#mcu ableism

[legalandnotease]

This post.

The thing that aggravates me the most is that people are acting like Thunderbolts was *the* first time that Bucky's arm was treated like a joke, when really this has been happening since Infinity War, but TFatWS was the first time it was actually removed. Honestly that whole scene in TFatWS was painful. Not only does he not seem to think his opponent touching his shoulder is off and like - move... but he also wasn't aware that there was a killswitch on the arm. The situation is rendered absurd by Sam asking "did you know they could do that?" after its removal.

(...and *do not* get me started on the gross rhetoric that scene gave rise to in which people started saying the Wakandans had a right to confiscate Bucky's *weaponized prosthetic* because "they gave it to him therefore they own it". Yes, the Wakandan arm is a weapon.

Yes I do understand why T'Challa gave it to him- and I do understand the fate of the very world was at stake. Bucky would probably have been happy to fight Thanos either way but the fact still remains. That new prosthetic was given to him for the express purpose of *fighting*. Bucky knew that- its why he says "where's the fight?" the instant he sees it.

The implication that the Wakandans had a right to remove it for doing something they didn't like is disturbing in two ways. First because its literally weaponizing part of his body which BTW is exactly what HYDRA did to him.

Second there's the idea that disabled people don't own thier own ability aids and have a right to use them as they see fit. Like, someone gives Matt Murdock new sight stick and they - have the right to take it away if he represents someone they don't approve of?The implication that fully able people have the ultimate control over disabled people's bodies is actually gross.

Last of all, its hardly a shock that Bucky's arm became a running gag when *hours* after he got we had Rocket making that quip and *then* several more jokes about it in TFatWS. One character calls Bucky "the bionic staring machine" (it might've been Sam) and another calls him a "cyborg". You can dismiss both oas a harmless jokes if you want (many do) but to me its part of a pattern. First of defining Bucky as nothing more than his disability, and second of mocking and minimizing both the disability and the tramatic events which resulted in him becoming disabled in the first place. A pattern that started in 2018 and still hasn't ended.

Its no surprise really that we got the vile Nebula giving Rocket his arm as a Christmas present plotline the following year. It bears noting with that as well that whilst fandom today denounce and try to distance themselves from that scene at the time people were actively *asking for* it to happen. They *wanted* Rocket to "get the arm".

At very very least in Thunderbolts we had Ava showing enough consideration to pick up the arm when an incapacitated Bucky couldn't and carrying it for him until he asked for it back. (Then you remember that Ava also has a bodily difference... so it at least read that as one disabled person looking out for another). Last time it was "ripped off him" that didn't happen and the time before that he had to pick it up himself whilst Sam just made a joke at his expense.

You know what the worst thing is though @nrilliree? It isn't the casual ableism of the last 7 years. Its that one of the writers of Civil War actually suggested that Bucky's arm being blown off wasn't intended to be sympathetic. It was intended as a narrative "punishment". He wasn't being treated with respect even in Civil War.

Y’kno, for all of CA:CW’s faults, at least it never treated Bucky’s left arm as a joke.

When Bucky loses his arm in this film, it isn’t because he suddenly forgets how to move away from an opponent that’s suddenly in his space and touching him (TFATWS) or he throws some clearly ineffective punches at an enemy and, for whatever reason, doesn’t think to change his strategy (Thunderbolts), but because he got blasted by Tony Stark’s arc reactor point blank after using an incredible feat of strength to try and stop him. And when his arm is blown off? It’s treated with the appropriate amount of shock and horror. It frames it as a terrifying moment for Bucky and makes him feel incredibly sympathetic. He just lost a part of him in an extremely brutal fashion in the fraction of a second. It wasn’t something he could’ve predicted or easily avoided (unlike future instances where he loses his arm…again 🙄).

But now? Now his arm is used as the butt of stupid jokes. Rocket wants to buy it. Nebula STEALS IT off screen to use it as a Christmas gift. Bucky spills some sauce on it and the only way to wash it is by running it through the dishwasher. He now has to lose it at least one ☝️ time in every new thing he’s in like it’s some quota that has to be filled. Like. The MCU writers seriously can’t think of anything involving Bucky’s arm that doesn’t take away his dignity as a disabled person while also showcasing him as the strong, competent fighter he is?

Literally the only genuinely funny thing involving his arm is when he threw a punch at Peter, leading to the latter catching it and immediately exclaiming how cool it is. And that happened in Civil War!

I don’t know. Civil War definitely could’ve been a much better film, but at least it got that part right.

[legalandnotease]

Me: The whole "making amends" idea in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier is incredibly stupid and smacks of victim-blaming because Bucky should not be forced to make amends for things he was *made* to do against his will.

Its literally like telling a SA victim to apologize to all the other people their attacker also hurt.

Also, don't tell trauma survivors to *get their shit togeher* its extremely insentistive and misinformed. Mentally ill people aren't just being annoying or mean on purpose.

