#im so sick of this y'all

[whumpfish]

It has come to this. I have content blocked the word Caretaker.

This has been a slow spiral into doneness for a while. At first I content blocked just the main phrase present in the most egregious ableist woobery, "Caretaker's heart breaks." Then I blocked "Caretaker raises their voice." Then I blocked "Whumpee cowers" because sometimes woobie "Whumpees" confused their trusted Caretaker for their evil Whumper over something similarly trivial and unrealistic but not exactly. Then I had to block "cowers" because sometimes it was "Whumpee just cowers" and it wound up on my dash anyway. Then I thought if I blocked "all the things the whumper did" I would remove whumpless "whump" from my dash. That would take care of the people who want to write after but can't handle their own before, right? Spare me that, at least? Nope.

I'm not the only one who has asked for this woobie shit to be tagged. For it to at least be tagged as "infantilization" if you don't self-identify as woobie. But it hasn't been. Not once, that I've seen. And I've been watching for it, hoping.

And that tells me something depressing about the state of the community. It tells me that a lot of folks don't see infantilization and ableism as a problem. It tells me that a lot of folks don't care as long as their soft blanket power fantasy is satisfied. It tells me that a lot of folks have no intent to afford the same courtesy to others that they insist others afford them. It tells me that this community is no longer the one I joined years ago, that was my literal salvation when I was bedridden.

One where "Caretakers" were optional because it was the whumpees who were the focus of the narrative because we were here to explore pain and vulnerability in a place where it isn't sanitized with blankets and soup. One where we could confront the reality that such "Caretakers" as have become popular do not exist, and have that acknowledged in a space that was ours, away from a mainstream fiction culture that likes to imagine itself in that role... right up until the moment they'd actually have to do it. One where we could get away from that self-fellating performative sympathy.

I hate making these posts. I hate feeling like I'm "being negative" when I'm asking for basic genre parameters to be respected... which is what this makes me feel like because I've been - wait for it - conditioned to think that I'm an annoyance and a burden on Normal People in Normal Society, and that standing my ground is unreasonable, impolite, dragging people down, and just overall Killing The Mood.

And I can literally feel the vagueposts forming in the aether. About "whump" that contains no actual whump ever being ValidTM and don't let people make you feel bad if you mislabel your posts. I hate having to make these posts and I hate how often I'm driven to it, because the thing is, I'm not asking a lot.

If I labeled my dead dove shit #angst, y'all would lose your shit. If I tagged my caretakerless whump #hurt/comfort, y'all would lose your shit. It would be the end of the goddamn world. I would be a pariah--and rightly so, because dead dove isn't angst and hurt/comfort is literally the only genre extant where comfort is mandatory. Whump is a genre about pain, and as such, pain is explicitly necessary for something to belong to that genre. It's not personal. It's categorization. It's being able to find what you're looking for and avoid what you're not.

I don't put my watermelon in your casserole. Don't put your broccoli in my fruit salad. That's just basic courtesy. I don't hate casserole, I like me a good casserole every once in a while. I just get aggravated when I find broccoli in my fruit salad, because the whole reason I opened the container of fruit salad in the first place was that I wanted fruit, not greens. My goal when I write these things is not to make anyone feel bad, it's to make people be aware.

I am just. So tired. I want my community back. Maybe this latest measure will allow me to have that again... I'm just aggravated that I had to take it.

[howdoyouget]

taking jason todd rights away from dc and putting them up on the shelf. you know what, bruce wayne rights too. you can have them back when you learn how to treat them kindly.

[gothamsglam]

pray for my camera roll guys

[keithbutgay]

I would like to share a brief moment of silence for our beloved Dazai, who was sadly murdered five years ago by his lover and rival Nakahara Chuuya

[hayaku14]

NO FUCKING WAY I DIED AND GOT SICK FOR TWO MONTHS AND I COME BACK TO RUMORS THAT KAISHIN COUSINS IS CANON NAAAH DONT FUCK WITH ME THAT SHIT SAY IT AINT SO GOSHO I SWEAR TO GOD

[immortalbutterflycos]

I JUST FOUND OUT THAT ONE OF MY BEST FRIENDS OF ALL TIME HAS ACTIVELY BEEN READING MARAUDERS FANFICTION FOR A WHILE AND I'M SO EXCITED TO START WRITING THINGS FOR THEM AND THEM ALONE.

