Violence! Rape! Agency! The rapiness that comes before

[Galactus]

It's been awhile, what issues did you have? I recall there was a pro-life message in there that I can see rubbing people the wrong way...to put in it mildly given the circumstances in the narrative.

That's the one, yes.

[Sci-2]

American History X is another great movie, if my memory serves.

[Grack21]

Well

I'm breaking me own rule, so I'll have to hit myself with a fish but after the Prometheus trailer came out I was thinking about the original alien film, which i watched on blu ray a few months ago(fantastic restoration, I could go on about that for pages) and as always whenever I watch it I pick up new stuff.

Anyway, it struck me this time just how much rape subtext there is in this movie, and I was just wondering what your opinions are on it. I'll spoiler tag in case anyone hasn't seen it(blasphemy!)

The scene where Parker and Lambert get killed, and you here Lambert getting killed over the radio, well, lemme quote form a website its easier.

Did the Alien rape Lambert?

This is left ambiguous in the film, but many of the original ideas behind the Alien had sexual undertones to make it much more unsettling. H.R. Giger's original design of the Alien was much more sexual, but eventually he altered the design and used his original ideas for the film "Species". Ronald Schussett, one of the writers of the Alien screenplay, had even stated the original idea of how to get the Alien onto the ship would be "the Alien fucks him!" and the whole idea behind the facehugger violating a man's mouth would add an extra layer of discomfort to male viewers. As for the "rape" scene, we see that Lambert is fully clothed when the Alien corners her. We see the Alien slowly creep its tail in between her legs and up to her back and although the scene then cuts away, we hear Lambert over the loud speaker as she gasps, convulses, and then give a final shriek of terror before silence. When Ripley finds the bodies of Parker and Lambert, we never see Lambert's full body but we see her legs dangling in the foreground, now undressed with blood running down them onto her feet, and her big toe has been broken and is bent out of shape. Exactly what the Alien did to Lambert is left to the imagination of the individual viewer.

Creepy right? That scene gave me chills when I first saw it when i was like 14 and didn't get most of the subtext, but it freaks me out even more now.

Anyway I was just wondering about people's general opinions of the way rape is used in that film. Not here to start any arguments. I promise!

[Sci-2]

Damn, it's been so long I can't remember the movie that well. I definitely didn't notice any of this specifically, but yeah the aliens always seemed to have a walking-penis quality. I'd be curious in reading about the collaborative process between Ridley Scott and Giger.

ETA:

From Wikipedia:

O'Bannon himself later described the sexual imagery in Alien as overt and intentional: "One thing that people are all disturbed about is sex... I said 'That's how I'm going to attack the audience; I'm going to attack them sexually. And I'm not going to go after the women in the audience, I'm going to attack the men. I am going to put in every image I can think of to make the men in the audience cross their legs. Homosexual oral rape, birth. The thing lays its eggs down your throat, the whole number.'"^[100]

[Grack21]

Yeah, if you look at the "chair" the space jockey is sitting in, its a penis. Not penis like, its just a big giant penis.

[Sci-2]

Talking to my sister about two movies I can't even bring myself to press play for:

Monster

Boys Don't Cry

[Grack21]

I think I killed the thread.

[Sci-2]

Well, I think all the RL cases of sexual assault are pretty depressing topics for the holidays.

[Sci-2]

COLD COMMANDS SPOILERS:

Cold Commands has a rape scene where the victim is described as pretty, but her looks are apparently fading. Now, the question is why does she need to be pretty and why does she need to be raped?

The former I have no idea about, I'd be curious to hear Richard's thoughts. The latter, apparently is a punishment:

The victim of rape is Poppy Snarl, a slaver who bought and sold Gil's cousin.

What does it mean for a protag to sentence a character to rape? Does it validate rape as punishment for bad women? Does the narrative sufficiently disassociate itself from any positive portrayal of the act?

ETA: To be fair, there is an attempt made to discuss the above questions in the narrative. I wasn't quite satisfied personally with this.

[sologdin]

we have endemic sexual abuse in US prisons, which appears to be de facto accepted as part of the corrective measures intended by the penal system. raising that practice and its bizarre tolerance as part of fiction does not seem in itself to be objectionable. whether the gender politics of the representation in fiction are poorly handled is a separate question.

