Okay! Time for a new pinned post. The old one is here. I'll keep this brief — a couple of housekeeping notes, then a taglist under a read more.
I'm LeaJoyWrites on ao3, btw.
Please let me know if I miss something on any of the following. I may forget to tag, misinterpret a post I reblog, or fail to check my internal biases. I do want to be told, and I will make an effort to correct my mistake.
I try to tag warnings thoroughly.
This blog should be a safe space for sex-repulsed people.
I have no tolerance for bigotry, and exclusionism is bigotry.
I write, write about, and analyze texts containing sensitive topics. I try to approach this in a sensitive manner, and again, I try to tag accordingly.
I do not discuss real-world events in my blog much, but I'm not strict about it.
My approach to fandom moralism is "live and let live." I do actually have a complex moral philosophy, but its application in online spaces is just "if it's not intrinsically harmful to an actually existing person, there is no moral issue with it."
Related to the above, I am very much so against censorship.
Fandoms and taglist below the cut! Fair warning that I do not format it as just a list, and I do ramble.
one of my most-used tags is #hellyeahmeta, which I use for meta-analysis posts written or at least op'd by other people. I sometimes forget to use this tag, so some meta analysis posts are tagged as meta. I tag for specific character meta, specific fandom meta, etc..
some other tags I use for different kinds of (especially non-fandom) meta are #meta squared, #fandom meta, #fandom etiquette, #fandom things, and #meta meta. I'll (probably) come back and actually link these at some point, but rn you can copy+paste them into the search bar in my blog to the same end.
a couple of tags I use for a specific flavor of character are #beloved bereaved burdened burned and #beloved bereft bereaved. I mostly used these tags early on in my blog, and I used both for Jason Todd (second Robin, Red Hood) and the first one for Five Hargreaves. I think I specifically started using them because of web weaves, but I don't remember exactly.
tags like #funnies, #not fandom related, #relevant for life, and #cool things -> exactly what they say on the tin. #miscellaneous is more or less synonymous with not being fandom related, but it's a tag I use more often because I'll drop it onto a post when I don't have the bandwidth to properly tag it but don't want it fully untagged.
#tumblrisms -> self-explanatory if you've been here for a while. If you haven't, it's sort of like... there's a set of phrases, in-jokes, and classic viral posts that you learn on tumblr by a sort of weird osmosis, so it's basically just stuff related to that. I personally use it as a sort of anthropological archiving tag bc I wanna note whenever people do it.
Okay, this next part is actually a list; it's my blog-specific "[my username] [does this]" tags and then fic tags for when I talk about or post pieces of said fics, prompts, etc.. there are fandoms I've posted fanfic for that I don't talk about on tumblr, but that's beside the point.
#leajoyfics
#leajoyprompts
#leajoymemes
^I'll probably have more of these later, but I doubt I'll have many. Next part is fics/fic series with fandom and very brief synopsis specified in parentheses
#bury me in broken glass let me see the sky (no fandom; horror-tragedy flash fiction)
#it's too late and it's just getting later (Danny Phantom; existential horror + vivisection, hurt w/eventual comfort)
#rh and jl no good deed (dc fandom; pseudo trope-subversion + character study)
#Project: HOLLOW (The Hollow; govt. experimentation au)
#forgive but don't forget to hold a grudge (Wednesday [netflix] AU where Tyler gets to be saved, rather than blamed + character study of multiple characters)
Next part is a few AUs I came up with for Ben 10, which I don't want to write because I have too many projects going already, but which I also do want to write because [insert keyboard smash here]. Alphabetical order. (as of when I'm writing this, I only have one post that goes over all of these lmao)
#A.T.E.M. AU (AF s3e15 Time Heals doomed timeline is partially remembered by the trio)
#Ben10 G3 AU (Classic s1e11 A Small Problem Graymatter almost getting dismembered scene -> Graymatter does get dismembered but he comes back from the dead immediately and doesn't tell anyone)
#Redemption Arc Makes Things Worse In This One AU (UA s2e18 The Perfect Girlfriend is followed by the nanites being removed and Elena being cured, but Ben is terrified of her now because holy shit levels of stalking and violation of trust)
#Technopath Stalker AU (Ben's personal life is filmed for months and snippets released on the internet in a power trip/attempt at humiliation/grab for glory/etc.)
a non-exhaustive list of children's cartoons which have handled heavy themes with more nuance and respect than any equivalent adult/YA media I've seen:
Avatar: The Last Airbender — a classic, well-known example. Themes such as genocide, cultural genocide, colonization, propaganda, ableism, and cycles of violence are all handled with a legitimately shocking amount of nuance and complexity.
