idk if I've told this story on here before but one time I was sitting at my desk at work and a random dog I'd never seen before strolled into my office and curled up at my feet. and I was like oh you are adorable but what the fuck?
then a woman knocked on the door and said "oh I'm so sorry he's a therapy dog he's trained to seek out people in severe distress"
and I was like right okay, just getting my whole life drive-by roasted by a dog then
Little Johnnyâs mom sits him down before they go visit their neighbor who just had a baby boy.
âListen to me very carefully,â she says. âThe poor baby was born without a chin because of a rare genetic condition. His mother is extremely sensitive about it. If you make even the tiniest comment about his chin, you are grounded for a whole month. Got it?â
Johnny nods obediently.
They arrive, chat for a while, and then Johnny turns to the new mom with a sweet smile and asks:
âWhen your son grows up, will he move out of the house one day?â
âYes, of course, hopefully when he goes to college.â
It was a Tuesday in 1981 when the San Francisco police kicked in the door.
Inside the small apartment, they expected to find a hardened criminal. They expected a drug kingpin. They expected resistance.
Instead, they found a 57-year-old waitress in an apron.
The air in the apartment smelled sweet, thick with chocolate and something earthier. On the kitchen counter, cooling on wire racks, were 54 dozen brownies.
The police officers began bagging the evidence. They confiscated nearly 18 pounds of marijuana. They handcuffed the woman, whose name was Mary Jane Rathbun.
She didn't look scared. She didn't look guilty.
She looked at the officers, smoothed her apron, and reportedly said, "I thought you guys were coming."
She was booked into the county jail. The headlines wrote themselves. A grandmother running a pot bakery. It seemed like a joke to the legal system, a quirky local news story about an older woman behaving badly.
But Mary wasn't baking for fun. And she certainly wasn't baking for profit.
To understand why Mary risked her freedom, you have to understand the silence of the early 1980s.
San Francisco was gripping the edge of a cliff. A mysterious illness was sweeping through the city, specifically targeting young men. Later, the world would know it as AIDS. But in those early days, it was just a death sentence that no one wanted to talk about.
Families were disowning their sons. Landlords were evicting tenants. Even doctors and nurses, paralyzed by the fear of the unknown, would sometimes leave food trays outside hospital doors, afraid to breathe the same air as their patients.
Men in their twenties were wasting away in sterile rooms, dying alone.
Mary knew what it felt like to lose a child.
Years earlier, in 1974, her daughter Peggy had been killed in a car accident. Peggy was only 22. The loss had hollowed Mary out, leaving a space in her heart that nothing seemed to fill.
When the judge sentenced Mary for that first arrest, he ordered her to perform 500 hours of community service. He likely thought the manual labor would teach her a lesson.
He sent her to the Shanti Project and San Francisco General Hospital.
It was a mistake that would change American history.
Mary walked into the AIDS wards when others were walking out. She didn't wear a hazmat suit. She didn't hold her breath. She saw rows of young men who looked like ghostsâskeletal, in pain, and terrified.
She saw "her kids."
She began mopping floors and changing sheets. But soon, she noticed something the doctors were missing. The harsh medications the men were taking caused violent nausea. They couldn't eat. They were starving to death as much as they were dying of the virus.
Mary knew a secret about the brownies she had been arrested for.
She knew they settled the stomach. She knew they brought back the appetite. She knew they could help a dying man sleep for a few hours without pain.
So, she made a choice.
She went back to her kitchen. She fired up the oven. She started mixing batter, not to sell, but to save.
Every morning, Mary would bake. She lived on a fixed income, surviving on Social Security checks that barely covered her rent. Yet, she spent nearly every dime on flour, sugar, and butter.
The most expensive ingredientâthe cannabisâwas donated. Local growers heard what she was doing. They began dropping off pounds of product at her door, free of charge.
She packed the brownies into a basket and took the bus to the hospital.
She walked room to room. She sat by the bedsides of men who hadn't seen their own mothers in years. She held their hands. She told them jokes. And she gave them brownies.
"Here, baby," she would say. "Eat this. It'll help."
And it did.
Nurses watched in amazement as patients who hadn't eaten in days began to ask for food. The constant retching stopped. The mood on the ward shifted from despair to a quiet sort of comfort.
Mary Jane Rathbun became "Brownie Mary."
For over a decade, this was her life. She baked roughly 600 brownies a day. She went through 50 pounds of flour a week. She became the mother to a generation of lost boys.
She washed their pajamas. She attended their funerals. She held them while they took their last breaths.
She did this while the government declared a "War on Drugs."
By the early 1990s, the political climate was hostile. Politicians were competing to see who could be "tougher" on crime. Mandatory minimum sentences were locking people away for decades.
In 1992, at the age of 70, Mary was arrested again.
This time, the stakes were lethal. She was charged with felonies. The district attorney looked at her rap sheet and saw a repeat offender. He threatened to send her to prison.
One prosecutor famously whispered to a colleague that he was going to "kick this old lady's ass."
They underestimated who they were dealing with.
They thought they were prosecuting a drug dealer. In reality, they were attacking the most beloved woman in San Francisco.
When the news broke that Brownie Mary was facing prison, the city erupted.
It wasn't just the activists who were angry. It was the doctors. It was the nurses. It was the parents who had watched Mary care for their dying sons when the government did nothing.
Mary turned her trial into a pulpit.
