About Padmé's Death
In response to this post by Tricia and Lex at FANgirl Blog:
What's wrong with Padmé Amidala losing the will to live at the end of Revenge of the SithWhat happened to her on that day would have sent many a normal person into an extreme clinical depression, the kind where you - yes - lose the will to live. And it's consistent with her ( Read more... )
What's wrong with Padmé Amidala losing the will to live at the end of Revenge of the SithWhat happened to her on that day would have sent many a normal person into an extreme clinical depression, the kind where you - yes - lose the will to live. And it's consistent with her ( Read more... )
Says who?
To me the point of telling them is that thinking them up and telling them is fun in itself. Same about reading them. When I want to learn, I'll take a class or open a textbook. When I open a novel or watch a movie, I want to have fun. Learning something in the process is nice, but not necessary.
That's their function.
The function of stories is entertainment.
No, I get it: there are different ways of seeing everything. There's nothing wrong with that. Problems happen when we refuse to accept that our view of reality isn't the only one, or as one of my teachers likes to say, "when we mistake our reality for everyone's reality, if there even is such a thing".
His Dark Materials had a greater effect on the way I think and the kind of person I am than anything I ever learned at school, or uni, or work
Yes. It's true for you. Personal experience is not a valid basis for generalisations about what people in general do, and even less about what is "supposed" to be.
No work of fiction has had any significant influence on the way I think or the kind of person I am. This doesn't prove anything about anyone except me. My experience is true for me and yours is true for you, even though they are contrary.
Stories are supposed to affect you, to change you
Says who, again? As if I would let them do that, when I know better than many how unreliable and just bad the things people write can be.
look at the way anti-semitic films in the thirties could bolster all of Nazi Germany's beliefs, look at the way films like Casablanca can put heart and determination into thousands of people
These are theories. The influence of these things is unproven and unprovable. Nazi Germany very probably wouldn't have happened without Hitler, anti-semitic films or not. And the social psychology of obedience to authority and conformity had much more to do with it than propaganda through fiction, which, by the way, isn't really comparable to regular fiction which doesn't have an intention to manipulate its audience's beliefs.
to my mind, the notion that stories influence you leads to the logical conclusion that you should read or watch or listen to as many of them as possible
You want to be influenced and changed by outside things, thing you don't control? That, to my mind, is hard to understand.
Reply
Says who?
I operate with the assumption that people can be trusted to know better than to take fiction as gospel. We should never forget that people possess judgment and free will and aren't passive receptacles of culture.
Personal experience is not a valid basis for generalisations about what people in general do, and even less about what is "supposed" to be.
So you operate on an assumption that people can be trusted in a certain way as pertains to stories - which is based on your personal experience of them - but your personal experience of the way you enjoy/read stories is not a valid basis about what stories are "supposed" to be.
Yes, of course I want to be influenced and changed by outside things. To me, the idea of remaining exactly the way I am right now, to staying the way I am right now for the rest of my life - thirty forty fifty sixty years - is Hell itself.
If I can't change, what's the point? That's a thought that scares me, being static. Imagine: irnan, trainee lawyer, can't hold her liquor, likes wearing suits, thinks a, b and c. Always has done. Always will. To her very dying day.
*shudders*
So for me that leads to asking: how does anybody change if they don't allow themselves to be influenced by outside things? Isolation scares me, and that's what's implied - to me - by refusing to be inlfuenced by outside things. The trick lies in deciding which influences you want to accept and which you don't. (In that sense, I absolutely control them.)
Perhaps it's the implied (moral) absolutism that I don't like about the notion. To never want to change, to never allow myself to be influenced by outside things I don't control, is to me an implicit statement that I know better than they do. Well, frankly, I know Sweet Felicity Arkwright. If you can change my mind - either through a story or a reasoned discussion - that's a thing to respect, for me. (But you're not going to change my mind about stories - ever. ;) That's a thing I chose to hold on to.)
These are theories. The influence of these things is unproven and unprovable.
Which is... true of pretty much everything either of us have said so far.
propaganda through fiction, which, by the way, isn't really comparable to regular fiction which doesn't have an intention to manipulate its audience's beliefs.
OK, so Harry Potter and Star Wars are not about persuading the viewer or the reader that Love Conquers All, at least for a little while? I think a good story has to manipulate you in order for you to be entertained by it - you have to accept its truths and its philosophies above your own until it's over. Whether you carry them past the last page of the book or out of the cinema with you... well, that's when it gets complicated.
Reply
The trick lies in deciding which influences you want to accept and which you don't.
That's safer, but still...
There are other ways to change: acting/experience/doing things, introspection, learning.
an implicit statement that I know better than they do
You know better than they do who you are, who you want to be, and what's good for you. That's all it's safe to assume you know better than they do.
(But you're not going to change my mind about stories - ever. ;) That's a thing I chose to hold on to.)
Likewise. It doesn't help that my opinion on stories developed from my way of living the role of (fanfiction) writer for many years.
so Harry Potter and Star Wars are not about persuading the viewer or the reader that Love Conquers All, at least for a little while?
Only their creators know what they are really about. But what they are about to me? No, not that. They never persuaded me of that, not even for a little while, yet I enjoy them immensely.
you have to accept its truths and its philosophies above your own until it's over
Or simply find its truths and philosophies interesting, more so because they are different from yours.
that's when it gets complicated.
It's complicated long before that!
Reply
But of course - yet all of these things, I would say, involve outside influences. There are so many of my experiences I haven't had control over - I've given basic consent and then it all blew up in my face and I came out the other side the person I am today. Uni, for example. I sign up for a moot court and a year later I've been dragged halfway around the world and worked myself half to death and been made to have experiences that I never would have thought to without the influence/presence of these certain people in this certain time, and not a whit of it did I control. It's the same with stories, for me.
(Although I will say that it took a correspondingly long time, afterwards, to sort out of myself what I was prepared to take with me and what I wasn't.)
You know better than they do who you are, who you want to be, and what's good for you. That's all it's safe to assume you know better than they do.
How? That bothers me, and I don't know if I'm putting this the right way, but: how do I know that I am who I want to be if I don't allow myself to be presented with other options? I'm sure that's an awfully uncertain way to think of oneself. But it's kind of exciting, too ;)
Yeah, I'm very much coming at this with the perspective of a reader. My early attempt being a writer was awful, and thus soon abandoned ;)
Or simply find its truths and philosophies interesting, more so because they are different from yours.
But even then I find I accept them as true for a while, in order to study them or argue with them - does that make sense? That the act of being interested involves acceptance: as logical, or as true, or whatever. After that I take them apart ;)
Reply
how do I know that I am who I want to be if I don't allow myself to be presented with other options?
You don't. But how would anyone else know it? Your knowledge of yourself is far from perfect or complete, but it's more complete than other people's knowledge of you... unless you really lack self-awareness. ;)
That the act of being interested involves acceptance: as logical, or as true, or whatever.
Something can be logical without being true or right.
Reply
Your knowledge of yourself is far from perfect or complete, but it's more complete than other people's knowledge of you... unless you really lack self-awareness.
I guess that's a pretty fair assessment.
Something can be logical without being true or right.
"Logic is a wonderful thing, but it doesn't always beat actual thought". That's Pratchett... But I think for me, to find something interesting is to... to treat it as something that may be true. That may apply to me. At least for as long as it takes to formulate a counter-argument! You give it a chance, and then you counter-argue, and then see which wins out.
Reply
Leave a comment