Sam Stans and people in wider fandom:

*That's not victim blaming! Bucky was never a victim, it was doing it all willingly anyway and that's why Sam said to make amends!

Also Sam has PTSD too. He is the only person in history who ever suffered discrimination, so Bucky trauma doesn't count and if you keep mentioning it you are a big bad racist!!

Me: OK, that's messed up. Don't dismiss and invalidate people's trauma.

Also know its not just black people who are subject to discrimination? Lots of people suffer discrimination, including disabled people and mentally ill people and this applied historically as well.

Furthermore, having been subjected to racism doesn't give Sam or anybody else a free pass to mistreat others. What's wrong with just treating those around you with basic decency, sympathy and compassion?

That includes Bucky, who is also disabled BTW.

Sam fans and others in general fandom:

"Bucky is not disabled! I already told you HE IS NOT A VICTIM he never was! He is not marginalized! Stop babying him! He's an adult and he CHOSE to do all the things he did as the Winter Soldier!"

He's just being mean to Sam on purpose and being selfish. Sam doesn't have to be nice to him! That's so tone deaf and its racist!"

Seriously poeple: if Bucky had bought up how the disability jokes and blaming him for things that caused his PTSD made him uncomfortable IRL Sam would have been receptive and understood because he's actually a decent human who knows its wrong to mock people for things they can't help. Or blame them for things that they didn't choose.

It is a shame that the writers of FAtWS and a good number of Sam Stans can't seem to grasp this.

[buckydeservesthebest]

I'm going to write my own general response since some Sam Stans have started with absurd posts about how in their distorted version of reality Bucky "has been a bad friend and betrayed every black person he has ever met"... *sight* this could not be more stupid, untrue and unfair.... 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

On the subject of Bucky and the rest of the New Avengers "working for Valentina", I already wrote a long rant explaining that there is NOT a single shred of proof of this. And that at the end of it all, the OG Avengers literally were formed by a government organization (SHIELD), Sam was going to form his own team of Avengers at Ross's instruction and was going to work alongside him had the Red Hulk scandal not happened and Ross not ended up in prison. THE AVENGERS WORKING TOGETHER WITH THE GOVERNMENT IS NOT SOMETHING NEW. BECAUSE WORKING WITH THE GOVERNMENT DOESN'T MEAN BEING SUBSERVIENT TO IT.

Bucky having his own team literally does NOT in any way in the remotest way affect Sam, because literally nothing detracts from him or minimizes him as Captain America or in any other way, nor does it somehow prevent him from being able to form his own Avengers team and operate as he sees fit.

So this description of "traitor" to refer to Bucky COULD NOT BE MORE STUPIDLY FALSE AND BE FARTHER AWAY FROM REALITY.

And for those who complain that one of Bucky's team members is John Walker, does everyone forget that they already worked together briefly at the end of TFATWS to capture the FS and there was no problem??? Bucky does NOT hate John, literally the only disagreement from Bucky and Sam towards Walker was over the possession of the shield, and that problem is over, so don't come whining that Bucky can now be his ally, because there is literally no moral impediment of any kind for them to be part of the same team.

And do people forget that, again, Sam was going to work alongside Ross?? The same guy who ordered the extrajudicial execution order (which is literally illegal) against Bucky, convicted him as guilty for the UN bombing without a fair trial, which is literally also a violation of his human rights, and on top of it all lamented that the SWAT team couldn't kill Bucky. Ross is a horrible person (no better than Valentina) and literally ordered Bucky's murder, and I don't see anyone calling Sam a traitor because he was going to form an Avengers team under his instructions and was going to work in conjunction with his government.

So don't come with your shitty double standards calling Bucky a "traitor" either, when no one called Sam a "traitor" for allying himself with the one who ordered the murder of his friend.

It's almost funny how no Sam Stan has ever wanted to acknowledge the ableist and victim-blaming attitudes Sam directed at Bucky. All those horrible jokes and tasteless comments like "cyborg brain", "bionic looking machine that killed almost everyone he met", "we're not assassins" "you're going back to your frozen rat diet of your time as the Winter Soldier", that only in the mind of imbecile could be funny. All of this disgusting shit is ableist.

Sam literally held Bucky responsible for what he was forced to do as the Winter Soldier ("you were stopping all the wrongdoers *you* enabled as the Winter Soldier" ep. 5) and gave him "advice" that is exactly the same as Dr. Raynor's, and is nothing more than re-victimization.

There is absolutely nothing healthy about telling a victim of abuse that they should "make amends" for something they were a VICTIM of. Let alone showing up with the other victims of the same abuser and apologizing as if Bucky was the victimizer and not another victim. This is extremely dangerous and damaging to both parties. Already a real life therapist created a Twitter thread where she explains absolutely everything that is wrong with this.

