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BSG Meta: Kara and Sam and that whole abused spouse thing...
So, um, there is a new round of "Sam is an abused spouse! If you gender-swapped it, no one would give Kara a free pass! Lee/Kara isn't abusive because they both hit and it's not abusive if you're not in a relationship!" going around. And I'm a bit, "whatever, concern trolls" about it, along with "please stop repeating yourselves, it's not 2008 anymore."
BUT. Into every life, some meta must fall, and despite the fact that I've probably said this all before (and that other people have said it far more intelligently), I figure, what the hell.
Note: if you're new here, I ship Kara/Sam, and this is very subjective and stuff.
1. I know this is going to be really a strange thought, but I don't... I don't think I find Kara to be abusive? At least, not in the way I normally see abusive men portrayed (belittling the wife/gf, making her believe he's the only thing in her life that's good, that she deserves what he's doing to her, shutting her off from her own friends, controlling what she wears, etc.ok, so now I want fic where Kara forbids Sam to wear sleeves).
What she's doing isn't in any way a means to tearing down Sam (or Lee). In fact, it's a means to tear herself down. The self-deprecation of "cheating bitch of a wife" leaves it pretty clear that Kara is punishing herself.
All the way up through UB, it seems clear that Kara is trying to keep Sam away from herself/emotionally-detached from her because she still hasn't dealt with the New Caprica thing. We don't know if Sam knew about the dollhouse at that point (it is so frustrating, the things they left up to guess-work). We know he knows a little, that Kara's reaction in Collaborators was a classic "I've been raped/hurt/abused, stay away from me because I'm going to do it back to people" (though whether he recognizes it, at the time, is debatable. I don't think he does. I think he's still working on the assumption that she's perfectly fine--TIGH lost an eye, but he wasn't anymore broken, that only happened after hemurdered killed Ellen--which is why he gives her the dogtag back, trying to shock her out of it.)
Second, Sam has the option to walk away. He's not even on the Galactica anymore. He could sever all ties to her and never look back. This isn't like in real life where a woman/man might be trapped financially or with kids. Yes, there are emotional ties that can also hold an abused spouse--but again, Kara hasn't isolated Sam or convinced him she's the only thing that matters in his life.
The most that Kara's trying to do to exert control over him is hurt him to make him go away. Again, something that rebounds and hurts her, because it proves she's not worthy of being loved.
On top of that, Kara's not the only one pushing in the UB scene. Sam wants her back, and he's terribly human and vulnerable about it.
I mean, don't get me wrong. I think Kara's an ass in UB, but I also don't see an issue with it, given how she's NOT dealing with everything and how she's been SHOWN to not ever ever deal with anything. (er, I also think Sam is, too? This is, after all, the second time he walks away from Kara, btw. He doesn't know how to deal with her.)
And there is a big fucking difference in simply being an asshole and being an abuser.
Now, as an aside, I'd like to note a few things:
1. Kara was gone for four months, it's perfectly natural for Sam to not want to let her go. It's also stupid and human for him to reject her being broken. I'm good with that.
2. Kara has her pick of people to fuck. She calls Sam. I don't think it's just because he has a nice penis. Unless you all subscribe to that whole theory about how women have to have an emotional component to get off? I don't think Kara does.
I'm sorry, I was watching the end of 1408 and got distracted. Where was I?
Oh, right. Kara the abuser.
*reads over what's already on the page*
Hrm. I think I've covered that. All right, moving onto pistol-whipping Sam.
We dealt with that whole thing on fandomsecrets not that long ago, but to reiterate: Kara hit everyone, it wasn't personal, and it's not a reason to walk away from a marriage that you've put a lot of blood, sweat and tears into.
Especially when you're all twisted up about whether you're human or not. (and that goes for Kara AND Sam)
This is the thing: you cannot remove Kara and Sam's actions from their context. They happen because of the context, not because Kara and Sam are evil people who go around abusing everyone. (or Kara and Lee, though I don't particularly think 'beating each other to a pulp' is exactly healthy, but that's something other people have covered extensively)
There is so much going on in season four to fuck with their heads:
Kara: came back from the dead, driven to find Earth, going insane, doesn't know what she is, still has post-NC PTSD, is thrust into command, etc, etc. And that's not even covering that the man she considered a father has repeatedly told her she's a cancer and choke-slammed her (you want to talk abusive relationships? Adama vs Kara? Yeah. His main goal is cutting her to pieces and controlling her.)