[dottores]

so i officially caught up up on jjk manga the past few nights and let me tell you guys, kashimo hajime is the love of my life and i've been in a massive depression after reading the most recent chapters. gege needs to STOP.

[satoruoo]

GUESS WHO'S BACK 🗣️🔥🔥🔥 EXAMS R KICKING MY ASS RN Y'ALL BUT I AM MISSING MY SILLY LIL BLOG 😭

[the-gayest-sky-kid]

if you even care..... he cares abt them sm.... he loves being their friend ....

[lucyshypemaster]

evret hayle is MY roman empire.

[wolfsbanesparks]

I had a sudden great need to talk about Captain Marvel and his villains with you, bc something about them seemed connected in a grander scheme of things to me and it's late at night right now but I needed to sing about this

Dr. Sivana - (movie version) A man who in his childhood was teleported against his will and essentially temporarily kidnapped to a strange and horrifying place in the middle of the night, forced to be tested for something he had no idea about but continued to be called delusional and insane for when speaking about it to anyone. Driving him mad for being unworthy, feeling like he was rotten despite the circumstances out against him were unfair at the time in his eyes. That moment stayed with him permanently, keeping him locked in that memory forever, never truly growing up, but also losing his heart.

Mr. Mind - In most versions he is an alien or magical creature, but in one version I was told about, apparently he was an abused child who loved to read as an escapism. One day he accidentally ended up in a magical room, where he was transformed into what we now know as Mr. Mind. Human experimentation as a child, possibly. Never having a chance to live as a child and forced to grow up into something he did not want to become, but had to.

Chain Lightning - From what I heard from you, Chain Lightning is a girl with multiple personalities, one (or more) of them being villainous in nature, but one of them being genuine and in love with a boy. Trapped in her own body and mind, a child who has no will of her own to live her life as she wants to.

Lady Blaze/Satanus - Children fathered and abandoned by the wizard. For reasons, I do not know yet, I'm still researching, but this sounds like serious issues that caused them to go mad, vengeful that they were not seen as worth anything in their father's eyes to leave them their "rightful inheritance" after his passing.

Sinclair Batson - A reanimated puppet made by Lady Blaze, a wish by Ebeneezer Batson. A false son. No childhood given, no innocence given, just given a purpose to fo as he is told by people he does not know in a world he does not know.

Black Adam - An ancient and crusty old man, who, in his mortal life, murdered his own nephew for the power he coveted and was not meant to be his. He took the life of the child he was meant to protect and love, and yet when the child protected him instead, he returned the act with malice. The boy was chosen as champion, for the sake of the world, an innocent boy, and the world ripped him apart via his own family.

And then, there's Billy Batson. Orphaned, foster child, homeless (depending on the version), and alone. A child that the world does not see and is also against at the same time somehow. He struggles so hard to find a place in the world for himself, but remains pure of heart during all the bad times. He refuses to become as rotten as the people who see him suffering and ignore him. When he is chosen, it is not by his choice. He did not know what he was in for, and became a superhero with more responsibility and power than he was ready for at his young age. He did not consider himself able to have a childhood before, but WITH the powers he had now?? He couldn't ever think about being a kid ever again.

Just. Them. The theme of lost innocence and being forced to grow up, or the event in childhood ruining them forever and that event being the catalyst for so much more.

At one point in all of those origins for those characters, there were children who needed help, guidance, love, understanding, etc. But they were never given any of that, and look at what happened in the end. Billy seems to be the only one who managed to turn out good, but he could have been so different

Sorry if this is a lot and if there's spelling errors or mistakes, this is just something I wanted to talk about for a long time, and something I'll make my own post about at another time, but I felt like you would have great insight on this

Okay so I've been thinking about this all day because childhood innocence (and the loss of it) have always been a central theme of Captain Marvel’s comics.

