Memes/Art

From what I can tell, there are only three universally applicable pieces of writing advice:

Read a lot (mandatory)

Show your writing to people (mandatory)

dcxdp fic idea

"I got it!" Sam yelled.

"what?"

"We charge Batman with Felony Murder!"

"ya ok" "good one Sam"

"No, guys. Listen, I'm serious. Under the law Danny's being charged with Felony Murder because their a bunch of ectophobic assholes and think because Danny is the king of the dead and technically responsible for turning the portal on they can charge him with every crime ghosts have committed and Danny's own death. But by that same measure Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman- all of them would be responsible for deaths committed by people that they saved. So we get Batman charged with Felony Murder, there's bound to be corrupt cops in Gotham, and let the media circus bring attention to the crime. Worst case he looks into who got the charges filed and we get him on our doorstep-"

"Which we all agreed we didn't want-" Tucker interjected.

"-which gets him on our doorstep and gives us a chance to defend ourselves. He would come looking. We wouldnt be going to him, so he would have already done all his background checking and would suspect us of anything."

----

"Felony murder? but you didn't kill anyone B-man!"

"That seems to be the point Dick."

"That can't arrest Batman for NOT killing someone‽‽"

"It appears that they can hold Batman responsible for the deaths of any who have died at the hands of someone whose life he has saved Master Grayson," Alfred said.

"But that's crazy! by that standard they could arrest every hero on the planet!"

"I think that's the point Dick."

"Who came up with this crazy idea anyway? No one on the force is smart enough for this. Who gave them the idea?"

Oh, a human being is seeking a social response? Human being, the social animal wired to make and track social connection? A human desires the vital blood that permitted their species to survive for millennia? The human being who was born completely helpless and primed in every way by nature to seek attention and help from their community?

Tumblrites, the hour has come for us to practice one of our most sacred rituals.

Ao3 does not need a 1-5 star rating system, you just want to bring down authors writing for FREE

Ao3 does not need automatic censorship, it is an archive, therefore anything can be posted

Writing or reading about something illegal does not mean the author nor the reader condones it, if that were true, you could never read a story involving anything negative

I saw a post about someone chiding Millennials for not knowing about JKRowlings transphobia, and asking how it is at all possible that people can exist in the world and the internet and, you know, not know.

Which I mean, I get. It is so present in so many of my online spaces that it seems astounding that someone could simply be ignorant! It feels impossible!

But let me tell you a story:

I went on a girls trip with a bunch of friends. All of us are rather incredibly liberal and all of us are incredibly online.

One girl would not stop talking about Harry Potter.

At one point, another girl asked her why she was ok with supporting it, and she had no real clue that JK Rowling was at all transphobic. She had heard that she likes to support Lesbian causes and thought “oh ok cool!” And that was it. She was AGOG with the news and rather horrified.

I must once again emphasize that she was an incredibly online person. She’s a foodie and a restaurant blogger.

Later in the trip we were picking restaurants and I suggested one I found on Google, and she gasped at me. Actually gasped, asking how I could ever be okay picking that one.

The shock must’ve been on my face, because she then told me all of the shitty things that restaurateur does. He abuses staff. Underpays them. Fires them on a whim. Is known for being one of the worst people to his employees in the entire restaurant business on this coast.

And she was so shocked I had never heard of this. Because in her mind, I was just as online as her. And in her online world, EVERYONE knew about this guy.

So I think the moral of this story is: always approach the other person with some empathy. Even online people, even people you think MUST know about how bad people are, may not have heard. It may truly be just them being on a different sphere of the internet than you.

So be gentle, be kind when letting people know they might not have heard about the cancellation of XYZ person. Don’t assume that everyone knows all the same info as you.

Oliver: no

Barry: I have babysitting experience but not fatherhood

Diana: I was the last child on my island, so no.

Hal: I also only have babysitting experience

Arthur: I'm not a parent yet....I need three more months before my little turtle is here.

Bruce: Yes

JL: ....come again?

Bruce: I have children, so I have parenting experience. Why?

Clark stun: Um well I have a little boy and I needed advice....I'm sorry Batman has kids?

Bruce: I am the proud father of ten

Hal: Ten!?

Bruce: *stoneface* I love them very much. What advice do you need, Superman?

Clark: Er...well Danny is only five but he keeps breaking things around the house.

Bruce: Is it due to his Kryptonian strength?

Clark: No, hes adopted. He's a regular human

Bruce: When he breaks things, is it ussually when he's playing or after a moment of silence?

Barry: Why does that matter?

Bruce: It matters a lot. If its play time he's doing it on accident, but if its after moments of stillness and silence hes doing it on purpose to test Superman's boundaries. Children who are adopted from bad foster homes tend to test boundaries by seeking the punishment they believe will eventually come. He may not be completely settled in Superman's home yet.

Oliver: Oh my god, he is a father....

Clark: Danny is definitely doing it on purpose but I don't think its to test my limits. I think its more scientific curiosity? He tore apart my toaster to make a net launcher for ghosts

Hal: Did it work?

Clark: Yes it did launch a net but it only caught our landlord.