[Sci-2]

we have endemic sexual abuse in US prisons, which appears to be de facto accepted as part of the corrective measures intended by the penal system. raising that practice and its bizarre tolerance as part of fiction does not seem in itself to be objectionable. whether the gender politics of the representation in fiction are poorly handled is a separate question.

Excellent point.

[The WaterDancer Knight]

Cold Commands has a rape scene where the victim is described as pretty, but her looks are apparently fading. Now, the question is why does she need to be pretty and why does she need to be raped?

The former I have no idea about, I'd be curious to hear Richard's thoughts. The latter, apparently is a punishment:

The victim of rape is Poppy Snarl, a slaver who bought and sold Gil's cousin.

What does it mean for a protag to sentence a character to rape? Does it validate rape as punishment for bad women? Does the narrative sufficiently disassociate itself from any positive portrayal of the act?

ETA: To be fair, there is an attempt made to discuss the above questions in the narrative. I wasn't quite satisfied personally with this.

You answer your first question in the spoiler. She's a pretty woman but she's a bad woman too. Or to say it differently : as much pretty outside as she's ugly inside. It's a common trope in many fictions.

[Spring Bass]

spoilers for The Cold Commands

That was a genuinely ugly decision by Ringil, one that he made in the moment out of anger at Poppy Snarl for her role in his cousin's enslavement - and I think the narrative portrays it that way, particularly when he grows angry and disgusted with what he's done and just kills her. He could, and should have just killed her if he was hell bent on getting his revenge, but he wanted her to <em>suffer</em>. The fact that his thugs were all gung-ho on gangraping her was just the most convenient way to do that at the time.<br>

I think of it as a reminder that Ringil really isn't a nice guy. He has his moments, but he's still often a bitter asshole.

Mod Edit: Watch it with specific spoilers for specific events, particularly in very recently published novels. Just stick a spoiler tag on them. (...because I will grow annoyed with doing it very quickly and will simple delete offending posts. Cheers, Datepalm.)

[Richard]

Oh, god, where to start..........

Let's try this:

What does it mean for a protag to sentence a character to rape? Does it validate rape as punishment for bad women? Does the narrative sufficiently disassociate itself from any positive portrayal of the act?

What does it mean for a protag to hack his enemy to death with a bloody great sword? Does it validate capital punishment for bad people? Does the narrative....?

See the problem?

There is nothing special about rape - it's been popular for millenia, it still is. In the UK, marital rape wasn't made illegal until 1991, and aside from Scandinavia, we weren't lagging that far behind the pack. And as a function of war and banditry, rape is endemic. Even in the Second World War, Allied generals believed the best they could hope to do following the D-Day invasions was keep the number of incidents down - and those were the "good guys".

To be shocked by rape in a narrative that deals with violent eras where men wandered about with sharpened steel on their hip is to massively miss the point. What's shocking (or, let's say, remarkable) is instead the amount of epic fantasy fiction in which rape is simply expunged from the landscape (while other fun forms of violence are retained in all their glory).

*

That said, let's get textual. What seems like an eternity ago on another thread, I complained that the level of textual address within the fantasy genre readership is often poor, and here's some more evidence for that: at no point is the victim of the rape in The Cold Commands described as "pretty". And at no point does the protagonist sentence her to rape.

So, in the service of better textual critique, please answer the following questions (I guess spoiler tags will probably be necessary). Enjoy:

1) The rape victim is not described as "pretty". How is she in fact described?

2) How does this description impact the rape?

3) What does this description tell us about the background of (a) the character and (B) the world she inhabits?

4) There is the implication of punishment in the rape - what acts is the victim being punished for?

5) What, IYHO, would be an appropriate punishment for such acts?

6) What punishment would you personally hand out to someone who committed those acts upon a member of your family?

7) Is there a difference between your answers to (5) and (6)? If so, how do you explain the discrepancy? What question is the text forcing you to confront?

8) The protagonist does not in fact sentence the victim to rape. What does he actually do?

9) What, IYHO, should he have done instead? How and why would this have been better? What acts of vengeance are you prepared to excuse? Which not? Why?

