Very Bad Things
Dec. 6th, 2011 05:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mark_asphodelSo, a little less than a year ago, someone posted this to the kink meme:
"Any villain/any main lord. Kink is rape, and then the hero being found by his/her allies."
Rape goes in my "squick" basket, and even if it were a kink, if I wanted to read about Fire Emblem characters being raped, well... the SSB section of FFNet is easy to find. So I didn't give it another thought until![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
amielleon pointed out that the prompt doesn't specify that the villain has to be the rapist. The piece could just as easily end with the "allies" walking in just as the hero is lacing up his Tight White Britches of Lordhood.
Oh, I thought about that one for a long, long time. Again, out of sheer perversity; leave an opening like that, and someone's gonna come along and exploit it. I must say I've come up empty, though; for better or for worse, I can't quite get any of the FE protagonists in a mindset where they're going to rape somebody. With some of them, it just breaks my conception of the character too much-- Eliwood? Roy? Leaf? Cellica? And as for the ones who exhibit some, ah, worrisome traits in canon when it comes to stabbing/slicing/impaling people with weapons (not to go for the obvious here, but Hector at the beginning of his own route does come off as something of a kill-happy brute), well... they've got weapons, don't they? They have a canonical mechanism for dealing out "justice," one that can get vicious, get barbaric, get into the nasty zone, all without the need to unlace those white britches and get personal with the resident villain. They can sublimate any serious issues lurking beneath the surface into combat and look like, well, a hero. The closest thing I could imagine was a case of the sort of "justice" recently doled out to Col. Gadhafi, with the weapon itself being used for the violation. And I suspect that was even more distant from the intent of the prompt.
The dynamic was also an issue. Look, I've come out of fandoms where hero/villain and hero/anti-hero rape was just part of the territory, and said territory was usually overgrown with the kind of "slash vibes" that leads as often to silly mushy love stories as it does rapefic. Aside from some weird things I've read featuring Eliwood and the Reed brothers, I'm not seeing a lot of that here in FE-land (I'm sure there's Ike/Zelgius and vice versa, but I don't go looking for it), at least not in the games I favor. Not one-sided perving like Valter's act, but two-sided relationships fraught with something that could lead to sex, death, or both.Sort of what Minerva and Michalis have going on.
So, yes. Dead end there, unless some equally perverse mind has a window into the situation.
Speaking of perversion, I think I have three "Sleeping Beauty" scenarios down-- for FE2, one for FE12, one for FE8. I will try my hand at each.
"Any villain/any main lord. Kink is rape, and then the hero being found by his/her allies."
Rape goes in my "squick" basket, and even if it were a kink, if I wanted to read about Fire Emblem characters being raped, well... the SSB section of FFNet is easy to find. So I didn't give it another thought until
amielleon pointed out that the prompt doesn't specify that the villain has to be the rapist. The piece could just as easily end with the "allies" walking in just as the hero is lacing up his Tight White Britches of Lordhood.Oh, I thought about that one for a long, long time. Again, out of sheer perversity; leave an opening like that, and someone's gonna come along and exploit it. I must say I've come up empty, though; for better or for worse, I can't quite get any of the FE protagonists in a mindset where they're going to rape somebody. With some of them, it just breaks my conception of the character too much-- Eliwood? Roy? Leaf? Cellica? And as for the ones who exhibit some, ah, worrisome traits in canon when it comes to stabbing/slicing/impaling people with weapons (not to go for the obvious here, but Hector at the beginning of his own route does come off as something of a kill-happy brute), well... they've got weapons, don't they? They have a canonical mechanism for dealing out "justice," one that can get vicious, get barbaric, get into the nasty zone, all without the need to unlace those white britches and get personal with the resident villain. They can sublimate any serious issues lurking beneath the surface into combat and look like, well, a hero. The closest thing I could imagine was a case of the sort of "justice" recently doled out to Col. Gadhafi, with the weapon itself being used for the violation. And I suspect that was even more distant from the intent of the prompt.
The dynamic was also an issue. Look, I've come out of fandoms where hero/villain and hero/anti-hero rape was just part of the territory, and said territory was usually overgrown with the kind of "slash vibes" that leads as often to silly mushy love stories as it does rapefic. Aside from some weird things I've read featuring Eliwood and the Reed brothers, I'm not seeing a lot of that here in FE-land (I'm sure there's Ike/Zelgius and vice versa, but I don't go looking for it), at least not in the games I favor. Not one-sided perving like Valter's act, but two-sided relationships fraught with something that could lead to sex, death, or both.
So, yes. Dead end there, unless some equally perverse mind has a window into the situation.
Speaking of perversion, I think I have three "Sleeping Beauty" scenarios down-- for FE2, one for FE12, one for FE8. I will try my hand at each.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2011-12-06 10:35 pm (UTC)I actually wonder to sooooome extent about Ike. Not your classic graphic stranger rape type of rape fic, but an inadequate understanding of the other person's wishes and an overestimation of his own righteousness. Of course, coming up with a villain to put on the other end is harder, and let's not talk about the issue of sticking Ike with a strong sex drive.
