chewing on the alderson siblings, their mother, and the role she plays in their trauma. to quote a comment i made on another post:

[i am interested in acknowledging] the role of persecutor as a twisted perversion of protector[, which] is so rich and often misunderstood. we see this in how he thanks his mother for getting him through prison, the complex difference in how elliot experiences her (possibly as, subconsciously, safer and more predictable than his father, possibly even an ally in resenting him) vs. darlene, who only sees her mother as villianous/doesn't quite get the complexity that exists there.

elliot clearly does not view his mother as the root of all evil. his discussions of her feel detached from emotion, neutral for the most part, which isn't uncommon in dissociative trauma responses. he recollects the maltreatment, but does not carry the passionate anger darlene expresses, or seem to dwell much in particular. once we are introduced to his position in season 2, it becomes clear just how emotionally dissociated from any blame toward his mother he is. he views "living with her" as the objectively best fantasy to cope; he finds comfort in her brand of rigidity.

"better the devil you know, right?" is especially powerful here. a quote i think helps contextualize the importance of "devil one can immediately recognize":

"In every man's heart there is a devil, but we do not know the man as bad until the devil is roused." --James Oliver Curwood

essentially, there is comfort in always knowing the devil rather than waiting for it to reveal unexpectedly. one cannot combat what they have no reference or preparation for.

of course almost everything we know about magda is filtered through elliot, both in what he tells us and what is ommitted. we must also acknowledge that the persecutor identity forms on the basis that preempting and self-allocating punishment will prevent external abuse. the fact that for elliot this takes the form of introjecting his mother suggests a subconscious association of care.

her attitude toward most things is callously business-like at best, and cruel at worst... but it is notable that she is predictable. magda, as she exists to us as an audience, does not pretend to be something she is not. she is distant and abusive, emotionally avoidant, and neglectful, as a rule. this also means there are no pockets of friendship or kindness to lower the children's guards or confuse their relationship. the abuse can be processed for what it is, and the consequenced can be anticipated. the "system" is manageable, perhaps even exploitable. or: know the rules, follow the rules, and you will be okay.

that lens considered, there is also an underlying sense of utilitarianism in magda's logic; her parenting will help her children to "toughen up". reading between the lines, magda has the air of someone carrying significant generational trauma who attributes her own survival to the harshness of her environment. to her, this is real life. there is no use in catering to or dwelling on emotion. harshness breeds "necessary" resillience. the nature, reason for, or severity of hardship is unimportant--perhaps up to and including incestuous abuse--the only thing of importance is to carry on. this is dime a dozen abuser logic, and it's not an excuse. but to a child? one who has been betrayed in the most confusing, painful, violating manner by the person they trusted the most? when compared to the father who showed them kindness, only to weaponize it in a completely unforeseeable, deeply traumatic way, magda's consistent malignance might just feel like safety.

we cannot know for sure whether magda was aware of the abuse occuring between edward and elliot. the idea that she may have become aware of, or at minimum suspected, the abuse has occurred to me. the disgust and disregard for edward may well have been in part because of this. regardless, what we do know is that for whatever reason, magda holds a vocal, unapologetic resentment for her late husband. she refers to him as weak. in some ways, this is the closest thing to allyship that elliot experiences from his mother--whether it is out of conscious awareness or not, she is the only person in the world who openly condemns the "real devil" that was hiding in plain sight.

understandably, this is a lot for a child. considering elliot would have been compartmentalized from the abuse from his father, there may not be much remaining other than the emotional imprints; the guttural bodily reaction. some part of elliot felt comfortable enough with the thought of giving into his mother's abusive structure-- something I do not believe is a coincidence, when he was physically entering a place known for high rates of male sexual assault-- because that abusive structure was both familiar and less psychologically damaging than the alternative.