Sam is NOT a victim of abuse or mind control, nor is he a therapist trained to talk to people who are victims of this situation, so he can NOT go around pretending to give advice on something he knows absolutely nothing about. That is unethical.

If you think that telling this truth is "racist", let me tell you that there are people in the black community who think exactly the same thing. Are they racist too??

...

Oh and regarding the Wakandans issue...I've talked about this a lot before, but in light of some Sam Stans wanting to revive this ridiculous issue as an excuse to try to vilify Bucky.. 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

*sigh* first of all the reason T'Challa offered Bucky assistance in removing the Winter Soldier's programming from his brain, was not because of how magnanimous T'Challa is in wanting to help a poor man who had suffered too much, but rather that that assistance was given in the form of an apology for having spent it trying to kill him without being sure if Bucky was the one truly responsible for his father's death, and also in the form of thanks because thanks to him and Steve, T'Challa was able to get to the one truly responsible. The canonical comic Avengers Infinity War Prelude literally said so:

So while Bucky is grateful for the assistance Wakanda offered him, he does NOT owe them lifelong loyalty nor is he limited to only doing what feels right to them and did not represent a damage to their pride, because that is a stance worthy of an abuser.

So NO. In absolutely no way did Bucky betray Wakanda because Zemo's temporary freedom does NOT affect them in the slightest. Literally Bucky always intended to send him back to prison and literally Ayo understood this and that's why he gave him the 8 hour deadline to come back for Zemo, and literally Bucky NEVER objected to this.

Regarding Zemo. Literally the plot gives Bucky the reason to enlist his help and assist him in his escape, because as "the foremost expert on Hydra and the super soldier program" his knowledge was needed to figure out how the serum was recreated to get to Karli. This is what canon book The Art of TFATWS says, and it literally also says that Sam knew this and agreed.

People deliberately and conveniently forget that Zemo is NOT only responsible for the death of T'Chaka and the other dozen people from the UN bombing. Zemo was also an ABUSER of Bucky and one of the people who hurt him the most in his life. Zemo framed him for the UN bombing causing everyone to try to kill him, put him in the crosshairs of any Hydra member that still existed, had him imprisoned in cell that was electrocuting him all the time, subjected him to mind control and forced him to kill people and fight his friends which caused more charges to be added against him, etc, etc, etc. Now it turns out Wakandans know more about their own abuser than Bucky himself?? This is bullshit.

In just world part of Zemo's sentence should have been for all the damage he caused Bucky.

And the point is, again, Ayo understood and agreed with Bucky's plan and that was why he gave him an 8 hour deadline to come back for it. Ayo was NOT upset about that. Ayo didn't handicap and dehumanize Bucky because she felt "betrayed" but because she was upset that he had stopped her from committing unjustified murder against Walker. Bucky tried to reason with her and only defend himself with non-violent techniques, Ayo disconnected his arm in a low and dishonorable move, and now it turns out that Bucky is to blame?? 🤡

"Bucky betrayed the Wakandans" say the same people who always planned to betray him by putting a kill-safe (on a prosthetic that he didn't even request to have in the first place, but was given to him by T'Challa himself for him to fight for his nation) behind his back whose unawareness could have proved fatal to him, in case by sheer bad luck something could activate it when Bucky was hanging on to it for his life...

IT IS NOT JUSTIFIED UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES TO REMOVE DISABILITY ASSISTANCE FROM A DISABLED PERSON.

BEING A BLACK PERSON DOES NOT GIVE YOU A FREE PASS TO HAVE ABLEIST AND VICTIM-BLAMING ATTITUDES TOWARD ANOTHER PERSON.

And yes, people in the black community also think Ayo's attitude was unjustifiable.

Are they "racist" for daring to say this?? Of course they are NOT.

[hollow-keys]

Your Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-Man erasing Lonnie's albinism... love the reminder that disabled representation straight up doesn't matter to people.

[legalandnotease]

Most Bucky fans I know have been saying the ableist jokes and gags about Bucky's arm aren't funny for the best part of 4 years. Why 4 years? Because this literally started with The Falcon and the Winter Soldier- the show that "fans" like this consider perfect.

We were shouted down and called "racist" for daring to flag up the millionth joke about Bucky's disability in that show, because it was Sam telling the joke or Ayo removing his arm.

So you'll forgive me if I call bullshit on people like the op and Sam Stans suddenly pretending they care about respectful treatment of Bucky's disability when they've been letting things like this slide for 4 YEARS. When they consistently attacked anyone who bought up the ableism against his character.

They don't care: they're just jumping on the anti-Thunderbolts bandwagon.

@buckydeservesthebest

Damn he comes out with more he didn’t like every day 😭 bro really doesn’t like what they did with Bucky 😭

[ableist-cut]

Daredevil: Blind, Not Broken

While Marvel's Daredevil wants you to believe it's doing disability representation right. On the surface, it does seem that way. Matt Murdock is a blind lawyer, but a hero by night. The man is a brooding fighter who refuses to be defined by his disability. Although scratch beneath the surface, and you'll find something much more complicated. Daredevil walks a fine line between empowerment and erasure. A part of the show represents blindness and the struggles that come with it, but also fantasizes about it. By doing so, this show leans into the common ableist theme of the Supercrip.

