to find them.”

”Well,” the two men stood up. “I will be praying for your and the others safety. The public doesn’t realize how close they are to evil.”

Clark nodded. “Yeah, we have to keep them safe.”

The priest places a hand on Clark's forehead. “May the risen Son be your guide. No matter where the journey may lead. No matter how far away. May the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.”

“Thank you Father John,” Clark said with a weak smile.

The two men gave brief smiles before Clark turned toward the exit, briefly taking a glance at a stained glass piece depicting the martyrdom of Saint Sebastian. He had a long night ahead of him.

The mission was a disaster. They were able to track down the ancient vampire, a woman with a penchant for plants. But when it mattered most…Clark was distracted. His mind ventured elsewhere.

The cloudless Metropolis night morphed into a battlefield of emotions. Thoughts of Bruce filling his head. The others noticed that there was something wrong with Clark, but they stayed silent. Though Clark knew they must have blamed him for losing her trail. She and Clark had a quick encounter, her ability to use magic to summon plants surprised the priest and she even managed to get a few hits on him before she ran off.

But there was something in her eyes, the way she looked at him, that felt…

Afterwards, Clark went straight to his room, not even bothering to join the post-mission debrief. He had messed up. He had faltered. He had never done that before. His mind was always in the game. Always focused.

He was the strong one. The one that everyone could depend on. And yet, his trust in himself was waning. In his mind, it wasn’t fair to the others that these…thoughts were clouding his judgement. His ability to perform and rid the world of evil. Of sin.

He knelt down in front of his bed. His fingers ran over the beads of his rosary. His body tense and his breathing tight.

”Hail, Mary, full of grace,” he twisted a bead between his forefinger and thumb. “The Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.” He paused before finishing the prayer.

“A-“ he was cut off by a loud noise. Well, loud to him. He usually tried not to pay too much attention to what was happening around him during prayer, but he recognized the sound of those footsteps.

”Amen,” he quickly finished. He wasn’t done yet. He still had a ways to go. But his heart screamed at him to defy his own logic and get up prematurely.

He knew he shouldn’t. He knew he needed to continue praying and asking for peace and ruminating on the mysteries. But…

Before he could register what he was doing, he was already in the hallway. In front of Bruce’s room. Bruce gave him a long stare. His cassock and cape weren't soaked this time. His black hair fluffy. Touchable.

Clark tried hard to push away the thoughts of running his fingers through the man's hair. Cupping his head in his hands and leaning forward to give him a-

“How was the mission?” Bruce asked.

Right. The mission. “She got away. It was the first time I’ve met a vampire that could control plants”

Bruce let out a huff. “She could be half vampire, or maybe she studied under a wizard.”

Bruce’s brow furrowed, his body stilling.

”Yeah, that was my guess too.” Clark tried to hide his inner turmoil, not at all realizing the war going on inside Bruce.

Bruce made a choking sound, his eyes wide and his hands twitching. In an instant he bolted off, running into his room and slamming the door behind him.

“Bruce? Are you ok?” Clark asked, worried.

”I-“ Bruce gritted his teeth.

Clark had been cut in his spat with the ancient vampire. His mind was so clouded that he didn’t even notice the tiny cut on the back of his neck. Normal vampires and monsters couldn’t ever hurt Clark. But ancient vampires were different. If Clark knows he’s been injured, he can just focus some energy at the cut and it will quickly heal, but he had no idea.

Bruce was also so consumed with his own thoughts that he didn’t notice the sweet tantalizing aroma until he was face to face with the Kryptonian. Bruce had a very strong resolve, but Clark was someone blessed by the sun god. Someone imbued with so much divine power that he nearly glowed.

He knew he should have gone back to the manor the day before while he was in Gotham. Alfred always made sure to keep lots of blood bags in stock in case Bruce ever returned and needed to feed. But his mission took longer than expected and he didn’t want to miss the last train of the night to Metropolis.

“If you are not feeling well I can heal you!” Clark shouted as he lightly knocked on Bruce’s door. Clark's worry skyrocketed when he could hear a retching sound coming from inside. “I’m coming in. If you are sick I can-“

”Don’t!” Bruce shouted. His control over his own body was fading fast. He needed to get out of there before he did something he was going to regret. Though, a part of him wondered if he should just let Clark learn the truth since Clark could easily kill him and end his curse.

Clark turned the knob enough to break the door and force his way in. Bruce silently cursed at the priest's strength and ran toward the window. His breath heaving.

“Bruce-“

“Stay back!” Bruce growls.

”Just tell me what’s wrong. You can trust me.” Clark took a few tentative steps forward.

For a moment, Bruce tries to regain control, but it was fruitless. In a last ditch attempt to escape, he opened his window and placed his right foot on the windowsill while gripping the frame. He just needed to get back to the manor.

“I need to go back home, I will be back in the morning,” Bruce said as he hoisted himself up onto the windowsill.

A pang of sadness bloomed in Clark’s heart. His friend didn’t trust him. He was running away from him. He didn’t want him to heal him. Without thinking, Clark grabbed Bruce’s wrist, forcing Bruce to twist his body toward him.

”Please, just tell me what’s wrong,” Clark begged bashfully. His eyes downcast, embarrassed for his own actions.

“Let me go!” Bruce yelled as he struggled to get himself out of Clark’s grip. The man was strong. “I will return in the morning.”

”Just…Just tell me where it hurts,” Clark begs, tears threatening to fall. He focuses some of his divine power into the hand that is holding onto Bruce. He hoped that it could help his friend with whatever sickness he had.

Bruce screamed. The divine power felt like molten lava surging through his veins. Or like being stabbed a thousand times over. He stumbled backwards and fell onto the floor of his room. Clark knelt down next to him, still holding his wrist firm.

That’s when Clark saw it. Before, Bruce’s face had been hidden by the shadow of his cloak. But this was unmistakable.

Stark white-silver hair. Red eyes. Bruce’s mouth was open in a silent scream, showing off his protruding fangs.

Vampire.

Vampire.

Oh God, he’s a vampire.

Clark let go of Bruce’s wrist as if it had stung him. “You-you’re a-a-a,” Clark stuttered.

The pain from the divine power finally subsided and Bruce was able to think clearly again. Instead of trying to escape again, he sat there in silence.

“How is that possible? I-I’ve been with you in the sun before. I-you wear a cross for Christ sake. You-“

Bruce cleared his aching throat. The sweet lull of Clark’s blood made his fangs ache and his throat itch. “I was born this way. Ancient vampire. Pureblood…” Bruce contemplated whether to admit the source of his anguish. “You have a cut. On your neck. I need to go back to the manor. My control,” he ran his tongue over the tip of his fangs. “Is slipping.”

Vampire. The word repeated in Clark’s mind. But then, as if a ray of sun was shining through the rain, he realized something. Bruce wanted his blood. Bruce wanted him. Bruce was like this because of him. And in some twisted way, Clark liked that. His friend was like this because he wanted so deeply to drink his blood. His heart fluttered. He knew it was wrong. He should be upset. He should tell the others. He should purify Bruce like he had done to so many vampires before. But the idea of having the man's fangs in his neck, his body flush against his own, the two breathing in tandem, felt like bliss. Felt like sin.

At that moment, Clark knew Father John was wrong. Because in no world would he ever be able to resist this temptation.

This fantasy.

This sin.

Like the sun descending into the horizon as the moon rises to take its place. Like an angel falling from heaven into the darkest depths of depravity. If this was bad, then Clark no longer wanted to be good. Clark opened his mouth. “My blood did this to you?”

Appalled by that question, Bruce glared at Clark. The answer was obvious, but that was not what bothered Bruce. What bothered him was the slight enjoyment in Clark’s tone. As if he had been waiting for this very moment. As if he wanted Bruce to admit, with his own mouth, his desire for the Kryptonian.

“That much is obvious,” Bruce responded. He wasn’t about to admit his desire and speak into existence the hunger and lust that pooled deep in his stomach.

Bruce stood up and brushed himself off. He contemplated going back through the main hall to get to the entrance of the rectory, but it would be too risky. His only option was to jump out of the window and make the trek back to Gotham, or call Alfred to pick him up. The last train of the night had already left and Bruce would need to use the last of his control to use his powers to get to Gotham.

“You don’t need to do that. You can go out the front door. No one is near there.” Clark bit his lip. “I won’t tell the others. You can trust me.”

Bruce scoffed. “Hah, trust. Trust is what gets you killed.”

”It’s my blood you want, right?” Clark blurted out.

For a moment, Bruce imagined his shard fangs against Clark’s soft unmarked neck. He shook his head, forcing down those feelings.

“You-you can drink my blood,” Clark said almost too fast.

A low rumble reverberated in Bruce’s chest, Clark felt it in his bones.

“Is this just some game to you? You think,” Bruce whipped around and bared his fangs at Clark. The priest was taken aback by the sudden aggression. “You think I don’t want to? I am at war with myself right now. It is taking every ounce of control I have to not sink my fangs into your neck. This isn’t some game. This isn’t some mission. This isn’t some joke. You know I am a vampire now, so what’s next? Are you going to kill me? Have me drink your blood so that one of them can walk in on us. See me for the monster I really am.”

Clark stepped closer. “No. I could never kill you. You are-“

“Stop that,” Bruce cut him off. Clark was walking toward him. Closing the distance.

And Clark, Bruce realized in horror, looked almost drunk. His eyes half-lidded. His body tense in some parts and way too loose in others. He wanted him. Not as a friend or as an extension of God. No. Clark wanted Bruce in a way that was carnal.

Bile threatened to spew up through Bruce’s esophagus. He needed to get out of there before his stomach turned in on itself. Before he broke down the invisible wall that separated the two men and held the priest in his arms like a savior; a lover.

That tantalizing scent grew stronger. Bruce’s eyes focused in on Clark’s hand that was now out-stretched toward him. Clark had bitten as hard as he could to draw up blood.

“What are you-you’re crazy!” He slapped Clark’s hand out of the way.

”Drink.”

”No no no no I am not going to hurt you. I am not going to drink from you. It could kill you. It could turn you. Do you want to be a monster like this forever?” Bruce was visibly shaking. His desire to grab the priest's hand and bring the delicate skin up to his mouth was winning against his resolve.

“Drink,” Clark begged. “I want to help you.” The last part felt like a lie, but he already felt like a damned sinner the second he imagined those fangs in his skin. The glistening white enamel puncturing him, marking him, and drinking from him his very life force. An absolution. The final surrender to his depraved human desires.

He wondered why he was blessed with so much divine power if he was not strong enough to stand up against a singular vampire. A vampire who he had been fantasizing about for months. Years; if he is being honest. The demon that had been calling to him in dreams and leaving him in a cold sweat.

The monster that he had been sworn to protect the world against, that he had sworn to protect himself against, was going to break his skin and defile his sanctity. And Clark wouldn’t have it any other way.

If it was someone else, then he would have acted rationally. He would have approached this whole revelation with logic and reason. Telling the vampire that he would need to be purified of his curse and rid from the world. But this was Bruce. And Bruce was different. He was the moon, pulling the tides of Clark’s heart. Unintentionally soaking into Clark’s every waking moment. Even in sleep he cannot resist the moon's pull.

Against his better judgement, Bruce grabbed Clark’s outstretched palm and lifted it up to his mouth. The aroma pushing him into a state of euphoria. His fangs ached. His body ached. He shuddered a breath and slowly licked the small cut.

Clark’s breath hitched and he had to look away. It took everything in him to keep himself from making any vulgar noises. Whatever barrier that had been up between the two had come crashing down. In a crescendo.

The sound of Bruce suckling on his hand drifted into Clark’s ears like an aria. Clark almost wanted to laugh at how fast he fell from grace. How fast he found himself begging a vampire to suck his blood. What would the others think? What would the public think?

Clark imagined his broken sin ridden body paraded around like a warning for the temptation of evil. A martyr turned pariah.

The deep desires that he had been trying to hide coming to the forefront. He understood then when Eve must have felt when she was presented with the forbidden fruit. How Adam must have felt following her off the cliff of paradise and jumping head first into the valley of the shadow of death.

“I need,” Bruce whispered, but Clark could hear it as clearly as a scream. Bruce’s eyes focused in on Clark’s jugular. The sound of the priest's heart beating calling to him like a siren song. As if he had been stranded out in the vast ocean and he had for once come upon land. Fertile land. Fruitful land.

“Take it, take me.” Clark pushed off the hood of Bruce’s cloak and ran his fingers up the underside of the vampire’s head, urging him closer.

Bruce didn’t need to be told twice. He descended upon Clark like a hungry beast. Licking a line up his jugular, savoring the taste of his skin. He bit hard.

Clark threw his head back and stared up at the ceiling. It wasn’t as painful as he thought. Bruce wrapped his arms around Clark, caging him in, like a predator refusing to let his prey go. Their bodies flush against each other. The only sound and movement was Bruce's mouth on his neck.

A part of Clark’s mind wondered if he would regret this later. If he would come running to Father John and immediately confess his sins. He wondered what his fellow priest would say. Wondered if he would judge him. Wondered if he would see Clark for who he is, for what he is, instead of seeing what the Kryptonian could be. See him as a flawed human and not as a heaven sent savior.

Clark mindlessly ran his fingers through Bruce’s hair. It was almost soothing. He still wasn’t sure if being bitten by Bruce would turn him into a vampire and rid him of all of his divine power, but he was still willing to take the risk.

After a couple minutes, Clark pulls himself out of Bruce’s grip and places a firm hand on his chest, gently pushing him. A small growl vibrates against Clark’s skin and he rolls his eyes and smiles.

“That is enough-“ Clark almost slipped and called Bruce ‘baby’. Sweetheart. Lover. His one and only. The air in his lungs. The blood in his veins. The person that tempted him out of the Garden of Eden.

Bruce withdrew his fangs and stood back. Blood dripped down his chin and he stuck out his tongue trying to get every last drop. Bruce felt strong. Stronger than ever. He quickly turned his hair back to black and his eyes back to blue. His fangs retracted back into his mouth and he looked human, if it wasn’t for the blood. And the deep lust in his gaze that can only be described as monstrous.

Though, unbeknownst to Bruce, a thin ring of gold shone brightly against the blue of his eyes.

Clark held up a hand to his bleeding neck and used some of his divine power to heal it. “I guess you can’t turn me into a vampire.” Clark was relieved, but only slightly. The idea of being Bruce’s thrall made his heart stutter.

The two stared in silence. A tense silence. Both wanting to say the same thing but neither having the courage to do so.

Clark took the initiative and closed the distance. His lips were on Bruce’s and he tasted the lingering coppery liquid. Bruce gave in immediately, opening his mouth in a strangled gasp.

If he hadn’t gone against his vows before, he definitely went against them now.

And it felt like heaven.

Like he was at home.

Like he was safe and loved.

Like he was seen.

Like he was accepted for who he was.

Who he always was.

Who he was made to be.

Not beta read.

I am not Catholic so I had to do some research for this. Let me know if I got anything wrong! I’m not sure how long this series will be-maybe only a few parts-but I at least have the entire plot written down already. I am also waiting for my AO3 invite so that I can cross post my fics and essays on there.

For people who follow me for my essays: I am still working on my next one! I hope to post it within the next two weeks since I will be going on a short hiatus (probably) at the beginning of August.

[wisdomseulogy]

Sam: Hey Dean check this out. Apparently there has been a lot of demon activity reported in Seoul South Korea. An entire train full of people went missing. And there are other reports too

Dean: You know I don’t do planes Sammie. You remember the last time I was on a plane.

Sam: But get this, according to the lore, each generations for centuries there are these musical demon hunters that create this thing called a ‘Honmoon’.

Dean: And?

Sam: Something must have happened. I think we need to go over there and check this out.

Dean: How are we going to get there Sammie? By boat?

Sam: We have to help them turn the Honmoon gold, Dean. Or else the world will be filled with demons.

Cas: You know, I could fly you over there. Well maybe-

Dean: I would rather be on a plane than strapped to your back over the pacific ocean. *sigh* How many credit cards would it take to charter a private jet?

Sam: *smirks* Looks like we’re going to Seoul

—-

This was inspired by a TikTok by probablyscott. If someone has already done this, let me know and I can take this down :) I will be back to my normal content soon.

[wisdomseulogy]

EVERYONE NEEDS TO WATCH THE NEW SUPERMAN MOVIE

—-

Now that I got that out of the way, here is my review of the new Superman (2025) movie. It is pro-Palestine, anti-war, anti-big business, anti-far right, anti anti immigration, and more.

From this point on there will be massive spoilers. I will basically be describing the entire movie in detail and giving some analysis at the end. If you just want to see just the analysis then you can skip to the end.

Synopsis:

I went into this movie just hoping to get more content for my SuperBat fics, but I was pleasantly surprised by how genuinely good and moving the movie was. It comes as no surprise to me that right leaning people did not like the movie. For coming out of a multi-million dollar franchise, which at times could have been described as thinly veiled pro-government and pro-America propaganda, this movie is able to show all the negative aspects of big business, war, online hate, and anti-immigration sentiments.

The movie begins with Superman’s first defeat against The Hammer of Boravia. He is taken to his ice fortress by Kryto (a super dog with a cape) where he is healed by semi-sentient robots who replay the message that his parents sent him with from Krypton. Superman listens to this same video clip/audio of his parents expressing their love for him and wishing for him to be a savior for the people of Earth. Superman is healed by the sun and he returns to fight The Hammer once again.

The person calling the shots for The Hammer of Boravia is Lex Luthor and LexCorp in general. (Though the public does not know this, the audience learns the truth about the fight against Superman early on.) But The Hammer of Boravia is stronger than any enemy that Superman has gone up against and Superman is once again smashed into the ground as public sentiment for the alien hero sours.

Prior to the events of the movie, Superman had intervened to keep the country of Boravia from invading their neighboring country Jarhanpur. And Lex Luthor as well as others, go on a campaign to make the public distrust Superman for it. Granted, we do learn from Clark’s interview with Lois that he basically kidnapped and tortured the president of Boravia to keep him from invading Jarhanpur. Clark does not see it this way, obviously, he sees it as a sort of necessary evil in order to try and protect the people of Jarhanpur and to keep the war from escalating. Lois tries to explain to Clark that what his intentions are doesn’t matter in the face of public opinion. That since Clark acted alone and was theoretically a representative of the United States that he was over stepping his bounds as a super human.

At the same time as all of this is going on, public opinion for super or meta humans is souring. People are debating whether meta humans should be allowed the same rights and freedoms as ‘regular’ humans.

The real turning point of the whole movie comes when Lex Luthor and his gang hack into Clark’s ice fortress and are able to obtain the original, slightly destroyed, recording that Clark’s parents sent with him. And in the part of the recording that Clark had never seen because it was broken, his parents tell him to take over Earth and be their king and to have a large harem of wives so that Clark can spread his superior genes to the dumb weak Earthlings. (I am being serious, that is not an exaggeration)

Lex Luthor obviously leaks this footage to the press and everyone turns on Superman. Even Clark starts doubting everything since he genuinely believed that his parents sent him to Earth to help them not to subjugate them. Rumors start spreading of Superman having a harem and the president (or dictator?) of Boravia does a statement where he says that Superman intervened in the war because Superman liked the way that Boravian women looked and wanted to add more to his harem.

The audience obviously knows that Superman doesn’t have a harem and that all these things that people are saying about him are fake. But the public in the movie doesn’t know. Everyone, even people that knew Superman personally like the Justice Gang turned on Superman.

Clark decides to turn himself as Superman over to the police because when he went back to the ice fortress after Lex Luthor and his gang were there, Krypton was missing and Superman wanted to figure out where the dog was.

Once in police custody, they take him to a military base with a portal to a pocket dimension that Luthor created where Luthor stores all the people he doesn’t like or wants to use. There we see that they are studying Krypto and Luthor says that once they understand how a Super Dog works then they will kill him (the dog). Superman is very upset about this, but he is in a cage with someone who is able to turn their body into an organic matter including kryptonite.

While suffering the effects of kryptonite, Luthor brings out someone that Superman had talked to once and had given him a falafel named Mali and Luthor plays Russian roulette with the man and the man dies after the second attempt. The man inside the cage with Superman, Metamorpho, who turned his hand into Kryptonite starts crying after having witnessed the innocent man die. Also, the innocent mans last words were “I believe in you Superman” (or something adjacent to that, I am doing all of this from memory)

Metamorpho’s baby was being held by Lex Luthors men in the cell in front of them and Superman tells Metamorpho that he will rescue his child if he gets rid of the krytonite. After having witnessed the innocent man die, Metamorpho gets rid of the kryptnoite but Superman is still unable to move, he needs the power of the sun to keep him going. So Metamorpho makes a mini sun and Superman is able to regain his powers and he rescues Metamorpho’s baby and Krypton and him, Metamorpho, Krypton try to get out of the pocket diemension without falling into a black hole but they are being attacked by Lex Luthor’s men. (I am a little bit hazy on this part but I think it was Lex’s men that are attacking him).

Meanwhile, Lois is trying to figure out where Superman went and how to save him. One of her colleagues at the Daily Planet, Jimmy Olsen, says that he has an inside source that says that Superman is in a pocket dimension. We later learn that this inside source is the bimbo-esque arm candy that Lex Luthor is dating/keeping around. The woman whose name is Eve Teschmacher, really wants to be with Jimmy but she is stuck being with Lex Luthor. Eve’s dream is to one day be able to run away with Jimmy and spend at least a whole weekend with him.

Lois takes the info that Superman might be in a pocket universe to the Justice Gang (Green Lantern, Mister Terrific, and Hawkgirl) (Also it is important to note that the Justice Gang is a corporate superhero squad.) And because of all the things they learned about Superman and all of the negative public sentiment about him (Also we learn that in the pocket universe Lex Luthor is using trained monkeys to write terrible things about Superman online and all of the hate and negative hashtags about Superman were coming from these monkeys paid for by Lex Luthor)

However, Mister Terrific put some nano bots (?) in Superman’s blood and was able to track him to a military base but isn’t able to see where he went after that and Mister Terrific would know if Superman died so he’s not dead. Mister Terrific and Lois go to the military base and Mister Terrific is able to take down most of the people there and turn on the portal. But they have no way of getting around while inside the pocket dimension so Mister Terrific uses his spheres to try and find Superman where he finds Superman, Metamorpho, Metamorpho’s baby, and Krypto trying not to get into a black hole.

Eventually they all make it out of the pocket dimension but the portal they used is incredibly damaged and Mister Terrific stressed that it is incredibly ill advised for Lex Luthor to have created a pocket dimension at all since it could destroy the very fabric of reality.

