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naynay5155 · 3 years

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C!Tommy’s Storyline With C!Dream Is A Very Concerning Depiction Of Abuse

Wild Title

Okay, I’m sure that this probably isn’t too new information for anyone paying attention to the overall story of the DreamSMP, especially C!Tommy’s storyline, but I figured I’d give my two cents for this anyways.

C!Tommy is an Abuse Victim who has gone through horrific stuff at the hands of C!Dream. This is not an arguable fact. regardless of if C!Dream had reasons for doing what he did, if C!Dream also later gets abused, or if ultimately the abuse portrayal could be considered in some ways flawed or unrealistic, that stuff doesn’t ultimately matter. Because we’ve seen what happened to C!Tommy during Exile, have seen the physical, emotional, and mental abuse he was put through. Just because they won’t call it Abuse doesn’t mean it isn’t Abuse.

Now, C!Tommy being an abuse victim is an interesting idea from a storytelling perspective. It has a lot of potential to lead to genuine character development, or to affect relationships and story beats in interesting ways. And it could be an interesting way to really say something about abuse and coping with it.

And to an extent, an argument could be made that it has, though I’d argue the exact way those are handled in canon, but not the point. The point is, abuse is not just something that you get to gloss over. If you want to include themes of abuse in the story, a story you are making available to the public for millions to see, then there needs to be a clear and obvious message being portrayed with including abuse in the story. Preferably, that abuse is bad, and can have majorly negative effects on anyone, especially children. We don’t always get that lucky, but whatever.

But, from my months of watching the story of the DreamSMP, and trust me I’ve been here a long while, I haven’t seen C!Tommy’s abuse being handled very... well. I could, of course, be wrong in some aspects, and maybe be misremembering stuff since this dumpster fire has been happening for a year now, and feel free to correct me or bring up more points if you know something I don’t. But, I still think that overall, I have a point of view that should be considered.

So basically, C!Tommy is an abuse victim, right? this is easy to see, very obvious in the way he acts and behaves. Or... is it?

Abuse is a complex topic and one that, in real life, presents itself in all sorts of forms. Many abuse victims were raised in unloving homes and ended up becoming more vulnerable to abuse later on in life as a result of that. Others never properly learned how to express emotions or turn people down and got taken advantage of. Others were abused from the start, and develop various ways of coping and dealing with that, even ways that they might not be fully conscious of themselves. Abuse is not a one-way street, it could hardly be considered a street at all given how diverse and differing the people who experience it end up developing into are.

So I’m not saying that, if C!Tommy were a real person, that he isn’t “Being traumatized enough” or that “Why isn’t he more like what I expect him to be like?”. That is not what I’m saying at all.

What I am saying, is that C!Tommy is a fictional character who exists within a narrative, a story. And in a good story, consistency is half the battle. I, as the audience consuming the story, need to be able to look at C!Tommy and pick up on and understand the effects abuse has had on him. And these effects need to be consistent, otherwise, as an audience member, I’m going to get confused and start having questions about why he acts one way here but doesn’t somewhere else.

I also need to be able to clearly see and understand, by being given narrative stepping stones, if something is changing for his character.

As the saying goes, “Show don’t tell”. C!Tommy can’t just say he “Goes to Puffy for Therapy” offhandedly one time, as a means of handwaving away why he doesn’t really consistently act as traumatized as he used to even though it’s literally only been a few weeks, or months at most. To explain how he can jump back between being really sad and depressed about something, to joking about Women and Twitter. It seems weird if he’s able to just so seamlessly, so effortlessly, go back and forth. Almost as if he’s bouncing between OOC and IC, but that’s a whole other discussion.

Sure, C!Tommy is representing real mental health issues, but he is, ultimately a Fictional Character existing in a story. I need to be given signs, proof, foreshadowing, to explain when he has certain reactions and behaviours in order to understand his character. And these need to be consistent, otherwise we get plotholes and general confusion.

I criticize the inconsistency and the offscreen handwaving because it’s generally not very good writing. It’s the same reason I disliked Eret’s basically off-screen-sort-of-redemption-arc. It’s the same reason people dislike it when Villains of previous seasons suddenly come back as fully reformed good guys for seemingly no reason. There is no arc, no development, no progress is shown to us.

Because when you’re telling a story about a character having some major change or developing in some way, or having an important character trait, if I don’t see it on screen, then it didn’t happen. How am I supposed to root for C!Tommy’s progress, or understand what he’s doing to progress, if a never see his coping mechanisms? His therapy appointments?

You can’t just say something, or inconsistently portray something, and expect me to jump through hoops to connect these nearly transparent dots that keep getting thrown around.

Show don’t tell. Show me Tommy getting better, because otherwise you’re just telling me he made character development, and showing me this completely different character as proof. No, last I remembered C!Tommy was having panic attacks and yelling when C!Dream was even mentioned. You can’t tell me that a day later he can interact normally after days of being in the prison and a month of being dead.

Or, if you are gonna have him flip flop back and forth, don’t have it be so sudden and jarring, give an explanation. Is he faking being fine? Does he have memory issues? C!Tommy doesn’t read to me as the type who’s good at suppressing his emotions, he wears his heart on his sleeve. So you’re going to have to explain, clearly, in a way that isn’t ambiguous, what’s happening with C!Tommy here.

You’re not really saying anything about the abuse C!Tommy goes through, if all of that trauma is automatically wiped from the story when the writers get too lazy or too scared to keep it in. At best, you are showing abuse and trauma for the sole purpose of showing it, with no intention of properly dealing with and addressing it in the story. At worst, you are basically just doing torture porn.

Pain, Hurt, Trauma for the sake of it. Not with any goal in mind. Just for the drama of it, or to hurt the audience.

And then your audience is just supposed to take that content in uncritically, and they gain no true understanding of how abuse victims survive and cope after their traumatic treatment.

Exile Arc sure did a good job at making C!Tommy suffer. But as soon as that arc ended, a lot of the stuff that happened in it went completely glossed over and unaddressed for a long while. That might have been fine in the lead-up to Doomsday, since a lot of plot stuff had been going on and stopping to handle C!Tommy’s issues might (Might is heavily doubted cause it certainly isn’t impossible) mess with the pacing a bit. But then after Doomsday, there isn’t really any excuse to put it off. Because nothing was really happening for a good while, and nobody had anything to do plotwise.

And this became even more true with C!Dream being locked in Prison. Nothing was really happening, so what was stopping the story from taking the time to properly discuss and deal with this stuff?

Well, nothing really. So, the Hotel Arc happened. And oh boy, was it a mess.

So, C!Tommy being angry at C!Dream for the abuse and trauma he has suffered at Dream’s hand isn’t an issue. It’s an incredibly common thing for victims to feel angry at their abusers, and to even go so far as to wish for vengeance against them in some way. And that’s a totally valid and fine feeling.

You’re hurting, you’re scared, you’re in pain. I get that. When we’re hurting, we don’t always act rationally or healthily.

But, ultimately, that rage, and hurt, and want for vengeance is not a healthy thing to hold onto. In many circumstances with an abuse victim wanting to inflict pain back on their abuser, we run into various problems.

For one, getting vengeance on your abuser is quite frequently going to give you more emotional pain than it will fulfilment. Especially if you are young, or are letting this want for vengeance take over your entire livelihood. It does you no good ultimately, to attempt to bring pain to the person who hurt you, because not only will you often be unsuccessful, you frequently won’t find emotional healing and stability in that.

(The only exception to this rule being if ignoring them or moving on from them isn’t an option for you right now.)

Actions have consequences, and if you invest more time in that person who hurt you, then you have no time to work on yourself or the relationships around you. You have no time to heal, and this can become self-destructive.

Spending time around an abuser, as a victim, is in all likelihood just going to upset you more. You’re retraumatizing yourself by spending time around them, and as you make attempts to give them their comeuppance, you could possibly end up internalizing the methods they used on you, and just end up perpetuating the cycle of abuse again.

And even if you have no problem with doing that to this particular person, consider how fully internalizing these abusive behaviours could affect your friends or family. Frequently, even when they don’t mean to, abuse victims can internalize the things that they went through and then use those same behaviours against people in their life later on. Being shitty to your support system because of what you went through isn’t a good move, for you or them.

Basically just, an Abuse Victim has more to gain from working on themselves while finding ways to heal and overcome their trauma and abuse, than they do spending their time and energy on the abuser. Its frequently unhealthy, distressing, and self-destructive to indulge in that too much.

(Of course, I don’t speak for everyone, but from what iIve looked into and seen, this is the healthiest method of actually healing from your abuse. That doesn’t mean you just... leave your abuser alone and never address or talk about what they did, you don’t let them get away with it, of course not. It just means you don’t waste your mental well being and time obsessing over someone, especially someone who has hurt you so much.

You deserve better than that. You deserve to heal.)

Now, let’s get back to C!Tommy.

C!Tommy, instead of finding a proper means of coping with his issues (proper therapy, diagnosis for his issues, forming and maintaining healthy support systems, focusing on things he loves, etc) is shown to repeatedly focus back on C!Dream. When he was making Big Innit Hotel, it did seem like he was to an extent finding ways to cope with his shit. He was still kinda shitty and his hotel was not exactly made and run by the most morally great standards, though I suppose I can’t expect too much when he is a very traumatized teen and doesn’t really know what he’s doing.

But, ultimately, this all fell apart when he got locked in Pandora’s Vault with C!Dream. Arguably, it was already falling apart the moment he decided to keep pursuing C!Dream even when he was locked up.

See, the thing is, C!Tommy can never just… have trauma. Having trauma that he can healthily and methodically work through is something that for him as a Character, is basically impossible. His character is an angry one, one built on spite and childishness, and who holds the mantle, unfortunately, of “Spunky Male Protagonist In A YA Novel”. So, his mental health issues can never just be a struggle he has to cope with, especially not when the DreamSMP can never seem to have anything between “A lot is happening right now omg” or “Literally nothing is happening and nobody is playing on the server at all omg”.

Instead, his issues have to be seen as a battle, and they fuel the narrative of the story. Him having been abused by C!Dream cannot just exist as a thing that he as a person has to work through slowly with the help of others around him. It has to be seen as this Epic Triumph Against Evil, another battle of Tommyinnit VS Dream on the DreamSMP, a classic Villain versus Hero fight.

This, of course, isn’t too great. By C!Tommy’s abuse plotline being framed in this manner, it makes it so that C!Tommy is constantly obsessing over his abuser and recklessly throwing himself into dangerous and triggering situations is some attempt at an “Epic Battle With Evil”, rather than this being treated like the self-harm it actually is. And yes, it is self-harm, a form of it.

C!Tommy uses his trauma and issues as fuel for the story, making it so that its impossible for him to truly progress and a character, and the moment he does start growing, he has to get retraumatized again so he goes right back to where he was.

C!Tommy does not become a better person when he’s around C!Dream, nor does he find any form of fulfilment in being around him. He gets shaky and panicky at just the sight of him. He regularly has violent and explosive outbursts at just the mention of him. When C!Dream talks to him, he gets nervous and basically can’t help but listen due to conditioning he still listens to.

When C!Tommy went to go visit C!Dream the first time in Pandora’s Vault, he brought with him stacks of TnT. He did it because he wanted to mimic what C!Dream had done to him in Exile, where he would take all of C!Tommy’s newly gained items and blow them up underground for dramatic effect.

C!Dream did this for control over C!Tommy, to manipulate him, for his suffering.

And C!Tommy wanted to do this to C!Dream, because he was feeling vindictive.

When C!Tommy got into the prison, he mocked C!Dream, hit him repeatedly, and tried to boss him around. He made him write ridiculous books and verbally berated the man. He did this in a feeble attempt to gain some feeling of control over C!Dream. This, evidently, did not work. At best his success was momentary. And this sense of achievement he gained was gained through projecting his abuse trauma onto someone else.

He repeated the cycle.

After he got brought back from the dead and let out of the prison, he was much much worse. C!Tommy was now paranoid, anxious, constantly thinking about C!Dream, and had his mindset solely on getting revenge on him, by killing him.

It got so bad, he ended up doing lacklustre “Exposure Therapy” to help himself not panic when he went into Pandora’s Vault to kill C!Dream. It got so bad he dragged C!Tubbo and C!Ranboo into this, putting them in danger and putting more pressure on another two teenagers’ shoulders.

It got so bad, that Ghostbur died, C!Sam closed off even more, and C!Wilbur came back.

Objectively, C!Tommy leaving C!Dream alone would be the better thing for everyone. And yet he keeps repeating the cycle. Because C!Tommy is not meant to grow, learn and heal. He is made to suffer.

The problem is not so much showing an unhealthy depiction of a mentally ill or traumatized person. Because trauma and mental illness and the effects of abuse are not always pretty, and they shouldn’t always have to be portrayed and pretty or sympathetic to be accurate.

It becomes a problem when you get this depiction of C!Tommy’s coping being presented uncritically to an audience of a lot of underaged and young people.

Nobody in canon, whether they be adults or fellow teens, has ever tried to question C!Tommy’s methods for coping. C!Ranboo and C!Tubbo just limply went along with his plans for Exposure Therapy with no consideration of if this was a good idea. No adults really offer to genuinely step in and help C!Tommy deal with his shit, and the ones that do leave him or get corrupted in some way, often leaving him with more trauma as they do.

C!Puffy’s therapy methods are dubious at best, and the most we ever see of her actually helping C!Tommy is her humouring his toxic behaviours, and C!Tommy making offhanded mentions to vague therapists appointments we never see.

C!Technoblade stopped giving a shit as soon as C!Tommy walked off the screen. C!Wilbur was dead, and now that he isn’t he certainly isn’t helping C!Tommy. C!Phil isn’t C!Tommy’s dad and has no obligation to do anything for him as a result. C!Ranboo has the backbone of a chocolate eclair. C!Tubbo is too busy repressing his own trauma to help C!Tommy with his. C!Sam is being ruled by the prison and C!Quackity. C!Quackity has become an Ancap.

Nobody in this story is a reliable or trusted person to C!Tommy, who could properly tell him his methods are unhealthy and give him better alternatives. And as a result, nobody is able to tell the audience that C!Tommy is wrong

Unreliable Narrators are only effective when the narrative in some way has their unreliableness pointed out or proven to the audience. If you go into a story with the assumption that everybody watching will be able to see past C!Tommy’s POV and not take him at face value, then you are naive. Especially when this fandom is made up of many teens and children.

I only know C!Tommy’s methods are unhealthy because I care way too much and do my research. A vast majority of the world doesn’t have the same understanding and education on these topics, especially not children and teenagers. A good chunk of people, especially neurodivergent and mentally ill people, could very well take the story at face value and automatically assume that what Tommy’s doing is actually a good coping mechanism because they don’t know any better.

There is no clarification or safety net for preventing misinterpretation. And being of the opinion that “Well, they should know better than to trust a bunch of Minecraft Youtubers for this stuff” or “We can’t expect them to be psychologists! You expect too much” is just… not helping.

Because I shouldn’t have to explain why children and teenagers, especially those that are using these people to cope, are not always going to make level-headed and common-sense decisions. They will be influenced by these Content Creators, whether we think it’s “Stupid” or not.

And I can say with certainty that, while yes, this might be a bit much to expect from a bunch of British/American white guys who play Minecraft to handle, may I also point out that nobody fucking made them put this stuff in the story. There are ways to write a story without stepping outside of your realm of true understanding. Nobody begged these MCYTs to go and make torture porn for a 16 year old, nobody asked them to touch on topics they have no fucking clue about.

They put that in themselves. And we have the right to point out the problems and flaws in it, and criticize them for not handling this stuff better.

You don’t start applying for a job you don’t meet the requirements for. You don’t start an expensive project you can’t finish.

You don’t include elements in a story you aren’t willing to fully go through with and address in a proper and sensitive way.

#hope this makes sense #dreamsmp roleplay #dream smp critical #dreamsmp #dream smp #character analysis #c!tommy #c!dream #tw abuse discussion #tw abuse #negativity #dsmp critical #critical dsmp

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alpacaparkaseok · 3 years

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Spooked

Requested by anon - a picture of your request will be at the bottom of the post! Thanks for sending it in, I had so much fun with it! :)

Pairing: best friend!BTS, maybe some secret crushes going on? 👀

Premise: You + all 7 members of BTS visiting a haunted house. What could go wrong?

So, so much.

Word Count: 4k

Warnings: they are touring a haunted house, so there’s gonna be some scary story/spooky things going on. hopefully there’s enough fun things/fluff to counter it?

a/n: this was longer than I expected it to be...but I was having fun with ot7. hopefully nobody minds lol

It wasn't your fault that Hobi had never seen "A Quiet Place". He had mentioned it as you scrolled through the options on his TV while lounging on his couch like an overgrown cat. Everyone else was in the process of scarfing down their dinner, popping popcorn, and laughing over whatever Jimin and Yoongi were bickering about.

Obviously you had to watch it.

Naturally, the conversation had drifted to a bit more spooky topics. You'd come back from grabbing more popcorn surprised to find Jin talking about his friend that wanted to open up a house they'd inherited for ghost tours.

After nudging Jimin out of the way, you took up your usual spot next to Taehyung. They all watch you with amused eyes, knowing full well that Taehyung is the only one that willingly scratches your back on movie nights.