What is a supercrip? A supercrip is a person who is disabled, but is depicted as having superhuman abilities as compensation for their disability. Matt Murdock is a brilliant example of this. He doesn't just avoid his blindness, nor does he let it stop him. Rather, he transcends his disability in ways that defy reality. The problem isn't that a blind man is a superhero; the issue is that his blindness is only acceptable because of his superhuman powers.

The show treats Matt's blindness less as a meaningful part of his identity but more as a visual concept. Throughout the show, there are scenes where Matt uses his cane or reads braille. However, the show invests most of its time in making the viewer forget he's blind. Take this, for example. We never really see how Matt practically navigates his daily life. I want to know what kind of accommodations he has in his office. I want to know how he cleans his apartment or even cooks! Yet the show doesn't unveil that. To the show's credit, though, there are scenes where Matt resists the pity that often follows his disability.

The argument is, Daredevil is not the worst offender when it comes to ableist media. It proves that representation without proper reflection or research can still hurt. However, it also shows how easy it is to replace disability with fantasy.

[thousandyearphantombunker]

CW: I'm mean here about shows and stuff people like

syndrome from incredibles, Thanos in the comics, mad hatter from Batman, tighten from Megamind, frollo from Hunchback of Notre Dame, Red Hulk, parasite from superman and Ozai all of these villains are pathetic but they work for some reason I cannot place. A lot of stories try and write villains that are pathetic but also scary and it doesn't work- I love Starscream he can be an amazing character (he can be sympathetic or a straight up monster he can be lame but still threatening etc) and I like most versions but God can writers screw him up and he can fall flat (i love tfp i swear but god i hate their starscream! He just didn't work for me! Megatron and knockout are cool tho) Belos for some reason doesn't work for me at all- I know he should be scary while the fandom is wrong about him being a colonizer/cult leader/a dictator (he's not stop using words you dont understand the meaning of)and how insane it is that he's in a kids show (watch more cartoons there's villains darker than him) he's still trying to commit genocide and he's abusive and he's at his core got very little depth or complexity- he's really just an isekai character gone wrong- a pathetic guy with a hero complex and emotional baggage who becomes a villain- but he just didn't work for me. Neither does Jacob Hopkins- he's just Ronaldo from SU if he was written to be a straight up hate sink. I'm a lesbian latina with autism and was raised with a different sect of christan beliefs from him- I know historically this guy would have murdered me and i know he should work but something about him didn't stick the landing! The main thing I think about with belos isn't 'wow this guy is a great villain' it's 'can y'all stop being weirdly ableist toward this old man' or 'why do so many of y'all wanna fuck this man he's ugly' and dont get me started on mcu villains - their version of the mandarin, she-hulk's dumb men rights activists on reddit (seriously that's the scariest villain you can come up with? Like revenge porn is evil but really? I don't like the term man-baby- I have personal issues with how the term has been used in ableist ways- but yeah erm man babies on reddit are the best you can do for a villain? That's freaking stupid) and OMG Sutur in Ragnarok was terrible etc etc- these villains all suck!

How do you write villains that are pathetic but still work? How do write villains who are at their core whiny insecure losers but still work as detestable threatening villains? Like marvel made a character whose whole thing was that he's an incel work but so many other stories fail to write that stuff. Part of me thinks it's because these stories are desperate to make their villain into a hate sink joke but still make them scary and it fails but Tighten and Red Hulk are right there and there's no way the writers weren't purposely writing hate sinks with them! And they work! Why doesn't belos?

[legalandnotease]

Honestly, I cannot understand this characterization of Bucky as "brutal", not least the examples given in the OP.

As @buckydeservesthebest revealed in her screenshots, the police in Bucharest were straight out trying to kill him. More than that: they were trying to kill him in a an especially brutal manner.

First, blowing him up with a grenade and then on a the stairwell one of them gets bloody close to *shooting him in the face at point-blank range*.

I mean look at the position of that gun after he pushed it out the way.

To call his reaction to somebody trying to put several bullets through his skull which consists entirely of evasion/preventing his opponent from shooting him "brutal" is absurd.

If Bucky wanted to be brutal, he could have thrown each and every one of those guys out of the windows, or down the stairwells. Or even picked up one of the discarded guns and literally mown them down.

He's good with guns. He used them all the time as The Winter Soldier.

Yet he doesn't do that here.

Also, let's be honest here. If any other MCU character was in this scenario, such as Tony Stark, nobody would blink at him firing a missile at his pursuers and blowing them up. Nobody would object to Clint Barton shooting them or Natasha garotting them .

