~~ rationalization fixation
May. 31st, 2004 02:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
reenkaI think I get carried away and forget to say exactly what I mean sometimes, so when I say "I hate fanon Draco", I don't actually mean that in a sweeping sense, really. I mean I can't stand the idealization of particular characteristics in any person. I mean that to take away someone's right to make awful mistakes in judgement is, to me, to take away their humanity.
Everyone has their horrors, y'know. My horror is forcing people to be self-aware, mostly because I so -want- them to be that way naturally somehow, and also because I feel I'm rather violently irrational and I cling to my emotional responses to things, I suppose. I feel a strong empathy towards someone who'd have their (unhealthy) passion stolen from them.
The only real excuse I can think of for loving idealized characters is that this is a normal part of growing up, of adolescent development-- so it would be perfectly okay for a 14 year-old, say, to have idols, to refuse to see the ugly irrationalities of human nature in their favorite celebrity or someone older they look up to. This is a left-over from how children view their parents, I'd imagine.
This sort of reminds me of fairy-tales like Cinderella, where the girl hero is, at first glance, perfect: obedient yet reasonably rebellious, kind yet mean to the ones that deserve it, and of course, as pretty as can be. The thing is, behind this veneer of supposed perfection, Cinderella is more like where Harry started off-- the real core of her is a girl who -fights- and resists keeping to her "place". It's not that she wants to be beautiful or powerful, really-- which is why she winds up with these things. She's basically herself regardless of -what- she's doing, which is why she can make the transition. That is the core of the fairy-tale, I think: not that she was always perfect, but that she was always fiercely, sincerely alive, and that shone through.
But above a certain age, doesn't the need for idols become dangerous? This sort of willful blind eye towards our flaws could easily become something that -has- to be there, it seems to me. At what point do we need fanon Draco, for instance, because ugliness is no longer palatable? And that point where we need to tell this lie to ourselves to feel okay-- that's the point of dystopia; of horror.
It's an integral part of growing up, isn't it? Seeing the world and the people in it without its childhood glitter (yet still retaining a sense of wonder and the capacity for hope, of course). You grow up and you realize that Santa Claus didn't exist-- just like Harry did. You realize that your father was a prick and your mentor figure lied to you for whatever reason, that you basically have no one but yourself because you can never predict when people will change or disappear-- and the things people had said to protect you have actually been lies that now hurt you. You realize you're existentially alone, and there's no friendship and no father-figure-- nothing there to fully lift that burden.
And without that realization-- without that bleakness to be accepted or overcome or what have you-- what's the real worth of the ideals one still holds, anyway? What's so exciting about someone being able to overcome these existential issues with some epiphany of reason? What can anyone take away from a story like that? What's the use of it, even as fantasy, in the end? It has nothing to do with us; it doesn't have to do with our hearts.
One may wonder why, exactly, I'm -so- upset... and okay, it's.... Somewhat hypocritical at first glance, but. Eh. It's specific things that bother me, like... not so much the enjoyment of whatever fantasy but... when I think about it..... the implications. Like, in reviewing and thinking about it, mostly. Gah.
It occurs to me that most leading characters in American pop culture (well, movies & TV) are heavily idealized, so perhaps there's a genuine mass appeal to this that stretches beyond amateur writing do's & don't's. Perhaps there's something about the culture that encourages the creation of these "stars". I would say that fanon!Draco easily fits the mold of a pop or movie star. In a way, he's possibly more rational rather than emotionally-centric, but that's a small quibble. He's basically of a certain Hollywood-style heroic mold, isn't he. Hmm. The only difference is that Hollywood heroes start out that way; they don't really start ugly, generally.
This brings me to all kinds of thoughts about the submersion of ugliness & undesirable qualities in the men (and boys) that are set out for public consumption. It's not a coincidence that fanon!Draco is pretty enough to be an American-style model-- stick-thin, blond, often expressionless, pouty. I suppose that's what they look like in Vogue & so on, isn't it? Yeah, I think so.
~~
It's the type of fanon "fixing" that bothers me. The rationalization-type fixing. I don't care if someone's wittier, snarkier, sexier, more dapper, or has an entirely different personality, not so much. Buuuut, when you make anyone more -rational- & kind of force them to be "right", that's when I get upset.
These are the most commonly idealized supposed "improvements", and basically they grate on me. The idea that one can just wake up and be reasonable and "see the light". For some reason, I can't leave that alone.