I feel similarly about Hector. He may overestimate boundaries, but the fundamental situation is still difficult to contrive. Unless it comes with a long-winded backstory about his sexual repression and his secret fantasies with the Reed brothers that just happen to be doable at an opportune moment... which does kind of sound dubiously romantic, quite true. And carrying Hector out as appropriately desperate without breaking his character also seems pretty difficult.
Although, I can't help but notice that you dodge any discussion of Marth here....
*I think Shinon might have the potential to do so. Especially in combination with alcohol. I'm not sure he's that much of a "hero" character though.
Soren in a world without Ike supports might -- I think a motive is possible but I have a hard time pinning it down.
Naesala would for the sake of Kilvas, but it seems to me that transferring responsibility on some level back to the Begnion Senate is defeating the point.
no subject
Date: 2011-12-06 10:57 pm (UTC)But yeah, I can't really see it happening. Not for any of the main characters, anyway, despite FE8's unsettling propaganda angle. Not that they're all too Shiny and Perfect and Good to do anything like that -- just, as you said, that just doesn't seem like the method they'd use to channel unsavory urges, really.
no subject
Date: 2011-12-06 11:41 pm (UTC)Not to mention that even morally gray characters have their standards.
I'm all for less-than-perfect interpretations of protagonists, but personally this is one door I would like to leave shut and bolted, thanks.
no subject
Date: 2011-12-06 11:54 pm (UTC)I actually wonder to sooooome extent about Ike.
He's a little more likely than most of the rest (how's that for waffling?) but the sex drive thing is a stumbling block for me. Fandom!Ike could be pushed there, but fandom!Ike is wrong on many counts.
Ephraim at least has a sex drive, except apparently where Tana is concerned.
And carrying Hector out as appropriately desperate without breaking his character also seems pretty difficult.
Agreed.
Although, I can't help but notice that you dodge any discussion of Marth here....
You mean the main lord who is canonically hateful, practically nonchalant about killing at the outset, capable of objectifying entire countries into "people who just need to die," willing to some extent to play games with his enemy, and unable to fully understand or express his own emotional impulses? That one?
If we're talking just an act of horrific violence, I think the kid who mowed down four enemy soldiers at the age of fourteen without a trace of regret is uh, a really promising candidate. I still don't see him in a situation where he'd ever rape anyone. And he gets past many of the negative traits listed above by the end of FE11, including the objectification issue.
no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 12:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 12:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 12:32 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 12:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 12:53 am (UTC)This is, of course, assuming that rape is about the sex and someone's sexual drive, when in fact it's usually more often about having power over someone else.
IMO, if you wanted to play the rape card in a hero/villain sort of way, it would have to probably be more about power than sex. Obviously having power over someone in such a way gets these types of people going (or they wouldn't be able to have sex) but someone just raping someone is usually not because they're looking for sex.
That doesn't make the whole idea any easier, because TBH, even Hector (who can be something of a douche) doesn't really strike me as the type of person who gets off to having power over someone else. Not like that, anyway. And most others I just can't even picture it at all.
Shinon, yes-- but he's no hero.
no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 12:57 am (UTC)Understood, BUT the sex angle is hard to explain given that there's already more canon-compliant ways for them to show their power over the villain/victim. These people aren't door-to-door salesmen, after all; they're nobles and warriors with minions and armies and fabulous weapons. The writer would have to make the case that the will to dominate, if it exists, jumps past other forms of violence that we see them commit and leads to sexual violation, and I can't make that case. At all.
no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 01:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 01:46 am (UTC)Normally when we talk about rape as a crime, we view it as a willful transgression of someone else's will, but when we compare rape with other ways to transgress someone else's will, then sex jumps up and down and waves its hands around as the primary difference.
no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 01:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 01:58 am (UTC)Would be interested on hearing more about your FE12 Sleeping Beauty scenario though~
no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 02:12 am (UTC)Yeah. Not every dodgy individual is a would-be rapist. Not at all.
no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 02:15 am (UTC)Dear me.
despite FE8's unsettling propaganda angle
Yeah, there is that. And Ephraim is one of the handful that you can't rule out immediately, but the accusation is still so far of the mark that Amelia's misconceptions are funny.
no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 02:21 am (UTC)Oh. Well, the thing would be three different angles on the "sleeping beauty" concept, all with a female as the active party and the male as passive, all more sexual than fairy-tale like. Don't want to share the details, as I'd rather surprise people. Though the FE8 pairing is L'Arachel/Innes because three people expressed interest in that one.
no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 08:43 pm (UTC)I do think L'Arachel would be a good choice for your FE8 'Sleeping Beauty' scenario.
And rape is ... one of a few things I emphatically do not write.
no subject
Date: 2011-12-07 09:35 pm (UTC)I would only write it as the depraved crime that it is. And, as it happens, I can't seem to write it anyway.
L'Arachel/Sleeping Beauty Innes, yay.