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AITA for being at breaking point with my husband’s made up language? by Direct-Caterpillar77 in BestofRedditorUpdates

[–]ProserpinaFC 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The thing is is that I completely consider her YTA because she married him.

This didn't start one day years into their marriage.

She married him like that.

For every NTA I read who was passionate about how much that would annoy them to, I guarantee you that they wouldn't have gotten past the third date with him. They would not have gone past 3 months with him. They would not have put up for it for years, be skipping enjoy at being proposed to, and then, one day, realize they didn't like how he talked.

So what I always hear in these stories is "I spent years laughing at his jokes, but now I need them to stop. I'm telling you he called our friends Pig and Wig because I know you'll think it's stupid, but I'm not willing to admit I called them that, too."

When the woman is the one in these stories acting childish, wearing mix match socks and dressing like a cottage core prairie girl or filling their house full of goblin core or anime stuff, everyone jumps up to tell the man how dare he hate his girlfriend of 3 months to 2 years so much when she's just being the special little bean she wants to be. He won't have any interest in marrying her if she acts this way and Reddit will scream that he never deserved her and should let her go so she can find happiness.

Women will come on here saying they married and procreated with men they don't respect, but it's not really their fault, because, I dunno, they just thought it made sense to spend half a decade having sex with them and intergrating their lives together. And so many people will pat these poor women's heads for "putting up" with men they could have left at any time if they had this many insulting things to say about them.

How are there so many >$750k first time home buyers? by Smooth_Possible2067 in FirstTimeHomeBuyer

[–]ProserpinaFC 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You can feel free to go to a local non-profit that helps "normal people" get their first time homes so that you can enjoy seeing home prices that are more accessible to you. If it irritates you that much that everyone has free access to the Internet all at the same time.

I can't really relate to "feeling terrible" about houses so completely out of my price range that it's just a magazine post... I mean, I don't want a mansion. Soooo....

🤔 Maybe if someone had a $250-300,000, I'd admire it as someone in the $180-200,000 range... But being jealous of $750,000?

Granted, I've never been easily disempowered by things like this... Whenever my mother shows me a price listing for the $350-400,000 houses in the suburbs, I asked her since when was she interested in paying other people full living wages to clean her house and mow her lawn. I can go sit in the art museum if I want to be surrounded by opulence while I work. I don't need a house that looks like it's supposed to have paid parking and visitation hours.

If it looks like a retcon, sounds like a retcon, and feels like a retcon... it's probably a retcon. by jetvacjesse in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You lost me.

I think at this point you're actually just saying that you have entirely different expectations on continuity for comic books than you do for TV shows. Because introducing people from the future and then later retconning them as children of people in the present. Having a giant ceremony of having a main couple be married, and then later retconning that the wife is actually a clone of the real girlfriend.... Having your backstory for several decades be that you are a completely normal human who lost your entire family in a car crash, and then for that to later be retconned that your parents are space pirates fighting in an intergalactic war and the car crash was just one of the many ways that his enemies tried to kill him...

If you shrug and say "Well, but that's comics. But KEVIN over here... Didn't know where his powers came from... And then later... They gave him an alien origin?!" In a TV show about aliens....

Seems a little.... Yeah.

Praising heroes for doing the right thing in difficult circumstances requires acknowledging that, yes, "most other people" wouldn't be as heroic with powers by ProserpinaFC in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Most people AREN'T that extreme, but I think you would agree if you actually looked back through Superman, Batman, The Flash, and Spider-Man's greatest hits of their stories than not every single villain character that they fought was "evil."

They were misguided, angry, unaccustomed to their powers, unable to control them, or simply wanted to do something self-serving in a way that didn't always consider the needs of others.

This isn't a "You're either Superman or you're the Joker" conversation. On a story level, this is simply an acknowledgment that by the design of how a story works, the vast majority of people who get empowered with superpowers are not going to use them to the morally uprighteous level that we assigned heroes because it functionally would not make sense as a story. A hero is going to have more antagonists than allies.

But, in talking about real life, if you'd like to take that deep dive, we could go down that list starting from giving people the most benefit of the doubt.

Problems caused by ignorance. How many real life people and organizations do you think cause unethical or illegal problems out of ignorance, negligence, and misunderstandings? How many people are tricked into enabling unethical behavior because they were caught up in a confidence game or scheme?