"Really, like is it the kind of haunted house where people dress up and scare you?" Jungkook asked, his interest piqued.

Jin shook his head. "No, not really. It sounds like they just walk you through the house and tell stories and stuff."

You and Jungkook share a look, already thinking the same thing. A glance at Hobi shows him clutching a blanket to his chest, caught between the events of the film and the conversation taking place.

"We should go," you ventured, immediately earning a startled stare from both Jin and Hobi. The others chuckle in response, Namjoon swatting Jungkook's hand half-heartedly as he tries to steal more popcorn from him.

"...noooo," Jin began. "It's not like it's up and running yet, they're just working on getting it ready for the fall-"

Jungkook picks up where you left off. "Perfect! We can be their test group. That way they'll know what they can do for the general public, get an idea of what works and what doesn't."

You jump in again before Jin can protest more. "C'mon! And besides, this may be your only chance just to go for fun! Otherwise you'd have to find a way to go without running into all of those people, and have to contact management about it..."

Jin sighs, looking at Hobi who stares back at him with an expression of defeat. You grin, Taehyung chuckling beside you.

"Fine."

It was all too easy. Standing here now, you can see just why they want to open this up for ghost tours. Of course you won't admit it, but you already have chills running down your spine.

Or maybe that's just because Jung Hoseok is currently breathing down your neck.

"Alright," Jin's friend, Gina stands at the top of the steps, smiling down at you all. "Everybody ready?"

Jungkook and Taehyung, completely riled up, let out whoops and cheers while everyone else grunts in acknowledgement. Hobi clings to the back of your jacket, whimpering like a lost puppy.

This should be fun.

Jungkook doesn't bother to wait for everyone else, heading straight inside after Gina. Taehyung and Jimin are hot on his heels, joking about something back and forth. You follow after them, glancing back at Hobi with an amused grin.

"Oh," he realizes that he's still clinging to you. "Right." Extracting his hand from your jacket, he lets you move forward. He remains close behind you, Jin at his side.

Namjoon and Yoongi bring up the rear, hardly paying attention to anything that's going on as they chat about a business they saw not far from here.

"We'll begin in the front study here," Gina adopts a spooky tone as she stands in the candlelight. Shadows dance along the walls, making the hairs on the back of your neck stand up straight.

Suddenly you wish that Hobi was still holding onto you.

Slowly, so as to not draw the attention (and teasing) of the maknae line, you step back until you're between Namjoon and Yoongi.

The two of them smirk down at you, knowing full well that you're already spooked.

"What are you doing?" Jin whispers back to you, eyes wide while he rubs his arms as though he's cold. "Trying to abandon us to the ghosts?"

You shake your head fervently, hoping that they don't notice the way you're sneaking your hand into the pocket of Yoongi's jacket.

"No, the middle is the safest place," you argue. Yoongi gives a breathy chuckle beside you, his hand finding yours in the warmth of his pocket and giving it a squeeze. Thankfully the house is dark enough that the blush on your cheeks shouldn't be visible.

Absentmindedly you link your other arm through Namjoon's, hardly able to breathe properly when he instinctively moves closer.

What were you even saying?

"A-and now you've got three in front and three in back. You're totally safe."

Hobi and Jin look at each other like they know exactly what you’re up to, but don't push it as they suddenly begin walking again. Gina leads the way toward the dining room, weaving a tale of how the estranged wife of the owner of the house swore she would never leave the property.

"Did she?" Jungkook asks from the front, peeking in closed off rooms along the way. You can't help but marvel at his fearlessness.

Gina's eyes glow with excitement, almost as though she were waiting for someone to ask that. "No. Years later, when the owner sold the house, the new occupants said they found a sealed off room in the basement." You gasp, the sound echoing through the hallway. You miss the look Jimin gives you, too attached to the story.

"What..." you clutch Namjoon's arm, the fabric of his jacket bunching in your hand. "Did they ever open up the room?"

Gina grins. "They did. They hired someone to come and open the sealed door. However, the man they hired only got about halfway before quitting. He was terrified."

Yoongi leans down to whisper in your ear. "Are you trying to cut off my circulation?"

It's only then that you notice you've been squeezing his hand with startling strength. "Whoops." Going to remove your hand from his, he frowns, holding it tighter before you can move.

Well, if this isn't a rollercoaster of emotions.

"Why was he so scared?" Namjoon pipes up beside you, a hint of a smile gracing his features as he reads the expression on your face. Oh, you're so screwed. "Did he find something?"

"It's not so much what he found as what he didn't," Gina replies. "But we'll have to save that for last. For now, the dining room. Come on in, everyone."

Hobi looks back at you, a mixture of horror and overall curiosity on his face. “Oh, she’s good.”

Indeed, Gina definitely seems to have a way with words. You’re just having a hard time understanding them as your heart beats loudly enough to drown out any other noises. Yoongi has taken to tracing circles on the back of your hand, which you think are meant to be soothing.

It only serves to send your heart rate skyrocketing. You stare at the portrait on the far end of the dining room, practically boring holes into the painting of the young woman.

Breathe, don’t do anything stupid.

“...alright?”

You blink, finding yourself to be the sudden center of attention. Jungkook grins widely at you.

“What?”

Jungkook repeats his question. “Are you doing alright?”

“Oh.”

Jimin bursts out laughing. “That’s not an answer, jagiya. Need us to protect you from the ghosts?”

Your wide eyes immediately give you away, and even Gina is offering you a look of pity before deciding to continue on with the tour. Before you embarrass yourself even more, you slip out of Yoongi and Namjoon’s grasp, sneaking up behind Jin and Hobi.

“Hello boys,” you drawl, making Hobi nearly jump out of his skin. You earn a laugh from the group, Jin chuckling at his scared friend. Hobi just glares at you.

“This sucks,” he whispers to you, pulling you up to stand between him and Jin. Immediately they stick to your sides like magnets and you realize that you have indeed done something stupid as Jin’s breath ghosts over the shell of your ear as he goes to whisper something to you.

Out of the frying pan and into the fire, it would seem. Your heart certainly agrees.

“I’m not scared, you know,” Jin whispers. You take a deep breath, reminded yourself that these idiots are your best friends, not menu items.

You shoot him an incredulous look. “I doubt that.”

He grins at you, eyes lingering a bit longer than usual. “You’ll see.”

Tearing your eyes away from his and hearing his deep chuckle, you wonder if it’s too late to ask Gina where the nearest exit is.

Don’t do anything stupid.

“Shall we head up to the attic?” Gina asks. “It’s a small space, we can only go three at a time. However, there are some really interesting old photographs up there that we should look at.”

In the blink of an eye everyone is paired off, and you find yourself face to face with Jimin. He grins at you like the Cheshire Cat, making you wonder if he isn’t the most dangerous thing in this house.

Jin and Hobi have the glorious opportunity to go up together while Gina leads the way, and several screams accompany their little trip. In the middle of the candlelight in the hallway, you chuckle with the rest of your friends.

“It’s been interesting so far,” Jungkook muses. “I really want to know what they found in that sealed off basement room.”

Taehyung hums in agreement. “Mmm. Or rather, what they didn’t find.”

“What does that even mean?”

Nobody is given a chance to answer Jungkook’s question as Hobi and Jin come scrambling down the ladder, faces pale even as they laugh. Gina chuckles from above, beckoning the next pair to come up.

Jimin looks at you with an arched brow. “Wanna go next?”

“Sure.” You follow him up the ladder, laughing as Jin recounts how he swore the woman in the photograph blinked.

The attic is filled with moonlight, and under other circumstances it might be pretty. However, amongst the old heirlooms sits an ominous scrapbook, filled with black and white photos of less-than-happy people.

Jimin reaches down, grabbing your hand and helping you to your feet as you look around. When he lets go you aren’t sure whether or not to be disappointed.

You’ve hardly made up your mind when he leads you to where Gina stands beside the scrapbook and slips behind you. A moment later his arms encircle your waist, chin propped up on your shoulder.

So there’s that.

Gina points to the first photo, a grim-looking man standing behind a chair where a young woman sits smiling. “This is the estranged wife, before she was estranged, of course. And this is the owner of the house. From what we’ve been able to dig up about his past - no pun intended - he was always deathly serious.”

Jimin hums in acknowledgement, the vibrations going straight into your spine. Unsure of what to do with your arms, you gently place them atop his arms around your middle.

You swear he smiles for a moment before turning pensive again. “Why did they separate?” You manage to ask, applauding yourself for getting a complete sentence out while Park Jimin hugs you from behind.

“Rumor has it she cheated on him with his best friend,” Gina whispers, pointing to another photo where the solemn owner stands beside a smiling man. “He was driven mad with jealousy. Terrible, isn’t it?”

Gina gives you a long look, and suddenly you straighten your spine. “I-uh, yeah. Horrible.”

She shows us another photo, explaining something about it while Jimin mumbles out a couple of questions. You hardly process any of it, staring at Gina and wondering if she thinks that you are somehow cheating.

But on who? Jin, maybe? Since that’s her friend?

“Alright, send up the next pair,” Gina croons. Jimin detaches himself from you, suddenly leaving you cold. You turn to follow him, but stop as Gina places a hand on your arm.

“Yes?” You ask, struggling to keep your tone even. Gina motions for Jimin to keep going, pulling you back to the scrapbook. She tilts her head to one side.

“Forgive me for maybe overstepping a boundary but...” she motions toward the ladder, where everyone waits below. “Don’t tell me you’re flirting with all of them.”

Your eyes widen, and a breathy laugh comes out. “Me? What? N-no. They’re my best friends, why would I-”

Gina laughs, the sound too loud for the small attic. “Well, they’re flirting with you.” She playfully elbows me. “Speaking from girl to girl...enjoy it. For the rest of us.”

Nearly choking, you frown but nod all the same. “...ok?” When she makes no move to say anything else, you head down the ladder. The boys look up at me with confused looks, Jimin waiting at the bottom to make sure you get down safely.

“What was that about?” Jin asks, looking a little nervous. “She didn’t say anything to make you uncomfortable, did she?”

You blink at him, wondering for a moment if the boys have always been like this around you. Surely not. It’s just the haunted house bringing out this protective side, right?

Right?

“No, she just wanted to show me something else. She’s actually really nice.” You think.

The other groups go up, and nothing else happens to pique your interest. Gina comes down last of all, giving you a wink before walking down the hallway.

“I think we’re ready to go down to the basement, everyone!”

Somehow you end up at the front, surrounded on all sides by the maknae line. You crane your neck, looking back to see the older boys all lost in a heated discussion. Hobi catches your eye after a moment, elbowing Namjoon who looks up at you with fake innocence.

You frown, Gina’s words coming back to you. “They’re flirting with you.”

You must have lost your mind. Was the haunted house really that traumatizing as to make you start coming up with such ridiculous things? How silly of you.

The feeling of a hand resting on the small of your back has you yelping, jumping to face forward again. Taehyung gives you a sheepish grin.

“Sorry,” he mumbles, gently pushing you forward to stand in front of him. “Are you really that spooked?”

“I...no.” You fail to come up with a complete sentence, but shrug it off. Taehyung smiles brightly at you, gesturing for you to head down the stairs.

“You seem distracted tonight, are you alright?”

The way your heart had begun palpitating calms down as you notice the obvious concern on Taehyung’s face. You give him a small smile, allowing yourself to relish the feeling of his fingers splayed against your back as you move down the stairs.

“I’m fine, don’t worry. Just distracted by the story.”

Taehyung looks at you for a moment longer, not quite believing you but shrugging it off. He brings both hands to your shoulders as you enter the basement, an obvious chill in the air.

You fight off a shiver, Taehyung noticing and beginning to rub at your arms in an attempt to warm you up. Gina immediately notices the action, hiding a smile as she pretends to cough.

“Well,” she says once her ‘coughing fit’ subsides. “We’ve made it to the final leg of the tour. How’s it been so far?”

This time everyone cheers with renewed vigor, although a part of you has a hunch that it’s because Hobi knows he’s nearing the end of this scary experience. The thought makes you grin.

“Earlier, you guys asked me what was found in the sealed off room. It’s easier to show you, rather than explain.” Gina walks backward, motioning for everyone to follow her. It’s darker down here, only a few candles light the way. Despite being surrounded by people you trust, you can’t fight the fear that sneaks inside of you.

Rounding a corner, you see a small hallway with a half-open door. Jin curses behind you, clearly feeling just as freaked out as you.

“Remember how the estranged wife said she’d never leave this place?” Gina nods toward the door and dark entryway. “In that room there’s evidence that she may have had an...extended stay here. It’s very small, and the door only opens to a certain point. Almost as though whoever designed it didn’t want to have an easy escape point.”

Chills run down your spine, and even Taehyung’s ministrations pause for a moment as he takes in this new information.

Jungkook speaks up, ever the curious one. “Wait...her body isn’t still here, right?”

Gina shakes her head. “No, although we think that she may have been buried somewhere on the property. We have yet to find her, though.”

“That...” you shake your head, shuffling from foot to foot. “That sounds so ominous. Like she still walks the property or something.”

The smile Gina sends you is enough to make your blood run cold. “We haven’t ruled anything out.” She gestures toward the door. “Due to fire hazards, we can only have two people at a time in the hallway and in the room. Do I have any volunteers?”

Jungkook’s hand immediately shoots up in the air, and he looks at his hyungs pleadingly. You remain still as a statue, refusing to look up for fear of being called on.

You swear you can almost hear Taehyung sigh before he speaks. “Well, obviously you have to go.” He nudges you forward, and you whirl on him in absolute horror.

“What?!” You shout. “How could you betray me like this?! I- no way!”

The boys can’t help but laugh at you, Namjoon clapping Taehyung on the shoulder. Taehyung gives you an apologetic look, shrugging.

“C’mon, I’ll keep you safe,” Jungkook promises, his big pleading eyes on yours.

You hate how you can never say no to him.

Gina pats your shoulder as you walk past, laughing lightly. “Have fun,” she croons. “Ok everyone, let’s go into the open area just around the corner-”

“You’re leaving us?!” You shout again, stopping in your tracks. “Noooo, no no. Not happening.”

“Jungkook will take care of you,” Yoongi says over his shoulder. “Or do you not trust him?”

Jungkook pauses, looking at you with those big brown eyes. “You don’t trust me?”

Yoongi chuckles darkly before leaving the hallway, and you know he’s aware of what he did. You’ll have to make him pay for it later.

Possibly in the form of food.

“No, I do Kook,” you sigh. He extends his hand out to you, waiting patiently.

You take it a little too quickly.

Gina was right, the door only opens to a certain point, leaving you no choice but to shimmy through. Jungkook inspects the entire area, pointing out what looks to be scratches on the doorframe. You shiver.

“It’s not real,” he reassures you, keeping his hand in yours as he shimmies into the room. You hesitate for a moment, daring to glance at where your hands are connected before following after him.

It’s nearly pitch black in the room, hardly allowing for you to see anything. “Can you even see anything?”

Jungkook laughs, squeezing your hand. “Nope. I think we’ll have to wait for our eyes to adjust. You good?”

You squeeze back. “Yeah, I think-”

The door is shut.

Suddenly delved into complete darkness, your breath hitches in your throat. “Jungkook,” you whimper. “Jungkook, I’m scared-”

“Shhh,” Jungkook hushes you, pulling you closer until you bump into his chest. “You’re fine. They’re just pulling a prank on us.”

Without thinking anything other than, I’m too young to die, you instinctively wrap your arms around his waist, burrowing your head against his chest as he chuckles.

“I can’t die, Jungkook,” you mumble into his chest. “I’m too young. I have so much to do. I have a test this week to take, and I’ve studied so hard for it, I have to take it. That’d be so stupid to die before taking that dumb test. And I have to yell at Yoongi or something, I don’t know-”

Jungkook’s giddy laughter pulls you out of your daze, and if you weren’t so scared you would be glaring at him. He laces his fingers behind your back, pulling you impossibly closer.

“You’re so cute,” he whispers into the dark, making every last thought eddy out of your brain. “Have I ever told you that before?”

Finding just enough willpower to move, you shake your head. Jungkook harrumphs above you, the sound almost pulling a giggle from you. Then you remember the situation you’re currently in.

Jungkook sighs. “Well, you are. That, and a lot of other things. Would you like me to tell you what else I think you are?”

Hands bunching in the fabric of his clothes, you find your voice. “...yes.”

Jungkook takes a deep breath. “Scary smart. It’s horrifying.” A chuckle bubbles up from your chest. “And inclusive. That’s so underrated these days, you know? But you’re always making sure everyone is involved and enjoying themselves.”

You can tell that he’s holding his breath from the way his chest has stopped moving, and you’re about to ask him if he’s alright when he hesitantly runs his fingers through your hair.

If that wasn’t enough to send you over the edge, he lets out a shaky breath before continuing on. “I’m sorry I haven’t told you those things before.”

You manage a laugh. “I’m sorry that it took us going on a haunted house tour for you to say it.”

Jungkook smiles down at you, your eyes finally adjusted to the dim room. He stares at you for a long moment, and you wonder if he’s going to kiss you.

You wonder if you’d let him.

He must see the question in your eyes, but he gives you a knowing look before heading toward the door, making sure your hand is in his.

“You don’t have to worry about that,” he says, testing the door and giggling at your sigh of relief when the door is unlocked.