She arrived at court not as a defendant, but as a grandmother standing her ground. The media swarmed her. Reporters asked if she was afraid of prison. They asked if she would stop baking if they let her go.
Mary looked into the cameras, her voice gravelly and firm.
"If the narcs think I'm gonna stop baking brownies for my kids with AIDS," she said, "they can go fuck themselves in Macy's window."
The quote ran in newspapers across the country.
The court didn't stand a chance.
Testimony poured in. Doctors from San Francisco General Hospital wrote letters explaining that Maryâs brownies were medically necessary. Patients testified that she was an angel of mercy.
The charges were dropped.
Mary walked out of the courthouse a free woman. But she didn't go home to rest. She realized that her personal victory wasn't enough. As long as the law was broken, her "kids" were still in danger.
She needed to change the law.
August 25 was declared "Brownie Mary Day" by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. It was a nice gesture, but Mary wanted policy, not plaques.
She teamed up with fellow activist Dennis Peron. Together, they opened the San Francisco Cannabis Buyers Clubâthe first public dispensary in the United States. It was a safe haven where patients could get their medicine without fear of arrest.
But Mary wanted more. She wanted the state of California to acknowledge the truth.
She campaigned for Proposition 215. She traveled the state, despite her failing health. She spoke in her simple, direct way. She didn't talk about liberties or economics. She talked about compassion. She talked about pain.
She forced voters to look at the issue through the eyes of a grandmother.
In 1996, Proposition 215 passed. California became the first state to legalize medical marijuana.
It was a domino effect. Because one woman refused to let her "kids" suffer, the public perception of cannabis shifted. The Economist later noted that Mary was single-handedly responsible for changing the national conversation.
She never got rich.
She had always joked that if legalization ever happened, she would sell her recipe to Betty Crocker and buy a Victorian house for her patients to live in.
She never sold the recipe. She never bought the house.
Mary Jane Rathbun died in 1999, at the age of 77. She passed away in a nursing home, poor in money but rich in legacy.
Today, over 30 states have legalized medical marijuana. Millions of people use it to manage pain, seizures, and nausea.
Most of them have never heard of Mary.
They don't know that their legal prescription exists because a waitress in San Francisco decided that the law was wrong and her heart was right.
They don't know about the 600 brownies a day.
They don't know about the thousands of hospital visits.
Mary didn't set out to be a hero. She told the Chicago Tribune years before she died, "I didn't go into this thinking I would be a hero."
She was just a mother who had lost her daughter, trying to help boys who had lost their way.
She proved that authority doesn't always equal morality.
She proved that sometimes, the most patriotic thing a citizen can do is break a bad law.
Every August, a few people in San Francisco still celebrate Brownie Mary Day. But her true memorial isn't a date on a calendar.
It is found in every oncology ward where a patient finds relief. It is found in every dispensary door that opens without fear.
It is found in the simple, quiet courage of anyone who sees suffering and refuses to look away.
Mary taught us that you don't need a law degree to change the world. You don't need millions of dollars. You don't need political office.
Sometimes, all you need is a mixing bowl, an oven, and enough love to tell the world to get out of your way.
Sources: New York Times Obituary (1999), "Brownie Mary" Rathbun. San Francisco Chronicle Archives (1992, 1996). History.com, "The History of Medical Marijuana." Weird Everything, FB december 12, 2025
I'd be only too happy to do that. I was suspicious to start, too. It seemed a bit on the nose to have the weed brownie grandma named "Mary Jane," but also, that's a very common combination in a certain place and time, so I thought it was worth the extra effort.
What I did was find sources that made the claim (in this case, that a woman named Mary Jane was a medicinal marijuana activist in California, USA in the 1980s and 90s.) I checked the dates to get some certainty those sources aren't AI slop, then checked that the sources are generally reliable.
Then I followed useful details about the place and time, and other people involved, to explore it more fully.
The first thing I did was search for "Brownie Mary" and see if that turned anything up at all. It turned up a LOT of results. Predictably, some of them were recipes, but not all of them.
Next up, I checked sources and dates. Wikipedia can be dodgy for academic use, but their policy on LLM-generated input is very clear: they don't want slop. I started by reading that page and then went on to read others.
The Atlas Obscura article is from 2018. I found another one from SFWeekly from 2017.
Both of those are decent sources - Atlas Obscura gets a High factual reporting rate from MediaBiasFactCheck, and while MBFC doesn't have a rating for SFWeekly, the verbiage in that article is very close to what GastroObscura has. (Also to what the post itself has, right down to the choice of pull quote.)
Now, we can stop there and feel pretty confident that articles published before the wide availability of LLMs are not, in fact, LLM generated.
...or we can go deeper, and run this all the way back to source.
I spotted references to a Chicago Tribune imterview of Mary Jane Rathbun, published in 1993.
My search string of "Chicago Tribune 1993 Mary Jane Rathbun" hit it in the top 3 results. That article includes some fun new details: she wore a cannabis leaf shaped pendant to her trial!
She also objected to being portrayed as a cuddly grandma up against The Man, so I must retract my flippant tags, above.
The evidence now strongly points to Brownie Mary being a real woman who really went to court for giving AIDS patients weed brownies. But can we get closer? I've now seen several mentions of a 1980 attempt at convicting her too.
The articles have mentioned Sonoma County and a nonprofit called the Shanti Project, so let's hook onto that and see what we get.