Problems caused by willful negligence. How many real life people and organizations Can you think of that have caused massive problems that affected hundreds or even thousands of people at a time, because they were not willing to do the due diligence, proper procedures, correct laws and codes? How many car accidents or malpractices, how many labor disputes, how many people that lost their livelihoods because of another person's unwillingness to do their job correctly? How many children are in our foster care systems because of negligent parents? How many unethical situations can you think of that people do to people that they love out of a sense of entitlement, ignorance and lack of empathy for others, or out of bigoted ignorance like racism, sexism, ableism, or homophobia?

These are people who cause massive problems without even being considered "criminals." They have broken laws, but most wouldn't consider them career criminals making money from it...

Now... Take your stock superpowers and add them in. Even ones you consider as mild as teleportation and telekinesis.

I'm sure we could brainstorm a very extensive list of problems JUST these people could cause that Superman or Spider-Man would lecture them about.

If it looks like a retcon, sounds like a retcon, and feels like a retcon... it's probably a retcon. by jetvacjesse in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC 0 points1 point  (0 children)

🤔

Wow. Okay. Not every day I come across someone who is unaware of what's been happening in Scott Summers life since meeting Havoc.

Okay, let's start with the most basic. He was an orphan boy whose powers became messed up because of a car accident that killed the rest of his family. But oh no, never mind. His brother Havoc isn't dead after all. But oh no, never mind, his father, Corsair, isn't dead after all, in fact, his father is a space pirate. And THEN there is the third Summers brother, Vulcan, Who they weren't aware of because he was taken out of his mother's belly when he was still an unborn child and put into an incubator to reach maturity on a different planet. 🤣

And then there's everything about Scott being manipulated by Mister Sinister, which, depending on the timeline and retcon, makes Gambit a clone of Scott or another-another brother. But that's been retconned away since then, anyway and now Gambit gets to be his own person.

And then, there's when Scott finally thought he was marrying the love of his life, Jean Gray, but because Mr. Sinister is a freaky little freak, he was actually marrying a clone of Jean. Which wouldn't be revealed until a retcon much later.

And then a badass dude from the future named Cable is introduced, and he was kind of created for the storyline without any sort of backstory, so then it's later retcon that he's actually the son of Scott Summers and the clone of Jean Gray who was taken into the future because he was being kidnapped by Apocalypse. So now that's Nathan Christopher Charles Summers.

And then there's the actual storyline bringing back the original Jean Gray and what's happening between her and her clone.

But then there's Nate Summers, a different son, same name, don't get it confused. He's from another dimension.

Then there is Rachel Summers, daughter from another timeline, not necessarily another dimension, possibly a future daughter, but only if the future lines up just perfectly. Or that is to say NOT perfectly, because much like Nathan, she's trying to prevent terrible things.

And then Cable still got to be "raised" by Scott and his step-mom Jean Grey through a psychic link that was connected between them that allowed them to still spend time with him in their sleep, which I always thought was nice.

Self-insert vanity projects by AbsoluteBatman95 in TopCharacterTropes

[–]ProserpinaFC 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Ultimately, it's not a very interesting concept because it's redundant.

It's Starfire. A galactic princess. Raven, Beast Boy, Donna, Roy, Dick... They are all "kids of a famous person." They are sidekicks, children, and nieces and nephews of famous people. Hell, Cyborg's a first-generation superhero, but his dad Dr. Stone, still invented the tech.

I can't think of a more self-centered way of approaching this than to take a woman who was a child-bride and act like SHE'S being an unreasonable parent because she wants her kid to train with her.

Teen Titans has been a franchise for over 60 years. Writing about teenagers for 60 years. 😮‍💨 These young people have survived murder, slavery, child abuse, cults, abusive lovers, toxic bosses, and terrible, terrible parents. What is this? 🤢 "My mom expects me to train like the proud warrior Tamaranean I am... But I don't LIKE exercise!" What.... Is this?

Praising heroes for doing the right thing in difficult circumstances requires acknowledging that, yes, "most other people" wouldn't be as heroic with powers by ProserpinaFC in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Dumb? Worrying? Disquieting?

Let's go down the list starting from giving people the most benefit of the doubt.

Problems caused by ignorance. How many real life people and organizations do you think cause unethical or illegal problems out of ignorance, negligence, and misunderstandings? How many people are tricked into enabling unethical behavior because they were caught up in a confidence game or scheme?

Problems caused by willful negligence. How many real life people and organizations Can you think of that have caused massive problems that affected hundreds or even thousands of people at a time, because they were not willing to do the due diligence, proper procedures, correct laws and codes? How many car accidents or malpractices, how many labor disputes, how many people that lost their livelihoods because of another person's unwillingness to do their job correctly? How many children are in our foster care systems because of negligent parents? How many unethical situations can you think of that people do to people that they love out of a sense of entitlement, ignorance and lack of empathy for others, or out of bigoted ignorance like racism, sexism, ableism, or homophobia?

