MAN PAIN two point aha! a field guide
I’ve started to realize that when we say MAN PAIN, we don’t just mean MAN PAIN. Like “insomnia,” MAN PAIN is something different from “occasional sleepless night”/”fictional man suffering in one way or another.” Rather, it is an umbrella term for several distinct but possibly overlapping conditions.
(I’m only going to give specific examples with characters I like, or at least sympathize with, because it’s not that much fun for me to leap into the deep end of my own aggravation, but by all means let's indulge some bile in comments.)
There’s non-character-specific MAN PAIN. This is the type of pain that goes with WIR. In this case, it does not reflect a character strength or flaw on an in-universe level. The characterization of the pained man gets stepped on by the PTBs in their rush to manipulate the audience by stuffing a woman in the fridge. VERDICT: tough to pin on the dude, unless you already don’t like him, but a highly transparent weakness in the narrative.
There’s the undeserved MAN PAIN. This is when a narrative overrates the sympathy the audience will have for a particular character, and therefore overplay its hand regarding his MAN PAIN. Bitter Beta Male pain is a fairly straightforward(ly aggravating) subset of this.
This is midway between writing flaw and character issue. Insofar as those of us who are used to interpreting media through a social justice lens, this is a difficult one, because the writers’ miscalculation regarding who matters in what narrative is, of course, likely to be skewed toward the white, cis and mascuiline-presenting, appears as TAB, male character.
This can just be something that doesn’t work, of course, it doesn’t have to say anything much beyond that. But I think it’s a deceptively touchy one. Because I think when we* respond negatively to this particular ploy for sympathy, it’s still a response to systemic sexism, because it relies on this idea that to be Good Women, we will have that deep feminine well of compassion for all hardships which are faced by a Man. And we don’t want to buy into Universal Misery Chips idea, that X amount of male suffering entitles a character to Y amount of passes from the audience.
But it can get into thornier territory. How much sympathy we feel a character “deserves” is going to be influenced not just by gender identification, but also by gender performance, by race, by mental health status and neurotypicality, by class markers, and so forth. (This is my longish, complete-sentences version of my little tag-rant about Xander Harris the other day.) I don’t think that women have any obligation to prioritize forms of oppression which are not based on gender, therefore earning the right to object to inequality by being Nice Enough Girls, because that’s a right not a privilege, and in any event, newsflash: the game is rigged such that we can never actually be nice enough for that. But critiques of this kind of man pain seem really susceptible to Social Justice ™ Concern Troll pile-ons? “I am righteous in indulging some vaguely coded classism/masculinity policing/whatever because FEMINISM!”
*This isn’t a passive-aggressive “when I say ‘we’ I mean ‘you, maybe, sit there and soak in your uncertainty and my superiority.’” I really don’t know how much of this is at play with, say, my reaction to Matt Donovan. He’s terrible, and no amount of ~suffering on his part makes his emotionally abusive tendencies any more acceptable. But he’s also a kid whose survival is at risk on every level - he’s very aware that the roof over his head and the jugular in his neck can be ripped away at any moment - and his exploitation of his male privilege and social manipulation skills is a pretty clear attempt to shore up the only survival tools he has at his disposal. And…I don’t know where to go with that?
Then there’s the type of MAN PAIN which is what I think I am referring to when I say “MAN PAIN” and that is, very specifically, abuser crocodile tear pain. It is SO HARD on this poor man to be such an UNRELENTING DICK to the people around him. Oh, he could just FUCKING STOP, but then he wouldn’t have the joy of making them dance to his narcissistic little tune anymore. At its worst, it’s WHY DO YOU MAKE ME HIT YOU?! pain.
Obviously this is the type that reliably sends me into a frothing, steaming fit of rage, but YMMV.
I’m…trying to refrain from editorializing on this any more than I already have which is a lot. The distinguishing factor for me, though, is it is not a normal human response to grief-inducing plot machinations, like Type 1, or an expression of disempowerment, like Type 2. It’s a tool by which the character not only expresses but strengthens his position relative to those over whom he exercises power. Type 3 pain often functions as a dominance show for the audience and a vague threat in-universe, a reminder that the character can cause pain to others.
There’s very little that I think is categorically bad storytelling. When done well, Type 3 pain can create a compelling antagonist, and can go a long way toward creating a truly morally ambiguous character. But it’s a really fine line, which can very easily tip into abuse apologia or even glorification.
At the opposite end of the spectrum from Type 1, there’s MAN PAIN as just a plain character flaw. This bothers me not a whit, though it’s one to which people (understandably) have strong, often negative, reactions. As I had occasion to say elsewhere on a locked post today, I adore Tennant’s Doctor because he was so clearly struggling to keep his head above water sometimes, and because I never felt like the narrative was dismissive of what that did to the people around him.
Obviously not hard-and-fast, mutually exclusive, comprehensive, or independent of very subjective interpretations of the overall narrative in question. Whether Klaus is a Type 3 or Type 4 depends on how much you think TVD wants us to root for its characters. (He is my precious baby angel, naturally, but I know I have a lot of f-listers who really disagree.) And so on.