Yet when an unarmed Bucky engaged is non-lethal *hand to hand* fighting against 40-odd men with machine guns all aiming for his head, he's the one in the wrong.

You know what I think?

I think viewers want Bucky to be more brutal than he is, and so they read "brutality" into almost-invariably defensive fights, where there is none.

Because of course he's "The Winter Soldier": he's a "badass". Why is he only fighting to defend himself? Why isn't he just going full on with his missile launcher?

The idea that he might have a no-kill rule, the idea that he doesn't engage in aggressive violence and that he might not be a naturally violent person contradicts everything we have been led to believe about his character.

Not just his character, but the superhero genre generally. Superheroes are not mean to be semi-pacifists who would sooner run or retire to a farm then fight.

Also those male stereotypes come to play. Big man with big muscles metal arm *must* be violent and brutal. Why would he be big and have metal arm otherwise? The dichotomy between Bucky being physically strong but not prone to aggression is there, and is is glaring: and it is something both the MCU writers and audience struggle with.

A similar stuation existed with the Star Wars prequels and Anakin Skywalker. How could the "future Darth Vader" (male power fantasy...) have been a kind, gentle, sensitive young person who cried and cared about women?

How can the former Winter Soldier be a kind, protective and yes *gentle* person who if he has a choice, does not want to fight at all? Who would rather use his metal arm to check if plums are ripe, do farm work, or play with local kids. Or live as an amputee with only one arm.

I think some people mad about the arm is not necessarily about the fact that Ayo disabling the arm itself, it's more of the fact that it was not necessary and the fact that Bucky had no idea they can do that. If I were to be honest, I think it was not that necessary because Ayo is well capable of taking him down without having to disarm him and she is definitely not threatened by him. I think what some people find upsetting about that scene is the fact that it kinda comes off as Ayo putting Bucky in a position where it would make him feel like he doesn't have full control of his own body after all. The Wakandans, especially Ayo, T'Challa and Shuri had every right to feel betrayed and upset but the point is they should have told Bucky about how the arm can easily be disabled like that, they didn't know Bucky was going to set Zemo free when they gave him the arm and regardless of the things they have done for him and if they were ones who gave him the arm, they should have at least told him about it, because it's connected to him, it's a part of HIS body. It doesn't matter if it was necessary to disarm him or not, the point is they should have told him about it because apart from the fact that it's his body and that it was a bit insensitive given his history, it's also a point of vulnerability, and the fact that she did it in front of Walker (and possibly Zemo) --- people who can easily turn on Bucky, could easily that to their advantage and attempt to disable it themselves. Just my thoughts on it.

Thank you for sharing your perspective, anon!

I’m going to use this long-ass reply to address this stuff with Ayo and also voice some thoughts I’ve had over the past few weeks seeing people paint Bucky into being this complete soft and harmless human that needs 25-7 protection which I don’t jive with — and this is me, a complete Bucky stan.

Many moons ago, I saw a post that compared 1940s Bucky moving with stealth and a loaded gun on the train to the Winter Soldier doing the same thing, essentially discussing the similarities and debating how much of non-brainwashed Bucky was in the Soldier. And I think the fandom forgets or chooses to neglect the following when painting him as this fragile, peace-loving guy:

Bucky was an incredibly skilled sniper in the United States Army. His job is to eliminate threats in the most efficient way possible, and he’s good at it. HYDRA gets their hands on him and + the serum, this gets magnified. It wasn’t like HYDRA turned him into someone with the ability and mental capacity to kill — that was already there. The brainwashing and torture just carved out the rest of him to leave those honed skills and an amplified ruthlessness with no moral issues, no sense of self to contend with. That ruthlessness is part of Bucky, whether people like it or not.

When Bucky is outside of HYDRA for the first time and hiding in Civil War and gets attacked, he’s so brutal in his actions that Steve Rogers, the man who literally was ready to die to save Bucky and free him when no one else believed in the good in him, intervenes because “Buck, you’re going to kill someone.” Bucky responds that he’s not going to kill anyone, but the fact remains: with or without HYDRA control, Bucky has a strong capacity for violence that hovers on brutality — again, what’s the most efficient way to eliminate or neutralize a threat? Like, I don’t want to kill you, but I’ll knock your ass out with cinder blocks to the chest.

Bucky has a good heart, he’s loyal, he’s smart, he’s caring, he’s the longest-standing POW in history and was turned into a slave for decades, put through unimaginable trauma and torture and horror with no escape. Bucky is also a strong and incredibly skilled super soldier who has a bionic arm, is a trained sniper, is unnervingly precise with knives, and self-describes himself as “semi-stable.” Zemo notes in the bar that “it didn’t take Bucky long to get back into form,” and he’s right because the ruthlessness and skill of the Winter Soldier is a part of him and always has been. We see it when he has his hand around Zemo’s neck and tells him he will kill him, when he rips the glass from his hand and throws it across the room.