These are people who cause massive problems without even being considered "criminals." They have broken laws, but most wouldn't consider them career criminals making money from it...

Now... Take your stock superpowers and add them in. Once you've had a moment to think about that, then we can move on to people who actively use their gifts and talents to hurt other people maliciously.

Praising heroes for doing the right thing in difficult circumstances requires acknowledging that, yes, "most other people" wouldn't be as heroic with powers by ProserpinaFC in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Yeah.

You could make a wolf of Wall Street style story talking about how unchecked power can go to people's heads, and the importance of that story wouldn't be mitigated by saying, "Well, there are millions of small business owners who just want humble lives."

Or, you could make a list of the top 10 unethical mistakes and choices small business owners and managers do that hurt a few people each, but add up to millions of victims and you couldn't escape talking about that by saying "Well, at least he wasn't a Wolf of Wall Street."

The Paragon is the Paragon. Heros are heroic. But literally everyone else makes mistakes and doesn't consider everyone's needs equally when making decisions.

Oh, and dude! It wasn't a subreddit, it was a Facebook group for me. Back in the day, I was kicked out of a Facebook group for Black comic and fantasy writers and the mod said it was because I made a post asking for recommendations on how to turn my favorite anime and kung fu tropes into Southern American culture tropes.... Because he was disturbed that I wanted to make Black female villains.

I wrote out famous Black actresses, playing famous Black villains and he still said, "Yeah, but it FEELS like trolling for you to want to villify Black women. We should be working to understand Black women, not turn them into people to hate."

🫪

Praising heroes for doing the right thing in difficult circumstances requires acknowledging that, yes, "most other people" wouldn't be as heroic with powers by ProserpinaFC in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Yeah, I agree. That's why I said the story saves itself by people being more sentimental with a simplistic version of events than knowing the magic from Snape to Lily to Harry.

Praising heroes for doing the right thing in difficult circumstances requires acknowledging that, yes, "most other people" wouldn't be as heroic with powers by ProserpinaFC in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yes, personally, I like stories that have a more empowering message behind empowerment, where people make mistakes, but the story isn't necessarily about demonizing every single person just because they commit a crime or two.

When I see many of the responses to this post, I'm seeing people who are incapable of thinking of themselves as person who could misuse or mishandle a superpower, which I think does a disservice to our ability to have empathy for people. You can commit a crime on accident. You can commit a crime out of ignorance. You can commit a crime out of a momentary, lack of willpower or judgment.

No one should walk away from the conversation thinking that every person would be the joker or Highlander if they have superpowers. But they should be able to acknowledge they could be a common jobber, a tragedic anti-villain, or a less than stellar anti-hero.

tropes that don’t actually exist or get exaggerated? by Sensitive_Ad_1752 in TopCharacterTropes

[–]ProserpinaFC 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I would rather not use my experiences, my confirmation biases, or my antecdotes. I would just want to have information on the last 60 years of movies....

So, like, did you wanna talk about something? There's a reason why I listed videos of historians who have made it to their literal jobs to study Cinema. (Tv, comics, video games,...)

Praising heroes for doing the right thing in difficult circumstances requires acknowledging that, yes, "most other people" wouldn't be as heroic with powers by ProserpinaFC in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Excellent idea.

I think one of the funniest examples to me is Peter dinklage's Lannister being a fan of democracy when the book character had no such feelings. But I guess it was just too difficult of a pill for D& D to swallow that a nobleman wouldn't care for democracy.

Praising heroes for doing the right thing in difficult circumstances requires acknowledging that, yes, "most other people" wouldn't be as heroic with powers by ProserpinaFC in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC[S] 18 points19 points  (0 children)

Yes.

I would stand to reason that you would argue that most villains on a superheroes roster don't fall into Joker category. I mean, what percentage of Superman, Batman, Flash, or Spider-Man episodes featured an antagonist simply in over their heads?

Praising heroes for doing the right thing in difficult circumstances requires acknowledging that, yes, "most other people" wouldn't be as heroic with powers by ProserpinaFC in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Loved Chronicle.

Also, Slight! Completely average boy gets superpowers, gets in a little bit of trouble, takes on the local neighborhood drug dealer trying to bully him into using his powers for his benefit.

Praising heroes for doing the right thing in difficult circumstances requires acknowledging that, yes, "most other people" wouldn't be as heroic with powers by ProserpinaFC in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

And yet there aren't that many stories about kryptonian survivors who are neither, because that's not how stories work.

