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shihalyfie · 3 years ago

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The role of the American English dub in the “02 has inconsistent writing” sentiment

This post is made entirely in response to an incident the other day, in which I had the unfortunate scenario of reading someone’s accusation of the 02 writing staff for having a fight in the writing room to the point they couldn’t be consistent about the way the 02 kids felt about accepting Ken in the second half of the series. The fact I have to see these kinds of things in this day and age is really frustrating because, firstly, that there was a “writer dispute” over 02 is a completely baseless myth with no evidence (in fact, evidence actually implies the opposite), and secondly, the “inconsistency” over how the kids approached Ken is entirely dub-induced -- in Japanese, the gradual process in how each kid came to approach Ken was very consistently handled to the point you can analyze it in relation to each character, and in general 02 in Japanese is a very consistently written series especially when it comes to its characters, which is what you might expect for a series that actually is known to have a ridiculous amount of background information behind each of them (some of which still hasn’t even been publicly revealed yet).

If we’re just strictly talking personal preferences, I don’t think it’s a problem if the only version of 02 to you is the American English dub’s version of it, and if your feelings of how much you vibe with it will be based on that alone (whether you dislike 02 after those changes were applied, or whether you still like it despite or perhaps even because of those changes). However, I do think it’s a serious problem when combined with the “the American English dub didn’t change anything significant” myth, because this means that all of the discourse surrounding 02 in the Western fanbase is heavily influenced by this, and it’s a very frustrating experience if you’re working from the Japanese version (especially if you’re from a country with its own dub and have never even seen the American English one in the first place) but have to deal with people talking to you like it applies to everything. More significantly, I think it’s a problem if there’s a lack of awareness that these changes are a thing that happened to the point people are retroactively reflecting it back on the Japanese version (including expecting later content like Kizuna or the upcoming movie to be compliant to a version of 02 that was very different from what it was originally working from). In discussing localization changes in practically any other franchise, it’s very normal to point out that these changes are a thing that happened and understand what impact those changes had regardless of what version you follow (see: Ace Attorney), so it’s a bit frustrating that even bringing up “there were changes and we should talk about this so we know it happened” will get you pinned as a purist trying to throw the entire dub under the bus, or accused of being a killjoy.

With that, I’d like to point out a lot of common perceptions of 02 in particular that I find are primarily dub-exclusive but are rarely (if ever) identified as such, and why there’s often such a huge disparity with how people working with 02 in Japanese (or a dub based off of it) will often have a very different view of the series from those who only know the English dub. I don't think this necessarily means that everyone who dislikes 02 in English would necessarily love it in Japanese (although there are many cases of this happening!) nor that there aren't English dub-only people who were able to grasp the originally intended point in the end, but, nevertheless, this difference in perception does exist in practice, and it's an issue I'd really like to see addressed more often.

Daisuke

The reason I bring up Daisuke most often when it comes to discussing 02 American English dub changes is that he’s probably one of the major changes that’s most prominent, and the one that most significantly impacts the core behind 02 and the story it wanted to tell. After all, Daisuke is the story’s protagonist -- but every so often you hear a take that in fact Daisuke was just a decoy for Ken being the real protagonist because he’s the focus of 02′s narrative from a plotting perspective. The thing is, Daisuke is undoubtedly the character who best represents 02′s themes and way of life it advocates, and that is extremely apparent in Japanese -- but not so much in the American English dub.

If you ask those who follow the Japanese version for a quick description of Daisuke’s character, you’ll usually get something along the lines of “a positive, forward-thinking pure-hearted puppy who loves and emotionally supports everyone”. This should probably be the first thing that comes to mind when it comes to Daisuke -- but almost every aspect of this phrase is blurred or much harder to glean out of the American English dub because of the sheer number of lines they give him that starkly contradict this portrayal.

This is to the point where it genuinely weirds me out how anyone could watch 02 with said dub and in Japanese and still claim that nothing substantial was changed, because of the sheer and blatant degree Daisuke’s lines were changed -- and this is especially in the case of 02 episode 8, one of the most important early-series episodes in terms of setting up things that’ll become relevant later (mainly, the relationship between Daisuke and Ken, as a precursor and contrast to their eventual relationship as Jogress partners). It’s also one of the earliest episodes in which you hear Daisuke say some fairly insightful things -- that he doesn’t care about winning or losing as much as he treasures the opportunity to even play against someone the entire country admires, and just enjoying things for what they are. So when you get to the second half of the episode, it just shatters him that someone so admirable is using his talents for evil (much like the feeling of all of us finding out that people we admire are actually terrible people).

...But in the American English dub, nearly every single line Davis has in the first half of this episode is him arrogantly talking himself up (complete with wanting to impress the chicks). If we’re talking the Japanese version of Daisuke, “arrogance” and “Daisuke” mix like oil and water; it’s in fact significant that Daisuke has virtually no self-awareness and that a lot of his abrasiveness is simply out of insecurity and lack of confidence in himself. (It is an extremely common doujinshi topic to center around Daisuke having zero awareness of his own amazingness and ability to be insightful.) And while this is the episode where the changes are arguably the most stark, imagine taking these changes and applying them to Daisuke’s lines for an entire series.

In the Japanese version, it was quite apparent after a fashion that while Daisuke seemed abrasive and argumentative at first, a lot of it was just because he has very strong emotional reactions to everything and tends to overreact (his official website profile even points out how a lot of the disaster surrounding him comes from just having overly extreme emotions), but at heart he’s a nice kid who likes other people, is happy to appreciate others, and actually worries a lot about their welfare. In Japanese, Daisuke only ever lashes out defensively, but never goes out of his way to demean others -- and in fact, here are a list of very common observations about him for those working from the Japanese version:

He admires his seniors (especially Taichi, but really, his seniors in general) and is basically a deferential, well-behaved puppy around seniors and adults;

In the vast majority of cases he gets argumentative over something, it is actually a legitimate worry or concern, he just happens to get really emotional over it (much like Yamato);

He arguably adores his friends more than he likes himself.

All of these things are things where nearly every single line of dialogue was changed in the American English dub to reflect a very different disposition that was arguably more arrogant and self-centered. In addition, his apparent hostility towards Takeru (T.K.) and possessiveness over Hikari (Kari) was severely up-played to the point it practically dominates his character, but in Japanese a lot of it was really just flailing around at the fact that neither Takeru nor Hikari were being straightforward about the exact nature of their relationship, and, other than momentarily freaking out if he felt he was being third wheeled, he was quite courteous to both Takeru and Hikari even during the early episodes and respected their boundaries. (It’s actually very commonly felt among fans of Daisuke in Japanese that he’s extremely courteous and respectful to girls, but it’s very unlikely you’ll get this impression with Davis due to the very possessive way he treats Kari; the idea you’re supposed to get with the Japanese version was that he was digging himself into a hole flailing around and losing brain cells in Hikari’s presence, so you felt bad for him doing this to himself regardless of whether or not you actually supported the ship.)

In general, most of Davis’s characterization in the dub seems to be a significant exaggeration of his behavior in 02 episodes 4 and 7 -- episodes when Daisuke was arguably at his “worst”, not the Daisuke as we knew him for the rest of the series (and even then, he wasn’t nearly as rude as the dub would make him). It’s very common for those knowing only the American English dub to express grievances about Davis for being a conceited jerk -- which was something that could not even remotely apply to Daisuke in any way, really. In fact, Daisuke is much more emotionally sensitive and considerate, and far better at apologizing and taking responsibility for stepping on others’ toes, than Taichi is, but such a thing might sound like a heathen statement to someone only working from the dub.

Even when the American English dub didn’t technically change the core content of the lines, though, the delivery still makes a big deal -- because the thing is, Daisuke’s the way he is and able to be so positive because he’s pure-hearted and resilient, not because he’s too stupid to understand what’s going on or flippant. This is also a big reason a lot of people working from the Japanese version tend to take issue with so many of the 02 lines at key moments getting turned into jokes or made to have significantly less gravity; it’s not that they want to be some kind of killjoy about funny jokes (and in fact I think most people don’t have problems with added jokes during scenes that actually merit humor), but a lot of these were really important lines that showed off the depth of Daisuke’s character, because him being deeply emotional meant he was emotional in every direction. Lines that were very serious in Japanese would often have an “and also, you suck” atmosphere that made Davis come off as him pushing on forward because he’s aggressive or belligerent, but in the Japanese version it was very apparent that Daisuke was emotionally touched by everything he was encountering -- hence why his scene of crying over Wallace’s plight in Hurricane Touchdown was such a big deal (because even after having bickered with Wallace earlier, he cared enough about others’ problems to genuinely break down over it), or why he was audibly on the verge of tears when trying to talk Ken out of a borderline suicidal plan in 02 episode 26.

This is why Daisuke is such an important key to 02′s storytelling and major themes, especially those in regards to moving forward with positivity even in the midst of trauma or suffering. Daisuke doesn’t move forward because he’s too stupid to get it; rather, he empathizes deeply with others, understands their problems, and, through his natural pure-heartedness, is capable of coming up with some surprisingly pragmatic solutions to what they need. He does feel the pain of everything, and cries or is sent on the verge of crying about it, but he has the priority of living life to its fullest in spite of that because he knows that’s the only way you can keep going with your life. It’s a very strong principle that he genuinely believes in!

Hence, this is why Daisuke is so intrinsically tied to the themes in 02: the story itself is about moving forward, so of course he’s the one at the core of that narrative, and his positivity drives everyone. Through him, the message of 02 as a whole is very clearly spoken by the time we get to the end. But when it’s somewhat more in doubt whether he’s really as kind and pure-hearted as he is, and whether it’s harder to tell whether he actually got through everything he did out of resilience or whether he’s just too dumb to understand or care about the full depth of the problem, his appeal as a character and the reason for 02′s narrative as a whole falls through a lot more, or at least is much harder to discern. For many who only know Davis from the American English dub, the first thing you’ll hear usually has to do with his more negative traits like him being stupid and aggressive, or being obsessive over Kari -- things that really weren’t supposed to be the point.

As a side note, I've noticed that sometimes people from the American English dub tend to cite things that "don't seem to track" about Daisuke -- that it's strange that someone so rude would also somehow be the person so open-minded about Ken in the second half of 02, or that his portrayals in the drama CDs (mainly Spring 2003 and The Door to Summer), Diablomon Strikes Back, and Kizuna seem to have him be noticeably less rude in general. Yeah, so, about that -- that’s all consistent in Japanese; the two latter movies were dubbed much later than the original 02 dub, and are much closer to the original script. That senior-adoring puppy dripping with sheer happiness is basically what Daisuke’s always been like since the very beginning of 02 -- so of course those materials are all consistent with that.