Superman returns back home to Kansas with Lois in order to heal and recuperate. There are heartfelt scenes between Clark’s Earthly parents and him and Lois. Clark’s dad is also very emotional and doesn’t want Clark to be hurt or anything. And Clark talks to them about the message from his biological parents and they tell Clark that his reason for being here originally isn’t what matters, whether he really was sent to Earth to subjugate it or to help it, all that matters is what he does.

Mister Terrific then tells Clark that Lex Luthor opened up a rift in the fabric of reality that was going to tear the world in half and it started in Metropolis, and people had to be evacuated. At the same exact time, Boravia is going to invade Jarhanpur again. Boravia has 80 billion dollars worth of military assets and the country of Jarhanpur doesn’t have much if anything to defend itself with.

This puts Superman in a tight spot where he has to decide whether to save Metropolis or Jarhanpur. The people and specifically the children in Jarhanpur put up a flag of Superman’s S and the people start shouting for him. And at the last moment when all hope seems lost and Superman is not going to come, the Justice Gang (including Metamorpho but excluding Mister Terrific) arrives and protects the people of Jarhanpur against the Boravian military.

When Superman first got out of the pocket dimension, Lex Luthor gets really upset and throws a pencil at Eve. Eve gets really upset and calls Jimmy and tells him that she has enough info on Lex to take him down and is crying and telling Jimmy that once Lex is out of the picture she wants to be with him. At first it seems that all that Eve sends is selfies of herself, but in each of those selfies are contracts, documents, maps, proof of what Lex Luthor is doing and what his goal is (which is taking over Jarhanpur and creating his own country where he can be king.)

Lois, Jimmy, and the other people at the Daily Planet take this info and write a story on all of the evil deeds of Lex Luthor.

Superman goes after Lex himself and that’s when Lex sends Ultraman on Superman (Ultraman was also disguised as The Hammer of Boravia in the beginning of the movie) Ultraman always seems to be one step ahead of Superman and is able to counter all of Superman’s attacks (That is also because Lex is controlling Ultraman by telling him what to do) The fight is heated and Lex tells Superman (through a communication device in Ultramans chest) that brains will always win over brawn. Right when Superman might be killed by Ultraman, Superman whistles for Krypto and the dog destroys the floating cameras that Lex was using to tell Ultraman what to do. With little to no input from Lex, Ultraman was weak and didn’t know what to do. After another fight, Ultramans mask comes off and we learn that Ultraman is Superman’s clone and that is how Lex was able to get into the ice fortress.

Lex recounts how he created a clone of Superman but that the clone was dumb and so Lex needed to tell it what to do but the clone at least was strong and had all the same powers as Superman.

The reality rift is starting to get further past Metropolis into other cities and Lex’s people are begging him to close the rift and Lex says he’ll close it once the rift actually gets to a city that he cares about. Then they decide to jump ship and go through a portal into the pocket dimension but then Superman tackles Lex.

Superman calls Lex out for being envious of him and Lex is like you think I don’t know that. You think I don’t know that I am consumed by envy. Lex goes onto give such an amazing villain monologue about how Lex hates Superman because Superman is everything that he personally lacks. Lex spent so much time and money building his empire and Superman was loved immediately the second he showed up. And no matter how much he tried Lex could never BE Superman because Superman isn’t even human. He comes from another planet. Lex really did almost everything he did in hopes that he could kill Superman.

But at the same time, the article about everything that Lex has done is published and the public opinion goes against him. The same news hosts that praised Lex are now saying that they were duped and that they had no idea of all of his misdeeds before having him on. Public opinion has swayed in Superman’s favor.

Lex gets put into custody and Superman is praised. Superman decides to give Lois an ‘interview’ where they disappear into a building and kiss.

Superman goes back to the ice fortress and the robots are helping him when his cousin Super Girl shows up drunk and calls Superman a bitch while taking back her dog Krypto (Super Girl has been traveling to planets with red suns so that she can get drunk and party.) The robots ask Superman if he wants to watch the message from his parents again and he says yes. But this time its not his Kryptonian parents, its his Earthly parents and it shows clips of Clark growing up in the small town in Kansas with his family and it was honestly so moving it nearly brought me to tears.

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

Analysis:

There is quite literally so much so say about this movie that I am sure I am going to forget to mention some things. Like I said before, I had limited expectations, how much can you really expect by a big budget film in this current day and age? But I quickly went from pleasantly surprised to completely moved.

First, Lex Luthor is quite obviously working with the US government and the US government is backing the Boravian government. This is seen through the fact that Lex meets with top US officials and how the US is letting Lex have a pocket dimension portal on their military base.

So already we see that the government is in the pocket of this huge multi-billion dollar corporation which might as well be the DC version of Lockheed Martin. And the government already has a lot of anti meta human and super human sentiment which is seen explicitly when Superman gets arrested and they don't read him any rights stating that since he was not born on Earth or in America he has no rights and they can basically do whatever they want with him. They then hand him over to Lex Luthor.

The Jarhanpur is very similar to Palestine and I have seen creators on TikTok already show some very similar imagery and references. (Which would in turn make Boravia Israel. Though I know people will be calling this a stretch, it is surprising to see any anti US backed government sentiment in a major film right now.)

Before the movie even begins, Superman had helped Jarhanpur in stopping an invasion from Boravia. When he is having the mock interview with Lois, she says that Jarhanpur is a country run by terrorists and Clark immediately cuts her off and says that innocent people were going to die. Implying that the Boravian government doesn't actually care about fighting terrorists, they want to completely annihilate Jarhanpur even innocent civilians and Superman wasn't going to stand for that. And then Lois says that Boravia just wants to help Jarhanpur and get rid of the terrorists and Clark gets mad and tells her that's not true. And Lois responds saying she doesn't know that for sure since she is just a journalist.

Also, Boravia did a whole smear campaign against Superman and once they had the dirt of the extra video footage the leader of Boravia claimed that Superman was just trying to do all of this so that he could steal/seduce Boravian women.

In the end of the movie, the people of Jarhanpur are up against a very strong military and country that is funded by the US government and LexCorp and their literal only hope is that Superman would save them. They raise his insignia as a sign of hope. Hope that someone would help them and hope that someone still cared. With public sentiment increasingly pro Boravia, Jarhanpur had nothing to hope for other than the impossible.

That is because Superman is a symbol of hope for people that need it the most. He doesn't weaponize that hope, he doesn't monetize it, he goes where he is needed. He doesn't do this out of political or ideological affiliation, he does it because someone needs to and he can. And the hope that Jarhanpur had paid off when the Justice Gang came to help them. Superman may have been busy fighting his clone, but he still made sure the innocent people of Jarhanpur didn't have to die senselessly. That their child didn't have to die for a war that they didn't even start.

When Lex does his whole envy monologue, he says that he sees in Superman everything that he isn't. But that's not true. Superman isn't proof of humanity's weakness, it is proof of its possibilities. Superman may be able to do more than anyone else, but anyone could be Superman. Anyone can be a symbol of hope. And we see it in how at the end Mali turns into a symbol of hope as well. Even in the face of death, Mali still believed in Superman. Still believed that there was still good in the world.

And at the end when Superman is back in the ice fortress he doesn't look at the message his biological parents sent him, because that wasn't who he was. He wasn't just some alien from Krypton, he was Clark Kent. Raised by John and Martha Kent in Kansas. Just as much as this movie was about hope for others, it was about hope for Superman himself. He learned how to see himself as he is and not as he was possibly meant to be.

I also really liked how Krypto is arguably a bad dog, he is an ankle biter and destroys things and is reactive, but Clark turn himself into the government just so that he could figure out where Krypto was. He even admits to Lois that he's not even a good dog, and Krypto isn't even Clark's dog at all, but that he needed to make sure the dog was safe. I think this also ties back to how Superman is willing to save anyone, even if that thing or animal isn't necessarily good. He was willing to stand up and protect a country that is seen as just a bunch of terrorists. He is willing to put his life on the line for a dog that can barely respond to a command and often destroys parts of his ice fortress.

Another aspect I liked was how there were a lot of scenes of men being vulnerable. I wish there was more of this in media in general so I was pleasantly surprised to see men crying and you could also consider Lex's envy monologue him being vulnerable as well.

Lastly (for now, I will probably add more later), I loved Eve's character and how she is presented as this stereotypical bimbo character who only cares about taking selfies and her looks but its revealed that she was actually using all of her selfies as evidence to use against Lex so that she can live the life she wants to live.

Anyways, I really love the movie and I will be watching it again :)

[wisdomseulogy]

I ONLY THREW THIS PARTY FOR YOU

Great Gatsby AU, Bruce Wayne x Clark Kent

TW: drinking, partying, internalized homophobia, light angst

---

It started as a light curiosity. Bruce rarely concerned himself with the dealings of the other heroes, but it started to annoy him that Superman kept doing interviews with this one specific reporter at the Daily Planet.

It was only a light curiosity. Nothing to lose sleep over. Nothing to brood on. Just a lingering question like a wisp of smoke, sometimes transparent and sometimes as dense as a cloud, but it followed him. Like a curse.

That must be it, a curse. This Clark Kent, this nobody, this random guy from Kansas who just so happened to have a pretty face was always interviewing Superman. Bruce scoffed as he read the latest article about Superman saving a small town.

Once again, Superman had done an interview with this reporter. Right after. Were they lovers?

Bruce shook his head. It's not like it matters....but if it did matter then he would tell Superman that its reckless to be dating a reporter. How could he trust this guy? They must be a thing... Bruce concluded.

Which is fine. Completely fine. Bruce repeated to himself like a prayer. As if trying to reassure himself.

But no matter how many times he repeated those words in his head, his chest still felt tight. Was it jealousy? Envy? Bruce could have anyone he wanted...any woman he wanted. Men were different.

He never really cared about people romantically. Maybe it was side effect of never being taught how to love properly by his late parents, but he figured no one would be good enough for him. Or rather, that he would never be good enough for anyone.

And yet, here Superman was flaunting his relationship without a care in the world. As if he wanted to get found out. As if he didn't care. Why doesn't he care?

Bruce never learned how to truly depend on anyone, and maybe that was another reason why he hated the idea of a stable relationship. He had many flings, of course, to keep up his image as a desirable playboy billionaire. It was just to keep up appearances, he never felt anything for any of those women. If anything, he felt bad for them, hoped that they expected nothing out of him.

Clark was handsome. At least he has good taste. But Superman could have anyone in the world and yet he chose a reporter from Kansas. What made him so special?

That's when the Galas started. Bruce always did a few a year for charity events, but all of a sudden Bruce was inviting everyone who was anyone to a Gala every month.

His first plan was to just get an exclusive interview with this Clark Kent but every time he tried the Daily Planet had someone else do it. He couldn't overtly ask for Clark, that would be too much. People would start questioning his intentions. He needed it to be natural. Organic.

A meet-cute at a Gala called to him like a lighthouse. A blinking fortress reminding Bruce that he was so close to land. All he needed was for Clark to come. But the paper never sent him.

Each Gala, Bruce would request that there would be a reporter there to write about it. The Daily Planet was happy to go...for the first 10. After that it started to feel excessive and they weren't sure if this was somehow a cry for help or as a way for Bruce to prove to people just how much money he had.

Bruce never centered him about money or extravagance like that. At least not to the public. And here he was spending millions of dollars on large lavish parties with ice imported from Norway, wine imported from Italy, etc. Each glass was expensive crystal and the drinks and food were always overflowing. The most popular musician of the month would headline the party.

And in the center of all of this was Bruce, smiling, thanking everyone for attending his party. Though, he was hard to find once the parties started. No one knew exactly where he went. There were some rumors that he was doing drugs or sleeping with women. Or maybe getting blackout drunk.

But the truth came in the form of him with his head in his hands, wondering why Clark still hasn't come. At this point, it had to be personal. He even tried to personally request an interview with the reporter but he was busy with an interview with Superman.

He stared at the crystal champagne flute on his desk. His rage boiled over as he flung the flute, making it crash against an expensive painting that Bruce couldn't care less about.

What was so special about this guy? What was so special about Superman?

Alfred silently picked up the pieces of the broken flute. Alfred had already advised Bruce many times against these parties, against trying to lure in the reporter. Though Bruce never voiced exactly why he was obsessed with the man, Alfred had his suspicions.

Finally Bruce cracked, he made it so that the only reporter available to come to the next Gala was Clark. Everyone else was either sick, busy, or dealing with an emergency.

He would finally reach land. Reach the lighthouse. Reach this blue-eyed pearl.

---

Clark didn't want to go to the party. He didn't like the obnoxious displays of wealth. And for some reason, Bruce Wayne kept wanting to have an interview with him. It made Clark feel uncomfortable. Why had the billionaire suddenly taken an interest in him? What was his plan?

One by one, his colleagues had something come up. A few were sick, a few were dispatched to other breaking news for the night, and a few had flat tires and couldn't make it in.

Clark wasn't dumb. He knew immediately that this was suspicious. Perry called him only a few hours before the Gala was supposed to start telling him that he was going to have to be the one to cover it. "Do we really need to keep attending? He has one every single month..." Clark droned on.

At first, everyone wanted to go to these lavish parties. But the glitz and glamour get old very fast. Each party bled into the next. The only real difference was the food and the music. Otherwise it was like playing a broken record.

Clark sighed. I guess it's time I finally meet him.

Lines of expensive cars lined Bruce's drive way and the street next to the manor. It might as well have been a car show with how expensive these cars were. And how rare as well. But Clark didn't care about all of these things.

Living in Metropolis meant that he didn't need a car. He could live simply in a nice studio apartment. He could live just like everyone else.

Clark was expecting Bruce to meet him at the door, but instead he was greeted by a song he knew. He didn't even think to check which band was playing. The Mighty Crabjoys. One of his favorite bands.

Clark stilled and looked around for whatever camera must be filming him but there was none. The band wasn't even that popular, especially not right now, and Bruce only paid for the most popular artists.

Well, if anything, Clark could enjoy some good music and some good food. He slowly walked into the manor and saw a bunch of celebrities walking toward a door that led outside. Clark followed, taking note of all the extravagant décor. Ice sculptures, flower arrangements, a photo station.

Staff walked past with small plates of food and drinks. Clark grabbed a drink and slowly sipped it as he stepped outside. The band looked out of place surrounded by the top celebs and a few corporate heroes.

Bottle girls carried bottles of champagne and sparklers. Dancers rocked out to the music while others took selfies.

Clark closed his eyes and reminded himself that it was just a part of the job. That he would just talk to Bruce a little bit and then he'll never have to come to one of these pretentious parties again.

"Do you like the music," a deep voiced asked behind him.

Clark whipped around and came face to face with Bruce Wayne. His smile was infectious, Clark had to give him that.

He didn't hate Bruce Wayne, he actually really admired the guy for all of his charitable efforts. Clark just didn't like people who threw their money away like it was nothing. Mentally, he was wondering how many people could be fed if Bruce instead put this money toward hunger relief.

"Ah yeah it's-uh-one of my favorite bands."

"Oh really? I had no idea. I heard them recently and thought it would be nice to have them here." Bruce looked from Clark's blue eyes and down to his mouth. He took a sharp inhale of breath that would have gone unnoticed to anyone, except Clark wasn't just anyone. He was Superman.

That confused Clark. He knew that Bruce had been trying to get an interview with him and he chalked it up to maybe a slight curiosity. It wasn't exactly subtle that he was the only one that could interview Superman and Clark had many people reach out to him about it and he ignored them all.

"How about-do you want to do an interview? It's kind of loud over here...I can show you to my study," Bruce tried desperately to say without his voice showing any sign of nervousness. Because truth be told, Bruce immediately knew what made Clark special.

It wasn't just his looks, though his looks did help a lot. His fluffy hair that would feel so nice through his fingers. His strong muscles that must have taken months if not years to curate. His black rimmed glasses that perfectly framed his face. His sharp jawline. His plump lips that looked almost kissable-

"Uh," Clark looked around. "Sure. It is not everyday that you get to interview someone...like you."

Bruce's heart fluttered, but he didn't let it show. He couldn't let it show. This was just a small curiosity. He just wanted to know what made Clark special and he figured it out. He saw it in the way the mans eyes lit up when he heard his favorite band. He saw it in his slight smile.

As if the entire world was moving in slow motion and it was just them. Just Bruce and Clark. The billionaire and the reporter.

Bruce led him to his study and leaned against his desk while sipping a glass of wine. Clark looked around the study. It was lined with floor to ceiling bookshelves. It had everything from Plato's Republic to Thoreau's Walden to Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations. And more. Each one a masterpiece in its own right.

"You like to read?" Clark asked as he was inspecting the books.

Bruce swirled the red liquid in his glass. "In my free time. I am a fan of the classics."

"Hmm," Clark hummed as he brushed dust off of the top of a copy of Jane Eyre. "This is quite a collection."

"Yes, well I have a wide variety of interests. What about you, what are you interested in?"

Maybe this was more than a slight curiosity, Clark thought.

"Well I just got a dog so he takes up a lot of my free time," Clark admitted.

"A dog?" None of Bruce's sources mentioned anything about a dog. He was going to need to investigate this later. "What breed?"

"He's a mutt. Not even that 'good' of a dog either. A real ankle biter." Clark pulled out a copy of Wuthering Heights and flipped through the pages.

"What's his name?" Bruce asked, wanting to keep this casual conversation flowing. It felt natural. That this is exactly how life was meant to be. Just two men enjoying each others company. That's all it is...right?

Clark didn't want to lie but he also couldn't tell Bruce that the dogs name was Krypto. "Max," Clark lied.

"Nice name. Once knew a great guy named Max. I think he ran an accounting firm out in Boston."

Clark nodded and shut the book. "So, should we do the interview?"

"Oh." Bruce placed his glass down a bit too forcefully. "Yeah what questions do you have for me?"

"Why did you start doing these Gala's?" Clark asked.

Bruce bit his lip. He never voiced it before. Never admitted why he started. But a part of him wanted to say that he did all of this for him. For Clark. That he wanted to get to know him better. And he needed an excuse for a reporter and him to meet.

"I guess life was getting a bit boring these days," Bruce lied with a smile. He pushed off from the desk and walked over to the window. People were still arriving. Bright smiles on their faces as they saw the grandeur of the manor.

"Hmm," Clark hummed in response. "How do you choose who to invite?"

Bruce didn't care who came to his parties. He just needed to make sure Clark came. He had his assistant send out invitations to whoever would come to a party. Because what's the point of an empty party. He needed to keep up the illusion.

"All I can say is that it's a long process. We invite celebrities, heroes, activists."

Clark nodded. "How do you feel about people calling you out online for wasting money on Gala's?"

Bruce let out a long breath. "I still donate the same amount I always have. The Wayne Foundation is still helping everyone in Gotham and beyond. That hasn't changed."

"But people are saying that the money you spend on these parties could-"

"How about we change the question?" Bruce asked with a smile.

"Okay..."

The tension in the room was thick enough to cut with a shard of glass. Neither men spoke, just absently staring at each other as if waiting for the other to say something.

"May I ask something off record Mr. Wayne?" Clark asked.

"You can just call me Bruce and sure. I am an open book." Bruce held out his arms as if to further his point.

"Why did you want me to interview you?"

Bruce blinked rapidly a few times, his brain catching up to what Clark had just asked. "Oh well," Bruce grabs his glass of wine and nearly downs it "I saw that you do a lot of interviews with Superman."

"That's true."

"Why do you do so many interviews with Superman?" Are you lovers? Does he hold you at night? Does he whisper sweet nothings into your ear?

"I guess you could say I know him personally. He is a friend of mine." Clark was choosing his words carefully. Lois had warned him that if he kept doing interviews with Superman that people would get suspicious. Maybe he should lay off some of the interviews for a bit. Maybe do a few with Lois or the others.

"Friends," Bruce repeated.

"Yeah I guess he likes the articles I write about him." Clark and Bruce were practically locked into a staring competition. Clark thinking that Bruce was trying to expose him and Bruce trying to figure out whether Clark and Superman are dating. The idea that Clark and Superman could be the same person never even passed through Bruce's mind.

"Well, I guess a reporter good enough for Superman is good enough for me. I was just curious. That's all." Bruce turned back on his charismatic persona.

"Yes, well I will be sure to write a...nice article about...this party." Clark wasn't sure what to say. He didn't like the Gala's but he wasn't about to trash Bruce Wayne. Clark hoped to find out why Bruce started having these all of a sudden, but he knew he probably wouldn't get the real answer out of the billionaire.

"Please do. Though you can write a bad one if you want to."

"Duly noted," Clark walked toward the door to the study. "I'll probably head out. Parties aren't really my thing."

Bruce smiled and tipped his glass. "Sounds good."

The door shut and Bruce stood in silence watching the door, hoping that Clark would come back.

"Get home safe."

The sound of fireworks going off rattles the manor.

---

Not beta read

I got this idea after seeing a TikTok of Bruce and Clark set to Charli xcx's party 4 u. Bruce is definitely Gatsby coded.

[wisdomseulogy]

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

Part 3: Fanfiction/Fandom and Commercialization/Capitalism

Fanfiction is one of the last non-monetizable artforms, but this has not stopped the spread of commercialization. Fandom culture is also similar to gift-giving societies of antiquity. In this essay I will explore how capitalism intersects fanfiction/fandom and what, if anything, we should do to stop it. I highly suggest reading my essay on how capitalism negatively impacts our lives and self identity since it will help in understanding why people do the things they do. But you will still be able to read and understand this essay without reading the other one(s).

The next part of this series will be called “Fanfiction Through the Ages”, where I explore how fanfiction has always existed throughout history. It will include religious and non-religious references and will probably take a while for me to write since I will be doing a lot of research. 

Thank you to everyone who interacts with my essays!!! (And everyone that reads my other things too!) All of yalls comments and likes are what keeps me writing these.

If you want me to write an essay on something that you are interested or confused about feel free to ask! They might not be long, but I am happy to try my best to answer people's questions. 

(I am not a historian, anthropologist, or a philosopher so I may get things wrong. This is an opinion piece)

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The fandom and fanfiction exists on a weird crossroads of capitalism and community. Fanfiction, by design, cannot be monetized and thus the creators cannot make any money from their works. Instead of making art for the hope of later monetary profits, fanfiction authors create art for the love of the game and post their art to spread that love to the community. Because there is no monetary exchange happening in the fanfiction community (i.e. fanfictions aren’t behind paywalls, you don’t have to buy access to read them, etc.) the community has become more akin to a gift giving society where there is no expectation for reciprocation.