“Worry about what?” You feign ignorance. Jungkook sees right through your, tugging you along as you head out the door.

He shrugs, suddenly unable to look you in the eyes as pink no doubt paints his cheeks. “You know...overstepping any boundaries.” He looks down at his feet. “Making a move.”

“Why?” The question comes out before you can stop it, and you inwardly curse yourself. Jungkook smiles softly at your inquiry.

The sound of everyone chatting makes you almost want to cry with relief. They must be just around the corner, waiting for you to return.

Jungkook leans over, whispering to you. “Because we have a pact.”

You turn to question him further, eyes wide. He anticipates this, taking long strides until you find yourselves back in the open area with everyone else.

“We’re back!” Jungkook announces, shooting you a smirk. You can’t help but stare at him, mouth slightly agape.

A pact?

Gina smiles broadly. “How was the room? Did you find anything interesting?”

You shake your head, trying and failing to stop yourself from overanalyzing every glance the boys give you. “...no. I was too freaked out to even look around after the door closed on us.”

“Yeah, who did that? We didn’t even hear you guys,” Jungkook asks.

Everyone looks at the two of you before looking at Gina, clearly just as confused.

Gina, on the other hand, looks absolutely terrified.

“Ummm...” she begins, rubbing her arms in an effort to warm herself up. “Remember how I said that we haven’t ever found the body of the estranged wife?”

You nod your head but stop, the words sinking in. The hairs on the back of your neck rise up, and you find yourself shuffling over to stand next to Jin, clinging to his arm.

“Yeah...” Namjoon says, eyes darting around the room.

Gina sighs. “Alright, everyone, single file line. Head out as quickly and quietly as possible.”

You don’t need to be told twice.

masterlist

this has been turned into a series!

series masterlist ∆∆∆ join the taglist

oooh so spooky ;)

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shihalyfie · 3 years

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Adventure, 02, pragmatism, and humanism (morality of fighting, conflict resolution, the importance of personal choice, etc.)

Adventure and 02 are naturally very idealistic series, but despite being idealistic, there are times when they can get rather pragmatic -- even uncomfortably pragmatic in ways that seem a bit unusual for a kids’ show. The entire last quarter of Adventure and almost all of 02 dealt so heavily with the topic of “is it okay to fight, even if it means incurring deaths?" to the point it’s pretty hard to miss, but both series have an approach towards the morality of fighting, the possibility of potentially having to kill enemies (including former friends that have turned antagonistic), the approach to dispute resolution, and the meanings of “moving forward positively” and “not getting hung up on needless negativity” that are surprisingly nuanced. At times, there’s even a strong message that warns against getting hung up on preachy principles that sound noble on their face but actually don’t get anywhere in practice.

This is a handful of topics, and it’s to the point where it may seem a bit strange to condense all of these under one meta instead of dedicating separate posts to it, but I decided to on the grounds of the fact that they’re all very tied to each other in the course of Adventure’s narrative. Overall, both series are very kind to the feelings and mentalities and thoughts of the young children involved, having the characters not only be kind towards each other but also encouraging the audience to understand their feelings. This is an approach towards understanding oneself and others that happens to be very applicable to life in general, even for adults; both series float a balance of being pragmatic and yet humanistic, kind to the struggles and internal thoughts of all of the characters within, and have a surprisingly nuanced look at what it means to take part in conflict and what the “best thing to do” in such a case is.

As said above, this is a long and complicated meta, and it’s to the point where I’ve considered separating it into multiple parts or posts, but in the end could never bring myself to because of how interrelated all of these topics keep ending up with each other. So, to spare those of you who are intimidated by the sheer length and winding-topic nature of this, here are the main points:

One who is not emotionally ready to fight, or is unwilling to fight, should not be forced to fight. On top of it being inhumane, emotional exhaustion is treated much in a way similar to physical exhaustion; especially in a world where fighting strength is linked to emotional will, one whose heart is not in it will not even be able to effectively fight in the first place. Even when joining the fight is the obvious ideal solution, one who needs to sit out should not be blamed or scorned for it. A choice to fight is exactly that, a choice, not an obligation; the world is messy and imperfect, and the most you can do is try to do whatever you can within the best of your ability. If you do, there is no reason you should be scorned for it.

There are many meaningful ways to contribute to the overall fight that don’t necessarily involve direct physical violence; those ways are still valuable and necessary, and those more attuned to those roles should embrace those roles if it makes them more comfortable to do it that way.

If an extreme result -- such as killing the enemy -- is reached, it needs to be done with the first and foremost priority being to protect people and prevent casualties. A diligent effort should still be made to preserve as many lives as possible (which means this isn’t something where you get to go all “knight templar” and beeline for a violent solution) -- but sometimes, there will be times when push comes to shove and that most extreme solution will have to be reached, even if that “enemy” was originally a friend, because inaction will very obviously lead to more people being hurt.

When a dispute about important points like the above is reached, everyone’s feelings must be acknowledged. This is not to be confused with philandering around with a “both sides have a point!” compromise; in fact, Adventure and 02 both make very firm stances on the above issues. Rather, it makes it clear that said points need to be made while not invalidating the other person for having those feelings -- that is to say, there’s a huge difference between “your opinion is wrong” and “you are stupid and unreasonable for having that wrong opinion.” Dispute resolution and understandings can only be reached when you properly understand why the other person came to that conclusion, and treat them with proper empathy and compassion while you try to work it out. You don’t have to acknowledge their point, but you have to acknowledge their feelings. (For those of you who have seen Appmon: Shinkai Haru is a master at this technique, and there are multiple times during the series where he will very assertively make his case against others while still appealing to the other person’s feelings and never denying their right to have them. This is also an extremely useful technique for dispute resolution in general, and I recommend that those reading this consider employing it more often, at least assuming you’re dealing with someone who’s open to listening.) Likewise, to truly reach out to someone and support them also requires understanding their feelings -- you can’t truly “support” them unless you’re capable of doing so.

There is a certain limitation in which adhering too closely to “moral principles” ends up becoming impractical, and don’t end up contributing to anything in the long run -- fixating over things like grudges, revenge, “punishing” people, and even the concept of forgiveness can quickly turn into platitudes. The best way to move forward is to not fixate on those principles or get hung up on the past, and rather think “now that we’re at this point at the current moment, what’s the best way to move forward in a way that helps others the most and minimizes harm?”

Adventure and the morality of fighting, and the necessity of personal choice

Believe it or not, the question of how feasible pacifiism is was first brought up as early as Adventure episode 12, when Takeru states that he has no intention of fighting Devimon. Elecmon calls this mindset out for the naivete of thinking they can just waltz up to Devimon and ask for answers instead of him trying to murder them on the spot -- and, in fact, he is completely right, because Devimon is not someone who can be reasoned with and indeed immediately tries to murder everyone on the spot one episode later, which results in Angemon’s death and Takeru trading out this very idealistic, naive mindset for the no-compromise, strict anti-darkness stance he takes in 02.

So there are two things to get out of this. The first is that, while Adventure and 02 are certainly very idealistic series, they are absolutely not naive. There are bad actors out there like Devimon who can’t be reasoned with whatsoever. Already off the bat, we have a clear statement from Adventure that an “everyone should stop fighting and get along!” mindset, when applied ad absurdum, is not going to get anyone very far.

The second is that none of the Adventure (or 02) kids like fighting. Takeru’s reaction here is certainly as extreme as it is because the idea of “fighting” presumably triggers his trauma from his parents’ divorce and the resulting split, but there’s no actual indication that any of these kids are necessarily fond of it. Certain ones like Taichi might get a little cocky midway through the battle when they’ve gotten it in the bag and are on an adrenaline high, but there’s also no indication that they’re interested in beating stuff up for the sake of it. Note that all of the fighting in Adventure episodes 1-10 was done out of sheer self-defense, and no Digimon was killed in any of the resulting battles (we’ll assume that the giant Bakemon in episode 11 doesn’t count mainly because it’s already dead) -- it was always fighting to the minimal amount to chase the attacking Digimon away or get them off their back. And, in File Island, that was possible -- but starting from the Server Continent and after, the hostile Digimon were actively out to kill them instead of just being territorial wild Digimon, forcing the Chosen Children to up the ante in order to survive.

The issue of “whether fighting in itself is the right thing to do” is brought back in the Dark Masters arc, and this is also where we start getting a discussion about the disparity between “the right thing to do” and “whether one is capable of doing said right thing to do”. Mimi, the most emotionally sensitive of the group, starts having an emotional breakdown over whether they should keep fighting and potentially drag in more casualties -- especially because the Digimon that had died had all done it for their sake in order to continue the fight, and therefore the Chosen Children are indirectly responsible for their deaths. Yamato thus explains the difficulty of the situation: he himself agrees that Taichi’s evaluation of the need to push forward and continue the fight is the right thing to do, but it’s inhumane to not consider the stress and and emotional toll this is causing and force everyone to continue in spite of that.

In addition, Taichi’s reasoning for why they should continue is “revenge” -- a very negative, spiteful reason very tied to “fighting for the sake of it”. It’s understandable for Taichi to have these feelings, but he’s going at it from the wrong direction, and he’s overall being very insensitive in this scene. Later, in Adventure episode 45, he says that he’s doing it for the sake of honoring the Digimon who died for them. In other words, a lot of the reason Taichi’s methodology isn’t working is that he’s hung up on “the principle of things”, and not the more pragmatic reasons one should fight.

In Adventure episode 45, the kids finally meet the entity who chose them in the first place, who self-identifies as “the one who wishes for stability” -- the novels name them “Homeostasis”. Note the name -- it refers to the maintenance of internal balance within a living system, and Homeostasis themself starts their long infodump with their motive: it’s not that they want to eliminate all darkness from the world entirely, but that the powers of evil are upsetting the balance so badly that everything will be consumed if something isn’t done. It’s not like they’re insistent on violence either -- it’s just that they have a world to protect. The novels give us a particular amount of extra information on this entity, namely that it is not an omnipotent god by any shake of the imagination (in fact, there’s even an implication that there are higher powers that they themself don’t understand), and rather just a mere security system that observed that things were going south and used its rather limited methods of communication (via the Agents) to help make preparations.

Regardless, back to the episode -- we learn that the reason this entity recruited human children into all of this was because of the Hikarigaoka incident in 1995, which displayed to them and the Agents that a bond between children and Digimon could allow Digimon to evolve spontaneously, something that’s not possible with Digimon in the Digital World alone. Oh, and also, that they’ve been wanting to talk to them since File Island, and this entire thing about being cryptic with information was because they literally had no body and there was a massive amount of information loss after the Dark Masters blew up the Agents’ base and killed everyone except Gennai. In other words, just like with all of the actions the Chosen Children had been taking up until this point, everything Homeostasis and the Agents did was out of desperation because they were running out of other options to save their world, and during their brief time of being able to speak with the children, Homeostasis dumps pretty much everything they need to know and speaks to them using the extremely deferential sonkeigo form, meaning that they consider everything the kids are doing to be a massive favor to them. (Contrary to common belief, their possession of Hikari’s body does not seem to be non-consensual, given that they spend multiple episodes trying to contact her, and are clearly depicted having a proper conversation with her before temporarily borrowing her body.)

Most importantly, at the end of their speech, Taichi asks them what to do next, and the response is effectively: “We don’t know, but we trust you to make the best decision.” So, again: fighting as a Chosen Child is not an obligation, but something done because they want to do it and can. They were handed the tools to get this done by Homeostasis and the Agents, who believed in their potential to create miracles and be virtuous people and do something to save their world beyond what the native Digimon could do alone out of desperation and a lack of other options, and they are not hovering over the Chosen Children to see if they’ve “succeeded” or “failed” (note that they seem to have no sense of grudge or disappointment over Taichi’s SkullGreymon stunt in Adventure episode 16, explaining it very neutrally as an example of a risk), but more “we believe you were the best people who were able to do it and we trust your ability to help us.” (This is especially because, while it’s made clear they’d been wanting to contact them for a while, their most direct intervention comes right after Yamato had questioned why they were chosen in the first place -- presumably, they felt that the kids deserved an answer.)

At the end of Adventure episode 45, Mimi, considering the fighting they’re doing to be responsible for all of the fallouts and the sacrifices, decides that she won’t participate anymore, and Jou decides to stay with her in order to convince her to come back (although the novel also reveals that he himself is having doubts, too). Very importantly: nobody begrudges Mimi for being emotionally overwhelmed and sitting out, and nobody even begrudges Jou for choosing to stay with her. This is smack in the middle of the Dark Masters arc when everyone needs all the support they can get -- but after everything that had just happened, it’s inhumane to force either of them forward in this condition.

Despite his doubts, however, Jou himself is already coming to understand the limits of “pacifism” at a time like this:

What he wanted to tell her was this: that he didn’t see any likelihood of co-existing with the Dark Masters, and that they had no other choice but to fight them. Even a neutral country like Switzerland had a military. They would be invaded by enemy countries without one. It would be nice and ideal if they used the nonviolent resistance approach as Ghandi did. But that didn’t mean it was okay to just be killed without lifting a finger… But not even he could find a good answer.

Again: Adventure and 02 are an idealistic series, but they are not naive. It would be nice if the fighting could all stop and everyone would be happy, but there are malicious bad actors who will take advantage of you sitting there and doing nothing.

And so, Leomon dies in Adventure episode 47, and Mimi and Jou learn the hard way: if they do nothing, people will still die. Mimi had witnessed all of the Digimon sacrificing themselves for the Chosen Children’s sake, and thus had followed the logic that their friends would stop dying for them if they stopped fighting, but now that they’ve stopped fighting, said malicious forces (in this case, MetalEtemon) went ahead and killed their friends anyway -- and they’ve gone and destroyed the Village of Beginnings to boot, preventing any of them from being reborn. So in other words, if the intent is to “prevent casualties”, as it turns out, inaction didn’t actually prevent casualties.

Nevertheless, Mimi does not like fighting. In fact, Jou doesn’t like fighting either. Both of them now understand that it’s the best thing to do in this situation, but is it really the best thing to do to force them into embracing violence because of this? Instead, Jou determines in Adventure episode 50 that the overall fight doesn’t necessarily mean that everyone has to jump in and get violent -- the likeable and friendly Mimi has started to cultivate a skill in getting other people to rally behind her, and Jou is starting to consider that he may have a future in treating the wounded and supporting people before they become casualties. Those are still valuable ways they can contribute without forcing them into doing things they can’t bring themselves to do -- and, indeed, Mimi’s rallied army ends up saving everyone’s rears in Adventure episode 52.

While Taichi is not there to personally witness this discussion, Adventure episode 50 has him make a slightly less reckless tactical plan, and he explains (directly citing what happened with Yamato, Mimi, and Jou as his rationale) that he’s learned that he needs to take into account the potential for there being collateral damage. Recall that, earlier, his motive for doing things had been on a sheer principle level, with a lot of negative emotions of spite and revenge. But now, he’s come to understand that the most important thing he needs to do is to “prevent sacrifices”, and that’s the reason they still need to fight. Hence, why Taichi makes a proper plan for doing it instead of just doing the first and most aggressive thing that comes to mind, since he’s a soccer captain and has the potential for being a bird’s eye tactician, after all -- this time, he just needs to channel it in a way that prioritizes the lives of people around them.

And in Adventure episode 51, when reaching out to Sora (who’s cracking under all of her self-imposed expectations and sense of duty to others), Yamato and Jou take what they learned from Homeostasis six episodes prior and apply it -- Sora is working under the mentality that they have an “obligation” to get this done and that they are impending “failures” if they don’t (and, to be fair, if they don’t make it, the world is going to end, which is pretty unambiguously terrible). But what Yamato and Jou do is reframe it to fall more closely under the philosophy of what Adventure is saying here -- the fact they can do something about it is already absolutely incredible. (I mean, not to sugarcoat the fact that the world is still going to end if they pull it off, but the stress, self-hatred, and self-blame of “we’re failures for not pulling it off” is definitely not going to help.) They are doing everything they can right now, within their reasonable abilities. If they end up not being able to do it, that’s not something that should be considered a sin or a failure on their part; they are here because they can and want to and are doing it and are here to make the best possible use of that.

It’s one of the many times Adventure and 02 will make this statement, indirectly or directly: despite the title of “Chosen Child”, the Chosen Children do everything they do because of their own choices, and because they want to, not because they have to.

We finally meet Apocalymon in Adventure episode 53, and we learn that he(?)’s a combined spirit made up of all of the Digimon that were “eliminated” and failed during the evolution process, and is deciding to take out its anger and spite at the world out on everyone else by “denying evolution” (this is clarified in the novel to also be the reason it subtly influenced the prior enemies to destroy everything and especially the Village of Beginnings, because it functionally would put an end to the Digital World’s evolution by reducing it to nothing). So, in the end, we have a contrast between Apocalymon, who’s fighting for the sake of self-centered spite (including wanting to take down everything with it in Adventure episode 54 even when its demise is already clear), and the Chosen Children, who are fighting to protect their loved ones.