“Contradictory characterization”

The thing about 02′s characterization style is that it doesn’t really use the focus episode format Adventure does, and its plot is in general much more complicated than Adventure’s (which, to be a bit blunt about it, kinda doesn’t really have a plot except “defeat enemy, then defeat bigger enemy”). This means that a lot of 02′s characterization will not be handed to you on a plate, and their shifts and growths are rarely, if ever, stated bluntly in outright words.

In fact, Adventure in Japanese had a similar writing style to 02, and Adventure’s American English dub often took quite a lot of liberties with lines that would change their respective characters’ dispositions (characters like Koushirou and Mimi are much less like their American English dub counterparts than the fanbase would often like you to think). The thing is, however, that their “character arcs” mostly had to stay the same regardless of how many lines the dub changed, because they were shown front and center in the animation, so the rough structure still held. It wasn’t a perfect adherence since you still get arguments over characterization to a certain degree because of the changed nuances, but for the most part you had about the same gist.

This isn’t the case in 02; all of the character arcs are more subtly carried out through interactions and lines, partially as a byproduct of the fact that the series is more about relationships than it is about the individual. This means that, yes, indeed, every single nuance in every line contributes meaningfully to each character, which means that being a bit too reckless about changing those lines would often have a significant impact on each character arc. Note how the character arc nobody really disputes between the original Japanese version and the American English dub is Ken, because his was prominent and relevant to the plot -- much like with the Adventure character arcs, even significant changes could only derail it so much -- but the constant changes applied to the other characters across effectively the entire series make it much more difficult to weed out a consistent thread for each character, because often their lines and dispositions won’t match the storyline they eventually ended up going into. This leads to accusations like “the writers didn’t know what to do with their characters” or “they never got any character development” (because it’s so inconsistent that it’s too difficult to figure out what the progression is), which really aren’t true at all.

The example I mentioned above pertained to the accusation of 02′s writing for handling the team’s attitude towards Ken inconsistently, but the thing is that it was very consistent in Japanese: Daisuke and Miyako were the pure-hearted, open-minded ones who accepted him easily without much trouble, Hikari took some convincing, and Takeru and Iori were initially cold but eventually came around. (Of course, that Daisuke was the first one to turn around and most active in reaching out to Ken is the most prominent.) The problem is that a lot of the American English dub lines just flip-flop in practically every direction. 02 episode 25 has Takeru express a sentiment that he acknowledges Ken has changed but that he doesn’t understand what he’s thinking (which ties into a later statement from him in 02 episode 27 accusing Ken of doing this all for his own self-satisfaction) -- the point is that he acknowledges the change but still won’t be open towards trusting him -- but the dub barrels completely into changing this line into being about him completely being open-minded towards Ken changing and that things will be different now, completely contradicting what we later learn about Daisuke being the one who’s unusually open-minded while Takeru’s still a bit on the cold and elusive side. Or when Miyako makes it clear at the end of 02 episode 25 that she’s now open-minded towards Ken but wants to give him his space and let him join on his own terms, hence why one episode later she tries to mostly stay out of the dispute between Daisuke and the others, whereas the dub makes Yolei suddenly decide she’s absolutely against the idea of Ken joining again even though she’d just clearly changed her stance one episode prior.

Again, the way each kid approached Ken was actually supposed to reflect on themselves; Hikari never said outright in words that she was open to Ken now, but you can tell via her actions of starting to quietly pass him more emails and invite him to join in during episodes 32 and 34 (which directly follow her experiences with Ken and Miyako in 02 episode 31 and understanding Ken’s position). Because Hikari is the kind of person who doesn’t like being argumentative or raising a fuss, so this is her way of extending goodwill! They’re all subtle gestures and little things that slowly built up over the course of the series to mean something -- but adapting those things too loosely obscures a lot of those very important subplots.

The biggest problem this results in is that in the American English dub, the characters’ personalities as built up over the course of the first half end up contradicting their role in the second half -- most prominently with Davis (who’s built up as arrogant and self-centered only for the second half to revolve specifically about how pure-hearted and kind Daisuke is), but also with the others as well. Many of the little nuances for each character ended up being very important later, especially in terms of the Jogress arcs.

It’s so easy to just pass off Kari and T.K. having a ton more lines and casual jokes than Hikari and Takeru ever did as just “the usual dub adding a lot of lines”, but the problem is that Hikari and Takeru’s failure to be straightforward about their feelings is literally a plot point that ends up becoming extremely significant during the Jogress episodes and the later group dynamic (that Hikari refuses to speak honestly about her own feelings or pain, requiring Miyako to go out of her way to actively reach out to her, and that Takeru is elusive and difficult to read the intentions of, which is why Daisuke was having such a hard time with him at first and why Iori takes a whole three episodes to understand him so that they can Jogress). In the case of Miyako and Iori, this arguably could even extend to voice direction; Miyako is excessively emotional and high-strung, doting on everyone, and, most importantly, extremely harsh on herself for her own perceived failures, but those lines about her self-consciousness and genuine affection for others were often taken out or heavily altered to imply something different (which is part of the reason the Western fanbase tends to perpetuate an idea that she shouldn’t have the Digimetnal of Love, even though “affection” is practically in her blood), and Iori’s not supposed to sound like he isn’t feeling any strong emotions but rather that he’s constantly holding himself back because he’s trying to be well-behaved and proper, and -- this is important -- often really failing at it because he starts hitting emotional breaking point. (There is a very delicate balance between Iori’s “childishness” and his polite maturity that he tries to put up a front of; that Iori is still a “precocious young child” isn’t reflected nearly as well in the dub, especially since they make him often sound genuinely condescending instead of acting within the range of a very stubborn, narrow-minded child.)

The other byproduct of this is that, in a series where the literal theme of the story is “relationships”, the American English dub makes it much easier to come off with a sentiment that these kids don’t like each other much at all. In Japanese, this shouldn’t even be up for dispute; the kids cultivated such a tight and mutually adoring relationship that they practically became inseparable (there’s a reason this is even a subtle plot point in Kizuna, because it contrasts their seniors’ dynamic that much). That the 02 group gets along so well and is so ridiculously tight is a standout even among the entire franchise (look at Japanese 02 official art and fanart and you’ll notice there is a much higher rate of everyone physically huddling together or being physically intimate in general), because this was such an important theme in the series, and these kids were characterized with some very deep-seated issues that required the others’ support to help them through. Moreover, the real-life focus 02 had made it clear that these kids loved each other's presence even outside Digimon incidents -- they weren’t working together out of obligation, they were friends even on a social level -- and also that their seniors had genuine affection and support for them even outside necessity as well, because they were very proud of their hardworking, reliable juniors.

But when the American English dub replaces so many lines that were originally the characters doting on each other with uncalled-for insults (sometimes way beyond the level of “I get to insult you because you’re my friend”), this just doesn’t come off as well. One really major example of this is regarding a subplot near the end of 02, where, as Daisuke was starting to show off his potential for getting more and more insightful and making keen observations about his friends, everyone was starting to get progressively more taken aback at how completely on-the-nose he was getting (basically, in certain ways, Daisuke was turning out to be the smartest person in the area). But as far as the dub is concerned, the kids still don’t seem to respect Davis much at all even to the end of the series, and one prominent line where Taichi was taken aback at how insightful Daisuke was getting (from 02 episode 43) is replaced with Tai musing that he wishes Davis would shut up.

Since 02 is so much about relationships, the dynamic within the group is arguably just as important as the individual characters, but takes on how a given two characters from the 02 group (or between the 02 group and one of their seniors) are often starkly different between English and Japanese fanwork. And, in certain ways, the 02 characters overall; some base details like Miyako’s skills in computers and her penchant for being aggressive or liking cute people might remain, but those aspects end up treated like Davis’s crush on Kari: like they’re the sole guiding focus of their characters, even though that wasn’t actually supposed to be the originating point.

“Plot holes”

02′s plot is definitely convoluted no matter how you look at it, and regardless of which language you’re watching it in, it’s definitely true that its second half has a ton of subplots that shuffle in back and forth. The problem is that, in Japanese, these aren’t contradictory or unexplained plot points! If you want to say that the plot is “disorganized”, or that “some explanations feel forced or unsatisfactory”, those are fair, but for the most part, the explanations and plot events were not contradictory or unexplained in the Japanese version. Yet so many people tend to accuse of 02 of “plot holes” to the point where it makes me question what on earth they even mean by “plot holes” to begin with. Regardless of whether the explanation is satisfactory, the series did acknowledge that the audience deserved an explanation that made sense!

Indeed, a lot of this is dub-induced, and in fact some of this is due to a double standard; Adventure also had a lot of these changes that led to contradictory plot points (erroneously saying Mimi has a younger brother, accidentally implying that Matt’s father mysteriously knew about Digimon beforehand), it’s just that somehow Adventure gets to be excused for this but 02 doesn’t. Granted, a lot of this also probably had to do with 02′s more complicated plot, meaning that there was a lot more to keep track of and a lot more ways the dub seems to have made too many assumptions...

The infamous 02 episode 13 is often talked about in regards to its “cliffhanger” that it...never actually had in Japanese, because the sea creatures practically said “we’ll leave you alone then” and left, but the dub seemed to take their vague ominous answer as meaning that it now needed to start outright hinting that Dagomon would come back for Hikari, when...there was no evidence of that in the original. Or in 02 episode 21, when you have Wormmon talking about his past with Ken, the dub inserts a lot of words about them having happy times conquering the world together, but in Japanese there wasn’t anything of that sort and it was actually (in retrospect) obvious foreshadowing of the ill-fated “adventures” he and Wormmon went on beforehand, when Ken was a much better person, only for him to eventually get hit by the Dark Seed.

It’s not like the second half of 02 had a particularly smooth plot structure to begin with, but when lines are being changed all over the place to be contradictory, character arcs don’t exactly track, and extraneous information that doesn’t necessarily contradict the plot but goes against the actual series theme and message is placed in, it gets much harder to discern what 02′s intended theme and message was and what role each plot event plays in each character’s story, which is why it becomes that much easier to dismiss 02 as just “some kind of plot clusterfuck” instead of recognizing that there was some kind of meaning or narrative purpose to every aspect of it. (Even when something in its second half didn’t ostensibly seem to contribute something from a plot perspective, there was often a more significant tie to the overall theme or to the progression of the character arcs.)