When talking about ancient civilizations, a lot of people draw up the image of bartering or trading, and though that did happen, there were many gift based societies. In this way, you would give something to someone else and in turn you would have things given to you by that person or others. In essence when you are hungry you would be fed and when others are hungry you would feed them. The gift becomes an extension of the self and also the person's placement relationship to society as whole. 

In capitalist gifting situations, what gift someone gives or receives is dependent on their placement in the social hierarchy, but this is completely different in the fandom community. In Fandom, instead of there being social hierarchies based on money, power, gender, and status, everyone is on the same playing field. Any fanfic, fanart, etc. is a gift to the community at large. For the most part you can see, read, and interact with these things for free and the creator does not expect the people who are interacting with their posts to give them something in return for their hard work. The art itself is removed from the capitalist machine and loved and experienced as itself and not as an expensive piece. 

In a capitalist society, art only has value or meaning if it is worth lots of money. But fandom subverts that. Art can be good and life changing without it costing anything. Without being a best seller or widely acclaimed. The meaning rests in the individual interpretation of the art instead of whether or not the art adds value to the capitalist machine.

We do not remember what life was like before capitalism, but I think that fanfiction is a gateway to understanding how art was interpreted and experienced during antiquity. And I believe it can also help us to understand what life could be like without capitalism. 

When a creator on Tumblr answers someone’s ask and writes them a fic, story, headcanon, etc. they are giving both that person and everyone else that will interact with that ask a gift and there is no social expectation for reciprocation other than appreciation. Appreciation at its most fundamental level does not require money. You can show appreciation in many ways in life and online that don’t require anything other than someone's time and attention. 

Another example of gift giving in the fandom community is Art Fight which even calls itself an “art gifting game”. Though there is a goal set for people to try and win and beat an opposing team, the fundamentals of Art Fight are based on community appreciation and interaction over money. This works because the fandom community already has the precedent to give gifts without the desire to have their gift reciprocated monetarily or socially. (though I am sure people would be upset if they drew a lot of other people characters and no one drew theirs) 

In a capitalist society, if you give a gift to someone that is below you then you do not expect a gift back. Following that logic, if you give a gift to someone that is at your level or higher then you expect a gift or something tangible in return. But in the fandom community everyone is at the same level. The reason you do not expect a tangible gift in return is not because the person is below you but because the intangible is more important to this community. 

Another facet of capitalism and how it affects our perception of art is how in capitalism time = money. A lot of people get paid hourly so the time they spend doing something can be equated to actual dollar amounts. But in the fandom community this idea is not as present. If someone is not as skilled at drawing/or does not spend as much time as others when drawing and they draw someone else's character, in a capitalist mindset that would be seen as a cheap or poor drawing, but in the community the OC’s creator is usually happy just for their character to be drawn. 

Capitalism has a large focus on the tangible material world. And it also has a large focus on individualism (only you alone matter and that you should better your own life without regard to others or the environment). But these two things are not what makes life fulfilling for everyone. The beauty of fandom/fanfiction is its love of the intangible. It’s appreciation of human interaction over monetary gains. 

Fandom itself comes from a shared love of something intangible (like fictional characters, fictional stories, etc.) instead of the love of the tangible (money, materials, goods, services, etc.). Though fandom cannot exist without some intersection with the tangible, it does not exalt the tangible the same way other communities do. For example, Bruce Wayne does exist tangibly, you can buy a figure, print, comic, etc. But he also exists in the intangible realm since he is fictional. We use the material plane to express our love, knowledge, desire, appreciation of the idea of him, but he does not exist as an entity in the tangible world. He is a thought, a creation that lives collectively in our minds instead of in the real world. He is a concept but is no less real to us. Even if someone who deeply loves his character becomes downtrodden, they can still hold on to the idea of him in their minds and their hearts. And in that way, the person still has something. If you love and interact with fandom and characters alike, you can never truly have nothing because you at least have the ideas of these characters with you in your imagination and your heart. 

That is the foundation that fandom stands on. A shared collective love of the intangible over the tangible. A gift giving community where there is no expectation for reciprocation. There is no emphasis on money or even time. There is art and people who appreciate art. 

When I was at my most recent convention, I participated in a large badge ribbon trading event and it made me realize just how different fandom culture is from capitalist culture. People were happy to trade and see other peoples badges and would trade for badges that didn’t even necessarily pertain to their interests because it was the act of trading and gifting itself that was enjoyable not the end product. Though I did get a lot of very fun badge ribbons, it wasn’t about quality, or whether someone's ribbon was good enough for mine, it was about sharing and being a part of a community.

But as fandom culture becomes more mainstream, people who are just now entering the community are bringing with them the capitalist ideals that are instilled into us from birth. And that is hurting the community at large. 

I understand wanting to be able to make a living off of your art and creations (though I wish we lived in a society where we could just live and we didn’t have to sell ourselves or something else in order to just exist) but when fanfiction becomes involved things get very tricky. The reason that fanfiction can exist and sites like AO3 have not been taken down is because the creators of fics are not profiting off of their creations. 

AO3 spends a lot of money on lawyers to advocate for fanfic creators and to keep the site up and running like normal. But when money breeches fanfiction it becomes a possible slippery slope to the entire thing being persecuted. 

I have seen people make patreons or use Ko-Fi to try and make money off of their fics. Though they usually are advertising their original works and not their fics, in some cases there is a lot of grey area. Like I just said, I understand wanting to be able to live with just your own art, but I am not sure if we are at a point in society where it is possible to make a living off of fics. You can make a living off of fanart or other avenues, but fanfiction is a very tricky thing.

There is also the aspect where people would rather read or interact with art that is a part of fandom which means that artists will have a harder time trying to sell or market their original works. I know artists who do not like vending at cons for this reason since they would have to change or alter their art style to make it more palatable for the most amount of people and at the same time being stuck drawing whatever is popular instead of what they want to draw.

There are many factors that are leading people down this route and I am not pointing these things out as a way of calling people out singularly but as a way to talk about what I am seeing in the community currently. 

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Another way that people are bringing capitalism into the fanfiction community is by selling fics on Etsy. If you are not aware of this already, people on Etsy are downloading fics off of places like AO3 and binding them into books and selling them. The authors of these fics are not involved in the selling and are having their free content stolen so that someone else can sell it. 

I understand wanting to print out and possibly bind your favorite fanfics for yourself, but you cannot steal someone else’s fic and then profit off of it in any way. Fics are not meant to be profitable. It feels to me like taking someone's beautiful painting that they gave to you to look at for free, stealing it, and selling it to a rich buyer. But this is the essence of capitalism. 

Capitalism teaches us that no one else matters except for ourselves and we need to use any means necessary to make money even if doing so goes against ethics and morals. But, as I have already explained, fanfiction exists outside of the realm of capitalism and subverts it entirely. The people who are binding these fics are equating the time it took them to bind the fics into monetary value and are expecting to be paid for their work in doing so. Which if they were binding anything other than stolen non-monetizable work would be valid in our economy. 

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We need to push back against the monetization of fanfiction. Fandom culture as a whole is a bit more nuanced since we have things like conventions and official/non official merchandise which are all bought for with money. Though, cons are becoming more commercialized and there are issues with vendor halls not being well vetted. (Though some cons have forgone the vetting process entirely and instead use a lottery based system so that they can not be blamed if someone sells questionable stuff at the con.) 

I have been attending cons since the late 2000’s so I have seen a lot of change over the years. There used to be a lot more bootleg stuff then we see today (though there is still bootleg stuff. Instead of outlawing it entirely, some cons give vendors percentages of how much they are allowed to have of unofficial merch.) Though I have also noticed a lot of 3D printed slop and cheap items bought from alibaba/aliexpress/amazon and then sold for a lot more. 

(Be wary of booths that do not allow you to take pictures. I understand why someone who is selling fanart might not want pictures taken but every time I hear of a booth that was selling stolen art, A.I. art, aliexpress/alibaba/amazon things (and claiming they personally made it), etc. they also did not allow photos.)

Because of the mass produced slop that is invading the con space, it is hard to find quality items for a fandom. I wish cons would do more vetting so that there could be better options in the vendor hall instead having to pick between 4 booths that are selling the same rocks that may or may not be what they claim to be, 3 booths selling bootleg merch saying they designed and made it themselves, a bunch of booths selling 3D printed slop, etc. I know of at least one con that takes the vendor hall very seriously and if it didn’t give away my location I would promote them here. But it shouldn’t be a one off thing, it should be the baseline for conventions.

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Another way that capitalism is encroaching on the fanfiction/fandom space is through the expectations of new fans or readers. In my essay on capitalism and self identity, I talk about how capitalism is inherently individualistic and this has become an increasing problem with social media and algorithms that will only show you what you want to see.

When I was first creating this series on fanfiction, puritan culture and commercialization were going to be combined because one bleeds into the other. When people only see things that they already like, they are going to expect the same in every space they enter. But the thing about fanfiction, and AO3 in particular, is that you will see things that don’t directly support whatever it is you like. There is no algorithm on AO3, you have to search for what you want to read and you are inevitably going to see things that don’t relate to your interests. But capitalism makes us believe that the only person that matters in the whole world is ourselves and so seeing things that don’t directly relate to you can feel like an offense.

I believe this is why puritan culture and the fanfiction discourse at the moment is so toxic is because at the end of the day what people are mad about isn’t that these fics are being written, it's that they have to see them. Some people might be trying to do some moral high ground thing by calling others evil and freaks for what they read (moral individualism. I highly suggest reading at least the parts about individualism in my capitalism essay) and then assert themselves as the ‘good’ ones. This leads to strong puritan beliefs and is a cause for what we are seeing today on AO3 and Tumblr. 

It is also important to note that any social media platform with an algorithm is inherently conservative, in my opinion. It is a lot easier to be a conservative and to interact with conservative content on algorithm based social media compared to non/limited algorithm based social media since you have to physically search for what you want to see. 

Another example are people who are used to reading BookTok books and then moving over to fanfiction and treating fanfiction the same way they would a book. But fanfiction is not some monetary item that you buy, it is a gift from one person to the next and should not be treated the same way as published works. 

(Side note: I lowkey might write an essay on BookTok books since I’ve been trying to read some and…I have a lot to say about it. I think a lot of popular published romances these days are just conservative values rebranded as agency and activism)

Since fanfiction is a gift, you should not comment on them like you are reviewing a book or telling the author you wished they wrote something else. I have seen too much of this and it is driving me insane. If you are going to comment, then you should be praising the author or the work in some way. If you do not want to praise the piece, then don’t comment. Don’t interact. Put that gift aside and pick up another one. Not everything is going to appeal to you. That’s just a fact of life.

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Capitalism wants us to believe that the only thing that matters in the world is ourselves. Our pleasure. Our pain. And the downside to that is that it makes us convinced that we are alone and that no one could ever understand us. But capitalism is an economic system that hurts everyone within it and it can only continue to work if there is rampant inequality and suffering. 

It is easier for us to imagine the end of the world than it is for us to imagine an end to capitalism. We don’t remember what society used to be like before our bodies and abilities were exploited so that someone else could make money. And so, it is hard for people to imagine what Democratic Socialism could look like. But I don’t think we have to look far.

AO3 is a great example of what can happen if a bunch of people come together for the greater good. The site is completely run and funded by the people for the people. It lets people read and interact with things without having to see ads or having to go through any sort of paywall. It is a community effort that supports the community. 

Capitalism wants us to believe that there is nothing that we can do. That we are just in a losing battle and any fight is going to be worthless. Alone we may be weak, but together we are strong.

Only 1-5% of the US population came out for the No King’s protest. And yet that looked like everyone. But could you imagine how much change there would be if just 10% of the US population came out? (which would be roughly 34 million people). The current government wants to limit what we can see and do online. And we already know that it is most likely going to directly target queer spaces like AO3. We need to protect this community and its people. 

“What if no one shows up to the protest?” But what if everyone does? That is how we need to think. We need to dream of a better future and do everything we can to get us there even if it may be impossible. 

It is really easy to fake caring about something, but it is a lot harder to fake showing up.

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Articles:

Fan Labor

Gift Giving in Anthropological Perspective 

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When I was writing this in the library a really nice old guy sat down next to me and was using the library to print out his investment portfolio which was over 40 million. What in the dystopia is this?

Also if you want to join a tag list just for my essays let me know :)

This is lowkey unedited so I may come back later and change some things around. Or if you think I left anything out please let me know :)

[wisdomseulogy]

MASTERLIST

Welcome to my blog :) I post both my non-fiction and fiction here.

Non-Fiction:

Fanfiction Manifesto Part 1: Fanfiction as a window into the self

Fanfiction Manifesto Part 2: How puritan culture, misogyny, and homophobia are affecting fandom spaces and fanfiction.

Fanfiction Manifesto Part 3: Fanfiction/Fandom and Commercialization/Capitalism

On Capitalism and the Formation of Self Identity in the United States

Fiction:

DC:

You Were so Good (Mob Boss AU Platonic Batfam x gn!Reader, angst)

Just Breathe (Jason Todd x gn!Pregnant!Reader, heavy angst)

Not Your Typical Alpha Romance (SuperBat Omegaverse, comedy/angst)

I only threw this party for you (SuperBat Great Gatsby AU)

The Curse of the Sun Part 1 (Vampire x Priest SuperBat AU)

Marvel:

Stony/Stucky headcanons

Tony Wishes He did (Tony Stark x Steve Rodgers, Omegaverse, Angst)

[wisdomseulogy]

NOT YOUR TYPICAL ALPHA ROMANCE

Omega!Bruce Wayne x Alpha!Clark Kent imagine

TW: implied mpreg, some romance, some angst.

This is PG 13.

Also I took some liberties with the timeline of things. I know Dick is canonically in his teens when his parents die, but I decided to make him around 8 years old

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It was supposed to be just another normal interview. Bruce can't even remember what it was supposed to be about. Since him and the reporter ended up doing a lot more than just talking.

Bruce put a lot of work into appearing as the most desirable alpha, and his body helped him keep up that visage. But when he presented as omega, he decided that he was going to keep the truth with him to his grave.

He kept up the playboy act really well. An alpha that cant seem to settle down and spends his free time going to charity events and keeping up his image. He never fit the image of an omega anyways, he was strong and tall. But his body had another idea when he was alone in the room with the alpha reporter who just so happened to forget to wear scent blockers.

Clark was running late to the interview. The paper wanted it to be done in Bruce's manor with a few shots of him in his office. The interview was going to be about how he manages to balance his work and home life.

When Clark first arrived in Metropolis he quickly learned about the enigmatic alpha bachelor from Gotham. Its impossible to not look up at the alpha for inspiration, admiration, and maybe a little desire. Bruce had everything Clark liked, a strong dominant flirty personality who seemed to deeply care about others.

The Wayne Foundation was doing more for Gotham than the government or anyone else ever would. And Clark admired that. How someone so strong and revered could still have empathy for others and still try to do good.

Most alphas fall into a pit of constantly having to prove their masculinity and alpha status. But Bruce didn't need to do all of that. He didn't need to be mean and rude to prove that he was an alpha to be reckoned with. Proved that there could still be good role models for young children.

So maybe Clark was a little bit blinded by his devotion to notice that Bruce was an enigma. An omega stuck in an alphas body. If Clark tried hard enough he could probably use super senses to smell Bruce's true presentation, but the illusion and dream was too strong. And Clark would be lying if it didn't give him a thrill every time he thought about being alone in the same room with such a strong alpha.

Bruce had been using his military grade suppressants for far too long and his body was starting to give out. He knew that if he used them for too long without a break then they would lose their effectiveness, but he figured it would just be one interview and then he could go on vacation somewhere remote for a few weeks and come back as the same strong alpha as before.

The whole interaction started innocently enough. Clark was a bit disheveled struggling to carry a camera, tripod, and a lengthy folder of possible questions. Bruce smiled and leaned in, putting on his playboy charm. He grabbed the stack of papers. "Let me help you. I can't have such a lovely reporter as..." Bruce gave Clark his signature long and suggestive look. Biting his lip a little to continue the façade.

The playboy alpha stereotype was a role that Bruce played amazingly well and it also helped to deepen his image. Omegas weren't supposed to be flirty. They weren't supposed to imitate at all, and Bruce made sure to be everything an omega isn't.

"Diligent as yourself." Bruce pondered calling the poor alpha something like 'lovely' or 'caring' but that felt a little too over the top even for him. And this was meant to be a business transaction. The poor alpha was on the job and Bruce didn't want to harass him too much. A little was okay though.

But a little quickly turned into a little more and then eventually the folder of papers was scattered across Bruce's expensive mahogany desk as he tenderly held Clarks head as the two kissed.

Clark, for his part, thought that this was just a part of Bruce's personality. He also knew that this could jeopardize his job and his future at the Daily Planet. But when Bruce leaned in, his eyes half lidded and his breath coming in a bit to ragged to be normal, Clark threw decorum out the window. This was a once in the lifetime chance with his idol, and even he wasn't going to miss it.

Clark was so engrossed in the moment he didn't even notice that Bruce doesn't have alpha specific anatomy. He just wished that moment could last forever. Every breath, a prayer. Bruce could have been saying the most outrageous things at that moment and Clark would still have received it as a divine message.

Meanwhile, Bruce was in his own personal hell. He was at war with his body and his desires. Mentally, Bruce was going through the moral implications of sleeping with a reporter for a newspaper that he owns. If Clark decided to say anything this could blow up in his face and the only way Bruce would be able to save himself would be by revealing the truth.

Bruce was...cordial after. A little bit too much for Clark's liking. Clark wondered if it was naïve of him to think that he actually meant something to the billionaire playboy. He was probably just another name on a long list of trysts.

Luckily, Clark never said anything about the interaction afterwards. Granted he would lose his job is he did, but it at least gave Bruce some hope that the reporter didn't find out about his true presentation. Even an upstanding reporter wouldn't be able to hold back from a tell-all article about how one of the most famous alphas in the world was actually an omega. No doubt it could generate Clark millions of dollars if he went public with the information or sold it to some new agency of information broker.

As decided, Bruce went on a long impromptu trip to Rome. The official statement was that he was scouting the area to possibly put the European head quarters of Wayne Enterprises, but the truth was a lot more dubious. When Bruce cut off the suppressants entirely he expected to go into heat, or maybe something of the sort. But nothing happened.

And after a month Bruce's suspicions were confirmed, he was pregnant.

Alfred had seen many crazy things while working at Bruce's side. He saw the young boy turn into a strong young man and a protector of an entire city. But crazier than all of that was seeing hearing of the pregnancy. Alfred nearly broke an expensive bottle of wine and nearly tipped over a wine cart of crystal glasses.

Bruce is the one that came up with the plan. He was going to have the kid in secret. Pay a family very good hush money to raise the kid as their own and when the time came, Bruce would adopt the kid. Call it a charity. And even if the child looked like him, he would have elaborate falsified documents to prove that its just a coincidence. And no one would be wiser.

Though his plans came crashing down when he went to visit the child at the circus and discuss the next stage of the plan with the parents when, due to the ropes in their circus act getting intentionally cut, the parents fell to their death. And his kid, Dick, watched it all happen.

Bruce wondered then and there if he should tell Dick the truth. That he was his 'real' father but he decided against it. Maybe it was the empathetic part of him, but he didn't want to hurt his son anymore than he already has been. And with the adoptive parents being dead, it was a lot more believable for Bruce to adopt his son.

And everything would have went perfectly...if his son was not obsessed with Superman. Bruce didn't have any particular feelings for the metropolis hero, but Dick didn't even care that Bruce was Batman. When Bruce told him his identity, all the kid asked is if he knew Superman.

This made Bruce's jaw twitch. And that became a common theme. While trying to get over the grief of losing both his parents, Dick consumed himself with Superman. A pillar of hope. A ray of sunshine in a dangerous world. Someone who would not think twice about saving a kid in danger.

Bruce indulges his son, giving him a Superman themed room and all the Superman merch the kid could want. And every night Bruce sat through the same YouTube videos of Superman saving people. It was honestly exhausting, but the guilt of lying to his son was reason enough to continue the indulgence.

Dick took to being Robin like a fish to water. The second Bruce framed it as Dick being just like Superman Dick was already swinging from the banister showing all the cool moves he was going to use against the bad guys.

"And then!" Dick shouts while getting ready to show Bruce his next move. "I do a flip and I kick the bad guy in the face! And I punch him in the arm and I say 'This is to truth, justice, and a better tomorrow!'" Dick said excitedly.

Bruce's smile didn't reach his eyes, staring to wonder if this obsession was unhealthy. "That's Superman's catchphrase, you can't use it kid."

Dick pouts. Then, as if a light bulb turning on in his head, he perked up. "What about, 'Holy moly I'm going to turn you into guacamole'."

Alfred stifled a laugh.

"Let's put a pin in the whole catchphrase thing and we can come back to that later," Bruce offered while trying to gently lead Dick into the Batcave.

"But Superman has such a cool catchphrase and I need a cool catchphrase too."

"You don't need a cool catchphrase. You just need...to make sure the bad guys don't get away. Got it? Now lets get ready-" Bruce was cut off by Dick running down the stairs at a lightning speed that made Bruce pause for a moment.

The first time Bruce brought Dick with him to the Watchtower he knew it was going to be a whole event. He had already emotionally prepared himself for Dick to run off immediately to find Superman even though he told Dick many times to stay by his side and to not bother any of the other heroes.

And without fail, Dick immediately ran off looking Superman. Bruce sighed as Wonder Woman walked up and greeted him.

Bruce had already mentioned his new sidekick at the last meeting and everyone was so interested in meeting the kid. But Bruce warned them that Robin was a bit...special. Maybe a bit obsessive. And at times hard to keep still. He conveniently left out the part where he's obsessed with Superman since Bruce still hold onto a slight hope that Dick would listen and stay by his side.

"I see the little one ran off," Diana said with a smirk.

Bruce sighed. "He can be a bit of a handful at times."

"Don't you think he's a bit...young to be in this line of work?" Diana asked. Bruce never told them how old Dick was, so the others were imagining at least a 13 or 14 year old, not an 8-9 year old.

Bruce did wonder that at first. If Dick wasn't ready to be on patrol. But the kid just had such a...zeal for being a superhero that he's sure Dick would have snuck out and joined him on patrol anyways.

