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good-to-drive · 6 months ago

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Abuse, Silence, And Why Kevin Can Fuck Himself

I recently finished watching Kevin Can Fuck Himself on Netflix, and, aside from being the most brutally honest portrayal of domestic abuse I have ever seen, I discovered a beautifully written examination of narrative as power and silence as abuse and how this manifests in our larger culture.

Without going into too much detail, the show is filmed in two distinct styles that are interleaved throughout each episode to tell a cohesive story. Allison and Kevin’s relationship as seen by the rest of the world is told through a multi-cam, laugh-track sitcom that depicts a very typical “goofy husband, shrewish wife” mainstream comedy. Allison’s life through her own eyes is told through a single-cam drama/thriller about Allison planning to murder Kevin to escape his abuse.

It’s an absolute masterclass in screenwriting, but more than that, every episode explores the difference between truth, fact, and reality, and how none of these things are quite as much or as little as story. But while the process of transforming the chaotic and plotless reality of life into a story is as involuntary and essential as breathing, misogyny and the degradation of women is just as ubiquitous in our society, and a story that exists at the expense of another person’s lived reality is a refutation of their humanity.

It's also just a great show for anyone who likes to engage with history (or reality TV or true crime or “real life stories” in general), because while we have to tell ourselves stories about her own lives, we have to tell ourselves stories about other people as well. Eternal silence is narrative death, and the perpetual silence of an unspoken narrative is often the last death we can visit on someone whose story we’d rather ignore.

I also pulled up some books – Lolita and Disgrace – that dealt with similar themes, but from the perspective of the abuser. And what strikes me the most is that, across three beautifully written stories about narrative and silence within a culture that normalizes abuse, Allison, who began her story within a state of narrative death, was the only point-of-view character who had any chance of surviving.

One of the main themes of Kevin is that a compelling story is often a story that reinforces what we already believe or like to believe, and while the story may be factual and true it often also exists at the expense of someone's lived reality. The exact same series of events can be a silly joke or a harrowing tale of abuse depending on the lens through which we view it, but historically we've only been willing to see the multicam, laugh track, sitcom perspective on unbalanced relationships.

The alchemical process of turning a series of disjoint facts and experiences into a narrative creates something new and compelling, and erases much of what previously existed. In this way, it’s entirely irreversible. We spin our experiences into a very thin thread, a story we can tell ourselves that elicits something within us, something we need in order to live with the complex, uncertain, and unsatisfying reality of life. In think in many ways the thing we elicit in ourselves is truth. But truth is both more and less than fact, often more a reflection of our own beliefs and desires than the events of our lives. And in telling that truth we may never stray from the facts, but we almost by definition cannot give voice to another person’s reality.

There's a scene in season 2 of Kevin when Allison is hit by a door – a la the classic excuse – because of Kevin’s carelessness. And while he absolutely did not hit her, the way it's written is such an incredible allegory for how Kevin has curated their story and curated their friends' and family’s perceptions of their story such that even if she tells everyone the exact, unvarnished truth of what's happening to her and begs for help, they will only be capable of seeing the laugh-track, sitcom, “Kevin is a harmless goofball and his wife is a total shrew” perspective on the events of their lives.

As so often happens with abuse, their friends and family saw Allison being hurt because of Kevin. But the alchemy of creating a narrative around Kevin and Allison is irreversible, and the series of events they witness can only be spun together to a joke, an accident, a silly, childish mistake. Allison’s reality, Allison’s pain and fear, is completely elided. Like a lost sound in the middle of a sentence, her experience goes silent, and their larger understanding of her relationship never has to change. And you feel so acutely how Allison lives her entire life in that silence.

Storytelling is human, it’s essential, there’s no other way to engage with our own lives. And it’s not lying. It’s never lying to tell the truth. But it doesn’t reflect every reality, either, because another person’s reality can’t be reflected within our own narrative, because that’s what it means to be another person. To spin two different threads.

And because narrative is the essential process by which we understand our reality, denying someone their own narrative, or denying that this narrative be heard, is inherently abusive. To allow someone a voice is to give them humanity, and to suppress it is to strip that humanity away.