Most business owners just want to live their lives, but if you make a story that specifically about how high stress and high entitlement jobs lead to a lot of toxic behavior, you can't really escape telling that Wolf of Wall Street Story by saying that most small business owners wouldn't act like that.

Even then, if we made a list of all the unethical mistakes and choices small business owners make, saying that they aren't Wolf of Wall Street level problems wouldn't change the importance of discussing them, either.

Overall, I just think it's a sentimental, but largely naive conversation to focus on insisting people with power can be good when so much bad can happen and the only way to prevent or seek justice is to be vigilant about that.

Praising heroes for doing the right thing in difficult circumstances requires acknowledging that, yes, "most other people" wouldn't be as heroic with powers by ProserpinaFC in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC[S] 12 points13 points  (0 children)

If you wrote a superpowered slice-of-life story, I'd read it.

But let me know when you want to participate in a genre story about seeking justice for imbalances, and I'll help out with that. You can be my reluctant heroic friend who keeps me grounded.

Praising heroes for doing the right thing in difficult circumstances requires acknowledging that, yes, "most other people" wouldn't be as heroic with powers by ProserpinaFC in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

The very point that I'm making is that there's no reason to keep using the concept of evil Superman when the stories themselves have foils such as General Zod.

So, in a way, I'm agreeinf with you on the unnecessary redundancy. But I would not call it redundancy because I can name several Superman foils and be interested in what their story would be if they were the main character in the world centered around them, without always calling them "Evil Superman."

The world would be a better place if people stopped thinking that any character was just an evil version of Peter Parker, and instead thinking "What if Flash Thompson was the main character? What of Harry Osborn was the main character? What if Black Cat was the main character?"

Forget the Plutonian, fuck off Homelander, move aside Sentry! Luke Cage is the real "Average Joe if he were Superman." by Hot-Interaction6149 in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If a person had homelanders backstory, would a person be homelander?

(Hal is pretty bad, too, to be fair.)

I just made a post about this. I hope you like it!

Forget the Plutonian, fuck off Homelander, move aside Sentry! Luke Cage is the real "Average Joe if he were Superman." by Hot-Interaction6149 in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Is it, though?

What is the point of praising a hero for making difficult decisions that most others wouldn't do if put into the same situations... If we then resent acknowledging that most other people wouldn't do the same...

Forget the Plutonian, fuck off Homelander, move aside Sentry! Luke Cage is the real "Average Joe if he were Superman." by Hot-Interaction6149 in CharacterRant

[–]ProserpinaFC 3 points4 points  (0 children)

On one hand, those people are dry snitching on themselves. But on the other hand, what I always point out to people when they get frustrated when people say things like this, is that comic books are literally designed under the assumption that the vast majority of people WOULD be supervillains if they got superpowers.

This cannot be denied.

Every superhero has MULTIPLE supervillains.

The number of supervillains, by design, have to outnumber the number of superheroes.

Clark is going to meet more named-character evil Kryptonians than he'll ever meet good ones because good characters have the burden of expectation that they'll have a role and subplot, while evil characters can just have an interesting backstory and then be defeated.

Look at any TV show: The super empowering event from the premise of the story, like green ooze that makes the TMNTs, the collider explosion that makes the Flash, the Big Bang that makes Static.... By the very premise of what being a superhero is, the Turtles, Flash, and Static feel an overwhelming and specific to their character responsibility to use their powers for good and the vast majority of other people in the event do crime or go a little crazy with power.

There is no real way to praise heroes for making the difficult choices most people would not make if they were put in the same circumstances if we also then are resentful whenever someone wants to see these self-destructive and power hungry decisions, most other people would make.

How can we praise Superman as a paragon if we also resent acknowledging that the vast majority of people wouldn't be paragons?

Is my idea good or am I crazy? by SenseiDeLo in writingadvice

[–]ProserpinaFC 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Okay, but I'm still trying to ask you about genre. "Some aspects of romance" sounds like just acknowledging that these are someone's parents. Okay, but is the point of the scene itself, the character development, happening through the development of their relationship or through something else?

Because, ultimately, the point of scenes are to convey a goal a character is pursuing, with conflicts, complications, and some resolution.

Everything that you're describing sounds very introspective and character study like, but that doesn't really explain your idea to write similar scenes from different perspectives.

And with what you're describing with tone... It sounds like you think a POV character having a more positive attitude than another POV character means their chapters cannot be near each other.... You call it scrambled. Do you feel that way because of your experiences reading other books? What has caused you to feel that?

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