"Do you remember that time you saved that family from the burning building? You were so cool when you came out holding them like whoosh woosh and you landed like boom boom and everyone was clapping and that you said," Dick was talking a mile a minute and Clark was barely understanding his jumbled words. "It's only a part of the job," Dick said in his mock deep voice. "And then you flew up and it was so cool. I watch that every night."

"Oh."

Clark was a little stunned as he walked over to Batman, ready to return Robin to his caregiver. Clark loved kids and was very excited to meet Robin for the first time. But now he understood all the vague things Batman said about the kid. Though, it warmed a piece of his heart that such a broodish and cold alpha like Batman would be so gentle and caring to such a kid.

For all that Clark is worth, he never stopped liking Bruce Wayne. But when he first met Batman, it felt like love at first sight. Tall, handsome, strong, and he had a mysterious cold edge to him that just made Clarks heart flutter and his head fill with every possible scenario of their future life together.

But liking Batman felt like he was cheating on his first real love, Bruce Wayne. Though he knew the billionaire would never love him back, Clark still felt like he was doing something wrong. He hadn't talked to Bruce one on one in practically 9 years and it was finally time for Clark to put aside his impossible crush.

"I hope he didn't bother you too much," Bruce said in his deep Batman voice while reaching for Dick. Dick turned to Bruce and stuck out his tongue.

"Do you remember that time the bad guys blew up the train tracks and you had to grab the trains and stop them from colliding? It was like screeeech." Dick ignored Bruce and turned back to his true hero and inspiration. "Or the time there was that big earthquake and you and Krypto were going through the...the uhh the"

"Robin," Bruce said in a firm voice.

Clark gave him an awkward smile while once again trying to hand the kid off to his guardian. "I think maybe it's your bed time."

"No!" Dick flipped out of Superman's hold and hid behind him.

Clark was impressed at the speed and agility. No wonder a kid like him was able to hold his own against criminals.

"Robin."

"I don't want to go home!" Dick pouted furiously, tears threatening to fall down his face at any moment.

Bruce sighed.

"Sometimes we have to make sacrifices kid," Superman said encouragingly. "Next time you come maybe I can sign something for you."

"Really?!?" Dick's emotions were like the swing of a pendulum, one moment sad and depressed the next happy and excited.

"Yes, but you have to listen to Batman."

"...Ok...I guess we can leave." Dick kicked the ground lightly, defeated.

Superman gave Bruce an encouraging smile. "He's a good kid. Nice of you to -uh- take him in."

Diana gave a knowing smile as she looked between Batman and Superman.

After that first interaction, Bruce made sure Dick could at least contain his obsession slightly and not instantly run to Superman and bother him.

Bruce and Clark were scheduled to be just two boats sailing off, never meant to cross paths again. At least as civilians. And yet somehow Bruce found himself cursing whatever God or power that be there was which caused him to have to be alone in a room with Clark Kent again.

The interview was going to be simple, the public loved the fact that Bruce adopted a child orphaned due to crime and the Daily Planet decided they wanted to full inside scoop. Bruce made sure it wasn't going to be Clark that was interviewing him, but as fate would have it, the original interviewer got sick and that was how Bruce found himself sitting across from the father of his 'adopted' child.

Dick wasn't interested in doing an interview. It took a lot of coaxing on Bruce and Alfred's part to get him to agree to sit still for at least thirty minuets. Bruce had promised him that they could have whatever Dick wanted for desert and that Bruce would try to bring Dick with him to the next Justice League meeting.

"What's it like being a new parent? It's not often we see lone alphas willingly adopt a child."

All of Bruce's responses were prepared in advance. "Well I am not just any alpha."

Clark swallowed hard and tried to keep himself from blushing at that. Man, he felt like a kid experiencing his first crush all over again.

"And what's it like having such a successful man as a role model?" Clark asked Dick.

Dick finally turned and looked the reporter in this face. He paused and knitted his eyebrows together. "Superman?"

Bruce closed his eyes and took in a nice and controlled breath. Not even noticing the way that Clark visibly stiffened. Bruce had went over all the questions with Dick the night before, but one of the first rules of raising a child was to expect the unexpected.

"Sorry, he's a huge fan of Superman these day. Isn't that right?"

Dick didn't answer. He studied the reporter. "Are you Superman?"

"Now Dick- sorry like I said this is a bit of a...special interest of his. How about you answer the nice mans question?" Bruce's eye twitched as he tried to steer the conversation back.

Dick shook his head and pointed at Clark. "You look like Superman. I met him. He looks like you."

Bruce ran a hand down his face. "I am so sorry Mr. Kent. We may have to reschedule the interview for another time."

Clark didn't register a word Bruce said, he was too busy staring the kid down trying to figure out why his enchanted glasses weren't working on the kid. And what was this about Bruce Wayne's charge meeting him? Could it have been before Bruce adopted him? Clark mind spun.

"Oh yes well I can also skip onto the next questions, um" Clark stammered as he tried to blink away his fear of getting found out.

Meanwhile, Bruce is just happy that it doesn't seem like Clark realizes that Dick is his kid. The last thing Bruce needed was for his secret to get found out. He already managed to dodge the bullet of his omega status being known, now he just needed to make sure that no one knew that Dick was his biological child.

Eventually, Clark and Bruce continued the interview as normal. But Dick only wanted to talk about Superman after that. Crossing his arms and staring Clark down like he was trying to size him up.

Fuck, Clark thought, this kid really does know. Why aren't the glasses working?

That night, Clark was consumed by his thoughts and worries. But he couldn't put his finger on how the kid knew his identity. The glasses were obviously working, Bruce thought the kid was just playing games. So why was this child special?

And where did he meet him?

"Ugh," Clark lightly hit his head against his desk. The act was more symbolic than anything else. He was at an impasse.

As if grabbing onto an invisible string, a thought so impossible solidified in Clarks mind. Clark had two obvious crushes, Bruce Wayne and Batman. And both alphas recently look in a young boy. Both boys were obsessed with Superman and he had personally met Robin on multiple occasions.

But the next string of thought felt even more impossible. People like...Clark were immune to some magic enchantments. The glasses probably wouldn't work on someone who was a Kryptonian. Or even half Kryptonian. Though it is possible that Dick was something else entirely that was also immune to the enchantment.

"That would be impossible," Clark groaned. "I might as well be grasping at straws."

In a sea of impossibilities, this...option felt the most likely. If anything, Clark would just ask Bruce about it and they would have a good laugh. Or Clark could lose his job for bringing up their one-night stand.

The waves of curiosity were nipping at him and he decided to take the plunge. At the next Gala, Clark managed to fenagle himself an invite through his work. It took a bit of convincing and maybe a few under handed tactics, but he needed to know if his theory was correct.

Bruce is his usual suave self, making Clarks heart jump as he builds up the confidence to confront him.

Is the kid mine? No... I can't say it like that. So I noticed that your child looks a lot like you. No...Hey I'm Superman and I think you're Batman. No... Clark grabs a random champagne flute and downs it as he notices Bruce step out onto a terrace outside.

The cold air bit into his skin as he opened up the door. Bruce was standing there nursing a cigar, his body tensing when he heard the door open.

"It's occupied," Bruce said.

"Um," Clark started. In all honesty, he still didn't know what to say. The words were stuck in his throat and they were threatening to stay there forever. "I-"

Bruce whips around. Smoke billowing slowly around him. His eyes no longer portraying the calm and collected demeanor that he always had. Bruce had expected it would come to this.

"I didn't know it was customary for entry level reporters to attend these things."

This wasn't the Bruce Wayne he knew. This wasn't the Batman he knew. Clark didn't know who this was but he didn't like any second of it.

"I-someone couldn't make it so..."

"That was the excuse last time too, right? Clark, is it? What we had was a one time thing-"

"Is the kid mine?" Clark blurted out.

The air stilled. No one dared to move. The truth hanging in-between them. An invisible red string of fate tying them together.

"How much do you want? Just say a number. Better yet, I will have Alfred send you a blank check and you can just put whatever amount you want on there."

Silence. "Or would you prefer a promotion? I can pull some strings and-"

"That's...he's...he's my kid?" Clark was stunned. He thought for sure that he was wrong. That it was so impossible that it was laughable. Never in a billion years did he imagine that he had a kid with the alpha playboy billionaire Bruce Wayne....omega playboy billionaire Bruce Wayne.

"What do you want? For your silence." A million emotions ran through Bruce's head. His heart feeling like a jumbled up mess of yarn. This was his worst nightmare. All the other times that he thought he would surely die and shrivel up did not come anywhere close to this. His entire reputation was on the line. His entire livelihood. Everything he fought so hard for. So hard to protect. His city. His family. Everything was slipping through his fingers.

"I-Can I be in his life-does he know?" Clark asked.

Bruce opened his mouth to respond but nothing came out.

"How did you do it? I mean no one suspected a thing. If it wasn't for the fact my glasses don't work on him because he's half Kryptonian then I would have never known."

"Kryptonian?"

"Oh."

Bruce took another drag of the cigar and run a hand through his hair. This was more complicated than he even imagined. Not only was his baby daddy a reporter, he was also Superman. God, Dick is obsessed with Superman.

"I-Can I-I want to be a part of his life. He obviously likes me and-"

"No!" Bruce shouts a bit too loud making Clark flinch. "He likes you because you're his favorite superhero. No. He can't know."

"He looks like us," Clark tried to reason, but he might as well be reasoning with a brick wall.

"And so do his parents. Just-Just tell me what it is you want and I will give it to you. He can't know. He can't. He misses his parents so much. He can't know they weren't his real parents." Bruce didn't realize when exactly his anger turned into pleading. Bargaining. Begging.

Clark nodded slowly. "I understand. I just...I have a lot to think about now."

"Me too," Bruce offered, his cold aloof mask completely cracked.

"Even if he doesn't know that I am his...dad...I still want to...hang out with him sometimes." Now Clark was doing the pleading.

Two broken boats, their rudders knocking them into each other once again.

"I can make that work."

---

Not beta read.

Should I do a part 2?

[wisdomseulogy]

JUST BREATHE

Jason Todd X Reader (Gender neutral except that reader is pregnant)

TW: Death, Abortion, Teen Pregnancy, Heavy Angst, Religious imagery, sadness, suffering, mentions of SI, happy ending. This is meant to be psychologically sad, do not read if you don't want to experience that. I also took some liberty with the timeline of things.

Divinely inspired by the song: Breathe (2 AM) by Anna Nalick

Images are not mine

---

You first met Jason a few years ago when he started attending Gotham Academy. By then, the school already felt suffocating. Surrounded by rich kids in an impoverished neighborhood who care more about networking then they care about actual friendships.

You felt like you always had to sell yourself just to get a few words in because you weren't like them. The Wayne foundation gave you a full-ride to the private school and you thought maybe this would be your chance to break the cycle of generational poverty. But instead you were met with a bunch of people who were busy trying to prove that they were worthy enough to be friends with. Morals only matter to people in privilege, you didn't get that choice when you were born.

But Jason was different. It felt like he understood you in a way that the others couldn't. And maybe that's why you fell in love with him and still clung to the hope of him even when times were tough.

The relationship was very rocky. You hated how secretive he was and how he could go days without messaging you or even showing up in class. It made your mind drift to the possibility that something might have happened to him. And whenever you brought this up with him he just brushed it off saying he was busy and that you wouldn't understand.

Maybe you were so blinded by the illusion of hope that he gave you to notice him slipping. His eyes darker, staring off into space for longer. His texts shorter and the times you couldn't reach him stretching from just a couple days to weeks. But when he came back to your open arms, it was like all was right with the world. That all those lonely nights were worth it if it meant you could sleep by his side at least once.

You didn't expect to get pregnant. How many teenagers really expect that? But when you saw those two blue lines your heart fluttered for a moment, like a snowflake distilled in time, until it plummeted to the floor. A kid. His kid. Your kid.

Your brain turned into a flurry of thoughts. What would he say? Would he care? Would he want to be a part of the kids life?

A part of you was thankful it was his, at least you knew that the Wayne family would help you two to take care of the kid so you wouldn't have to relive your own childhood once again from a taller perspective.

It wasn't long before you started looking at baby clothes and trying to figure out what name you would give the child. But after a while the numbing fear of having to break the news to him set in.

He was on one of his no contact binges again. You figured he would come back in a week or so and you could tell him then. But he never came back.

What did come was a spattering of missed calls and texts. When you saw your phone lighting up in the middle of the night you smiled and assumed it must be Jason.

"Please call me back." A text from Bruce Wayne. You forgot he even gave you his number. A vague memory of him putting his contact into your phone at the last 'family' dinner telling you to let him know if anything happened.

You weren't sure when you stopped breathing, but you took a forceful inhale as you sat up and paused your finger over the button to call him back.

"Uh hey, it's me. You wanted to talk? Is Jason ok?" The words flew out of your mouth is a stuttering speed.

The short silence told you something you already knew. Jason was not ok.

Your conscious mind didn't even register Bruce's response before you found yourself running to the bathroom to throw up. The world was spinning so fast and all you had to hang onto was the toilet.

Someone came to check on you. You don't even remember who, your body moving on auto-pilot as you take a back seat and watch as the blizzard intensifies.

You were running through an endless tunnel and the snow banks were getting higher and higher. Screaming and clawing your way out. The closer you got to the light, the farther away it felt. Until you were standing in a church dressed in mourning black and holding a bouquet of roses. The thorns biting into your fingers but you didn't care. Nothing felt real anymore.

You looked around and you recognized the others. Bruce, Dick, Alfred. But that was it. Just you, them, and a coffin. His coffin.

Maybe it was the December air that froze your tears, and you tried so hard not to beat yourself up for not crying. Shouldn't you be crying?

A firm hand lands on your shoulder and you turn and look up at Bruce, his face cold and impassive. He notices the slight trickle of blood dripping down your fingers and onto your clothes.

"You should have Alfred bandage that up when...you're done," he said before giving you a tight smile that did nothing to encourage you. "I'm sorry," he says before giving you a pat on the back and walking away with Dick.

Sorry. That word meant nothing to you anymore. What was he to be sorry about? The news said it was the Joker. That he had been beaten so hard with a crowbar that his body was indistinguishable. They figured out it was him from dental records and blood tests.

You vaguely remember being asked if you wanted to see the body and you shook your head. You don't want to remember him like that. Like a beaten corpse. You didn't want those images poisoning your memory.

His memory.

The memory that was growing inside of you. The child that you had so much hope for turned into a parasite. A reminder of everything you've lost.

There was no way you were going to raise a kid on your own. Sure, you could have told Bruce that the kid was Jason's and maybe he would offer support, but that would mean having to tell people that you were pregnant with Jason's child. And if you said that aloud then...it would be real.

And right now its just a secret. A secret that no one needed to know. A burdened that was for some reason pushed onto you and now you had to decide what to do.

You hadn't been far along. If you went now you could get an abortion. Or maybe you could pray diligently and hope for a miscarriage. Or you could drink so much that you hope both of you die.

A very small part of you hoped-reasoned-that maybe Jason could take care of the kid for you if you let them reunite. Another part of you was going through pages and pages of people explaining how it is just a fetus and you shouldn't feel anything. But that fetus was once a bright star in your starless night, and now it is a black hole threatening to destroy everything.

Their eyes felt like they were burning through you. But everyone was here for the same reason right? And it was just a medical procedure and you didn't have anything to worry about and the receptionist gave you smile that reminded you that you still existed. That sometimes we work so hard for a future that we have no control over and eventually some people are going to wind up in a waiting room.

And it just so happened to be you this time. Trying to breathe through frozen tears in a vast silent snow covered meadow. Hoping that eventually December will just be another month and you will be able to live past this. Maybe one day the sun will shine and your heart will defrost and you can be happy once again. That you can smile once again.

Life is like car ride and you are the passenger. The only choice you have is which window to look out of and which music to play. But your destination will always be the same. And maybe one day you can look out of the front instead of the back.

Its been years since then. Since you closed your eyes as your half-naked body lay atop the medical bed like a bleeding lamb on an alter. Presented to the heavens as an offering. Praying that this was the right choice. And if its not to grab your soul and destroy it. Or else let you be reunited with the man you loved.

The pain gets better over the years and eventually you are smiling again. Even through the thickest of blizzards, the sun can still shine. Though at first it felt wrong, like it was burning your skin. That you weren't meant to be in its warmth and you were meant to die of hypothermia. You eventually get used to it.

To have loved and lost meant that you at least were loved. Knew how to love. Knew how to hope. Knew how to exist.

Though you never did cancel the baby registry. Your mind stills slightly as you get the email congratulating your baby for their 5th birthday.

And you don't even notice as the sun glints off a red helmet. You turn off your phone and go back to hanging out with your friends.

---

Not beta read.

[wisdomseulogy]

YOU WERE SO GOOD

MOB BOSS AU, Platonic! Batfam x gn!Reader (Mainly Dick)

TW: Death, gore (ish), angst, traumatic experiences

You were adopted by Bruce fairly young and didn't know that Bruce was actually the head of an organized crime syndicate (the mob) until Jason died and you learned the truth about your family.

You hated the mob/crime and the second you could you moved out of the manor and got your own apartment and job on the completely opposite side of Gotham

You never spoke to anyone in the family for years, having even gone so far as to get a new phone and phone number

But everything comes crashing down on you when you accidentally kill a man who was drunk and already injured after a bar fight. He runs into you and you gently push him out of the way but it makes him stumble backwards and hit his head just right on the pavement to die almost instantly

Freaking out and unsure of what to do, you decide to call the only number you still had memorized. Dicks. (Well you could probably try to remember Bruce's number but there was no way you were going to call him)

"Hello?" Dick says in a confused voice.

You shakily explain to him the situation and give him the cross street that you are standing at. Before you know it, there is an nondescript van pulling up with tinted windows.

Men in suits jump out and give you a once over before opening up the passenger side door. Dick steps out in his signature blue and black suit. Older than you remember but just as intimidating.

He walks around you looking for any injuries before motioning to the car. You open up your mouth to try and explain yourself but he shakes his head.

"Not here," he says in a rough voice while nodding his head toward a CCTV camera that was pointed precariously at you.

Most of the men that got out of the car stay there while you get into the backseat.

"Don't worry, they'll take care of it. I have Tim erasing the footage as we speak. The clean up crew will just make sure there is no trace of you on his body," he says so casually it makes you want to throw up. "I'm taking you to a safe house."

You open your mouth to argue, all you wanted to do right now was curl up in bed, but you decide not to fight it. You didn't know anything about the 'family business', once you found out the truth Bruce forced you to learn self defense and how to handle multiple different types of weapons. But you didn't want to learn all those things, you wanted to be a normal child from a normal family.

"I thought I could escape this life," you say softly. Dick's face twitches ever so slightly at your comment, but you can't see it. His face is focused on his phone as he is waiting for confirmation from Tim and the clean-up crew that everything has been handled.

"You're going to have to talk to Bruce eventually. It is only a matter of time before he knows. Nothing goes undetected under his watch," Dick says.

You shake your head, trying to keep both tears and your own thoughts at bay. The last thing you needed right now is to talk to your adoptive father.

After moving out of the manor, you changed your last name back to your birth parents last name, throwing away 'Wayne'. It was more than an act of rebellion, it was a way for you to signal to yourself that you were different from those monsters.

You're not sure how much time has passed, but you eventually arrive at the safe house. It is a decent sized cottage in a forested area. Out of all the safe houses, Dick decided to bring you to the one farthest from the city. If it wasn't for the fact that you knew Dick wasn't going to try and kill you or anything you would have been suspicious.

Instead of going straight to one of the rooms, you decide to hunker down on a slightly dusty couch in front of the fire place. Dick grabs some firewood and old newspaper and starts a fire.

Your brain wonders as you watch the flames dance around. The reality that you inadvertently killed someone clawing at the outer edges of your consciousness.

You don't even notice that Dick's phone keeps buzzing and barely even register when he steps outside periodically.

Some part of you wondered if this was all a very elaborate dream. In no real world would you ever willingly call your siblings. Thus, this must be some figment of a twisted imagination. A nightmare meant to instill lifelong psychological trauma instead of a quick momentary fear.

But the way the mans blood pooled under him and the scent of copper and liquor was all too real. And you didn't know if you would ever be able to remove either of those two from your memories.

You're sure everyone has heard about this by now. And in your twisted imagination fueled by self-hatred and yearning, you imagine them laughing at you. Joking about how you have finally become like them. That you finally killed someone and so now you can no longer say that you are not like them.

You imagine Damien's sneer, his insults were always the worst and you can't imagine he has changed all too much since you last saw him. Even though he was just a kid back then.

Their wicked smiles and sneers, teeth speckled with blood and flesh taunt your waking mind. Dancing behind your eyes like a macabre comedy. And even in these glances of imagination, you could not defend yourself. Defend yourself from your own torture. The torture you started.

You grabbed the whip when you pushed the guy out of the way, and you cracked the whip against your own back when you stood there silently watching him bleed out. Maybe you could have called an ambulance. Maybe you could have tried to help and maybe that could have saved him. But instead you just stood there in abject shock. The whip hits you again when you decide to call the mob instead of the police. And once again when you hear Dicks voice again. As if all those years that you made sure to distance yourself from that hellhole of a family were nothing and you were back living at the manor.

But no amount of physical pain could ever drown out the knowledge that you are more worried about being seen as a monster than you were about the fact that someone died. That was a fact that you pushed far into your subconscious, deep into the pits of hades. And you threw the only key that could unlock that knowledge into the river Styx and stood silently, making sure it sunk all the way to the bottom.

You don't remember going to sleep, or grabbing a blanket, but all of a sudden you are back in reality. The ocean-like sounds of the forest surrounding you like a pastoral hug. Birds were chirping. Flies were buzzing.

Even though your world ended, the world did not.

"Do you still drink coffee?" Dick asked from the kitchen.

Right, he was still here. You look down at the multicolor wool blanket depicting the migration of bison that Dick must have wrapped around you while you were sleeping.

"Yeah," you respond.

"Any preference?" He asks.

"No."

Not before long, Dick walks over with a mug. You grab it hesitantly and look down at the sand colored liquid.

"Put some oat milk and sugar in there," he said as he slowly sipped his own coffee.

Your chest tightened slightly. Of course they would know how you made your coffee every morning. At this point, it feels almost stupid to ask how he knew that without you telling him. Could it be a guess? Or more likely, did they never stop watching you.

How many cameras were installed in your apartment? Microphones? Of course you could never escape them. You were family. And when you have nothing and the world is a dark dangerous place filled with death at every corner, at least you still had family. Or that's how they thought. But you hated their twisted version of what it meant to be family.