Searching for "Mary Jane Rathbun Sonoma County 1980" gets me an article from a law firm; that mentions the prosecuting attorney by name, and points to a book: Lust for Justice: The Radical Life & Law of J. Tony Serra, by Paulette Frankl. It even has an excerpt!
We can run the book down too, just for fun (now we have a primary source.) My favorite used book site has a copy for $1. Amazon gives a view of the back cover, too:
...wow. I should see if my library has that!
The excerpt on the site has a mention of a candelight vigil held for her death in 1999. It took some hunting past things I'd already read and a bunch of shops giving written tributes, but I found a news report about that, too.
There's a lot of information out there, and it's worth digging into. Otherwise it's altogether too easy to think something real and worth knowing is just another bit of slop.
It was a regular Justice League meeting. Wrapping up after a global calamity, going over budgets, training schedules, regulatory updates, etc. more of a catch up by this point than anything even though Batman was trying to get 'offical business' accomplished while the majority of them were actually present for once.
When, out of the great blue yonder, a portal opened up.
Everyone froze before getting into position, unsure if friend or foe were about to appear before them. Ready to attack, or in need of aid.
A pale head topped with snow white hair and glowing green eyes popped out, seemingly talking to someone.
They looked at the Justice League.
The Justice League looked at them.
They looked at the Justice League
The Justice League looked at them.
"Hold on a second Sam. Whoops. Wrong dimension. Sorry about that. Seems like your dimensional walls a little thin. I'll fix that while I'm here as a sorry for trespassing. That should at least slow down transdimensional beings if not stop the weaker ones outright and keep excess energy from leaking out. And help prevent causality loops. Which. At least one of you seems to have gotten stuck in. Sucks dude. I'll get that sorted. Sorry again yall. So, anyway Sam,-" the being said, pulling their head back through just before the portal snapped shut behind them.
âAre there any questions left?â Wonder Woman all but signed, rubbing her own temples from exhaustion. It was one thing to push against a global calamity that nearly erased half the landmass on earth. It was a completely different thing to push through the âpostâ-apocalypse meeting. Everyone was tired, sore and exhausted to the brink of passing out.
She quietly suspected that Flash had fallen asleep within five minutes of it starting, considering how suspiciously quiet he was. But she was so tired herself that she didn't feel like calling him out.
After a few seconds of quiet, she stood up. âMeeting closed, you all are disââ
A hole opened in the air, for a moment it was pitch black then became illuminated from within with a toxic green color. Someone groand, someone swore loudly, and someone else yelled âOh come on!â
She found her sword in her own hand without remembering drawing it. Everyone got ready to meet the potential thread or try to contain the Dimensional Traveler before they could wreak havoc.
It was safe to say they were not prepared for a young adult to half walk out of the portal, clearly talking with someone on the other side.Â
âSam, no. For the last time I can't just send Undergrowth to the Amazonas because you think it needs reforestation. We are already on shaky grounds with the Gov and I don't want to give them ammunition to shootââ He half turned his head, paused, then turned back to âSamâ.
âGive me a minute, would you?â They couldnât hear the answer but judging from the eyeroll the answer had been sarcastic.
He then moved fully through the portal, which remained open. They looked at him, just as he looked at them. The staring contest lasted just long enough to edge into uncomfortable territory.
âOkay, terribly sorry for just breaking in to wherever this is, but do you know that your dimensional walls are like wet paper? Seriously, I didnât even notice going through it.â
Batman growled out âWe are aware of it.â
âOh, okay, cool. Mind if I take a look and fix it? You know? Reinforce the fabric, jiggle the dingle and swivel the bevel?â
They looked at him like he had a stroke.
âI take that as a yes.â He half turned back to the portal, âI will be back in a bit to fix everything.â
He moved through the portal, âLike I was saying Sam, I donât want to be declared illegal agaiââ
The portal closed.
A beat of silence.
Wonderwoman could practically hear Batman's anxiety rise. Everyone groand.
So we all know that Zoey is a massive turtle/turtoise fan right?
SO WHY IS NOT A SINGLE WRITER GIVING HER PET TURTLES?!?!?!? FOR THE LOVE OF GOD DO IT!!!!!
The fun thing is he would understand why people were getting him outfits with storks on them. Thatâs a word, itâs his name, straightforward. All the humans get him the same gag gift, but like, theyâre putting effort in at least. This is a genuinely nice outfit. Stork will be a walking zero-effort pun sometimes, rather than waste a perfectly fine robe.
Itâs fine. This is a readily comprehensible human illogic. Exactly the kind of thing he expected from moving to Earth.
Six years in he finds out about the stork bringing babies.
Stork has a good long meditation session about this myth, his name, his job, the outfits, the whole shebang (or whatever Vulcan concept is the equivalent).
And he decides heâs honored by it, in a humanly illogical way.
The humans are asking him to do what is after all his job, and specifically requesting him for the joy his name brings them on top of an already agreeable and satisfying task. He has no objection to engendering positive emotions in others. Harm hastens the heat-death of the universe, Surak teaches, so happiness must logically slow it down.Â
Plus, Vulcans of his generation love puns. There were two decades of punning competitions in colleges across the planet. So when he realizes that he is a walking zero-effort pun, and that the humans also love the pun, he is all for it. He is the Joe Cool of the entire Vulcan population in his city.Â
And via this pun, the humans are including him in a cherished and traditional myth, by casting him as the literal bringer of life and the expander of families.Â
Thereâs no downside. Stork wears his robes, pins, keychains, and other bird-related tchotchkes with genuine pride.Â
For real though working together with some human social workers, a Vulcan would be an excellent caretaker for children in an adoption center.