Sam: Wife died, discovered he's a Cylon, wife is resurrected and doesn't know what she is, wife threatened to shoot him, DISCOVERED HE'S AN EVIL ROBOT THAT DESTROYED HUMANITY.
Is it any wonder these two aren't very healthy when they interact? They're both trying to reclaim their humanity, the only way they know how. With emotions, and blood, sweat and paint and sex.
The scene in Ties That Bind is their states of mind in a nutshell, right down to Sam finally getting to sex up his wife again. (ok, that last is gratuitous, but it is a good point: DEAD FOR X NUMBER OF MONTHS, and I don't think Sam had any company aside from Tory, and KARA IS STILL THE WOMAN HE LOVES. I totally do not blame him for stepping up and going, "sexnaopls")
To wit: KARA WAS DEAD. If you don't think that gives Sam a free pass to sex her up, even when she's being mean to him, YOU HAVE NO SOUL.
And the aftermath echoes between them all the way into Revelations, where she finally finds out. And then it all just clicks for her: why Sam has been squirrelly, why he's been using her as much as she was using him.
Because Sam was using her. She was a human connection to reality, after all.
If Kara's classed as abusive, then so is Sam. And so is Lee. The latter throws as many, if not more, punches. And he's also verbally abusive towards her, tearing her down as often as not (pilot who can't keep her pants on, anyone?) (not to mention: how squicky is the implication that KARA OWES LEE SEX for wearing a dress, and it's ok for him to punch her in the emotions and the face and make her come crawling back to him and apologize for it? That rings way more "I'm sorry I made you hit me, baby" than ANY Kara/Sam interaction. EVER) (also, that scene is even squickier if you paste it into gender-swap, since then it's the whiny girlfriend calling her bf on his sleeping around, and him just punching her instead)
AHEM. I got way off-track, there. Mostly because this is pretty stream-of-consciousness. I'm trying hard not to repeat myself and failing a lot.
So, yes, blah, found he was a Cylon, blah. Found her dead body on Earth, didn't talk to him until he was shot in the head...
It's funny, but Sam's "YOU OWE ME" line was sort of wince-worthy.
But before I get to that, can we talk about the whole gun thing?
One of the things I loved about BotS, was that Kara rescuesthe damsel Sam, and they both immediately go for the ammunition. And Kara knows without looking that Sam is behind her grabbing guns when Lee shouts at her. That whole vibe is one of my kinks, you know. That instinctive "I rescued my man, and he is now gonna be gettin' him some guns." thing? OH GOD BE STILL MY HEART.
I. I. Ok. I'm going to read fandomsecrets before continuing, because my reaction to Sam getting shot and Kara making her decision that Sam is more important than anything else to her, it just. It makes me incoherent.
I don't think I've meta'd much about 4.5. Partly because it's sad-causing and partly because it makes me really angry. But I haven't really thought about Kara/Sam all that deeply. And now that I'm trying to, all I'm really coming up with is a jumble of emotions and babbling.
1. Sam gets shot, and Kara immediately is at his side. Right here, everything she's ever cared about is blowing up in her face. In that instant, it doesn't matter that he's a Cylon, that he lied about it, that she found her own corpse, that Leoben ran away, that Adama might die, that the ship is in the charge of someone who loathes her--
Sam is dying by inches, his eyes already going blank, and Tigh wants her to leave him behind.
Kara knows that it's almost hopeless, but while Sam is breathing, she's going to give it a try. She's going to drag the guy who's probably got 100 pounds on her from where he fell to the infirmary, and he is not going to die on her.
2. Against the odds, Kara gets him there. She has some help, as I assume Romo really did help (despite not wanting to). Then the 4.5 monster strikes even further. Instead of Sam being Sam, he's got all of his memories and he's more than Sam. I'm not sure I'd be able to deal with that, but Kara, who's already lost everything anyway, can't let him go.