Of course, the person who's willing to sit down and be patient with it may be more likely to discern the intended meaning the same way they would from the Japanese version, but it takes many more steps to get to that point, and even then, it’s possible to think of it as “that’s what the writers were going for, even if they ultimately didn’t do it right” rather than the fact it was significantly clearer in Japanese and got a bit more confused in the localization process. These things were still subtle in the Japanese version too, and 02 is a controversial series on both sides of the pond because you do really have to be patient to be able to get this out of it (it usually takes a second or third watch and an open mind for a lot of this to come out). But the difference is that in Japanese, a lot of this is there and consistent to the point you can sit down and pick apart the nuances of nearly every single line, and those who are patient enough to give it a chance are often on the same page and extracted that meaning without problem. With the American English dub alone, you have to go through several layers of contradictory changes in the lines that make it much easier to be unsure about whether that was actually the intent or not, which leads to much higher rates of people arguing about the characters or plot -- and on top of that, the constant mantra of “this dub didn’t change that much” means pressure on even those who aren’t working with the dub to “admit” to problems in 02 that are actually dub-specific (for instance, the high rate of 02 fans who eventually confess that they never actually agreed with the “02 didn’t have any character development” stigma, but were pressured into questioning themselves and “admitting” it because of how overwhelming that sentiment was in the Western fanbase).

So, in the end, the point goes back to this: I think the failure to acknowledge that the American English dub’s changes were as significant as they were has led to a lot of confusion, unnecessary arguments, and possibly 02 getting a much worse critical evaluation over here than it really deserves due to it shaping so much discourse here but without the important context of it being a localization change. Again, I don't want to advocate for throwing the entire dub under the bus because of how difficult of a process localization is (and especially for an anime dub from 2000), nor do I want to make anyone who works primarily from that dub feel bad, but I’m genuinely frustrated at the absolute refusal to acknowledge that the changes might have had a substantial impact, and that two people may be talking about two very different things. And, again, I think this is also important when it comes to discussing the post-02 material like Kizuna and especially the upcoming movie, where their writing will be very likely to be dependent on things that the dub changes had nothing to do with -- I’m really, really scared of hearing potential accusations of the 02 cast in the new movie being out of character in a situation where their characters are actually completely compliant with the original series -- so I really hope that this can at least be an issue that’s better discussed and with greater awareness going forward.

#digimon #digimon adventure 02 #shihameta #dubbing discourse

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zaelous · 3 years ago

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The noble and most ancient House of Black was both a family and a cult. A cult is a social group that is defined by its unusual religious, spiritual, or philosophical beliefs, or by its common interest in a particular personality, object, or goal. In the case of House of Black, this philosophy and its subsequent goals were a form of magical eugenics focused on the supremacy of so-called “pure blood.” Establishing these basic principles is important at the outset in order to demonstrate how these beliefs and the House of Black’s implementation of them are what make them not just a family of extreme beliefs but a cult whose practices affected Bellatrix’s sense of identity, self esteem, and motivations, effectively forming her personhood.

I. PRINCIPLES BY DEFINITION

Eugenics is a set of beliefs and practices that aim to improve the genetic quality of a human population, historically by excluding people and groups judged to be inferior or promoting those judged to be superior. Positive eugenics is aimed at encouraging reproduction among the genetically advantaged; for example, the reproduction of the intelligent, the healthy, and the successful. Negative eugenics aims to eliminate, through sterilization or segregation, those deemed physically, mentally, or morally undesirable.

Pure-blood supremacists believe that only pure-bloods were real witches and wizards, and were often inclined to consider themselves as the elite of the Magical world; a place in which they believed that Muggle-borns did not belong. More militant subscribers of this philosophy even consider themselves to be akin to royalty. Elitist pure-bloods even believed that it was a sign of weak magic to enjoy non-magical company. Those who are pure-blooded but do not ascribe to supremacist ideologies are considered to be blood traitors and are shunned.

Shunning can be broken down into behaviours and practices that seek to accomplish either or both of two primary goals:

To modify the behaviour of a member. This approach seeks to influence, encourage, or coerce normative behaviours from members, and may seek to dissuade, provide disincentives for, or to compel avoidance of certain behaviours. Shunning may include disassociating from a member by other members of the community who are in good standing. It may include more antagonistic psychological behaviours. This approach may be seen as either corrective or punitive (or both) by the group membership or leadership, and may also be intended as a deterrent.

To remove or limit the influence of a member (or former member) over other members in a community. This approach may seek to isolate, to discredit, or otherwise dis-empower such a member, often in the context of actions or positions advocated by that member. For groups with defined membership criteria, especially based on key behaviours or ideological precepts, this approach may be seen as limiting damage to the community or its leadership.

Concerted efforts at influence and control lie at the core of cultic groups, programs, and relationships. Many members, former members, and supporters of cults are not fully aware of the extent to which members may be manipulated, exploited, or even abused. While there is really no standardized diagnostic tool with which one can definitively say whether an organization qualifies as a cult, some social-structural, social-psychological, and interpersonal behavioral patterns can help to assess a particular group or relationship, in this instance the House of Black.

II. PATTERNS OF CONTROL & DIVISION

The group displays an excessively zealous and unquestioning commitment to its leader, and (whether he is alive or dead) regards his belief system, ideology, and practices as the Truth, as law. This is a trait more difficult to illustrate than others, since there is no one individual leader of House Black; however, it is the root of the House Black philosophy that their ideologies and beliefs are passed down generationally, presumably from medieval times (given their family tapestry). We do see a lengthy history of the family’s current patriarch (whoever it is at any given time) enforcing these ideologies on other family members by excommunicating anyone whom they deem to have fallen out of line with the House of Black doctrine. The fact that excommunication from the family is even a thing that exists and that it furthermore is seen as the ultimate form of punishment emphasizes two things:

Questioning, doubt, and dissent are discouraged or even punished. There is no room in the House of Black to politely disagree or hold any sort of discourse on ideals. Even at the tender young age of sixteen, Sirius was summarily blasted off of the family tapestry and considered a traitor by the Black family for expressing his malcontent and running away to the Potters, a blood traitor family. Any member of House Black is obliged to conform to their ideologies or be expelled, which is seen as the worst possible outcome.

The most loyal members (the “true believers”) feel there can be no life outside the context of the group. They believe there is no other way to be, and often fear reprisals to themselves or others if they leave—or even consider leaving—the group. In a normative, healthy family situation, being formally dismissed from the group usually only occurs under dire circumstances and often even then doesn’t fully occur at all. The implementation of characters such as Sirius and Andromeda prove early on that the family’s dogmatic beliefs are non-negotiable and that deviation has consequences.

The leadership induces feelings of shame and/or guilt in order to influence and control members. Often this is done through peer pressure and subtle forms of persuasion. This might be considered to be a more headcanon-y than explanatory point, given I don’t readily have any examples of shame or guilt being utilized directly, but given that these other points exist and are true within the narrative, it would be impossible for those things to have occurred without the use of shame and guilt to manipulate family members, even in occasions when it isn’t intended to deliberately. The peer pressure aspect of control is an especially pointed aspect of the situation, given that they are a family, having one’s entire family ascribe to certain beliefs and practices makes it a given.

The leadership dictates, sometimes in great detail, how members should think, act, and feel (e.g., members must get permission to date, change jobs, or marry—or leaders prescribe what to wear, where to live, whether to have children, how to discipline children, and so forth). This is a point easily illustrated by again referring to the tapestry blasting incident(s), as it was up to the Black patriarch what should be done about betrayals, and he even further punished those who continued to support Sirius in violation of his ruling. However, it’s also common for House Black to arrange marriages between family members to those families whose ideologies align with their own, and if a suitable match cannot be found, to keep the blood pure by arranging marriages within the family itself. These marital practices tie in with other notable behaviors (elitism, polarization, isolation), but most importantly, they illustrate an aspect of positive eugenics, which is the practice of selective breeding.

III. GENDER ROLES

The whole point of this excessively lengthy essay is to explain how and why selective breeding is canon and thereby explain my headcanons for Bellatrix’s relationship to her beliefs and her gender and why the two are inherently linked. The entire concept of supremacy and eugenics relies on the continuation of the genetic precepts that the supremacists view to be superior-- that is, there is an inherent obligation within these beliefs to carry on the pureblooded genes and to provide the future generation of supremacists. The brunt of this endeavor obviously falls upon women, as they bear children, but given the patrilineal and patriarchal nature of the family structure (and that of English culture in the 1950s), the implication is that rather than wanting women who can bear these children, the desire is for male heirs to carry on the family name and the family bloodline, which is their most sacred duty.

Having been born a woman in the House of Black was to have been born with a form of original sin in that Bellatrix had already failed to be a male heir. Her only recompense for this initial transgression is to go on to provide male heirs, especially given that her mother died trying (and failing) to do so. While there is very little personal information available about Cygnus Black, we do know that his wife provided him with three daughters rather than a son, and died giving birth to Narcissa and left him to raise these daughters alone. Without a doubt, Cygnus would have viewed his failure to provide a male heir as a shortcoming, and given that his wife was dead, there was no way for him to vent his resentment on her. This is where we cross over into headcanon territory because I can’t prove anything about who Cygnus Black was as a person from the original text; however, it stands to reason giving the existing evidence and narrative structure (and how his daughters each turned out) that he was not a well man and that subsequently Bellatrix’s childhood was not a healthy or happy one as a result of that.

As the oldest child, Bella had little in the way of protection from her father’s dictatorship, although she did her best to shield her sisters from it once she had sisters. She always took the brunt of her father’s expectations, and his wrath should those expectations fail to be met. This is why, of all the Black sisters, Bellatrix held her supremacist values and mission the closest to her heart, and why I believe she and Narcissa held such a close relationship despite the onset of Bellatrix’s very obvious descent into madness. I also believe this is the key difference between Bellatrix and Sirius: although they both came from House Black, they grew up to be polar opposites. I think it was Rowling’s intention here to illustrate that no matter where you come from, you choose your own beliefs and destiny and you can choose to be good rather than evil or some shit, but I don’t think it’s necessarily as clear as simply choosing a different set of beliefs. I think that Sirius and Bellatrix were raised in very different conditions that instilled the same beliefs differently, and therefore had a different effect. Then one might point out Andromeda, but there’s a difference there, too-- not only did she have Bella to provide a barrier between her and their father that Bellatrix did not have, but she also experienced love outside of the family, which is a whole other set of variables I won’t begin to get into. Suffice to say that falling in love is an external catalyst which can’t be accounted for, and it certainly didn’t happen to Bellatrix.

As an adult, Bellatrix would have had a clear duty to take a pureblooded husband and provide him with male heirs. I do have a whole headcanon (which frankly deserves its own post but I digress) that she was first engaged to her Hogwarts sweetheart, but that he died early in the first war before they could be married, and as a result, her father arranged her marriage to Rodolphus Lestrange instead. This was not just to fulfill the whole get-married-have-babies mandate, but also because Bellatrix went mad with grief after her fiancé's death, and it’s really her first tangible, visible detachment from emotional stability. Her father’s solution to simply replace her fiancé might have been fine, had the couple not experienced infertility issues and been unable to produce children.