Incidentally, we also learn in Adventure episode 53 that there were Chosen Children who put an incomplete seal on Apocalymon prior to the ones in 1999. (Kizuna also introduces Menoa Bellucci, who became a Chosen Child in 1997, and assuming you’re following Adventure’s background doubling-every-year lore, at the time of 1999, there were a whole eight other Chosen Children besides Taichi’s group in existence.) The novels make it clear that the time dilation and distortion was going all the way up until the defeat of Apocalymon, long enough that the partners of those older Chosen were able to evolve to the Holy Beasts (and possibly enough for said older Chosen to get really faded through Digital World history to the point even Gennai doesn’t know about them). So the point here is that in the grand scope of the entirety of Digital World history, Taichi and his friends are not particularly singular existences -- there are people who saved the world before them, and 02 will introduce people all over the world who are going on their own adventures (including the main 02 kids in Tokyo), and, of course, by the time of the 02 epilogue, everyone’s going to have a Digimon partner. Koushirou later observes in Two-and-a-Half Break that there’s nothing special about having a partner in itself.

Does that make Taichi and his friends’ adventure of self-growth and saving a whole two worlds somehow insignificant, just because it’s not particularly unique? No. Because, again, they did this all not because of whether Homeostasis chose them or not, but because all of it was operated by their own will and strength and desire to protect others, all within the restraints of what they could feasibly do and handle, and they are amazing people for pulling that off.

02 and the importance of mutual understanding (and, also, more about the morality of fighting)

Before we proceed onto the 02 analysis, I think it’s important to establish a bit of important context about how 02′s lead protagonist, Daisuke, approaches things, and how it relates to the recurring debates on the morality of fighting throughout the series. In 02 episode 14, we learn that Daisuke was captured at Big Sight during the Odaiba Fog incident, and therefore witnessed, firsthand, the threat of Vamdemon’s lackeys attacking innocent civilians (something that Miyako, who witnessed the self-contained Omegamon vs. Diablomon battle on the Internet, and Iori, who only happened to be on a grounded plane after the Vamdemon fight had already ended, did not quite have anything on the par of). Spring 2003 and the Adventure novels elucidate what was going on in his head at the time: he was frustrated at his inability to protect his loved ones, and wished to have the power to fight the “bad guys” who were threatening everyone.

Remember this for later.

Moving onto 02 itself. 02 is a series about relationships, but, more significantly, it’s a series about the sheer amount of work it takes to maintain relationships, and especially the principle that “maintaining a relationship to another person requires being properly aware and understanding of the other person’s feelings.” One thing that often frustrates me about a lot of media (both kids’ shows and non-kids’ shows) and, well, to be honest, a lot of people in general, is the preaching of supposedly “positive” platitudes that actually go straight into what’s called “toxic positivity” for good reason -- because while it’s ostensibly “positive”, it also denies other people’s feelings, waving away everything negative and going “yeah, well, positivity!” and “optimism!” and “power of friendship!” and all sorts of stuff that are actually dismissive because they’re not showing any real effort to properly understand the other party and acknowledge why they feel this way. Like, sure, you may be telling someone to cheer up, but it also carries an (accidental or otherwise) implication of “you’re irrational and stupid for being upset and you should be smiling all of the time because ~positivity~.”

There is a lot of conflict in 02 -- especially because the theme of the morality of fighting is even more relevant, particularly in the case of the added question of “when the enemy in question is not an unambiguously evil sadist but a former friend in trouble”, and later the question of how someone who’s done horrible things in the past but is clearly making an active effort to make up for it should be treated. Daisuke, 02′s lead protagonist and carrier of a lot of its main themes, is ostensibly a simple-minded idealist, but even his theory of “positivity” and “always moving forward” has a lot of nuance beyond what you would usually see in this kind of anime lingo.

Context is also very important here. Adventure and 02′s stance being about “doing the best you reasonably can in a given situation”, it also means that what might be the best thing to do will change depending on context. 02′s starting circumstances are very different from Adventure’s, because it starts off without the threat necessarily being immediately world-threatening -- certainly, they need to stop the Kaiser, but this is in the form of a long-term territory war with an enemy who (at the time) doesn’t appear at night, and it’s unclear just how long it’ll take. This means that when the threat is not immediately world-ending, none of the kids are ever given grief for prioritizing their own personal obligations in lieu of fighting.

Iori and Jou do choose to ditch their kendo lesson and prep school exam (respectively), but they make it clear that they did this out of personal choice, and in fact this conversation opens with Armadimon apologizing to Iori for giving him grief for not coming, because he thinks Iori is perfectly within his rights to have stuck with the lesson! Perhaps, if the world were to end in a few hours, it would certainly be pretty idiotic to insist on sticking with a kendo lesson or prep school, because those things aren’t going to exist anymore if the world ends, but this is a very long and drawn-out territory war with no known end, and it’s understandable that these kids need to maintain their life necessities while straddling the balance between the war and their lives as a whole.

Again, they’re doing the best they can, and being a Chosen Child is about doing things because they want to, not because they have to.

This is especially because the Kaiser himself attempts to exploit the meaning of a Chosen Child in 02 episode 3 -- again, being a “Chosen Child” means being trusted to do the right thing with what you’re given, but the Kaiser basically betrayed that trust, and nobody was able to stop him from exploiting it and attempting a takeover with it. And Ken takes that title of “Chosen Child” and interprets it to mean he’s entitled to all of this -- but the other kids are Chosen Children just like him, and (at this point) all of them are simply choosing to do whatever they want with that.

And on the flip side, you have the Adventure seniors, who are a little nerfed by the Dark Towers, but as far as the way the younger 02 kids see them goes, there is no doubt that the 02 kids respect them deeply and are practically reliant on their support and advice, and their experience and maturity in comparison to themselves. The episode that establishes most how in awe the 02 kids are of their seniors is 02 episode 17, where they learn the details of the adventure in 1999, and so it’s not about how much combat power they’re displaying right now but rather how much experience they have in doing such amazing things. Likewise, their seniors are frustrated at their inability to help -- not because they see it as some obligated duty, but because they see their juniors trying their best to deal with an ongoing crisis and want to help, resulting in them providing support roles such as covering for them with a camp trip in 02 episode 18 and allowing them to do a long-term Digital World stakeout. For this, the younger 02 kids adore them and give them all of their respect.

02 episodes 10-11 are significant in juxtaposing the themes of “conflict” and “understanding each other’s feelings” -- at the end of 02 episode 10, we see Yamato punch Taichi, but he holds his hand to him right after, indicating that Yamato punched him not out of anger or condescension or scorn over Taichi’s hesitation to fight Agumon, but rather simply to snap him out of it for his own sake, knowing he wouldn’t take it offensively, so in other words, what looked like a “conflict” on its face was actually communication between the two, with neither of them treating each other with scorn.

The conflict at the end of the episode is over whether they should run the risk of killing Agumon in the process of fighting him to get him back from the Kaiser’s Evil Spiral-induced brainwashing (note that this is about the risk, since it’s not necessarily guaranteed they’ll have to kill him, and they still of course need to make a conscientious effort to prevent that outcome). Yamato, however, frames it in terms of very practical matters, and even takes Agumon’s own feelings into it while he’s at it: if they pull back purely for the sake of not running that risk, Agumon will end up being the Kaiser’s slave and killing machine and nothing will be resolved, whereas if they run the risk, the best outcome is that Agumon is saved (which is, fortunately, what happens!), and the worst outcome is that he’s killed, which is still a preferable outcome to him having to remain the Kaiser’s brainwashed slave used to kill other things en masse.

02 episode 11 further explores the theme of conflict in the face of “understanding each other’s feelings”, as it starts off with a fight between Daisuke and Takeru on the grounds of whether it’s okay to risk killing Agumon. Takeru’s stance is to side with Taichi’s decision, even if he doesn’t like it (again: just because some of these kids are able to make these decisions doesn’t mean they like it, and they’re doing it not because they’re callous but because they’ve thought hard about it and have decided it’s the best option they have!). Daisuke, being a bleeding heart, is appalled that Takeru could so easily endorse killing Taichi’s partner, and the two fight.

Note that the series does not “both-sides” this issue -- Taichi and Takeru’s stance is basically treated as the optimal course of action here -- but it also doesn’t invalidate Daisuke’s feelings of understandably being very shocked and appalled by this! Taichi and Yamato, in what initially seems like a violation of common sense, encourage them to be allowed to continue fighting, saying that it was essential to their friendship, and that confuses everyone present at the time -- but the meaning becomes clear by the end of the episode, when Takeru’s own Patamon is momentarily taken by the Kaiser and put at risk of himself becoming an Evil Spiral slave. Takeru blows up at Daisuke for hesitating (remember, this is one of his triggers), and eventually runs the exact same risk he’d advocated for Agumon with his own partner.

Remember what I said about “toxic positivity”? If everyone had just forced Takeru and Daisuke to shut up for the sake of “not fighting”, both of them might have remained angry at each other and stewing in silence, but because of the conflict, Daisuke himself personally witnessed Takeru run that risk for his own partner, presumably for the same reason (as much as the potential of Patamon being killed hurts him, the idea of Patamon being used as a killing machine is even more panic-inducing for him). With that, he understands that Taichi and Takeru made the decision to go ahead with this not out of callousness or cruelty, but because they sincerely felt they had to, no matter how much it pained them. Daisuke rails on himself for not understanding Takeru’s feelings better, and considering that he and Takeru never get in this vicious of a fight again, the point is: it wasn’t about whether they should form a friendship by fighting or not fighting in itself, it was about the fact that the two of them were able to get their feelings on the table, and that Daisuke was able to understand why Takeru endorsed what he did. (And this, too, is what it means for why Taichi and Yamato are friends now because they fought so much in the past -- back in Adventure, those fights ended up having them bare some very raw feelings to each other.)

While in the series itself, they’re successfully able to save Agumon anyway, Hurricane Touchdown presents a more unfortunate outcome of the “friendly fire” debate, in which Daisuke learns that the hostile Digimon kidnapping their seniors (and, later, a lot of other people) is Wallace’s own partner. Daisuke is so emotionally overwhelmed by this that he breaks down crying at the possibility of having to kill someone’s partner, knowing that he’d never be able to do something like this if it were V-mon, and Wallace gets him on board with an attempt to appeal to Chocomon without fighting.

This stance is not unreasonable, Wallace and Daisuke cannot be blamed for being hopeful, and, in the end, it’s admirable that they did make a conscientious effort to solve this with pacifism (again, this kind of attempt should be made, and it’s not good to beeline to the most violent solution for no reason). But unfortunately, once they meet Chocomon in the flower field, it turns out that not only is Chocomon beyond reason, he himself is also clearly out of his right mind and suffering through all of this, and Wallace finally relents and asks Daisuke to assist him in the fight (after having stayed in denial for half a movie about wanting to avoid this). Daisuke, witnessing all of this himself, agrees without hesitation, and eventually, it turns out that this decision for the best when Chocomon himself begs Gumimon and Magnamon to put him out of his misery, and them obliging (albeit hesitantly) allows him to have peace in death instead of suffering in life.

Hurricane Touchdown’s sequel drama CD, The Door to Summer, presents Daisuke with yet another dilemma with Nat-chan, who is also clearly suffering in quite a similar vein (the parallel is directly drawn). In the end, the same conclusion is reached -- Nat-chan is unfortunately killed, but is able to find release.

02 episode 16 presents an argument about the limits of ethical principles instead of approaching things practically, when Iori considers himself a horrible person for having told a lie to get Jou out of an important exam. This is mainly just about a lie, but in terms of Iori’s character arc and its relevance to 02′s themes as a whole, the point here is that there is a certain point where being too stuck on “the moral principle” of things instead of thinking practically is actually selfish in some sense. If Iori hadn’t lied, he’d get maybe one more point of moral integrity, and then everyone would have suffocated to death -- compared to lying and therefore everyone for the most part benefiting (Jou’s very happy to help his juniors and save them from, well, literally suffocating, after all). This topic becomes very important later when it turns out to be generally applicable to the wider morality of fighting that the kids later face in the series’s final cour.

The disparity between “moral principles” and “what actually happens in practice” also shows up in 02 episode 19, when Takeru loses his composure and starts punching out the Kaiser. Is the Kaiser a horrible person (at this point) who totally deserves this? Absolutely! Are we as the audience getting a lot of catharsis seeing his face punched out? Probably! But at the same time, railing at the Kaiser with unbridled anger is also...not actually accomplishing anything! Instead, Takeru’s just getting a few moments to stew in some really unhealthy emotions and uselessly punching out the Kaiser while nothing productive is getting done, and it’s also contributing heavily to his emotional isolation from Iori (and the rest of the group) because he’s not coping with it in a healthy way at all. Takeru’s feelings are certainly understandable (again: the episode is absolutely framing this in such a way that you’re inclined to take his side), but at the same time, being malicious about this is not actually practically making any headway.

One of the major reasons I’m covering all of these seemingly unrelated topics in one post is that all of them end up having a massive combined amount of relevance to the narrative behind Ken discarding the Kaiser persona, and how he comes to integrate himself with the group. On the surface, the storyline seems to be simply that Ken learned the error of his ways and tried to stop drowning in regrets, and Daisuke’s idealistic personality reached out to him and helped him heal. That said, there’s quite a bit more going on than just that.

A theme going on behind Ken’s character arc for the second half of 02 is one that probably seems a bit unusual for an idealistic kids’ show, but the point that ends up being made quite often is that whether Ken should be “forgiven” for his actions is a rather immaterial question. 02 episode 23 has a bunch of Baby Digimon rail on him, and remind him that he will never be able to take that back. There is nothing in either world that will erase those actions or make them retroactively justified or pushed under the bridge. The only thing he can do is accept the fact that it happened, whether he likes it or not, and determine what to do from here in terms of taking responsibility and making things right.

And this ends up having an influence in how Daisuke advocates for him, and how the rest of the group reaches out to him...

First of all, Daisuke being the most open-minded about Ken was not blind optimism. There’s no evidence that he was actually all that emotionally receptive to Ken or interested in being his friend before 02 episode 25. However, Daisuke also does not advocate for “punishing” Ken or kicking him while he’s down -- because that won’t accomplish anything, and Ken is clearly not in a state to be wreaking more havoc right now. Daisuke remembers the footage of Ken’s parents crying on screen, and determines what would be the first course of action to fix this situation -- and thus, he tells Ken to “go home”, because whatever Ken did in the past and no matter how much the team resents him right now, they are in this situation, with a boy who’s clearly not going to cause any more trouble right now and a family that’s hurting by his absence, and the very least he can do is do something productive from here on out.

Hence, at the end of 02 episode 24, when it turns out that Ken’s back and saved them from Thunderballmon, Daisuke decides to be optimistic about him and start the process of emotionally reaching out, but, again, it’s not blind optimism -- he sees what Ken did and takes this to mean “okay, clearly he’s not going to do bad things anymore, so regardless of whatever he did in the past, he’s helping out now, so we should check in with how he’s doing and let him help out.”

This is, of course, enhanced by the fact that Daisuke had communicated with the Crest of Kindness in 02 episode 20, but there’s also another layer to this: the major point of dispute between him and Miyako in 02 episode 25 (with both of them generally being rather open-minded about Ken otherwise) is in regards to the fact Ken and Stingmon were responsible for killing Thunderballmon in the prior episode. Come the climax of 02 episode 25, it is made clear that if Golemon successfully destroys the dam, the results will be absolutely disastrous, and there will probably be an incredible amount of casualties. Here, Daisuke himself is the first person to realize that killing Golemon may become a requirement (Ken is not actually a part of his initial comment) -- that is to say, most likely, the reason he’s willing to give Ken the benefit of the doubt about Thunderballmon is that he himself is understanding of that potential mindset (especially since 02 episode 43 does indeed establish Daisuke as being the first to accept it).

Recall that, between Daisuke, Miyako, and Iori, Daisuke was personally involved three years prior in a large incident with an unambiguously malicious Digimon that was about to claim a ton of victims -- he’s a bleeding heart, sure, but he’s also a bleeding heart for the potential victims, and the one thing that ate at him during the time of the Vamdemon incident was that he couldn’t do anything to protect everyone. Therefore, he’s the most receptive to this potential conclusion because he doesn’t want to see victims like that again. Not only that, Takeru and Hikari (having witnessed similar conclusions back in Adventure) are also very quick to point out that this might be an inevitability -- it’s just Miyako (who, in her emotional passion, is desperate to find a way out and clinging onto the hope that they won’t have to) and Iori (who considers doing such an act “no better than him” -- again, see the fixation on “moral principle” and “being above him”) who are so vehemently against it.

In the end, it turns out that Golemon is a Dark Tower Digimon (and therefore not sentient), and everyone’s left off the hook for now, but the reason this is still important is that through this, Miyako learns that Ken -- someone whom everyone was side-eyeing for potentially lapsing back into his cold, callous ways after supposedly having given up the Kaiser mantle -- was not out to kill (and, indeed, when the first kill inevitably happens in 02 episode 43, Ken is just as shaken about it as Miyako and Iori). The important part is that Miyako, and later the other kids, accepted Ken not out of some principle of optimism or forgiveness, but because they came to understand his position and feelings. All of the kids accepted Ken on their own terms after understanding his feelings and position better via interacting with him and hearing his own testimony -- they came to understand his mindset, what he’s been through and what he’s planning to do from here on out, and, most importantly, that he needs support really, really badly right now.

