On Problematic Tropes
Oct. 22nd, 2015 10:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rowynI have a couple of conflicting principles that I don't know how to reconcile:
* Fiction at its best illuminates reality. This includes all genres, even the obviously fantastic and implausible. Fiction has the ability to make us understand one another better, to let us see through another's eyes. This is amazing and powerful and should be used wisely.
* Daydreams and fantasies are harmless fun. Fantasizing about things that are unrealistic, as long as you know that they're unrealistic and have no interest in making them reality, is fine.
There's no conflict between the two when one's fantasy is something socially-acceptable if impossible, like "having a telepathic bond with a friendly dragon". Things where, if you could make them real, it wouldn't be particularly detrimental for the world at large.
But lots of fantasies are not socially-acceptable, nor a desirable/plausible reality. Twilight, for example, gets a lot of flak for its romance between a century-old vampire stalker and his 17 year-old love interest*. There's a novel I won't name about a romance between a Nazi concentration camp commander and a Jewish prisoner that ends with him rescuing the internees and her converting to Christianity. Master/slave romances are commonplace.
I've named all romance tropes here because those are the ones I hear discussed. Maybe in horror circles they discuss whether their monsters are too monstrous or the events depicted too awful, and I just don't hear it. I hear occasional decrying of the Chosen One trope of fantasy, or more rarely, on the idealization of feudal societies and tyranny.
In general, I am talking about tropes that entertain but appear to do the opposite of illuminate: dehumanise, debase, disinform. Tropes that turn things that are devastating and awful in reality into light entertainment, or portray those things as acceptable and even enjoyable in the context of the story.
I believe in free speech, so obviously I think people should be allowed to read and write what they please regardless of whether or not I think it has merit. That part is easy.
But when I run into a trope that deeply offends me, I feel this conflict over whether or not condemnation is appropriate. How dangerous are fantasies? Does it make a difference if you draw on real history or use a fantasy world for the setting? (Eg, would the Nazi/Jew romance be less offensive if the same tropes were used in fictional countries with fictional religions?) How much does tone matter? I can't help thinking that tone has an impact, that some things are written as escapism and the author and readers are aware that it's Not Realistic, and that's different from a book written seriously. From one where the author's style suggests "this book is illuminating, resonant, true" and I am all D:
But I don't know. Maybe what I want is a bright line between someone's goofy dubcon fanfic and a mainstream novel glorifying rape, and maybe there can't be one. Maybe judging works case-by-case, and recognizing that what I think is offensive and repugnant may be someone else's harmless fantasy (and vice-versa) is inevitable.
I remain curious about how other people feel on the topic: Of the principles I opened with, do you find one one or the other unconvincing? If both are relevant, how do you handle the conflict?
* On this subject: I half-joked last month that 'I'm not saying it's not possible to write a good romance between a first-person young woman narrator and an ancient superpowerful male jerk. Wait, maybe I am'. But I remembered later that there's a book I liked which used this trope! N.K. Jemisin's The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. So yeah, apparently I judge based on execution as well, even when I feel strongly about the trope.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2015-10-22 04:23 pm (UTC)It might make sense to worry about romance, since romance is a kind of wish-fulfilment story.
Horror is not wish fulfilment. It's closer to humor, where the gap between what you expect (or what you'd expect) and what happens is the appealing part. You want strange for its own sake, and violating social mores (like, 'don't murder people') is one form of strangeness that you can use.
Porn is... sort of its own thing. In a way it's wish fulfilment, but part of the wish is 'I wish things were really this simple and free of consequences' and you know they're not. If you try to take porn seriously... you're going to have a bad time. And end up getting really angry at people who don't deserve it. This actually also applies to 'violence porn' or 'military porn' or whatever -- they're surprisingly well named.
*ponders 'scenery porn'* I'm not sure that one is well named.
And action movies. Action movies are essentially porn.
