A few thoughts on victimhood...

[graculus]

Every fandom has one. The character who always gets it, the one who's more often than not in peril or injured so that the other(s) can rescue him. It's a staple of h/c and always has been. Whether it's Daniel Jackson or Illya Kuryakin (or Obi Wan Kenobi, Harper, Blair Sandburg... the list is endless), there's always one character who gets to be 'the designated victim' more often than not. Often much more often than not.

What puzzles me is how much making those characters any kind of victim, with all the passivity that implies and requires, takes a warping of what we see onscreen beyond all reason. What most of us like about those characters in the first place is their strength of character (call it stubbornness if you like, sometimes that's a more accurate description) and yet writers apparently think nothing of utterly stripping characters of that so that they can be victimised with impunity.

In the worst examples, said victim is tied to the metaphorical railtracks like a silent movie heroine while the manly hero (every fandom has one of those as well, it seems) rescues them. It's bizarre. Because, frankly, you could whump Illya Kuryakin or Daniel Jackson till doomsday and neither of them would just lie there and take it - they'd both be trying to escape under their own steam, snarking at their captors while they did so. They'd suffer the consequences, of course, but neither of them would let a little thing like more pain stop them from trying to do what they could. It's in their nature.

Is there a fandom out there where the risks experienced by the characters are more evenly spread? One where there isn't a designated victim who has to be written OOC in order to play that part effectively? If there is, I'd love to hear about it.

Comments

[rivier.livejournal.com]

Good point, and I'd totally agree. Chalk Harper up as another character who, canonically, tends to fight like a feral creature with really nasty toxic teeth when anyone tries to victimize him, but who is absolutely the fanon sacrificial virgin and helpless chew-toy. With Harper, I can see why the fandom does it, to some extent - because he literally *looks* small and vulnerable and cute, a line of argument he tries to use on any aggressor dumb enough to fall for it.

Also, canonically, to some extent Harper has been the one (like Daniel or Illya) who falls over, gets broken / kidnapped / impregnated by Magog, and it's the manly men men - Tyr or Dylan (like Jack or Napoleon) - who've rescued him. But he certainly never takes the aggression lying down, any more than Daniel or Illya do. When any of them become passive, trembly, moist-eyed little victims in a story, is usually the point where I grab my coat and say tutty-bye to the fic in question.

I'd very hesitantly suggest that Atlantis is bucking the trend, one season in. On the show, honours are about equal between McKay and Sheppard as to which one gets whumped and which one rides to the rescue. I guess it helps that David Hewlett, who might have been landed with the vulnerable little geek-boy role, is clearly a big strapping lad who isn't going to be picked up and rescued by anyone in a hurry, least of all Sheppard, who he probably out-weighs by half as much again.

In fic, there doesn't yet seem to be a consensus about whether it's Shep or Rodney who's the bigger victim - McKay has emotional baggage which tempts the wussy-fiers, but then again, Sheppard seems to be sitting on some kind of emotional time bomb, not yet revealed. I've read about even numbers of stories where each of them is either the virgin or the manly hero - and I think they're competing for the titlw of Beloved Adored Object in the fandom. I guess time, and another season or two, may tell!

[graculus.livejournal.com]

I guess it helps that David Hewlett, who might have been landed with the vulnerable little geek-boy role, is clearly a big strapping lad who isn't going to be picked up and rescued by anyone in a hurry, least of all Sheppard, who he probably out-weighs by half as much again.

I've never known little things like facts to get in the way of fandom victimhood, personally. After all, MS is hardly a shrinking violet (over 6' tall and I can personally attest to him being muscled like my own fondest dreams..) but that doesn't stop people casting Daniel as Penelope Pitstop. ;)

I've read about even numbers of stories where each of them is either the virgin or the manly hero.

It'll be interesting to see how that works out over time. Is this just the slash side of the fandom or the fandom as a whole? I assume there's gen Atlantis fic out there? If so, then perhaps some of the major villains of wussitude may well turn up in your fandom some time soon and then we'll see what happens. (Yes, I do have someone in mind - she recycles the same hideous OOC mpreg stories in a multitude of fandoms).

[d-and-cats.livejournal.com]

Oh, the one that really gets me... I have seen someone write in response to a fic "You mentioned Daniel carrying a gun, which totally threw me out of the fic because Daniel is a pacifist and never carries a gun."

Um, since when? This is a man who picks up a staff weapon and kills a Jaffa with it, and hits his twice more before he hits the ground in the MOVIE, not to mention suggests using a nuke to blow up a ship where he knows there are innocent children because it's that, or let Skara and Sharya die. In the pilot he's letting the Abydonians guard the gate with assault rifles and submachine guns and in season one he's the one that suggests going after Apophis in the Nox. Frankly, I think if you look at it objectively, Daniel's probably *more* bloodthirsty than Jack.

Yet Daniel is always the victim.

Totally don't get it.

[graculus.livejournal.com]

I have seen someone write in response to a fic "You mentioned Daniel carrying a gun, which totally threw me out of the fic because Daniel is a pacifist and never carries a gun."

True enough, if you're setting yourself up as a fan of the show and have never actually watched an episode. All the way through the series, Daniel is shown more than competently using both handguns and assault weapons. It's true he might not turn to them first, but when he does, then Daniel is more than capable with them and certainly not anyone's definition of a pacifist.