- Becoming self-aware: as far as I know, this takes not only intelligence but a fair amount of introversion to achieve, especially during adolescence. True self-awareness, where one actually sees one's mistakes in the short-term and overcomes one's prejudices by sheer force of reason, is almost unheard of. No one does this, in other words; or so close to no one that it's equivalent.
There is very little that could be said to justify such a ridiculous development in any person, but if it did happen, the process of such complete re-evaluation would have to be painful and time-consuming. It is impossible to "wake up" to "reality". You can only pain-stakingly reconstruct it, especially after years of brain-washing by one's parents & the society one is part of.
- Rage removal: keeps happening simply because one "matures", and inexplicably, love is the inevitable consequence. Anger seems like the greatest hurdle to love, since it tends to overwhelm all other emotions and is so difficult to let go of. So perhaps this makes sense in a way, but it still bothers me 'cause it's so much like some horrid form of cheating. To be -cheated- of one's anger without it being dealt with... that's a frightening thing to me.
While love may follow any number of previous feelings, from irritation to admiration to hatred, actual "love" takes some significant amount of knowledge of that which you love, as well as a healthy amount of that fickle beast called "self-awareness". Many characters say, "but we don't know each other, how could we love each other" in fics, but then go on and proclaim love anyway. This, while realistic in terms of denial by the characters, shouldn't be reinforced by the objective events or turns a story takes.
Love is routinely denied and acted against the grain of by people who're not very self-aware or not ready to face its consequences. Accepting it when it's unexpected or contrary to past experience is part of accepting oneself in general, which takes time and a certain amount of courage enough people simply don't have, anyway. Commitment is an even greater hurdle to cross for such people, on top of all that.
And I suppose it's personally upsetting to me to have anger be summarily removed as if it was never of any real consequence. It's like-- where does that sort of thing -go-, anyway?
- Rationality: along with logic and common sense, this is a rare and precious quality with most teenagers, and a goodly portion of the human race in general. If there is an obvious, "sane" solution to some problem, one can trust most people not to take it into account. This is just another way of saying that young people are notorious for making mistakes, and these mistakes are generally a consequence of not listening to what their heads tell them.
One of the most improbable things you could imagine is writing a character who simply has a tendency to make the right choices. That in itself is a dangerous lie if it's believed, because you create this -type- of person who does the "right thing", as if it's a consequence of the "right" personality type. There's no such thing as a person who tends to do the right thing, really.
In Hollywood movies, you often have the main character somehow dance through the whole film, jumping these rigged hurdles like a professional athlete, it seems. The whole point is that the hero has to win. The philosophy is the same, even if it's transferred to fanon!Draco, who suffers the opposite fate in canon. I mean, in reality, no one wins, really. There's no such thing as a "winner" in practice-- everyone sacrifices something precious when they pursue a goal to the exclusion of whatever else. We are all losers, basically, and rationality and reasonable decisions don't actually make us any more likely to "succeed" in terms of other human beings.
I think I've succeeded in losing whatever real point I had, btw, once I got over my sudden... er... frustration. Yes. That's it -.-
Everyone has their horrors, y'know. My horror is forcing people to be self-aware, mostly because I so -want- them to be that way naturally somehow, and also because I feel I'm rather violently irrational and I cling to my emotional responses to things, I suppose. I feel a strong empathy towards someone who'd have their (unhealthy) passion stolen from them.
The only real excuse I can think of for loving idealized characters is that this is a normal part of growing up, of adolescent development-- so it would be perfectly okay for a 14 year-old, say, to have idols, to refuse to see the ugly irrationalities of human nature in their favorite celebrity or someone older they look up to. This is a left-over from how children view their parents, I'd imagine.
This sort of reminds me of fairy-tales like Cinderella, where the girl hero is, at first glance, perfect: obedient yet reasonably rebellious, kind yet mean to the ones that deserve it, and of course, as pretty as can be. The thing is, behind this veneer of supposed perfection, Cinderella is more like where Harry started off-- the real core of her is a girl who -fights- and resists keeping to her "place". It's not that she wants to be beautiful or powerful, really-- which is why she winds up with these things. She's basically herself regardless of -what- she's doing, which is why she can make the transition. That is the core of the fairy-tale, I think: not that she was always perfect, but that she was always fiercely, sincerely alive, and that shone through.
But above a certain age, doesn't the need for idols become dangerous? This sort of willful blind eye towards our flaws could easily become something that -has- to be there, it seems to me. At what point do we need fanon Draco, for instance, because ugliness is no longer palatable? And that point where we need to tell this lie to ourselves to feel okay-- that's the point of dystopia; of horror.
