#down with the clown

[tainbocuailnge]

So a friend of mine who I talk with about FGO says Ashiya Douman is one of the most irredeemable assholes in all of FGO b/c his acts of evil were way more personal than most antagonists and he was ALWAYS like this (it isn't just servant BS), the entire reason the Heian-Kyo story exists is b/c Chaldea is going after him so even Ritsuka should hate him. I just want to know how much of a monster he truly is or if my friend is just SUPER fixating on the bad parts (it helps to get other opinions).

obligatory disclaimer that i read heian kyo in the form of fallacies' fantranslations and I'm still in atlantis on NA

at the end of heian kyo we get a scene of the living ashiya douman trying to kill himself because he knows all the crimes caster of limbo committed were rooted in feelings that he indeed harbours and it horrifies him. he's horrified that all it took to break him was hearing "at this rate you'll never surpass seimei even once" in his own voice. he's horrified that he's capable of doing the things caster of limbo did and his sense of morality says he should kill himself for knowing the conditions under which he will break. it's seimei who talks him out of it, even though seimei knows douman in panhuman history was nearing his breaking point at this time and would soon indeed start committing numerous great evils.

is ashiya douman an irredeemable person? caster of limbo, who is ashiya douman's inferiority complex over forever being seimei's ridiculed rival combined with two gods who are both ill-defined but likewise designated as targets for hatred, wants you to believe this, because the purpose given to him by the alien god is to be an insufferable irredeemable clown bastard. ashiya douman also believes this, because the feelings at the root of caster of limbo are real. is it true though?

although the historical abe no seimei is widely known and beloved, and ashiya douman is consequently almost as much of a household name, not much is known about douman at all beyond the few stories where he gets clowned on to make seimei look better. is douman a villain just because we mostly know him from stories where the hero defeats him? caster of limbo was unable to become a beast of humanity because he lacked the love for humanity necessary to become a stepping stone for humanity's growth. he also failed to become a plague upon humanity because ashiya douman does not hate humanity and does not want to destroy it. ultimately, all he ever wanted was simply to surpass his friend and rival seimei even just once.

limbo is the afterlife for people not evil enough for hell and not good enough for heaven. when he tries to do good he fails to become a hero. when he tries being evil he fails to become the final boss. there is much evil in ashiya douman, certainly, and you need far more than two hands to count his crimes. there is much evil in many people, and there are many circumstances in which it will reveal itself. he's good at psychologically torturing people because he's intimately familiar with how insecurities can ruin a person and his job as alter ego was to bring out the worst in people. his acts of evil are way more personal than most others because he has no greater goal he wants to achieve, he has no other purpose than to be an insufferable irredeemable clown until he's backed into a corner and realizes that he does have something he wants to achieve, namely proving that he can achieve anything at all.

if you ask me, ashiya douman's character is meant to make you ask how useful "redeemability" even is in assessing a person's worth. when playing house with nursery rhyme he requests the role of mother in law because the nature of his legend is to be the hated person that makes everyone else look better by comparison, regardless of anything he actually did. he's obsessed with people who lost something important to them that they want to get back at all cost, and he gets his claws in them by offering them a way to get revenge, to show those who wronged them what they can really do. he wants to help just as much as he wants to hurt, and in many of the cases in the game those two end up being the same thing and mostly causing a lot of problems for everyone and especially chaldea, but that doesn't exclude that there are circumstances in which he would have helped more than hurt. if things were different maybe he wouldn't have ended up like this, and who's to say things can't still be different?

is ashiya douman irredeemable? this is not the right question to ask in this game. nobody in fate is ever truly irredeemable as long as they're willing to learn and grow, and alter ego ashiya douman shows up in chaldea so that he might learn to understand love.

[matt-n-trey]

when i see my moots hating on juggalos.. without knowing IM a juggalo..

[coloradosnumber1dad]

I just need him to sleepover at my house and stay up all night with me playing video games and then let me do our matching juggalo makeup while we listen to icp

[witchv0mit]

BORN WITH A HATCHET AND A JUGGALO FACE

BORN AS A CORPSE THAT THEY CALLED A DISGRACE

[obscuredsilk]

Despite it all we stay being goofy!!!!!

[bringingthemoon]

I really want DC to stop using the J*ker for everything. There are so many interesting characters that could be used but no let's keep going back to the clown. Please free us from him 😭

[sparknightdrawing]

jegus

Don’t let me get bored

[eriochromatic]

In the outskirts of the city lies a rundown apartment building filled with eccentric residents... Doesn’t seem like anyone checks on this part of town, but it’s not like they’re causing trouble, right?

Impel Down Escape Team Modern AU!!! 🏬🏬🏬 they r all living in the same building and being silly together

[engravedlives]

misc music stamps

[onryou-onryou]

Frank & The Hurricanes - I Know I'll See a Ghost

[visenyaism]

Gortash redemption wouldn’t work because he does not give a fuck about growing or improving or breaking the cycle he’s putting fireworks into teddy bears for refugee orphans because fuck ‘em. He’s cooked. Ketheric thinks he’s too far gone the sunk cost fallacy already has his hooks in him. It’s over. Orin though. Six months of secure attachments to people who see her as an individual, an introduction to art mediums that are not finger painting with intestines, a trip to the circus (fun), regular exposure to the sun, and a blunt later and she is picking up trash by the river and voting in municipal elections.

[witchv0mit]

I need to redo my Shaggy juggalo paint again

[urgentkettle]

i fear that if left unchecked, Kendrick may start releasing a diss track every 12 hours. By the end of next week we’ll be at 4 a day.

[carcinocavity]

HIIIIIIII ❤️

My name is Tricky!!! I am a trickster Karkat fictive!! My pronouns are he/she/su/swee/swi/am/lo/ye/ice/hea/ci! I am a qaudgender bi/pan transfem (the body is NOT transfem)! The body is 19 years old!

I post about my life, my partners, cute aesthetics, mostly pink things, and more!!! Sourcemates are free to interact, anyone can interact!! I love talking to people!!! I use my TYPING QUIRK!! Which is all caps. I use a bunch of explanation marks as well! Sometimes I don't use my typing quirk when I'm sad. All post with my typing quirk will be tagged as "caps!"

Last updated: 9/3/23

Tag dictionary under the cut!!!!

TAGS:

#love letters - ASKS!!!

#romantic talk - OG POSTS!!

#karkatcule - THE POLYCULE TAG FROM MY KARKAT TIMELINE(S)?

#junebug - JUNE EGBERT'S TAG

#apple pie - DAVE'S TAG

#candy-coated metal - DAVEBOT'S TAG

#birdy boy - DAVESPRITE'S TAG

#pony boy - EQUIUS' TAG

#princy - ERIDAN'S TAG

#buzy bee - SOLLUX'S TAG

#sillay kitty - NEPETA'S TAG

#down with the clown - GAMZEE'S TAG

#twwo iin one - ERISOLSPRITE'S TAG

#honey lavender - ERISOLKAT TAG

#kitty tech - EQUIKATNEP TAG

[sualne]

a good looking buggy to make up for the silly ones

[gumgumexplosion]

HATS