And I’m sure the Wakandans know all this about Bucky, this light and his ability for hard-to-stop violence, whether from talking to Steve and Bucky or doing their own homework. And they still choose to help him out of the goodness of their hearts because he’s been put through hell and they believe they have the capacity to help him and it’s the right thing to do — they’re betting more on those positive attributes. And they put a failsafe on his arm, a literal weapon, and chose not to tell him. You know why I think that shows how much they did care about him? Because they could’ve blatantly come out and said “Hey, we don’t trust you,” and hurt him outright, but they didn’t because they’re betting on the light in Bucky to outweigh the dark or any future manipulation. That it’s a worst-case scenario function they hope to never have to use — so they’re prepared if shit hits the fan, and if it doesn’t, Bucky doesn’t have to be hurt feeling like he can’t be trusted. I see no issues here, they’re just being cautious.

Now coming to Ayo, my QUEEN Ayo. From that beautiful, beautiful opening scene, we get to see her support, her reassurance, her belief that Bucky will be able to work through this, even when he doesn’t believe it himself. She watches him fight and struggle and cry, and you can feel the hope in her and how moved she is when she gets to tell him it worked, he did it — he’s free. And she says it not once, but twice. And you can hear not just the comfort, but the PRIDE and warmth in her voice directed to him, who I’m sure she’s watched throughout the whole deprogramming process and gotten to know and is happy to see him work through the pain and come out on the other side.

And then she sees that same individual make a decision in freeing Zemo that she perceives as a “fuck you” not just to her country, but to her, someone who was charged with protecting her king. She could’ve just disarmed Bucky the second they met up, but she doesn’t. She takes the time to explain her side and her feelings, her guilt and her shame, and basically implies that she feels betrayed by Bucky because Wakanda helped him and now he’s doing something that’s hurting her country. And still, she doesn’t attack or just go get Zemo. She gives Bucky the benefit of the doubt and a whole 8-hour American workday to do what he has to do because again, she believes in the best of him. And then that time limit runs up, and he chooses to get in her way.

And that’s the final straw. She’s angry, she’s guilty, she’s frustrated, and she feels betrayed hurt by someone I think she did respect and care about, someone whom she worked with and helped and supported when he was his most vulnerable. Did she “need” to disarm the arm to fight Bucky? Probably not. But is she doing it in the heat of battle and adrenaline and a whole bucket ton of emotions, including what she sees as the White Wolf blatantly disrespecting her country and her as a person and even friend and she just says fuck it, I’m done? You hurt us and me, and I’m going to hurt you back? Oh yeah. And Bucky looks shocked, not because he’s a poor fragile baby and “oh no, my arm, how could you?? my TrAumA”, but in the dual realization of “oh shit, how’d you do that?!” and “oh shit, I think I crossed a line here.” And also, I don’t think a single person in that room would be able to recreate the disabling sequence other than Ayo — it’s way too targeted and specific for someone like Walker to pick it up in the whole three seconds it took.

People need to stop reducing characters to these black and white extremes of soft and hard, of good and bad. Doing so completely devalues and ignores the REALITY of the complexity of being human, and Bucky and Ayo are both great examples of that played by stellar actors who portray that range and depth extremely well. End of the day, my thought is that the failsafe in the arm was justified and people need to stop coming for Ayo based on this ridiculous narrative that Bucky is too traumatized and sensitive and too much of a fave to ever be challenged or he’ll explode into dust. Boy deserves a life of freedom and healing and mental health support, but he’s also still a formidable opponent with the capacity for violence and skillset to kill. People are more than one thing.

Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk!!

[full-of-malice]

i haven't seen the new deadpool and wolverine movie yet, i've heard a lot of good things about it and i was actually kinda excited? most of the mcu has sucked so bad for a while now and deadpool is cool i love both characters. i love the art that was made by the fandom and the creativity i've seen from the fandom from the new movie

and then i learned that they for some reason put an r slur joke in the movie for no good reason at all. like wow. we just can't have nice things.

i was genuinely looking forward to this movie and that just. basically ruined the entire thing for me. it leaves a gross taste in my mouth now. really disappointing honestly

like i genuinely think the fandom is lovely, the ships are goofy, the art is wonderful, the movie seemed to have wonderful potential but like. come on. and i've seen like a total of one person talk about it

[karterroster]

i do not like bucky's treatment post endgame or the title of tws being used, am I the only one?

No spoilers for thunderbolts. And this is not concise or organized sorry.

The new suit- The red star* on the same arm, against black background. It goes with this mockery of his trauma that the mcu has been doing since endgame.

You would NEVER hear the end of a victim being forced to wear the same outfit they wore the night they were abused. Ever. The media would be up in arms if it was a real life victim.

But no, it's a sexy man wearing sexy colors in a full body suit that you can drool over. And suppress and exploit his trauma.