Disgrace, by J.M. Coetzee, follows the story of a professor, David, who rapes a student and then fails to protect his daughter, Lucy, from being raped by intruders in their home. He destroys his daughter’s life – not through failing to protect her, but through twisting her rape into a story about why the rape of his student wasn’t wrong. The main theme of the book is generally considered to be exploitation, but Coetzee doesn’t deal with the exploitation of the rape. That’s too direct, too immediate, too easy for the reader to understand as misogynistic and wrong. Rather, Coetzee delves into “the innocuous-seeming use of another person to fill one's gentler emotional needs” (Ruden).

The rape is how we understand David as a fundamentally exploitative person, a person who denies others their humanity by converting them into a vessel for his own desires, who erases their voice in order to speak through them and give himself the things he needs. And that’s how we recognize that the way he absorbs and claims the stories of his daughter and his student is another kind of violation of their humanity. Another way of turning women into vessels for men’s pain and fear and need.

What’s fascinating is that David's student finds her voice – files a complaint against him – and is eventually able to continue with her life. The woman he raped is less damaged by him than his own daughter, because she was the woman he couldn’t permanently silence.

In Lolita, another brilliant novel about abuse, dehumanization, and storytelling, Humbert turns to the reader at the end and says, “Imagine us, reader, for we don’t really exist if you don’t.”

It’s not that Humbert knew he was fictional, but that he knew everyone was fictional. Believed the entire world only truly existed in his own mind, because anything beyond that was irrelevant to his needs. He coped with the collapse of his ability to dehumanize Dolores (who he called Lolita) by demanding that his voice be resurrected. Demanding immortality. Demanding his narrative exist in another person’s world, and thereby be given the existence and humanity that Allison and Dolores and Lucy and David’s student were denied.

Pushing his needs, finally, onto the reader, because we are the only person he has left, and a person like him can only exist through the use of another. In that way, Humbert was powerless. In that way, Kevin and David were powerless, too.

In Disgrace, David’s dream is to write an opera, and at the end of the book he realizes he’ll never finish his magnum opus. He’ll never be able to terminate the process of converting himself, his world, into a story. But he does learn to decenter himself in that narrative. And it’s when he loses all fear of death, and any conception of the self, that he gains the ability to give dogs – who he generally equates to women – a voice within his opera, his life’s work.

It’s in death that we discover our true unimportance as human beings, that we learn to let go of vanity and our conception of the self entirely. And David had degraded women so thoroughly in order to justify how he used them to meet his own emotional needs that it was only in losing all value for his own life that he could gain the ability to see them as equal voices. To actually put those voices into his own life story. It's at the cost of himself that he allows other people to truly exist, in the death of the self that he finally allows the world to exist outside of himself. It’s almost a positive character arc. Almost.

When Kevin finally loses the ability to abuse Allison, he, like many abusers, loses all desire to live. His world was built on a structure of superiority and inferiority, on beings and vessels, on the inherent value of men and the inherent meaninglessness of women’s lives. The system on which he based his entire reality has been destroyed by Allison’s declaration of the self. And, if he was a being because she was a vessel, then in losing the ability to treat her as a vessel, to fully and completely dehumanize her, he has lost his own humanity.

It may be perfectly summed up here: “Become major. Live like a hero. That's what the classics teach us. Be a main character. Otherwise, what is life for?” (Coetzee).

If you’re not to be a main character, if there indeed is no split between major and minor characters, between people and the paper dolls that populate their story, between living beings and the vessels into which they pour their need – what is life for?

Nothing. At least, not for people whose narrative must exist at the expense of another.

And that’s why I say that only a narrator like Allison could survive this kind of story. Despite beginning her story trapped in eternal silence, her reality fully elided no matter how immediate and obvious it became, Allison was the only point-of-view character of any of these three stories who didn’t establish her power through the degradation of another. Who didn’t conceptualize the world via being and vessels. Whose narrative didn’t exist, by necessity, at the expense of another person’s humanity. Whose thread could exist in a larger tapestry without destroying her sense of self.

Don’t get me wrong, she’s not generally a likable character. She’s misogynistic, cruel, selfish, jealous, desperate, afraid, and in pain. Like anyone in an abusive relationship, she’s not at her best, and she’s often pushed to do things that are ugly and disturbing because she’s simply been pushed too far.