This got very long so I'm putting my analysis under the cut.

In captain marvel comics, unlike in other places, innocence isn't equated with naivete or stupidity. Billy is a very innocent character in the grand scheme of things, but he's both very competent and savvy to the issues people faced. This childhood innocence, which is reflected in Captain Marvel’s own behavior even when they are separate people, is about doing the right thing, about not succumbing to things like selfishness and anger even when it's tempting to do so.

And your last point about Billy being the only one to turn out "good" is really important because it's why he was chosen to have these powers in the first place! He was pure of heart not just because he was good and kind, but because he continued to be that way even when he faced hardships that can (and often do) lead people down a darker path.

Now let's talk villains.

The movie versions of Billy and Dr Sivana have very clear and explicit parallels with each other. I think his story is the clearest in terms of how a loss of childhood innocence/trauma can haunt a person throughout their life. His lack of control of those circumstances is definitely one of the biggest factors in why he became obsessed with this one moment, a moment he believes his life was unfairly ruined.

I can't say I'm familiar with the version of Mr Mind you mentioned here, but based on what you've mentioned it's really interesting that his appearance and his powers are from something out of his control. Ironically he is now able to control others, continuing the cycle of abuse.

As for Chain Lightning (Amy is the main alter) is like many characters who canonically have DID in that her alters exist in part to protect her inner child (one of her other alters), to take on any pain or suffering in order to keep their childhood innocence in tact.

Lady Blaze and Satanus take after their mother, a demoness who may or may not have used magic to seduce him. His immediate and continued rejection of them, his assumption that they were evil from birth, certainly had an impact on them and the people they became. They never got to be innocent because Shazam wrote them off as evil from the start. Their insistence that they are owed his power and his place in the Rock of Eternity can be read as them longing for connection to a father that abandoned them and proving they were worthy of wielding his powers despite his rejection. (I'm starting to sense an additional theme of needing to feel worthy in Shazam's eyes but that's another post)

Sinclair exists in an unnatural and not fully autonomous state. He is Ebenezer's child first and foremost even if he isn't actually a child at all. He lost his innocence somewhere between death and resurrection.

And then there's Black Adam. There are a number of different versions of his story but all of them revolve around loss. Whether it's the loss of a child (his nephew or son) or the loss of his wife or brother, he gave into his pain. He have up on childish things like doing what's right and let himself be lost to his own worst impulses.

I think on top of the theme of innocence there's also this parallel theme of autonomy, of wanting male your own choices but having someone or something else taking that control away from you. Which definitely resonates with children who often don't have much control of their circumstances.

This was a lot but the English nerd in me loves talking about themes~

[viridian-house]

EXCUSE ME NOT HIM PHRASING THIS LIKE AN INCENTIVE ‼️ I am WEAK

[savageboar]

i can't stop thinking about how insidious it is, these advertisers demanding the censorship of even uttering the word suicide. like. as someone who suffers from suicidal ideation you know what kept me from opening up about it and my depression and seeking medical help for so long? people treating it like a forbidden taboo subject you're not supposed to ever talk about. all this will do is actually cause more people to suffer and die. we gotta kill capitalism.

[bloosemood]

am I just going through the motions or is this how I'll be?

[teddie-bear22]

Hope this clears things up

[sga-owns-my-soul]

i saw a post and i don't wanna take over and derail the literal entire point of their post so i'm making my own

can we PLEASE stop acting like being dumb is inherently a negative, offensive thing. i hate to break it to you guys, but some people really are just plain old stupid. intelligence is an actual thing you can lack, and some people do lack it! and THATS OKAY!!!! it in absolutely no way contributes to someone's worth

you can be fat, you can be skinny, you can be tall, you can be short, you can be queer, you can be straight, you can be any of these things and not a single one of them are good or bad inherently, they just are

being stupid is the same. sometimes, people really are just stupid. but you CANNOT use it as an insult!!!! towards others OR yourself!!!!!! because a lack of intelligence does not negate your inherent worth and value as a human being