Infertility is not so surprising when one takes into account the rampant inbreeding in both the Black and the Lestrange families. Generations of intermarriage in the name of blood purity is guaranteed to give a myriad of health issues, certainly not all of which might be cured through magical means. However, an inability to fulfill her duties as they relate to Bellatrix’s personhood would be, to her, an absolute and unmitigated failure on her part. Fertility issues are already an enormous strain without the added pressures of a bloodline to preserve, but especially given that Andromeda essentially defected from the cause, the responsibility lies solely with Bellatrix and Narcissa, and as the older daughter, the responsibility is once again heavily on Bella. Her inability to conceive disallows her from adhering to her most sacred principles, which Bellatrix views as a failure on her part and results in a definitive rift in her self esteem and identity that she could not repair. She is desperate to be good and pure by the standards in which she was raised, and to fulfill what she views as her destiny, but she is unable to, and this destroys her.

IV. SYNTHESIS & RELEVANCE

Having been raised into these conditions, Bellatrix was conditioned into holding House Black and its doctrine at the forefront of her being. Because she held these beliefs so firmly and from such a young age, being a pure blooded witch is a part of Bellatrix’s identity and her self esteem. This is why any affront to these beliefs upsets her so much; it is a personal betrayal not just of these ideals but also of her wholly as a person. What made her turn on family members who had been burned off of the Black family tapestry was how personally she took their choice to leave. It was a personal betrayal, it was a publicly humiliating snub by someone who ought to have been on her side. Who did she have to rely on but family? The word family carries with it an expectation that they would die for the name Black and subsequently anyone who bore that name. Betraying the family was the same as a personal betrayal to Bellatrix, and was essentially spitting on everything Bella believed to be the most sacred and important obligations they held.

These circumstances create the perfect candidate for an offshoot of the pureblood supremacy cult, the Death Eaters. In the context of the House of Black, Lord Voldemort would have been the obvious escalation and clear apotheosis of pureblood supremacist ideals. Since Bellatrix had already been raised in an environment where the ends justifies the means and violence was an acceptable and omnipresent tool (she had ancestors who literally tried to make muggle hunting a legal sport so it’s not a stretch to think that House Black implemented casual violence elsewhere), she was an ideal fit for an extension of that ideology that placed more emphasis on negative eugenics and moving into the extermination of those deemed unworthy of their society.

V. AZKABAN

Following the conclusion of the First Wizarding War in 1981, Bellatrix was incarcerated at Azkaban at the age of 30, when she still had time to conceive a child. Her fanatical religious devotion for her cause convinced her that she would not be in prison for very long, but as she passed the decade mark, it would have been very clear to Bellatrix that if she were having fertility issues in her twenties, having aged past forty would make it very nearly impossible to get pregnant once the dark lord finally came to rescue them. Perhaps her belief in his infinite power led her to believe that Voldemort could magically fix whatever was the impediment to conception, or perhaps, having long given up on conceiving a child, Bellatrix viewed this failure as a reason to prove herself, a reason that she had to be the most dedicated, the most accomplished of his followers-- because she had failed in all other aspects and this was all she felt she had left to contribute to the pureblooded cause.

Either way, her spent youth would have clearly marked her failure in what she viewed as perhaps the most important endeavor in life, and one might suggest that her regression to a child-like state of mind following her traumatic incarceration in Azkaban could be an unconscious response to her desire to return to her youth in order to fulfill this expectation of her; or a desire to return to a time when she was not a failure but instead could still be of value to the ideologies in which she was raised and through which she viewed her purpose in life.

One could also surmise that Bellatrix’s recklessness in battle and her willingness (and possibly eagerness) to die for the cause of her pureblooded messiah might be due to this failure and the hope that at least if she died before the onset of menopause, it could be said that she was murdered before she could fulfill her duty, rather than being accused of having failed at it altogether. It’s also worth mentioning that her father had died while she was in Azkaban, and with his death, she lost any opportunity to finally earn his love and approval.

#meta ❝𝚆𝚁𝙰𝙿 𝙸𝚃 𝚄𝙿 𝙴𝙻𝚃𝙾𝙽 𝙹𝙾𝙷𝙽❞#this is SO LONG #but it's SO IMPORTANT #this post includes all of my most relevant hcs for bella #and my interpretation of so much of her canon #it took me over 4hrs to write #and I know I promised it like 2wks ago #but here it is finally

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silenthillmutual · 4 years ago

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[ID: Anonymous said: this isnt like, a demand or request, just an expression of interest - you mentioned in your daniil-is-autistic post that you also think artemy is neurodivergent, and i would really enjoy seeing a similar post on that topic. thank you, have a nice day.]

(anon is referring to this post!)

i do have some thoughts that i would like to share about that topic! however comma, it probably will not be as in-depth as my post about daniil, as i am myself autistic and have had a couple years since being diagnosed to ruminate on places where that has affected my life, and so it’s easier to write about coming from a place of personal experience. i can do the same with depression, for the same reason.

i have a couple of ideas about what artemy could have:

adhd

ptsd

ocd

i won’t really be going into ptsd or ocd on this post because i feel like it’s more difficult to point the ptsd out (artemy doesn’t talk much about or flashback at all to being on the front) and because i think ocd should have its own post. it is severely misunderstood, even by other neurodivergent people. plus i think all four of the healers have it (or aspects of it), and this post is about artemy.

i feel like… something about the dsmv diagnostic criteria for adhd feels condescending to me, like it feels the way it’s worded places a lot of the blame on the person who has it? and some of the criteria like “fails to follow through on instructions”, “does not seem to listen when spoken to directly”, “has trouble holding attention on tasks” can depend greatly on the player. not as much of that is baked into artemy’s character and dialogue in the same way that social ineptitude, which is a core feature of autism, is baked into daniil’s character and dialogue.

with that being said: while i will include a few things from the diagnostic dsmv diagnositic criteria as listed on the cdc website, i am going to primarily be thinking about accounts from people with adhd. i have several friends with adhd (and i suspect that i may have it, though i’ve only come to suspect this recently and have had less time to think on it) whose experiences i will be taking into account.

other links to sources i am referring to: [adhd/autism venn diagram by tfw-adhd] [what those symptoms look like in adults, by chadd] [ptsd criteria on brainline] [ocd criteria on beyondocd]

vague spoilers for pathologic classic & pathologic 2

very briefly & quickly: ptsd & ocd

the problem with going into it is this game is already a very difficult and anxiety-inducing world because of the plague and i’d argue that any of the healers could have one or both of these either before the outbreak or after it, so here are some things that stick out to me for

ptsd - overly negative thoughts or assumptions about oneself or the world (can overlap with adhd; artemy has the option to repeatedly blame himself for his father’s death), negative affect, feeling isolated, irritability or aggression, risky or destructive behavior, hypervigilance (any game that dabbles in horror aspects will expect this from you), difficulty sleeping (overlaps with adhd), depersonalization (this is a core aspect of the theatre theme of the game)

ocd - without going through the entire ybocs, i’ll just say that i think all three healers struggle with hoarding (understandably and by necessity) and hypermorality (all three protagonists believe they are the one and only person who is right, rubin is awfully judgmental of people who don’t abide by his personal standards). compulsions would be easier to point out in the game than the obsessions they are linked to, as we’re not exactly privvy to intrusive thoughts outside of the dreams. you could, however, say that artemy struggles with intrusive thoughts of causing harm even inadvertantly and argue that he takes measures to ensure that he doesn’t, won’t, and hasn’t. in classic, this is highly dependent on playstyle.

[this is my standard disclaimer that i have an official diagnosis of ptsd so i’m not just pulling this out of nowhere and am about 98% sure i have obsessive-compulsive disorder, and have researched it thoroughly.]

what’s built into the game: making careless mistakes, poor planning skills, time blindness / anxiety, executive dysfunction

pathologic is a game that sometimes feels like you’re being set up for failure. something that i missed talking about in my previous post is that it often feels like an autism/adhd simulator because it is, in classic, so very easy to screw yourself over and get locked out of an objective by picking the wrong dialogue option. while some of the correct dialogue options are obvious, others feel like a guessing game and you have to just hope you’re picking the right thing and have made a save file at the right place to go back and pick different options in the case that you’ve bungled something. hence, “making careless mistakes”. it’s a little bit easier in 2, as dialogue options that end a conversation are indicated with a diamond (thank you to whomever decided on that!), but it makes up for this by being unforgiving in other aspects. i believe the difficulty settings for imago state that the game is intended to be “almost unbearable” - and lots of people have difficulty completing it on the intended difficulty without cheats. (do not discourse about this on my post.) the game invites you to make careless mistakes and either live with or learn from them.

keeping this in mind, you’re kind of expected to have “poor planning skills” on at least your first time playing it. part of the game’s point is that you can’t do everything, and you can’t save everyone. not paying close enough attention or interpreting the instructions of the game just right in classic can cost you the lives of several of your bound.

that also feeds into time blindness & time anxiety. classic & 2 do these in different ways. in classic, you can’t run, so you have to hope you’re not busy doing something else or else hope that all of your letters come in at a time where you can hit up all the places you need to go, or you’re going to be cutting it short on time for the day. in 2, you can run, but there are far more sidequests to be completed than in classic.

i’d also argue that executive dysfunction is a core aspect of the game. you are very busy and very poor and items are very expensive, meaning that unless you know what you’re in for, either you or the town is low on resources or funds or time to do things like eat, sleep, and take care of your aches, immunity, and infection. all of which can be avoided if you don’t make careless mistakes, have good planning skills, and can manage your time wisely.

“interrupts or intrudes on others”

i don’t appear to have a screenshot of him doing this in 2, but he and daniil do have at least one conversation in which they keep interrupting each other. peak autism/adhd solidarity.

i do, however, have a screenshot example of him doing this to clara in pathologic classic

Haruspex: …Wait a second. If there was nothing but the great Bull, where did the stars and light come from? Changeling: Oh, don’t interrupt!

and as for intruding - khan feels that he does this frequently: intruding on him and capella at the station, intruding on him and notkin at the broken heart, and here he is intruding on kids at the nutshell:

We have so few places of our own - only a couple. And yet you feel the urge to impose yourself even here. Do you know what childhood is? It’s slavery. Herders treat their cattle better than parents treat their children. They lock us up like objects, mold us like statues, and still never take us remotely seriously.

he also intrudes on clara talking with block on day 11, either completely oblivious to the fact that he’s doing it or outright ignoring that he is.

“is often ‘on the go’“

i could say that this is one that is built into the way the game is organized, and it’s true! but his time spent with lara comes to mind. she’s not the only one to mention his restlessness, but i don’t keep screenshots of big vlad on hand so their day 1 dialogue is lost to the wind.

Aren’t you supposed to be terribly busy? I don’t understand why you keep coming. Or do you need my help again? I’ll wash your clothes. You’re filthy, like a chimney sweep. Revolting. While they dry, have some sleep.