Now of cousre i havent seen thunderbolts yet, and i was only able to watch tfatws half the way through once when it first came out. So take this all with a grain of salt.

2. The title of The Winter Soilder still in use- you don't call a victim the special name their abuser came up with. Like why have him be called the white wolf and never bring it up again? Why is he going by a hydra codename that references not only being tortured by cold chamber, but his fall in a cold climate(winter), his time as a (drafted!) soilder, and all his years he lost to literal electrocution of his brain and being forced to commit crimes.

3. They keep forcing this narrative that he should get over it and just be a "new" version of the winter soilder. And it is so icky. They push that idea men can't have trauma and that it is edgy or cool to not get help.

and there's an new undertone of "oh, no, it actually wasn't that bad, and he might have just chose it cuz it was so edgy and badass" that other people have noticed. Like it's not funny and it's not edgy or badass to be tourtured and forced to do literal nazi war crimes.

Final notes for now- It should have been the falcon and the white wolf and I will die on that hill. Sam even brought it up in tfatws, that that was who he was now after wakanda (no, i dont like the writers downplaying it by 'little time' sam wouldnt say that), right? So why is he just a quirky made fun of disabled war veteran who was literal a prisoner of war for 70 years.

Main idea- Why is the "quiet, doesn't need help cause I'm a man" routine his character now. There was so much more to his character just a few movies ago.

Anyone can and should add on their opinions please. I would love to read and reblog them.

*@oneofstarkskids has said the red star is a call back to the comics and I did not know that but it still was used as a red herring in mcu of the winter soilder, as it's his logo. I mean at least it's not filled in so its a little different, but I still don't like it being used for bucky.

[legalandnotease]

Let's also not forget the "ACSHULLY Bucky isn't disabled because he's a super-soldier" crowd.

Yeah- Having the serum didn't grow his arm back. Without a prosthetic he still can't do a lot of things people with 2 arms can.

So yeah... he's a disabled super-soldier. Hope this helps them.

I recently had a friend on X tell me they had to delete a post about Bucky being disabled because of harassment.

That just makes me so mad. Bucky is disabled. Period. Why is that controversial still?

I'm sorry your friend had to go through that in the year of 2025.

I am not sure why a lot of people struggle with the idea of Bucky being disabled. Is it because of a general misunderstanding of disability meaning you have to be significantly physically disadvantaged? That someone who has a high functioning prosthesis who is nevertheless missing an arm somehow makes him not disabled? That somehow people can't correlate a disabled person with being capable and competent?

This is before we even go down the mental health and brain injury rabbit hole.

But yes I remember this argument back during the TFATWS days, especially in relation to Bucky's arm being removed. A lot of people tried to minimise the ableist connotations of that scene with the argument that Bucky's arm was made of vibranium and therefore it was a weapon and therefore he deserved to have it removed when he "misbehaved".

And I'm guessing with Cap 4 and Thunderbolts this year, a lot of these old ugly arguments have resurfaced.

[saltedplumtea]

Captain America: Brave New World once more participates in the fine Hollywood tradition of showing that your villain is villainous through them having facial differences and visible disabilities. Hurray. Maybe next time we can imply that the villain has the Evil Crime Mental Illness to really rack up all the ableism points.

[ebenelephant]

anyway so the super soldier serum has some pretty eugenicist undertones and considering that steve grew up chronically ill during a time where eugenicist thinking was common i think that should be examined more in fandom

[tyrannuspitch]

i understand that not everyone knows this, but i would really like the loki fandom to be a little more aware that psychiatry is institutionally biased against people with npd, and this bias is particularly magnified in social media and pop psych for sensationalist, commercial reasons. even the npd diagnostic criteria are Not Great (especially the short version - there is an expanded version!), and even if they were perfect, the understanding of the disorder you get just by reading a checklist is not a whole, rounded picture.

npd is (at least very, very often) a trauma disorder. people with npd having very low self-worth and self-destructive tendencies is incredibly common. npd is not "abuser disorder" or "evil disorder", it's just another mental illness, and honestly, any disorder can be framed in a demonising way if you try. (depressed people are scary because they're obsessed with death! adhd people are scary because they have no control of their emotions or impulses! etc.) i have yet to see a "debunking" of loki being "a narcissist" that gets past this popular, biased surface level.

here and here are two posts explaining how stigma can distort common descriptions of npd symptoms, and here is an unofficial suggested revision of the npd diagnostic criteria written by someone with the disorder to focus on the patient's experiences, and not on how others view them.

loki cannot "too good" to have npd, because having npd does not make you a bad person. reading loki as having npd is not inherently demonising or victim-blaming. and if a specific person's npd loki reading really is doing that, then the fundamental problem is not that they're biased against loki, a fictional character - it's that they're biased against a very vulnerable, stigmatised and real group of mentally ill people.

now that we've dealt with all that - DOES loki have npd?