Child has a meltdown? Imagine Stork, perfectly calm and unbothered, approaching the kid and saying âYou appear quite upset, Eliza. If you would please allow me to relocate you to the âbean-bag-chair,â we can discuss the source of your distress.â
A Vulcan educated in medicine and child psychology would be endlessly patient with a kid with behavioral issues. Stork wouldnât get or upset or frustrated. After all, these are children with medical and psychological conditions. It would be illogical to blame the child or to not treat them with the appropriate care.
Even if the a little one was having a bad day or was just overtired, Stork wouldnât get angry. He might even be a calming presence. Any new kids acting out would learn real quick that theyâd have better luck trying to arm-wrestle a Klingon than get a rise out of Stork.
Not only that, Vulcans live much longer than humans. Imagine Stork looking virtually unchanged as decades pass. Kids heâd helped years ago would turn up fully grown, maybe there to adopt their own kids, and run into Stork, looking almost exactly as they remember him.
And heâd probably remember them too. âWelcome back, Eliza.â
Before she can protest, Mira tears off her sleeve, revealing the wound slicing through her patterns in all its hideous glory.
She tenses, ready to bolt, but then Zoey's on her lap, her hands pressing into Rumi's waist.
"Don't leave," she pleads, her voice soft and fragile that Rumi worries that moving might break something, which she supposes is the point.
"Patterns," she stutters weakly.
"We know," Mira says softly, even as she upsets Rumi's entire worldview, "We've known for a while. We don't care, you're still Rumi,"
"How...,"
"You got drunk, you freaked out and cried about it, passed out, then we freaked out and cried about it," Zoey explains, taking Rumi's hand in hers, pulling her attention from Mira's ministrations, "You didn't remember. We were hoping you'd come to us eventually, but you never did. Mira and me have kinda been racking our brains how to tell you we knew without you running, freaking out, or shutting down,"
"I-I'm sorry-,"
"Don't." Mira says quietly, "Please don't. We were upset that you and Celine lied to us, we are upset that you never trusted us enough to come to us on your own terms, but we understand why you hid,"
"Celine's whole 'Anything with patterns is a Demon, all demons must die' speech made it very clear," Zoey says, her voice tinged with a rare, distraught anger.
No one speaks after that. Mira's hands are gentle, Zoey's weight on her lap is grounding, and she's finding it harder and harder not to cry.
Eventually, Mira presses a bandage to her wound and wipes her arm clean of everything except the patterns.
"Do your patterns hurt?" she asks quietly, her finger pressed lightly against a stripe high on her shoulder.
"N-no. Not physically,"
"That's good," Mira hums, nakedly relieved, resting her head on Rumi's shoulder.
"They're very pretty," Zoey says, and Rumi feels her ears burn.
"You don't have to pretend,"
"I'm not pretending, Ruru. Demon patterns are pretty, they're usually just attached to soul sucking jerks. Luckily you aren't a soul sucking jerk, and a certified hottie on top of that,"
She bursts into tears. She can't help it any more.
Rumi had nearly made it, all she had to do was get to her room, get the hoodie off and then dress the wound, find a fresh hoodie and join her the girls for dinner. She let out an exhausted sigh as the elevator doors opened and they could enter the apartment.
But before she could extract herself Zoey grabbed her left arm, gently pulling her towards the couch. âZo? What are you doing? My first aid kit is in my room?â Zoey gently pushed her down onto the cousin, then practically climbed in her lap, hugging her arm and tucking her head under her chin, resting it on her collar bone. âI know, but just for once, let us take care of you. You have been working so hard for so long.â
Mira emerged from the Kitchen, holding the large First Aid kit that they had for serious injuries. She popped the latch open and fished out the scissors. âHold still.â She just said before grabbing the top of her sleeve and cutting it away.
Rumi squirmed hard, trying to get away before they saw. âReally! Iâm fine, just a scraââ Mira tore the rest of the sleeve open, revealing her patterns in all their glory alongside the deep gash in her arm. Rumi went as stiff as a board, expecting shouting, screaming and the inevitable pointing of weapons, but instead Mira just grabbed a cotton puffer and disinfectant.
âWe knew.â Came softly from Zoey. Her head snapped around so fast she nearly pulled a muscle in her neck. âWe have known since we won our second Idol Award.â
Rumi made a noise from the back of her throat.
