#stillness answers

[stillness-in-green]

The thing that doesn't make sense to me if Izuku resolved to kill is how it doesn't let them prove AFO wrong? AFO did his big reveal which only makes it clearer how deep the grooming went and it should've been time for Izuku to understand Tenko and Tenko to understand the abuse then reject the mindset forced onto him. But Izuku killing Tenko doesn't do that. Tenko just dies. It feels very wrong.

I guess Izuku just wasn't very interested in proving AFO wrong! Honestly, the only thing I immediately remember Izuku disputing the guy on was the same thing he disputed Shigaraki on: that he was anything more than a human being. AFO isn't a Demon King, but just a lonely man. Shigaraki hasn't transcended humanity; there's still a human somewhere deep inside of him. Izuku won't correct his allies' use of dehumanizing language for Villains, of course, but he's quick to push back when the Villains themselves self-aggrandize.

Sorry, I really only have withering disdain for Deku at this point. And I guess I don't really see any evidence that Deku was ever particularly driven by "proving AFO wrong." He wants to stop AFO, certainly, but that's because AFO is a monster who takes advantage of vulnerable people to maneuver them into doing Bad Things that advance AFO's Bad Plans and sets them onto Bad Paths that are difficult to walk back, not because he expressly opposes AFO on this or that ideological point about the nature of humanity and society.

(Hit the jump for the rest of a somewhat rambly reply.)

If anything, current evidence is that neither Deku nor the manga itself really do disagree with AFO about the frailty of humans, as expressed by Tsukauchi answering Deku's question about how to prevent future tragedies by shrugging and saying, "You don't, because life fucking sucks sometimes and that's just how it is. Our hands are completely tied on improving the system as we have it, so all we can do is punch out the Villains that appear in front of us to stop them from causing more harm."

That's also me being a bit harsh, of course. The fact that Deku is even still asking that question in the epilogue suggests that the manga hasn't reached its final answer yet, and maybe it will yet come up with something better! It doesn't have much time left, but it's still possible!

All the same, Deku is still having to ask that question in the epilogue because he never truly faced it over the course of the story. Never thinking about what Shigaraki as a person said in favor of fetishizing the Crying Child, never coming up with any kind of non-violent plan of attack or conversational approach, I have to ask what exactly about Shigaraki did Deku ever disagree with AFO on?

AFO, in the end, characterized Shigaraki as a puppet he molded exactly as he desired, a doll who he sculpted and programmed to act as he wished, a feeble child who has never made a single decision that AFO didn't cultivate him to make. So far as I can tell, Deku never really contested that framing. He didn't know the extent of it until the full reveal, of course, but Deku, like AFO, insisted on approaching Shigaraki solely through that "Crying Child" lens. He seemed to believe that nothing Shigaraki said or did on the surface really mattered (save as a reason that Shigaraki had to be stopped and potentially killed), that the "truth" of Shigaraki was that feeble little weeping boy who never grew up.

How could Deku possibly "prove AFO wrong" in that context? He doesn't even disagree with him! I mean, he's got some nice talk about how people deserve a second chance, sure; he says that people doing wrong doesn't make them Villains for the rest of their lives. What does do that, however - insofar as I can tell from how opaque the series keeps Deku throughout the final war - is refusing the hand out of the darkness. You stop being a victim and become a Villain for the rest of your life by choosing to remain a Villain even when offered an alternative (no matter how patently awful that alternative is).

Shigaraki chooses to remain a Villain and Deku doesn't have a counter for that because Deku never really got past the false binary represented by Villains and Victims to begin with. And I think the same goes for people who expected Shigaraki to just fold when he realized the extent of the grooming he'd undergone. Disallowing Shigaraki any agency in who he is and what he's done is defining him the same way AFO and Deku both did; when Shigaraki refuses to accept that framing, refuses to be a passive victim, the only thing left for him to be is a Villain. And when a Villain refuses to stop...