10) How does the victim react to the rape? What does this tell us about her background? What social implication is there in this?

11) How does the protagonist react to the rape? What does this tell us about him? How does he compare to the victim?

12) The protagonist is an experienced soldier. How many previous rapes has he probably witnessed? What, if anything, is different about this one? What impact is his previous experience likely to have on his actions here?

(13) subsidiary question for those who have also read The Steel Remains - what particular significance would rape have for the protagonist? Does this make his actions worse or better in any way, and if so which?)

14) What is your opinion of slavery?

15) A man who fights against slavers is a hero, true or false?

16) Do the men fighting against slavery here behave heroically?

17) What conclusions does the text invite about heroes?

18) By the end of this section of the text, how do you feel about (a) the protagonist (B) the rape victim © the soldiers under the protagonist's command (d) the world they inhabit (e) our own world (f) human beings in general?

19) The novel begins not with the protagonist, but with another character. Which of the two would you prefer to have on your side in this world? Why?

20) What is the text implying about implication certain forms epic fantasy which focus on characters similar to the one at the beginning of The Cold Commands?

Happy New Year!

[Sci-2]

Apologies if I mischaracterized your text Richard, though beyond whether the character is pretty (which may have been stated in TSR) I don't think I have.

I'll get to the questions later today.

ETA: I'm a bit confused on the "not sentencing" part. Do you use the term sentencing as a legal term, rather than an action of condemning? I suppose I was taking a wider view of the word, like, you know, some people do with the word censorship. ;-P

Before that, let me be clear this isn't a glaring condemnation against you or The Cold Commands. TC² is definitely entertaining and the overall story is good. I had issues with the pacing wrt the overall narrative as I mentioned in the other thread.

[Sci-2]

Dissecting Rape Scene in Dragon Tattoo

[Kalbear]

I've not read Cold Commands, so take this with a grain of salt, but Richard - you can't both have rape as a punishment and it meaning nothing. It's clear that using rape as a punishment was meant to shock on some level - either the readers or the people being punished or any number of things - but it's not much of a punishment if you're also claiming it was just there and happening all the time.

Another question to ask, Richard - would it make sense in your world to have a man raped as punishment? As threat of punishment? If the person mentioned was a man instead of a woman, would the narrative otherwise make sense?

[Sci-2]

What seems like an eternity ago on another thread, I complained that the level of textual address within the fantasy genre readership is often poor, and here's some more evidence for that: at no point is the victim of the rape in The Cold Commands described as "pretty". And at no point does the protagonist sentence her to rape

To quote TSR:

<strong>"Poppy Snarl, <u>harsh painted beaut</u>y and weary, look-you-can’t-seriously-expect-me-to-put-up-with-this counterfeit patience before she inflicted one of the brutal punishments for which she was famed, and which invariably crippled for life."</strong>

So wrong book, right words.

To be shocked by rape in a narrative that deals with violent eras where men wandered about with sharpened steel on their hip is to massively miss the point.

I think this is where you are arguing against a complaint no one I know of has made in these threads. No one is complaining about their delicate airs, if anything the complaint is on the juvenile, porn-level treatment of the subject. The narrative frame is incredibly narrow. A female is raped, the rape is described, the recovery process and cultural RL context is lost. It's a cheap narrative trick to elicit emotion, usually as a means of saying something about a male character.

That you've missed this, after all the posts about RL and fictional examples...I find it...well let's go with bizarre.

1) The rape victim is not described as "pretty". How is she in fact described?

Covered above, though I do agree if someone read Cold Commands alone they would not get this description and I apologize for that. Here's the description from Cold Commands:

<p><strong><br></strong></p><p><strong>"Looked briefly into the tent’s tiny dressing mirror at the caked makeup, the sleepless eyes, the creeping signs of age."</strong></p>

2) How does this description impact the rape?

It's the same thing as when Bakker describes a rape victim as "lithe" or Terez is a beauty. The female characters are presented as sexually pleasurable to a male gaze.

3) What does this description tell us about the background of (a) the character and ( B) the world she inhabits?

You know, if you already have answers in mind you could just state them.

<p><br></p><p>As for the character, she's a slaver who lives in a violet world.</p>

4) There is the implication of punishment in the rape - what acts is the victim being punished for?

