Meta: Angels and Demons: Thorns and Stings

[chasingtides]

Perhaps I was a little unclear in my last meta. Perhaps I fell victim to my English-major habit of needing to prove everything, even things only tangentially related to my topic. If I did, I apologise. Perhaps I wasn't talking about what you wanted to talk about. I don't apologise for that.

I talk about a lot. I talk about sexism, ablism, and Castiel and Ruby as counterbalances, among many other things. I even have a convenient list if you don't believe me. But I also talk about uncomfortable things and I'm getting the feeling that I'm treading on uncomfortable ground here.

To clarify my point, I'm going to copypasta from my previous meta:

Dean's fight with Zachariah, where he keeps telling him that no, he won't let Michael take him is both heart breaking and terrifying. It is one thing to think of a demon - Meg or Lucifer or Azazel - taking someone against their will, but the brutality of the angels is beyond cruel.

Zachariah says to Dean, "You're Michael's weapon or, rather, his receptacle... Michael's vessel. You're chosen. It's a great honor... I am completely and utterly through screwing around.... Now, Michael is going to take his vessel... You understand me?"

I think part of the terror is how easily Zachariah dehumanizes Dean. Dean isn't a person. His consent doesn't really matter (or, in Zachariah's words, the angels' god-given need for consent is "unfortunate"). Dean is an object - he is a receptacle and a vessel. Dean is empty until Michael fills him and uses him. Dean is nothing; he is empty until Michael rides him.

I really don't blame Dean for saying no to that.

Then Zachariah takes it a step further. He broke Sam's legs because Dean was mouthing off at him, but when Dean actually dares to say no - dares to assert himself as a person - Zachariah is visibly furious. He offers to heal Bobby, if Dean will say yes, but says that if Dean says no again, Bobby will never be able to walk. After Dean says no again, Zachariah gives Dean stage four stomach cancer, saying he will heal him if he allows Michael to take him. (Stage IV gastric cancers are usually metastasized tumors that have spread to other parts of the body - probably Dean's only hope of recovery is a miracle.) At another no, Zachariah removes Sam's lungs.

Unsurprisingly, Dean begs for death at this point. Zachariah has, after all, pretty much run out of people to hurt and Dean is in visible agony from his gastric cancer, while Sam struggles behind him. Zachariah, however, tells him, "Are we having fun, yes? ... Kill you? Oh no, I'm just getting started." Zachariah is ready to torture Dean into allowing Michael to ride him.

I want to talk about this.

I want to talk about how Dean is being victimized here. I want to talk about how we have a (manly man's man who drinks beer and listens to rock and roll and eats red meat and sleeps with women and drives a classic car and likes big guns) is having his choice - his consent, his ability to say no - taken away by a (should-be-trustworthy, older, authority figure) male. On a (mainstream, regular, not-special-interest) television show, Dean is being told that, regardless of his own desires, Michael is going to take him and Zachariah is going to have fun in forcing him to say yes to Michael.

Some brief information on assaulted men: Men are even less likely to report assault and rape than women. Imagine, briefly, how off that makes our statistics. Male rape, particularly penetrative rape, is associated with a loss of manhood, making it problematic on multiple levels. Like all rape, it is about power, not sexual desire. According to Wikipedia, the first successful prosecution of male-on-male rape in the UK was in 1995. According to RAINN, in 2002, one in eight rape survivors was male. Have some links.

Male sexual violence is also rarely depicted in media, especially mainstream media. The victim is usually a child, gay, or in prison. The media offered by Mankind Counselling fit these boundaries, almost exclusively features characters who are molested as children. I'm still looking for another representation that is like what we saw in Sympathy for the Devil (5.01), which, according to the information I have found, is fairly realistic in what male rape actually does look like.

As I said in my previous meta, I'm not sure what it means. I am, indeed, grappling with what it means that Castiel took (rode, possessed, was inside) Claire and then took Jimmy, when Jimmy was dying and desperate to save his daughter. I'm grappling with what it means that the men of the show - John, Bobby, Sam - who manly men and men's men and all-American men with big guns and fighting skills have been taken and ridden and filled against their will, except for Dean who was so clearly, visibly brutalised in a highly sexual manner.

It's one thing, as a friend pointed out to me, for Lilith to take little girls. It's one thing for Ruby or Meg-demon or Azazel to ride an unwilling victim. But it's a new line, a new violation for an angel to do this, even if we don't find angels to be terribly trustworthy. What does it mean that even angels will ride roughshod over consent with pleasure?

And what does it mean to have this representation of male rape in mainstream television and have it primarily - as I see it, correct me if I'm wrong - ignored by its normally highly rape-conscious, misogyny conscious fanbase?

I don't know which bothers me more, to be honest.

Comments

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

I think you make some really good points. And I agree with everything you say about the Michael's Vessel scene. Like a commenter before me, I find it interesting that Dean is continually sexually-assaulted/victimized/objectified in the show. In this episode, he was assaulted by both demons and angels - both a female and a male (at least in body..."meg" was male when she assaulted Jo). Both the forced kiss by Meg, and the torture scene at the hands of Zachariah, were uncomfortable to watch.

