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Post by Pacmanite on Jun 14, 2011 1:39:10 GMT -5
Oh man, I just wrote an essay about this. For Classical Mythology. Rape scenes were a big part of their stories back then too, although the treatment wasn't always drawn out and lengthy... it's clear from the ancient sources, though, that at least some of the women in the audience of Roman pantomimes found the scenes titillating. As much as I gag about thinking of rape scenes as entertainment for either sex.
I won't write too much. But I remain skeptical that explicit rape scenes can be handled appropriately... as much as I'd like to kid myself that onscreen rape can serve a supposed higher art, there still remains the sheer spectacle of it. The feast of the eyes. If rape is needed at all, it's far, far more tasteful to keep it off-screen.
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Post by Huntress on Jun 14, 2011 8:26:53 GMT -5
Y'know, this whole throne-of-skulls debate reminded me of one of the most trigger-y photos I've come across in my lifetime: the famous shot of Buffalo Bill atop the skulls of all the buffaloes he mowed down. I sortof stopped finding anything cartoony in skullthrones after that >>
My point being that this is a sort of "my horror is more horrible than your horror" debate, which is always a slippery slope. It's kinda hard to quantify those things. There isn't a clear scale that says that this is a Very Bad Thing and that is an Even Worse Thing and then there's the Worst Thing To Rule Them All. It varies according to the personal experience of the viewers. But I'm basically with Komori in that I don't like scenes of prolongued torture, physical or psychological, in general. Murder can be quick and easy. Drawn-out torture scenes, which I daresay onscreen rape falls under, cannot. The only actual purpose I can imagine this serving is raising awareness (either about situations in POW camps or about rape, I'm talking in general terms now) because face it, mankind is very good at glossing over things we don't see. We've had wars for millennia but the first big anti-war movement (hippies, mon) kicked off when? With Vietnam. The first war that got TV coverage and people actually saw what went down there.
(But for something like this to actually come across as raising awareness, it'd have to be executed ver-ry skillfully, yes, and far too much of this just falls into Truffaut Was Right territory. So Yeah.)
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Post by Pacmanite on Jun 17, 2011 9:02:11 GMT -5
Ugh, I just read a Simpsons short comic book (there was one lying around in my newsagency and I wondered if it'd be as good as the animated series), and the sheer idiocy of how it used rape as the punchline of a passing joke really got to me.
Edna: Class, the kid whose assignment is the best will win this coupon for a year's supply of squishies at the Kwik-e-mart.
Bart: Egads! That's a huge coupon! I thought it was only legendary! (Ok, I'm bad at paraphrasing the sound of Bart's voice.)
Milhouse: How did she ever come into possession of such a token?
Edna: Heh heh. (to herself) No one will ever know that dirty little secret. eheheheh.
Cut to a panel where she is literally thrusting herself bodily on top of an unwilling Apu in the Kwik-e-mart. (I mean, both are clothed, but the implication is there.) He protests weakly, saying that he is in an uncomfortable position, but she ignores this.
Next page: the story resumes, and the Apu incident is never mentioned again.
*headdesk* I don't even know what to make of it. Did Edna just rape Apu, and he gave her the coupon to... to make her relent? Or was that somehow not rape, because obviously Apu must have secretly wanted it because a man would never not want sex, even if it were thrust upon him and he was married and he protested. Meaning that he just gave Edna the coupon in gratitude. And this is... funny? And it's an even greater headdesk because the incident had absolutely no relevance to the rest of the story. It was simply thrown in for a laugh. (Yeah, the Simpson comics are certainly not as good as the Simpsons animated series. More's the pity.) |
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Post by Komori on Jun 17, 2011 15:23:51 GMT -5
Well, I don't think they meant to imply that that scene went so far as rape. Edna's supposedly portrayed (at least in the most recent Simpsons) as an aggressively sexual character. But at the same time, she's also fairly old and homely. I would imagine (though I haven't seen the actual comic, of course) that the joke was that she was repulsive enough to scare Apu into giving her the ticket. Not that she jumped him behind the counter, had her way with him, and he gratefully gave her the coupon. Drawing a rape conclustion sounds like a bit of a stretch.
(As a total aside, I definitely don't ship Edna and Ned. >_<)
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Post by Fang of the Dead on Jun 17, 2011 17:33:48 GMT -5
Speaking of Rape as Comedy: Duke Nukem Forever.
The women writhe and moan in a fairly humiliating fashion, and they regularly sob with no small amount of implied misery. In essence, the women look like they're getting raped. In fact, they are. That's the big joke of the level. The aliens are raping the women to create babies.
Seriously, just reading that makes me seethe with abject rage. It is, quite possibly, the worst thing we have made as a species. |
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Post by Deleted on Jun 17, 2011 20:46:36 GMT -5
Speaking of Rape as Comedy: Duke Nukem Forever.
The women writhe and moan in a fairly humiliating fashion, and they regularly sob with no small amount of implied misery. In essence, the women look like they're getting raped. In fact, they are. That's the big joke of the level. The aliens are raping the women to create babies.
Seriously, just reading that makes me seethe with abject rage. It is, quite possibly, the worst thing we have made as a species. Thank you. Now I know what not to read. Ever. I also don't like how in the Roman founding story they had to throw in that thing about the Sabine women. It was pretty good until then...*facepalm* |
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Post by Komori on Jun 17, 2011 20:57:01 GMT -5
Sae: Duke Nukem Forever is a game, not a story. ^^; So now you know what not to play ever. But yes, DNF is making news for being horribly racist and sexist and unfunny. And I heard the main character winds up handling human feces in the very first level.  |
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Post by Correction on Jun 17, 2011 21:03:26 GMT -5
Speaking of Rape as Comedy: Duke Nukem Forever.
The women writhe and moan in a fairly humiliating fashion, and they regularly sob with no small amount of implied misery. In essence, the women look like they're getting raped. In fact, they are. That's the big joke of the level. The aliens are raping the women to create babies.
Seriously, just reading that makes me seethe with abject rage. It is, quite possibly, the worst thing we have made as a species. Thank you. Now I know what not to read. Ever. I also don't like how in the Roman founding story they had to throw in that thing about the Sabine women. It was pretty good until then...*facepalm* Actually the Latin word used in the context of this story is raptio, which is commonly translated as rape, but which actually doesn't imply the same thing as it does in our modern era. It actually means 'abduction'. Furthermore, the primary source on this story is Livy, who actually explicitly states that no sexual violation of the Sabine women took place, and that Romulus spoke to each of the women personally and offered them land rights and other benefits. Just making a note. xD |
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Post by Pacmanite on Jun 18, 2011 7:38:53 GMT -5
Hmm, I can see what you mean there; Livy did treat that mass kidnapping quite seriously. But then again, he's more of a historian than the rest of the sources which tell us the myth. Ovid in particular makes the Rape of the Sabine Women into a writhing spectacle of terror, lust and fright... actually Ovid has a really awful sense of humour when it comes to rape.
And I have to say that rapio (the verb used by both Livy and Ovid in the Sabine episode) can imply rape. It doesn't have to, but it can. It would depend on the context, naturally. (Granted, raptio, the noun, does mean "abduction", but I didn't find it in either Ovid or Livy.)
But if anyone thought the Roman founding story was all right until the Rape of the Sabine women, then I should probably grudgingly point out the rape of Rhea Silvia, mother of the twins Romulus and Remus. Mars just happened to take a fancy to her when she was sleeping, and--
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