i want so badly to understand the batman lore because i want to read the fan fiction and actually know who’s talking but there’s just.
so.
many.
people.
why are there so many robins? from what i’ve gathered i think one of them died, came back to life, and isn’t TECHNICALLY a robin anymore but kind of sort of still is? i have that one narrowed down to being either nightwing or red hood, but i DONT KNOW because i’m trying to keep track of another two dozen children whose hero names are just variations of Robin.
there’s also someone named Signal who can maybe i think see ghosts or something? who is he? where did he come from? was he also a robin?
i just need like a google doc or something with summaries of who everybody is, with personalities and generally agreed upon fanon descriptions, along with WHO IS CURRENTLY OR USED TO BE A ROBIN. (WHY ARE THERE SO MANY OF THEM)
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On the topic of How Do You Handle XYZ Comment, I've always wondered how you handle terrible responses on your toh takes. Like I know the toh fandom doesn't lack piss on the poor reading comprehension and they also really enjoy wildly out of touch takes, but I've never seen any comments on your princess luz stuff of that nature. I'm sure they must be there but maybe I'm too early? But anyway, how do you tend to deal with the "acktually shipping luz and Hunter is incest" and the "ur not a real lesbian because putting amity in a poly ship is lesbian erasure" and the "as a white person kinda sus you make the poc woman an empress" kind of responses? Ones that are technically not hate and maybe if you squint could be from people who aren't inherently trying to do bad but just lack the maturity needed to engage with the internet at large?
this ask made me giggle. honestly, i haven't received as much pushback as you might expect! way less pushback than i expected. in the princess AU, i've gotten a LOT more "this is actually too grotesque for me to stomach" comments than "this is problematic" comments, which is fine. horror-thriller isn't for everyone, those comments do not upset me.
i have had a Few run-ins with bad faith people, whom i mostly block. there's one prolific commenter in toh tumblr fandom who would repeatedly write angry essays on my humor meta posts -- essays that were all about how belos is too evil to be sympathetic and/or about how hunter is a soft gentle boy who shouldn't be jokingly referred to as evil. then they'd go "i can't help my active and conscious decision to type a bunch of rude fucking words and then my active and conscious decision to send those rude fucking words because i'm autistic :(((" around the fourth or fifth time this happened, i was fucking done with that nonsense and finally blocked them. shoulda done it after the first comment tbh!! no more autism exceptions.
as for the rest of it, my main management strategy is to simply.... preempt the bad faith comments?
i had a LOT more unpleasant and conflict-filled fandom experiences when i was in the raven cycle fandom. that was my first exposure to "you can't ship multi-gender polycules if anyone involved is gay" and "queerplatonic het relationships are just heteronormativity shipping that you're trying to get away with." having dealt with those takes before, i've found a few different ways to disarm bad faith readers before they get started.
first is to be super open and honest about my interests. i talk about what i find compelling in different relationships All The Damn Time. it's really hard for anyone to accuse me of only wanting hunter to fuck amity if they've seen, like.... anything i've said about hunter and amity.
same with hunter and luz. the only negative reactions i've really gotten to how they're written in the princess AU is like.... two people being squicked by camila thinking they're romantically involved. i REALLY expected more pushback on the touchyfeely bed sharing stuff, but from what i remember, there's never been Any....? not even from people who consider them siblings.
i expected a lot of pushback on how mean hunter and amity are to each other, since it's taken So much farther than the canon. but it turns out that there's a very large overlap between people who like dark horror AUs and people who like hunter and amity murdering each other. (in a fluffy fic i don't think this characterization would fly Nearly as easily.)
i find that being funny really disarms people, too. when you look at any of my toh meta posts that could be controversial, they're basically all funny. people are a lot more willing to listen to what you have to say if you make them laugh, and it's harder for them to get angry at you.
and then the last thing is that i think i'm in sort of a privileged position in toh fandom. i've written a lot of controversial subjects and relationships and characterizations.... but i've also written some WILDLY popular mainstream fic. and people who like the mainstream fic don't really want to beef with me about differing niche opinions, bc there's a level of respect there. which they might not have for a writer they don't like.
but anyway. when things Do happen, i almost always just block and move on. there are so many people here who get what i'm talking about that there's no need for me to try to convert people who don't, you know??
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overcoming anxiety (through practicing the things that scare you) is so interesting. i used to be horrified of taking up space or alerting other people of my presence. now i'm compelled to tell strangers i like their outfits or hair or earrings- on bad days i tell maybe a quarter of them. do i still overthink it? absolutely. but i call attention to myself to tell someone else my opinion. and with the way they tend to smile and tell me "thank you!" i'm pretty sure it's taken to heart.
i used to be horrified of making phone calls as well. this is one i'm still getting over- i just Don't Like Doing It. i used to have a phone call routine that i still joke about- realize i need to call someone, cry, avoid it for a few days, suck it up, write a script, memorize the script, cry again, final script read, make the call with the script in front of me. and i would be Exhausted by the end of it. i don't cry when i need to call people anymore. i'm even needing scripts less and less- i've found out that people actually won't kill me if i talk a little too fast or stumble on my words. i doubt i'll ever like making phone calls- i especially hate robots (i'm afraid they'll mishear me and direct me wrong or a person will suddenly show up and i won't be prepared)- but i can make them now.
i get overwhelmed really easy. just a thing that happens to me. my brain is really really good at taking one task and breaking it up into thousands of little tasks and it feels like i'm drowning. if i try to make it fewer larger tasks then it starts to feel insurmountable. i was completely lost on how to deal with this (other than avoid until you get that panic attack and can do work in the post-catharsis calm until 6:00 AM) until one night when my dad (who i often meet late at night due to overlapping mental illness symptoms) asked me how to eat an elephant. i looked at him, confused, and he said "one bite at a time." that was way more effective than any other analogy i've seen has been. "light at the end of a tunnel"- i don't feel like i'm moving forward, i feel like i'm scaling a wall. "steps on a trail"- i can see my destination, but it feels impossible to move forward. but eating an elephant? that sums it up perfectly. this huge task which seems impossible at a glance. but it must be done. so you eat the elephant, a bite at a time. every time i'm overwhelmed i repeat that phrase to myself. it hasn't made any major changes yet, but it keeps me calm enough to start before i hit the panic attack, which i'll take.
i was such a perfectionist growing up- i actually thought it was a good thing (school always taught me to strive for perfection). but it made me scared to try new things- if i wasn't immediately good at them, then it clearly wasn't for me. i'm still not great at starting new hobbies, but i try a lot of new things within the hobbies i already have. i test out different ways of making art, i try new puzzle games i don't understand, etc. and the feeling of steady improvement reminds me that i don't need to be good right away. some of the most satisfying moments don't come from immediately being good- they come from achieving that skill over time. i'd like to try to learn to sew soon.
idk it's interesting. i rewire my own brain's fear response by doing the Horrifying Thing enough times for me to understand that no i will not die. and while i'm doing it it feels like nothing is changing. i get so stressed every time- it can actually take a lot out of me (turns out fight-or-flight burns a lot of energy). but i look back at then vs. now and i realize how far i've come, and i can't help but think "huh. neat"
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Watching Micah and Irina genuinely laughing every time another girl is upset or distressed makes me wonder why anyone talks to them.
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