Well, Hawks already told us what the Heroes' answer to that is. "Someone has to die." As no one ever stepped up to prove him wrong, as far as the story is concerned, he isn't.

AFO always knew that victims can be turned into Villains with the right nudges; that's the whole reason for him cultivating "warped seeds" whenever and wherever he found them. Hero Society is - and always has been - much too rigid in its enforcement of the Hero/Villain/Victim narrative to effectively combat him. Crucially, Deku - the boy who wants to bring everything back just the way it was - doesn't disagree with him. He thinks AFO is an asshole for setting people up to fail, but he doesn't disagree about what failure means. So if AFO, Deku, and the story itself are all in agreement, what's even there for Deku to disprove?

Now, there is something that would prove AFO wrong, but it isn't something you can do while insisting on drawing lines to separate sad manipulated woobie victims who just need to be saved from awful unrepentant villains who just need to rot. It isn't something you can do while infantilizing Shigaraki Tomura.

The way to prove AFO wrong is to make room in society to help all Villains. Even if they aren't asking for it, even if they never ask for it, and even if they're jolly bastards who don't really deserve it! As long as there's a point at which it becomes okay to give up on trying to save Villains, Shigaraki will remain unsavable. He will insist on being unsavable. He could no more let that go than All Might could step aside and let AFO's attack kill an innocent at Kamino.

That's what it means to be a Hero for Villains.

Ultimately, what makes AFO right is that he knows that Hero Society makes it difficult if not impossible to uncross the victim-to-Villain bridge, and so anyone who does cross that bridge (with or without his influence) is that much more susceptible to him. Deku, in turn, thinks the only Villains he can save are those who drop everything and come sprinting as fast as they can back to the Hero side, so anyone who won't do that is someone he can't help.

Shigaraki refused to stop trying to create a better world for Villains. Toga refused to live in a world that would imprison her. Twice refused to give up on the friends no Hero would help. It's the same with every other Villain who refused to quietly endure their status quo: in a society that refuses to change how it treats Villains, anyone who won't submit to suffering in silence cannot be saved.

That's the paradigm AFO exploits, and Deku will never prove him wrong without resolving to change the paradigm first. We'll see if the last two chapters get him there.

[everythingwasnormalhere]

pls rb if you think cuddling doesn't have to be s3xual

im tryna prove a point to my bf's mother help me out

[ideas-ideasideasideas]

Batman gives each of his Robins a different code to use when they’re in trouble and need immediate extraction. He promises that when they call, he’ll drop everything just to get to them, come hell or high water.

Jason, during his time with the League, shares his code with Damian, to be used “only in the direst of circumstances, when you have exhausted all other options.” He doesn’t know if Bruce will answer, given how fractured their relationship was before he died, but it is better than nothing. Every tool counts when they live such dangerous lives.

Damian uses it exactly once, and Bruce, who still feels the loss of his son like a yawning chasm in his chest, responds to it even though he knows it can’t be Jason because Jason’s dead. What he finds, instead of Jason, is a boy in League garbs, drenched in blood from the tips of his midnight-black hair to his too-small feet, with a face that Bruce sees himself and Talia in, requesting asylum from a grandfather who wishes to possess his body. Bruce doesn’t question how this boy who is so clearly his son knew the code. Talia al Ghul is resourceful and places family above all; the code is not beyond her abilities to discover, and she is not above using Bruce’s desperate love for his dead son to ensure that hers does not meet the same fate.

Bruce takes Damian in, because of course he does, and since Jason is dead he allows Damian to keep using the code. After all, it’s not like Jason is alive to use it, right? If someone uses the code, there’s no one it could be but Damian, right?

The next time the code is used, Bruce traces the location to Gotham even though Damian was supposed to be in Bludhaven visiting Dick. But whatever happened that resulted in Damian being in Gotham can wait, because he has already failed one son and he will not fail another, his son is in trouble and he needs to get to him, he needs to—

What he finds, instead of Damian, is a boy (just eighteen, too young, but also too old, but also he will always be a boy to him) in League garbs, drenched in blood from the tips of his midnight-black hair to his too-large feet (when had he gotten so big), wearing the face of his dead son.

