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shadowkatSomeone last night posted something in my journal that kept rolling about in my mind all day long. It's by no means the first time I've seen this comment, but it is the first time I thought about it objectively. One of the nice things about an obsession letting go of you, is you can start to look at certain things a tad more objectively without all that wicked emotion getting in the way.
Trouble with obsessing over things, I think, is it is really hard sometimes to see the thing you are obsessing over for what it is. It becomes blurred by other factors, which often have nothing to do with it.
I freely admit that I have obsessed over many things in my life - specifically fictional characters. But, and this is important I think, I've always known deep inside that it was an obsession, that it would pass with time, and that it was no doubt a reaction to something going on in my reality that I either could not control or was struggling with. Once I came to grips, often through writing about my obsession or indulging in it, with whatever was troubling me, the obsession would start bit by bit, to pass. Either that or I'd just eventually burn out on it. I can't decide which happened with the character of Spike. Did I burn out? Or did I resolve whatever it was that caused me to obsess so much? Or did I merely take the portions of the character that appealed to me and find another outlet for it? Letting go of the original template and creating a brand new character, containing bits of the old, yet more appealing to my own psyche? Something uniquely my own? As writers we do borrow from one another, bits and pieces, just as we borrow, I think, from life, it lends an authenticity to our work. Also, there really are no new ideas or new character types out there, just new ways of talking about them.
But back to the topic - do we idealize or romanticize characters? And when does this become dangerous to our psyches? When does the idealization/romanticization turn into something unnerving such as idolatory?
Where someone literally turns a character into a role model or idol and worships them as such? Because romanticizing a character in of itself isn't bad. We all do it. Whole nature of being a fan. Fans by definition obsess over and to an extent idealize (defined as envision or represent as the ideal) certain types or archetypical characters. Although, to be honest, I'm not sure how much of this is really idealizing as it is romanticizing. I don't think female viewers were idealizing Spike and Angel so much as romanticizing the characters. (Romanticize means - to view or interpret romantically, romantically is imaginative but impractical, conducive to love - just so everyone is clear on my syntax.) Speaking purely for myself? I tended to romanticize the character somewhat, seeing the aspects I wanted, ie. the poet, the vulnerable romantic, the fool for love, and ignoring the aspects that squicked me. I did the same thing with Angel, actually. It wasn't until years after two-part season finale of the second season aired aired, that I noticed all the Lolita imagery, I completely ignored it in my first viewing. There's a saying that people hear what they see - I also think people see what they want to see. If you think about we are living in world that bombards us with images, constantly. Almost overpoweringly so.
I've been told that auistic children can't screen them all out, can't screen out all the things they touch or see or hear, but most of us can. We'd go insane if we couldn't. So we choose which images to see and which not to, often to protect ourselves. And because we do this, often unconsciously, we want to talk to others - to find out what we missed. Just in case there's something vital to be learned in that mass of information thrown at us daily, that weren't able to process due to a whole host of reasons, while someone else out there somewhere was able to process it.
At the risk of pissing off about 85% of the people who read this journal: If you take the time to read the diverse number of livejournal entries, essays, fanfictions, and posts on the series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (as an example), you'll probably notice that no one saw the same series. And everyone romanticized some aspect of it. Whether it was Buffy, Willow, Xander, Anya, Giles, Jenny, Nikki, or the vampires that slept with and loved Buffy or the whole concept of female vampire slayers in general. If they didn't, they wouldn't have become obsessed with the series. Something in that series grabbed at your heart, yanked it, and made you go weak in the knees.