She is being punished for being a slaver.

<p><br></p><p>Specifically, she bought and sold Ringil's cousin.</p>

5) What, IYHO, would be an appropriate punishment for such acts?

Incarceration after trial.

6) What punishment would you personally hand out to someone who committed those acts upon a member of your family?

Not sure, ideally the same as 5). Again, you seem to have an answer in mind, why not state it.

7) Is there a difference between your answers to (5) and (6)? If so, how do you explain the discrepancy? What question is the text forcing you to confront?

I'm sorry, but I don't see how the text highlights the discrepancy between 5 & 6.

8) The protagonist does not in fact sentence the victim to rape. What does he actually do?

You're going to have help me with this one, because as I see it this is exactly what happens. We can search-replace "sentence" to "condemns" if you want.

9) What, IYHO, should he have done instead? How and why would this have been better? What acts of vengeance are you prepared to excuse? Which not? Why?

You seem to be missing the point here. This isn't about how one scene is better or worse. It is about a predictable trend.

On an artistic level, the whole scene read like a easy out to say something about the male character and indulge in some grimdark elements.

On a societal level, you have a male character with physical power over a woman indulging in his power over her body to condemn/sentence her to a fate specifically geared toward the character being female. If the text is trying to make this into a discussion about rape, or even about the character, it didn't do an overly good job of it IMHO.

I'll get to the other questions in time.

[Spring Bass]

Another question to ask, Richard - would it make sense in your world to have a man raped as punishment? As threat of punishment? If the person mentioned was a man instead of a woman, would the narrative otherwise make sense?

It actually might happen (albeit not as frequently), since male-on-male rape has been referred to in the series.

IIRC, Ringil has a memory flashback in The Steel Remains wherein a couple of bullies from his school raped him while he was a student there. I think it was also hinted that this was all-too-common there.

It's clear that using rape as a punishment was meant to shock on some level - either the readers or the people being punished or any number of things - but it's not much of a punishment if you're also claiming it was just there and happening all the time.

I think it can be both depressingly common in-universe as well as a shocking punishment.

Ringil thinks at some point that Poppy Snarl was probably raped more than once before the gang rape in her life (which she basically says is true), but that doesn't mean that it can't still be a traumatizing event for her.

[Arthmail]

I think this is where you are arguing against a complaint no one I know of has made in these threads. No one is complaining about their delicate airs, if anything the complaint is on the juvenile, porn-level treatment of the subject. The narrative frame is incredibly narrow. A female is raped, the rape is described, the recovery process and cultural RL context is lost. It's a cheap narrative trick to elicit emotion, usually as a means of saying something about a male character.

That you've missed this, after all the posts about RL and fictional examples...I find it...well let's go with bizarre.

It's the same thing as when Bakker describes a rape victim as "lithe" or Terez is a beauty. The female characters are presented as sexually pleasurable to a male gaze.

You know, if you already have answers in mind you could just state them.

<p><br></p><p>As for the character, she's a slaver who lives in a violet world.</p>

She is being punished for being a slaver.

<p><br></p><p>Specifically, she bought and sold Ringil's cousin.</p>

Incarceration after trial.

Not sure, ideally the same as 5). Again, you seem to have an answer in mind, why not state it.

I'm sorry, but I don't see how the text highlights the discrepancy between 5 & 6.

You're going to have help me with this one, because as I see it this is exactly what happens. We can search-replace "sentence" to "condemns" if you want.

You seem to be missing the point here. This isn't about how one scene is better or worse. It is about a predictable trend.

On an artistic level, the whole scene read like a easy out to say something about the male character and indulge in some grimdark elements.

On a societal level, you have a male character with physical power over a woman indulging in his power over her body to condemn/sentence her to a fate specifically geared toward the character being female. If the text is trying to make this into a discussion about rape, or even about the character, it didn't do an overly good job of it IMHO.

I'll get to the other questions in time.

I think this is where you are arguing against a complaint no one I know of has made in these threads. No one is complaining about their delicate airs, if anything the complaint is on the juvenile, porn-level treatment of the subject. The narrative frame is incredibly narrow. A female is raped, the rape is described, the recovery process and cultural RL context is lost. It's a cheap narrative trick to elicit emotion, usually as a means of saying something about a male character.