You take a tentative sip and then look up at Dick expectantly. There was an unspoken connection. Both of you knowing what the other was going to say.

"How do you know that?"

"Do you really want to know?"

You think for a moment and take another sip. In all honesty, you didn't want to know. You enjoyed the illusion of privacy and the illusion of freedom. And anything you did to try and hold on tighter to that illusion (finding cameras, figuring out which people in your life they pay for information about you, etc.) was only going to make them work harder. Because you were family. Family.

"Not really," you conceded.

His lips twitched upward slightly, like he had won some grand victory. You started questioning everything. Had they planted that guy there so you would call them? No...they wouldn't do that. They just have a depraved version of care, and Bruce was never one to let someone die without a reason.

"We're having a family dinner tonight, maybe you could stop by. For old times sake, you know?" He asks casually, leaning against the mantle of the fireplace. The fire had long died some time in the night.

You almost chuckled at his question. "With those monsters? Hell no. I would rather die." A bit harsh, even you knew that, but its how you truly felt.

They were monsters and you were...well not a monster. Whatever the opposite of evil incarnate was. That was what you were. A bright and glowing peal in a dark sea. A singular white dove in a wildfire holding onto the last unharmed olive branch. That was what you were.

They were the fire. They were the darkness. They were evil and they were death. They were the monsters under your bed and you were praying helplessly for them to go away. You were on top of the bed and they were below it.

"Monsters...right. Monsters. Evil scary...monsters. How is your life by the way? Got yourself a nice apartment." You don't notice the tightness in his jaw, the coldness in his eyes.

"It's good. I work 9-5. Administration stuff mostly. Lots of email. But it pays well. I have my nice little studio apartment in the good part of Gotham. I have a cat named Titus. That's pretty much it," you respond casually. The coffee tasted just like you always made it. Dick must have gotten the same blend too.

He waits a moment. Wondering if you were going to ask him how he's been, but he knew that such a wish was not grounded in reality.

"Why did you stay in Gotham? The apartment, the job, the cat, it all makes sense. But you could have all those things in any city. Why did you stay here?" Maybe a part of him hoped that the happy kid that he always remembered that would sneak out with him to look up at the stars and listen to music was still there.

They had wanted to protect you. Thought that maybe by never explaining what the family business actually was, you'd be happier. And maybe if Jason didn't die and the truth came out in a much smoother and more regulated way then you would have understood them better. But Dick lost two siblings that day, you and Jason. And Bruce lost two children.

Nothing was the same after that. Though, how could they expect everything to be the way it once was. Holding onto those poisonous nostalgic memories brought him a slight hope that maybe things could eventually go back to the way they once were. Before you shut all of them out.

His question startled you. You never thought about it before. You could have moved to Bludhaven, Metropolis, so many different places. But you never left Gotham. You found the 'safest' part of the city and moved there. Found the safest job and worked there. But you were always only a few bus rides away from Crime Alley.

There weren't that many sirens in your part of the city. Not that many people screaming in the middle of the night. Not that much crime. Your apartment building even had a security guard that would walk you to the bus station if you asked.

When your neighbors learned that you grew up in Gotham, they told you how happy they are it is finally getting better. That finally all that evil crime was going to be stopped and all Gotham needed to drive out all the criminals was more coffee shops and Pilates studios. An old warehouse was recently demolished to build an expensive high-rise building.

But you knew the unsettling truth. There weren't less homeless people, they were just being put onto inter-city busses with a one-way ticket out of the city. There wasn't less crime, the crime was just invisible. Because this was still Gotham.

A part of you wondered how you could ever leave the city that raise you. Gotham was just as much of a part of your family as your dead parents were. And to leave that behind, the last proof you had that at least at one time you were loved, would mean to leave yourself behind.

And you knew who truly controlled Gotham. The Wayne family had the power, trash, gas and water company under their control. Let alone also having control of a multi-billion dollar company. Some of the police force was even inside the Wayne's pocket book.

"The rent was cheap," you respond. You stared at each other in a long awkward silence. "How have you been?" You finally ask.

He raises his eyebrows and looks off to the side. "Oh you know, same old same old. Working nights. Got a few modeling gigs though. I also do a few podcasts here and there about the importance of philanthropy or you know how to be a playboy 101. Few events here and there. Nothing you can't read about in the news."

"Working nights?" You knew what that meant. But you had to ask anyways.

"Yeah. Working nights. As I am sure you are aware. Since you just saw me on the job. Though," he takes a long drawn out sip of coffee. "I thought you wouldn't want to hear about all of that monster talk."

"It's-" you begin but he cuts you off.

"No I get it. I really do. You are a good person. You have a good person job and you live in a good person apartment in a good person part of town with your good person cat living your good person life. I get it. I am a bad person living in my bad person penthouse going about my bad person life. That's why you left right? So you wouldn't have to associate with bad people?" His face is cold and indifferent. Something you've seen from Bruce many times, but never Dick.

"I-I don't want to be a bad person. I don't want to hurt people."

Dick sets his empty cup of coffee on the mantle of the fireplace and stares into the coals. "You act like you're so high and mighty when we both lived and grew up in the same manor. The only difference between you and me is that you got to have a childhood and I didn't. We both have the same adoptive father. We both laughed and played together."

"That's before I found out what the family business actually was!" You nearly shout. This was your worst nightmare. Having to relive all of those memories while trapped in some secluded safehouse.

"Your toys, your furniture, your clothes. It was all paid for by the family business. It was all bought with dirty money. You wouldn't have all of those things if it weren't for the business."

"I didn't want those things. I just wanted a normal family that loved me!"

Dick turns around instantly. His eyes like darts honing in on the bullseye. "We love you. Our love for you wasn't fake. You were the one that threw it all away. Granted, Bruce should not have instantly thrown you into the fire by making you train like some soldier, but he was doing that so that you could defend yourself. The most dangerous weapon in this line of business is knowledge all of a sudden you knew everything. Which meant there was no longer any plausible deniability in case something happened."

"After Jason died..." you pause as the memories flood back. "I told Bruce I was scared that the Joker would kill me too. And you want to know what Bruce did? He handed me a gun! He should have told me I would be fine."

"But there is no guarantee you would be fine. He wasn't going to lie to you. Would you have preferred we just lied to you the rest of your life so that you could live in this fake scenario where we are all one big happy normal family?"

You wanted to say yes but you hesitated.

"Why do you care so much about being good?" Dick asked. His chest heaving with unresolved anger and frustration. All those years of no-contact finally getting to him.

You fidget with the hem of the blanket. In all honesty, you didn't know why you cared so much. But isn't that what everyone should strive for? To be good? To be perceived as good? Right?

The moral of every superhero story is that the hero is good and the villain is bad. The villain is defeated because they are bad and the hero is praised for their goodness. The villain is never praised. They are buried with maybe a headstone if they are lucky.

The villain is forgotten while the city rejoices and parties in the streets as the hero once again saved everyone. Maybe that's what you wanted. To be praised by everyone. To be loved. By everyone. To never be forgotten. But in doing so...you forgot yourself. Forgot who you were and forgot where you came from.

---

Not beta read

[wisdomseulogy]

On Capitalism and the Formation of Self Identity in the United States

Authors note:

First and foremost, this is an opinion piece. I do quote a lot of things to show a lot of research but it is still an opinion piece. I don’t want people reading this and taking everything I say as fact, but rather I would prefer if people used this to help foster a larger conversation.

Next I will be writing part. 3 in my series on fanfiction and fandom culture and it will be about capitalism. I realized I was going to need to explain how deeply capitalism affects our lives first before going into how it relates to fanfiction or fandom culture.

After part 3, I am also working on essays on Christian nationalism and the male loneliness epidemic, but if yall have any suggestions of things you'd like me to write please let me know! My goal is to take these difficult to understand topics and translate them into something more readable and approachable.

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TW: Religion (Christianity), mentions of mental health issues, addiction, gambling, sex written about in an academic way, exploitation, slavery, racism, sexism, homophobia

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Introduction:

A specter, a ghost, of a revolution has wafted through the streets many many times in American history. But every revolution is inevitably hindered by the systematic issues associated with capitalism. Within the framework of capitalism, as we know it today, we will never be able to have a true revolution.

To paraphrase The Communist Manifesto: The history of society, from ancient times till now, is the history of class struggle. The history of the worker fighting against those that exploit them. But it is not only the worker that is exploited but the environment and world at large. Capitalism and the environment are diametrically opposed. But the capitalist will do everything in its power to divest blame onto the consumer or the system that they exist within.

In this opinion piece, I will be delving into the nature of capitalism and especially how it relates to the formation of self identity. I will first be pointing out some of the history of capitalism within the United States and how it relates to colonialism, slavery and religion. I will then move towards talking about how capitalism negatively affects the lives of everyone that lives in a capitalist society (with an emphasis on sex, social media, education, family, mental health, morality, A.I., doom mentality, inaction/apathy, exhaustion, addiction, debt/control, etc.). Finally, I will talk about things that can be done to help those suffering in these systems (return to community, social services, protesting, hopeless optimism in the face of adversity). Each section will be labeled, but I do suggest reading it straight through first since each section builds upon the ones before it.

Key terms:

Capitalist: A rich person who uses capital usually in relation to business and industry. 

Capital: Anything that could be used to produce more wealth (money, buildings, machines, people, etc.)

Exploitation: Using someone or something for personal advantage (i.e. money, etc.)

Inequality: Unequal treatment of individuals (i.e. income inequality where some people make more than others even though they work the same job or how much money rich people are hoarding vs how little money everyone else has)

Individualism: An idea that the desires, needs, and beliefs of the individual are more relevant or important than those of others or the community at large.

Possessive Individualism: two possible meanings: 1. individuals as possessable beings, 2. selfish individualism where someone wants good things for themselves and no one else

Moral Individualism: The idea that people are good or bad without regard to any contextual reasons like the environment, community, history, ethnicity, age, gender, illnesses, disabilities, family, religion etc. 

Colonialism: One country (or people) having control over another country or people. This also includes one country (or people) enforcing their culture and ideas on another country (or people) stripping them of their previous culture, history, belief, or ideas.

Social hierarchy: Where the poorest and more disenfranchised people are at the bottom of the social pyramid while the richest and most well off are at the top of the pyramid. The top of the pyramid cannot exist without the bottom that is their foundation.

Enlightenment: A philosophical movement of the 17th and 18th century which turned away from traditional understandings and focused more on rationalism and the individual.

Free Market: A supply and demand based economy that is unpredictable but can create lots of profit.

Chattel Slavery: The enslavement and owning of people as property. Making the slave a physical piece of property and asset to the slave owner. This is the type of slavery that was used in the US. 

Numbers inside ( ) indicate that I am directly referencing something in the bibliography at the end of the essay. 

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“It is easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism” (Capitalist Realism - Is there no alternative? by Mark Fisher)

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A very brief history: (I might get some of this wrong, so please let me know if I did. I am not a historian)

The history of the United States is the history of colonialism. The British Empire colonized North America, pushing out the indigenous Native Americans. As any American would know from being taught in school, this eventually would lead to more colonies and eventually those colonies gaining independence from Britain and forming their own country. But the shadow of colonialism never left after the end of the revolutionary war, it continued very vibrantly in many different ways: slavery, the subjugation of Native Americans, and also the very economic framework that the US holds so dear: Capitalism. 

(These are not the only ways that the US continued to colonize)

One of the founding fathers of capitalism, Adam Smith, believed the most basic form of human nature was one's pursuit of their own self-interests. This concept came at the same time as the Enlightenment which stripped away traditional and often religious understandings to thinking about someone as an individual and thinking about the world in a ‘rational’ way (which meant without religion or traditional beliefs). 

Through the Enlightenment, the individual, as we know it today, was created. And through the creation of what it meant to be an individual, comes the heightened understanding of individual desires and pleasures. Now, it was morally just to pursue one's own self interests even if it went against the community (18). Through the constant pursuit of self-interest, the idea for capitalism was born. A way for people to constantly pursue happiness and pleasure in a way that would both be economically profitable and also help the viability of the government.

But this system of constantly pursuing self-interests without any recourse, leads to mass exploitation. In the pursuit of more wealth or an easier life, Americans would buy slaves to do whatever they did not want to do themselves and slaves were also the cheapest form of labor. Contrary to popular belief about how the Civil War was started on a pure moral fight against slavery, it was a fight born out of money and unification since the south was making too much money and the southern economy was sustained on slavery. (Eventually it did become a moral fight against slavery as an unjust institution, but that came later.)

The 13th amendment abolished slavery unless to be used as a punishment for a crime. Because of that, slavery as an institution never left America, it was just changed in order to fit the current moral standings of its citizens, but America would never get rid of the cheapest form of labor. In this way, slavery was rebranded and hidden from the general public.

As it stands, the economy of the current age is still upheld through slavery. There are many prisoners today who are slaves, working for little to no pay at all. The foundation of modern capitalism is still slavery as any institution that profits greatly off of massive inequality would never give up the cheapest form of labor.

In an article by the Associated Press (12), they investigate the proclivity for prison slaves as well as the products those slaves make and found that not only are some slaves working on the same plantations that were used during the time of chattel slavery in the south but they also found that “The goods these prisoners produce wind up in the supply chains of a dizzying array of products found in most American kitchens, from Frosted Flakes cereal and Ball Park hot dogs to Gold Medal flour, Coca-Cola and Riceland rice. They are on the shelves of virtually every supermarket in the country, including Kroger, Target, Aldi and Whole Foods. And some goods are exported, including to countries that have had products blocked from entering the U.S. for using forced or prison labor.” (12) 

It should not be surprising that one of the ways mega corporations make excessive profit is through modern slavery. The constant pursuit of self-interest is the foundation that capitalism stands on and anything that can further the self-interest of wealth accumulation will never be contested except by the ones being exploited. 

Prison laborers and undocumented workers are some of the most vulnerable workers (since they have little to no rights, they work in unsafe conditions, they may not be properly trained for dangerous jobs, they are hated/invisible to the public, they cannot speak up for themselves, etc.) as well as being some of the most essential for capitalism to run properly. More so than the documented and non-incarcerated workers, these workers are treated as possessable property and assets. 

The idea of being able to possess others or even oneself is a byproduct of slavery and colonialism (20). It is so prevalent in everyday life that the average person probably doesn’t realize that the way they think about themselves and others is, in a way, dehumanizing. Removing the human and leaving only their worth as a piece of the capitalist machine. 

Though slavery and colonialism has been rebranded or taken away from the public eye, it is a very important facet of capitalism. Capitalism is praised for many things including “its capacity to promote economic growth and personal independence” but at the same exact time “capitalism perpetuates a contemporary form of exploitation akin to slavery by taking advantage of its labor force in the present era” (19) But this is nothing new, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels already knew this when they wrote the Communist Manifesto:

“the modern working class developed - a class of labourers, who live only so long as they find work, and who find work only so long as their labour increases capital. These labourers, who must sell themselves piecemeal, are a commodity, like every other article of commerce, and are consequently exposed to all the vicissitudes of competition, to all the fluctuations of the market [...] Not only are they slaves to the [capitalist] class, and the [capitalist] state; they are daily and hourly enslaved by the machine, by the overlooker, and, above all, by the individual [capitalist] manufacturer himself” (1) (I changed the word bourgeoisie to capitalist since that is what it means in our context)

In capitalism, the worker must sell themselves as an asset to their employers and are then treated as disposable pieces of company property that can be thrown away at any moment. Within this system, there are two forms of slaves, people who are not paid for their work or are forced to work, and people who must sell themselves to be exploited by the system. And the way the worker sells themselves is by proving how much of an asset they can be to the capitalist and how much money they can generate for their employer. Money that the worker will only see miniscule amounts of. 

This form of exploitation is what keeps capitalism running and is why we are seeing so many social issues today. The less the employer has to spend on their workers, the more money the employer makes. This leads to unsafe working conditions, zero benefits (as in like paid time off, health insurance, 401k, etc.), no job security, and no upward mobility (being able to be promoted and thus make more money).

A free market, which is the hallmark of capitalism, means constant change and no consistency. People can lose their jobs, houses, lives, etc. for no fault of their own but purely because the market was doing poorly. And this leads to constant uncertainty and a lack of any control in the average worker's life. Which, of course, leads to many mental health issues. 

Capitalism infects everything that it touches, especially the individual and all aspects of their life. The biggest propaganda win that the US government has is convincing people that capitalism is the only option. Even economists and scholars can agree that capitalism is not the ‘best’, but they have no concept of anything else. 

This is because of many reasons, but one of them is the way in which capitalism weaponizes memory. In the book Capitalism Realism by Mark Fisher, he writes that “capitalism subsumes and consumes all of previous history” (2). We cannot imagine a world outside of capitalism, because capitalism has taken root in the way that we view history and the way that we remember things. The best possible option for the capitalist is if the worker only believes what they can see (2) and thus nothing else is real to them. And then, the capitalist can pick and choose what it wants the worker/citizen to see so that the worker will never know or even comprehend a life outside of the throws of capitalism.

If all the worker knows and sees is a life of exploitation that will inevitably lead to a possibly even preventable death due to the constant pursuit of wealth over humanity, then they will not know any other way of living. And thus, any other way of living will be impossible to understand or comprehend or even feel like oppression.

Memory is just one of the ways that capitalism exerts control over its people, another is religious belief. The Enlightenment sought to understand the world and the individual outside of religious belief and dogma, and though capitalism came about through that, the capitalism that we see in the US today loves and uses religious belief as a way to mobilize and control people. The concept that the average voter/citizen is more likely to listen to their religious leaders than a government official.

One of the reasons that the Christian church in the US is so different from elsewhere around the world is because unlike other countries, there is no unified state sponsored church. Which means that the church must get all of its funding from its parishioners and if the parishioners (people who attend church) stop giving the church their money, the church will go out of business. 

In order to make sure that their parishioners keep giving them money, the church will focus on only talking about things that their patrons want to hear, which inevitably will lead to different understandings of biblical texts and narratives. In the US, if you don’t like what one church says, you can easily just find one that will say exactly what you believe and want to hear. 

(This of course leads to large disparities between church sects and is a huge contributor to Christian nationalism that is becoming more popular today. I will be writing a separate essay specifically about that.)

In the early age of America, “the notions of Christianity and liberty [were so intimately tied] in their minds that it is impossible to make them conceive one without the other” (10 / 7). The idea of being liberated from oppressors like the British Empire and the foundation of democracy was so intrinsically tied to being a Christian. 

This was seen explicitly during the rise of communism where American religious leaders touted that communism was the work of the devil or inherently godless. Famous (or infamous depending of who you ask) American evangelist Billy Graham is quoted of saying “Communism is not only an economic interpretation of life-Communism is a religion that is inspired, directed, and motivated by the Devil himself who has declared war against Almighty God”

But it comes to no surprise that a business that just so happens to also be a religion would be opposed to anything that could change the way the business is run. Though it is interesting how the business of Christianity in the US is very anti social services and it is very common for people in the US who depend on social services like food stamps, social security, medicaid/medicare to vote for conservative representatives that wish to take those same services away (7).

And it also comes to no surprise that the pastors at especially mega-churches would be against things like taxing the rich in order to have more social services because those pastors usually make a lot of money and their income is subject to income tax. 

Capitalism has seeped into everything, and it affects both the world around us and our own perception of ourselves. 

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Capitalism and the formation of the self

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Bodies, sex, sexuality, and the economy:

The first step to understanding how capitalism affects the formation of self identity, is by understanding how it impacts the concepts of the human body and sex. One of the things that comes out of slavery and colonialism is the idea that humans are possessable objects. A person's worth is then tied to their ability to be useful for whoever is above them in the social hierarchy. 

The human has thus been reduced to a sexually stimulating inanimate asset to the economic system. The more productive the human is, the better off the economic system is. And the more bodies there are, the more work can be done, the more taxes can be paid and the more new workers can be born. 

A person's worth is connected to their ability to perform the act of sex and their ability to gain from that act the creation of another human who will eventually enter the workforce and be another asset to the capitalist machine. Men are taught (usually by other men) that their worth is defined by their ability to uphold their duty and human nature as a sexual being to have as much sex as they can. At the same time, women are taught that their self-worth is tied to their ability to raise a family or be desired by the most amount of men as possible. 

With capitalism (and also colonialism since colonizers often took away LGBTQ+ narratives from indigenous cultures to further their heteronormative agenda) comes the need for the most amount of people to be heterosexual as possible. The more heterosexual people there are in a capitalist country, the more potential there is for those people to make babies. Capitalism needs a steady workforce (that can be exploited for financial gain) in order to keep going. 

The reason a lot of capitalist countries are worried about declining birthrates is because it means a decline in the workforce and a decline in the amount of money the rich/capitalist/government can have. In this way, every fetus is a commodity to the government as it could possibly pay taxes, work, or end up in prison/jail where it can also be forced to work. No matter the outcome for the fetus, the government and the rich capitalists will make money as long as more exist. (Even if the fetus dies, the capitalist will make money through medical fees/debt)

The woman's body, in this way, has become a machine and what she produces is more government/capitalist assets. But people are not as easy to control as machines. The government can spend a lot of time and money on propaganda to make people desire to have more children, but no amount of government propaganda will change the economic and social situations of people that can give birth. So, instead of trying to give the average worker more benefits if they have children (like paid maternity leave, financial subsidies, free items such as cribs, clothes, food, etc., free child care, help with housing, etc.) the government is focusing on forcing anyone who may have gotten pregnant to keep their child even if keeping the child would kill them. Because an unborn fetus is more important to the government as a potential asset than the mother herself. 

Women as possessable objects has existed since antiquity, but women as possessable assets for the government/economic system is a newer invention. This coupled by the capitalist concept that a person's worth is completely defined by their ability to work or be productive leads into very misogynistic and heteronormative discourse. (This way of thinking is also very ableist since capitalists only see people as humans if they are working or able to work. Thus, people who are unable to work become less than human. Capitalists are usually also very against government services, subsidies, or assistance to people that they don’t deem to be valuable to the workforce.)

With the rise of individualism and the constant pursuit of self-interest and pleasure (in a male dominated world), comes with it the idea that men are more productive and more active members of society if they have lots of sex. This, of course, has the big downside that it then teaches men that they have no worth in the world or society if they are not having the correct amount of sex or having the right amount of partners. 