personally, i go back and forth on whether i think he fully qualifies for the disorder, but as i interpret him, he absolutely does show many traits of npd, such as the following:

perfectionism and fluctuating, fragile self-esteem. he has to be best, because if he isn't the best that would mean he's the absolute worst, worthless, monstrous, unlovable, etc. even when he is succeeding in his goals then maybe he's somehow the best and the worst at once, and almost anything could bring him crashing down again.

constant comparison of himself to others, leading to insecurity, jealousy, bitterness, paranoia...

basing his feelings of safety/security on his connections to people he sees as powerful and/or admirable, and basing his self-esteem on their approval, to the point where he becomes dependent or defines himself by them.

desperately, sometimes destructively, acting out for attention - whether showing off (begging for approval) or picking fights (demanding it.)

experiencing loneliness, shame and guilt easily and extremely intensely, making him hypersensitive to criticism and the possibility of rejection or abandonment - which can provoke a fight/flight/freeze/fawn response.

defensive/paranoid distortion in his analysis of others' feelings - focusing intently on what they think of him (do you love me, hate me, want to hurt me?) while less aware of their own feelings (eg, he can be fairly insensitive to thor's own capacity to be hurt). (in loki, as in many real people, this seems to have originated as a defence mechanism against being manipulated, and from having to walk on eggshells in a toxic family where *everyone* has more social power than him.)

a deep-rooted fear of being manipulated or controlled, which leads to a very strong need to feel in control of himself.

a deep-rooted fear of emotional vulnerability which makes him very reluctant to express his emotions, and when he does, it's often either a calculated tactical decision (so he can tell himself he's still in control), or the result of an emotional breakdown because he just can't keep up the mask any longer.

a paranoid view of the world in which everyone always wants to control him, and controlling power imbalances are an inherent feature of all relationships ("freedom is life's great lie"...), leading him to try to "defensively" manipulate and control others. (this is the ugliest symptom on this list, but it's also arguably the least textbook npd - something this literal and pronounced might be better characterised as ptsd's "distorted understanding of own trauma"/"change of fundamental beliefs" symptoms.)

obviously everyone has a right to their own reading and headcanon, and of course you can reject any reading at all based on simply Not Vibing with it. this isn't the Mandatory NPD Loki post, just me trying to encourage you to consider the possibility. there's a lot here! it's a very plausible reading!

(and honestly, why stop there? you might also note that thor, who grew up in the same toxic household, display a fair number of these symptoms too...)

[this post is meant to be informative and to give people a little insight into an alternative perspective on npd to the dominant pop psych one. i'm happy to answer questions, but if you want to "debate" me or approach this as "discourse", please don't.]

[mama-imperator]

Absolutely hated the r slur being used in the movie, along with some other stuff. In Deadpool and Wolverine, Deadpool says a separate word beginning with r and another character replied with the r slur (thinking that’s what Wade had originally said)

It personally made me extremely uncomfortable hearing it. Plus the audience, including children, laughing. Wade’s response to it didn’t help either. He didn’t call this person out on what was said.

I get it, it’s just a movie. But I am worried about a slight increase in this word being used and people saying “I’m just quoting the movie” or “I saw it in this movie so it’s okay” type thing.

I'm worried, too. It doesn't help how some people don't give a shit about why the r slur is an ableist slur. I'm just worried that people (both neurotypical and neurodivergent) will use the movie as an excuse to say the r slur. As a disabled person who has been called the r slur (both in the past and as of recently), it's sad how people don't realize the harm that the r slur has caused to disabled people.

What doesn't help the case is that there is a trend of neurotypical people using the words "retired" and "restarted" as euphemisms for the r slur. Also, there was a joke created by Autistic people using the word "acoustic" as an euphemism for Autism/being Autistic. But of course, neurotypical people appropriated the joke, and now, if anyone says "is it acoustic" to someone being cringy, it has the same connotation of using Autism as an insult.

Marvel hasn't done anything remotely ableist to my knowledge. I'm hoping that that whole scene from Deadpool and Wolverine was just a one and done thing. Also, Deadpool has never been an ableist character from what I remember (but then again, I've only seen the second movie, so I might be wrong).

However, I do have some amount of skepticism with Marvel due to their history of antisemitism and anti-Romani racism. And with the fact that they brought back Robert Downey Jr. to play Doctor Doom in the upcoming Fantastic Four film instead of casting a Romani actor to play Doctor Doom since the character is canonically Romani.

But in conclusion, it's disgusting how people say the r slur to refer to someone or something being stupid. I've had instances at work where people have used the r slur, and unfortunately, I had to stand there and not say anything out of fear of starting an argument. And the sad part is that if you explain why the r slur is not a good word, you get met with people calling you a "snowflake", "sensitive", "over dramatic", or just doubling down and defending the use of the r slur. It's literally not difficult not to say the r slur.

[waterme-stories]

You might say

You might say her

You might say her new fight style is even more la- *gunshot*