“often fidgets […] or squirms in seat”

like with daniil’s body language, i don’t have any gifs to show to prove this. i’m really looking forward to seeing what idle animations he gets in the other two routes. for now i know that in the lucid dream, if you use flycam you can see him idling by swaying and rubbing his chin & that in other pantomimes he can be found constantly turning his head and looking around.

sleep problems

i don’t have the screen shot so just pretend that i do - he mentions this to the fellow traveler on, i think, day one when you go to the dead item shop. in either game, you can also only sleep for a maximum of six hours at a time, which is like..two hours less than the recommended amount, unless that’s changed.

little sense of danger & impulsivity

As usual, I act first and think later. I’ve made a panacea. But from what? What blood was that? Whose blood was that? To cure the Town, I’ll need to figure that out.

there’s actually no dialogue i can think of that addresses the danger of the situation he’s in - which is sort of the reason why i included it! though i am absolutely obsessed with classic artemy threatening grief, kingpin of the villains in town:

Bad Grief: That ain’t good! Got too soft a heart or something? Soft, eh… Well, can’t blame you. Haruspex: Got too hard of a bone structure? You watch it. I’ll break them in no time.

artemy has little to no problem offering to help daniil get ahold of organs and blood:

Bachelor: Exactly. I need tissues of a person who died of the Sand Plague. I need them today, right now! I’ve tried to get them at the cemetary, but failed miserably. The patrolmen are vigilantly watching over the dead. Haruspex: Would you like me to get you some? Bachelor: I’d reward you generously for that. Haruspex: Deal. I’ll do what I can, even though I still don’t have the right to.

‘even though i still don’t have the right to’ - he knows it’s illegal and could easily lose him reputation, but he jumps at the chance to do so. part of his route requires you being in constant danger, but later on there are options to tell daniil you won’t help him. this isn’t one of them.

in pathologic 2, you can also instigate fights with people by, to name a few: refusing to leave the house in the atrium where they have a person bound and gagged upstairs, not leaving barley the barber in grief’s lair, and picking the wrong dialogue option with the guys in the broken heart on day 11.

as referenced above, his impulsivity sometimes shows in the dialogue options you can choose. you can say things that clearly haven’t been thought through all the way. for example, this is what he says to clara bout her parents:

I wonder what you did to your old ones. There was someone gullible enough to adopt you?

and this is how she replies:

Clara: What? Why would you say that? I never even knew them. I’ve been an orphan for as long as I can remember. Artemy: I didn’t know. Right, that’s what I figured.

it’s not all that different from the sort of tactless comment a person with autism might make.

no motivation for tasks you are not interested in & hyperfixations

in pathologic 2, on day 3, daniil asks artemy to be his aide in developing a vaccine. artemy’s responses are all something dismissive and frequently quite rude. here’s the end of that conversation:

Bachelor: I will make the vaccine, but I can’t do it without you. All you need to do is be at hand and do as I say. I will take full responsibility for the situation. Haruspex: Perhaps I’ll drop by… if I have the time.

guess what never happens?

it’s understandable that the panacea is artemy’s main goal. what makes it stick out to me as a hyperfixation specifically is that, while a vaccine is daniil’s main goal, daniil manages to ask artemy about his progress with the panacea.

Bachelor: Anyway, how’s it going? Any progress?

the interest is never reciprocated.

emotional dysregulation & rejection sensitivity dysphoria

i personally think this is the most striking piece of evidence. every single perceived sleight can invoke a drastic reaction in artemy. just take day 3 for example - the perceived sleight here is the belief (based on no evidence) that daniil was snubbing him or trying to exclude him from the meeting:

Bachelor: Burakh. The situation is regretful. I just didn’t have time to warn you. Haruspex: This was ugly of you.

and then he proceeds to get into an argument with him. he can, in fact, get into snits with not just daniil, but with rubin and lara as well. i will not be taking sides in this, because who is right / who is wrong is not really the point, the point is how artemy responds to perceived sleights with increased emotional agitation.

when capella upsets him by telling him she’s taking the kids from under his care for their own protection, he can respond by comparing her to her horrible capitalist pig of a father:

You truly are your father’s daughter. Children always succeed their parents…

i can’t even remember what was said to him to get him to reply this, only that it was said to him by a teenager:

I’m a surgeon. Ever considered having your tongue removed?

he also holds onto murky’s repetitious “what is there about you to love? nothing. so i don’t.” and brings it up to her when she is infected with the sand plague on day 10. though it does bring the rather heartwarming line about murky having loved him from the start, my point remains that he has not been able to stop thinking about something murky has said that she has obviously already changed her mind about by this point in time in the game.

difficulties making & keeping friends

remember what i said about the interest in daniil’s vaccine not being reciprocated? yeah. friends, acquaintances, colleagues - they all kind of expect you to take an interest in their lives. this is where autism & adhd overlap, from my understanding - both can come with an inability to recognize social cues. in fact, i’m going to use the same example now that i used in my post about daniil (it is, after all, what inspired this ask):

Bachelor: From you? Oh, nothing. I was just sharing.

daniil thinks they’ve been having a normal conversation, but artemy hasn’t picked up on whatever social cues he’s been using. this could easily be on either one of them. though i will say, some of my easiest friendships as a person with autism have been with people who have adhd. which is why i’d suggest that daniil saying he’ll tell artemy about thanatica “the way i’d tell a close, intimate friend” is autism/adhd solidarity. despite initially not getting along, they are clearly able to communicate with each other.

i think the rest of this is really self-explanatory. despite being from the town in classic, artemy doesn’t actually appear to have any friends in it. could be a symptom of him having left much ealier (ten years ago as opposed to the five in pathologic 2), but in pathologic 2 his friendships are constantly under threat of spontaneous combustion. this day three conversation with lara sums it up nicely:

Lara: Ugh, whatever. Like it’s any of my business… Do whatever you want. Did you make peace with stakh? Artemy: Doesn’t look like it… Forget Stakh. I see now that I’m one step away from falling out with you. Why?

there’s a variety of reasons why his friendships are falling apart. but it occurs to me that there’s no mention of artemy communicating with his friends at all while he was gone, and maybe that’s contributing to it. this is not an attempt to pick sides (i think everybody’s wrong), i am just pointing this out.

adhd in adults: history of academic or career underachievement, relationship problems due to not completing tasks, chronic stress and worry over failure to accomplish goals, chronic and intense feelings of frustration / guilt / blame

artemy did not finish med school. classic has him described as a “vagrant scholar” traveling from town to town to learn instead of staying in the capital where he was sent (”always ‘on the go’” indeed). in pathologic 2 he simply states that he doesn’t have a degree and that he sucked at latin.

relationship problems mentioned under “making and keeping friendships”, but it should be noted that you can repair your friendships by completing a sidequest on day 3 to gather everyone together.

“chronic stress and worry over failure to accomplish goals” is sort of the entirety of pathologic 2. you could say it’s built into the game, but artemy does express a lot of stress over not knowing where to turn for answers, has bizarre prophetic dreams, and is plagued by… well, the plague taunting him for not being to save his bound. both when notkin gets sick on day 4 and when all of the children get sick on day 10, he can express an extreme amount of guilt for not having the ability to cure them.

i mentioned under ptsd that artemy has a tendency to be able to blame himself for his father’s death, and i think that fits under here as well. there’s also this:

I get anxious thinking about my kids… Are they faring all right in the Lair without me?

conclusion

i do not know if i have adhd myself and i am sure there are things i am missing, especially as i have not completed artemy’s route in classic yet or started clara’s. feel free to contribute to this, i would love to see others’ input!

#icarus.txt #icarus answers #artemy burakh #pathologic meta

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supernowa-art · 4 years ago

Text

i got angry. and when i get angry, i rant. and when i rant, i need to share the rant with the void of social media, just to have an outlet.

if you don't agree with me, i don't care. not looking for discourse.

i watched this video, for context. literally no one cares but idk

https://youtu.be/5uaJ1XyRwrU

Ok this is about to be long so bear with me.

To begin with, why are we still gatekeeping? It's 2020. Queers should stick together instead of debating who's identity is "valid" or not. Let people be who they want to be.

Also, I don't know what your views on trans people are (think you've made videos with trans folk so I'm guessing you're not intentionally being transphobic), but the preferred pronoun law is actually meant to PROTECT trans people. Which is fucking needed. In 2020 alone there have been at least 36 people killed in the US for being trans. There are probably a lot more, considering murdered trans people often get misgendered by the cops and the statistics don't include them. World wide, more than 3000 trans folk have been murdered for being trans in the last 11 years. And again, there's surely a lot more we don't know about.

The preferred pronoun law that you mock is life saving. It keeps trans people from being outed where it would be dangerous to be outed. Most trans people are killed by someone they know. Yes, the law is there to provide an encitement to use trans folk's correct pronouns because it can induce extreme dysphoria to be misgendered, but more importantly, it's there so a trans person's coworker or boss is less likely to mis-gender them and out them.

And the part where you said you can get a fine for misgendering when you make an honest mistake; no, you can't. At least, that's not what the law is for. The law is for repeated misgendering, demanding license or medical proof that you are biologically the gender you identify as, etc.

As you may have already guessed by my passion for this topic, I am myself trans. Non-binary, to be precise.

Now, I know that we as humans love to label things. I love to label things. I love labeling myself! I like knowing other people's labels! When someone identifies as merely "queer", I get this itchy feeling of: "yeah, but what ARE you?"

I get wanting to label things. What I do NOT get is aggresively stating that someone's identity is invalid. Identifying as simply "queer" is fine! If that's what you resonate with, go for it! Does it irk me that I don't know what that means exactly for you? Yes. Does my inherent need to categorise people start shouting for attention? Absolutely. But it's their identity, and that's cool! It is really none of my business, as long as I know what pronouns to use.

Now, I understand the confusion and anger around this. Before I came out as or even knew I was non-binary, I identified as a lesbian. Love being a lesbian! It's great! I really identified with that term, and I still do.

But then I realised I was trans, and thought hey, I'm not a woman, can I still label myself as a lesbian? Should I just say I identify as "attracted to women"? Say I'm gynosexual and confuse everyone including myself?

I went with just calling myself a lesbian, because that is the term I've used about myself for years. When you said that this word is very important to some people, you were right. Where you were wrong, however, was when you implied that it isn't hugely important to us, too.

Because here's the thing: gender and sex are not the same thing, and more importantly, gender and what pronouns you prefer are not always directly correlated. I know this might confuse you. That's totally fine! I'm confused about everything almost all the time, I feel you! But it is how many trans people feel. I get this tingly awesome feeling when someone refers to me as he/him, because I want to be percieved as masculine. I don't feel like a man, but I want to be seen as masculine or androgynous. I use they/them pronouns, because it's easier than explaining that sometimes I want to be called him, but sometimes not, and basically explain my entire gender to someone.

I understand this feels threatening. It feels like someone is taking away your identity that means so much to you, and that you might have endured a lot of hardship for having.