(Who, maybe, just maybe, may no longer be so dead.)

[dingledraw]

Well, that went down like a lead balloon.

[samble-moved]

post itself

false flags

trans/adjacent tags

accessibility features

tumblr live post (thanks for the link, @problemnyatic)

flashing / strobing / lights

unblockable flashing ad

buying ad free

staff @/macmanx guilt trip

list of staff + more issues

[letmetellyouaboutmyfeels]

I am incredibly serious right now when I beg you all, please, and if you have Twitter or Tiktok or whatever to please spread the word: click on an author's profile on Ao3.

You want to know if an author has written more? Want to know if they're still writing? Want to see more from them? Want to know if they've written a trope or kink or sex scenario you enjoy?

Click on their name. And look at their profile.

I cannot tell you how many times in the last six months someone has read a new or newer fic of mine and said they (a new reader who has read nothing else I've done) "can't wait to see what you do next!" I've written 50+ fics and over a million words already.

"I don't know if you're still writing..." click on my profile. I am. I literally wrote a 128k+ fic for that ship last month.

"Would you ever do X?" "Please do Y!" I already did. Click on my name and look at my works.

Archive of our Own is a library. It's an archive. Not social media. It is your responsibility to fight back against the laziness that corporate algorithms have trained into you.

Click my author name. Just click it. Just click it.

Before you demand more, or ask if a writer will do XYZ, or wonder if the author still writing, or anything - click on their profile. Click on the author's profile.

I'm not trying to be mean or condescending or anything like that. I'm just exhausted. It's disheartening and frustrating to repeat myself ad nauseam, because someone couldn't take thirty seconds to do the tiniest bit of work to see if I've written lately, if I've written more for their ship, or scan my works to see if I've written what they're asking for. Please. Please. I'm begging.

Click the author's name, and explore before you ask.

[the-phantom-peach]

a handful of miscellaneous domestic zelink for my the soul 💘

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

going through my old journals as part of therapy homework and i'm reading a section written in the emotional wreckage of a full-on breakdown when i get hit with this line:

There is never a satisfying answer to ‘Why didn’t they love me?’

like wow babe. good fucking point

[lady-disdain221b]

I NEED THE NEXT SEASON YESTERDAY!😭

[uncanny-tranny]

The leftism/anticapitalism leaving people's bodies the zeptosecond you imply that disabled people who aren't "productive" still matter in society and need to be treated like intrinsic equals who have a place in this world:

[animalinvestigator]

happy 9 years

here's to 990 more

[stillness-in-green]

First of all, thank you for Bring It All Back. Gave me chills. Second, what do you think about the newest chapters? It seems like Izuku took Gran Torino's 'killing to save' ideology to heart. Personally, I gave up somewhere around the Nagant arc.

Belatedly, thank you very much, @kermitthekrog-blog!  I’m glad you enjoyed it, and I’m particularly always happy to hear people say it was chilling, upsetting, enraging, or other such disruptive adjectives.  It’s a rabble-rouser of an art project, to be sure, quite intentionally so.

As to the rest, I’ve made a few posts here and there since I got this ask which probably make my opinions pretty clear, and I’ve got a new ask in the queue which wants to know my thoughts on the epilogue material thus far, so I’ll have more to say there!  But in the meantime, yeah, it’s pretty appalling to think back to all Deku’s talk about “saving” Shigaraki and realize that all of it predates the Gran Torino scene?

Like, he thinks he wants to save Shigaraki when they part ways at the end of the first war arc, sure!  And he tells the vestiges he wants to save Shigaraki!  But does that specific word choice endure once he wakes up?  Well, @codenamesazanka did some hunting recently (you can find two posts about her rereads here and here) and, it turns out, no; it doesn't.