It's an integral part of growing up, isn't it? Seeing the world and the people in it without its childhood glitter (yet still retaining a sense of wonder and the capacity for hope, of course). You grow up and you realize that Santa Claus didn't exist-- just like Harry did. You realize that your father was a prick and your mentor figure lied to you for whatever reason, that you basically have no one but yourself because you can never predict when people will change or disappear-- and the things people had said to protect you have actually been lies that now hurt you. You realize you're existentially alone, and there's no friendship and no father-figure-- nothing there to fully lift that burden.
And without that realization-- without that bleakness to be accepted or overcome or what have you-- what's the real worth of the ideals one still holds, anyway? What's so exciting about someone being able to overcome these existential issues with some epiphany of reason? What can anyone take away from a story like that? What's the use of it, even as fantasy, in the end? It has nothing to do with us; it doesn't have to do with our hearts.
One may wonder why, exactly, I'm -so- upset... and okay, it's.... Somewhat hypocritical at first glance, but. Eh. It's specific things that bother me, like... not so much the enjoyment of whatever fantasy but... when I think about it..... the implications. Like, in reviewing and thinking about it, mostly. Gah.
It occurs to me that most leading characters in American pop culture (well, movies & TV) are heavily idealized, so perhaps there's a genuine mass appeal to this that stretches beyond amateur writing do's & don't's. Perhaps there's something about the culture that encourages the creation of these "stars". I would say that fanon!Draco easily fits the mold of a pop or movie star. In a way, he's possibly more rational rather than emotionally-centric, but that's a small quibble. He's basically of a certain Hollywood-style heroic mold, isn't he. Hmm. The only difference is that Hollywood heroes start out that way; they don't really start ugly, generally.
This brings me to all kinds of thoughts about the submersion of ugliness & undesirable qualities in the men (and boys) that are set out for public consumption. It's not a coincidence that fanon!Draco is pretty enough to be an American-style model-- stick-thin, blond, often expressionless, pouty. I suppose that's what they look like in Vogue & so on, isn't it? Yeah, I think so.
~~
It's the type of fanon "fixing" that bothers me. The rationalization-type fixing. I don't care if someone's wittier, snarkier, sexier, more dapper, or has an entirely different personality, not so much. Buuuut, when you make anyone more -rational- & kind of force them to be "right", that's when I get upset.
These are the most commonly idealized supposed "improvements", and basically they grate on me. The idea that one can just wake up and be reasonable and "see the light". For some reason, I can't leave that alone.
- Becoming self-aware: as far as I know, this takes not only intelligence but a fair amount of introversion to achieve, especially during adolescence. True self-awareness, where one actually sees one's mistakes in the short-term and overcomes one's prejudices by sheer force of reason, is almost unheard of. No one does this, in other words; or so close to no one that it's equivalent.
There is very little that could be said to justify such a ridiculous development in any person, but if it did happen, the process of such complete re-evaluation would have to be painful and time-consuming. It is impossible to "wake up" to "reality". You can only pain-stakingly reconstruct it, especially after years of brain-washing by one's parents & the society one is part of.
- Rage removal: keeps happening simply because one "matures", and inexplicably, love is the inevitable consequence. Anger seems like the greatest hurdle to love, since it tends to overwhelm all other emotions and is so difficult to let go of. So perhaps this makes sense in a way, but it still bothers me 'cause it's so much like some horrid form of cheating. To be -cheated- of one's anger without it being dealt with... that's a frightening thing to me.
While love may follow any number of previous feelings, from irritation to admiration to hatred, actual "love" takes some significant amount of knowledge of that which you love, as well as a healthy amount of that fickle beast called "self-awareness". Many characters say, "but we don't know each other, how could we love each other" in fics, but then go on and proclaim love anyway. This, while realistic in terms of denial by the characters, shouldn't be reinforced by the objective events or turns a story takes.
Love is routinely denied and acted against the grain of by people who're not very self-aware or not ready to face its consequences. Accepting it when it's unexpected or contrary to past experience is part of accepting oneself in general, which takes time and a certain amount of courage enough people simply don't have, anyway. Commitment is an even greater hurdle to cross for such people, on top of all that.
And I suppose it's personally upsetting to me to have anger be summarily removed as if it was never of any real consequence. It's like-- where does that sort of thing -go-, anyway?
- Rationality: along with logic and common sense, this is a rare and precious quality with most teenagers, and a goodly portion of the human race in general. If there is an obvious, "sane" solution to some problem, one can trust most people not to take it into account. This is just another way of saying that young people are notorious for making mistakes, and these mistakes are generally a consequence of not listening to what their heads tell them.