She-ra and the Princesses of Power — a newer but still well-known show. The cycle of violence is a primary focus of the show, especially cycles of abuse, and the level of complexity and realism involved in the show's depiction of both is astounding. Honorable mention for historical revisionism and propaganda in Mara's storyline because wow.
Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts — extremely bizarre show, but surprisingly good with the serious themes. This show spends the first two seasons setting up a world in which you cannot reasonably identify one "oppressor class" and one "oppressed class," and it spends the last season using that set-up to emphasize that there is no scenario in which eugenics is remotely justifiable. Unsubtle but incredibly well-executed.
The Last Kids on Earth — a show that balances "they're literally kids" and "they've been in survival mode for months and it shows" pretty well. Handles grief, complex grief, and trauma all pretty well. The most impressive thing in the show is that the characters can be in conflict with each other without any of them necessarily being wrong, or at least with anyone in the wrong still being highly sympathetic, and I hardly ever see that. One of the ongoing themes is how kids without a solid support system are vulnerable to manipulation, and this culminates in an on-the-nose grooming/sa allegory that lowkey haunts me.
Honorable mentions (that is, questionable moments but still better than most adult media):
The Hollow — weirdly meta-textual show. Handles existential crises and suicidal ideation still-weirdly, but effectively, in season two. Also has legitimately casual (but explicitly stated) gay rep, which is wonderful.
Voltron: Legendary Defender — handles mass-scale violence, wartime atrocities, multiple instances of grief, and a POW's PTSD solidly well.
The Dragon Prince: Mysteries of Aaravos — confined to honorable mentions because I've watched less than half of it, but the depiction of familial loyalty through abuse (and all the various ways that goes badly), the use of verbal abuse against one person to manipulate another, and so in is just... holy shit. The way one person can be pushed far enough that they realize what's going on, and they escape, but another can be perfectly situated to be manipulated more and more until they're a seemingly-willing participant in atrocities... yeah. Anyway.
I never thought I'd see the day when I would be able to post aro/ace headcanons without getting destroyed for it yet over the last couple of years I've done it for a few fandoms and have gotten absolutely no negativity at all! I'm surprised and proud honestly
Controversial but I feel like they're taking events from pre new52 Jason and rewriting them in the new canon to completely remove any hint of Bruce's involvement in them. The big one to note is Rocky, Jason's first kill now happens before Bruce adopts him and without his knowledge so Jason is both 100% responsible for that death with no ambiguity but Bruce didn't even know about it so he doesn't have an opinion on it. Jason being angry at Bruce for covering up his father being murdered by Twoface, resulting in him deciding not to kill Twoface for revenge is now Jason finding out about Penguin killing his father years later with Bruce not being involved in the coverup and deciding to torture Penguin to death slowly (even though his father is alive). Sheila Haywood doesn't exist any more, Jason really just decided he could solo joker and died. Jason makes worse decisions and Bruce isn't even slightly involved in a way that might influence his philosophy. Bruce telling Jason that Father's avenge Sons as a form of warning him about consequences and Jason throwing it back in his face on his return makes sense. Jason who never got told that by Bruce deciding it's his core philosophy out of the blue doesn't.
For a long time I've been subject to a LOT of denial from other people telling me what I am. When I was 10, I thought I was a lesbian and told my mom, but she tried to convince me I was bi instead. Maybe 3 or so years later, I came out to her as genderfluid with a preference for they/them pronouns, she hugged me and said I'd always be her "daughter" (to this day she still sees me as a girl, I genuinely can't be bothered to correct her tho). Even recently, when I told some of my friends I was aegosexual, they said "that's just being asexual", even after I tried to explain it. One friend of mine even got onto me for my frequency to make queer OCs, and they're queer!