Which extends not just to Ken, but also everyone’s relationships here in general. Daisuke broke through to Ken and kicked off their first Jogress in 02 episode 26 because he proactively listened to everything Ken was saying and what he wanted to do, and correctly identified that Ken very desperately wants to take responsibility, so he talks him out of a reckless suicide mission by pointing out that all of his attempts to not make his family sad and to make up for everything he’s done are going to amount to nothing if he just throws his life away like this. In 02 episode 31, Miyako listens to Hikari’s troubles and her compulsion to not speak out for herself and reaches out to her successfully via promising to be there for her so she doesn’t have to slink into passive resignation. And in 02 episodes 34-36, Iori makes an active effort to understand Takeru’s mentality and why he has the drastic personality shifts he does, and communicates to Takeru that he wants to understand him better. So the point is: the 02 kids were able to successfully connect with each other and become deeper friends because they made an active attempt to listen to each other’s troubles and address the core of what they needed. They were only able to become “supportive” once they understood everything.

(02 episode 36 also has a moment where Iori’s about to rail off at everyone for not taking the fight seriously, before Armadimon reminds him that he’s starving -- again, it is very inhumane to ignore other needs and force everyone to keep fighting endlessly just because they theoretically can.)

We do meet the representative who claims credit for choosing Daisuke, Miyako, and Iori as Chosen Children in 02 episode 37 (Qinglongmon, representative of the Holy Beasts), and he explains the process of why they sent the kids what they did in order to retrieve Ken from the deep end. Notably, Qinglongmon admits that even the Holy Beasts were blindsided by a few things and adapted the situation as they saw fit (they didn’t originally expect the kids to be able to use multiple Digimentals at first). More importantly, this was, again, all a bit of a desperation move, because this was about as much as the Holy Beasts could manage, being sealed and drained of power and all.

Also, while retrieving Ken from the deep end was on the list of things the Holy Beasts set out to do, “everyone becoming Ken’s friend” was not necessarily on that agenda. Again: that was something that these kids chose to do on their own, by observing Ken’s actions and feelings and choosing to connect with him.

The episode ends with BlackWarGreymon going off on a journey of angst, and: note that the kids decide to drop the issue for the time being. Again, they’re operating not on a philosophy of grudge or whether one should get retribution for their actions, but what the likelihood of bad things continuing to happen is from here on out, and at this point in time, it doesn’t seem very likely, so there’s no point in pushing the issue or pursuing him.

Nevertheless, the morality debate over killing still remains looming over everyone’s heads, with Iori also realizing in 02 episode 29 that there are such things as Digimon that just want wanton destruction and cannot be negotiated with. The fact that the Adventure kids were put in world-threatening situations three years prior and are already far past this question is directly acknowledged in 02 episode 43, with Taichi advising Hikari that this harsh truth is going to hit the other four sooner or later, before it does eventually happen at the end of the episode. (Hikari visibly winces during her conversation with Taichi; again, none of the Adventure kids ever liked this.) And, in the end, predictably, Iori, Miyako, and Ken take it hard -- but Daisuke is the first to point out what would have happened if they didn’t do it. Namely, that the victims would have far outnumbered the Digimon they just killed.

It is, of course, good to be conscientious and not beeline for the most violent solution, and, again, context is important here -- in the situation provided, SkullSatamon was holding up a bus and split seconds away from murdering everyone in it. Had everyone refrained for the sake of morality, just like how Iori refraining from lying back in 02 episode 16 would have actually been selfish in a sense, here, the only claim you get to say after refraining is “well, I wasn’t the one who caused the harm.” Inaction would have caused the deaths of all of the young children in the bus; there would have been casualties either way.

Miyako and Iori are forced to face this truth again in 02 episode 44, with both of them being emotionally compromised by the reality of what they just did. In both cases, Hikari and Takeru step in to remind them what they’re doing this for, by pointing out the victims that would have been killed had they done nothing. Miyako and Iori are not at fault for being emotionally compromised or doing their best to prevent it -- it’s just that there’s only so much they can blame themselves for when they’re now directly faced with the potential victims in front of them.

Iori had already been grappling with this potential for several episodes now, so while he still takes it hard, more attention is given to Miyako’s reaction -- especially since she herself was the victim who was about to be murdered by LadyDevimon had Silphymon not done the kill. The voice acting and lack of Tailmon’s presence in Silphymon’s apology to Miyako implies very heavily that it was the Aquilamon side who took over and did it in a last-ditch effort to save Miyako’s life -- and he’s emotionally destroyed by it himself too, because he did it out of love for Miyako, and yet betrayed her request to not go for the kill. In the end, Miyako is forced to confront the fact that this was done out of love and a desire to protect, not a callous and malicious intent to murder, and comes to terms with it.

However, again: the series continues to reiterate that people who are not emotionally up for it should not be obligated to force themselves to do it. The beginning of 02 episode 45 has Takeru directly advise Iori that he shouldn’t do this out of obligation if he isn’t up for it -- remember that Takeru will only be able to fight with Shakkoumon if Iori is present, meaning that he’s perfectly willing to give up his ability to fight effectively because it’s not fair to force Iori to do it. This is not a series that advertises that everyone embrace the spirit of killing things and numb themselves to it. This entire situation sucks.

However, Iori makes it clear: he understands everything, and has decided to do it himself, because he understands the stakes and what it’s going to take to actually protect people.

Which is also reiterated in 02 episode 48 -- after witnessing the deaths of Archnemon and Mummymon at the hands of BelialVamdemon, everyone is shaken to the core. It should be established that the kids didn’t have much reason to sympathize with or like the two of them at this point, because everything we learned about them was from the audience’s point of view -- as far as the kids knew them, they were just two really rude and cruel Digimon who wanted wanton destruction. Yet even they are emotionally pained to see them die in such a cruel manner, and it causes everyone to hesitate -- even Daisuke, who does push forward because he knows what’s at stake, but still has to take a moment to collect himself.

Seeing what Daisuke’s about to do, Ken tries to force himself to join Daisuke so that Daisuke will at least not be alone (note that he actually says upfront that he’ll join!) -- but Daisuke notices that Ken’s heart isn’t in it, and actively advises him to sit out. Is the world in immediate crisis? Absolutely! But there is no scorn to be had for people who are emotionally falling apart right now and unable to get themselves to do it -- Daisuke even says himself that they won’t be able to fight effectively with Ken like this.

We close this analysis on a return to the concept of forgiveness and moving forward, and we learn in 02 episode 48 that Ken has two parts to his internal wishes: he wants the Kaiser (himself) to be “punished”, and he wants “forgiveness” from his deceased brother Osamu. Both of those things will certainly make him feel a little better emotionally, but they also won’t accomplish anything -- the “Kaiser” doesn’t exist anymore, so what good will that “punishment” do besides a little catharsis for the victims? And he can continue chasing after this standard of “whether he’s suffered enough” like it’s some numerical tally, but that’s not going to get him anywhere either, and it’s why Wormmon has to chase out even that ostensibly happy image of Osamu. Osamu is long gone, and is not going to return, and the question of whether Ken should be “forgiven” is rather immaterial. It’s not about whatever happened or didn’t happen back then; it’s about what Ken is going to do now.

Actually, what is “forgiveness” anyway? At no point do the 02 kids ever actually say they “forgive” Ken for his actions. In Spring 2003, Iori also says he doesn’t forgive Oikawa for what he’s done, either. There’s nothing that will ever erase what they did or suddenly make those actions retroactively justifiable, and there’s no arbitrary payment that Ken or Oikawa could do to meet some kind of quota of forgiveness. But what the kids do recognize in Ken is that, regardless of whatever he did in the past, at current he is a young boy in intense emotional distress who has gone through a lot, is working very hard to make up for his mistakes, and needs all the emotional support he can get, and there’s no reason to hold a grudge against someone like that instead of continuing to support him and loving him for who he is now. Given that, does it matter whether they “forgive” him or not?

And even if Iori will never forgive Oikawa, he can still lament everything that happened to him and drove him to do everything, and appreciate the meaning of what he did for the Digital World in the end, and use this as a further lesson on what it means to understand people instead of stewing angrily in a grudge that’ll only hurt himself.

Ultimately, that is the theory behind Adventure and 02. The world is messy, imperfect, and doesn’t fit under neat rules of morality and “right” or “not right” that you can cram everything under. Despite that, there’s something to be appreciated in not throwing in the towel and continuing to do the best you reasonably can in every situation. It would be ideal if all of the fighting could stop, or if it were possible to make the “optimal” decision of fighting or not fighting in every situation regardless of human exhaustion or emotional compromise, but that’s just not something that’s possible, and there’s no reason to call oneself a “failure” for not holding yourself to that standard. And in the end, the answer is this: instead of fixating on all of those arbitrary things that don’t actually serve any practical purpose, the way to live your best life is simply to look at where you are now, think about what you can do from here on out (regardless of what happened in the past), and do your best to protect and be kind to yourself and those around you.

Of course, you must be kind to others. But you have to be kind to others by understanding what it takes and everything around it -- and then choose to be kind anyway.

#digimon #digimon adventure #digimon adventure 02 #kizuna spoilers #shihameta

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scripttorture · 3 years

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Hello! I have a few questions related to your most recent post and the definition of torture. You said:

"A trained person who was never tortured will always out perform someone whose training involved torture."

According to everything else I have seen on your blog, this makes sense - the mental and physical trauma from being tortured have lasting effects which make certain tasks more difficult.

However, this seems to juxtapose certain tropes I've seen in US military training advertisements. For example, "Hell Week" in the Navy SEAL training seems like it would be torture if it was forced upon someone (like if the soldiers didn't sign up for it and didn't have the option to quit.). *Hell Week is when soldiers are training continuously for 5 days in freezing, wet conditions, with little more than 4 hours of sleep for the entire week, under insane amounts of physical and mental stress.

- If someone chose to be tested both mentally and physically, I feel like it wouldn't be torture. However, if the same exact conditions were forced upon someone else (testing their mental and physical limits without their consent or understanding), does your quote above mean that the person who did not have a choice would not reap the benefits of the training/testing? Or would the Navy SEALs be better soldiers if they didn't have to go through 'torturous conditions' during Hell Week, regardless of their choice to do so?

(I used Hell Week as an example, but I meant this question generally. I'm trying to figure out how to best train an elite soldier and avoid any harmful torture apologia tropes, while also making sure that they are able to handle insanely challenging situations)

- My other question has more to do with the definition of torture that you quoted from the UN in one of your master posts. If someone is being seriously injured (pulled fingernails, whipping, starvation etc), but not for the purposes of interrogation, punishment, or intimidation, is that still torture, or is that just abuse? And, regardless of what we call it, would the effects be the same as if it were torture for any of the three motives above?

Sorry if this is long and hard to understand, I can clarify if needed!

It’s not the longest I’ve gotten and it’s perfectly clear, duck*. :) Honestly this is a difficult topic with a lot of nuance, it’s better to take a longer and more thoughtful approach.

From the stand point of the legal definition and what we study/understand as torture any consensual activity, however extreme, is not torture.

But here’s where it gets interesting: consent and our attitude to an activity actually changes our response to pain. It may even change how much pain we feel.

I’m going to take a slightly different example to yours. There are a lot of cultures globally that have practiced scarification, ritual cutting to deliberately form scars. And this can be done for a lot of reasons: membership of a family or clan, coming of age, traditional medicine, religion, you get the idea.

A lot of people in these cultures describe their scars as incredibly important and the process of getting them as a moving, deep and positive process.

This does not mean they wouldn’t be traumatised if they were attacked by someone with a knife.

Being able to approach something painful and see it as positive really changes our perspective. It makes trauma and mental illness a lot less likely. And being able to back out, even if it’s just for a little while to take a breather, seems to make us able to withstand more pain then we would have otherwise.

The simplest and most famous experiment that dealt with this relationship between our mindset and pain asked people to keep their hands in ice cold water. They timed how long people could do it when they were told to stay silent and how long they could do it when they were allowed to swear. If they swore they could hold their hands under for longer. An average of forty seconds longer.

Looking back over O’Mara (Why Torture Doesn’t Work, a very good intro to how pain works and what it does to the brain) the way he describes it as by thinking of the experience of pain as a collection of three things. There’s the physical sensation itself, the nerves firing. But there’s also an affective component, how we feel emotionally about the experience and a cognitive component, how we think about it.

Did you ever play that game as a kid where you stuff as many chilis as possible in your mouth to see who would spit them out first? I… might have done. And from what I remember it hurts an awful lot. But those memories to me are mostly about messing about with my friends, I remember trying to be stubborn about it and I remember us laughing at each other.

This is a completely different experience to someone being held down and having chili stuff up their nose. But the difference isn’t necessarily in the physical damage done or the physical sensation of pain. It’s in the other components, the emotional response and the rationalisation.

I also had a filling drilled in my tooth without painkillers as a kid. I don’t know how common this is in the West? It happened in Saudi. Honestly my biggest memory of it is the language barrier between myself and the dentist.

These are anecdotes obviously but I’m trying to show that you probably also have experiences in your own life that back up the experiments too. The way we think about a painful experience really does make a huge amount of difference. And that means consent matters enormously.

These soldiers are going into this experience knowing what to expect, how long it will last and that they can stop at any time. That makes a huge amount of difference. Those same factors have drastically increased the time volunteers will spend in solitary confinement for research. I’m pretty sure if I dug even a little I’d find pain studies with similar findings.

Here’s the flip side: the physical factors are still in play.

Sleep is an important physiological process that’s essential to normal functioning. Studies on consensual sleep deprivation have shown massive negative impacts on memory along with a host of other things that you can read about here.

Let’s take a non torture example. A student who stays up all night cramming for an exam is not going to develop the symptoms of trauma that a torture survivors who was sleep deprived would. But the effect sleep deprivation has on memory is due to sleep playing an essential role in preserving memory (and learning more generally.) So they’re both likely to have difficulty remembering things in days just before and just after sleep deprivation. They’re also both more likely to have false memories and catch a bad cold.

As a result of this memory impairment I question the educational value of anything involving sleep deprivation: you can’t learn while messing up the processes that let your brain remember things.

There have been cases in the UK of people dying during training for the armed forces. Because while consent makes a huge difference, mindset makes a huge difference- our bodies still have limits. We can choose to push ourselves past those limits and, whatever our motivation or feelings, it can do real harm.

Personally? I’m unsure of the benefit of these kinds of exercises. As in I’m unsure there is a benefit. Learning is going to be shot, chances of injury are going to be a lot higher- I don’t see anything that could be improved by these sorts of exercises.

Anecdotally people do report feeling like a closer unit after going through these sorts of routines. That might be the benefit: moral and unit cohesion, possibly self-esteem too.

If you’re making up something for your story I think it’d be helpful for me to mention a little statistical effect that gets used to justify punishment pretty regularly. Get some dice out if you’ve got them and roll one. Let’s say the number represents performance in some kind of test (because effort and learning matter but our performance also varies because of things we can’t control.) A roll of 1 gets punished, a roll of 6 gets praised.

Now after you roll that first 1 statistically speaking the chances are your next roll will be better. And if you roll a 6 then statistically speaking the chances are your next roll will be worse. People observe this effect in real life and they often conclude that there’s no point in praising someone but that punishment leads to improvement. Really it’s just a statistical effect, after a particularly, noticeably bad day the chances are things will be better next and vice versa.

This effect can make it difficult for people to recognise overall, long term progress. Which is the kind of progress you should be paying attention to when designing a training program.

If you want good performance from people, whatever the metric, the most efficient thing to do is ensure that those people are; well fed, have access to clean water, get plenty of sleep, have breaks and have access to medical treatment when they need it.

I’d say the main things to keep in mind when designing this fictional training regime are:

Being honest about the effects you describe, ie if they’re spending long periods without shelter are they at risk from exposure? If they’re standing in cold water are they going to get hypothermia?

Remember that even if something is damaging or causes lasting trauma it would not necessarily prevent someone from doing their job. Torture survivors have serious, lasting symptoms but many of them still work.

I think I’m going to leave that there because I’m not an expert in militaries or training people. And keep in mind that I am a pacifist, read this with my biases in mind.

Getting to the second question, there is a little more to the UN definition then that. The primary factor is still who the abuser is. For it to be torture (legally speaking) the abuser has to be (or be ordered by) an on-duty government employee, part of a group that controls territory (ie an occupying force). Some countries also count international organised criminal gangs in this definition.

It’s also important to note that torture can be targetted at someone other then the victim. So if the police arrest the brother of a political opponent and beat him in order to intimidate the politician, that is still torture.

Basically there are a lot of factors in the legal definition of torture and it’s that way by design. The hope is that you end up with a framework that captures as much government abuse as possible.

But it also means that there’s a pretty high barrier when it comes to proving torture. Which means that things which are legally torture can be prosecuted as assault, bodily harm or equivalents to these, because it’s easier to get a conviction for those charges.

Technically you are correct: if abuse done by a government official doesn’t have one of the four motivations in the legal definition (attempts to obtain information, forcing a confession, intimidation or punishment) then it doesn’t meet the definition.

However in practice I’ve not heard of a case failing because of the motive.

I’m not a lawyer and I’m not an expert in international law. I won’t say it’s never happened. But it’s much more common for cases to fail for other reasons. Off the top of my head I’d say the most common reason is difficulty proving the abuse took place.

