The Pretty Knight

the op linked the study in the replies & i’ve been skimming it & it’s actually rlly rlly interesting to think abt

in the appendix (which you can find by scrolling down) CA:TWS is listed as having one torture scene, which immediately made me wonder because there are two that I can think of.

further on in the appendix when the authors are discussing the criteria for including torture, they give the vault scene in CA:TWS as an example of a scene that isn't torture, with the justification that Bucky seems to comply with his captors, and given the information shown on screen we can't conclude whether or not Bucky is a willing participant in the "wipe." Willing participants cannot be tortured, therefore the vault scene is not counted as torture

That is a WILD take on that scene. "doesn't fight back" does not equal "not being tortured" come on now

now, I could see disqualifying the vault scene as being a torture scene on the basis that the purpose of the "wipe" is not to inflict pain, it just happens to be an extremely painful process.

That's an interesting take. Is doing something incredibly painful or distressing to a person torture when there is ostensibly a secondary purpose to the painful thing, even though it also clearly doubles as a way of inflicting suffering and asserting power? This is a really important question to answer, since a lot of instances of torture and mistreatment in prisons and military situations etc. seem to fall under this. e.g. a strip search is nominally for "security" purposes, but it is also forced nudity which is a common form of sexual violence inflicted as part of torture.

But disqualifying the scene because there is not enough evidence that Bucky is being coerced to do it is nuts, since immediately prior Bucky gets slapped in the face for not answering a question and doesn't retaliate, and immediately before that Bucky gets a bunch of guns pointed at him when he acts up

That's another important question. Does being forced to comply with or participate in your own torture disqualify it from being torture?

The answer is, to me, obviously no, and in fact this seems like a relatively common feature of torture: e.g. forcing prisoners to dig their own graves requires a good amount of compliance from the victim and that's a major reason why it's so distressing

A few years later, in the early '70s, I started watching Star Trek -- both the original, in syndication, and the animated series in its network run. I was already a science fiction fan, and I was immediately hooked. I owned all of the Trek-related reference books at the time, including Bjo Trimble's Star Trek Concordance. I attended my first fan convention when I was in middle school. I watched all of the episodes multiple times, memorizing trivia, and by the time I got to college, I could identify any TOS episode by title after glancing at the screen for thirty seconds.

Despite all this, at no point did The Premise ever occur to me, and when I first heard about it -- I was attending Star Trek conventions in the 1970s, after all -- I found it implausible. I was, alas, a product of my times, and while I don't think I was ever actively homophobic, I was far from Woke in those days.

Fast-forward to 2020 or so. I'd been actively involved in the furry fandom since the mid-1990s. I'd survived a marriage and a divorce. I'd become much more comfortable with both my own (a)sexuality and sexuality in general. I'd gotten more sympathetic to fanfic over the years (in large measure to the fanworks and cogent blogging of @paulgadzikowski).

COVID had hit, and the nation was in lockdown. My job already allowed us to work from home one or two days a week, so changing to a full-time WFH schedule took very little adjustment -- and suddenly, I not only had the two and a half hours of commute time back, I had a lunch hour in my own living room with my TV right there. With the announcement of Lower Decks, I succumbed to temptation of three new Star Trek series, and subscribed to Paramount+.

With every episode of every series at my fingertips, I sat down and started watching The Original Series again. It had been a long while since I'd seen more than an occasional episode, and I'd never sat down and watched them all in the original airing order.

And this time around -- Holy SHIT.

The Premise was RIGHT THERE. I couldn't NOT see it.

This morning, it hit me.

It was a paradigm shift. It was Copernican.

Yes, I was tearing through books constantly, and talking to this teacher at least weekly. Because even though I always loved reading as a kid, literature was always a very weak subject for me in terms of a teaching-to-standardized-test school setting (I just do awful on "what color were the curtains" type multiple choice questions. Those details don't stick in my memory THEY JUST DON'T). But that didn't matter for this class. I could just read my way out of any bad test score. I have always had fond memories of how I "fudged" my way through that class and "abused' the extra credit policy.

Not, like, fake compliments or randomly giving scrounged up compliments to everyone you pass in the street, but -- say you see someone with an article of clothing you really really like. Cool accessories or a great haircut or something. Tell them.

I told an old woman yesterday that I liked her blouse. It was this super pretty white-at-the-top-floral-at-the-bottom shirt which was really lovely. So i backtracked where I'd walked past her and I said "excuse me - i love your shirt." And this harried, stressed-looking 80-something year old brightened up immediately, and beamed, and then when she and I headed off in separate directions, she had a pep in her step.

This other time I told a woman that I liked her boots. She gave me a company name thats since become my favourite brand of shoes. I told someone else that her scarf was cute and she was like "do you like it? Here, you can have it," and she dropped her scarf in my hands and then got on her train and left. I once saw a woman who had clearly put effort into her outfit that day but was now looking harried and frazzled as she wrangled four children across the road, and I told her that her outfit was gorgeous and she lit up like a christmas tree. I told a gay man that I loved his whole look once and he turned into a smiling, blushing mess as his super delighted and proud boyfriend was like "yea, he DOES look gorgeous doesnt he?"

…

actually typing out emoticons like XD and :D and :V never should have gone out of fashion and you can pry them out of my cold dead hands okay I know emojis are fun but THEY DON’T CAPTURE THE EMOTION IN THE SAME WAY

so like

:P

^_^

:3

^u^

:/

O.o

0.0

>:/

>_>

Especially alternating to really capture how boggled you are.

O.o

o.O

:3c

>:3c

OF7o

òwó

ú_ù

n_n

owo

oTL

TTwTT

83

8U

>8U

>8Oc

>////<

>////>

(-^_^-)

( 6w6;;;)

( > ^ <;;)

=(^w^)=

\o/

✧⁠◝⁠(⁠⁰⁠▿⁠⁰⁠)⁠◜⁠✧

(⁠ ⁠˘⁠ ⁠³⁠˘⁠)⁠♥

(⁠ ⁠T⁠_⁠T⁠)⁠＼⁠(⁠^⁠-⁠^⁠ ⁠)

ʕ⁠ ⁠º⁠ ⁠ᴥ⁠ ⁠º⁠ʔ

〜⁠(⁠꒪⁠꒳⁠꒪⁠)⁠〜

ʕ⁠ノ⁠•⁠ᴥ⁠•⁠ʔ⁠ノ⁠ ⁠︵⁠ ⁠┻⁠━⁠┻

ಠ⁠_⁠ಠ

with just a quick little tap

you can pry good old fashioned emoticons from my cold, dead hands

(and even then it’s gonna be a struggle)