But remember, us trans people have gone through shit, too. I don't mean to in any way compare the two struggles. I don't want to sit here and say "we have it worse", because really, it doesn't really matter. What matters is this: I get misgendered every day. When you're a binary trans, you can pass for being cis and automatically be called what you want. That will never happen for me. Unless someone asks me my pronouns (which is the best, try it), they are going to assume I'm a female. And I don't blame them! I see boobs, I think girl, too.

Now, imagine you have struggled with figuring out yourself for a long time, and you finally, finally find what you are. What you identify with. And then someone says that you can't identify as that, because you don't fit the mould. News flash, I never fit the mould anywhere, ever! The one place I have always felt safe and happy is within the queer community. And that's why gatekeeping fucks me up so much. Because people like me, who have been the weirdo all their life, hating their body and not knowing why, being confused and scared, not daring to come out, not wanting to draw attention to myself, finally find a place to belong. And then you get shut down. It feels awful.

Explaining that gender and pronouns don't have a direct correlation is hard. Because you can't really explain it. It's just a statement. Like: gender and sex aren't the same thing, but even harder, since it's based on experiences and not the fact that is: trans people excist.

Now, I know that this might have been focused more on cis women who use the pronouns he/him. And yes, like you said, pronouns do indeed give a big indication on what gender identity someone has. But it doesn't HAVE to. They might have a weird or bad relationship with their femininity for various reasons, or they might just feel like a woman but not identify with the female pronouns.

For example, I have a gender I know what my feels like. But I can't explain it for the life of me. Try explaining your gender in detail! It's a lot harder than you think, and it gets even harder to explain when the words aren't even invented.

A he/him lesbian is not a man trying to make fun of your identity, I promise. It's someone who either doesn't have any other word to use (like me), feels a strong connection to the word and associated identity (also me), or a woman who doesn't want to be labeled as she/her for various reasons, but who is attracted to other women. We are not here to shit on your identity! Please don't shi on ours!

I know that probably no one will read this absolute monster of a comment, and that's ok. I got so upset I actually teared up a little bit, so I felt like I had to express myself or I would be thinking about it indefinitely.

Please, if anyone's reading: be respectful. Understand that understanding others is hella difficult, but we have to try, and that both gender and sexuality is very fluid and complicated.

I tried to be as respectful as possible, please have the same courtesy if you intend to commt on my comment, so to speak.

Sad but hopeful lesbian signing off!

#lgbt #lgbtq+#lgbtq community #pronouns #trans #nonbinary #enby #enby lesbian #he him lesbian

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liberalfartsdegree · 4 years ago

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seeing a number of people here and elsewhere talk about NBC’s H*annibal series in terms of trans politics with largely 2 main sub-themes: 1. that the relationship between the two central characters “feels” t4t and 2. that the story captures something “trans” in the way that it deals with social ostracism, violence, and (ostensibly) the relationship between creation and destruction.

To the first, I’ll say that I too am not immune to pointing at characters on TV and saying “that’s trans” for fun, and it can be fun to look at villains for that moment because its satisfying or whatever.

But to the second, and the way in which it connects to the first, I’m profoundly sad about the way that it sounds like people are connecting to it. The article I’ve seen a lot of people float is about “creation through destruction” focalized through the writer’s experience of their top surgery and DIY piercing/tattooing experiences. I guess I’m struggling with the contiguity that’s established between those practices, and the kind of “self-making” (which isn’t always non-violent) that trans people often go through with the kind of violence on that show. Full disclaimer, I had to turn it off--I couldn’t bear to “read around” the way that psychological abuse and cruelty was the only way to express needs and desires, not to mention the unmitigated gore of the show I found very challenging.

It reminds me of my experience of reading Nietzsche--which the show references explicitly. The afterlife of Nietzsche has a weird multivalent presence. On face, Nietzsche is a violent racist, misogynist, anti-semite, white-supremacist, etc. and his philosophy explicitly and repeatedly invokes violence in every manifestation as a means of accessing and reinforcing power. However, in reading Nietzsche, ESPECIALLY in “enlightened” contexts with other readers (who I respect and trust! I’m talking about smart people doing good faith readings) there is an explicit desire to recover Nietzsche--to say “well, but his method” or “yes, and his structure of thinking is still useful.” I can’t fully reject this approach either! If nothing else Nietzsche developed a genealogical method that was instrumental in the kinds of reading that I care about. But The real task is’t to stop there, it can’t be to stop there, because we have to hold in our mind the fact that these meanings we can read in the text are co-constituted by the most repugnant and violent imaginings possible.

Looking at the moment that hannibal is having, my first thought was a question--why are so many people who I would like to consider myself in community with (young AFAB trans people) finding solace in this show that I can’t bear to look at? The article (which I’m not linking deliberately because I am reflecting, not trying to start discourse) seems to be in good faith--I fully believe the writer finds immense power in what they called the “creation from destruction” they read in the text. There was a slip in the discussion though--the writer saw the cutting into of their own body reflected more in the psyches of Hannibal and Will Graham instead of the actual destroyed bodies depicted on screen. I think that’s super interesting if deeply sad: the body was externalized to the dead bodies on the show, while the mind was transposed into the cerebral lead characters.

I don’t care to psychoanalyze that too much. Like, is it because AFAB trans people I’ve seen tend to connect with stories about the externality of bodies as a way to process dysphoria and lived experiences of misogyny etc? Sure maybe, but I think that kind of symptomatic reading strikes me as almost self-indulgent (that old tumblr meme about ‘some people need murder to cope’ comes to mind).

I guess I’m just seeing a confluence of something here--and I don’t know how to name it without spending more time on this than I need to--which comes down to a sense that the body is a vehicle for psychological distress and that modification (”creation out of destruction”) of the body is reparative, held at the same time that the body is only ever external to the mind, and seeing violence done to bodies is ok as long as it creates something for the mind seeing it.

And that’s just not true!!!! I mean like, everyone’s reading and life experience is different and there’s no one way to “be” trans and I’m not trying to prescribe a way of being for anybody. But like reading Nietzsche, taking that message out of that show seems to ignore the horrific, repugnant violence which is its precondition. I think it’s essential to see the elision between the violently dismembered bodies in the show and the creation/destruction of Will Graham (and I’m not even getting into the psychological violence Hannibal does against him which is nightmare-inducing). Transposing that onto the self seems to miss that key slippage in the show between “bodies that matter” (thanks judy) and the ones that don’t. Taken in real life, either the person’s own body becomes the site of this violence (as happened in the article) or the violence becomes externalized to an Other who matters even less than the person doing this reading (wherever abjection settles itself--from t*kt*k it seems like these readers are nb AFAB people who are trying to negotiate their own expressions of gender within their attachment to femininity who often direct this need for violence against “masculine women” whatever that means)

ive spent way too long on this idk just like what would it be like to experience your dysphoria as contiguous with your experience of yourself and with your embodied experience and recognize the urge to violence as predicated on a construction of something abject, and to instead reject that and start over from a place of care

(and im not subposting at you @ keneinahora if you see this--of course I’d love to hear your thoughts if you want to share them, but this isn’t intended as a weird passive-aggressive callout. I hope that it’s clear from writing this that I’m not addressing any single individual and the value that media has on an individual scale).

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didanawisgi · 4 years ago

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by Robin Koerner

“Jordan Peterson, the Canadian professor of psychology who in the last year has become North America’s most popular public intellectual, has spent many decades studying tyranny and its antecedents. As a result, he frequently warns his audiences of the unparalleled destructive power of “ideological possession.”

As someone who has long been writing about the threat posed by this all too prevalent epistemic disease, I am delighted to see the attention that is now being paid to it.

Ideological possession is to healthy political discourse as scientism is to science.

Any ideology has the potential to be deadly.

The most important thing to know about diagnosing ideological possession is that you can’t do it by looking at the content of the possessing ideology.

As I have said elsewhere, it’s not the content of your belief that makes you dangerous, it’s the way you believe it.

Any ideology has the potential to be deadly when advanced by those who are so sure of their own knowledge and moral outlook that they would impose it against the protestations of those affected by it. To the ideologically possessed, the imposition can always be justified because “it’s the right thing to do,” “it will start working if we keep at it,” “the complaints are coming from bad people,” and so on. (Yes. The logic is as circular as it seems.)

So, with apologies to Dr. Peterson and an open invitation to him to amend and augment the following (he is the clinician, after all), here, for diagnostic purposes, is a list of symptoms of ideological possession—that most fatal of epistemic diseases.

Cautions and Caveats

The symptoms of ideological possession manifest differently according to the possessing ideology.

So, for illustrative purposes, the following list of symptoms is presented with example manifestations, labeled to indicate their association with so-called “progressive” (P), so-called “conservative” (C), and so-called “libertarian” (L) possessing ideologies.

For instance, the fact that someone believes the world is out to get them doesn’t necessarily mean they are paranoid.

To be fair, it is not the case that all people who present with manifestations similar to those listed below are exhibiting symptoms of ideological possession. It is, after all, quite possible to hold apparently simplistic or radical views that are very carefully arrived at with an open mind, good data, and intellectual honesty.

For instance, the fact that someone believes the world is out to get them doesn’t necessarily mean they are paranoid (B does not imply P). More interestingly, as the old saw goes, just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean that the world isn’t out to get you (P does not strictly mean B is false).

Nevertheless, believing the world is out to get you is a very good diagnostic marker for paranoia (B is highly causally correlated with P).

So with that caution, the manifestations below are offered because I have witnessed each one, and when I did so, had reason to believe it was symptomatic of at least the early stages of the onset of ideological possession.

List of Symptoms for Diagnostic Purposes

Major Symptoms

The possessed insists that anyone who disfavors a specific view or policy must also reject the basic moral value that, to the possessed individual, justifies that view or policy. This is the fallacy of the assumed paradigm. (L: “If you won’t let mothers protect their children with guns, you’re a misogynist.” C: “People who favor gun control don’t value freedom.” P: “People against regulating firearms don’t care about violence against children.”)

The possessed uses one-dimensional labels for people they’ve never met and who clearly aren’t one-dimensional as a means of dismissing the value of all their beliefs or actions. (L: “Churchill was a mass-murderer.” C: “Gandhi was a pedophile.” P: “Thatcher was a witch.”)

Related to the above, the possessed will regard a few quotes or actions by an individual as proof that the individual is evil without regard to context, appreciation that everyone is a product of his time, recognition that people change over time, or consideration of other quotes and actions that provide evidence against the claimed ill intent of the individual in question.

The possessed advocates worse treatment of people within a specified group than others. (P: “Straight white men have privilege and so should have their opinions discounted or suppressed.” L: “People who work for the state initiate violence, and it is ok to use violence against those who initiate violence.” C: “People who burn the flag are traitors and should be punished as such.”)