The most common types of torture today are ‘clean’, a term we use to indicate that they don’t leave obvious marks. If someone turns up with fingernails torn out or the skin of their back lacerated by a whip that is clear physical evidence of abuse. Nothing else causes similar injuries. But if someone turns up at a doctor’s with swollen feet or reddened skin, if they’ve lost a lot of weight or they’re so tired they’re struggling to stand… Well all of those things can be caused by common tortures. But they can also be caused by common illnesses.

A lot of the deaths from torture today are similarly hard to prove. Beatings and stress positions ultimately cause death by kidney failure. Which can mean that prosecutors are asked to prove a victim didn’t have an underlying health condition. Or take drugs.

Honestly my instinct is that the motive is the easiest thing to prove. It’s often harder to bring charges against people in positions of authority, regardless of the country we’re talking about. Bringing those charges, proving abuse took place and proving it was done by the person in question, those are usually the tricky parts.

The difference between torture and abuse is scale. Torture is industrial scale abuse.

The law doesn’t define that scale but that’s what we’re talking about when we talk about abuse from organised authority. Abusers might have dozens of victims. Torturers have thousands, tens of thousands.

If you want to explore a different motivation in your story, something outside the legal framework, consider the scale at which this abuse is taking place. Consider how organised it is. If it’s organised and large scale, with multiple abusers, with no prior relationship between the abuser and victims then torture will probably be a better model then abuse. If it’s smaller scale with a more personal relationship and if it isn’t supported by a legal framework/organisation then abuse might be a better model.

For victims and survivors the difference isn’t so much about the symptoms they personally experience as the… side effect of that scale. Abuse victims are often very isolated and may not know anyone who has had a similar experience. Torture implies a community of survivors and possibly generational trauma. There are also effects to do with access to support, access to medical care and how likely it is that someone will be believed.

Torture survivors are often systematically disenfranchised in a way that abuse victims are not. Torture survivors are often forced to leave their home country. Anecdotally, based on what I’ve seen globally over the last few years, I think that struggling to get citizenship is increasingly an issue for torture survivors. And without citizenship there’s difficulty finding legal work, getting accommodation, accessing medical care, accessing the legal system etc.

I do not know whether torture survivors are more or less likely to be believed by their community compared to survivors of abuse. I do not think any one has attempted a comparative study. I do know that the prevalence of clean torture means that many torture survivors are not believed and this puts up a further barrier, making it harder to access medical treatment and bring charges.

Rejali’s book was published in 2009, so things may have changed a tad. At the time he was writing the average wait for a torture survivor to see a specialist doctor was about 10 years.

Abuse is to torture what murder is to genocide. And there are difference on a wider social scale as a result.

I mention all that because I feel it’s relevant but the impression I get is you’re mostly interested in the long term symptoms? In which case, yes the legal definition makes very little difference. The physical injuries caused by particular kinds of abuse don’t change depending on whether it’s a private individual or a police officer holding the Taser.

The lasting psychological symptoms are not particular to torture; they’re what the human brain does when traumatised. The same symptoms can manifest in people who witness traumatic events but weren’t actually hurt themselves. They can manifest in people who were injured in accidents and they manifest in people who were neglected or abused. Hell, I have a couple of them, though no where near the severity a torture survivors would experience. A sufficient amount of stress is enough for these symptoms to start developing in anybody.

You can find the general list of symptoms here. There’s also a post specifically about memory problems over here.

The pattern I describe; that these symptoms are a list of possibilities not ‘every torture victim will get all of these’ holds true for trauma survivors generally. Anecdotally there is some variability with chronic pain being reported more often with some kinds of abuse. That might be because it can have physical causes, psychological causes or a mix of the two.

Whether it’s torture or abuse there isn’t any way to predict a survivor’s symptoms in advance. Much of the advice I have about writing torture survivors and their symptoms holds true for trauma survivors generally. Which is why I’ll still take a crack at some questions that aren’t about torture.

Pick the symptoms that you feel fit the character and serve the story. We can’t predict symptoms and that means that there’s no reason why you shouldn’t pick the things that appeal to you.

And I think I’m going to leave it there. I hope that helps :)

Available on Wordpress.

Disclaimer

*This is a weird English endearment. I had someone ask if this was me trying not to swear.

#orphicphosphenes #writing advice #tw torture #torture as training #legal definition of torture #clean torture #military abuse #trauma #trauma and consent #pain #pain and memory #sleep deprivation #attitudes towards clean tortures #writing survivors #abuse within the military

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smaidjor · 3 years

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and i pay for my place by the ring (Chapter 1)

Hey guys! Welcome to another angsty fic by yours truly, provider of flower husbands pain.

Some things you should know before you jump into this:

1. This is a companion fic to my fic "i know they're losing". You can understand it without having read the other one, since it's the same story from two different POVs but I think the overall experience is better with both!

2. The overall title of each fic is from the mitski song I bet on losing dogs. Chapter titles are from the Last Goodbye from the Hobbit films.

3. There is a lot of lord of the rings lore in both fics, and I mean a lot. You may be kinda confused if you've never read tolkien's works. It will all be explained eventually, though!

4. With the fact that it's a companion fic and a lot of people came here from Jimmy's POV in mind- this is a lot heavier of a fic. The content warnings are heavier and the angst is more intense. You have been warned.

(Obligatory disclaimer that this is about characters, not ccs, and do not ship real people, as always!)

Chapter Title: to these memories i will hold

Chapter Wordcount: 4000

Content warnings: suicidal thoughts, self-esteem issues, panic attacks, past death, very frank discussion of death. (In general, if suicide or death are triggering topics for you, this is probably not the fic for you. Stay safe and take care of yourself!)

AO3

Actual fic under the cut:

Scott didn’t expect to survive 3rd life. No one did, he thinks, but especially not him. Clever, clever Scott, who knew his fate too well for his own good. He could have chosen his allies carefully, he knows, could have played on their emotions to make them think he was loyal until the moment he turned on them to win. He knew who the strongest factions and warriors were, the most cunning and intelligent participants in this death game they were forced into. Instead, he chose Jimmy. Sweet, dopey Jimmy, who had the personality of a golden retriever and only a handful of braincells at any given time. Jimmy, who was worth more than all the stars in the sky to him. Who made him feel alive . No, Scott didn’t expect to win. Not when it was Jimmy by his side- when it was Jimmy by his side, winning didn’t matter. All that mattered was Jimmy’s blush when Scott pressed a kiss to his cheek, the way his hair looked like gold in the sunlight and his smile lit up Scott’s whole world.

After Jimmy died, Scott stopped wanting to survive 3rd life. What was the point? The stars can shine on without the sun, but all life on Earth would wither and die. The same happened to Scott’s broken, bitter heart, he found. Jimmy was the first person in years to love him truly, wholly, with no strings attached; it was terrifying how quickly Scott fell for the first person to look at him and not expect him to be anything but what he was. Scott’s world, which used to be mountain peaks and endless blue sky, narrowed to warm brown eyes and a grin like sunshine quicker than he could comprehend. Jimmy, Jimmy, Jimmy, it all came back to him. What was Scott without Jimmy? The unwanted twin, the unloved child, the un-elven elf. Because who cared if he was a good shot with a bow or good at organizing teams or building pretty little houses? He would always be second-born, second-best.

It was fitting, really, that when Scott died, he died alone. Some might find it ironic that the man who knew enough people to fill the roster of a championship held by a god every month died without a single person to witness it save his enemies, but in the end, it was always going to be like this, Scott knew. He hadn’t been there to see Jimmy die, he hadn’t been able to hold him in his final moments and soothe the agony of death. Maybe this was his punishment. He wouldn’t be surprised; the gods of this world did not smile on him and never would. Why should they, when he had failed the only person who had ever found him good enough?

When he woke up in Rivendell, he was almost disappointed. Almost. He considered ditching the rest of the elves, up and leaving to somewhere that didn’t make it feel like the noose of immortality was slowly tightening around his neck. If nothing else, Noxite would let him crash at the MCC server for a bit until he found somewhere to go. And yet, in the end, Scott’s stubborn sense of duty won out. The elves needed a ruler. Xornoth had disappeared to god knows where, and though they had been braver, wiser, better in every way, Scott was the one who had stayed. Who was willing to take up the crown that weighed so heavily on its bearers. So Scott, who no one ever expected to rule, took up the burden of leadership.

Now, he tries and fails to get out of bed and wonders what the point of that even was. He’s fading, and worse than that, he’s fading over a human. His ancestors are probably rolling in their graves. Rivendell will be leaderless within a decade, and this time there are no heirs to take control. Not even a ‘spare’ like Scott used to be. What a mess.

There are footsteps on the stairs. They’re unfamiliar, meaning they could be a threat, but he’s too tired to bother sitting up. If he dies, well- it’s inevitable, really, in the same way watching the mortals he loves dies is.

The person comes around the corner, and Scott realizes with no joy that he won’t be dying today after all. Katherine looks both curious and concerned, but her voice tilts towards the latter when she asks “Scott?” and then, more hesitantly “Lord Smajor?”

He blinks at her, exhausted. “Hi, Katherine.”

“I came to talk to you about some empires stuff, but, I mean, if this is a bad time, I can come back later…?” She sounds so thrown off by his state that Scott almost feels bad.

Whatever it is, it must be important if she’s come all the way here, though, so he gestures her to a chair. “No, no, stay. I can muster the energy for a meeting, just don’t ask me to get up.”

Katherine takes the seat. “I came to talk about the corruption on the server, but- are you okay? Are you sick?”

Nothing about the question is funny in any way, but Scott laughs regardless. “In a way, yes.”

“What do you mean?”

“Take my hand.” He offers it out, knowing the unnatural cold is unsettling no matter if you’re elven or not. Katherine does as he asks, the concern on her face only growing as she grips his icy hand.

“Elves don’t get sick like mortals do,” Scott explains. “Nor do we die of old age. But we get...heartsickness, you might call it. We call it fading in our tongue- the cold hands are a symptom of that. Our souls are fragile, and the grief of the mortal plane can be overwhelming. If an elf is too struck by it, they fade away and die.” The words taste bitter on his tongue, a frank reminder of the slow and painful death that awaits him.

Katherine gasps, and Scott knows he’s alarmed her.

He goes on, though. “It usually happens to old elves, world-weary.” Ironic, it’s ironic that he’s saying that as a young elf explaining his own death. “Those who are tired of existence. But any elf who has experienced enough grief is at risk.”

Her face is nothing short of horrified. “You’re- fading? But doesn’t it usually happen to old elves? Wait, are you old?”

“I’m fifty-five.”

“Is that old?”

He has to laugh. “Fifty is the elven equivalent of eighteen for humans, the age of maturity.” Though he feels so much older than that, both in elven terms and in human.

“Oh.”

There’s a moment of silence, then, “How can you be so calm if you’re dying?”

“I’m tired, Katherine. The world tore me away from the people I loved, and..I’m tired of fighting it.” He’s so, so exhausted. So sick of having to claw and scrape and struggle for the barest scraps of happiness.

“Is there a way to reverse fading- to fix it?” Katherine sounds so hopeful that the question seems almost naive even though she’s far more capable of a ruler than he is. Naive in the affairs of elves, maybe, much as she’s intelligent in so many other ways.

Scott tries not to flinch at the innocent inquiry, thinking about the deaths from fading that he’s watched. “Technically, yes. If an elf recovers enough emotionally, it’s reversible. But whatever caused them to fade the first time can- and often does- cause it again.” And again, and again, until there’s nothing to be done but let them die , he finishes in his head.

Katherine nods, a look of determination overtaking the hope. “We’ll just have to reverse it, then.”

“That’s sweet, Katherine, but I’m dying.”

“No. You’re not going to die. Now come on, you can show me your empire while I fill you in on what’s happening on the rest of the continent.” She sounds so firm that he doesn’t dare disobey, though his exhaustion makes a fair effort at convincing him to. Will this really fix anything? Unlikely. But it’s worth it to try, if only to humor Katherine. At least this way she’ll have the comfort of having tried to save him when he inevitably fades away into nothing

Scott takes her hand, though it brings him little warmth, cold from her trek here. “Alright.” He swallows the bitter grief in his throat before it can seep into his words. “We can try.”

He leads Katherine around Rivendell, taking some pride in the way she oohs over the decor. If there’s one thing he can do right, it’s building. While some elven rulers might see it as below themselves to help build houses for their citizens, Scott finds building soothing. It’s one of the few skills he picked up during his time away that people really appreciate; no one wants to live in a shitty house.

As they walk, she also tells Scott about the demon, Xornoth. “The demon’s already visited a lot of people, I think. Gem and Shubble for sure, and Fwhip and Sausage. That’s not even mentioning the corruption that’s been spreading.”

If Scott said that the name Xornoth didn’t make him flinch, he would be lying to himself. It’s not your sibling , he tells himself. It’s just a coincidence .

It’s through the virtue of years of lying that his voice comes out steady. “There’s corruption in Rivendell too. Likely Xornoth’s work. And given that Jimmy still has Vilya-” his heart doesn’t ache when he says Jimmy’s name, it doesn’t- “well, I haven’t been able to do much.”

“Vilya?” Katherine asks.

“A ring of power. My inheritance from the Noldor.”

“Why does Jimmy have it?”

He doesn’t answer. He won’t- can’t talk about Jimmy, not without remembering how he looked with an arrow through his throat, bright smile gone and face frozen in fear. How does he explain how much Jimmy meant to him? How much he’s now giving up, knowing he’ll have to lose it one way or another?

Katherine drops the topic, seemingly sensing that she’s stumbled on something sensitive. When she has to go home, she leaves with a friendly goodbye and a promise to visit, and Scott believes neither. Who would put the effort into visiting him? He’s not a good friend, he’s not a good king, and god knows he’s not a good husband. In fact, he’s actively avoiding his husband. He may have kept the pufferfish Jimmy gave him, but that doesn’t mean anything. He can’t fall in love with Jimmy again. Loving Jimmy will kill him. (Scott ignores the small voice at the back of his head that whispers that he’s still in love with Jimmy and it’s already killing him just as he always knew it would.)

To his surprise, Katherine does come back next week, and the week after that. He’s ashamed to admit it, but there’s some part of him that’s pathetically grateful when she shows up at his doorstep. It’s a chance to not be alone . Much as he dreads the day when she finally gives up on him, it’s nice that someone cares enough to try and save him from himself.

The third week, Katherine doesn’t show up. Instead, the footsteps on the stairs are familiar in a way that makes Scott’s heart twist painfully.

He takes a deep breath. “Hello, Jimmy.”

“How’d you know it was me?” Jimmy asks. Scott can tell he’s startled by the way his voice goes up, almost frightened.

Scott steels himself, taking a deep breath before rolling over to face his ex-husband. “Do you think I could ever forget the sound of your footsteps?” He forces himself to not get distracted staring at Jimmy, instead going on before Jimmy can open his mouth. “What are you doing here?”

“Katherine asked me to visit, I’m not sure why, but...here I am. Say, why is she visiting every week?” Jimmy’s so curious. So naive, as always.

Scott laughs, bitter. “Katherine thinks she can save me.”

“Save you from what?”

Scott hears the concern in Jimmy’s words, and he can’t bring himself to break the news. It’s not as if it matters. It’s not as if Jimmy would care; he came here because of Katherine. Maybe he cared at the start of Empires, but Scott’s been nothing but rude to him since. There’s no reason for him to care. (He cares. Scott’s lying, like always. Jimmy cares and Scott knows it.)

“Save you from what?” Jimmy asks again, more insistently.

He refuses to say it. He needs Jimmy out, out of his room and out of his life before he does something he’ll regret. “You should go.” To prove his point, he tries to stand, finding himself too dizzy to quite pull it off. Jimmy rushes to catch him, and Scott hates himself just a little for how that still gives him a warm feeling.

“Scott, what is going on?”

He brushes Jimmy off, letting go of his arm and hurrying for the stairs. He can’t let Jimmy work his way into his heart again; Scott won’t be strong enough to let him go this time.

“Scott, seriously! Answer me, are you okay? What’s happening?” Jimmy sounds almost angry, but Scott can hear the distress under it and that’s what breaks him.

“I’m fading, alright?” His voice nearly breaks at the concern on Jimmy’s face when he whirls to face him. “I’m dying, now leave me alone!”

Jimmy sputters, seemingly caught off guard. “You- what- but elves don’t die, right?”

“We do. From poison, from swords-” Scott thinks back to third life- “from arrows through the throat, from grief.” The words come out more raw than he intends, leaving him scrambling to recover his composure. He takes a deep breath in and out, forcing his voice to steady again. “Come on. If you’re not going to leave, I might as well show you around.”

“You can’t just drop something like that on a man, you know!” Jimmy calls after him, although Scott can hear his footsteps following as well.

“You did ask, to be fair.” Scott replies. His voice is calm. He’s fine.

“I guess so, but- but still, dude.”

Scott pushes open the side door, holding it for Jimmy. “Here.”

Jimmy nods and slips through the door. “Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it.”

Scott starts towards the bridges, intending to show Jimmy the enchanting tower and then the door. He doesn’t care about how fast he’s walking, Jimmy can keep up. He’s taller than Scott and probably has better balance at the moment too. Scott’s struggling not to fall, honestly, but his pride won’t let him go slower.

Jimmy breaks the awkward silence with the question Scott least wants to hear. “So, uh..are we going to talk about 3rd life?”

“No,” Scott says firmly.

“Why not? We need to talk about it some time-”

“I said no .” He can’t talk about it.