Then again, sometimes motherfuckers are just crybabies.
This entry was originally posted at http://pocochina.dreamwidth.org/284279.html. Leave a comment here, or there using OpenID.
(I’m only going to give specific examples with characters I like, or at least sympathize with, because it’s not that much fun for me to leap into the deep end of my own aggravation, but by all means let's indulge some bile in comments.)
There’s non-character-specific MAN PAIN. This is the type of pain that goes with WIR. In this case, it does not reflect a character strength or flaw on an in-universe level. The characterization of the pained man gets stepped on by the PTBs in their rush to manipulate the audience by stuffing a woman in the fridge. VERDICT: tough to pin on the dude, unless you already don’t like him, but a highly transparent weakness in the narrative.
There’s the undeserved MAN PAIN. This is when a narrative overrates the sympathy the audience will have for a particular character, and therefore overplay its hand regarding his MAN PAIN. Bitter Beta Male pain is a fairly straightforward(ly aggravating) subset of this.
This is midway between writing flaw and character issue. Insofar as those of us who are used to interpreting media through a social justice lens, this is a difficult one, because the writers’ miscalculation regarding who matters in what narrative is, of course, likely to be skewed toward the white, cis and mascuiline-presenting, appears as TAB, male character.
This can just be something that doesn’t work, of course, it doesn’t have to say anything much beyond that. But I think it’s a deceptively touchy one. Because I think when we* respond negatively to this particular ploy for sympathy, it’s still a response to systemic sexism, because it relies on this idea that to be Good Women, we will have that deep feminine well of compassion for all hardships which are faced by a Man. And we don’t want to buy into Universal Misery Chips idea, that X amount of male suffering entitles a character to Y amount of passes from the audience.
But it can get into thornier territory. How much sympathy we feel a character “deserves” is going to be influenced not just by gender identification, but also by gender performance, by race, by mental health status and neurotypicality, by class markers, and so forth. (This is my longish, complete-sentences version of my little tag-rant about Xander Harris the other day.) I don’t think that women have any obligation to prioritize forms of oppression which are not based on gender, therefore earning the right to object to inequality by being Nice Enough Girls, because that’s a right not a privilege, and in any event, newsflash: the game is rigged such that we can never actually be nice enough for that. But critiques of this kind of man pain seem really susceptible to Social Justice ™ Concern Troll pile-ons? “I am righteous in indulging some vaguely coded classism/masculinity policing/whatever because FEMINISM!”
*This isn’t a passive-aggressive “when I say ‘we’ I mean ‘you, maybe, sit there and soak in your uncertainty and my superiority.’” I really don’t know how much of this is at play with, say, my reaction to Matt Donovan. He’s terrible, and no amount of ~suffering on his part makes his emotionally abusive tendencies any more acceptable. But he’s also a kid whose survival is at risk on every level - he’s very aware that the roof over his head and the jugular in his neck can be ripped away at any moment - and his exploitation of his male privilege and social manipulation skills is a pretty clear attempt to shore up the only survival tools he has at his disposal. And…I don’t know where to go with that?
Then there’s the type of MAN PAIN which is what I think I am referring to when I say “MAN PAIN” and that is, very specifically, abuser crocodile tear pain. It is SO HARD on this poor man to be such an UNRELENTING DICK to the people around him. Oh, he could just FUCKING STOP, but then he wouldn’t have the joy of making them dance to his narcissistic little tune anymore. At its worst, it’s WHY DO YOU MAKE ME HIT YOU?! pain.
Obviously this is the type that reliably sends me into a frothing, steaming fit of rage, but YMMV.
I’m…trying to refrain from editorializing on this any more than I already have which is a lot. The distinguishing factor for me, though, is it is not a normal human response to grief-inducing plot machinations, like Type 1, or an expression of disempowerment, like Type 2. It’s a tool by which the character not only expresses but strengthens his position relative to those over whom he exercises power. Type 3 pain often functions as a dominance show for the audience and a vague threat in-universe, a reminder that the character can cause pain to others.
There’s very little that I think is categorically bad storytelling. When done well, Type 3 pain can create a compelling antagonist, and can go a long way toward creating a truly morally ambiguous character. But it’s a really fine line, which can very easily tip into abuse apologia or even glorification.
At the opposite end of the spectrum from Type 1, there’s MAN PAIN as just a plain character flaw. This bothers me not a whit, though it’s one to which people (understandably) have strong, often negative, reactions. As I had occasion to say elsewhere on a locked post today, I adore Tennant’s Doctor because he was so clearly struggling to keep his head above water sometimes, and because I never felt like the narrative was dismissive of what that did to the people around him.
Obviously not hard-and-fast, mutually exclusive, comprehensive, or independent of very subjective interpretations of the overall narrative in question. Whether Klaus is a Type 3 or Type 4 depends on how much you think TVD wants us to root for its characters. (He is my precious baby angel, naturally, but I know I have a lot of f-listers who really disagree.) And so on.
Then again, sometimes motherfuckers are just crybabies.
This entry was originally posted at http://pocochina.dreamwidth.org/284279.html. Leave a comment here, or there using OpenID.