Bruce: So your son is a genius. Lucky for you, I have many children just like that. My third once hacked the Pentagon to place a coffee order in their cafe since I grounded him from the Batcoffee-maker.

Diana: Impressive

Bruce: Thank you. Superman, when Danny breaks things apart, does he ussually intend to use his inventions to fight ghosts?

Clark: Um yes?

Bruce: Excellent. Praise him, but gently explain that you need the items around the house and that you will, instead, take him to buy supplies once a month to build whatever he wants. You can put those expenses on my card. Also, bring the boy over; my genius children would love to meet another weaponsmith.

Clark: Wow! Thank you Batman!

Bruce: Please call me B. My children do.

Oliver: Am I the only one alarmed that B said "another" weaponsmith?

And a select few being super adamant about it is how Batman finds out his kids are actually, in fact, his biological kids.

This leads to a full on, all out fight on the Watchtower. Every single batkid is shouting, arguing, yelling, screaming at Batman. Because it’s not true. It can’t be true. How the fuck did Batman not know this before the JL? Why are they finding out from a shitty presentation given by HAL JORDAN of all people?

It ends with Batman sprawled out in a chair, slumped so far down that his back is on the seat of the chair, his neck bent at a funny angle against the backrest, and he’s groaning.

“I regret being such a whore in my youth,” is all they can get out of him.

Tim, Jason, and Damian are all pretty easy to figure out how they’re his kids. He already knew about Damian of course, and Tim and Jason’s moms were both from Gotham it made sense.

It’s Dick who’s fully having a meltdown.

“WHEN DID YOU SLEEP WITH MY MOM? HOW DID YOU KNOW MY MOM? DID YOU MAKE HER CHEAT ON MY DAD? WHAT HAPPENED TELL ME WHAT THE FUCK?”

Bruce, whose head is spinning, vaguely remembers a very tipsy night he spent with a beautiful French acrobat. They’d both been 16, it was the summer. She said she was about to run away and join a different circus, she’d been perfecting her routines with the circus she was in with her parents, but they were stifling her creativity. This was her last night in Paris, and she wanted to spend it with the cute American boy who was there on vacation.

“WHAT DID YOU DO TO MY MOM?”

“I bought her fancy champagne and clapped when she showed me how bendy she was,” he groans.

Dick has a visceral, disgusted reaction. He flings himself back, Jason has to hold him up so he doesn’t fall, and then he launches himself back at Bruce to damn near strangle him.

“DON’T TALK ABOUT HER LIKE THAT!”

*Damian and Jason, four hours into a stakeout*

Damian: Jay, hand me the mango pieces.

Jason: *plastic crinkling* ayyy, I’m 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 they’re your professor. Like, that’s not a ‘you’ thing, I don’t 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 aren’t 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 wasn’t 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 I’d just come from the desert compound I’d 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 ‘oh my god what the fuck kind of machine is that-‘

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 I’m zoned the fuck out, looking around this cave and not paying attention to anything father’s saying, and then I finally tune back in just to hear the words ‘-ackson drake’ while he like, tries to introduce me to Tim.

Jason: *slowly starts laughing again*

Damian, raising his voice to be heard over Jason’s increasing beats of laughter: -and so I’m fucking standing there, ten years old, no clue what this kid’s first name is, and everybody’s looking at me like I’m 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 ‘Damian you have to be strong and show that you deserve to be the Batman’s blood son. show no weakness and take the mantle you were born to have; show no fucking hesitance.’, so I’M 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: -that’s why I didn’t 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 ‘bless him he’s terrified, just leave him be’

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 ‘Drake’ 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 I’d 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 it’s like to go from *gruff voice* ‘Damian we don’t fucking kill, give me the katana or I’ll put you in Arkham’ to *high pitched, sweet voice* ‘oh hey Dames, obviously I can’t stop you from killing but I really would appreciate it if we discussed all our options and came to a mature decision together on what’s best in this scenario-‘

Jason: *crying, silent wheezes*

Damian: so DURING all this I’m 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 wasn’t AROUND for me to shift to calling him Tim! and when father was back I’d 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! I’d already taken Robin from the guy, I didn’t want him to feel like he was lesser of a brother to me than Richard. So I demoted you to Todd so he wouldn’t 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 ‘do you want wifi?’ and, y’no, 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 ‘oh shit, wifi must be slang for brawl here, we’re about to fight’-

Jason: *laughter* you’re fucking kidding

Damian: -so I’m like, so be it, and I say ‘come on then’ 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 ‘here’s the password so you can connect, I’m assuming you have a phone or something’-which I fucking didn’t by the way, my mother gave me a shitty flip-phone to call her in emergencies but it didn’t use wifi-, and he’s holding it out to me and I had to like, subtly shift my posture out of the defensive position I’d 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 ‘shit I might have to kill this one, it’s the only way to get out of this interaction’.

Jason: *wheeze* if we go through the timeline, every murder attempt on Tim’s life has just been an occasion where you’ve felt socially awkward and didn’t 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 I’ve been stuck as Drake for YEARS all because Damian’s fucking scared of social interaction?!

*crashing sound*

Jason: HOLY FUCK-