The reason I think it's more likely people are romanticizing these characters than idealizing them, is that most of the fanfic and essays I've read tends to take a romantic vein or romantic view of life. Now, there is nothing wrong with doing that. Life can be shitty - romance makes it tolerable. But people get really defensive about it. Maybe because in these so-called enlightened times, romance has been given a bad name? Also there is nothing wrong with romanticizing an aspect of a violent fantasy character or villain. Just as long as you realize you aren't, ahem, taking this into real life and thinking the real version isn't going to rip your throat out. Vampires don't exist. Serial killers unfortunately do. But to say someone who has fallen head over heels with Spike or Angel to the extent they write lots of romantic fic about them, is by association into serial killers or rapists or child molestors - is well taking the old logical syllogism a bit far. (Not that anyone has.) Be a bit like stating that any guy who fell for Buffy and/or Dawn, who was above a certain age, was by association a pedophile, because Buffy and Dawn were teens. Please. That's just silly. There's such a thing as over-psycholoanalyzing people, I know, I'm quilty of it. Methinks I'm a frustrated psychologist.
So what about idealizing? How is that different than romanticizing? This I've been trying to wrap my brain around off and on today. Did I idealize Spike?
According to the American Heritage Dictionary - to idealize means to envision as perfect or a standard of perfection. No, speaking for myself, can't say I did. Particularly since it was Spike's flaws that fascinated me the most. I ignored the ones that squicked me - ie. the whole sick Mommy thing that the writers seemed to be obsessed with, particularly in later seasons - personally, I think the head writer has some serious parental issues he needs to deal with, but that's just me. Just as I ignored Angel's fascination with adolescent girls - another thing that I think may say more about some of the writers than the characters, and I try hard to overlook. What fascinated me though was his desire to kill slayers, the one-upmanship, the struggle between the vulnerable poet who couldn't get a girl to save his life (or rather only got one that would take it) vs. the arrogant/overly confident ladies man vamp.
The dichotomy between the two, fascinated me. That and well, I'm a failed poet, and well identified. If anything, for me at least, there's more over-identification going on with the character than idealization. And the over-identification won't make sense to anyone but me, because I ignore the bits that contrast and emphasize the ones that don't. But I've never worshipped the character and I certainly do not view him as an ideal, not even close. IF I did? I would never have been that intrigued by him or ever written anything about him.
Just because I haven't idealized Spike, doesn't mean that I think others haven't. Quite a few people online have. Just as quite a few people online have idealized Angel. More have idealized Buffy. Certainly, quite a few, have idealized the whole slayer bit. And I've seen a little idealization going on with the supporting characters - Xander, Willow, etc. The idealization of any of these characters, to be honest, unnerves me. Unlike romanticizing, which is merely fantasizing about a character, idealizing - takes it to a whole other level. Here you've created a shrine. You are worshipping them. When you hunt for people to be romantically involved with? You look for that character.
Or you see yourself as that character, you hide behind their persona. Or you so identify with them - that they have become more real to you than others in your life. All of that...unnerves me a bit. The line between fantasy and reality in someone's mind is a fragile one. Course, that said, I think it is also possible to idealize a character - partially. Not go whole hog. Just maybe see them as the ideal for what you want, not all their traits, just some of them.
What I think may really be happening here is pure escapism. I noticed the other day how many distractions we've created, means of escaping our daily existence. Because real life? Tends to be dull and slow and frustrating. Can I just escape for five minutes into something more interesting? Can I have an attractive man or woman adore me? Can I be bitten in my dreams by a vampire than pop up the next minute and threaten to stake him? It's not real. We know that. But it is a release from the real. From worrying over whether you can pay the rent, feed the kids, get a job, keep the job your in, find someone to love you, keep the lover you've got...etc. Fantasy provides release. That's at least what I used Spuffy for in S6-S7 to distract myself from my own frustrations and personal hells. Every time I went into the evil bosses office and had to hide my emotions, grin and bear it, I played images from Smashed, Once More With Feeling, and Tabula Rasa in my head. So I could present the necessary poker face. Was it the best method in the universe to cope with the situation? No. Probably not. But at the time, it worked and well it branched out to an essay writing gig. Because when that grew old, which it did eventually, I just focused on analyzing the series in my head and writing essays on it. We all have our thing, I think.
Okay, once again, it's past eight o'clock and I need to eat damn it. So ta.
Trouble with obsessing over things, I think, is it is really hard sometimes to see the thing you are obsessing over for what it is. It becomes blurred by other factors, which often have nothing to do with it.