The possessed believes that a single principle provides answers to most important moral and political questions, disregarding reasonable moral intuitions to the contrary (precisely because they are to the contrary) and any uncertainty regarding the precise meaning or application of the principle. (P: “Equality.” L: “Non-aggression.” C: “Biblical authority.”)

When the results of an ideologically justified action are the opposite of those intended or used to justify that action in the first place, the possessed is convinced that not only is the action not the cause of any resulting problem but that more of the same action will eventually solve that problem. (P: “Venezuela needs more socialism.” C: “We need more unprovoked military involvement in conflicts that don’t involve us.” L: “Europe should open its borders immediately to everyone.”)

Minor Symptoms

The possessed enjoys opportunities to defend what he believes more than opportunities to make his beliefs more accurate.

The possessed collects data that support her beliefs instead of seeking data that would help her correct false beliefs.

The possessed offers unsolicited opinions without any empathic engagement with the recipient or any interest in whether she is in any state to be positively influenced by them.

The possessed would rather reform society’s institutions to better serve his ideology than reform his ideology to better serve people.

Immunity, Pathology, and Cure

Fortunately, the epistemic immune system of most mentally healthy people protects them from ideological possession. The core of the immune response—and indeed an effective cure—is Love of Truth, specifically the holding of Truth as the highest moral value.

Love of Truth, in fact, provides a near-perfect protection against ideological possession.

Pathologically, ideological possession may even be understood as the substitution of that highest value by another.

Love of Truth, in fact, provides a near-perfect protection against ideological possession because the disease, while deadly, has no defense against the honest admission by the afflicted of his or her symptoms.

Nevertheless, the most pernicious and subtle feature of the disease prevents the possessed from seeking treatment or treating himself: ideological possession can disguise itself in the mind of the afflicted as that very same Love of Truth that, in its authentic form, would cure it.

What conditions, then, enable those in the grip of ideological possession—whose love of Truth may have already been replaced by a counterfeit—to cure themselves?

To answer that, it is important to understand the symbiotic relationship of the disease with its host.

Although epidemics of ideological possession can be fatal to entire societies, the disease provides immediate benefits to the individual who is afflicted, such as intellectual certainty and stability, feelings of moral superiority, an apparent simplification of life’s difficult decisions and questions, avoidance of true moral responsibility, and a sense of belonging among others similarly afflicted. All of these tend to prevent self-treatment.

The painful shock activates the Love of Truth long enough to locate the cause of the pain.

Accordingly, the cures for ideological possession tend to be external and unsought. They nevertheless exist and fall into two broad categories—fast cures and slow cures.

Fast cures tend to be triggered by a catastrophic failure of one or more of the above benefits to the afflicted individual. This may occur when, despite the highly motivated perception and reasoning of the possessed individual, she experiences an unexpected, painful, and shocking outcome of an ideologically motivated action. The painful shock activates the Love of Truth long enough to locate the cause of the pain, forcing the afflicted to admit the symptoms, and therefore identify the disease for what it is, effecting the rapid cure.

Slow cures tend to involve a rising awareness by one afflicted individual of the same disease in friends or others with whom she identifies. This can be induced when the individual sees inconsistencies in those others’ words and actions that cause direct harm to others and to the stated goals of the possessing ideology. (In theory, this slow cure could be induced by observations of one’s own actions under ideological possession, but this is prevented by the self-righteousness that is felt when one acts in the grip of the disease.)

Maintaining Good Epistemic Health

To protect oneself from the terrible epistemic disease of ideological possession, epistemic nutrition and exercise are extremely effective.

The good news is, if you’re chasing Truth hard enough, it is very unlikely that this particular disease will ever catch up with you.

With respect to the former, the regular consumption of great thinkers like J.S. Mill (“He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that”), George Orwell (“To see what is in front of one’s nose needs a constant struggle”), and Dostoevsky (“Nothing is easier than to denounce the evildoer. Nothing is more difficult than to understand him”) will keep you in good epistemic health. Supplement these basics with a more varied diet of thinkers with whom you disagree on things that matter, and you’ll be in even better shape.

With respect to the latter, a comfortable regime of epistemic exercise—which takes a little time and effort but is immediately rewarding—involves maintaining real friendships with people who have very different assumptions, experiences, and declared moral and political priorities from your own.

The good news is, if you’re chasing Truth hard enough, it is very unlikely that this particular disease will ever catch up with you.”

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beinglibertarian · 6 years ago

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We Need a Realistic Discussion About Firearms

In the light of both the massacre at a bar in California and the murder of a Maryland man who was deemed mentally unfit to own a firearm by order of the state’s red flag laws, the gun control issue demands rational discourse in order to preserve the natural rights and the safety of innocent people.

Both of the partisan answers have led to unfortunate death.

Hey, progressives, gun control does not work

Countless examples of gun control’s failures can be brought forth, such as the California shooter utilizing an illegal magazine that held rounds in excess of the legal capacity in California. Or the fact that he murdered people, which is obviously illegal. Or other nations that maintain strong gun laws have maintained an alarming rate of violent crimes through the use of other inanimate objects.

Prohibition does not work. It simply creates the existence of a black market which induces an even deadlier outcome.

Next to these very few examples among the multitude, frankly, you have no grounds to remove one’s natural right to self-defense. By advocating that the government use force to remove the defensive properties of peaceful individuals, you become the aggressor. You are the violent entity.

This emotional response to a very touchy issue will not have the outcome you seek. Chances are, the very opposite will happen instead.

Simply put, devout gun owners are not giving their firearms to the entity that has a consistent tendency to violate the rights of its citizenry. The idea that one demands a civilian ban on firearms while simultaneously protesting government policies and accusing them of being Nazis is nothing short of cognitive dissonance.

Hey, conservatives, the problem is not simply mental illness

To insinuate that mental illness is the sole issue creates an extremely dangerous slippery slope to tyranny. By advocating that the government decree the mentally unfit may not have guns, it is simply not logical to assume they will not abuse their authority if you believe their intentions are already malignant.

If they were to pass this legislation, I am certain they would determine what qualifies the scope of being mentally unfit. In today’s clinical standards, 1/5ths Americans are “mentally ill.” What if they deem having a mild case of anxiety or ADHD as being mentally unfit? How about ODD? Oppositional defiant disorder. Anyone who questions authority would be seen as unfit!

What if they deem all veterans have PTSD and shall be barred from owning weapons upon return from service? That maneuver single-handedly removes our most skilled civilians from being serviceable in the event of an uprising against an authoritarian government.

How about the abusive husband who reports to the authorities that his wife is mentally ill? Removing her ability to lethally defend herself from him if necessary?

Next, to the mental illness claim, conservatives intend to claim this country does not have a gun violence problem. But a mass shooting at a school or public gathering every other week proves that there is. It is dishonest to say we do not have one, and a semi-automatic Daniel Defense can take out more people than an assailant with a knife. It’s simply the truth.

However, to their point, the tool is not to blame. A quick glance at Europe’s introduction of vehicular attacks and nail bombs prove there are other factors at play. The demand to simply ban the weapon not only is an emotional response that has empirically shown to do very little to decrease violence, but it also does not address the problem! What’s the actual problem? We don’t know, because we refuse to properly diagnose it. Instead, very black and white retorts are exclaimed.

Instead of concentrating on the perpetrators, we have knee-jerk reactions and instantly revert back to redundant partisan arguments. The criminal is no longer responsible for his action. Instead, a collectivist outrage ensues and the guilty is no longer held accountable.

There is no discussion on how to address the fatherless home issue. No conversation about addressing and properly diagnosing erratic behavior, and how to approach these people. No discourse on how we as a society can teach our children to respect the sanctity of life. These are a multitude of potential factors.

The tired partisan talking points are getting us nowhere. If we want the bloodshed to cease, we must have a logical discussion and approach the very root of the issue, not simply the repercussions that unfold.

This article represents the views of the author exclusively, and not that of Being Libertarian LLC.

The post We Need a Realistic Discussion About Firearms appeared first on Being Libertarian.

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#IFTTT #WordPress #libertarian #beinglibertarian #being libertarian #freedom #free market

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bedobedo-kincare-archived · 3 years ago

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the urge every day to pull together resources and make a post on “kin is involuntary, there are Words that mean kff without using the word kin” vs the effort that’d take turning me off from doing it

also like others have made similar posts?? idk i just have been wanting to go off about that lately, like. spiritual and psychological kin are not choosing these identities, spiritual kin are not choosing the timelines we lived, and yet y’all have diluted the meanings so much that people have tried to gatekeep the timelines in front of my very eyes

like damn sorry i wasn’t Exactly Like My Canon Self ???? i understand we need representation for things (i’m nd, mentally ill, lgbt+, the works, so i get it) but if i lived a life, i lived a life!

i don’t indulge in my problematic timelines for the most part either, those shifts feel icky to me, but believe me i have them! they suck! but i’m not condoning them in this life, i literally lived a life i lived many and i cannot multiverse hop to change them

so like. maybe i should allow more problematic sources here? i mean i would if discourse wasn’t so anxiety inducing sdhdsh and also i’d have to keep some of them blacklisted anyway do to personal squicks and timelines i don’t want to even think about publicizing ..

anyway that was longer than i intended it to be. i just feel a very specific way abt this, that’s all-

- mod albedo

#witness my great undertaking! ; talking

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crossedbeams · 7 years ago

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The Rape of The X-Files: Chris Carter and Control

An essay on my rage. - Rose

As a relatively new fan to the show, I’ve sometimes struggled to understand the level of vitriol the fandom harbours towards the show’s creator, Chris Carter, but 12 hours from the premiere of S11, I think I’m finally starting to get it. It’s not about any one episode, or a character arc that is less successful than the show at its best. It’s not about the anticlimax of years of rose-tinted revival.

It’s about disrespect and misogyny masquerading as creativity.

It’s about a man who has created a project and with it a person, offering it to us as one thing - a journey for truth starring a woman of integrity and worth, uncowed by impossible odds and stalwart in a world determined to misunderstand and belittle her. But this is not actually what he is offering. Having convinced us that he values and believes in this character, that we should too, he begins, under the guise of “character development”, her total destruction; the molestation of all she holds dear, and through this act and a hundred other micro-messages reinforcing the same thing, the rape of not just one character but in essence everything the show has purported to be.

To its fans and many of the creative forces involved, writers, directors and cast, The X-Files is a show about love and hope and possibility. It is a tale of strength and loyalty and humans. It is a show I have come to love, a show that brings us all together here, which is what makes its creator so increasingly problematic.

Chris Carter has shown, time and time again, through the stories he tells when he writes that what he actually believes in is not God or Science or the capacity of those who fight and seek truth to achieve justice, but in his right as creator to borrow tragedy and torment from anywhere and anyone, without remorse or care, to feed his egotistic vision of The X-Files. He truly believes that what his audience wants is his “genius” 40 minute take on issues that he does not understand. He is liberal only in his appropriation of trauma to feed his narrative; no race, religion or gender is safe from his careless pilfering.