One of the most improbable things you could imagine is writing a character who simply has a tendency to make the right choices. That in itself is a dangerous lie if it's believed, because you create this -type- of person who does the "right thing", as if it's a consequence of the "right" personality type. There's no such thing as a person who tends to do the right thing, really.
In Hollywood movies, you often have the main character somehow dance through the whole film, jumping these rigged hurdles like a professional athlete, it seems. The whole point is that the hero has to win. The philosophy is the same, even if it's transferred to fanon!Draco, who suffers the opposite fate in canon. I mean, in reality, no one wins, really. There's no such thing as a "winner" in practice-- everyone sacrifices something precious when they pursue a goal to the exclusion of whatever else. We are all losers, basically, and rationality and reasonable decisions don't actually make us any more likely to "succeed" in terms of other human beings.
I think I've succeeded in losing whatever real point I had, btw, once I got over my sudden... er... frustration. Yes. That's it -.-
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-05-30 11:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 12:08 am (UTC)quickly, quickly!
............hopefully not too many people saw most of that ><;;;
no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 12:56 am (UTC)But really, you must have read some truly awful fic. I'm not sure what you were railing against in this post because I've got no idea what kind of Draco are you talking about. :-?
no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 01:00 am (UTC)Oh, and I'm med free ^^;;;;
Dude, I overreact all the time, but I vent and it's gone, y'know. I just don't think before I type, generally, ahahahah. It wasn't a fic so much as a review of a fic I didn't like reminding me of everything else I didn't like & it sort of snow-balled. It was like, well, this person I respect the opinion of didn't seem to notice this glaring -lack-, y'know, as if it wasn't -important-. The thing that bothered me isn't "fanon" in general but just... someone (Draco, but it doesn't matter -who-, really) who was being robbed of their anger and made reasonable & self-aware and rational and that's just scary and evil to me.
See, we're alike, Draco and I. We rage for no good reason a lot of times, but I like that about us. I mean, better than being all reasonable and stuff.
*stubborn!!*
no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 09:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 09:41 pm (UTC)In this fic, basically Draco thinks Potter is an "self-righteous irritant", clearly "not his favorite person", but Draco has better things to do than hold silly grudges(!!!). No, he's a thoughtful sort of person who enjoys relaxing with a good book and debating the finer points of obscure magic with his father. It's all very civilized, y'know. And then he just kind of sees Lucius acting "eval" & goes, "OMG MY FATHER IS EVAL?! THAT IS SO UNREASONABLE, HIM ASKING ME TO BE A DEATH EATER! HE'S NOT EVEN ASKING NICELY!" (except he wasn't shouting). And then he's like, "hmmm, this is an unfortunate turn of events; clearly the most reasonable conclusion is thus to become a spy & join the Good Guys".
I mean, he's ruffled, but in a very useful, focused way. "Oh I seeee, so my father wants to use me? Well! I must make the rational, considered decision to now go against everything he wants, now that I realize how -dark- the Dark Arts really are, for I did not realize this before! Oh good gracious!!"
...*issues* :>
no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 09:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 09:54 pm (UTC)See, I don't care what else they do to his characterization, but if Draco's not a drama queen, it is too painful to be borne!! heh.
Y'know, Draco's nice to his house elf in this fic o_0 AHAHAHAHAH.
no subject
Date: 2004-06-02 02:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-06-02 02:45 pm (UTC)He dresses up as Lemony Cricket and gets on his broom, showing up at this Muggle orphanage in the middle of the night. Sister Mary-Ann comes out, and there he is, in his yellow-and-green suit, right. And he holds out a bunch of wizarding galleons wrapped like candy. She just stares and stares, and then he leaves the bundle in her arms and flies away on his broom again.
Sister Mary-Ann swears to herself never to drink that much vodka again.
...yeah, I don't know either :>
no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 12:01 am (UTC)I think there's something in females that wants to fix up a bad boy.
no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 12:17 am (UTC)I think I like...... just... have issues with rationality in fiction. And in reality. Especially when used like a club-hammer. I BRISTLE, man. Frrrrrr. *bares teeth at fic*
Seeing "that fic" reviewed without mention of sad overt rationality made me upset. Then again, the person reviewing was rather known for being logical & linear & rational, so perhaps no wonder they weren't bothered ^^;
*quickly edits* ^^;;;;;
no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 02:25 am (UTC)What's utterly fascinating is that there's this episode called Absolute Power where we see a vision of what the world would be like if Daniel were given the entire store of knowledge of every member of a very technologically advanced race. It starts off he's just more help to the US government than he was before, and then within a year he's taken all real power in the world to himself and he's nuking Moscow in furtherance of his plan to defend the planet. So the St. Daniel people seem to be of the opinion that the world would be a much better place if Daniel ran it with no interference from those who don't appreciate him, and the show, interestingly enough, has categorically stated that that's really not the case.
