[ SECRET POST #5838 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5838 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 36 secrets from Secret Submission Post #836.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[meadowphoenix]

eh, i always find this type of "i feel but it's not real" articulations about fictional characters very interesting. it's one thing to like a villainous character, and people do get very hissy about that alone. they do, and there's zero critical thought behind some of it.

but it's also very odd to pretend that you can derive no useful information from group behavior or that there is no effect on groups based on common symbols but this is barbie discourse all over again lmao.

like will you shoot up a school? unlikely. will the threshold for angry people to cause chaos be lowered by persistent empathizing in social circlies with alienation as a reason for violence even if that empathizing is for fictional characters? yeah lol that's the theory on which stochastic violence works lmao. reality isn't the issue, symbols are (take religion, something that shares a lot with fiction, alone). I mean are there a shitton of other factors involved for those people who actually cause stochastic violence? also yes. does this all have to be balanced on intensity of potential harm AND potential influence? yes again! does this mean you can dismiss criticism on class dynamics because you individually don't fit? no.

like this is all very complicated, and nuance is less a thing than ever, but also...class dynamics are not individual dynamics and confusing the two isn't useful for the people criticizing nor the people feeling targeted by the criticism. lotta people need to get a grip.

[feotakahari]

It seems like those people who shoot up schools because they think everyone else is their oppressor would be less likely to do so if they encountered more people like them who they didn’t want to shoot.

[meadowphoenix]

not historically it doesn't. radicalization of any sort just furthers in-group/out-group thinking even when the in-group is large (or seems large).

[feotakahari]

This made me realize that when I think of what “radicalization” means, I think of lack of sympathy. That is to say, if you’re being told not to have sympathy for someone, I interpret that as being “radicalized” against that person.

[(Anonymous)]

That’s not really what radicalization is though. At least, not exactly. It’s not untrue being told someone or some group is not deserving of sympathy is part of the radicalization process. But that’s not all it is. And people not having sympathy for school shooters isn’t really the same as a group like Nazis not having sympathy for any group they deem inferior. Or a school shooter themselves having no sympathy for the people they intend to kill, or have killed. Intent to do harm is a part of it also. Because although people may be “told” to not sympathize with school shooter types by society, that lack of sympathy may happen without being told. And isn’t likely to lead to violence against the school shooter type. Although it’s not impossible for violence to happen against them regardless of if they have or would actually gone through with anything. But it’s not something encouraged most of the time. But a group that a school shooter might find themselves joining or aligning with, they usually have a specific group that they want to deny any sympathy towards. Sometimes for prejudiced reasons. And violence against those people is much more likely and encouraged. I consider that radicalization but not the people who don’t have sympathy for the school shooter type. I say type because the story would seem a bit more black and white if I was talking about actual confirmed shooters. It may not actually be black and white behind the scenes though. At least as far as motives go. Sometimes it isn’t because of radicalization just bullying or abuse of some kind. That’s not a justification, just a different story than someone radicalized into wanting to commit a school shooting. And not everyone profiled as a school shooter type would ever actually go through with a shooting. Some may not even want to and are just being stereotyped. It’s all pretty complicated. I used school shooter types specifically because those were what was being discussed by others more or less. Not just something as vague as being told not to have sympathy for someone. I just really don’t think it’s automatically being radicalized against someone just because you’re told not to have sympathy for them. That discounts situations where someone is a convicted murderer. Sure they may have had something in their past worth feeling sympathy for at some point. But it can be considered insulting to their victims to focus on sympathizing with them. You can still do it. It doesn’t automatically make someone a bad person to do so. But it accomplishes nothing. And you’re not being radicalized if you don’t feel sympathy for them.

Apologies for my grammar. I’m ESL.

[meadowphoenix]

Radicalization is merely drawing people, for good or ill, with tactics reasonable or manipulative, into adherence to a shared set of beliefs.

You can radicalize people against the prison industrial complex, for instance, which doesn't require a lack of sympathy, and may require more empathy than is usually called upon.

But the type of radicalization that incites stochastic violence usually does involve dehumanization.

Not for nothing however, we intuitively remove social support from people who are more willing to harm our community. That's not radicalization, that's just a protection mechanism on behalf of potential victims.

[(Anonymous)]

You’d think that, wouldn’t you? Realistically though, it has always gone from “Me against the world” to “Us against the world” to “Us against the intruder(s) who threaten our way of life.”