âWhen you got really drunk at the afterparty and we got you home, you saw a tiger plushy and cried, saying that you would love to have such pretty patterns too and that you hate the ones you already have.â
Zoey tucked herself in a bit more, practically melting into her. âWe asked what you meant but before you answered you threw up all over yourself and then passed out.â
âIt was disgusting.â Mira chimed in from the side, having finished cleaning the wound and moved on to dressing it. âLike seriously disgusting, especially after you decided to cling onto me. I still haven't managed to get the stain out of my dress.â
âMira!â Zoey chided her weakly. âWhat? Itâs true.â She grabbed a wrap before continuing. âWe got you home, dragged you under the shower and that's when we saw them. Honestly the only reason why we didnât shake you awake was because we feared you would throw up again.â
She tore the wrap and smoothed out the end so it would stick nicely to itself, then looked Rumi in the eyes. âWe freaked out at first, worried you have a deal with Gwi-ma. Then we figured you would tell us eventually.â
Rumi said in a very small tone âBut I never did.â
âYeah, you didn't and that hurt.â Mira packed up the Kit and set it on the coffee table. âBut we do understand why you didnât. Considering Celine's preachings about âEverything with patterns is evil and has to dieâ.â
Zoey gently moved out of her lap, still leaning against her shoulder as she began to pet her unhurt arm. Rumi fights her tears, she could feel her walls crumbling, with each gentle stroke from Zoey, with each moment. âBut-but they are uglyâŠâ Rumi's voice sounded like glass.
âThey are not.â Mira countered, âThey are beautiful, they are mesmerizing.â She gently traced the patterns on her bare arm, mindful of the injury. She hesitated for a moment, âThey don't hurt, do they?â
Rumi shook her head. âNotâŠ.not physically.â At her words Miraâs shoulder sagged in relief.
Zoey seemingly picked up on the double meaning of the sentence. âWell I think they are pretty.â
Rumi let out a fragile laugh, âZoey, please, donât lie. I know what they look like. I have known my entire life.â
âIâm not lying. I never thought patterns were ugly, Itâs just that they are usually attached to soul sucking parasites that try their best to hurt my besties. Thankfully you arenât a soul sucking parasite so I can finally admire them like I always wanted to.â
Rumi ducked her head, feeling her ears burn up.
âYeah, they are just as hot as you are.â
Rumi didn't know if her tears were from laughing or not.
Bruce is one of the richest men in the world. Bruce does not want to be one of the richest men in world.
He starts by implementing high starting salaries and full health care coverages for all levels at Wayne Enterprises. This in vastly improves retention and worker productivity, and WE profits soar. He increases PTO, grants generous parental and family leave, funds diversity initiatives, boosts salaries again. WE is ranked â#1 worker-friendly corporationâ, and productively and profits soar again.
Ok, so clearly investing his workers isnât the profit-destroying doomed strategy his peers claim it is. Bruce is going to keep doing it obviously (his next initiative is to ensure all part-time and contractors get the same benefits and pay as full time employees), but he is going to have to find a different way to dump his money.
But you know what else is supposed to be prohibitively expensive? Green and ethical initiatives. Yes, Bruce can do that. He creates and fund a 10 year plan to covert all Wayne facilities to renewable energy. He overhauls all factories to employ the best environmentally friendly practices and technologies. He cuts contracts with all suppliers that engage in unethical employment practices and pays for other to upgrade their equipment and facilities to meet WEâs new environmental and safety requirements. He spares no expense.
Yeah, Wayne Enterprises is so successful that they spin off an entire new business arm focused on helping other companies convert to environmentally friendly and safe practices like they did in an efficient, cost effective, successful way.
Admittedly, investing in his own company was probably never going to be the best way to get rid of his wealth. He slashes his own salary to a pittance (god knows he has more money than he could possibly know what to do with already) and keeps investing the profits back into the workers, and WE keeps responding with nearly terrifying success.
So WE is a no-go, and Bruce now has numerous angry billionaires on his back because theyâve been claiming all these measures heâs implementing are too expensive to justify for decades and theyâre finding it a little hard to keep the wool over everyoneâs eyes when Idiot Softheart Bruice Wayne has money spilling out his ears. BUT Bruce can invest in Gotham. Thatâll go well, right?
Gothamâs infrastructure is the OSHA anti-Christ and even what little is up to code is constantly getting destroyed by Rogue attacks. Surely THAT will be a money sink.
Except the only non-corrupt employer in Gotham city isâŠ.Wayne Enterprises. Or contractors or companies or businesses that somehow, in some way or other, feed back to WE. Paying wholesale for improvement to Gothamâs infrastructure somehow increases WEâs profits.
Bruce funds a full system overhaul of Gotham hospital (itâs not his fault the best administrative system software is WEâhe looked), he sets up foundations and trusts for shelters, free clinics, schools, meal plans, day care, literally anything he can think of.
Gotham continues to be a shithole. Bruce Wayne continues to be richer than god against his Batman-ingrained will.
Oh, and Bruice Wayne is no longer viewed as solely a spoiled idiot nepo baby. The public responds by investing in WE and anything else he owns, and stop doing this, please.
Bruce sets up a foundation to pay the college tuition of every Gotham citizen who applies. Itâs so successful that within 10 years, donations from previous recipients more than cover incoming need, and Bruce canât even donate to his own charity.
But by this time, Bruce has children. If he canât get rid of his wealth, he can at least distribute it, right?
Except Dick Grayson absolutely refuses to receive any of his money, wonât touch his trust fund, and in fact has never been so successful and creative with his hacking skills as he is in dumping the money BACK on Bruce. Jason died and wonât legally resurrect to take his trust fund. Tim has his own inherited wealth, refuses to inherit more, and in fact happily joins forces with Dick to hack accounts and return whatever money he tries to give them. Cass has no concept of monetary wealth and gives him panicked, overwhelmed eyes whenever he so much as implies offering more than $100 at once. Damian is showing worrying signs of following in his precious Richardâs footsteps, and Babs barely allows him to fund tech for the Clocktower. At least Steph lets him pay for her tuition and uses his credit card to buy unholy amounts of Batburger. But that is hardly a drop in the ocean of Bruceâs wealth. And she wonât even accept a trust fund of only one million.