Of course there are stories that try to be realistic and portray characters that the reader is meant to identify with in situations that are supposed to be portrayed in a reasonable light. I guess. Some people like that sort of thing.
no subject
Date: 2015-10-22 04:32 pm (UTC)More to the point, everything you said about porn not being a thing you expect or want to have happen in your real life applies equally well to romance. Romance readers aren't inherently more likely to internalize absurd tropes than porn consumers.
no subject
Date: 2015-10-22 06:32 pm (UTC)A lot of my fantasies about being in fantasy worlds did not include being in the actual story being told. "I want to live in a world with magic" doesn't mean "...while it's being invaded by ogres and everyone is dying." Maybe that's just me though?
no subject
Date: 2015-10-23 12:44 am (UTC)I might have wistful, half-thought fantasies about piloting an AT-ST and nimbly stepping my way through a traffic jam. I might waste a thought-exercise on, "If there were a zombie apocalypse, where would we go, and what would we take with us?" I might follow any number of stories and wish somehow I could magically explore "what-ifs" -- what if this character had done this instead of that? Would it make the story better? More interesting? Or at least satisfy my inclination to meddle with things vs. just being a spectator?
But actually being there in battle -- me, my real self? Even if I magically received a perfect physique, a cool starship, training in new requisite skills, a magical battle-pet, or whatever else is the "price of entry" to play in this world, actually BEING there and not knowing what the future has in store (as soon as I change something, the "future" I thought I knew from reading to the end of the book no longer exists) ... that's going to be terrifying, I'm sure.
Often, my "fantasies" regarding reading stories reflect my desire to meddle, rather than replacing any particular character and stealing the spotlight. What if a character did X instead of Y? How might that impact things? I sometimes find myself wondering ... what if I could somehow be inserted into one particular place in the story, knowing what I know (once I've read to the end), and I could -- without any special powers, per se -- say the right thing to the right person? Could it change the course of events? Might a sidekick character be spared a melodramatic and violent death? Might a needless conflict be avoided? Written as a book, the outcome might make for a boring read (if only our protagonists TURNED AROUND in the first 5 minutes of this movie, we wouldn't have a story!), but it might make for a better outcome if you actually had to live there.
But if I were really, actually, honest-to-goodness offered such a chance, to step into a fantasy world of danger?
...
Actually, as stupid as it would be of me, I'd probably take it, if Gwendel gets to go along for the ride. I would dread it, be certain I'm probably going to die, but I would feel OBLIGED to take such an opportunity. Like, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. If you refuse it, you're going to live to regret and wonder what could have been, even if realistically it probably would have turned out poorly. :P
My answer would likely be different if I had kids. I would of course regret and wonder, but there's no way I'd be like the protagonist of Close Encounters of the Third Kind and go, hey, forget the wife and kids -- I'm gonna go into SPACE with freaky aliens and not be seen for 40 years! Whee! (And bringing the kids along to get eaten by ogres would hardly be better.)
no subject
Date: 2015-10-25 03:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2015-10-25 03:03 pm (UTC)1) Wanting to go to the cool fantasy world and play with magic and meet fantastic creatures, etc.
2) Wanting to go into the book and Make Everything Better.
In my daydreams of the latter, I often endow myself with sufficient power to just FIX whatever the problem is, so that it'd make a boring book. But sometimes it's more on the lines of "what if I didn't have any special powers beyond foreknowledge of events? How much good could I do?"
I'm not sure what kind is the most frequent, as far as "time spent daydreaming" goes. I think the "go to the cool world and live a peaceful happy life" is certainly the only one I would want to COME TRUE, but I probably spend more time on variants of "fixing the problem". Because there's more stuff to think about when there're problems to grapple with. :D
no subject
Date: 2015-10-26 01:30 am (UTC)I mean, if I learned that any time I wrote a story (?!?) the characters within it became REAL on some level, and suffered through all the travails I invented for them ... well ... AIEEEE! I wouldn't very well go on writing stories that feature people in horrible, horrible situations. (Well, honestly, I think my brain might implode at the implications. I'm not sure how I could RATIONALLY approach something like that. Or believe it.) But my point is just that I think it's natural to have a very different idea of "what is a story I am interested in" and "what is an idealized setting I would like to LIVE in."
no subject
Date: 2015-10-26 01:44 am (UTC)