But, for me, the power in her character is in how her last scene never felt like a final scene. Her story didn’t have to be killed, her conception of the self didn’t have to be killed, in order to reveal the brutal reality of stories twisting and intertwining without any inherently superior truth or narrative among them. Allison’s story was one of declaring herself. And that’s why it didn’t feel like it ended at the end. Instead, this felt like a beginning.

#this is probably the most egregious 'post that no one asked for' that I've ever written #but man this show HIT me y'all #and then I went back and reread parts of disgrace and that hit me too #it also made me reconsider my online presence and how I myself engage with narrative in the very small little world I'm a part of #I caught some shit a while ago and made a conscious decision to never comment on the narrative around mental health #and to be clear I was just talking about a general narrative in society at large I wasn't bringing up anything specific or attacking people #more how larger social narratives filter into and sometimes come to define individual stories #but it was upsetting to people and I figured instead I can just try to express a compassionate perspective on the mentally ill myself #but now I wonder if I've gone too far #idk without naming any names I'm getting unblocked by people who should definitely still find my mindset intolerable to their worldview #and I don't blame them because we all have reasons for the things we believe and we're all just doing our best #but it's a canary in the coal mine #it makes me think I've become so focused on not ruffling feathers that I'm tacitly approving some disturbing beliefs #and I think I could have happily ignored that if I hadn't just watched this show #posts that no one asked for #kevin can fuck himself #kevin can f*** himself #op #longer rambles

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lil-artist-blog-fandoms-ocs · 7 months ago

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DCA venom au

Chapter 1

The one where the reader goes out hiking and stargazing, but things take an unexpected turn.

alien DCA x human Reader (qpr)

Warnings: pessimistic thoughts, thoughts of death(not graphic), thoughts of war(not graphic), description of sickness

This would be just another day of your life. Would be, if you didn't take a few days off to go hiking in the nearest forest. What were you even doing here? The ground is hard, the campfire smells not as good as people say it does, the forest creatures make all sorts of noises.

And the freaking s'more is just a sticky, sugary disappointment.

You lick your fingers, trying to clean up the sticky goo of the burned marshmallow. Your fingers taste gross. You abandon all hope and go for some baby wipes to deal with it.

A good question. What were you doing out here, so far away from civilization and your favorite small grocery shop that has this wild variety of instant noodles? You wouldn't even consider going away from your work, but this coworker wouldn't stop nagging you. Something about "very good thing happening", or how did she say it? Doesn't matter. She shouldn't be so much into those fancy cards.

A small breath left your lips, the night air was crisp and fresh, making your body shiver a bit. You move a bit closer to the campfire.

This whole trip was a big waste of time, the comfortable routine you've carved for yourself was ruined, and now you also had dirt under your nails.

The night wind blew softly, making the trees and bushes rustle. Almost sounds like a whisper. Or steps of an animal. Spooky.

You wondered for a moment if there were wild animals here. That'd be a dumb way to die: perish only because you didn't check if there were bears or wolves or something else in this area. Not that you'd care if you died. Nor would anyone really. You felt bad for the poor soul that would find your b-

You bite on the fried mushroom and burn your tongue. You hiss, snapping from the dark thoughts and covering your mouth with a hand as if it's gonna help you somehow. You really should learn to wait sometimes.

Fried sausage. Fried potatoes. Fried mushrooms. S'mores. What else do you remember hearing other people eat during camping? … You couldn't remember. Oh well. You were full anyway.

The night sky was clear. Some white dots were visible even when you were sitting next to the campfire. After some thinking, you decided that you don't want to skip the stargazing and threw a blanket over yourself.

You settled on the ground a few meters from the fire. Air felt so much colder already.

But the stars? Oh, they were beautiful.

Your eyes had gazed upon this vast nothingness filled with sparks of light. The human frame so tiny and insignificant in comparison. And yet it felt like this nothingness wanted to crash down at you like a tidal wave. To pull you in, to swallow you whole, to have you amongst its tiny dots.

It was breathtaking, to say the least.

You were alone. So, so alone. All these stars were alone. Millions and billions years away from each other. From you. You were far, far away from everyone. So far away for so long.

