With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Fourteen)

[PepeTheFrog]

What the fuck crawled up Clark's ass? He's not listening or thinking, just reacting.

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Imagine if you found out that Robin was actually kidnapped by Batman instead of adopted. Nothing else. Just that information. How would that change your perspective on Batman and Robin's relationship?
Clark has no idea about anything else to do with Sodam Yay other than the fact that he's an alien of a similar species to himself that's been seperated from his family. He's *now* finding out the other mitigating details.

 

[Ngamer11]

Imagine if you found out that Robin was actually kidnapped by Batman instead of adopted. Nothing else. Just that information. How would that change your perspective on Batman and Robin's relationship?
Clark has no idea about anything else to do with Sodam Yay other than the fact that he's an alien of a similar species to himself that's been seperated from his family. He's *now* finding out the other mitigating details.

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This self-righteousness is something I hope this incident will alleviate in the Justice League. It'll be necessary now more than ever since they're "not" taking over the world.

 

[Vaermina]

"Maybe she should ask her husband." This isn't-. This isn't helping. "Alright, look. I'll go and speak to Lantern Yat and Lantern Coutara and see if they're willing to speak to her. But if you're serious about this, you need to go to Daxam, and get an accurate idea what it's like. I recommend taking Martian Manhunter."

"To read their minds.

"Yes. Because if they're willing to talk to you, I don't believe for a moment that they're going to tell the truth." I stand, then head for the zeta tube. "Excuse me."

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I really want these people to just be completely reasonable.

Because it would be hilarious to see Orange Lantern enter one of "I can't be wrong" paranoia spirals because of this.

 

[boo600]

Paul just informed them that Sodom Yat has the ability to go home at any time, and that he hasn't. He just informed them that he wanted to escape, that his parents murdered a shipwrecked, friendly alien in front of him - that he doesn't want to be near them, and that unlike Robin, Yat isn't even doing combat. He's going to school, even.

And they don't care. He has clearly made his choice, and Paul has given them a light overview on why… but a few words from his mother, and they don't care.

Speaking as someone who still hasn't entirely escaped his abusive mother - despite being well into my twenties- I can honestly say I have never wanted to hurt these characters more. I would strongly appreciate it if they at least ended up punched in the face, ideally hard enough to break their upturned noses.

I apologize if that seems a bit bloodthirsty, but for context: my mother has done things like attack me in my sleep because her roomba woke her up (yes, really) when I was 14, or throw me out of the house at 16 (telling me I wasn't aloud to come back) only to immediately call the cops on me for 'running away,' leading to me getting a lecture from the police officers who dragged me to the place I wasn't even trying to leave on 'listening to my mother.' (I was in fact trying to figure out how to get anywhere I could get help getting my parents to give my driver's license/birth certificate/SS card/etcetera back. Or, you know, just shelter. It was cold.) I wasn't even being disobedient at the time; she was just throwing one of her literal tantrums.

As such, I hope you can understand my sheer loathing for madame Yat and anyone who looks at the title 'mother' as one which is innately more important than the way said mother treats her child, or the child's own wishes. People don't typically try to stay as far away as possible from their parents for a year because their parents made them eat vegetables - they do it because their parents hurt them, or enjoy making them feel powerless in order to revel in their own power and importance - and it's entirely possible for parents to do this while genuinely fighting schools and other bureaucracies to get them to treat their child well, because of their own perspective in regards to their reputation or duty or genuine belief that they're a good parent somehow, or because 'only they get to hurt their toys,' or any other various logics.

Guy's father was horrifyingly possible - but it's not the only type of abuse. Sometimes it's the mother, sometimes it's intermixed with genuine-seeming care, or perhaps even actual care - but it doesn't mean the 'child' shouldn't be listened to.

 

[Ngamer11]

I really want these people to just be completely reasonable.

Because it would be hilarious to see Orange Lantern enter one of "I can't be wrong" paranoia spirals because of this.

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The only way that'll happen is if Mr Zoat completely changes what Daxamites are like from both canon and how they were already portrayed in the story.

 

[Galler]

It has been a while, but I believe that Clark went to Daxam. IIRC, Paul mentioned the planet to him and said that he should stay away. Clark said that he would use the fortress to find the place. Then after some time Paul meets Clark again and he is injured. When asked what happened Clark says that he didn't realise just how much the Daxams didn't want to see him.

It could have been a renegade update.

 

[boo600]

No, that was Paragon. He also ignored Paul's warning regarding Karsta - whereas Renegade Superman met Karsta when she was finally in command of a Kryptonian resurgence, and got off with a telling-off.