I’m not saying that men like Carter shouldn’t write about these things, in many ways I wish more would, but to the service of their subject. Good writers try to look beyond their experience out of a desire to illuminate, protest and educate, to lend the privilege of their position. They create space for controversial content within their world out of a desire to be an ally and deal humanly, hopefully with the repercussions and the result. They aim to inspire change

Chris Carter just wants to cause controversy.

When asked by EW what led him to make My Struggle III’s decision about Scully’s child’s paternity, Carter replies

“ It adds to the characters in an interesting emotional way. “

This after ten seasons of character building. This after the pre-exisiting trauma of these seasons has driven Mulder and Scully apart. This, at the end of an episode, in which Scully has already had seizures, endured a car accident and had an assailant attempt to throttle her in her sickbed and watched her partner murder this man on top of her, all while missing her son, orphaned and fearing the end of the world and for her own sanity.

If you cannot, as a writer, find interest and emotional meaning in this rich body of work, then you are no writer. Except Carter is. He has written many interesting and innovative plot-lines for The X-Files, generated spin-offs, this whole world is born of his imagination… which leads us to a much more troubling truth.

He simply doesn’t care.

To him, The X-Files is a plaything and Dana Scully is an object. With every trauma unconsidered, every choice undermined and every abuse of her mind and body, Carter demonstrates that Dana Scully (the “two steps behind please” back-up who didn’t have a backstory until David Nutter wrote her one in Beyond the Sea) was never envisioned to be a feminist icon or symbol of female empowerment. To Chris Carter, she was only supposed to be a body for Mulder to bounce ideas against, a plot device for a conspiracy of men to use and exploit. Perhaps this is why Carter hates ‘shippers so much, because Scully was never intended to be Mulder’s equal, his lover, she was just supposed to be his foil. Her sexuality is supposed to be limited to inspiring male envy (Milagro), rage (Never Again) or reproduction (preferably medically induced to deny her agency even in this most traditional of female roles. Making Scully the body upon which to enact his fears, prejudices and fantasies at the cost of her own integrity is why Carter has become the show’s greatest Achilles Heel.

Ironically, this casting is perhaps most keenly summarised by a monologue Carter penned himself in yesterday’s episode. While he attempts to describe the motives of the Cigarette Smoking Man he unintentionally presents an unfortunately apt description of his own relationship to The X-Files.

“He was to be the man to lead us, but he became destructive. He took only his own counsel. […] You have no idea this man’s need to control our fate.”

- Chris Carter, My Struggle III

It’s about control, and in this case the need to maintain it when what you have created threatens to become more than you. Chris Carter was given the opportunity to be the most powerful man in a world with a long reach and the power to inspire through change. He was given 25 years of viewership and acting talent and budget to make a TV show that was revolutionary. Only he doesn’t want a revolution. He wants things to be as he sees them, his characters to be clean and platonic and known; blank canvases who spring back from torment unscathed, ready to have fresh terror and trauma rained upon them. Just to add interest. Chris Carter cannot see that the X-Files universe is one of collaboration, of unexpected circumstance sparking development, of characters becoming more than they are written. In his desire to air the biggest, most complicated conspiracy arc of all time, he is missing that many of the most beloved and iconic episodes are about small people and issues that are the more impactful for their lack of wham-bam-drama.

Why else would he, at the end of a dramatic episode that had fairly successfully fixed a tricky cliff-hanger, (an episode that I actually quite enjoyed), would he use the last three minutes to rewrite everything based on a harmful, damaging, degrading alteration of the show’s long term narrative. Mulder and Scully refer to William as ‘our son’, Scully, a medical doctor, claims William’s stem-cells will save Mulder, suggesting she knows they are genetically compatible (and we know from canon that she knows the difference between a sibling and a parental match). Given this, given the many questions that are raised in My Struggle III about a new faction of human colonisation nutters, Scully’s mental health, Skinner’s maybe-betrayal and the possibility of an apocalyptic scenario, why would we need to throw in a medical rape, ret-conning En Ami and rendering irrelevant much of the character work (Mulder and Scully as grieving parents) that he has done in the seasons since?

“Because Chris Carter” is the only reason I can come up with. It’s a self-indulgent flexing of muscles nobody asked to see and for that I will struggle to forgive him.

The calculated cruelty of his treatment of his world, characters and audience is irredeemable, and were it not for the culture of discourse in this fandom, the possibility of appreciating much of the rest of the show, its writing and performances, my struggle would be reconciling my feelings for Chris Carter and my love of The X-Files.

Fortunately, outside the writing room, the X-Files is beyond his control. The friendships it creates, the community it fosters have the power to keep the world of Mulder and Scully from descending irrevocably into a racist, misogynistic soup, even if canon’s gravity is headed that way. It crosses cultural boundaries, asks brave questions and it brings us together in our outrage. The wounds left by Carter are met by creative bandages, fanworks which take the best of the show and its people and make beautiful, powerful statements. So don’t be ashamed to love this mess of a show or allow Chris Carter’s megalomania to drive you away (though I do not judge you if it does). Get mad, get inspired and get loud in whatever way you can. Let Fox know that whatever comes next, either for The X-Files or a new show, behaviour like Chris Carter’s will not go unnoticed. Write letters, write emails, scream it on your social media, talk to your friends, make it clear to anyone who will listen, even if it is only one person, that The X-Files fandom will not support rape culture. Perhaps it feels small but all revolutions start with a whisper. Changing one mind is a huge victory.

Do it for Dana Scully, who deserved better and for all the little girls she inspired who deserve more than a world in which their idol is a man’s plaything

#txf #txf commentary #txf s11 #meta #chris carter #rapegate #my struggle iii #problematic faves #rose thinks #criticism

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kinetic-elaboration · 7 years ago

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March 2: (Not Quite) A Cleanse

So...I think I’m finally coming out of this bad mood that’s been trailing me for...a while. Maybe. It’s still tentative. But I’m feeling a little more ambitious and more capable of positive thinking.

I don’t want to get too much into self-analysis and planning because it’s boring, not as useful as it feels like it should be, and not really in the spirit of this project, either. I’m old enough and know myself well enough to understand the cycle of my moods by now and it’s not worth describing to myself how it goes.

But. One specific thing that’s been nagging me and that I would like to...tweak in my life. I’ve been thinking off and on for a while about the ways all of our brains have been fucked by the internet/smart phones/social media, and I read a fair number of articles and think pieces about it and blah blah blah. I know, I objectively know, that blue light distorts sleep and that social media is designed to make you constantly refresh and refresh, (apps too), and obsess over metrics, and that these habits are not only a time suck, they make us unhappier and, perhaps worst of all, turn us into pawns of social media developers who just want to exploit us for ad revenue--I KNOW all of this. Fuck, I remember a time when the internet had zero place in my life, and a time after that when it was basically finite: an hour or so and I got fucking bored.

And all of this bothers me. The thing is that I’m probably more reasonable in my internet and social media use than the average bear, and I am quite adamant on not backsliding from where I am, for sure. I don’t have a smart phone, I don’t have facebook or twitter accounts, I keep some parts of my day screen free...

But I’m not where I want to be at all. But I don’t know what to change. Utter purge as an experiment? More strict rules for myself? More ways to trick myself?

Two things have brought this to the fore of my mind recently. One is that, for whatever reason, during my bad mood, I did what I often do and started randomly obsessing about something as a distraction and in this case I picked AO3 kudos and my disdain for them. Which is probably a distraction from issues I have with writing--with, tbqh, balancing a second unpaid job on top of my actual job, which is, stress-wise, what it is sometimes. A second job I can’t quit because it’s like integral to my being. But I just felt myself going into this death spiral of annoyance, irrationality, and irritability over something dumb, something rather Beside the Point.

The second thing was this article about a tool to take the stats off of Twitter, and about what social media stats do to us more generally. I’m not on Twitter but it made me think I would love to take the stats off tumblr tbh. At least hide my follower count. I try not to look but, first, it’s right there, and second, there’s other info on the same drop down I do want: my queue, my likes. I know objectively that it doesn’t matter, first because it just doesn’t but second because the nature of my blog means I’ve probably reached my permanent high point of followers. I was gaining a bunch at the end of last year for some unknown reason but I think that’s done. I’m not strictly fandom, I’m not strictly a theme, I write but I’m not a Popular Writer... The number is meaningless but I’m just hardwired to Care about numbers and put value on them even though objectively I know I shouldn’t.

I want to...have a comfortable and healthy relationship with technology and the internet and tumblr/AO3. A part of me wants to Utterly Cleanse, like unplug for a week or something, but that’s short term and also probably not worth the trouble. So I’m trying to think of other, more realistic, stuff.

For a few weeks now, I’ve stopped looking at any screens before I get to work on weekdays, which was definitely a good decision. I’ve also blocked my fandom email on my laptop Monday-Thursday. I can still check it at work (and I do) and on the weekends.

This week, I’ve decided to block my fandom email from my laptop 24/7 and to try to check it at work less often (that’s hard because vague but I’m only human--but frankly my ability to refresh-refresh-refresh like a lab rat at work is limited what with actually having to work). I’ve also blocked my AO3 dashboard--which has my inbox on it--so I can’t look for comments there. And I’ve unsubscribed from getting kudos emails to teach myself to forget they exist. I’ve never thought of them as important or gotten any joy from receiving them so why do they clog up my inbox? That’s gone now.

As for tumblr...scrolling through my dash after work is how I unkink my mind and unwind, and since it’s hiatus and I don’t follow many blogs, it doesn’t even take that long. There’s also fairly little wank--again, hiatus, and I don’t follow blogs that become hubs of discourse. I don’t think there’s a time-suck issue here, or a too-much-rage-inducing-shit issue either. So I think there it’s just a question of keeping myself calm and detached and using this blog for the purpose it was always intended to have: to be a collection of stuff I like, and if other people want to see that, be my guest, but it doesn’t really matter.

And finally, I’m going to try to stress less about writing. I feel like it’s been rolling out of my hands recently in a way that’s hard to describe. Like I’m somehow subtly writing more for other people or caring more about what other people think or feeling this weird irrational obligation to other people. That needs to stop. I don’t know how, but I need to free myself from second guessing everything as I write and just enjoy putting the stories in my head down on paper. I can nitpick them later, as I edit. (This never used to be a problem for me but for the last several months I haven’t been able to shut the critical voice up, even when I’m in the zone.) (This are really two different problems: a macro and a micro problem. I don’t know if they’re related.)

So anyway it’s the weekend. There’s a lot I want to do... but it’s only two days. Right now I need to shower and then sleep soon. That will be a good start.

#the year 2018 #2018: rl #gosh this is long

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