#my pipedream is for murdoc to get to experience recovery in some capacity but

[greywindys]

Um

Okay so I’ve been receiving a number of asks about what’s going on with Murdoc in prison, and why the entire prison storyline like, isn’t my favorite. If you were someone who sent an ask along these lines and were wondering wtf happened, I apologize! I haven’t had a lot of time to sit down and write it out, and it’s also not the happiest of topics. Additionally, I feel like I can be downer about most things so, idk...I was putting off talking about it at length. But since I have the day off today...

trigger warnings for discussion of sexual assault and csa.

Starting with the current phase, most of this resurfaced with the Murdoc bot, which references an “unfortunate incident in the showers” Murdoc experiences at the end of the first conversation. I guess you could argue that this could mean anything, however, I put together the sequence of messages and idk, I think it’s pretty clear (read from left column to right column).

Like, ymmv as to the extent of the assault, but like, at the very least this is strongly implying that he was attacked. For additional context - “Soap Sisters” is a reference to the phrase “don’t drop the soap” which is a reference to prison rape (a quick google will give you more history if need be).

So, yeah! Kind of a bummer! And it’s enough of a bummer as a one time thing but they’re like, keeping this narrative running as something that’s a constant presence in his current environment. See this screenshot of an answer from the most recent update:

And this screenshot of the letter from the Free Murdoc package:

And for further history, Murdoc has been subjected to this sort of treatment before when he was in prison in Mexico where he was threatened with becoming “the prison bike.” See this excerpt from Rise of the Ogre:

And finally, though not directly related to his prison experiences but still relevant, Murdoc is a CSA survivor. I think at this point, this is pretty common knowledge but in case you need reference - another Rise of the Ogre screenshot:

So basically, he’s the one character in Gorillaz who’s been subjected to ongoing sexual violence, even before the developments of phase 5. It isn’t discussed very often, but it’s, imo, a significant part of his trauma history and something I consistently consider when writing about him. It also makes it difficult for me to laugh at what he’s going through as “karma” or w/e it is people are saying because that’s like...not an ideal way to think about things for so many reasons? I can’t exactly get on board with the “maybe he’ll learn the error of his ways in prison” line of thinking either because one, statistically speaking that NEVER happens. People often leave prison with more trauma than when they come out, recidivism is also A Thing; and two, positing that being subjected to *more* abuse would be the defining event to make him “better” and kickstart a theoretical redemption arc is like...not an ideal narrative at all, imo.

Tl;dr it would be a lot easier for me to go along with them if they’d just like...leave him alone in this regard? It would be one thing if they were planning to seriously address this and include some recovery, but like, so far all they’re doing is playing it for laughs and if that’s what they’re going to do I’d rather they leave it out completely.

On another note, we also know that he’s been getting badly injured from physical altercations. So he isn’t doing well.

#personals. #discussion #so yeah #my pipedream is for murdoc to get to experience recovery in some capacity but #ref