Luckily, I dropped those friends. Narrow-minded is company I can't dumb myself down to tolerate. And I've been FAR happier and more secure in myself since doing so!!
Even more luckily, I've found friends online and IRL that have supported me regardless of who I came to be. One of which actually helped me figure out I'm genderfluid and arospec!! And to make things better, I'm friends with someone who I genuinely care about more than anyone else. And I kinda really really like him. He's made me so happy, and this is one of the most secure friendships I've ever had. He also made me realize I'm pan, I helped him figure out he's genderfluid (like myself, wonderful coincidence), and we've both helped each other through our mental problems.
I hope one day I can get the guts to tell him how I feel, but for now I'm just incredibly happy to have him in my life at all.
it's absolutely okay for your labels to change as your learn more about yourself - we are growing and changing all the time!
I do really love it when women write graphic and fucked up things. I feel like so often people react to fucked up fiction with “of course a disgusting man would write this 🙄” and it often carries an unspoken (honestly sometimes spoken) message of “a woman’s PURE and DELICATE and FEMININE mind could NEVER think of something this VILE”. Thank you women in fucked up fiction 🫡
If anyone is looking for a book tracking app, StoryGraph is a Black woman-founded alternative to goodreads! The founder and CEO is named Nadia Odunayo.
We'll help you track your reading and choose your next book.
Oh that is a hilarious tag line lmao. She's right, life is too short for a book I'm not in the mood for. Thank you for sharing!
proud to announce that I have finished chapter one of my Undisclosed Ben 10 Fic From Hell. it's roughly 3500 words long, switches between two POV characters (via line break) no less than four times, and is filled to the brim with cruel and horrifying dramatic irony. this is intentional. I now have to decide whether I want to share it (and not update for an unholy amount of time) or continue to absolutely not explain myself (and write more before posting).
Hey kids! Don't smoke. Just don't do it. It affects your body in the worst ways possible, even if you never get cancer.
Hey kids who smoke! You are still fucking worthy of love, dignity and respect and anyone who mistreats you because of your addiction alone is a fucking cop.
There is hope for you, and hope beyond coping with smoke. Specifically, the younger you are, the safer you are to quit. Specifically, even if you cannot quit, you are not wrong. You are not evil or gross.
Smoking is a vice. Vices can be managed, cut back and replaced.
If anyone tells you go cold turkey on most drugs in a high stress period of your life if they are not causing insane self harm or harm to others, they are like a puritan and a cop who is going to inadvertently hospitalize you or give you a stress attack. Quitting cigarettes cold turkey while braving exterior stress can make your health worse should you relapse.
Consider counting cigarette intake down before quitting entirely. So you don't have intense panic attacks.
You often need to be stable to quit. It is okay when you aren't.
so something that I find really interesting about Kai's powers in canon is that like. they don't actually impact his intelligence in any meaningful way. of course, there are a bunch of ways to measure intelligence, but the narrative shorthands for "this character is smart" don't really happen with him.
in fact, the others are a lot better at solving puzzles and analyzing situations than he is. I don't mean this as a slight against his character — I wouldn't be talking about the implications of his powers if I didn't frickin' love his character — but objectively, the others do seem to have better investigative and strategic skills (Mira's creative solutions like the waterspout, Adam's observational skills resulting in him figuring out they're in a game, Mira realizing before either of them that they weren't supposed to be there in season two, and so on).
what he does have is knowledge, and something that's way too easy to miss is that it isn't just technical knowledge. sure, he knows the carrying capacity of an electric cable just by looking at it, and he can apply that knowledge even on something as advanced as a spaceship, but he also knows things like, say, witches come in threes.
and like... that's the kind of thing that, even if he remembered it, wouldn't necessarily apply to the real world. and at the time, he thinks he's in the real world.
anyway, the point I'm making here is that I generally interpret his powers as having nothing to do with technology and everything to do with meta-level knowledge.