You wondered if you still had your light.

Another soft sigh left your lips and the world went dark for a few long seconds.

You tried so, so hard to not let your thoughts drift off and spiral. You were alone and there were a lot of ways to do what the voices in your head would tell you. You didn't want to ruin the day of some random ranger.

You opened your eyes, meeting the stars above once more.

Wait, was it just you or one of the stars became brighter? And bigger too. What's-

In a blink of an eye, the flash brightened the sky before disappearing just as fast. The air shook and made you jump when a loud BANG exploded somewhere to your side.

The war had started, you thought. A missile must've misfired and fallen in the forest. In a few moments you'll be covered by the energy wave, or whatever it's called, and you'll be gone. And no one will know you were here and became one of the victims. You closed your eyes once again, waiting for the worst.

One second. Two. … Minute. Two minutes…

Why is it taking so long?

You opened your eyes when you smelled the scent of burned wood.

A faint, barely visible trail of smoke followed from the depths of the woods. You didn't notice how your body moved on its own. You got up to your feet and went where the smoke was coming from.

Earth was soft and a bit creaky under your shoes. Little pebbles clanked softly with each step you took. You went deeper into the woods, led only by the faint smell of burning. Then, you saw it. The tops of the trees ahead were broken. The black tainted the torn branches. You followed the trail of damaged trees until you stumbled upon….a rock.

You blinked.

The rock was neatly sitting in the crevice of its own making. Some grass around it still had some splashes of red in it, you quickly made your way to step on those sparks. You didn't want animals to die in the fire. The ground was warm, you could feel it even through your shoes. In the dim moonlight you could see clouds of steam come off the rock.

That's when it hit you.

That wasn't a missile. That was a meteor. Or a comet. Or an asteroid. You never learned the difference. It didn't matter anyway. There was a freaking space rock right in front of you. A real rock, right from the skies above. As real as can be.

You could hold in a little squeal of happiness that left your throat.

You quickly stepped closer to this big space rock to take a closer look. You couldn't see it too well, since you failed in being logical and didn't bring a flashlight or your phone. The moon light was all you had.

It had a bunch of holes in it, kinda reminded you of a sponge. You hesitated before touching it, just to see what kind of texture-

You, once again, failed as a human being, as you touched the scolding hot space rock that burned grass around it. Good job.

But you still were able to feel some of it. It was weirdly smooth, like pebbles or glass shards that were left in a moving water for long. You weren't sure what it meant, but guess smooth is better than sharp. You'd be burned and cut. How fun it would be...

....

So, you saw something fall from the sky, but it's not like there's any danger or anything. Go back to the camp and enjoy the last few hours of your trip, right?

Wrong.

You wanted that space rock.

That space rock was calling for your weird fascination with cool rocks. And how cool would that be to have a literal space rock in your collection.

There's only one small problem.

This rock is half your size.

You stood there, looking this boulder over and trying to come up with a way to get it home so it could be a part of your collection. You clearly couldn't bring the whole thing, but maybe you'd be able to bring a piece?..

Oh, what if it's one of these cool rocks that people smash open to reveal pretty crystals inside. Geode, was it? You'd probably die from happiness if that was what it was.

You grabbed the nearest branch that looked sturdy enough. First time it hit the rock with a quiet knock. You hit harder. Nothing happens. You hit once again. The branch breaks, almost hitting you in the face.

Okay, so a stick won't work. Maybe another rock will?

You quickly find a rather big rock with sharp edges. You hold it securely with both hands as you take a stand.

Breathe in. Smash. Again, breathe in. Smash. Once more, breathe in. SMASH.

The boulder cracked loudly and you dropped your tool to pry it open, cursing the hot surface. But there were no crystals inside.

It looked as if you tore a sponge apart, the holes you saw on the surface went all the way through the rock. It was black on the inside. Wait, is it wet?-

....

You woke up when the sun was right above your head, effectively blinding you. You sat up, looking around. You were right where you were stargazing at night. All your stuff just as you left it, you even had your blanket on.

What a weird dream. But no time to dwell on it, you didn't like wasting time out here. Touching grass and watching nature wasn't enough to solve all your problems. You need your job and the comfort of your routine.