no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 02:49 am (UTC)Funny thing is, people don't actually trust rational, logical-type people in real life or anything, and aren't really swayed by reasonable arguments. Maybe it's just some sort of geek-writer power-trip ideal or something. Heh. Sort of the way people saintify Remus, too, sin't it? Just because he's reasonable & empathic doesn't make him... I dunno... better like that. I've always thought people (a lot of amateur-type writers, anyway) often just don't know what to -do- with "nice", "reasonable" characters. I mean, one's supposed to write from life, but how many people like that do most of us know in real life? So maybe they do sort of inevitably become caricatures a lot.
Still, imagining fanon!Draco as equivalent to Remus somehow is cracking me up >:D
no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 03:27 am (UTC)super-hotnessempathy. He's really good at connecting with people and not putting their hackles up.Unless it's someone he likes, and then he puts up their hackles constantly on purpose. :)
no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 03:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 03:56 pm (UTC)Myobsessionissopure.
no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 04:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 04:10 pm (UTC)*off to read it again*
no subject
Date: 2004-05-31 06:18 pm (UTC)...
Any SG-1 fan should definitely should read it. It may not be nearly as kickass if you don't know the characters and can't picture their faces and intonations, though it's still probably pretty amusing.
(Dammit, how can she do *everything* so well? Like, there's my favorite Buffy fic and one of my top 5 Smallville loves, and Sherlock Holmes, and Master & Commander and even... *Gatchaman*...)
I hate Cinderella.
Date: 2004-05-31 06:41 am (UTC)And without that realization-- without that bleakness to be accepted or overcome or what have you-- what's the real worth of the ideals one still holds, anyway?
I actually feel so strongly about this that I can't even finish fics that feature idealised Draco. You know, I started thinking about an alternative short-hand for fanon Draco, because it's true that fanon is improperly used; maybe idealised Draco is a better description for the blond hottie with the moral high-ground. Because "fixed" would be misleading... in a way, every time we set up to write fiction, we set up to fix our characters in a way, make them grow. So, idealised Draco. He's like Romeo in a way.
And then you get to think about how important it was for the play that Romeo screwed things up; if he wasn't so impatient to forget about previous agreement, not read IMPORTANT MISSIVE, and kill himself without even wondering if something was awry, then what would have been of Romeo and Juliet?
The thing that surprises me is the avoidance of mistake in fanfic! Like, fiction is made of change, isn't it? How the hell do you achieve change if the character immediately respond to input in the correct way? Then it's not fiction, it's a manual.
Character through fiction is really a journey. It's a parth to an enlightening of some sort, to get the answer to a question, but you've got to ask the question first. There's no impetus to search fot truth and to change yourself otherwise. You can't appreciate the strenght without seeing the weakness, can you? And can't appreciate triumph without seeing the whole battle.
Fantasy is different. I have a lot of silly self-indulgent fantasies I play out in my head when I am in urgent need of a happy. But they aren't supposed to portray reality; they aren't stories, with an eventual moral voice. I don't judge fantasies with the same criteria with which I judge stories; it's story that claims to make a point about humanity and then its point turns out to be that humanity means ideal that I object to.
Idealization of lead characters is one of the main drivebehind my interest for antagonists and minor characters. They don't have to sell, see. So they're allowed to be human, or the sort of human I recognise. Also often a foil is just that, the ugly part of the main character's humanity that the hero (the author) doesn't want to see in himself, so it ends up being projected on the outside group (ie the monster, ie the other).
I really get what you say about rationalization-type fixing. Developing a character isn't necessarily fixing, not even improving; mostly it's a flashing out that's necessary to your alternative narrative, where the pov has shifted or there's more focus on the minor character/the antagonist and their motivations. It really makes me sad, though, to get the message from a work of fiction that the core of yourself (say, that first layer of canon Draco we add to) isn't enough. It makes me sad for people to think they're not enough unless they're great.
Re: I hate Cinderella.