After Deku wakes up and talks to Gran Torino, the focus switches to Deku understanding Shigaraki, choosing not to ignore him, finding out the nature of the Crying Child, all that stuff.  That word completely stops coming out of Deku's mouth, and very shortly after stops coming from any of the OFA vestiges as well.

It really does read, in retrospect, like, yeah, he sincerely took Gran Torino’s words at face value and to heart. “Killing can be a way of saving, so I can save him by killing him.”

Heck, if anything, given how little he focuses after that on saving, it almost feels like that’s the moment he resolves to kill Shigaraki—rather conveniently, it allows him a way to make peace with extrajudicial murder and avenge himself for all the people Shigaraki’s hurt that Deku can’t forgive him for.

The only thing that’s different from just killing him outright is that Deku wants to understand him first, as if he has to verify for himself that Shigaraki is secretly unhappy and why so he can justify that save-by-killing—putting Shigaraki out of whatever misery Deku can make himself believe Shigaraki is in—with a clean conscience.  But he absolutely does not make any further promises about not killing him afterward.

Grim fucking stuff, but it lines up.  One wonders what he would have done if the Shigaraki in the mindscape had changed to Sweet Innocent Tenko and never reverted back to Shigaraki Tomura at any point.  Would Deku have tried not to punch him to death?  Tried to call for Eri or Recovery Girl after AFO’s vestige faded out?  Felt like more of a failure because the “person” VFO devoured would have been that cute kid, meaning Deku failed to save the “child”?

As it is, he mostly just seems vaguely discouraged and unhappy about Shigaraki staying “the leader of the League” until the end—would he have preferred that his hands were ashen and flaking with the powdered remains of the crying child instead?

As to me giving up, the Nagant fight is one of two places I'd put that pin.  I was discouraged by the first war arc, when so many of the advantages Shigaraki had gained over the course of MVA were stripped away from him again.  I was dissatisfied with the second encounter with Muscular, when Deku's "victory" was framed in such a heroic, triumphant light despite being a categorical failure based on the standard Deku seemed to have set for himself.  But Deku’s fight with Lady Nagant was so bad for so many reasons that it served as the first true hammer blow to my belief that Horikoshi would be willing or able to seriously grapple with the societal problems the manga had been building up to at that point.

My patience with the manga, and the enjoyment I derived from it, continued to deteriorate throughout the rest of that arc and the following war arc, but the hospital attack is the other place I would point to as the sequence that completely destroyed my engagement with the series.

Just—the naked contrivances of it, the excruciating treatment of Spinner, the howling tone-deafness, the monumental unfairness of the demands it laid at the feet of its oppressed minority. The series presents a backstory like Shouji’s alongside current story elements like heteromorphs being turned away from shelters in the supposedly accepting and quirk-blind big cities and still somehow comes out valorizing passive endurance so hard it starts to look like willful self-subjugation.

It is the most comprehensively noxious moral in the entire endgame, rivaled only by Deku’s murder of Shigaraki under the guise of “saving” him, and frankly? I would still put that one in second place. At least you can point to Shouto (and possibly Ochaco, though that remains to be seen) as an indication that save-by-killing is not a story-wide moral about villains who have “gone too far.”

Conversely, pretty much everything the hospital attack mini-arc winds up preaching can be read outward onto the rest of the story's antagonists as well, including Lady Nagant. What else to make of her exchange with Hawks The Optimist, after all, than that the conclusion is that she should have just kept murdering whoever the government told her to until some outside player solved her problem for her?

A Hero is someone who is willing to suffer in silence. A Villain, then, must be someone who refuses to.

Truly, the hospital attack is the poisoned well that wipes out the entire village.

[doydoune]

hey have you heard of this brand new aa trend that totally just came out

[gascreates]

a new star

[bloodenjoyer]

[hinamie]

hina... have you ever drawn nanami & yuji. pls i need to see them. my reluctant mentor and ray of sunshine. maybe eating together after a mission

cleaned up this request doodle from a while ago <3