Except he, and others including myself, have called you out for your double standard. Firstly, i want to contest this continued assertion that it's juvenile porn-level treatment. If we are referring to Abercrombie (the original source of ire), the sex is equally as disgusting between Logen and Ferro. With Morgan, in the Steel Remains, Cold Commands, and all of his books to be honest, the sex is more explicite. Personally, i gloss over most of the sex because i'm not really interested in reading it. Much the same as battle scenes do not do much for others. As for battle scenes and violence, i draw you back to when i called out your double standard. Part of what i have been saying from the beginning is that there is no mention made by you that the violence needs to be treated with the same kid gloves and special care as the rape. Soldierly characters are not expected to deal with PTSD for all of the nasty shit they did (i just read a section in my history book about the final fall of Constantinople, which is pretty brutal, as was the fall of Jerusalem), so why should rape be dealt with in more depth? Why the special distinction? In Abercrombies book, i asked why torture and everything else was glossed over while the lesbian rape was a point of hate. I do not remember this issue being addressed, which is what has led me to bowing out of this conversation several times, because it seems that some people have a candle for this issue and cannot fathom it actually working or being useful for narrative purposes. We always gloss over the violence, which today remains a huge problem, but we cannot do it with rape. Why? And there are many cheap narrative tricks that authors do all of the time to elicit emotion. No writing is perfect, and many times the author is trying to say something else. Your issue is not necessarily his issue, but it does not mean that he cannot draw on things that help to make his job as a writer a little easier.

That you've missed this, after all the posts about RL and fictional examples...I find it...well let's go with bizarre.

Except you are willfully ignoring what he has said, as well as what others have said, again. You focus like a laser on your fucking issue, and when others basically critique the critics, you get up in arms and claim no one is listening to you.

It's the same thing as when Bakker describes a rape victim as "lithe" or Terez is a beauty. The female characters are presented as sexually pleasurable to a male gaze.

What does it matter if they are pretty? Or lithe? You've been asked this before. Why no outcry for Lolly's or whatever the hell her name is, the fat and homely daughter of whoever in GRRM's books that gets gangraped in an alley during a mob uprising in King's Landing? Why no outcry there? Because she's just a female? Because she's not pretty? This is as bad as people coming to the rescue of seals because they are cute, but no one gives a real shit about the depleted fish stocks. Another part that has been contentious, and i mentioned this to you before with your hot lesbian comments, is this focus on good looking. You should not have to bring up the fact that they are good looking, rape should be enough.

You seem to be missing the point here. This isn't about how one scene is better or worse. It is about a predictable trend.

Like the violence in movies and books increasing steadily? That sort of predictible but ho-hum trend? Again, it's the cognitive dissonance of bombing another nation and throwing it into civil war and not caring, but going fucking stupid nuts over a nipple on tv.

On a societal level, you have a male character with physical power over a woman indulging in his power over her body to condemn/sentence her to a fate specifically geared toward the character being female. If the text is trying to make this into a discussion about rape, or even about the character, it didn't do an overly good job of it IMHO.

And referencing Morgan's books, you have Ringil getting raped. Main, male, protagonist. As for making it a discussion about rape, again, why is that the only thing. Did you object to the scene were Ringil got raped in the first book, and actually came from it? Or, again, is it because it is a lithe/pretty/hot lesbian?

Listen, rape is a continued and serious problem. I imagine it always will be. But every book that has rape in it need not be a prolonged study of it, nor should it be. Authors should not feel that it has to be, or that they need to address it in further depth simply because some feel that they should. I mean, we really only see surface levels of suffering associated with being a soldier and seeing terrible things in most any of the books. Sure, they are angsty, or at best conflicted. But a good friend of mine suffered from severe PTSD, and that shit is nasty. But like i said earlier, i don't think it needs to be addressed in every story. Instead of railing about it in some book, i'd rather see people actually volunteer or join initiatives to broaden peoples knowledge of it. And there are books that address that problem specifically. So leave them to it if that is what they want.

Would you rather, in the end, not have the issue addressed at all then?