Date: 2004-05-31 06:44 am (UTC)I actually know about growing pains. I know about accepting yourself. I don't think I've yet accepted the whole me. There's things I don't like that I keep rejecting, but that's what an adult does, an adult is someone who accepts his own imperfection. I think most idealisation you see around is due to the fact that most people do not embrace their flaws; they wouldn't be so allergic to them if they did. In fandom terms, for example, I think a lot of wank stems from delusions on the self. I mean, in my experience people who deal with the ugliness inside themselves are less inclined to reject it in others, they are nicer people, they don't get off feeling superior to the other. Lots of bad feelings between people are caused by a crave for supremacy that can't be just biological, you know? Like the entire point of interaction is to win, and the entire point of winning is to be better, approaching perfection at every go. Mmmh, someone lie to me and tell me that made sense.
Many characters say, "but we don't know each other, how could we love each other" in fics, but then go on and proclaim love anyway. This, while realistic in terms of denial by the characters, shouldn't be reinforced by the objective events or turns a story takes.
Oh! That was so smart. *takes notes*
This is just another way of saying that young people are notorious for making mistakes, and these mistakes are generally a consequence of not listening to what their heads tell them.
Or doesn't tell them! They really don't have this much rationality, because evaluation processes are a result of trial and error, it takes a lot of time to perfect them, shift them to adapt to the recurrent event. Or... however you call it in English. *g* Also, teenage have great filters to block out what they don't want to see. Which makes them act like brainless twats most of time, so you get the mistake.
All in all I don't like balanced and/or wise people. They work as the mentor, or the fool on the hill - but not as the characters a story is built around. So long as they're avatar types, more symbols really, I'm okay. But if an author starts asking me to care about them as human, I am weirded out.
Re: I hate Cinderella.
Date: 2004-05-31 02:19 pm (UTC)Lots of bad feelings between people are caused by a crave for supremacy that can't be just biological, you know? Like the entire point of interaction is to win, and the entire point of winning is to be better, approaching perfection at every go. Mmmh, someone lie to me and tell me that made sense.
Actually, it did make sense, and I'm not lying. It sort of goes hand in hand with what you said the other day about how people have this tendency to completely black-paint Draco, because it makes them feel better about themselves. Like "I may have my short-comings as a human being, but at least I'm not Draco Malfoy. I would never harrass the Gryffindors or put a leg-locker-curse on Neville, or be a racist, and besides, I bet Draco would rape people too, and laugh while casting Cruciatus-curses on them, and at least I'd never do that."
You remember that thread of Sistermagpies, about confessing your childhood flaws? I think there's a chance I might conveniently have forgotten one.:D "Self-righteous" like Harry (and Hermione too, perhaps?) There is this instance I remember particularly clearly. I was inlove with a boy with a Draco-like personality from age 7-10. Then, at ten, he began to bully me in order to impress his friends, which made me truly, and passionately hate him, and in my head, I portrayed him as the worst scum who had ever walked on earth. I swear, if I had read the HP-books at ten, I'd have been one of those rabid Draco-haters you see around, and that's also why I'm far more understanding of young Draco-haters (who are still in school), than I am of adult ones, who I figure should have grown past their grudges.
Anyway, one of these days in fourth grade, we were discussing "Anne Franke" in class, and our teacher brought up how the people who kept the Franke-family hidden during the years of the persecution, were so brave, etc, and she asked us, the children who had all been born long after WW 2, if any of us would have done the same thing. Only I and another (self-righteous;)) girl raised our hands. Then this Draco-like boy raised his hand to say that he could honestly not say that he would have, even though he knew it would have been the right thing to do, because it would be such a high risk, to do such a thing, and he would probably have been afraid. And (here comes the really embarrassing part) I thought to myself "No, you wouldn't do it, because you, unlike me are too much of a coward!" And looking back at this incident, it's kind of funny, because Draco-like boy, was really the only one in class who said something intelligent this day, he was right damnit, it would have been dangerous and scary, and no matter how morally superior I and the other girl felt, for being convinced we would have acted like the heroes, doesn't change the fact that we don't know how we would have acted, because we didn't even live at that time. It's easy to say something, but words are cheap, and for all we know, it's possible that the Draco-like boy would have helped out jews, had he lived back then, just like it's possible that I and the other girl would have been cowards, or even Hitler-Jugends. We don't know, and to think that someone would be morally superior over pure speculation is ridiculous beyond words.
Re: I hate Cinderella.
Date: 2004-06-02 03:19 pm (UTC)It would be interesting to see what has been of this guy.
Re: I hate Cinderella.
Date: 2004-06-03 10:50 am (UTC)We sort of buried the hatchet sometime during sixth grade. We never became friends or anything, but we managed to hold civil conversations.;-) He stopped showing quite as much open contempt for me, and I more or less stopped resenting and despicing him.
Re: I hate Cinderella.