Jason wins for best-worst child though because he currently runs a very lucrative crime empire. And although he pours the vast, vast majority of his profits back into Crime Alley, whenever he gets a little too rich for his tastes, he dumps the money on Bruce. At this point, Bruce almost wishes he was being used for money laundering because then heâs at least not have the money.
So childrenâgenerous, kindhearted, stubborn till the day they die the little shits, childrenâare also out.
Bruce was funding the Justice League. But then finances were leaked, and the public had an outcry over one man holding so much sway over the worldâs superheroes (nevermind Bruce is one of those superheroesâbut the public canât know that). So Bruce had to do some fancy PR trickery, concede to a policy of not receiving a majority of funds from one individual, and significantly decrease his contributions because no one could match his donations.
At his wits end, Bruce hires a team of accounts to search through every crinkle and crevice of tax law to find what loopholes or shortcuts can be avoided in order to pay his damn taxes to the MAX.
The results are horrifying. According to the strictest definition of the law, the government owes him money.
Bruce burns the report, buries any evidence as deeply as he can, and organizes a foundation to lobby for FAR higher taxation of the upper class.
All this, and Wayne Enterprises is happily chugging along, churning profit, expanding into new markets, growing in the stock market, and trying to force the credit and proportionate compensation on their increasingly horrified CEO.
Bruce Wayne is one of the richest men in the world. Bruce Wayne will never not be one of the richest men in the world.
conversations overheard through the batkid com lines pt 2
*Damian and Jason, four hours into a stakeout*
Damian: Jay, hand me the mango pieces.
Jason: *plastic crinkling* ayyy, Iâm Jason again!
Damian: *snorts*
Jason: what was with that, by the way? I just showed up in Gotham and found you referring to everyone like theyâre your professor. Like, thatâs not a âyouâ thing, I donât know why you started doing that.
*audible chewing noises*
Damian: do you want the genuine honest answer?
Jason: please god do tell
Damian: so- and you arenât allowed to laugh. but when I first came to Gotham and I showed up at the manor, father obviously had to give me a tour of the place, right?
Jason: yeah.
Damian: and they wanted to do a DNA test to check that my mother wasnât pulling a fast one by claiming my birthright, so the first place he showed me was the cave, which was also where Tim was.
Jason: *hums*
Damian: and you know that place- the first time you went to the cave, it was wild, right?
Jason: oh, like walking into the tardis for the first time. insane.
Damian: exactly. all high-tech and shit, and Iâd just come from the desert compound Iâd spent my entire life in- like, my first time going into the kitchen at the manor I saw Alfred loading the dishwasher and my first thought was âoh my god what the fuck kind of machine is that-â
Jason: *abrupt cackle*
Damian: -so the fucking cave for the first time? as a little desert-boy ten year old? I was a little distracted,
Jason, chuckling slightly: ok, fair,
Damian: and so Iâm zoned the fuck out, looking around this cave and not paying attention to anything fatherâs saying, and then I finally tune back in just to hear the words â-ackson drakeâ while he like, tries to introduce me to Tim.
Jason: *slowly starts laughing again*
Damian, raising his voice to be heard over Jasonâs increasing beats of laughter: -and so Iâm fucking standing there, ten years old, no clue what this kidâs first name is, and everybodyâs looking at me like Iâm supposed to be the one fucking talking right now, and ALL I can think of is my mother, who before she shipped me off to Gotham completely alone kept fucking telling me âDamian you have to be strong and show that you deserve to be the Batmanâs blood son. show no weakness and take the mantle you were born to have; show no fucking hesitance.â, so IâM panicking,
Jason, still cackling: *a clap* NO I DO- I DO REMEMBER, LIKE, BACK IN THE LEAGUE-, holy shit back in the league when your only coping mechanism for not knowing the fuck was going on around you, was literally just to pretend you knew what the fuck was going on around you and bullshit till you make it,
Damian: WELL IT WAS LIKE THE ONLY FUCKING THING MY MOTHER TAUGHT ME-
Jason, through tears: -thatâs why I didnât say shit when I came back to Gotham and found you fucking, doing all this blood son bullshit! You started calling me Todd and speaking in old english and I was just like âbless him heâs terrified, just leave him beâ
Damian: *cackles* and I did- I did appreciate you going along with it, because back when this happened I panicked and just started calling Tim âDrakeâ because I was too embarrassed to ask him for his first name, and then by the time I heard somebody else call him Tim in passing, everybody had just assumed this was a thing I did. and I was too socially awkward to clear it up and switch back, so I just had to stick to Drake.
Jason: *wheeze* a-and Grayson?
