SPACEWALKER

Ok I’ve just seen yet another post saying ‘omg Raven finally told Jasper how worthless he is. Best part of the episode. Jasper’s so whiny.’

I literally want to scream.

I am currently studying a module in mental health at university. Yesterday we had a psychologist in to talk to us about the stigmas surrounding mental health. One of the main topics was about how men are taught not to show emotion and that they are far less likely to get help for their mental health because they think they’ll be told they’re weak.

This is literally what some of this fandom are saying about Jasper.

I agree, basically every character in The 100 has PTSD and yeah I agree that some of them might not get the opportunity to deal with it but why does that mean that Jasper should be attacked because he’s angry and struggling to cope? It’s almost like these donuts in ‘the fandom’ don’t understand that everyone is different and therefore people deal with PTSD and other mental illnesses in different ways.

People might say that I’m getting too annoyed over a fictional character. But today I’ve literally seen someone say that Devon is ‘problematic’ for asking people to stop referring to what Jasper’s going through as ‘man pain’ and that PTSD can affect any gender. I personally think Devon is amazing for speaking up about these issues.

So if you still think that Jasper’s whiny and annoying and that everything that Alie/Raven said to him in the episode was justified remember that this affects real people in real life.

OK now sit your asses down. A little background: I have had PTSD my entire life AND I work with people who have PTSD (through activism, volunteer work, and paid work I have work with and for people who have gotten PTSD from childhood trauma, assault, war, gender violence, etc. So I’m not only intimately familiar with it, but I have also spent my entire life helping others like me).

Now I’m not discounting that everyone on The 100 has suffered immense trauma, but the thing is - not everyone who undergoes severe trauma develops PTSD. But this is secondary to the ACTUAL point here.

ANYONE CAN GET PTSD. REGARDLESS OF GENDER OR ANYTHING ELSE. IT DOESN’T FUCKING MATTER WHO YOU ARE YOU, YES YOU CAN GET PTSD. If you have a brain, and you undergo a trauma/traumatic situation then you can develop PTSD. Some people never do, some develop short term (acute) PTSD, and some develop long-term/chronic PTSD.

For anyone to even suggest that Jasper doesn’t have PTSD astounds me. Usually I hear that War Vets are the only ones with PTSD (who statistically there are more men then women, though overall women develop PTSD more then men) so for a large portion of The 100 fandom to sit around and deny Jasper’s PTSD??? What?

Let’s take a look at classic PTSD symptoms. I’ll bold the ones that Jasper has displayed this season so far:

Being easily startled

Feeling tense or “on edge”

Having difficulty sleeping

Having angry outbursts

Trouble remembering key features of the traumatic event

Negative thoughts about oneself or the world

Distorted feelings like guilt or blame (I think this is safe to say)

Loss of interest in enjoyable activities

difficulty in concentrating

hyper-vigilance

substance abuse

Staying away from places, events, or objects that are reminders of the traumatic experience

Feeling emotionally numb

Feeling strong guilt, depression, or worry

Losing interest in activities that were enjoyable in the past

Having trouble remembering the dangerous event

Flashbacks—reliving the trauma over and over, including physical symptoms like a racing heart or sweating

Bad dreams

Frightening thoughts

AND THIS IS WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT. A lot of these things we don’t know about b/c I don’t know what goes on inside Jasper’s head, but it doesn’t matter - he meets the clinical criteria for PTSD. 

So when you sit there and dismiss HIS PAIN you are dismissing the pain of EVERY. SINGLE. PERSON OUT HERE IN THE ACTUAL REAL WORLD who has PTSD. I hope that makes you feel better for ragging on a character you’ve decided not to like for some bullshit reason.

fanmix challenge, iv. months & days of the week [¼] → lazy sundays

      ❛ Teach me, Mourning Mother, how to STAND TALL in the face of that soul-crushing grief, how to walk down into the cave of necessity and do, without hesitation, what must be done. Teach me that no torment lasts forever, that someday I will walk out of that cave to see the sun again, and dance for joy. ❜ 

          private & selective sigyn from norse mythos

Do you dare to speak his name?   There’s evil at the root —cruel or kind, he’s on your mind, go on and give the dice a roll.

“FOR  ARES, LORD OF STRIFE, WHO DOTH THE SWAYING SCALES OF BATTLE HOLD, WAR’S MONEY-CHANGER, GIVING DUST FOR GOLD, SENDS BACK, TO HEARTS THAT HELD THEM DEAR, SCANT ASH OF WARRIORS, WEPT WITH MANY A TEAR, LIGHT TO THE HAND, BUT HEAVY TO THE SOUL; YEA, FILLS THE LIGHT URN FULL WITH WHAT SURVIVED THE FLAME— DEATH’S DUSTY MEASURE OF A HERO’S FRAME!”

          he was beautiful, that was always affirmed, but his beauty was hard to fix or to see, for he was always glimmering, flickering, melting, mixing, HE WAS THE SHAPE OF A SHAPELESS FLAME, he was the eddying thread of needle-shapes in the shapeless mass of the waterfall. he was the invisible wind that hurried the clouds in billows and ribbons. you could see a bare tree on the skyline bent by the wind, holding up twisted branches and bent twigs, and suddenly its formless form would resolve itself into that of THE TRICKSTER.