(on a meta level (ha), the intention of him being, iirc, the only character in the show to use the word 'meta' — "woah, that's meta. and kind of makes my head hurt" about Miles wanting to play video games with him — could be a subtle way to tie the character to the idea of video game self-referentiality. that would assume intentionality on the part of the writers, and honestly, I wouldn't be surprised)
it would make sense, then, why he has both realistic knowledge about things relating to the game mechanics ("there's some serious juice running through these cables") and technical knowledge that's... less realistic, ie fixing and flying a plane that has a standing takeoff mechanism (cannot imagine anyone actually designing one of those anytime in the next three centuries; if someone has or is trying to, the only question I have is why), and also being able to "stabilize the thrusters" by typing into a keyboard. The fire-powers propulsion thing would realistically give off way too much heat for him to do it anywhere near other people, which he would implicitly know if he was a scientific genius on all accounts... but which he wouldn't even consider if his knowledge is largely based off of video game mechanics, rather than real-world sciences.
and anyway, it wouldn't make sense for a video game to be able to imbue someone with technical expertise in a bunch of different scientific fields; it wouldn't make sense for the game developers to want to deal with that headache. not to mention, Kai makes a couple of small media references (Mermaid von Doolittle is, I presume, a reference to Dr. Doolittle), but the others don't really do the same. The one time I can think of that someone does, it's Adam recognizing the horsemen of the apocalypse, and I generally assume that concepts like that, which are pretty solidly entrenched in the culture and reiterated a thousand times in a thousand ways and what have you — that is, religious symbols in general — are probably not gonna get taken away by the memory block.
anyway. yes, I do incorporate this into his character in Project: HOLLOW, but since they're not in a video game, his knowledge isn't of a video game. instead, he understands some real-world mechanics and, rather than meta-level knowledge, he has the benefit of not getting totally fucked up every time he recovers a memory, and also of recovering clearer memories than the others. I digress.
and look i get it, people think the look is cool, and there is something to be said about treating someone like a monster BECAUSE of obvious scarring, arguably it falls in the category of prettiness is equal to goodness and therefore godliness (especially in the american context), BUT the whole point of jason's story is ERASURE.
his legacy, his story, his pain, his traumas, all of it is GONE. in the eyes of other people, jason is virtually an irrational blank slate who is supposed to be filled in by the people around him, he is what they SAY he is. everyone has been allowed to dictate how they view him, how his story was told, what happened to him in that warehouse -- ALL. OF. IT.
jason does not OWN a single part of his own trauma. it is someone else's, it's dick's, it's bruce's, it's joker's shining moment -- it's not jason's.
he doesn't have the scars, or twisted limbs, or the physical disability that would come with his torture. all he has is the memory of it, what he KNOWS happened and no proof other than his own words, and that's why he keeps YELLING about it. why he keeps DEMANDING to be heard because they cant SEE what happened to him.
he is aware he doesn't look so much like the kid that died, but that's HIM and he should get to decide how HE feels, what HIS death and torture meant, and NO ONE lets him and it's so easy to ignore because there's no physical proof on his body that he went through it.
jason's whole story is about grappling with the inescapable while everyone pretends nothing happened to HIM, like it just occurred to some version of him he has no access to.
but he CAN.
he IS that kid, and that kid deserves to be heard, to be stood up for no matter how many times he's silenced.
a jason with scars is harder to erase, is harder to pretend is separate from the tragedy that occurred, a jason with scars is NOT the jason we know.
and playing into him being covered in scars is actively playing into his erasure because he shouldn't nee to be covered in scars to be BELIEVED.
he shouldn't need to be covered in scars to be HEARD.
he shouldn't need to be covered in scars to be HONORED.
man sometimes friendship really is just "I saw this and knew it would give you psychic damage. please respond with agony" and then they do. and it's great
"Jason Todd of earth. You love in an excessively weird and intense way which we have decided to irresponsibly reward despite the way it harms you and ruins all your human relationships. Anyway here's a power ring that lets you create guns and go to space, it comes with a tight suit with a boob window and is going to explode in your face until you start doing CBT. Have fun."