[(Anonymous)]

My experience as a villain fan who really enjoys "seduced to the dark side" kind of narratives, is that I believe that virtually everyone has a threshold where they might snap and do very bad things. Everyone who's lived long enough (past early childhood) has caused harm to other people, whether they meant to or not. I know I have. I think anyone who insists they never have, that they are always the innocent, is someone to be very wary of, because they're not self-aware enough to understand or care that at some point, they were a villain in someone else's story.

So I like to look at a charismatic villain, because there's usually something I relate to there. And it reminds me to keep myself in check in real life, while enjoying that power fantasy in fiction. Because I know perfectly well I have that inner Moriarty and that inner Hannibal and inner whoever. I'm honest about that with myself.

I'm skeptical of people who always and only identify with heroes and victims and judge people who relate to villains. I feel like they're refusing to acknowledge their own dark side, and if they did something that hurt someone badly, would probably play the innocent victim because they are deeply invested in thinking of themselves as a good person.

[meadowphoenix]

"everyone has a threshold for some type of wrong" and "everyone has the capacity to become a killer cannibal" are two very different things lmao. I don't know exactly how you are relating them, so I just wanted register my disagreement about what I see is the framing here. I'd be more inclined to agree with "everyone has the capacity for some degree of manipulation" but I don't think that's the same as having an inner Moriarty and I don't think that's the same as having a capacity for severe manipulation. People have to a certain extent already become a product of their circumstances which might forestall other actions imo.

Anyway, you can have whatever reason, however irrational or personal or theoretical or experiential, you want for liking villains narratives. You can tell yourself its about moral relativism or personal accountability. Those reasons can have any degree of veracity. That's irrelevant to how a class of people, who will all have individual and personal reasons, behaves.

It feels like you're doing the thing OP hates just about hero lovers, but I have no problems thinking there are class dynamics evident in people who only like heroes and think liking villains is icky or whatever. I don't think they're what you think they are (I would guess something more like a uncritical moral perspective, which does not rely on self-regard), but i think it's not unreasonable to make conclusions about a group.

[(Anonymous)]

AYRT

Surely you understand that fiction is exaggerated to levels most of us will never experience in reality, right? Of course I'll never be a killer cannibal IRL, but I relate to Hannibal because his erotic artistry with human meat is aesthetically pleasing to me, and I like to imagine what it would taste like. I'm sure it's amazing.

I don't understand how any of this refutes my original point. Heroism and villainy in the real world aren't about intentions, they're about how much harm you do to others. As a working-class person and a queer person, I know that people who look like me and talk like me and come from a class background like mine are often coded villains in old films that are very much based in elevation of white middle-class-upper-class stereotypes.

But nowadays? In terminally-online fandom, people who look down on villain fans view themselves as morally superior to villain fans. That is a bold claim, and I've seen no evidence whatsoever that it's true, and a lot of bad behavior to the contrary.

I still stand by this though: if you can't appreciate a redemption arc or a forgiveness story, then you are probably blind to things you've done that you should beg forgiveness for.

[meadowphoenix]

right, i considered both that you were using unnecessary hyperbole (in that I think it did not aid in the conversation in a clarifying way) and that you weren't and addressed both. The idea that everyone is capable of the every evil as a reason for relating to villains is your justifying perspective not some deep truth. It's also irrelevant to how people should judge a group of people who relate to a group of villains. Your point, from what I can gather, doesn't really respond to mine in other words.

For the record, I don't necessarily think heroism and villainy are in fact terms with certain social definitions and certainly not necessarily useful ones. Even the idea that harm is the measure isn't universal or standardized. In media criticism, the hero is the one who works with the narrative ethos, and the villain is the one who works against it. Again, I can't really understand what this has to do with my original comment, but if you could explain, I would appreciate it.

Yes, I understand that you feel that way. I think that's a blindness to the vagaries of human motivation on your part lol. Human psychology isn't that straightforward.

[(Anonymous)]

I like villains because of thr power fantasy in the ABILITY to "snap" and do what I like regardless of consequence without having to actually deal with the consequence. Nice and healthy fictional stress relief and catharsis, lol.

For me, it doesn't mean I actually think I COULD be that "evil", because a lot of fictional villains are so over the top, but it's still a fun fantasy to be free of the "rules", you know?

...that being said, I still find this particular flavor of villain, the whiny white guy, to be so incredibly boring because of all the white guys I've met who absolutely think they're that smart or that alluring or that powerful. They're a dime a dozen.

[(Anonymous)]

+ infinity to your last point.

They aren’t creative or compelling at this point. And they aren’t making any kind of statement that isn’t better made by watching real life overprivileged whiny white boys messily self destruct on social media.