Stuffing some leftover fried mushrooms and potatoes in yourself as a breakfast, you quickly gather up your belongings and clean up after yourself. The trip back is long, but uneventful, except some dizziness you felt closer to the end. But you never moved so much before, so you figured that was as normal as seeing dark circles when you stand up a bit too quickly.

Surely, when you make it home, take a shower and have a good 18 hour long nap in your bed you'll be fine. And the management would be so happy to know that one of their nameless employees that took a week off would return only after a couple of days.

….

You make it home in a cold sweat. Your limbs feel like they're made out of overcooked pasta, you're dizzy as if you took a few turns of riding on a rollercoaster and you feel so sick that you think all your inner workings want to escape your body and leave you behind as an empty shell. The work can wait, looks like you've got severe food poisoning.

Damn mushrooms, you knew you shouldn't have trusted them.

The next day comes and goes in a haze. Time doesn't exist as you fall asleep and wake up a dozen times.

You tried eating, but anything that entered your mouth was pushed out by your raging stomach, so you were hanging only on water and bread. You cursed the mushrooms you ate on your trip for a hundredth time as you stood on your knees in front of the toilet bowl.

You'll never accept any food from the coworker that is into taro cards.

You're barely able to stand up to wash your face and mouth, hoping to get rid of the bitter taste. You splash some cold water on your face and then-

"How long is it gonna last?"

You jumped, startled by the sudden voice that came seemingly out of nowhere. You glanced around, paranoid that someone was in the bathroom with you, but you were alone.

"We can't eat, I'm hungry."

You jumped again as a slightly different voice whined in your ear. You were still alone. There was a long pause, before you sighed and whispered. "I guess I finally lost it. I have hallucinations now..."

"Hey, we aren't hallucinations! How rude." The voice calls.

"That's what a hallucination would say." You answer into nothingness. Well, if you were loosing it, might as well make the best of it.

Your left hand moves on its own and lightly slaps you on the face.

"Real enough?" A slightly huskier voice chuckles in your head. Pain feels real. That freaks you out a bit.

"That's my hand." You protest.

"Our hand." Both voices respond.

"Am I possessed by the ghosts of the soviets?"

No answer. For an alarmingly long time.

"No." Was all they answered.

"What are you then?" You ask, wondering what your hallucinations are gonna say.

"We're yours. And you're ours."

You were too sick to deal with it, so you went to lay down in bed and continue being miserable.

"What does it even mean?" You grunt, plopping yourself onto the bed.

"That means you're stuck with us, human." The higher voice called out suspiciously cheerfully.

You just groan. "Great, I'm having food poisoning and a bad trip."

The voice in your head grumbles, as if offended that you didn't stop thinking it was just a hallucination.

"That's not actually food poisoning." The huskier one says. "That might be because of us."

"Yup, your body doesn't want us here!"

"Too bad we can't leave."

"It can't get rid of us! We're bound now!"

You groaned once again, their chirping just making your headache worse. "Can you shut up for a minute?"

"Oh, do you still feel sick?" The chirpier voice asks.

You grunt in response, rubbing your eyes.

"Hm, maybe we can help with it…"

....

You don't remember anything after that.

The only thing you knew when you opened your eyes was that your body wasn't trying to get rid of your organs anymore. When you came back into this world and checked your phone, you noticed that a day was erased from your memory. It takes you some time to process everything, but you guessed that everything was just a weird fever dream.

You turn in your bed and take the phone in other hand to scroll through the news, just to see what you missed while fighting with the sickness. You thought how odd it was that you started hearing voices. It's been a long time since you had auditory hallucinations.

Anyway, you're just glad it's over now-

"Do you feel better now?" The voice in your head calls out cheerfully.

You drop the phone on your face.

#dca #dca fandom #dca au #dca venom au #dca venom au y/n #dca venom au Sun #dca venom au Moon #dca x y/n #dca x reader #mun writes #THAT'S IT FOLKS I'M OFFICIALLY TOO FAR GONE #I'M WRITING SHIT NOW #(that's how you know I'm totally normal about something)#also ask to tag cuz i know very little about triggers #no proofreading we die like men

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