“Those invested in the capitalist system work to convince us that these things are necessary parts of life and that participation in them makes us mature adults and “productive” members of society. As Freeman writes, “In the eyes of the state, this sequence of socioeconomically ‘productive’ moments is what it means to have a life at all.” Therefore, cisheterosexual sex itself becomes a means of productivity because it is understood to ultimately lead to marriage, procreation, and nuclear families, all of which are integral to patriarchal and white supremacist capitalist systems” (6 - Refusing Compulsory Sexuality - A Black Asesual Lens on Our Sex-Obsessed Culture by Sherronda J. Brown quoting Time Binds: Queer Temporalities, Queer Histories by Elizabeth Freeman) 

The body is a means of production, an asset to an economy that depends on massive inequality and actively works against people in the lower level of social hierarchy to make sure they never climb. Through gender and race wage gaps, the capitalist can ensure that only people they deem to be deserving are able to climb the ladder of the social hierarchy while also telling everyone in the system that their worth is directly tied to their ability to uphold the system itself. A system that is inherently anti-LGBTQIA+ and upholds the ideals and desires of colonizers (racism, slavery, misogyny, homophobia, etc.) 

“We become only bodies for the nation-state’s use” (6) and our self identity is tied up in these capitalist desires. Anyone “who deprioritize or divest from sex-and often marriage and reproduction along with it-regardless of the reasons why, become a threat to the established systems that rely and thrive on the exploitation of and extraction of labor from our bodies, including sexual and reproductive labor.” (6)

All of these influences affect our sense of selfhood and how we conceptualize ourselves within the capitalist world around us. A good first step to removing ones sense of self from the capitalist ideals is to realize the ideals that are promoting these perceptions of reality. It is possible to have worth and meaning without a job or without a highly profitable job or without having a partner or without getting married or without having kids. Though wanting any one of these things is not bad, it is important to understand why they are so important to the capitalist system.

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Mental Illness, addiction, and gambling: 

As we grow, our brains form. The environment and the world around us is what shapes our brains as we age. So, it should not come at any surprise that a chaotic economic and social system would negatively affect people's brains.

(Caveat: In here I will be talking about my personal opinion about how two very basic human desires are the need to feel special and the need for control. How someone goes about these two things is what defines their personality. But this is my personal opinion and that is also why I put a lot of emphasis that this is an opinion piece and not to be taken immediately as fact or truth but rather be a start of a greater conversation.)

The free market system is inherently stressful and chaotic. One moment someone can have a well paying job, a house, and a nuclear family. The next moment all of that can be stripped away from them for no other reason than the stock market being low. There is no real security (i.e. job security, home security, etc.) in a free market system. But security is what helps us to regulate our bodies and feel, at least in some part, in control of our situation. 

But the discourse about mental health issues is made and curated by people who uphold capitalist ideals and who instead of trying to understand underlying environmental or societal reasons to someone's issues would rather just medicate them and send them on their way back into the workforce. 

“One of the key detrimental influences of capitalism on mental health is the production of inequality. For example, in the 30 years following 1977, 60% of the increase in US national income went to just the top 1% of earners; this is projected to become even more extreme without tax adjustment (Piketty, 2015). Piketty argues that inequality is not an accident but an intrinsic feature of capitalism (Piketty, 2013), while free-market economists argue that substantial inequality is good for the economy (Hasanov and Izraeli, 2011) and advocates of capitalism promote inequality as a great good (Tamny, 2016). Thus, the prevailing view is that capitalist policy-making creates inequality. The link between inequality and mental health is well-documented” (15)

A system that requires and benefits from the lack of security and rampant inequality would inevitably cause distress and mental health issues for the people that have to deal with the dark side of the capitalist system. However, there are studies showing that people in the middle part of the social hierarchy are more likely to have mental health issues than the people above and below them. I believe this has to do with the fact that the people in the middle of the social and economic hierarchy have to both exploit the people below them (or be exploited by the people below them) while also be exploited by the people above them. 

Even though the link to mental health and socioeconomic status is not necessarily linear, it is still important to understand how our socioeconomic status affects our brains and our development. There is evidence to suggest that “socioeconomic deprivation in childhood is associated with impaired function (e.g., executive function deficits in childhood), but also structural brain changes” (15) which will follow a person as they grow and become an adult. But socioeconomic status doesn’t just affect the brain structure “ but also brain functional connectivity (FC) appears affected by economic disadvantage, the evidence mostly concerning young people from [free market] societies.” (15)(I changed the word neoliberal to free market because it means the same thing but I feel like people on here have too many different connotations as to what it means to be a [neo]liberal society.)

The connection between mental health and our capitalist society is often removed from the narrative entirely when trying to treat and help people with these issues. Instead of trying to go after the cause of the illness, capitalist society promotes medicalizing suffering while also promoting individualism as a way of stigmatizing anyone with mental health issues. 

In a hyper individualistic world, anyone's mental health issues are their own fault or their own defect and is not related to the environment or socioeconomic status of the person suffering. Depression, anxiety, etc. then become a blemish on the machines (humans) ability to work and uphold the very society that helped to shape their brains making them the way they are. The capitalists answer is medication, stigmatizing, shame and guilt. 

(I am in no way against getting medication for ones own mental health issues. I was on antidepressants and other medication for years. I am just pointing out that the system would rather medicate than understand since understanding would show the inherent flaws of the system itself.)

In American individualism, the person is to feel shame for anything that doesn’t uphold the capitalistic system. Anything that could impede their ability to work while also furthering mental health issues by telling the individual that they are alone and that their issues are their own bodies fault. But we are not alone. We are a part of a system that is actively trying to hurt us and keep us as complicit machines for their bidding. 

Certain mental illnesses like schizophrenia manifests differently depending on the environment that the person is in. Countries that have an emphasis on community and family rarely experience any negative impact on their daily life, while every person in America that was a part of the study had negative impacts in their life. (21)

Though people may be predisposed to mental illnesses due to genetics, the way those illnesses manifest and present is affected by the person's environment. 

But the system wants us to think that everything we experience is natural and that the fact that so many young people are having mental illnesses is just par for the course of society. If the price to keep capitalism is the mental health and anguish of its people, and the reward is that the rich get to have a lot of money and power, then what is the point of trying to uphold capitalism?  

With the advent of social media, one of the last frontiers for capitalism was breached: feelings and emotions. Though capitalism has always weaponized feelings and emotions, it has become more apparent and obvious. Young people are constantly bombarded with stimulus and the lack of any sort of stimulus is not boredom (like it may have been in the past) but depression. But an important part of growth is understanding and learning how to exist through boredom and modernity. 

Depression can both be an inability to feel pleasure or the inability to do anything except constantly pursue pleasure. (2) In order to cope with the world around us, our traumas, etc. we turn to the constant pursuit of something, anything. In this way, capitalist societies, especially today, are inherently addiction centric societies. We have become addicted to constantly feeling something that, for some people, the need to feel more intense sensations will lead them down more destructive paths. 

At the micro-level, addiction is reinforced and encouraged by the capitalists. They want you to want nothing more than for you to binge watch, binge eat, binge read, binge play. And they reinforce this by weaponizing the desire to be special or somehow chosen, which is in part the essence of gambling. 

Gambling begins with micro transitions on gacha games, blind boxes, arcade games based on luck and not skill. And then the person gets addicted to that feeling of somehow being lucky or chosen or special. Maybe they got the figure they wanted on the first try and now they need another box to try and chase that mercurial high. 

Or it might manifest as a sort of luck based skill like sports betting or gambling. Or it might manifest in substance use and abuse. Each of these addictions that I mention will inevitably support and uphold the capitalist system and the system encourages it until the person can no longer work or function to the system's standards in which that person is then shamed and ostracized. 

Though it could be argued that any sort of chaotic system would promote addiction. Receiving dopamine from random and uncontrollable events while also tying your sense of self to the outcomes of those uncontrollable events is the beginning of addiction. And if you tie a person's worth to their monetary or working value, then people will inevitably desire to raise their own value and worth even if doing so could potentially cause them harm. The system promotes going after ones desires without thinking about any consequences. The constant pursuit of self-interest even if it means suffering and inequality for others or even the self. 

Only the people that can no longer work or be a part of society are stigmatized within the realm of mental health, addiction, gambling, etc. Because the capitalist only cares about a person's ability to work and not their ability to live full and fulfilling and healthy lives. Especially since the latter costs more money. And an addicted and depressed machine that still runs is still an asset and for a capitalist will only try to fix (tho they don’t fix machines at all, they throw them away and replace them) a machine if it no longer works.

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Individualism, morality, social media:

“Morality has been replaced by feeling” (2, Capitalist Realism - Is there no other alternative? by Mark Fisher)

There are multiple different types of individualism, including but not limited to: hyper-individualism, moral individualism and possessive individualism. (These also all intersect with one another in certain areas. But one of the things that I want to talk about that I have seen a lot on social media, is moral individualism. 

As I’ve explained previously, individualism is the belief that someone exists outside of the context of the world around them. This leads to the pursuit of self-interests over the interests of the common good and also leads to massive isolation as people are taught that they are alone in this world and that they have no community or common ground with anyone. 

Moral individualism is the idea that people are inherently good or bad outside of whatever context or environment that they live in that is contributing to that person's actions, beliefs, and understanding of the world. It turns everyone into storybook caricatures. Someone is either good or bad and there is no in between. They are the villain who does evil for the sole purpose of doing evil and the good person is just inherently good with zero flaws or blemishes. But this is not how the world works. 

We create barriers between ourselves and others based solely on our own individual perception of the world or a moment in time without looking at any sort of bigger context or possible other answers. And these barriers, inevitably, fuel either our self-hatred or our fear and hatred for the world around us. For instance, if you hear that a car was swerving on the road, you may make assumptions about the driver being reckless, intoxicated, etc. and this is the basis of social media. Quick assumptions made from limited data. But context comes in when you step back and look at what might, if anything, be causing the driver to swerve. And there, you would see the giant potholes that the driver is avoiding. If you never stepped back and tried to understand why someone may be doing something instead of making quick assumptions, then you would have never seen the potholes. You possibly would have vilified someone who was making the best decision given their present situation. 

But stepping back is difficult because it does not immediately give in to pleasure or hatred. It requires you to deny yourself those feelings for a moment and the outcome may not be pleasurable but rather neutral. The lack and denial of context in modern day society, especially in America, correlates with the rise of constant stimulation and constant pleasure. The person now must make the most difficult decision that goes against everything that capitalism stands for, to deny oneself a momentary pleasure in lieu of a better understanding.

A lot of people like to put the blame on teachers for not teaching context well enough or on the students for not being receptive enough, but the fact of the matter is that American society is inherently anti-context. American society praises quick action and quick pleasure over thought and contextualizing. Since if people follow the context pipeline far enough, they will realize that people are mere products of their environment and whether a person is ‘good’ or ‘bad’ is directly dependent on their environment, upbringing, community, etc. But thinking this way is not fun. It is fun to blame the driver for being intoxicated and hating them for it instead of realizing they were never drunk to begin with and they were doing what anyone would have done in that situation.

But capitalism needs us to not see each other as equal. It requires us to enforce a subconscious hierarchy wherein some people are inherently bad and their actions can be blamed on their pure badness and that some people are inherently good and their goodness can be explained by their nature rather than the community that nurtured each of those individuals to that point. But this moral individualism is also a crux for many people who then see themselves as lacking goodness and falling into pits of despair.

It makes me worried to see so many young people who are not necessarily worried about doing the right thing but instead about being perceived that they are doing the right thing. And when we deny others context, we also deny ourselves that same grace. People are not stagnant. We move and change drastically over time, what you did when you were a child does not define who you are as an adult because people are capable of changing. 

But social media doesn’t want change or context, it wants the world to be stagnant (and I believe this ties back to a desire for control in an uncontrollable world). It wants people to never be able to change or grow, but change is an impossible thing to stop. People's opinions and viewpoints will inevitably change due to their environment.

I’m not saying this to be anti-cancel culture. I think calling people out on terrible things that they have done and said can be good because it shows people that these viewpoints, opinions, etc. are not universal and need to be changed. And people should take accountability for their actions. 

But one with social media algorithms where you will only ever see things you already want to see, it can become hard to imagine a world outside of yours. And when you cannot imagine a world that is not directly your own, you are quicker to dehumanize others and turn people from humans into caricatures, in an odd way exploiting them for your own emotional gain. Hate is very closely tied with pleasure and I would argue that it feels pleasurable to be hateful. To have something or someone to hate. 

And these hateful ideas are then monetized. You will see more and more hate, or videos that tell you how to feel instead of how to think, because that is what generates money. It ties back to the concept that in the modern day all we can do is constantly pursue feelings and that is all we amount to. Feelings, like hate and pleasure, are addictive. But if the person who is telling you to hate something is making money off of your hate, you should at least question why hate is so important in an already hate filled world. 

Humanity is not a dichotomy, we are shaped and influenced so much by things that are out of our control that reality is closer to a bunch of grey blobs arguing over who is greyer or bobiler. And understanding that there is more to a person than can be perceived and known on social media or in person is what context is.

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Family, home, and exhaustion:

Even Though the capitalist system upholds the nuclear hetero family system, capitalism is also what is destroying the family. Since both parents need to work now, there is little time for the parents to actually parent their children. And when you include the lack of stability and that over half of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck, it comes to no surprise that the young people of today are suffering greatly from the capitalist system.

One of the ways that capitalism controls its workforce is by making them exhausted. If someone is exhausted then they are not fit to fight back or not able to think critically about their situation and the world around them that is perpetuating it. But when the parents are exhausted and can't parent their children, the teacher becomes the parent. But when the teacher is exhausted and cannot parent all of their children, social media and technology become the parent. 

The child must look into their environment to be parented (and with the hyper-individualistic nature of American capitalism, there is often no community or family to help raise the children) and their environment consists of influencers, streamers, youtubers, and other social media personalities. Which leads to the children then having a parasocial relationship with their new parents. But these parents are also often in the pocket of big business. They will sell you anything they can and they will tell you only what you want to hear so that they can keep up engagement. 

A parasocial relationship is a mirror that reflects back at you whatever you put in front of it. Everything that you don’t know about a person gets filled by your own assumptions, your own opinions, yourself.

Without the community to lead these kids towards non-self destructive paths, children can often fall down pipelines that they would have never encountered or even thought of joining before because there is no one in their immediate surroundings telling them not to. I see this clearly with the rise of red pill content, ED content, alt-right content (and sometimes far left content can be self-destructive as well), among other things. Since with the advent of algorithms, these children will only see things that support their already self-destructive thinking. 

I can’t tell you how many times I have seen teens on TikTok talking about the new diet trend that they are following, which is just a rebranded eating disorder, and everyone in the comments congratulating them or saying they might try that new trend as well. Vaping, gambling, porn addiction are all things that young people are dealing with and social media is only showing them content that is supporting their already destructive lifestyle. 

Some parents have skipped the part of being a parent all together and have turned themselves into their child's boss and exploiting their child or children for profit. Family vloggers are an example of this as they turn their children into brand identities, removing all of their agency as children and as humans, and then profit off of the surveillance and exploitation of their children. In most states, there are no protection for children of family vloggers like there are for child actors. The parents could be making millions of dollars off of their children and there is no guarantee that the child will see any of that money. 

(There is also the aspect that some family vloggers make suggestive content of their children for profit.)

When you turn your own child into an employee that you exploit, you are removing them of their identity and their agency. You are their boss and not their parent. And when they need a parent, they will have no one to turn to. Though not all family vloggers have malicious intent, I am against the constant videotaping (surveillance) of children especially because it fosters an unhealthy environment and can lead to a lot of mental health issues.

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Education, debt/control, and A.I..:

One of the benefits of capitalism that is often touted is that because of capitalism people became more literate. However, the reason people became more literate wasn’t because capitalist systems encourage reading and writing, it is because they need the worker to be able to understand instructions. But with the rise of A.I., the worker no longer needs to be able to read and write, they just need to vote the way the capitalist wants.

“Capitalism is profoundly illiterate” (2), it only promotes literacy if doing so leads to monetary gains. There is a saying, which is most likely not true but does give a good insight into the justice system in America that says: Prisons use 3rd grade level reading scores to estimate how many beds they will need in the next 10 years. 

Though this is most likely not true, it is true that there is a direct correlation between education, literacy, and people who are in prison. It is estimated that 80% of prison inmates are functionally illiterate. And even though this hyper-individualistic world would like you to believe that literacy is a personal issue it is instead a systematic issue.

One of the reasons why I love fanfiction so much is because I was illiterate until 3rd grade and the only reason I learned how to read is because of fanfiction. I discovered fanfiction in possibly 6th or maybe early 7th grade and read my first book, cover to cover, in 7th grade. (I probably have really bad dyslexia and that is why it was so difficult for me to read at an early age). So I want to stress that illiteracy is a systemic issue. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to read, it was that I couldn’t.

So I really feel for young people, or people in general who struggle with reading and are told that they are lazy or that this is their personal defect that they can’t read properly. In a capitalist system, people are only praised for their ability to aid in the system, if you cannot read (and thus not work) then you are a threat to the system as a whole. Though people who end up in prison or jail can still be exploited by the system by being forced to work. 

The current education system, at least the public school system, is a victim of cost-cutting capitalist ideals that prioritize making the most amount of money possible with the least amount of effort. But students are not workers. They are not assets. They are people that need to be taught properly and in a good environment in order to be able to learn and thrive. Test scores are treated like end products in a factory and the factories that are able to produce the best scores get the best resources (which furthers inequality and furthers the capitalist system since capitalism cannot exist without inequality). Which inevitably leaves lots of kids falling through the cracks of a system that treats them as dollar signs instead of as human beings.

At the end of the day, if the capitalist needs someone who is smart they can just pick and choose someone from a rich private school. The goal of the public school is to create as many menial laborers as possible. Or lead them into debt by feeding them a dream of riches and salvation if they just get a college degree. And that debt will ensure that the student must work for the rest of their life. 

Student debt is a way of controlling the work force. The more debt a student has, the more they either have to constantly be in school to try and offset the accumulation of more debt and the more they have to be actively working. 

“Control societies are based on debt rather than enclosure; but there is a way in which the current education system both indebts and encloses students. Pay for your own exploitation” (2)

Debt in general is a control tactic for capitalistic societies. This is aided by the ‘credit score’ which makes sure that people with a low score will have to be in more debt for the rest of their lives while people who are well off can have an easier and cheaper life. People with low credit scores are then stigmatized and shamed even if there could have been extenuating circumstances. (I say as someone with a low credit score lolll)

Right now, there are people in school for jobs that will eventually be completely taken over by A.I.. A.I. is the cheapest worker, possibly cheaper than the slave, needing only environmental resources and little to possibly no payment (when compared to people who could be working the same task.) 

The rise of A.I. is no surprise in a capitalist system. It gives the person exactly what they want and immediately. It works on the instant gratification and pleasure principle. (The pleasure principle being that we are stuck to constantly seeking more and more, faster and faster, pleasure). Now, instead of having to do tasks like write an essay, draw a picture, type in code, the A.I. will do it for us. But this implies that the act of working in and of itself is not gratifying but just the outcome is. Which could be true in some cases. People may not enjoy writing an essay and would much rather read one written for them.

But it is important to remember that A.I. is a mirror. It will only show us what it thinks we want to see. (This is important to note with the rise of people having romantic relationships with A.I. and people who go through A.I. induced spiritual/religious psychosis) It turns the human into an inactive viewer. A vouyer who only sees what they want to see. 

In the age and rise of A.I., writing and creating things organically is a noble plight. The act of writing may not be fun in and of itself, but your creation is inherently you. If your sole desire is the pursuit of pleasure and immediate gains, then A.I. is the answer. But what if you want to feel a sense of accomplishment, a sense of being, a sense of creation?

The only importance of art is not the viewer's satisfaction, but the artist's satisfaction as well. Art is difficult. It takes time and the process is often laborious with possibly little to no monetary gain, which is why art itself sits on the precipice of the shadow of capitalism and the light of humanity. To create something beautiful that you cannot profit from goes completely against everything that capitalism instils in us from birth. (Which is another reason why fanfiction is so important.)

People who defend A.I. often cite that now anyone can be a writer, artist, programer, entrepreneur, but the hallmark of work is effort. In the age of A.I., the human is no more a valuable part of the process than a pencil is to the modern author. It doesn’t matter which pencil you use, you will still get the same outcome on the page. In this way, people who use A.I. for art is diminishing themselves to nothing more than a passive observer, when the whole point of art is being an active participant in the creation of something new and so inherently you.

I would rather buy someone's messy pencil sketch than A.I. slop, because I at least know that it is a human creation and all human creation reflects reality in a way that A.I. can never mimic.

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Doom mentality, apathy, inaction:

Every single year, there is someone who is absolutely convinced that this is going to be the year that the world ends. People might pull on biblical or non-biblical prophecies showing that the end of the world is just around the corner and this will be the end of everything. But this doom mentality is what keeps capitalism going. We cannot imagine a world without capitalism, so we imagine that there must be no world at all. 

Believing in a doom mentality leads to rampant inaction and the furthering of inequality. If you are going to die soon, then there is no reason to try and better your own situation. There is no reason to rise up and fight against the system that is oppressing you. 

Religious doom mentality is also usually very selfish or self serving. People desiring to watch others die forever so that they themselves can be proven as correct and thus better than the so-called ‘non-believers’. But, as famed biblical scholar Dan McClellan states: “There are absolutely no date that support the notion there are any biblical end times on the way” and that:

“The more that people try to leverage the fear or hope or expectation of an imminent second coming or end times or apocalypse in order to try to structure power and values and boundaries in ways that serve their own interests the more we do harm to our ability to thrive. The more we do harm to minority marginalized oppressed and otherwise vulnerable groups. The more we do harm to the mental and emotional and the physical health of young people. The more we do harm to our own future only because of our raging and belligerent dogmatism and refusal to think critically about these things” (29)

Capitalism loves doomers. It loves prophecies that lead to inaction and apathy. It will uphold these voices and dampen the voices of the exploited that just want their current situation to get better. We need to stop buying into doomist propaganda and trying to help people and the environment. 

One of the reasons capitalism thrives so much is because we already intrinsically know that it is bad. But we cannot fathom any other alternative. And so instead of trying to better our situation, we instead sit and wait for our situation or ourselves to die and hope that in death we may escape the evils of capitalism.