Date: 2004-05-31 01:35 pm (UTC)Ha! And big time WORD. Honestly, some fics out there would serve so much better as a reply to a shipping debate. I remember a H/L-fic I read once, that had Harry very calmly and rationally explaining to Ron why Luna was the right girl for him, as oposed to Cho, Hermione and Ginny. I was cringing. I saw the exact arguments that H/L-shippers tend to use in shipping-debates, only coming from Harry's mouth.
And yes, this fic was extreme, but I actually see this happening in a lot of fics, only it's usually more subtle and well-written. But it's still that you get a strong sense that the writer is trying to prove a point to you, by having his/her characters act in a way that's just not very realistic.
really makes me sad, though, to get the message from a work of fiction that the core of yourself (say, that first layer of canon Draco we add to) isn't enough. It makes me sad for people to think they're not enough unless they're great.
Agreed again. I think the existance of Mary Sues/Gary Stus, indicates that a lot of people think you need to be perfect to be loved, which is sad. But with the constant images of ideals the media showers us with, is it really that strange (http://www.livejournal.com/users/go_back_chief/1462.html?mode=reply)?
Re: I hate Cinderella.
Date: 2004-06-02 03:17 pm (UTC)XFiles was a good example of morals being proposed rather than imposed - at least until season 7, where I am up to.
Your essay looks great, I'll have to read it! Super-humanity is so incredibly depressing, especially when used as a model. I sort of... dislike heroes for this reason.
Re: I hate Cinderella.
Date: 2004-06-01 03:26 am (UTC)I suppose I only use "fix" to mean something slapped on & not natural, something that doesn't -fit- in any way, though I mean, I don't really care as much if it's not my all-time-favorite-hate, the rationalization fix. I'm all GRR ARG because I hate this in -any- character, original or fanon or whatever, any fandom. It's a trend I see in many a fanfic, and I've hated them all. It's like, scary to me. Whereas sexy-snarky-too-good-to-be-true!Draco is just... fantasy, as you said. He's... I dunno, amusing (while idealized), rational Draco seems like a tool of The Man, somehow. Almost. Y'know? There's this intristic difference between like, Veela!Draco & `A Thousand Beautiful Things'!Draco, to me.
Yeah exactly, it's a manual. I don't understand the motivation of writing a manual, and yet that's what people have done since the dawn of time (like, fables & fairy-tales & wasn't there a whole genere of Enlightenment & Victorian-era children's & other literature which set out to "educate" the reader, like say, I dunno, a lot of Dickens' work). I suppose some people are just rationalizstic and self-righteous & that comes through in their fic. Or something.
Hmm, it didn't occur to me that the writer (of `A Thousand Beautiful Things' & fics like it, for instance) wasn't -interested- in Draco's journey to self-awareness so they slapped together a situation when wham-bam, it was already there. Because like, as a writer, it just wasn't something they found worth exploring...?? Like, "I don't wanna write about this, so meh, let's say it's -there-". I mean, I don't want to write about Voldemort, but I don't tend to write fics where I say "so okay, Voldemort's DEAD, moving on now..." 'cause that's just stupid, but people do that, y'know....
Some people want to "win" just to be powerful rather than perfect. Like, a lot of people don't care about who they are, only what they have. Or rather, they equate what they acquire with who they are. I think.
I don't like balanced people mostly because one of my favorite subjects is the journey towards balance. And also because since most writers aren't balanced, they have no clue how to write it believably, I guess :>
Re: I hate Cinderella.
Date: 2004-06-02 03:32 pm (UTC)In general, I find fabulas and fairy-tales interesting precisely for their extreme simplicity - everything gets stripped down to the core matter, and all the other variables have to become costant for this. I like allegory precisely because it's not cheating, I mean, its very premise is that humanity is transformed into a symbol. Also offers great room for subversion, which you know I love and adore. I mean, bringing a complex, modern psychological level to a story that was never written to take it into account? It's great! Because the text is the text is the text, and as long as I am not contradicting it literally, everything is fair game.
Rational Draco is definitely a tool of the Man, which may explain why I hate him so. Well, other than stealing all the attention from my baby, you know. Now I totally want to make an icon with one of those models that people cast as fanon Draco with "tool of the Man" written all over it. And there goes my fandom tolerance. :(
The lack of interest always occurs to me. Like, I think it's about me having issues. I think I am always resenting people for watching in the wrong place, you know? Underappreciating things, not making an effort, being self-righteous in order to feel a good guy, and on and on and on. For example, why is JKR so disinterested in girls like Pansy, as opposed to Hermione and Ginny and their un-female sassy self?