I freely admit that I have obsessed over many things in my life - specifically fictional characters. But, and this is important I think, I've always known deep inside that it was an obsession, that it would pass with time, and that it was no doubt a reaction to something going on in my reality that I either could not control or was struggling with. Once I came to grips, often through writing about my obsession or indulging in it, with whatever was troubling me, the obsession would start bit by bit, to pass. Either that or I'd just eventually burn out on it. I can't decide which happened with the character of Spike. Did I burn out? Or did I resolve whatever it was that caused me to obsess so much? Or did I merely take the portions of the character that appealed to me and find another outlet for it? Letting go of the original template and creating a brand new character, containing bits of the old, yet more appealing to my own psyche? Something uniquely my own? As writers we do borrow from one another, bits and pieces, just as we borrow, I think, from life, it lends an authenticity to our work. Also, there really are no new ideas or new character types out there, just new ways of talking about them.
But back to the topic - do we idealize or romanticize characters? And when does this become dangerous to our psyches? When does the idealization/romanticization turn into something unnerving such as idolatory?
Where someone literally turns a character into a role model or idol and worships them as such? Because romanticizing a character in of itself isn't bad. We all do it. Whole nature of being a fan. Fans by definition obsess over and to an extent idealize (defined as envision or represent as the ideal) certain types or archetypical characters. Although, to be honest, I'm not sure how much of this is really idealizing as it is romanticizing. I don't think female viewers were idealizing Spike and Angel so much as romanticizing the characters. (Romanticize means - to view or interpret romantically, romantically is imaginative but impractical, conducive to love - just so everyone is clear on my syntax.) Speaking purely for myself? I tended to romanticize the character somewhat, seeing the aspects I wanted, ie. the poet, the vulnerable romantic, the fool for love, and ignoring the aspects that squicked me. I did the same thing with Angel, actually. It wasn't until years after two-part season finale of the second season aired aired, that I noticed all the Lolita imagery, I completely ignored it in my first viewing. There's a saying that people hear what they see - I also think people see what they want to see. If you think about we are living in world that bombards us with images, constantly. Almost overpoweringly so.
I've been told that auistic children can't screen them all out, can't screen out all the things they touch or see or hear, but most of us can. We'd go insane if we couldn't. So we choose which images to see and which not to, often to protect ourselves. And because we do this, often unconsciously, we want to talk to others - to find out what we missed. Just in case there's something vital to be learned in that mass of information thrown at us daily, that weren't able to process due to a whole host of reasons, while someone else out there somewhere was able to process it.
At the risk of pissing off about 85% of the people who read this journal: If you take the time to read the diverse number of livejournal entries, essays, fanfictions, and posts on the series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (as an example), you'll probably notice that no one saw the same series. And everyone romanticized some aspect of it. Whether it was Buffy, Willow, Xander, Anya, Giles, Jenny, Nikki, or the vampires that slept with and loved Buffy or the whole concept of female vampire slayers in general. If they didn't, they wouldn't have become obsessed with the series. Something in that series grabbed at your heart, yanked it, and made you go weak in the knees.
The reason I think it's more likely people are romanticizing these characters than idealizing them, is that most of the fanfic and essays I've read tends to take a romantic vein or romantic view of life. Now, there is nothing wrong with doing that. Life can be shitty - romance makes it tolerable. But people get really defensive about it. Maybe because in these so-called enlightened times, romance has been given a bad name? Also there is nothing wrong with romanticizing an aspect of a violent fantasy character or villain. Just as long as you realize you aren't, ahem, taking this into real life and thinking the real version isn't going to rip your throat out. Vampires don't exist. Serial killers unfortunately do. But to say someone who has fallen head over heels with Spike or Angel to the extent they write lots of romantic fic about them, is by association into serial killers or rapists or child molestors - is well taking the old logical syllogism a bit far. (Not that anyone has.) Be a bit like stating that any guy who fell for Buffy and/or Dawn, who was above a certain age, was by association a pedophile, because Buffy and Dawn were teens. Please. That's just silly. There's such a thing as over-psycholoanalyzing people, I know, I'm quilty of it. Methinks I'm a frustrated psychologist.