In terms of Castiel though, I see him and Jimmy not as rape, but as more of an abusive relationship, in which the abuser does not realize what they are doing. Jimmy DID give consent and he WAS infatuated with Castiel before he gave it...he DID pray for it, and he was glad to give himself to Castiel...until he actually found out what it meant. By then though, it was two late, and he was trapped in a relationship with Castiel that he no longer enjoyed. When he was finally free of it, Castiel moved on and found another willing host - presumably willing because she was frightened of demons, but willing nonetheless. At this point, Jimmy begged for Castiel to take him back, not because he missed Castiel or wanted to be in the relationship again, but because he realized that he could save Claire from the same abuse that he suffered, by turning the abuse back on him.

Now, I don't want to say that Castiel is guilt-free here, that his possession of Jimmy isn't as violent or nasty as the other possessions on the show, but I think the difference is that Castiel doesn't really realize HOW violent and nasty it is for Jimmy. He knows that Jimmy thought it was "rough" but he also knows that Jimmy CHOSE to be with him, so I think he believes that it's not actually THAT bad for Jimmy.

Perhaps I am letting my own personal experience inform me in this - I did have a male friend who suffered assault and abuse (and possible sexual abuse, though, typically, my friend will not admit to this and only alluded to it once by accident) from a girlfriend of his...a girlfriend who never did realize that what she was doing to him was wrong.

Anyway, just some thoughts. I really enjoyed reading yours.

[annapeace.livejournal.com]

Technically, if you're saying Castiel and Jimmy were/are in an abusive relationship, then it is still rape - something more like spousal rape, in this case. Castiel may not have been fully aware of what he was doing, but Jimmy came to the conclusion that he didn't want it anymore, so to have Castiel continue on inside him is definitely rape. Even though Jimmy "asked for it" the context can't be ignored: it came down to "take me, don't take my daughter" and that is hardly real consent.

And if this is the case, wouldn't angelic possession be so much worse than demonic? After all, demons just take people, and even though it's absolutely miserable, at the very least, the people can say with certainty that they never wanted it, never consented and fought the entire time. (At least, so I believe.) Being in an abusive-rape relationship with someone - someone you might have trusted, someone you invited to you - is much more damaging to the soul, isn't it? You don't want it anymore, and the person you trusted yourself to doesn't care.

In terms of legality, spousal rape is still a hard thing to prosecute, especially because it doesn't necessarily involve physical abuse at all. Men or women could be trapped in situations where they are powerless - no money, no family, etc. - so they'll do what it takes to keep the hubby/wife happy because they can't think of an alternative. Isn't that so with Castiel and Zachariah? "Give in or your daughter is mine. Give in or the world ends." In the end the rape becomes commonplace, and people may argue they can't call it rape if the victim no longer cares.

[chasingtides.livejournal.com]

This. This. A whole lot of this. I do think that Castiel might not even fully realise that he's forcing Jimmy, though. He might think that since he didn't ask Jimmy, as Jimmy lay dying, and Jimmy "offered" that it means Jimmy's good with it. (Remember also that Castiel isn't so good with figuring out humanity.)

This doesn't mean he's not raping Jimmy, though. It just adds another layer of interpretation.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

I didn't mean to imply that spousal rape was in anyway less demeaning/horrible than other forms of rape...I was more just trying to draw a comparison that I felt would show the difference between Castiel's possession and that of a demons, or that of Zachariah (since Zachariah knows full well that Dean does not want to be possessed.) Castiel, I think at this point, does know that Jimmy chose to be possessed just to save his daughter...I think it's a big part of Castiel's continuing story arc of understanding humanity.

But again, I did not mean to imply that just because people are in a relationship, it's not rape, or it's somehow less horrible - it is just as horrible as the other rape/possessions.

I've also been wondering if perhaps bringing Castiel back from the dead in Jimmy's body for S5...well, maybe "God" (or other mystery person) thought this time to leave Jimmy out of it and let him be at peace...it could be a Ruby-fix, like the use of Coma-girl.

[annapeace.livejournal.com]

Ohh, okay. You didn't imply that spousal rape was less demeaning, I just wasn't sure if you thought it was rape at all. It's only my opinion that it's worse because it feels to me that not only is the victim hurt, s/he's also suffering from being betrayed by a person s/he trusted.

I do wonder this also! If Castiel has been given a brand new body, it would neatly sidestep a lot of issues should he ever want to pursue relationships in the show. Poor Jimmy though, if he were really gone.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Well, at least Jimmy would be "at peace", instead of "riding a comet." He was going to die from that bullet wound anyway, if he hadn't accepted Castiel back into his body.

[chasingtides.livejournal.com]

I would agree with your interpretation of Castiel and Jimmy in an abusive relationship where Castiel doesn't realise what he's doing. After all, it's implied that heaven has tortured him while he was away in The Rapture and, as a friend of mine point out, Castiel is heavy on the "he consented to this; he prayed for this" in Lazarus Rising.

I think Castiel thinks that Jimmy wants this - even if Jimmy doesn't. Zachariah, on the other hand, is fully aware that Dean doesn't want to be taken by Michael and is happy to force the issue. It is also Castiel who saves Dean from being forced, implying, at least, that Castiel does not approve of forced vessels in this manner.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Yes, exactly. I also think that Castiel realizing that Jimmy doesn't want to be possessed plays a role in Castiel's growth as a character...which is I think, one of the reasons Castiel didn't come in with the whole "it's a great honour" line about possession and instead kicked the crap out of Zachariah's men...even though in Lazarus Rising Castiel DID tell Dean that it was a great honour. He's learned.