“It’s literally killing you to not talk about it!”

The words strike right at the raw wound of Jimmy’s death, and Scott freezes. Inhales. Exhales. Tries to keep calm.

“Tell me I’m wrong, Scott!” Jimmy cries. He sounds so upset, Scott’s heart aches. “I dare you, tell me I’m wrong! Tell me you never cared about me, tell me you didn’t bother to bury me, tell me it didn’t hurt even a little when I died! Tell me I was just stupid little Jimmy, a toy for an elf who’d live far beyond my lifespan! Tell me whatever, just tell me the truth! ”

Scott takes a deep breath. “Fine. You want to know what happened after you died?” He can’t think straight through the rage clouding his head, the desperate need to prove that Jimmy’s wrong , that Scott loved him so much it’s killing him. “You want to hear about me screaming until my throat went raw? You want to know that I kissed your face and sobbed and begged you to wake up, over and over until I couldn’t speak at all? You want to live with the knowledge that Grian had to physically pull me away from your body? Is that what you want to hear, Jimmy? ” His voice damn near breaks on his husband’s name, and Scott thanks the gods he stopped believing in a long time ago that it doesn’t.

“No,” Jimmy says. His voice is soft, gentle, almost as if Scott is a wounded animal that needs a delicate touch. “That’s not what I want to hear, not at all. I’d rather you be happy than love me.”

The words punch the air from Scott’s lungs, raw and soft and real. Scott is an excellent liar. Jimmy isn’t. Scott knows that Jimmy is telling the truth. What he doesn’t know is how to handle that level of devotion. He wonders again how Jimmy- sweet, genuine Jimmy who wears his heart on his sleeve and is hopelessly devoted to an elf who can’t be fully his- chose Scott of all people. Scott, who’s as bitter as Jimmy is sweet, who’s sarcastic and snarky and hasn’t been good enough for just about anything in his life. He certainly wasn’t good enough to save Jimmy, Scott thinks bitterly.

He shakes off the thought. “I buried you on the hill above our houses. I planted a poppy over your grave.”

“Oh.”

“Grian came over the next day. I didn’t want to see anyone who wasn’t you, but I let him in because I had to. He helped me do the straps on my armor and asked me if he could do anything else to make things easier. I told him to bury me next to you.”

“Did he?”

Scott almost laughs at the innocent question. “How would I know? Grian was honorable enough, though, loyal to his allies. I like to think he did.”

“He was a good guy,” Jimmy agrees. “A little bit bloodthirsty, I guess, but good. I don’t suppose he survived any better than the rest of us, though maybe being bloodthirsty helped.”

“Maybe.”

“Can I- can I ask you why you hate me so much now?” Jimmy’s tone is uncertain, hesitant and it hurts . “I mean, if you mourned me in third life and all.”

Scott looks away from his earnest gaze, but he can’t stop the truth slipping out. “I don’t hate you.”

“You don’t?” Jimmy asks, seemingly bewildered. “But you burned the pufferfish-”

“I didn’t. I kept it.” Scott doesn’t want to think about this, wants to say it even less. “I never hated you. I don’t think I’m capable of it.”

“Then why do you keep avoiding me?”

“I’ve been kind of busy dying,” Scott says wryly, unable to resist a bit of morbid humor at his own expense.

“Scott! That’s not funny!”

“It was a little funny.”

“No!”

Jimmy sounds genuinely distressed, and Scott drops the wry smile. “Jimmy, I’m an elf. I won’t live far beyond you, but only because I’ll fade without you.” It’s a simple statement. The truth, as much as he can give.

“So your solution is to isolate yourself and fade now?” Jimmy’s outrage is justifiable, but Scott just shrugs.

“It does sound stupid when you put it like that, doesn’t it?” It really does. “But I lost you once, and I don’t think I could bear it again.”

A hand lands on Scott’s arm, and he turns, startled. Jimmy doesn’t give him time to react, throwing his arms around Scott and pulling him close. Scott almost lets out a very undignified squeak at the sudden contact, though he slowly relaxes into Jimmy’s hold.

He should pull away. He shouldn’t give Jimmy false hope like this. But Jimmy is so warm , and Scott is so unbearably cold. Every fiber of his being is screaming that this is what’s right; screw Rivendell and obligations and too-heavy crowns, Jimmy is home to him. He’s warm for the first time in months, and the most heartbreaking part is that it can’t last. He can’t do this again.

He pulls away, ignoring the painful hope on Jimmy’s face. “I’m sorry, Jimmy.” For the first time all conversation, his voice well and truly wobbles. “I can’t. Not again.”

“But-”

Scott shakes his head. “Losing you will destroy me. We dared to love, and now all we can do now is lessen the pain when it all comes crashing down.” The words are like glass in his throat, but he forces them out anyways. They have to be said.

Jimmy’s silent, and it hurts more than if Jimmy had yelled at him.

“Goodbye, Jimmy,” Scott manages, turning away before Jimmy can see the way his face twists in pain. He makes his retreat as quickly as possible, stumbling and nearly taking a tumble just before he reaches the door. Unlike before, there’s no helpful ex-husband there to catch him, to make sure he’s alright and ask a million questions until Scott’s forced to admit that he’s not okay and hasn’t been in a long time.

He fumbles with the latch, hands shaking and vision blurring. Finally, it clicks, and Scott stumbles inside and slams the door shut before sliding to the ground. He won’t cry. He won’t . He doesn’t love Jimmy, he can’t love Jimmy anymore. Jimmy was never meant to be his. They might have carved out a few precious moments, stolen them from the universe and giggled like kids with their hands in the cookie jar as they kissed amongst the flowers, but those brief moments were all they were ever going to be allowed. It was always going to end this way, Scott tells himself. There’s no use crying over a mortal who will be dead in the blink of an eye to an elf. What would his parents say? That this was typical of him, probably. Typical Scott, always wanting what he would never be able to have. Typical, predictable Scott, loving a mortal who shouldn’t be worth anything to him.

He’s crying. There are tears spotting his cyan robes, splashing onto the wood floors he worked so hard on. Scott rubs at his eyes furiously, but that only makes it worse, sobs shuddering through him and leaving him hollow and aching. He’s so cold . The ache in his chest has returned tenfold, stealing away his breath, and he curls further into himself, struggling for air.

He’s going to die. He is going to die , alone on the floor of his house because he fell for someone he couldn’t have. For all that he’s spent every minute since Jimmy’s death in 3rd life wishing for some way out of this cruel world, he’s terrified now that it seems inevitable. He’s scared in a way he hasn’t been in forever, breath coming quick and shallow. He's scared, and he is so, so tired of this ache that haunts him, the chill that he can never get rid of.

“Jimmy,” Scott whispers. There’s no way for the human to hear him, but the name brings him some comfort. “ Jimmy .” He wants his husband. He wants someone to hug him. He doesn’t want to fade away freezing and alone, no one there to hold his hand or reassure him that the pain will be over soon. Internally, he begs for someone, anyone who cares to come looking. To find him, even if they’re too late to save him. Someone. Anyone. Please.

No one comes, and Scott lays on his floor until his breathing steadies out again. His head spins when he forces himself to his feet, and he has to lean against the wall for a few moments. There’s no time for dramatics, he tells himself sternly. He has a kingdom to rule. He cannot afford to break over a mortal he never should have fallen for in the first place. He doesn’t love Jimmy anymore, he can’t .

(He’s lying. But Scott has always been an excellent liar, even when it’s to himself.)

#scott smajor #jimmy solidarity #empires smp #i maintag my fic because i dont fear god or scott smajor #my writing

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thiswaycomessomethingwicked · 3 years

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so i am back on the grima train and i was reading through your posts (absolutely quality, for which i can only thank you !! 💓) and you mentioned in one about his use of magic that you have a Lot of Feelings about grima in relation to gender and plz i need to hear them!! (if you want to share? 👀)

LOTR: Grima & Gender

Oh man, so Grima and gender. My favourite topic. Other than Grima and magic - but they’re linked! So, that’s a bonus for us.

I want to thank you so much for asking this question. I have wanted to rant about this for Forever.

This became incredibly long, but the long and short of it is that Grima undermines social expectations of masculinity in Rohan through his disdain for martial achievements, his occupying a more private/passive role within the king’s household rather than the expected “masculine” public/active, his use of spells and potions being an “unmanly” and “cowardly” approach to problem solving, and his reliance on language and soft-power approaches to politics.

All of this works to position Grima within a more feminine role and character - at least within the context of Rohan’s hypermasculine performativity of manliness.

[It does allow us to read Grima as trans with greater ease in terms of fitting into the canon than the usual favourites, other than Eowyn. So, you know, do with that what you will. Eowyn and Grima both want to be queen. Let them be in charge! I’m going to get my ass bit for this.]

Grima’s gender performance needs to be quickly situated within the broader context of masculinity in Middle-Earth. Gondor’s ideal of masculinity is the gentler masculinity that everyone focuses on when they talk about men in middle earth being good models of what masculinity can look like. It’s a nurturing masculinity, it’s gentle, it’s healing-focused. Aragorn and others try and take the first off-ramp from violence or conflict whenever they can. There is no enjoyment in warfare or soldiering. It’s done because it’s necessary. Dick-swinging is limited to non-existent etc.

Rohan is different.

Faramir touches on this when he speaks to Frodo of how Boromir was more like the men of Rohan and how he thought that wasn’t a good thing as it meant he was seeking glory for glory’s sake, relishing war and soldiering as an occupation rather than an unfortunate necessity.

Of course, Faramir was also making (some very dubious) racial commentary, but race and gender are often bound up together (e.g. hyper-masculinization of black men and the feminization of East Asian men in the North America).

As R.W. Connell says, “masculinities are congurations of practice that are constructed, unfold, and change through time” — and, additionally, masculinity must be defined in opposition to femininity but, also, other masculinities.

For Rohan, there is a strong, militarized hyper-masculinity that threads through their culture. One of the reasons Theoden was seen as a failing king was his physical decline and inability to continue being a physically strong king. His aging emasculated him, more so when compared to Theodred and Eomer. (Something Theoden believed of himself and Grima capitalized on.)

For this, I’m going to speak of masculinity of the upper classes, since that’s what we see for Rohan. Masculinity, and how it’s to be performed, is contingent on social variables such as, but not limited to: age, appearance and size, bodily facility, care, economic class, ethnicity, fatherhood, relations to biological reproduction, leisure, martial and kinship status, occupation, sexuality etc. and as we never see lower class Rohirrim men it’s impossible to say what the “acceptable” and “expected” forms for a farmer or cooper would be.

Upper class men of Rohan are expected to be militarily capable - ready to ride and fight when called by their king or marshal. They are to be men of action over word, and when language is in play, it’s to be forthright and plain. No riddling. Marriage/Husband-ing is an expected part of manhood. Being strong minded, and capable of taking charge and making decisions is important. Fatherhood is also clearly prized, especially fatherhood that results in son(s).

(Theoden only having one child could be read as another “failure” in living up to Rohirrim ideals when compared to the older kings of his family who were far more prolific.)

The appearance of an “ideal” man is tall, fair, and handsome. Physically strong and capable in all ways (martially, sexually, fertile etc.).

Men should be able to demonstrate that they are capable of being in charge, taking control, defending and protecting families and homes. This slots in with more generalized expectations around bravery, honour and glory.

[Eomer: And that, in summation, is how you are to Be A Man.

Grima: Well that sounds utterly exhausting.]

So, with all of that in mind, let’s talk Grima.

First, let’s address the name and character construction as this is the least bound up in how he acts and its tension with Rohirrim ideals of Being a Man. It’s also interesting in that it can give a glimpse into Tolkien and the possible thoughts he had when constructing Grima.

Grima’s Name & Beowulf Stuff

Grima’s name is from old Icelandic Grimr, which is a name Odin takes during the Grimnismal saga.

Here are some lines from Odin in the saga:

I have called myself Grim,

I have called myself Wanderer,

Warrior and Helmet-Wearer,

[...]

Evildoer, Spellcaster,

Masked and Shadowed-Face,

Fool and Wise Man,

[...]

Rope-Rider and Hanged-God.

I have never been known

by just one name

since I first walked among men.

Not only is Grima’s name from Odin, more importantly, it’s the feminine version of that name. No man in the eddas or sagas goes by Grima. Only women. And most often they were seidr-workers or healers/magic practitioners of some kind.

"Other healers include Gríma from Fóstbræðra saga and Laxdæla saga and Heiðr from Biarmiland in Harald’s saga Hárfagra."

- “Hostile Magic in the Icelandic Sagas,” Hilda Ellis-Davidson

And

"There was a man called Kotkel, who had only recently arrived in Iceland. His wife was called Grima. Their sons were Hallbjorn Sleekstone-Eye and Stigandi. These people had come from the Hebrides. They were all extremely skilled in witchcraft and were great sorcerers."

- Laxdæla saga

This is most likely something Tolkien was aware of — I would be flabbergasted if he wasn’t. However, did he fully appreciate the implications in terms of gender and subversion of masculinity? Impossible to say, of course, but he certainly knew he was giving his male character a name that has only been used by women in historical texts.

It would be akin to naming your male character Henrietta instead of Henry. It’s a deliberate, explicit decision. And while I don’t think Tolkien expected most readers to track down the origin of Grima’s name, the --a ending, to most anglophone readers, signifies a feminine name, more often than not. At least, it rarely, if ever, signifies masculine.

So the name alone brings in, at a subconscious level to readers, feminine qualities.

Alongside this, Grima is loosely based on Unferth from Beowulf. The entrance of Gandalf et al into Meduseld directly mirrors Beowulf’s into Hrothgar’s hall (complete with Grima lounging at Theoden’s feet the same as Unferth at Hrothgar’s). Indeed, it was clearly Tolkien’s intention to make a call back to Beowulf with that scene. (He was being all “look how clever I am. Also these are Anglo-Saxons on horses. As a general fyi”).

Unferth is a fascinating character in his own right ,and there is much scholarly debate around his role within Hrothgar’s hall, as well as the text more broadly. While there isn’t enough time/space to get into Unferth, I will quickly note that he is another character who subverts his society’s ideas of manhood and masculinity — particularly with regards to expectations of heroism and bravery. Yet, at the same time, Unferth is noted for being very intelligent, cunning, good at riddling, and overall quick witted (also, a kin-slayer. Dude murdered his brothers for Reasons).

Unferth’s contrary behaviour that flies in the face of Anglo-Saxon norms and ideals of masculine bravery is clearly reflected in Grima. Particularly in Grima’s fear of battle and lack of interest in taking up his sword when called by his king.

This leaves us with a character who was given a woman’s name and who is loosely based on another character who is known for his inability to follow through on his society’s expectations for masculine behaviour.

Grima, from the first moment we meet him, clearly reads more feminine than masculine - this is amplified when he’s contrasted with the likes of Theoden and Eomer. And, not only is his aligned with traditional femininity more than other male characters, he is specifically aligned with the more negative tropes of femininity (i.e. lack of bravery, unreliable, dubious morals etc.).

That is a brief overview of the bones of Grima’s construction: name and inspiration. Now for actions and characterization within the text. This will be subdivided into comments on his use of magic and how that interfaces with Rohirrim masculinity then we’ll get into power and language.

Grima’s key point of power is his ability to weave words in so powerful a way he could convince Theoden of his own infirmity and weakness thereby securing control over the king. Alongside this, we know that he was using certain “potions and poison” to further weaken Theoden. Most likely to amp up the king’s physical weakness so it coincided with Grima’s mental magic games.

Magic for Anglo-Saxon and early medieval Scandinavians was heavily rooted in the power of the spoken word. Runes were probably used but the historical support of this is vague. Which is to say, we know they were used, we’re just not certain how and to what extent.

We do know that rune staves were a thing. They were most often used to send your landwights after opponents or wreck havoc on enemies from afar. To make one, a magic-worker would carve the prescribed runes onto a large stave and position it in the ground facing the direction of their enemy. On top of the stave was added the head of a horse. (Lots of horse sacrifice happened for early medieval Scandinavians, alongside some human sacrifice.)

But, the brunt of magic for Anglo-Saxons and early medieval Scandinavians was spoken word. Which makes sense as their society was, like Rohan’s, predominantly illiterate or, at least, para-literate (though, there has been some recent archeological evidence that is starting to call that into question, for what that’s worth).

In particular, Grima’s spellwork aligns most closely with seidr, a fact I’ve gone about ad nausea. And, again, something we can assume Tolkien was aware of, which means he was also aware of the gendered implications of a man practicing the craft.

The mainstay of seidrcraft is, but not limited to, the following:

making illusions,

causing madness and/or forgetfulness,

brewing of potions and poisons,

prophesying,

channeling the dead,

channeling gods,

removal of elf-shot, and

recovering lost portions of someone’s soul.

The first three bullets are things Grima does to Theoden. That kind of magic — the kind that fucks with your mind and your sense of self, the kind that is subtle and quiet and lurks beneath the surface so you don’t know it’s happening, that’s cunning — that kind of magic is what women do.

It was considered unmanly/effeminate for a man to partake in it as it undermined the hypermasculine militarized culture of the time. Winning a battle or a fight through spells and poison was cowardly.

Therefore, in Rohan where we have this hypermasculine culture that so prizes military glory and grandeur and martial might, Grima pursuing his goals through spellcraft and potions/poisons is Grima pursuing distinctly unmasculine, effeminate modes of action.