So what about idealizing? How is that different than romanticizing? This I've been trying to wrap my brain around off and on today. Did I idealize Spike?
According to the American Heritage Dictionary - to idealize means to envision as perfect or a standard of perfection. No, speaking for myself, can't say I did. Particularly since it was Spike's flaws that fascinated me the most. I ignored the ones that squicked me - ie. the whole sick Mommy thing that the writers seemed to be obsessed with, particularly in later seasons - personally, I think the head writer has some serious parental issues he needs to deal with, but that's just me. Just as I ignored Angel's fascination with adolescent girls - another thing that I think may say more about some of the writers than the characters, and I try hard to overlook. What fascinated me though was his desire to kill slayers, the one-upmanship, the struggle between the vulnerable poet who couldn't get a girl to save his life (or rather only got one that would take it) vs. the arrogant/overly confident ladies man vamp.
The dichotomy between the two, fascinated me. That and well, I'm a failed poet, and well identified. If anything, for me at least, there's more over-identification going on with the character than idealization. And the over-identification won't make sense to anyone but me, because I ignore the bits that contrast and emphasize the ones that don't. But I've never worshipped the character and I certainly do not view him as an ideal, not even close. IF I did? I would never have been that intrigued by him or ever written anything about him.
Just because I haven't idealized Spike, doesn't mean that I think others haven't. Quite a few people online have. Just as quite a few people online have idealized Angel. More have idealized Buffy. Certainly, quite a few, have idealized the whole slayer bit. And I've seen a little idealization going on with the supporting characters - Xander, Willow, etc. The idealization of any of these characters, to be honest, unnerves me. Unlike romanticizing, which is merely fantasizing about a character, idealizing - takes it to a whole other level. Here you've created a shrine. You are worshipping them. When you hunt for people to be romantically involved with? You look for that character.
Or you see yourself as that character, you hide behind their persona. Or you so identify with them - that they have become more real to you than others in your life. All of that...unnerves me a bit. The line between fantasy and reality in someone's mind is a fragile one. Course, that said, I think it is also possible to idealize a character - partially. Not go whole hog. Just maybe see them as the ideal for what you want, not all their traits, just some of them.
What I think may really be happening here is pure escapism. I noticed the other day how many distractions we've created, means of escaping our daily existence. Because real life? Tends to be dull and slow and frustrating. Can I just escape for five minutes into something more interesting? Can I have an attractive man or woman adore me? Can I be bitten in my dreams by a vampire than pop up the next minute and threaten to stake him? It's not real. We know that. But it is a release from the real. From worrying over whether you can pay the rent, feed the kids, get a job, keep the job your in, find someone to love you, keep the lover you've got...etc. Fantasy provides release. That's at least what I used Spuffy for in S6-S7 to distract myself from my own frustrations and personal hells. Every time I went into the evil bosses office and had to hide my emotions, grin and bear it, I played images from Smashed, Once More With Feeling, and Tabula Rasa in my head. So I could present the necessary poker face. Was it the best method in the universe to cope with the situation? No. Probably not. But at the time, it worked and well it branched out to an essay writing gig. Because when that grew old, which it did eventually, I just focused on analyzing the series in my head and writing essays on it. We all have our thing, I think.
Okay, once again, it's past eight o'clock and I need to eat damn it. So ta.
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no subject
Date: 2005-06-29 07:17 pm (UTC)Can't quite agree that romanticizing a character or character type is by definition essential to being a fan, even in the all-out, fic-reading/writing term-of-art sense, though doing so certainly takes up a big portion of a lot (most?) of individual fannish readings. I've been a Star Trek fan since the mid-seventies, but I don't think there's been significant romaticizing element in the ways I've thought about any Trek characters, even when taking those characters actual romantic story arcs--such as they were--into account.