“We live in a contradiction, a brutal state of affairs, profoundly inegalitarian – where all existence is evaluated in terms of money alone – is presented to us as ideal. To justify their conservatism, the partisans of the established order cannot really call it ideal or wonderful. So instead, they have decided to say that all the rest is horrible. Sure, they say, we may not live in a condition of perfect Goodness. But we’re lucky that we don’t live in a condition of Evil. Our democracy is not perfect. But it’s better than the bloody dictatorships. Capitalism is unjust. But it’s not criminal like Stalinism. We let millions of Africans die of AIDS, but we don’t make racist nationalist declarations like Milosevic. We kill Iraqis with our airplanes, but we don’t cut their throats with machetes like they do in Rwanda, etc..” (2, quoting Alain Badiou)

The capitalist wants us to think that either we have no option other than capitalism or that we will die soon anyways so acting at all is useless. It wants us to think that there is nothing we can do and because there is nothing we can do then we should do nothing at all. But that is also individualist propaganda. If enough people stop working, the entire economy would shut down. If enough people speak up, eventually everyone will hear. If enough people show up, then eventually everyone will see.

Social media shows us both what we want to see and what it wants us to see. The no kings protest in America was probably the largest one day protest in American history and only 1-5% of the population showed up. Could you imagine if just 10% of the population showed up to a protest? (Which would be roughly 34 million people). 60% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck which is roughly 204 million people. People that the system depends on and is actively exploiting. 

Instead of wallowing in our exploitation and becoming worker drones that do whatever the capitalists wants, we need to hold onto even a sliver of hope that we can change the future for the better. When faced with adversity, the last thing you have to keep you going is hope. 

I have spent almost two months writing this knowing that it will probably not really be seen by anyone or do anything, but that is not the point. When we are going up against a system that is actively hurting us all we can do is hope that maybe others will join. Alone we are small, but together we can move mountains. 

“What if no one shows up to the protest?” But what if everyone does? That is how we need to think. We need to dream of a better future and do everything we can to get us there even if it may be impossible. 

It is really easy to fake caring about something, but it is a lot harder to fake showing up.

Return to community and humanity:

One of the things that capitalism has stripped from us is community. But, I argue, community is one of the things that gives our lives meaning. It fulfills the desire to be special and it fulfills the desire to be a part of something bigger. Finding communities in your local area (or online if you are unable to join any local communities) and helping those communities will help to heal parts of our broken individualistic mindset. 

We also need to push for more and well funded social services. Donald Trump and others are looking to get rid of as many social services as possible, but these social services are what helps make life livable for people, and without them a lot of people will die or struggle and suffer a lot more than they have to. I was raised with money that my dad got from social security for being disabled and I know many people who have at one time or another needed food stamps or medicare/medicaid. These are real people who depend on these services in order to live.

Protesting in person and online is also helpful as well as volunteering in your local community or local protests. 

I dream of a better future for all of us and I hope that one day we can escape this hellish system and live fulfilling lives where our self worth is not determined by our ability to make rich people money or our ability to be an asset to the government. 

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Books/Essays:

The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels

Capitalist Realism - Is there no other alternative? by Mark Fisher

The Illusion of Choice by Richard Shotton

The Uses of the Blues by James Baldwin 

Everybody’s Protest Novel by James Baldwin

Refusing Compulsory Sexuality - A Black Asexsual Lens on Our Sex-Obsessed Culture by Sherronda J. Brown

Religion and the Rise of Capitalism by Benjamin M. Friedman

The Revolutionary Self - Social Change and the Emergence of the Modern Individual by Lynn Hunt

Cultish by Amanda Montell

Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville

Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism by Vladimir Lenin

Articles:

Prisoners in the US are part of a hidden workforce linked to hundreds of popular food brands

Undocumented immigrants at work: invisibility, hypervisibility, and the making of the modern slave

Anxious? Depressed? You might be suffering from capitalism: contradictory class locations and the prevalence of depression and anxiety in the USA

Testing hypotheses about the harm that capitalism causes to the mind and brain: a theoretical framework for neuroscience research

The Kids Aren’t Alright: Creating Greater Protections for the Children of Family Vloggers

Do prisons use third grade reading scores to predict the number of prison beds they’ll need?

Possessive Individualism: A Crisis of Capitalism

Capitalism: A Contemporary Manifestation of Colonialism

The Prehistory of Possessive Individualism

Hallucinatory 'voices' shaped by local culture, Stanford anthropologist says

Closing the empathy gap: A narrative review of the measurement and reduction of parochial empathy.

Youtube Videos:

Why Capitalism Loves Doomers

 How Capitalism Ruined American Education

John Holmwood, Modern capitalism as colonialism: Rethinking CB Macpherson's possessive individualism

 Jon Stewart – One of My Favorite People - What Now? with Trevor Noah Podcast

Including Tiktok videos by (since there’s the possibility of my tiktok account being somehow linked when sharing a url, I will just name the creators):

cypher.j

maklelan (specifically #maklelan2754)

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Wow this took so long! I read so many books (more than what is cited) and articles and watched so many videos. This basically consumed my life for the last month and a half or two months, I’m not sure how long it has been. I spent way too much money on books so I got a library card and went to the library every day I could. 

I had to leave some things out because it would have taken me forever if I talked about every single aspect of capitalism. I had to keep reminding myself that this isn't a dissertation and that it's just a ‘stupid’ essay that I’m writing. (I mean stupid in the capitalist sense that I am not gaining anything monetarily or academically from writing this. But it definitely made me want to go back to school so I might try to figure out how to do that.) 

I am going to try to include some art in my next pieces (or I will edit this or my older essay and include art with them). 

I know very few people are probably going to see this and even fewer people are going to finish it, so I am very thankful if you go to this point!! I just write essays for fun because I am unemployed ish and have a lot of free time.

If you don’t like something I said I am very accepting of constructive criticism. Like I said, I want this to be a part of a larger conversation even if aspects of that conversation don’t agree with my opinions. 

This is not beta read, we die like the American dream.

[wisdomseulogy]

Im sorry the next installment in my series is taking so long. I have read 4 books and have been doing a lot of research. But I guarantee it will be quality :)

[wisdomseulogy]

Tony Wishes He Did

Alpha Steve Rodgers x Alpha Tony Stark

(They have a biological son Peter Parker)

Word count: 780

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Tony stares his reflection in the eyes of his ex husband Steve as he prepares to kill him. And yet…it almost felt nostalgic. He knew that look. That hatred. The anger. 

He knew it might come to this. But he didn't expect it to feel so freeing. For the first time, his future was out of his hands. Whether he continued forward on his self destructive path or not, no longer weighed on him. It weighed on the man he once loved. The man he still loved.

If anyone was to kill him he would choose Steve. During the dark times he imagined something happening, maybe his body gets infected with some extraterrestrial disease or that his mind was controlled by some villain, and Steve would have to do ‘the right thing’. Do the thing that Tony always wished he could do. But how could he leave Peter the same way his parents left him?

How could he die knowing that Peter would be alone? Peter's independent because he had to be. His parents were always out fighting missions and he was left in the care of a nanny or someone else in the pack. 

Maybe in some perfect world, Tony and Steve could move onto a farm in the middle of nowhere and never have to worry about the fate of humanity again. Never having to put their own needs to the sidelines while they battle the next big thing. 

But this time, the big villain was his husband…ex husband. 

Steve's chest heaves as he holds the shield right above Tony's arc reactor, ready to kill him at any moment.

Sure, Steve should have told Tony that Bucky killed his parents the second he knew. But he knew Tony would react badly so he figured it would be better to keep it a secret than hurt his feelings. And now Steve was just inches from killing his former partner. 

Maybe if Bucky never came back. Maybe then things would be different. And maybe Tony was right when he told Steve it's because Bucky is an omega. Steve always wanted to be with an omega but when he met Tony he gave up on that dream. 

But the dream just went dormant, it never left. Like a fire still burning against all odds. No matter how much Steve tried to put it out, it continued to burn. It showed him shadows of what his life could be as the perfect traditional alpha with his perfect traditional omega. And when Bucky came back around, the shadows started to look more and more like his past love. Taunting him. 

He tried to remind himself that he already had a husband and a son. That he needed to think about his family. But no amount of sand could put the fire out. And in moments of weakness, he huddled around it. Lavishing in its warmth and glow.

-

Tony closes his eyes. Images of Peter in funeral black crying over his casket intruded into his mind. But he managed to push that possible future away by remembering one of the moments of quiet. 

Tony and Steve decided to take Peter to the beach one day. Well it was mainly Tony's idea. This was back when he was worried about being the perfect father and making sure that Peter could still live a normal life/childhood. Peter was just a baby back then and in retrospect, the two fathers had very little idea of what they were doing.

The idea of a beach trip came to Tony as he was watching “The Real Omegas of NYC”. One of the couples took their kids to the beach and the kids seemed to be having a lot of fun. Tony did some research. Looked up all the things to do with your kid at the beach. Everything he could possibly need to bring. He planned everything out, but he didn’t want to look like he was trying too hard. He wanted it to look like it came to him naturally and once the two fathers had a day off together, Tony brought up the idea of going to a beach.

The sea breeze pushing through Steve's blonde hair. Steve's goofy smile as he tried to make a sand castle with Peter. Tony going through the logistics of how to make the best sandcastle that could withstand the eventual rising tide.

There were no villains. No monsters. No aliens. No secret organization trying to take over the world. It was just them. And it was happy. 

“I'm not going to do it” is all Steve says as he gets off Tony and walks back to Bucky.

Tony wishes he did. 

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I will go back to writing about fanfiction and fandom culture soon!! I am currently working on an auxiliary text about exploitation and the illusion of choice in capitalism which will be posted before part 3.

Thank you everyone for the kind words and the support! :)

[wisdomseulogy]

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

Part 2: How puritan culture, misogyny, and homophobia are affecting fandom spaces and fanfiction.

During difficult times, people will desire harsh rules to make them feel safer or to make them feel morally jus and accepted. But what is ‘morally just’ when it comes to fanfiction? Why do people read controversial things? What is puritan culture and how does it relate to misogyny and homophobia? 

This is the second part of my series about fanfiction and fandom culture and how it relates to what is going on in society at the moment. This will be a lot more polarizing than the first part in this series, but I hope it will be a good read even if you don’t agree with everything I say. This is an opinion piece based on my personal lived experience which may not match up with everyone else’s lived experience. 

Originally, I was going to combine my discussion on puritan culture and commercialization, but with the growing amount of hate that authors are getting on AO3 these days, I feel it imperative to speak at length about puritan culture by itself. I will include commercialization in my next part of the series!

This is also the only part of the series that will include 18+ themes.

Lastly, thank you so much to everyone that read and interacted with part 1! It really makes my day to see that people are actually reading this!

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Fandom spaces have changed and evolved so much over a relatively short period of time. With the prevalence of social media today, fandom spaces have also become very toxic microcosm of society. That is not to say that toxicity has never existed in fandom spaces, but I would argue it is worse now more than ever.

There are a lot of different reasons for this. You have the fact that fear and anger drives engagement and thus money for people on apps like TikTok, (which I will be talking about in the next part of this series) and you also have the rise in misogyny and homophobia in America as the country turns more and more conservative with each passing day. 

(I am an American and a lot of my opinions come from being in America. Though, these issues can be present in many different countries and social circles, I am just specifying America since that is what I know personally)

But how did we get here as a community and what can we do to stop the rise of misogyny and homophobia in fandom spaces (specifically relating to fanfiction)? 

The first step is understanding the history and what has brought us here. I started attending cons and reading fanfiction in 2008, so I saw a lot of this firsthand. 

Before AO3 was made, people would post fanfictions on places like fanfiction.net, livejournal, Quizazz (Quotev), Wattpad, etc. But there started to be issues when people began posting sexual related fanfiction content (smut, lemons etc.). Fanfiction.net and livejournal infamously purged anything on their websites that they didn’t agree with that was of a sexual nature.

People's fics were being deleted left and right and there was nowhere for people to post their fics without fear that it might be taken down. And on top of that, the original creators of the works that fics were based off of weren’t happy with people writing fanfiction using their characters and plot.

Anne Rice, who wrote The Vampire Chronicles, infamously was so against people making fanfiction with her characters that she sought out legal action against the fanfiction creators. But, the saving grace of fanfiction is that it cannot be monetized and the authors are not making any money off of the fics they are posting.

(However, this is becoming a hot issue with people printing out and selling copies of fanfiction on places like Etsy. But again, that will be in the next part of the series.)

People who are discovering fanfiction after 2015 are more likely to not know this history, because AO3 was created so that fanfiction writers would not have to deal with any legal action or purging of their fics. It is quite literally a utopia for fanfictions authors and fan creators to be able to post their stuff without fear of any real sort of repercussions. 

However, with how America is moving more towards a conservative political stance as a whole, this liberty is being threatened. Especially with the KOSA bill which would allow complete internet censorship by the US government on anything they deem to possibly be bad. It is framed in a way to try and protect children, but it is, at its core, a complete government ability to censor the internet. This would include fanfiction. 

And you might have already seen that AO3 is preemptively taking precautions in case something like this happens. 

But why is fanfiction important and why do we need to fight to allow it to stay uncensored?

Fanfiction is one of the last non-monetizable forms of art. You cannot make money on it and the people who write and create fanfiction are doing it not for money but out of love and appreciation for the characters or the storyline. 

In a world where everything is commercialized, the last place that capitalism has yet to reach is fanfiction. It is a reprieve from a society and world that demands that things only have worth if they are monetarily valuable. Fanfiction is the last line of defense we have against late stage capitalism and censorship.

The beauty of AO3 is that nothing on there is censored. It is a kaleidoscope of the human condition. The good, the bad, and the ugly all combined into one place. The reality of what people have to deal with on a regular basis written through the lens of pre-established characters and plot. Or sometimes original work.

But with the rise of conservatism and puritan culture, fanfiction readers and writers are being attacked by virtue signalers in support of a ‘morality’ that is targeted against women and LGBTQ+ people. 

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From this point on, I will be discussing things that people may not be comfortable with. This is the only part of the series that will include 18+ language. Read at your own discretion.

I will not be giving any literary example of these: (i.e. writing out scenarios, quoting direct examples, or going into any graphic description), but these words will be mentioned in a general sense:

Kinks/fetishization

Breeding kink

BDSM

Sexual Assault

Rape/Non-Con

Omegaverse

Yaoi/Yuri

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In part 1, I talked lightly about how what we enjoy can be a reflection of ourselves and that we can use fanfiction to better understand ourselves and the world around us. But when we start talking about kinks, people are a lot less perceptive to understanding why someone might be interested in something.

The fact of the matter is that scientifically, we do not know why people enjoy certain kinks. There are most likely multiple factors going on at once which could include societal constructs/expectations, fearful/traumatic experiences (perceived or actualized), brain development, along with other environmental factors. But, there is no concrete answer as to why someone would develop one kink over another. Which means that saying anyone who has (insert kink here) is a terrible person, is not necessarily correct.

Though there are many theories on why someone may develop a kink, there is a general consensus that to an extent (depending on who you ask), any given person has little over their kinks.

But, I will explore the theory that, to some extent, kinks can come from fears or pain. There is a very thin line between what someone fears and what kinks that person may have. People who fear getting pregnant may have a breeding kink, people that fear being sexually assaulted may have a rape/non-con kink, someone who fears being helpless or hurt may have BDSM kink, etc. I could go on forever with how fear can relate to sexual desire, but I am sure you get the idea.

(Though this is just one aspect of how a kink could be formed, this is not true for everyone.)

In the same way nightmares can help our brain to prepare and react to future bad situations, kinks can help people to experience something fearful in a safe and consensual way. And that is important to understand when critiquing people who read fics with certain tags that may be considered bad. 

In an interesting way, the reader is consenting to reading the piece of writing in the same way the writer is consenting by writing it. Since you can always stop reading and you can always stop writing. The power is in your hands.

This is important for understanding why someone may read certain pieces of media. Without any context, someone may think that people who read something like rape/non-con are supporting that act and thus are terrible people. But if you think about the fact that fanfiction is mainly written by women and LGBTQ+ people, groups of people who historically have to deal with the very real threat of sexual assault on a daily basis, it stands to wonder how much of a kink, like this, comes from fear (whether actualized as they have experienced it, or internalized where they know they are at risk). 

Reading and writing is a very healthy way to work through complex thoughts and emotions. And fanfiction in particular is very helpful for this since it is easier to project your feelings on things you did not create. Something that is not the writer's creation, yet able to convey the writer's thoughts and feelings in a way that is harder to achieve in original work. In this way, even though a reader insert is meant to represent the reader, it creates a version of the reader that does not exist in reality and thus not held down by reality and only held down by the fictional world/work they are inserted into. Thus a figurative chimera of humanity and fiction. An existence outside of trauma and expectations.

AO3 has such an extensive tagging and filtering system, it is very easy to not have to read something that may be triggering. When attacking authors for their tag usage, the possible real outcome is that authors of things that can be triggering to many people will not attribute the proper tags to their fics and thus people who would have been able to easily avoid that content may be bombarded by it. 

It is important to know that just because a piece of media (like a fanfiction) has something horrific in it, that does not mean the author or the reader is glorifying this thing and thus wanting that thing to happen to them or others. In the same way that just because a character is the main character of a piece of media, does not mean that the character is instantly a good person and what they do is good. There is a lot of nuance to whether a character is good or bad and a character can be a combination of both. 

Of course, I could talk at length about how the rise of puritan culture is relative to the lack of media literacy taught or understood in school and how this all goes back to covid and politics. But since I am focusing directly on the effects of puritan culture in fanfiction/fandom, I will leave that for another time. However, it is important to understand that these concepts  (i.e. just because a horrible thing is written doesn’t mean the author is justifying that thing) should be taught in schools.

We exist inside of the context of all of our lived experiences. Much of which we have no control over. We have no control over where or how we are born, who our parents are, and where we live in early childhood and possibly beyond. We have no control over how our brain perceives the world or even how our brain develops. We use thoughts and decisions to feel like we have control, but those decisions were probably already made for us by either environmental factors/corporations/politics/brain and subconscious development. 

Many people do not realize that they have a lot of internalized misogyny and homophobia. That is because it is so ingrained into society, our brains interpret it as an absolute or a fact of life without questioning how we came to those conclusions or who is pushing those narratives. 

This does not only affect women and LGBTQ+ people. The fandom puritans will go after anyone who they disagree with and bully them into oblivion. But, I will be focusing on my own personal experience as a woman in fandom spaces. However, this is not to discredit what other people might be experiencing or have gone through. This is a much larger issue and is indicative of society itself. Once a person or people are deemed as a ‘witch’ (someone the fandom puritans don��t agree with), the puritans will be sharpening their metaphorical pitchforks and lighting their torches in hopes of seeing demise and hurt.

(This also correlates with the rise of apathy and lack of empathy.)

At the end of the day, each person has had different life experiences and will enjoy different things. And we will probably never know exactly why we enjoy certain things, as scientifically we are not certain, and so there needs to be a lot more grace and decorum when it comes to kink shaming or shaming in general.

Fandom spaces were safe havens for people to be themselves, but when things are uncertain, people will desire harsh codes and morals to feel safe. To feel that they are good or that they are right. And for someone to be good, someone else must be bad. And when justice is not always achievable, people will take it upon themselves to be the bringer of ‘justice’. But justice for who? That is the most important question when it comes to wondering what fandom puritans get from enacting their harsh moral codes on strangers.

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“There is simultaneously an epidemic of hypersexualization and puritan culture and both are targeted against women” (I saw this in the comment section of a TikTok video).

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In the rise of puritan culture, there is also a rise in policing what people can and can’t read based on their biological sex or sexual identity. I have seen lots of videos of people saying afab people cannot and should not read yaoi. I have seen people on tumblr asking creators if they are allowed to read their yaoi fics since they are afab. 

I have also seen people say that the omegaverse is blatant fetishization and anyone who reads it is an evil fetishizer. 

(For those that don’t know, a kink is anything unconventional that is used, performed, or desired in a sexual way. A fetish relies more heavily on a certain object, body part, or situation. Neither of these are inherently bad. But the word fetish has a lot more negative connotation to it than kink. The real issue is objectification and oppression.)

But policing what people can read is not the right route to go about things since it usually ends up hurting women and LGBTQ+ people more disproportionately. You are also making a lot of assumptions of these people's intentions which may be false or blatantly wrong and only work to further an agenda that restricts the sexual autonomy of women and LGBTQ+ people while acting as if you are trying to help them.

When a fandom puritan imagines a sort of proverbial reader for content they deem as bad, they are projecting everything they dislike onto a person that does not exist. These projections are an extension of societal expectations and societal expectations are not inherently correct. They are created and formed as a way to control as many people as possible. Under the guise that the more control we have over others, the less uncertainty there is. But that is not true. And these expectations are harsher to women and the LGBTQ+ community, people who have had a harder timer speaking up for themselves in society and history as a whole.

When we police what someone can and can't like sexually, we are removing or altering their bodily or sexual autonomy. (Their ability to use their body as they like). Cis male characters have always had sexual agency in media. They are allowed to be with who they like and do as they please. And they are even rewarded for doing so. Teaching that the more people a man is able to ‘conquer’ (take the sexual autonomy from), the more worth that man has as a person and in society as a whole. 

(But this also teaches men that without someone else they cannot have self worth. I will be talking about that in a different manifesto later where I break down the male loneliness epidemic and how society is sabotaging men for profit and political gain and that is leading to a rise in conservative values and misogyny.)

Women have internalized this: men are allowed to have sexual autonomy, women are not. Men are allowed to have sex as they please, while women are taught that every time they have sex with a different person, some part of themselves is fundamentally broken. 

Wanting to explore sexual desires and agency with characters that already have a precedent of sexual agency is very common. Though, you may not have heard it described in that way.

I argue that yaoi/omegaverse when it is written by women for women is where the reader and writer are exploring sexual desire and agency in a way where they are ‘allowed to’. Men are allowed to have sexual desire and to act in sexual ways, while women are not allowed those same privileges. A woman is only allowed to fit into one of two archetypes: the whore or the virgin. The over sexualized or the prude. 

But that is not indicative of the real lived experience.

(When it comes to LGBTQ+ people they are rarely given the option of the virgin archetype and instead are only hypersexualized (which is also a form of control and lack of sexual agency))

On one hand, yaoi/yuri is representative of an actual lived experience for a lot of people. And those stories provide voices and outlets for LGBTQ+ people to be seen and understood. To see themselves in the reflection of the characters eyes. To see themselves seeing themselves.

But I argue that yaoi/yuri or the omegaverse can also be feminist literature. (I use the term feminist broadly as encompassing both women and LGBTQ+ people and the struggle against the patriarchy and a society that is actively working against them. And feminist literature, in this sense, is literature that is by the oppressed for the oppressed against an oppressor (i.e. the patriarchy) I know not everyone will agree with this, but this is my personal definition here.)