Whether he's more bloodthirsty than Jack is debateable - I don't think there's a great deal in it. Jack is supposed to be a strategist, looking for the best result for his side with the minimum amount of casualties, so therefore he won't always go rushing in, guns blazing. What both Jack and Daniel have in common is that the use of firepower is an option, not the only alternative.

[d-and-cats.livejournal.com]

I was thinking specifically of Bloodlines, when Daniel dumps 30 rounds of 9mm into the tank of larval Gou'ald, of The Nox when Daniel is the one who convinces the team to try to take down Apophis and of Serpent's Song when Daniel almost kills Apophis.

Maybe Bloodthirsty is the wrong term. Maybe vicious or cold blooded is a better description.

[xochiquetzl]

Daniel is, in his way, harder than Jack, IMHO. The hardness goes deeper down than Jack's. Jack's is a mindset he puts on to enable him to do his job. Daniel's steeliness goes to the core.

[nakeisha.livejournal.com]

From my days of reading Starsky & Hutch, my memory tells me that this was one fandom where the 'bashing' and 'hurting' was indeed more evenly spread between the two characters.

(In fact I had just been saying exactly this to a friend via email only yesterday!!)

[xochiquetzl]

What most of us like about those characters in the first place is their strength of character (call it stubbornness if you like, sometimes that's a more accurate description) and yet writers apparently think nothing of utterly stripping characters of that so that they can be victimised with impunity.

I always find this disheartening. Apparently in most of my fandoms, I'm a big freak who is attracted to the designated victim for his strength. I fell for Daniel Jackson for the "I don't think so, beeyotch!" look he gave Ra in the movie. *swoon!*

Hell, I believed that Sith Academy Maul was attracted to Sith Academy Obi-Wan because he sensed Obi's Inner Badass. Note that the only two people he expressed a sexual interest in in the series who were in any way available were people who could cut him in half (Mary Sue--nearly cut him in half on their first date, and Obi-Wan--cuts him in half in the movie). For most of the series, believing in Obi's Inner Badass was definitely freakish. ;)

[moonlettuce.livejournal.com]

If you look at Mulder/Krycek fic for The X-Files then the whumpage is spread out betwen the two of them. (Although, it's usually the other one doing the whumping as opposed to the rescuing *g*) If you put Skinner into that equation, then it all changes. In M/Sk or Sk/K fic, then Mulder or Krycek pretty much automatically becomes the whumped/abused and Skinner rides in on his Big White Horse of Doom (tm) to sweep our little whumped woobie off their feet.

Now, admittedly, there are times when Mulder *should* have 'victim' tattooed across his forehead - his sister was kidnapped, his father hates him, his mother resents him, he was abuducted by aliens, he got committed, he had a brain tumour... the list pretty much goes on. However, he's also shown to be a resourceful son of a bitch. Yes, all of that happened and he didn't take it lying down.

Neither Mulder nor Krycek would let Skinner ride to the rescue and fight their battles for them. They just wouldn't, and to write them in such a way that they would means you aren't writing any version of Mulder or Krycek that I'd want to read.

[graculus.livejournal.com]

... and Skinner rides in on his Big White Horse of Doom (tm) to sweep our little whumped woobie off their feet.

Whisking them off to the nearest Dunelm Mill to buy curtains for that B&B they're going to run together? ;)

[moonlettuce.livejournal.com]

Frighteningly, I've read that fic...

[cycnus39]

Did they adopt orphans and Beagle puppies too?

[graculus.livejournal.com]

Nope, just three-legged kittens and little fluffy orphan baby birds.

[moonlettuce.livejournal.com]

You're not that far off...

[sg1jb]

>"...a designated victim who has to be written OOC in order to play that part effectively?"<

Just chiming in here with a quick comment -- I do not believe for a moment that a strong character need be written OOC to be a "designated victim". I have no idea why one might feel the phenomenon of victimisation has to be equated with character weakness. While there are many fics out there that tend to do just that, imo that's simply a problem with the author's skill and perspective, not with the character or the phenomenon itself.

I really do strongly disagree with you that victimhood, as you put it, implies and requires passivity. Far from it, imo. Being victimised -- being subjected to oppression, hardship, and/or trauma -- is simply (imo) an plot event that is inflicted upon a character, nothing more and nothing less, and for me the very best fics are the ones in which the strength, resilience, and tenacity of a character are illustrated by all that happens to them, and shine through *because* and in spite of the victimisation.

Imo.

[graculus.livejournal.com]

I think where you and I are disagreeing here is that my reading of 'victim' in fic is the character as a passive receptacle of whump, someone who has to be rescued because that's their function in the story, to cast a reflected glory on their manly rescuer.

Of course, being victimised doesn't make you a victim. Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be any alternate term for 'victim' that I can find that doesn't have that passive lie back and think of Abydos connotation to it, and it's certainly the one that the worst offenders hold hard to.

[captain-tiv.livejournal.com]

When I first got online, I went looking for Young Riders fanfiction. Those characters all get whumped. There didn't seem to be a single one that got whumped more than others.

I've read a few other fandom stories, but if you ever look for a fandom that the whumping is very few and far between and is more about twists and turns, I've read some Hogan's Heroes stories that are absolutely amazing. The few stories I read are more about Hogan and company outsmarting everyone else as they operated their Underground base at Stalag 13. :)