That may simply be a function of romance just never being a strong suit for the writers of any of the Trek series, including the original (my apologies to disagreeing K/Sers)--there've certainly been media characters I've found hard not to romanticize (The X-Files' Scully, Season Four Buffy, early-1980s Kitty Pryde at the time)--but I think one can also be a strong, even obsessive fan of a given source without necessarily romanticizing even characters with whom one closely identifies/sympathizes. As you say, "Something in that series grabbed at your heart, yanked it, and made you go weak in the knees"--but that something can be a straightforward appreciation of the characters' struggles, or even of a larger story arc or Big Idea (Trek again, or Babylon 5); it doesn't have to involve romanticization, though it helps.
...yeah, that can happen. I suspect with unfortunate results, at least emotionally.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-30 01:57 am (UTC)Speaking of only picking up on the certain details but I found this an interesting way to think about why my kids, who are autistic, don't communicate. That they don't feel the need, they're not missing anything, they're sufficient unto themselves. There's a weird old book called Flatland where the characters are geometric shapes and the story is about them discovering that other shapes have different numbers of sides and combinations of angles and then that yet others exist in more than two dimensions. In one chapter the main character, a triangle, meets a one dimensional point dreaming that "I am is all, all is in me, nothing exists beyond me."
Back on topic. There's obviously a lot of reasons people write fanfic. For some it seems to be an alternative way to express meta thoughts about the characters or the world. Some writers seem to be in love with romance per se rather than with a specific character and write the same story again and again just changing the names.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-30 10:30 am (UTC)Very cool post. Our relashionships with fictional characters are really such a fascinating topic.
I wonder at the definition though - it does seem to suggest some universal standard of "perfect".
no subject
Date: 2005-06-30 10:38 am (UTC)Very cool post. Our relashionships with fictional characters are really such a fascinating topic.
I wonder at the definition though - it does seem to suggest some universal standard of "perfect". You, and I, since I feel very uncofortable talking about you ;-) don't ignore flaws in out appreciation of a character - but what is a flaw?
The things that squicked you (and again, me too. Who, did all the mommy issues of season 7 leave me with a sort of mental nausea) are aspects of the character in the way he's presented - as in, by the authors. Those issues, they're less interesting to watch, not something that "wrong" with the character, from a POV of likeability, or niceness or goodness, or, getting back tot he idolization, perfection.
Except, he is a character, and for me at least, how much I like him, is not how much would I like to be his friend, or live in the country he governs, but how much I like to watch him. How interesting he is. So idolization, I think, is not a measure of definable perfection, in good traits - ie, I would ignore the character being weak, vain, evil, etc, but how interesting, so I would ignore the mother issues I find appalingly boring and somewhat disturbing.
Am I making any sense?
no subject
Date: 2005-06-30 11:26 am (UTC)I've run into people who, to my mind, identify with characters to the point that they become very annoying in an argument. (Possibly I'm one of them.) However, I've seldom or never run into a fan whose obsession with a character went so far as hunting up real-life versions of the character to interact with, though I have seen other fans make blanket accusations of that sort of thing regarding other fan factions. Since internet acquaintance is a pretty shallow thing most of the time, how would we know?
no subject
Date: 2005-07-09 02:15 pm (UTC)I've also met the ones who over-identify, which is something else entirely and possibly closer to what I was doing at a certain point in my own obsessive arc with the series. When you are arguing the series, or a character, you are arguing as if you are the character and every negative point made feels as if it is against you personally. This is a very dangerous place to be in emotionally. Not to mention incredibly annoying to the poor person attempting to have a reasonable discussion with you. But, it is very hard to detach oneself, when one is obsessed. Not unlike the Red Sox fan arguing with a Yankees fan. This tendency is by no means relegated to one medium.
So to answer your question? The internet is only as shallow as you make it. Speaking only for myself? I've met about 75% of the people I've interacted with online, including people I did not necessarily like. The ones I haven't met? My friends have.
I actually do have faces and names to go with many of the pseudonymes I see.
I write Dracula fanfic and I did a discussion awhile back..
Date: 2005-06-30 02:51 pm (UTC)http://www.livejournal.com/users/dracschick/5596.html
Feel free to read my Dracula fanfic as well if you want to see more of how I write the character:)