So I resent people for not caring about the journey, the same way I resent them for not caring about friendship or brotherly love or whatever in order to make it all about the sex. It's an issue! But I am really doing it for the people.
Some people want to "win" just to be powerful rather than perfect.
I think it's a mixture of the two. Or they come from the same place - lack of perspective and self-awarness. It's the self and the other all over again.
I have to think more about balance in the writer and balance in the text.
Re: I hate Cinderella.
Date: 2004-06-02 06:43 pm (UTC)I don't get all... um... politically upset about it. I mean, I hate "the Man", but more often, I tend to ignore it/him/them if I can. I'm so apolitical it hurts. If anything, politics/social systems upset me too much so I tend to ignore them. Ranting and raving & getting upset about things being societal plagues comes too easily to me. I can channel a lot of rage, but in the end it feels kinda useless 'cause I know I'm too sensitive & easily overwhelmed to do anything about it. It's just that bad fic won't leave me alone as long as I read so much of it on purpose. :>
I love symbolic simplicity, I do, I do. Stripping things to the bone, yes. Making them more sharp, more obvious, and yet also subverting them with subtleties & twists & such. Usually heroism isn't the thing I focus on or whatever-- there's plenty of other stuff. I don't care enough about the idea of "good" and "evil", "heroic" and "villainous" to really bother trying hard or getting upset or whatever. Rationality vs. emotion gets to me a lot more on that sort of basic level where I identify with the problem. I hate rationalistic Gryffindors (heroes) & Slytherins equally. Or something :>
My favorite fairy tales... are probably `The Snow Queen', `Beauty and the Beast', `Sleeping Beauty' & `The Frog Prince' out of the common ones... and I love `The Twelve Swans' & `The Twelve Dancing Princesses' & anything with seal-maidens or mermaids or princesses trapped in towers. My favorite are transformation & entrapment stories, I suppose, with the leading character having to transform themselves in order to affect a transformation in The Other. I love Oscar Wilde's fairy-tales, also. And a lot of non-English-language ones. Mmmm, yes.
I sort of accept JKR's little issues or whatever, because I simply don't think she's a good writer-- I mean... compared to all my favorite writers, she kind of really sucks. Buuuut, she created this logical world so I guess the irregularities show up more blatantly, or something? Mind you, the whole thing was always clealry meant as an exagerration & a parody (the Dursleys, right off the bat), so of course anything grey-area has to come slowly & focus on the things she -wants- to focus on, to keep her generaly storyline streamlined or something. She's not writing serious social commentary I don't think. Bleh. The Slytherins are props, so one takes them as props or one disregards the story, as far as I can see.
Then again, I can't really talk about taking the HP books too seriously, can I. But, ahahah I don't take the -books- seriously, I take -the characters- as they are in my -head- seriously. Fanon-centric and proud :>
no subject
Date: 2004-06-01 09:15 am (UTC)WORD. I can't really stand idealised characters, period, and something that have always baffled me in fandoms in general, is how hard people can judge characters just for having perfectly human flaws/making perfectly human mistakes. But considering the messages that often tend to get sent in different kinds of massmedia, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised by the number of people who seem to hold this attitude.
It occurs to me that most leading characters in American pop culture (well, movies & TV) are heavily idealized, so perhaps there's a genuine mass appeal to this that stretches beyond amateur writing do's & don't's. Perhaps there's something about the culture that encourages the creation of these "stars".
Yes, that's exactly what I mean. Mary Sues/Gary Stus did not appear in fanfiction out of nowhere. They've been part of at least "popular culture" for a long time. The personas massmedia creates of "stars" is definitely an example, but you can also find the characters in movies, on TV, in certain books, not to mention the commercial (I raged quite a bit about the all the ideals media constantly force-feed us with a while ago (http://www.livejournal.com/users/go_back_chief/1462.html?mode=reply).) I think we live in a society where there's really no room for mistakes. You're supposed to be perfect first off. I've seen adds for "crap-jobs" (by which I mean jobs that don't require education, that basically anyone could learn how to do, and that generally are severely underpaid, have crappy conditions and low status), that have just piled up all different sorts of demands on the supposed employee, and I'm just baffled by the nerve of the employer. I suppose it is because the western world is so capitalistic; it's considered an honour to get the best possible product, that has the most pros and least cons possible, for as low a price as you can manage, and this is an attitude that has transferred into people, somehow. I mean, people are excepted to be as good as the best car around, the more flaws they have, the less value, just as your car. Did that make sense?