Damian: well at first I just went along with the surname thing out of awkwardness, but then Iâd gone too deep and I had no way out- AND THEN- and then Batman fucking died-
Jason: *wheeze*
Damian: -and I went from being parented by the gymnastics version of the dark lord to being gentle-parented by fucking Nightwing-
Jason, choking: holy- holy shit-
Damian: do you know what itâs like to go from *gruff voice* âDamian we donât fucking kill, give me the katana or Iâll put you in Arkhamâ to *high pitched, sweet voice* âoh hey Dames, obviously I canât stop you from killing but I really would appreciate it if we discussed all our options and came to a mature decision together on whatâs best in this scenario-â
Jason: *crying, silent wheezes*
Damian: so DURING all this Iâm trying to subtly switch back to using peoples actual names, except it fucking backfired because people just assumed I was calling Richard Richard because we had that special parental mentor bond, and Tim had pissed off to- whatever he was doing in the desert for six months- getting a hysterectomy or whatever the fuck happened-
Jason, amused: hysterectomy- he lost a spleen, Dames
Damian: well whatever happened he wasnât AROUND for me to shift to calling him Tim! and when father was back Iâd made no progress and was back to square one, except this time I was stuck calling one brother Richard and the other Drake!
Jason, still laughing: and this is where I came in?
Damian: I felt BAD! Iâd already taken Robin from the guy, I didnât want him to feel like he was lesser of a brother to me than Richard. So I demoted you to Todd so he wouldnât feel alone.
Jason: very thoughtful.
Jason: we should probably get you a therapist, dude. I think everybody forgets that when you showed up you were literally just a very confused immigrant child with no experience of normal social interaction apart from me at the league.
Damian: oh I was like, 60% into an anxiety attack consistently for the first two years I was in the city.
Jason: *snorts*
Damian: the first time I was left alone with Tim we were in the kitchen and he said âdo you want wifi?â and, yâno, coming from the league, barely any tech and the only normality was the concept of fighting to the death over everything, MY instinctual ten-year-old thought was âoh shit, wifi must be slang for brawl here, weâre about to fightâ-
Jason: *laughter* youâre fucking kidding
Damian: -so Iâm like, so be it, and I say âcome on thenâ and get ready to start punching, only for him to turn around and grab a piece of card stuck to the fridge and hold it out to me,
Jason: *cackles*
Damian: and he goes âhereâs the password so you can connect, Iâm assuming you have a phone or somethingâ-which I fucking didnât by the way, my mother gave me a shitty flip-phone to call her in emergencies but it didnât use wifi-, and heâs holding it out to me and I had to like, subtly shift my posture out of the defensive position Iâd been in-,
Jason, delirious from laughter: this is the fucking best. thing.
Damian: -and I take it from him, and he gives me this weird look like he has no idea how to communicate with me, and I was just like âshit I might have to kill this one, itâs the only way to get out of this interactionâ.
Jason: *wheeze* if we go through the timeline, every murder attempt on Timâs life has just been an occasion where youâve felt socially awkward and didnât see any other way out of conversation,
Damian: pretty much, yeah. I should have been on xanax for those first few years.
Jason: stories from your first years in Gotham are my favourite thing in the world.
*a few silent beats*
Tim: are you telling me Iâve been stuck as Drake for YEARS all because Damianâs fucking scared of social interaction?!
*crashing sound*
Jason: HOLY FUCK-
Damian: OH MY GOD I FORGOT WE WERE CONNECTED TO THE MAIN LINE-
âi am a monument to all your sinsâ is such a fucking raw line for a villain itâs amazing that it came from halo, a modernish video game, and not some classical text or mythos
#discovering that the profound is lurking behind the absurd#just waiting for the chance to peek through like sunlight through the clouds#is one of the best things in life once you start to notice it
this is a beautiful way to put it and iâm gonna cry abt it
Ahem @bettinalevyisdetermined could you please do a video with this?
also âyouâre not brave, youâve merely forgotten the fear of death. Allow me to reacquaint you.â Is the rawest line and itâs from dominus ghaul from destiny 2âs vanilla story when it first released.
âSpare me this mockery of justice!â
(A few minutes later, a with a different character)
âSilence! Or you shall be held in contempt of court!â
âI have nothing *but* contempt for this court!â
The Transformers: The Movie (1986)
âFor every kid that dreams up the electric lightbulb, thereâs one who dreams up the atom bomb.â - Mr. Electric, The Adventures of Sharkboy And Lavagirl (2005).
here is a super helpful website for this kinda thing!
the first result isnât always the one youâre looking for but when you press enter itâll give you a ton of words related to your query thatâll probably have what youâre wanting, or something better
why does anyone in Gotham even bother doing crime like you KNOW the second you leave the bank with the money you just stole Bruce Wayne is gonna be chilling on a bench on the other side of the street in his bat fursuit like âhey bitch u better not be breaking the lawâ
Wayne Enterprises has a jobs program for those who are fresh out of prison.
He routinely takes major villains with mental health issues to an asylum where professionals are there to help.
Or do you just read the fight scenes?
WHAT THE HELL KIND OF BATMAN HAVE YOU BEEN WATCHING?
Fake geeks, I swear to godâŠ
The best part is that most of the lore, especially Batman: The Animated Series, gets to a point in Batmanâs career when everyone asks the question of why someone would rob a bank in Gotham when they know that if they approached Batman, and coincidentally Bruce Wayne, they could get the help they needed.
Thatâs the whole point of Batman. Granted there have been modernized adaptations that paint him out to be nothing more than a growling, punching, antihero. But nobody ever said those adaptations were canon or even good. The original Batman comics, most of the newer comics, the Animated Series, the animated spinoffs, even the Arkham video games all operate under the lore that Batman does everything within his power to help as many villains as he can, even if it means going against cops, politicians, etc. Thatâs what originally made him the vigilante. He went against the social norms. He did everything that a hero shouldnât do, not in a murderous way, but in a taking-sides way. Every other hero swoops in to save the corrupt politician from the criminal. Batman swoops in to save the criminal from the corrupt politician.Â
"Dann-oâ Jack spoke with his usual cheer whilst throwing his arms wide for a backbreaking hug.