(If you do not know what the omegaverse is, the most basic way of understanding it is that in the omegaverse, omegas can get pregnant no matter their primary gender (male, female, etc.) and alphas can impregnate no matter their primary gender. In this way, primary gender like male and female do not matter as much as your secondary gender does (alpha, beta, omega). However, betas are regular people so a male beta can only impregnate and a female beta can only get pregnant.)

Because the primary gender in the omegaverse is not important, there is a lot of commentary on what gender is and how society shapes people. 

While writing an omegaverse story, I got to asking myself what an omega is. Since an omega seems to be everything that society deems as feminine or womanly (submission, gentleness, etc.) but in the body of (usually) a man. And an alpha is the embodiment of everything society deems and manly or attributes to men (like aggression, domination, etc.). In this way, alphas and omegas are at the most extreme ends of masculine and feminine standards. Does this come from a desire to see a man go through the most extreme standards of what it means to be a woman in society and still be accepted? Because even if a woman is able to achieve the absolute pinnacle of what it means to be a woman, they will still be hated.

An omega is allowed to be both the virgin and the whore simultaneously. They are allowed to have intense sexual desire (i.e. heats) while also being allowed to not want intimacy. Being allowed to desire an alpha while also being scared of alphas. Oppressed yet holding power. 

One of the things I noticed a lot when reading yaoi/omegaverse is the proclivity of rape. At first I was very turned off by it. Why was sexual assault so normalized in yaoi? Is it a negative side-effect of hypersexualization or is it the literary embodiment of an internalized fear of rape and the desire to see a character come out fine? It is very rare for sexual assault to be treated seriously in yaoi/omegaverse if it is between the main couple. This is a reflection of the very real reality of how sexual assault is treated in the countries where these authors are from (including the US). 

Does it come from a desire to see something realistic in a male dominated world where the aggressor is given less than a slap on the wrist for sexual assault while the victim is blamed and can be herald as a murder if victim desired to abort a child born of rape? Is the writer trying to imagine a world where they are okay and actually benefiting from an experienced trauma? There are many possibilities, and I do not know the answers. I am just theorizing how I imagine some of these tropes come about. But this is important for understanding that just because someone reads or writes something, does not mean they are actively supporting that thing.

But instead of there being a distinctive right or wrong, everything boils down to how something is perceived. What context does the piece of media exist in? In the same way The Handmaid’s Tale is a piece of literature that actively explores the role of women in a patriarchal society and is not supporting the patriarchal society itself that is presented in the story.

When someone exists in a world with a lot of internalized misogyny and homophobia, they may read stuff like yaoi/yuri/omegaverse and not see that these texts are actively working against the narrative of the patriarchy and the societal oppressors. They may not realize that their hate of its mere existence is political. (I say mere existence since not everyone will enjoy reading it, obviously, but to hate it for purely existing is political. And it ties back to misogyny and homophobia as these are literary tropes that are mainly enjoyed by women and LGBTQ+ people)

Yaoi/yuri/omegaverse is feminist literature. It is observing the world through the lens of someone who challenges the very structure of society. Challenges the very politics that conservatism and puritanism is trying to push. It is creating a world where the ‘other’ can flourish. Where the outcast is seen and allowed agency. 

But the main pushers of conservatism and puritanism in fandom culture are not who you would expect, which makes it quite a difficult issue to combat. It is women and queer people working against the interests of other women and queer people. The oppressed policing the oppressed for the interests of the oppressor. 

(Though, I would like to point out a tidbit that people rarely acknowledge, which is that we do not gain the ability to think critically about our opinions and the world around us until late adolescence or early adulthood. Though it is different for each person. And thus until a certain age, we are just echoing the thoughts and opinions of others. This can be a reason as to why this is happening.)

In early fanfic culture, it was very common for an author to write “don't like? Don't read” which is something we should continue to live by today. Not everything is created for you. Not everything is meant to cater to you. Not everyone has had the same life experiences as you or the same desires, hopes, or dreams. 

But since fanfiction has entered the mainstream and people are finding it for the first time, they do not know the decorum that comes with reading fanfiction. Fanfiction is not censored or made for profit the same way a published book is. There is no editor or CEO with a prerogative that is reading over the fic and deciding whether it can be published and make money in the current political climate. 

Fanfiction is human made and reflects humanity in a way that anything monetized cannot. It shows the good, the bad, the fears, the desires, the hope, the fluff and the angst. A celebration of life while also being a eulogy to that life. 

The world watching itself be watched. 

When we focus on morality and what being morally good is, we lose sight of what it means to be human. No one is 100% morally just. It is something that no one can reach because it is not something that exists in society. But the easiest way to control a group of people, is to make them start fighting themselves. And it also comes from a desire to be loved. Equating that if you are morally just then others will like you and you will be loved and accepted for who you are.

And as the fandom puritan lights the witch on fire, they turn around and search for acceptance for their actions in the eyes of their peers. The burn of their desire to be loved heating their back as they address the crowd. That same desire to be loved killing the witch.

But humans were not meant to be perfect, and holding ourselves and others up to standards that inherently support patriarchy and societal and government control, will only end badly. Instead of using fanfiction as a way to be upset with the world, use it as a way to understand and love yourself.

Find what you enjoy reading and read it. Find yourself in the reflection of the characters eyes as they smile and cry. 

In a world that profits and is sustained on self-hatred, self-love is a political statement. 

Read what you want to read and move on. And when it comes time, protect fanfiction as one of the last non-monetizable artform.

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I honestly am not even sure if this makes sense. It took me so long to finish because I kept writing and rewriting it. Adding parts and taking other parts out. If you want me to expand on something or think I didn’t explain a concept well enough, please let me know! I am genuinely doing this for fun and enjoy it. :)

Also thank you so much to anyone who made it this far! This one is a lot more polarizing, but I did my best to explain it in a way that was as little polarizing as possible. 

In the next part of the series I will talk about commercialization and capitalism as it relates to the world and specifically to fandom spaces. I will expand on the idea that our opinions and ideals are given to us by corporations or politicians in order to further the narrative. And also that fear and hate drives engagement and people who make money on places like TikTok are more likely to fear-monger (whether intentionally or not) in order to get more money. 

If there is anything else you want me to touch on in this series please let me know! Otherwise, after commercialization it will be fanfiction throughout history and then a call to action and how we can use these concepts to create a better future. 

[wisdomseulogy]

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

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“I see you as you see yourself through all the books you read” - Vampire Empire by Big Thief

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Fanfiction and fandom spaces are some of the few places that capitalism doesn't have a stronghold on. I believe fandom spaces as a whole is one of the last vestiges that we have of what society should be. Though there are many commercial aspects to fandom spaces now and many people and companies are profiting off of it, but the community is still widely the same. Many people fighting for a common good. 

I have actively been a part of fandom spaces since Obama became president and I have seen it grow and change a lot during that time. But one thing has always remained the same, the desire to have community and a safe place to express love and common interests. Fandom spaces are probably the last place for capitalism to reach. Thousands of people everyday publishing art, not for money, but for others to purely read/see and enjoy. 

In this series I will be going through what fanfiction/fandom is and how we can use it to better ourselves and the world around us. Fanfiction/fandom is so much more than just fanfics or fan art, it is a community and a movement. And it can be used to lead us into a brighter future.

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Part 1: Fanfiction as a window into the self

Part 2: How puritan culture, misogyny, and homophobia are affecting fandom spaces and fanfiction (18+ themes)

Part 3: The commercialization of fanfiction and fandom spaces

Part 4: Fanfiction as an art form and how it is existed throughout history

Part 5: A call to action: How to use this to better our futures and continue the culture

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Part 1 : Fanfiction as a window into the self

Chronologically, it does not make sense for the beginning of the series to start with introspection, but it is the most important aspect of fanfiction. If we do not first understand who we are, then it is much harder for us to understand the world around us. 

Fanfiction allows us to think critically about the world in a way that is free and easily accessible. Though some places and companies are commercializing fanfiction, there are still millions of fics on AO3 that we can look at. And if you include other websites like Tumblr, Wattpad, Quotev, Fanfiction.net, etc. then there are even more fics for us to turn to. 

Fanfiction is such an interesting artform in that it (usually) cannot be commercialized since it is based off of someone else's work. One of the few artforms that people produce for free and to be enjoyed by others for free. An expression of love and commitment to characters, fandoms, communities, etc. outside of the harsh rule of capitalism.

But with the rise of bigotry, facism, and self-hatred in America, I think it is important to show how we can utilize fanfiction and fandom spaces to better understand ourselves. 

Self-hatred is the easiest form of societal and government control. In this way, loving oneself is an act of political protest. And I hope that after reading part 1, you will have tools for you to better reckon with yourself and the world around you. Hurt people hurt people. And I wish for a world where there are less hurt people. 

The rise of misogyny and redpill content is directly tied to self-hatred. Men hate themselves, hate the world, and are told that all of their problems can be solved if they turn that self hatred against women. This is also the commercial aspect of how fear and hatred makes the most money and gets the most engagement, but that will be a manifesto for another time. 

Why fanfiction is important for understanding the self:

One of the most important aspects of fanfiction is that the characters exist outside of the fic in which they are written. This might seem trivial, but it is how we can use fanfiction to understand ourselves since we too exist outside of the context in which we are perceived in.

Back when I was in college and studying fanfiction at Harvard for a summer, specifically poetry and fanfiction, I stumbled upon a video advocating for smut in fanfiction since unlike porn, there is an understanding that these characters exist outside of the sexual context. (I tried to find this video again but couldn’t T.T, if anyone finds it please let me know)

When you read a fanfic that is far from the canon, you subconsciously know that these characters aren’t just representative of what is in the fic. In this sense, the fic is vehicle and the characters and fandom mere passengers. You know that the characters exist outside of the realm of the fic and that the fic does not change them as characters in the canon. Because of this, we often use fanfiction as a way to work through our own struggles, fears, desires, needs, wants, etc. either consciously or subconsciously. 

From the outside perspective, you might see people reading something that is socially considered bad and assume that those people are bad. But I think we need to look deeper into why we enjoy certain tropes/tags and how that relates to ourselves. 

If someone said that they enjoy reading fics where the main characters die because it feels relatable since the main characters in their life have died, that would be understandable. If someone said they enjoy reading about characters that have terrible things happen to them, because it relates to their own experience, that is understandable. We need to acknowledge that the people who are reading and writing fics are also people; also human.

What happens in a fic will never impact the canon of the fandom it is pulled from. In this way, seeing a character you love going through something you deeply fear or deeply want can be very healing. Humans are story driven people. We love to use these stories to work through our experiences. 

Working through how a character can still exist even after terrible things happen to them is a window into how we exist even after terrible things happen to us. A fic might be a small moment in time where pre-established characters are playing out a narrative, but it is a part of a larger picture of the human condition. 

We exist outside of every little moment and scene in our lives. The world still moves on even when we believe ours is ending. And most importantly, we are able to still preserver after going through the worst atrocities.

The sun will still shine the next day even after you read and experience the most devastating and heart wrenching fic. Those characters still exist in our minds and our hearts even after we watch them die in a fic or even in the canonical piece of media.

—- Jjk spoilers for anime only—-

Gojo is still alive because we keep him alive through creating our own forms of media for him to exist in. Fanfiction, fan art, edits, etc. all work as a way to keep him alive even after his canonical death. Characters are not dead until we stop caring about them. Gojo’s legacy will live on in our hearts and in our media and minds. Just as a person would.

—- End of spoilers

(If you didn’t read the spoiler, here is the gist: characters live in our lives the same way people do)

We use characters the same way we use people; to give meaning and understanding to our lives. I personally am a huge fan of any sort of ‘broken’ character and I will admit that does directly relate to my past belief that I was broken. I no longer believe I am broken because I am gone on a journey to better understand myself and humanity as a whole.

To be human is to fail. It is to reach for perfection and fall short every time. Try to capture the sun and smile as our wax wings disintegrate. And yet, we get up and try again. And when we turn away from the sun, we hate our shadows.

Fanfiction is the best way for us to work through our issues and to help others through their own. 

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If you can love the joker, or any other broken character, then you can love yourself.

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I love reading about characters going through terrible things. Every now and then I will read something fluffy, but I mostly enjoy angst. I used to say that is because suffering feels more real, but suffering is just as real as joy, but I think we subconsciously like suffering more since it feels like it has more meaning. That suffering is more real than joy.

 (For a college class I had to write a sort of dissertation and I chose how in literature happiness is viewed as the absence of sadness or a numbness to sadness while joy is only experienced when we can embrace suffering and live through it equally with the good. So I could talk about this for forever, but I will leave it at that)

My current favorite trope is divorce. I love reading about two male characters getting divorced. Add omegaverse into the mix and it is truly perfection. My parents were never divorced (because they died) but there is something so beautiful about all the emotion and desire that comes with divorce. To love someone wholly and watch that love fade until the past itself starts to feel fictional and questioning whether there was any love to begin with. 

There is something so beautifully human about that. Reaching for the sun and failing miserably. Ending up on the ground, in the fetal position, crying and broken. Because we remember what the sun feels like on our skin. In our bones. Maybe we were never meant to reach the sun, but yearning for love and acceptance is so human. 

(Of course I visualize this with my personal headcanons about Steve Rogers x Tony Stark which I have posted right before this. But in my headcanon I wonder, what did Tony feel when his ex husband was about to kill him? Pain? Fear? Or did it feel nostalgic as he too wished for that same end?)

When my friend was going through something difficult and wondering why they were feeling the way they were, I asked myself: How would I write Tony Stark going through the same thing. Does Tony wish he could transform into a monster because he already sees himself as one and is confused by his own reflection? Or is it something deeper?

And that is what spawned me wanting to investigate how we use fictional characters to inform our daily lives, form our identities, and work through our trauma. 

Trauma takes many forms, and what is incredibly traumatic for one person may not be traumatic to the next. In the same vein how neglect takes many different shapes, but it is all formed from the same clay. 

(So do not discredit someone's trauma just because it is not your own.)

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I think the next time you beat yourself up about something you've done, ask yourself if you would hate your favorite character for doing the same thing. I believe that if you can still love the Joker, Bucky, Hannibal, etc. then you can love yourself. 

“But they had extenuating circumstances”

”They are broken”

”The world turned against them”

”They had no choice”

“They were doing what had to be done”

“They didn’t really mean it.” / “They didn’t mean to hurt people”

”What they did still affects them”

”They are mentally ill because of what they went through”

Say that to the mirror. SAY THAT TO THE MIRROR.

If you can love a broken character no matter what they’ve done (obviously I understand that there are some exceptions), then you can love yourself. You do already love yourself.

Our society is structured in order for people to hate themselves. If someone hates themselves it is easier for them to be controlled through capitalism and the government. If someone believes that they need to search externally for material items or money, then they are easier to coerce. 

I think an issue we are having in society is that we are turning our self hatred outward and gripping onto people (celebrities/influencers) and deifying them. Believing that these people cannot be bad and do bad things. Pushing a notion that there are people who can exist outside of the confines of the human condition and be perfect. And that we need to strive for that. To be perfect. To live perfectly. To have the perfect family, the perfect house, the perfect items, the perfect clothes and makeup, the perfect friends and the perfect job. And this narrative is being pushed onto people that cannot be perfect.

Because to be perfect is to not be human. And every person is human. We have been taught and conditioned that there is only bad and good, and we need to strive for being just good and hate the bad, our bad. 

But if there was no darkness, then we would not be able to see the light. And this system is only working to hate ourselves more. We need to understand that everyone exists within the concept of darkness and evil. 

We inherently put celebrities, politicians, or other people on pedestals and when they fall from grace we are disgusted as we are confronted with our own humanity. That is not to defend what any one person has done, but to explain that no person is free from having bad aspects to their past or present. 

A character that is perfect without any negative points, does not feel real or ‘good’. That is because we exist in a word where evil is just as prevalent as good, and two cannot exist without the other. 

I personally hate any female character (I specify female character because it is more prevalent, which has to do with my manifesto about feminist literature which I may post later) that is evil just to be evil. Just out of vindictive hatred or jealousy. But there is always a reason. A cause. To bring this idea into a fandom space so that we can better understand it, we know that Bucky Barnes (The Winter Soldier from Marvel) didn’t kill, when he was with HYDRA, for no reason. He didn’t murder people for the sole sadistic desire to see death. He had a reason. But when we are on the receiving end of any sort of suffering, it is easier to believe in these dichotomies. That there are evil people that do evil for no reason and there are good people who are just genuinely good.

But every single one of our actions is a reaction to something else. Bucky was brainwashed by HYDRA and had his psyche split so that he could kill without remorse. 

Most villains in media have reasons behind every single one of their actions. In WandaVision, Wanda just wanted to be able to live out an idealized life with her ‘children’. She enslaved and entire town in order to do this, but it wasn’t out of a pure desire to do evil, she had her own broken reason.

Geto had reasons for why he did everything in JJK. Itatchi killed the Uchiha clan in order to save Konoha and protect Sasuke. Light Yagami had reasons why he was killing people. 

Of course nowadays, there are a lot more characters that are evil for the pure sadistic desire of hurting others which correlates with the rise of injustice in the world. In times where everything is uncertain and there might not be justice, harsh moral codes and standards make people feel safe. (I will talk more about this in part 2.) Fandom spaces evolve and change overtime as society changes overtime. 

We like reading characters that have reason behind their actions. Because everything we do and everything we think is a reaction to something else. And when characters lack motive or reason, they fall flat. Fictional characters are condensed truths about reality and when something is too surface level, it lacks a bit of truth. The more truth a character has, the more complex it becomes. The more human it becomes. The more real.

Every single person is also their own main character. We all have rich and complex lives and our favorite characters/ships/tags/fanfics are windows into our complex identities. The more we understand who we are, the more we can love who we are. Through the brokenness and through the love.

So many terrible things can be tied to some sort of self-hatred. Misogynistic people don’t hate women, they hate themselves. They are taking that hate and turning it outwards as a way to feel better about themselves and what they are going through. 

The most important thing for us is to learn to love ourselves. And the easiest way to do that is through fanfiction. I love to read angst and I love to read when characters go through the worst possible experiences. And in a way, how could I hate someone for what they've done or been through when I love characters that have been through the same?

Love yourself. It is the strongest political protest. 

And if you need help, start with loving a character.

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I honestly don't think anyone will read this. But I also figured if at least one person read this then it would be enough. This is really just an opinion piece. I also took out a part about religion and how it feeds off of self-hatred since I thought it might be triggering for some people. I also repeat myself a lot 😬

Happy Mothers Day!

[wisdomseulogy]

Stony/Stucky headcanons:

Alpha Tony Stark X Alpha Steve Rodgers

The love was quick with a lot of passion and agression

Tony always hated how he wasn’t an omega and wanted to have a kid with Steve so he figured it out and had Peter. (Alternative timeline here where somehow Peter ends up with a different family and Tony thinks he lost of the baby and he reunites with Peter when Peter is a teen)

There is always a lot of tension in the Stark-Rodgers household (two alphas are bound to butt heads most of the time), but everything comes to a head when Bucky comes back.

Steve instantly recognizes Bucky as the omega that he knew growing up and tries to help Bucky instead of fighting him.

Tony hates this because it brings up his own insecurities about not being an omega (what he believes Steve deserves/desires)

Tony is instantly on the Bucky hate train saying that he cant be saved and he can’t be helped and that they need to take him down

Steve and Tony get into a huge fight and Tony tries to stop Steve from going up against SHIELD

Steve goes up against SHIELD/HYDRA and eventually fights Bucky.

Bucky is adamant that he doesn’t know Steve, but on the inside Bucky recognizes that Steve smells…familiar

Bucky saves Steve from drowning in the river.

Captain America Civil War:

Tensions have been as high as ever with Steve and Tony, but they are trying to at least put up the facade of a loving family for their son Peter.

But when Tony learns about the woman’s son dying and the Sokovia Accords, he can’t help but think about his son Peter and want no more children to die because of their actions.

Steve doesn’t agree with the Sokovia Accords.

And then, Bucky is suspected of having blown up the UN and killing the king of Wakanda.

Steve and eventually Sam are quick to defend Bucky.

Steve says he knows Bucky, he knows him. He knows Bucky would never do that.

In a room filled with the other Avengers, Tony turns to Steve and says, I thought I knew you. I thought you would agree with me on the Sokovia Accords, I thought you would give up on that assassin omega you used to know. I thought you would take my side instead of humiliating me in front of our pack.

Then Tony drops the bombshell that he wants a divorce and that he wants sole custody of Peter.

Steve is taken aback. Sure Peter has always been closer with Tony and Steve is often gone on missions. But aren’t children usually closer with their mothers?

Steve has to choose between his family or Bucky.

Steve chooses Bucky and leaves with Sam to Romania.

Tony is heart broken. Natasha tries to console him but he refuses to let the pack see him cry. Not like this. And then Peter…how was he going to tell Peter?

Bucky gets taken back and was supposed to be interrogated by a psychiatrist but it ended up being Zemo. Bucky goes on a rampage and it takes both Sam and Steve to hold Bucky down and take him to a secure location.

Meanwhile Tony is coming to terms with the fact that his husband chose an ex-situationship over him and his son. Peter can tell something is wrong, but no one is saying anything.

Eventually Tony tells Peter what happened and Peter decides to side with Tony. Tony begins to build team Iron Man to go up against his soon-to-be ex husband Steve.

There is the whole fight between team Captain America and team Iron Man on the tarmac.

Steve is upset with Tony for ‘pinning their son against him’ and for not trying to understand his side of the story.

Peter meets Bucky for the first time, the omega that his father broke the family over.

Huge fight breaks out and Natasha ends up betraying Tony and helps Steve, Sam, and Bucky get away.

But a crack has formed that cannot be sealed. Even though Tony learns that Bucky was set up, he still continues with the divorce filing.

Endgame:

(Sam and Bucky end up having a thing and eloping after sharing a heat together)

Steve decides to abandon his pack and his son for Peggy Carter for no apparent reason other than lust and greed.

Peter is devastated that his father left him to stay in the past. But Peter tries to hold it together.

Then Tony ends up sacrificing himself in order to save everyone and Peter is left with no parents and a half sibling and step-mom.

Sam and Bucky try to help Peter and raise him at least until he is able to move out on his own. (Of course later everyone ends up forgetting about Peter too.)

I have been obsessed with this for a while.