 

[Mr Zoat]

To be fair to the League, this is the first they're hearing about it and they are giving him a chance to explain what happened before taking any action.

 

[BlackCoat13]

To be unfair to the League, they're listening to him so well you wonder why they bothered to talk to him anyways. Should have had Manhunter in the room with him, have Manhunter re-live the Daxom meeting from Paul's own perspective.

 

[boo600]

"Did you speak to his mother at all?"

"No. And neither has he for a year and a half."

I sit back in my seat.

"To be clear, under Maltus law Lantern Coutara's adoption is perfectly legal unless Lantern Yat expresses a preference to the contrary."

Superman clenches his right hand. "Earth-law's not quite that simple."

"I.. also didn't apply for a visa for them when I brought them to Earth. How selective are we-?"

He glares at me. "Child-kidnapping is not the same as ignoring immigration law for relief workers."

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Superman glances at the sheet, then turns his head back to me. "Have you told him that his mother's here?"

"Please tell me that you haven't let them come further into the system?" He looks mulish, and I slap the paper down on the table between us. "Kal-El, they're physically kryptonian-equivalent, without the kryptonite weakness, and they're highly xenophobic. One could level a city and kill most of its population before anyone could respond. How many are on the ship?"

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They are talking to him - and ignoring him. He's already made it perfectly clear that Lantern Yat does not want to see his mother. They don't care.

I'm trying not to project here - I've had bad experiences with going for help, including one extremely stupid one where I went to a woman who's 'basically a part of the family,' someone I loved since I was born... and who was part of the family because she was my mother's best friend since at least college, which I - being a stupid child - failed to put together. So I get that I'm basically a parahuman without the power, here - I'm biased as all hell.

But I really, really, really, really can't stand them and how they're reacting. It's not fucking kidnapping if he's compos mentis, if he has the ability to go home or contact home at any time, and he clearly is choosing not to, for multiple months on end. It's obvious, and they just don't care, because Mothers are inherently pure and wonderful and abuse from them doesn't count somehow, especially if it's their son they're abusing, because men are so tough and strong even when they're preteens so clearly the mother is the one who's been in danger since she gave birth to the child she actively wanted and arenrgdiufl msd ;fdivfzdnjes.

Basically, this particular case pushes all my buttons, but the quotes above hopefully show why I believe that they're being awful and legitimately so, even given my particular baggage.
Speaking more neutrally, Paul has proven willing to override civilizations he sees as 'evil,' such as, I don't know, Coutara's homeworld's misogynistic eye-ripping mainsteam cult (ie, dominant religion). And frankly, I don't believe the League are interested in filing paperwork with the Glorious Dictator Genoscythe-the-Eye-Raper. As such, given what he's just told them about Daxam, especially given Yat's father murdering a friendly shipwrecked survivor in front of him? Sodom Yat is a refugee from a planet-wide cult. There is clearly no kidnapping, and they should shut the fuck up, instead of whining about Earth-law somewhere that it isn't applicable... which includes Earth, given that it's currently a Justice League/OMAC protectorate.

 

[WereDragon]

To be fair to the League, this is the first they're hearing about it and they are giving him a chance to explain what happened before taking any action.

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It feels a lot more like they are making accusations and had already decided he was in the wrong before he even spoke.

 

[Darko]

intended to serious harm him?

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'seriously'

 

[Steelplaza]

Nothing incurs the wrath of readers more than the idea that a protagonist might have to defend his actions.

I don't find some tense words so unreasonable.

 

[Mr Zoat]

'seriously'

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Thank you, corrected.

 

[boo600]

Paul has had to defend his actions before - he's also been bopped with a newspaper/squirted with water by Artemis (No Evil!).

He's also been asked completely reasonable questions, like "Genocide?" or "Why did you overthrow that planet's government/religion?" and come up with perfectly reasonable answers based on 'they were all clones programmed to be atrocity-maximizers' while politely not mentioning the equivalent genocide of the Appelexians that the League performed for much the same reason, or 'because they ripped out all the women's eyes at puberty, once they were used to being able to see, without anesthetic.'

And he's had his desires proved 'wrong.' (See the JSI arc).

Paul is not a Sooper SPeshul Snowflaxe whose the readers will allow to come to no harm. He is also not a Mary Sue who is Always Right; he makes some incredibly stupid mistakes, and is becoming more dependent on the orange light and less on common sense.

And here, he has made a perfectly reasonable decision whereupon he empowered someone to leave somewhere that they were trapped, and the League is responding as if they caught him eating babies. Metaphorically, or they'd have attacked already, but the 'chance to talk' is undermined by their inability to let sound carry information towards the useless lumps of flesh they insist contain neurons.