Indeed, within Rohan it could call into question the entirety of his masculinity. It would make him ragr (adj. unmanly) because his actions are the epitome of ergi (noun. unmanliness).

"In the Viking Age, homosexual men were treated with extreme disdain and a complex kind of moral horror, especially those who allowed themselves to be penetrated. Such a man was ragr, not only homosexual by inclination and action, but also inhabiting a state of being that extended to ethical and social qualities. This complex of concepts has been extensively studied, and in the words of its leading scholar, "the unmanly man is everything that a man should not be with regard to morals and character. He is effeminate and he is a coward, and consequently devoid of honour". [...] What we would call sexual orientation was, in the viking age, completely bound up with much wider and deeper codes of behaviour and dignity, extending way beyond physical and emotional preference." -Neil Price, Children of Ash and Elm: A History of the Vikings

Though Price references specifically homosexuality in this passage, a man could be considered ragr for more than just that — and one of the other ways was through practicing seidr.

We see this with Odin, who learns how to do seidrcraft from Freyja, and is then mocked by Loki for how emasculating the practice is for Odin to undertake (as if Loki has any room to talk). Odin’s made himself effeminate, he’s made himself unmanly, he’s allowed himself to learn spells that could enable him to take a cowards way out of a situation, to be dishonourable etc.

Which is a neat tie-back to Grima’s name being one of Odin’s names, particularly when he is in disguise and using seidrcraft and wily ways to escape various unfortunate situations that he ends up in during the Grimnismal saga.

(As Odin says: I have been called Evildoer, Spellcaster, Masked and Shadowed-Face, Fool and Wise Man.)

It also mirrors him to Gandalf - another character who bears an Odinnic name. Gandalf very much represents the masculine, “acceptable” aspects of Odin. Grima embodies the darker, more dubious, and more effeminate, aspects of the god. As I’ve said in other posts, they are two sides of the Odin coin.

Though both are temperamental as fuck.

Alongside the spellcraft and potions, Grima’s performance of power does not align with Rohirrim traditions and ideals. He relies on his wits and his skill with language to navigate the world. Succinctly captured in the epithet bestowed upon him: Wormtongue. This is the modernization of Wyrmtunga, or, Dragon’s Tongue.

Wyrm can translate to worm, sure, and we see Saruman doing this on purpose when he refers to Grima as a worm, a creature that crawls in the dirt. But Wyrm, of course, is actually a form of dragon. And in Middle Earth, wyrm is used interchangeably with dragon (Smaug is called both wyrm and dragon), rather than denoting a specific species/categorization of dragon as it does in our world.

Grima’s approach to power is that of a gentle touch. He speaks softly, but doesn’t carry a large stick. He’s not Eomer or Theodred, who are much more traditionally martial, aggressive and forthright in their responses to a situation. Grima is clearly all about influencing those around him either through persuasion/use of words, or through spellcraft. He manipulates, he uses linguistic trickery.

Additionally, how he undertakes his role as advisor to the king places him more within the private world of Meduseld and the king’s household than the active, public world of marshals and thanes. And, of course, the private world of households was traditionally considered the woman’s domain while men were expected to occupy the public spaces of the world.

Of course, being involved in court politics is a public role as opposed to existing within a wholly private space (such as Eowyn. Who, in the books, takes a mostly private role until she is required to rule in her uncle’s stead while he and Eomer are off at war, and even then it is clearly considered a temporary situation and part of her duty as a woman). But the manner in which Grima occupies that public position is a more “feminine” one.

We can assume that if Eomer or Erkenbrand or Elfhelm occupied the role as advisor to Theoden, they would have a very different approach to the position. A much more aggressive, active and probably military-focused approach. Less carrot, more stick.

A quick note on his appearance in the film, aside from being entirely in black with black hair in a land full of blonds because he needed to be visually distinct as the Bad Guy. He is dressed in longer tunics and robes compared to Eomer and other Rohirrim men (aside from Theoden, but as soon as he is “healed” of his possession(?) he returns to the Proper Masculine shorter tunics than the Weak and Effeminate longer robes and tunics of before). Grima’s hair is longer than Eomer’s and Theoden’s, he wears only a dagger and not a sword, the furs and quilting of his clothes indicate wealth and status, of course, but also decadence and effeminacy.

All in all, Grima’s performance and actions undermine and subvert Rohirrim expectations of masculinity. If not outright transgressing gender norms. He uses spellcraft to achieve his ends which is cowardly and effeminate. When it’s not that, he relies on language and manipulation to ensure his position and rarely, if ever, willingly takes on an active, martial role that would be expected of a man who is in the king’s household and serves as an advisor and a quasi-second-in-command.

Here is a man, occupying a man’s role, but doing it like a woman. Subversive! Scandalous! Underappreciated by fandom!

Grima lives in a liminal, marginalized space that is at once gendered and ungendered but is absolutely Othered.

As for my note on Grima and being trans - absolutely a trans woman. Grima suffers from that thing of “I want to be you and sleep with you” re: Eowyn. That’s my hot take. (Similar to me and Alan Grant from Jurassic Park - I want to be him and sleep with him.)

But no, in all seriousness, a strong argument can absolutely be made for Grima being not-cis, however that might look for Grima. Grima and Eowyn are the two, within the trilogies, that have the strongest arguments to be made for not being cis.

(Grima is a bit of a foil for Eowyn, I think, while also being a foil for Gandalf.)

#grima wormtongue #lotr #Lord of the Rings #writing #lit #gender presentation #gender in LOTR #Rohan #masculinity #queer shit #history #anglo-saxon #viking

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mysticalmusicwhispers · 3 years

Text

#i wonder what your thoughts on diaspora in hetalia are#cause its a pretty interesting topic (the post in question)

@urmomsstuntdouble a collection of things that I think about on a semi-regular basis below the cut (also thank you for the tags!)

Disclaimer: I think this turned into more of a discussion of immigration and immigrants, but I hope this strikes your fancy anyways 😅. Also this got SO LONG and I explained quite a bit of history (because idk whether anyone knows much about this), so the key thoughts will be bolded!

My thoughts are kinda complicated about this tbh; it’s weird, because if China really did exist as a personification in real life, we’d probably both be judging each other, just for different reasons 😅.

General Hetalia Cases

I think when discussing immigrants/diaspora, you have to think about why different immigrants left. @cupofkey kinda discussed that a while ago (if anyone hasn’t seen this superb post, GO READ IT NOW) about the Vietnamese diaspora, and I think there’s some of that in every country. How do the immigrants feel about the home country? Why did they leave: because of hard times, poverty? Political instability/revolution/war? Opportunities overseas? Are they doing well in their new home, or still struggling? Does their new country treat them like foreigners or outcasts, unworthy of even arriving, or doing anything besides menial labor, or have they been welcomed (rather unlikely)? Do they hate their home country (politically), or miss them? Would they ever go back, not just to visit family or the place of their birth, but to return permanently?

I think on the whole, hetalia nations would still maintain a connection to their immigrants, especially since most are still in touch with their culture, although they’ve crossed borders or changed nationalities. (However, the angst of not being as in touch with your culture as you think you should is so real; would our home countries be disappointed? Or do they sympathize, somehow?) In the end, we’re all the same that way. Plus, the alternative thought of them just disowning immigrants feels weird; I don’t even know how that would be possible. But I think that connection gets complicated by the reason people left, and their feelings for their place of origin; I’ll be using APH China and Chinese Americans as an example to discuss this hksdgsdf (sorry I don’t want to do more research than necessary and I have Thoughts about this)

**OBLIGATORY DISCLAIMER that immigration/diaspora discussions are almost always case by case and will vary greatly based on things like country of origin/race/ethnicity, country immigrated to, initial socioeconomic status, time period, etc. And even among diaspora, people can and will have vastly different experiences, and it’s not good to generalize. These are just some thoughts with one example.**

1. Waves of Immigration

Depending on when people arrive, they’ve got different push/pull factors drawing them to a country and it also factors into how the nation feels about them and vice versa... Chinese immigration to the US has mostly two major waves (you could also say there were 3, counting the post-WWII/Communist China wave, but I won’t talk about that): one in the mid 1800s and the other after the 1970s/1980s into modern day; the gap is because the Chinese Exclusion Act (1882) that banned most immigration from China wasn’t repealed until 1943 (because of Japan’s attack on the US in WWII, the US needed China as an ally).

IMMIGRATION WAVE 1: MID 1800s

These immigrants were mostly from southern China (Canton area), and they came to the US because of hard times (Opium Wars + political instability because of things like the Taiping Rebellion) and economic opportunity in the West (eg. Gold Rush (San Francisco is literally “Old Gold Mountain” in Chinese today) + industrialization, railroads, expansion etc.). There was Much Discrimination against those immigrants, and many worked as hard laborers in a variety of occupations (on railroads, gold mine, farms (in the South esp), laundry businesses; there were merchants as well, but they were the minority); many were looking to get some money that they could send back to their families in China and planned to return, but over time, they settled down and stayed. I think for those immigrants, Yao would definitely be understanding, even if he might not be empathetic. After all, he’s not thriving at that time either, and although he thinks Alfred is inferior to him (in many ways), he understands why people would be drawn by economic promise and quick wealth, even if it might not be the best strategy for getting rich. It’s not like staying in China would be better lmao. However, I don’t think he would approve (?) how many of his immigrants stayed in the US when most viewed it as a temporary move; I think Yao is very surprised by how so many of them persisted to carve out a home there, despite the discrimination and limited opportunities. Perhaps he admires their resilience, the creation of Chinatowns and community and how they still come to a country that doesn’t even let them in (see the San Francisco Fire of 1906 and the boon for paper sons), but still wishes they would come back, however unlikely that hope is. Personally, Yao would never be able to stay in Alfred’s country, the beautiful country, if Alfred’s hypocrisy prevented his experience, his immigrant’s experience, from being anything close to beautiful. (You were founded by immigrants and foreigners, but now you spurn them: the poor sojourners who continue to flee to your shores, and refuse them respite from the disasters at home.) And anyways, Alfred is just the next scrappy young upstart, barely 70 years old but with a swagger like he rules the world; how could he have something over himself, the Middle Kingdom, who has stood the test of time? (Admittedly, he’s doing nowhere as well as Alfred—even he can see that, despite his pride, and despite the haze of opium in his brain. Leaving is the logical, objectively sound choice. Still, his pride hurts vaguely when he thinks how his immigrants keep choosing a country that keeps rejecting them, over and over again, instead of himself. But it is no matter. The injury to his ego is inconsequential and easily brushed aside; for they are still his people, and they deserve a good life, wherever they are. His distaste for Alfred flares up again: Arthur’s bastard child, who takes advantage of his trade (see the Open Door Notes, 1899-1900), but refuses his people.)

if anyone wants more context or is interested in the history I mentioned, I highly recommend this pdf (from the book A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America by Ronald Takaki)

IMMIGRATION FROM 1949 TO 1980: according to Wikipedia, there was very little immigration from mainland China during this period due to the Cold War and China becoming Communist; most of the immigration was from Taiwan/ROC but counted in the quota for China. Since there’s a separate Hetalia personification for TWN, I’m not going to go over that. However, there were also many people from Mainland China who escaped to Hong Kong, still a British colony, during that period (I hope it’s clear why, but if anyone asks I’ll put it in a separate post); some stayed there, while others emigrated to the US; both trips were for more freedoms and a better life etc because China was really really messed up for a bit (also keep in mind the people emigrating all had the means to and were at least middle class, usually somewhat educated, etc.). I will not be talking about that group either because I don’t think it’s my place to, but please know they exist as well.

IMMIGRANT WAVE 2: 1980s ONWARD

A lot of people came from mainland China for education; there was also an. exodus of intellectuals following 1989 (which I Will Not get into). Many of these people sought job opportunities, like those that rapidly opened up in the computer industry, there are many students who come here to study abroad, who take SATs and TOEFLs to get into good US colleges or to conduct graduate research and get PhDs; some stay, others have gone back to like, advance China’s development (this sentiment of getting good students to go abroad and then go back to China to use their talents for Patriotic Purposes isn’t a new thing, stretches back to like the late 1800s). I don’t really have much to say about this group besides what’s below ↓.

2. Immigrant Thoughts On Their Home Country

more complicated, because it varies by generation and time period and probably 203943 other things. Mainlanders that came over starting in the 1990s till now have relatively positive feelings towards China (imo, extrapolating from my life experiences); I think part of that is also because most* of these immigrants aren’t really escaping from something? They’re coming for an education/job opportunities (students studying abroad in the US (留学生 or liuxuesheng) for graduate school or university come to mind as one example), and they’re still very much connected to China politically and culturally, sometimes* more so than to the US. For these immigrants, I think Yao doesn’t worry too much about them? They’re pretty successful* overall*, and discrimination, although still A Large Problem™, isn’t the same from stuff that Yao (or his immigrants) remember from, say the mid 1800s (see above), or even during the paranoia about Communists after WWII and the subsequent Chinese Confession Program that made many people really scared of being deported. (Red China made Chinese Americans a target of the Communist panic, and the confession program was instated in order to make sure Communist spies couldn’t infiltrate the US. Those who immigrated illegally could confess that and gain citizenship; however you also had to weed out everyone you knew who also immigrated illegally.) I think Yao would see them as an extension of himself in a different land; they’re very much still part of him, and he gives them his well wishes.

However, I think that immigrants born in the US in modern day at least (1990s onwards) are definitely more ambivalent about China’s legacy + modern day Issues™, as much as we are connected via culture and heritage. Not quite sure how Yao would feel about that, because I’m not quite sure how much Yao is the state and how much he represents the people. However, I think there would be some mutual unease; does he see this as betrayal of some kind? Perhaps he doesn’t blame us for feeling as we do? Maybe he wonders what we feel about him; maybe he doesn’t want to know. Maybe he chooses the easier route: to focus on the bonds between him and his huayi instead of the grievances, and leave the rest unsaid.

Additionally with first gen immigrants, there’s the conflicting feeling of being stuck between two worlds and value systems that oppose each other in many respects. Also there’s sometimes a feeling of not-quite-being-in-touch-with-your-culture (in other diaspora as well, ofc. here it’s often exemplified by forgetting or not knowing how to read and write Chinese proficiently, among other things 🙃); idk. does Yao see that as a bit of a disappointment? Would he wish us to try harder? Does he view it as inevitable, for those raised in the US; the environment is too different, and perhaps he won’t blame us for those differences, or shortcomings. Does Yao know, or care, about the racism? What about his immigrants who try to assimilate completely into American culture, who try to erase the Chinese part of their identity? Those that have tried it, but regretted it? Are they still his, when they have tried rejecting their connection to him, choosing to drop the “Chinese” from Chinese American? Does he consider racism when thinking about them? What about international adoptees? Does he claim them, when some have not been raised in a culturally Chinese environment, and when it’s still a sensitive subject on both sides of the ocean? I don’t have answers to many of these questions.

There are also immigrants who fled China because of war or persecution or upheaval, (one example is with regards to the Cultural Revolution), but I don’t feel qualified to discuss it here, and I don’t want to take it lightly.

But, despite everything I’ve discussed above, I’d like to think that however an immigrant feels about their home country or however long they’ve been there, all nation personifications would still wish them a better life (even Yao). I mean, it’s not always easy being an immigrant/part of a diaspora (especially when race becomes a factor). I really don’t think any of the hetalia characters would say “look at your struggles. What a mistake it was to immigrate somewhere where you still face so many challenges, although they might be different from the ones back home”. that’s just No. Also, I think that when you disregard sentimentality and their inherent connection to the people, countries would still be able to sympathize with people trying to strive for better, you know? People immigrate for a better life, whether it’s because it was getting rough when they left or because other places had more potential, and like. although nation-people can’t leave their own country, I think they understand the people who do, because it’s a chance to make a new life, and it would be unkind, counterproductive, limiting, to prevent someone from taking that opportunity if it came. And their children, and grandchildren; they are still connected to their origins even in a new country, by blood if nothing else, and nations are people too; they must have some sentimentality for their people born in a different land. I’d like to think that if Yao met a Chinese American kid running around San Francisco’s Chinatown, or bumped into an ABC high schooler in a well to do Massachusetts suburb, he’d stop and nod and maybe say hello, and wish them luck, wherever they go in the future. After all, they are the products of his immigrant’s hopes and dreams, and they are his too, as much as they live in Alfred’s land.

* (asterisks): this is a) from my experience and research; not everyone will have the same experiences! please keep this in mind and don’t generalize a very vast group of people. :)

Idk if that was too sentimental or rambly or something, but yeah, those are some of the things I consider when I think about nations and their diasporas. If you made it down here, thanks for reading! I greatly appreciate it. Also I hope I got all my facts correct, but if anyone spots anything incorrect, especially regarding the post 1980s immigration wave, please tell me! Tried doing my research but there are still a few things I’m unsure about rip.

This might be deleted tomorrow because I’m feeling weird about it, but feel free to reblog! I’d also very much love some feedback too if any of y’all are feeling up to it

#i was thinking about a lot of this when writing the zine fic so this post is partially an extension of that #hws china #aph china #musings #hetalia #nation lore #hws #aph #aph china headcanons #hetalia worldbuilding #headcanon musings #hetalia headcanons #I GUESS??

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