Danny hugged him back just as hard, having grown up and out in the years since then. He almost matched Jack in every aspect, but was just a slight bit smaller and slimmer.
âHow have you been, son?â They sat down at the low table in the hall. Ever since Jack had been transferred to a low level security prison they had met in person without a glass in between.
âOh you know, same as always, job is stressing out, still being head over heels for Cass, getting called for the occasional Justice League duty. You know, the usual. Oh yeah here, look at this!â
Danny reached into his pocket and pulled out multiple polaroid pictures. The first one showed Danny in a well fitted suit that didnât look awkward on him. He gave the cam a big grin and a small peace sign. Next to him stood Tucker, Dick and Damian.
The next one showed Cass, walking down the Aisle in a beautiful wedding dress, Bruce guided her down looking constantly at her with a mix of emotions on his face.
Jack flipped to the next one showing both of them standing in front of the Priest holding hands, it was followed immediately by the first kiss.
âDanno. I'm so proud of you!â Jack was nearly bawling at the sight. Danny just ducked his head a bit and scratched the back of his neck. âThanks dad. Oh, thereâs more.â He gestured to the pictures only to pause and listen to something only he could hear. He then got up rather quickly, âSorry, I'd love to stay but something really important just came up and I have to go.â
Danny nearly ran away before he hollered over his shoulder, âYou can keep them! The guards already approved!â Jack didn't even have time to ask what was going on before Danny had left the visiting area.
Slightly dejected he sat back down, and went to look through the pictures again. There was cutting the Cake, the Dance, all of them being pretty wasted and then the final one he couldnât figure out. It looked like a scan of something, but no matter which way he turned it, he couldn't figure out what it was supposed to show.
Cass was breathing hard. It had been a decent day so far, key word being so far, before Darkside decided he wanted to have another go at conquering the world. So here she, and the entire rest of the JL, stood and/or laid.
He had come at them swinging, literally. Superman had been knocked out within minutes of the invasion going on. They didnât even have the time to give a general evacuation order and simply had told the speedsters to âdo their best and be fastâ.
She jumped out of the way of another parademon, used a batarang to cut tendons and then snapped its neck as it toppled. She felt sick, not just because she had to kill but also becâDarkside slammed into the ground not two feet away from her, peppering her body with pebbles. Cass had just enough time to try and shield her face from the fist that will undoubtedly cave her skull in.
The punch was stopped dead in its tracks by a hand. âCass, oh Anicents. I came as fast as I could. Are you okay?â Danny was suddenly there, holding Darkside back as if he was nothing more than a toddler.
The word confused didnât even begin to describe how she felt. Darkside radiated the same emotion only to straighten out and assume his âbetter than youâ posture.
âAnd who might you be?â
Danny just threw a casual look over his shoulder, then went back to fussing over Cass. Getting her to sit down, and have her drink from a cold water bottle.
âI am speaking with you.â Darkside chimed, sounding more than a bit hacked off.
âYeah, and Iâm ignoring you. So shut.âÂ
Darkside was taken aback by the blunt and utter dismissal from the boy, âNow listen to meââ
âNo. Go away you big lug, I'm busy.â Danny had even found a big rock where Cass could elevate her slightly twisted ankle.
Finally having enough of it Darkside stepped forwards, throwing a punch at Danny's head only for a Creature to jump out of his shadow. âDamn it, twerp. Canât I leave you for a single day alone without you getting into trouââ
âDan.â Danny just cut the guys rant off. âFuck him up.â
âHA! FINALLY AN ORDER I LIKE!!â âDan bellowed before lunging at Darkside. He simply grabbed him around the waist and then hurled Darkside back only to fly right after him and start punching. Every Superhero watched as Darkside was pummeled by the being that had suddenly shown up.
Cass just looks from this âDanâ to her sweet husband and back, âWhat.â Was all she sad. âOkay, look there might be some things I havenât yet fully explained.â There's a loud âThis is better than that time I killed Supermanâ in the back. Danny just winces. âOkay there might be more than a few things.
Batman stalked over and glared at him. âFenton, explain.â Danny turns to the masked man and pulls a face. âDo you want the long version or the short one?â
âHnn.â
âLook, I'm not fluent in Bat-grunt so you have to use words. Preferably English.â
Every Social media account of the Waynes posted the same set of pictures. Bruceâs Twitter account had a picture of him, bawling his eyes out whilst holding a newborn baby. Next to him was Danny, grinning like a loon and giving a thumbs up. On his other side was Dick, who was also grinning whilst holding up a piece of paper that had an arrow on it that pointed to Bruce, beneath the Arrow was the word âGrandpaâ in large letters.
Timâs Account had him sitting in a Chair, awestruck as a second newborn held his finger. His face was somewhere between awed and babyface. Next to him was Daimian, who looked down with an incredible soft look on his face.
Finally Stephanie's Account had a Pic of her and Cass, who was in a hospital bed and giving a peace sign. Steph was grinning wildly, one of her arms was slung around Cass.
Dannyâs Account had a picture of him and Cass, each holding one baby. The description of the post read âDear Gotham, please welcome Thomas and Amber Wayne to the world.â
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