I love the fact that she makes the decision to operate, that she's the one who's being the adult here. (and it is an echo back to Demetrius, when Sam was the adult and she was the prophet)
3. The odds come back to bite her on the ass, Sam is comatose, then a hybrid.
And right there, Kara gives that speech about just wanting her Sam back AND OH MY HEART. Like they didn't own it before. Kara goes through more trials by fire, until she faces up to the reality:
4. Neither of them are the people they were, they've both changed irrevocably. Kara doesn't know what she is anymore, Sam is something that isn't Cylon or Human.
Kara and Sam are dead, long live Kara and Sam.
->>Note: I loathe the hybrid violently, but it's.... almost allowable, if Kara isn't Kara and Sam isn't Sam.
5. So, anyway, at this point, Kara and Sam are inextricably linked, and, and, well, then Sam flies into the sun and Kara disappears. And they lived happily ever after in angel-land, or got reincarnated, or just have lots of sex, or all of the above.
Also, Kara, who was changing all season long, had that last growth spurt and is an adult (she hit being an 'adult' sometime in BotS, she just didn't come to terms with it). And if Sam had lived as a human and she hadn't disappeared, they would have tromped off to become sea pirates.
...um. I had a point somewhere back there. I don't remember what it was anymore. SORRY. I got distracted by the whole MY OTP ARE AUGH-INDUCING OH MY HEART bit.
BUT. Into every life, some meta must fall, and despite the fact that I've probably said this all before (and that other people have said it far more intelligently), I figure, what the hell.
Note: if you're new here, I ship Kara/Sam, and this is very subjective and stuff.
1. I know this is going to be really a strange thought, but I don't... I don't think I find Kara to be abusive? At least, not in the way I normally see abusive men portrayed (belittling the wife/gf, making her believe he's the only thing in her life that's good, that she deserves what he's doing to her, shutting her off from her own friends, controlling what she wears, etc.
What she's doing isn't in any way a means to tearing down Sam (or Lee). In fact, it's a means to tear herself down. The self-deprecation of "cheating bitch of a wife" leaves it pretty clear that Kara is punishing herself.
All the way up through UB, it seems clear that Kara is trying to keep Sam away from herself/emotionally-detached from her because she still hasn't dealt with the New Caprica thing. We don't know if Sam knew about the dollhouse at that point (it is so frustrating, the things they left up to guess-work). We know he knows a little, that Kara's reaction in Collaborators was a classic "I've been raped/hurt/abused, stay away from me because I'm going to do it back to people" (though whether he recognizes it, at the time, is debatable. I don't think he does. I think he's still working on the assumption that she's perfectly fine--TIGH lost an eye, but he wasn't anymore broken, that only happened after he
Second, Sam has the option to walk away. He's not even on the Galactica anymore. He could sever all ties to her and never look back. This isn't like in real life where a woman/man might be trapped financially or with kids. Yes, there are emotional ties that can also hold an abused spouse--but again, Kara hasn't isolated Sam or convinced him she's the only thing that matters in his life.
The most that Kara's trying to do to exert control over him is hurt him to make him go away. Again, something that rebounds and hurts her, because it proves she's not worthy of being loved.
On top of that, Kara's not the only one pushing in the UB scene. Sam wants her back, and he's terribly human and vulnerable about it.
I mean, don't get me wrong. I think Kara's an ass in UB, but I also don't see an issue with it, given how she's NOT dealing with everything and how she's been SHOWN to not ever ever deal with anything. (er, I also think Sam is, too? This is, after all, the second time he walks away from Kara, btw. He doesn't know how to deal with her.)
And there is a big fucking difference in simply being an asshole and being an abuser.
Now, as an aside, I'd like to note a few things:
1. Kara was gone for four months, it's perfectly natural for Sam to not want to let her go. It's also stupid and human for him to reject her being broken. I'm good with that.
2. Kara has her pick of people to fuck. She calls Sam. I don't think it's just because he has a nice penis. Unless you all subscribe to that whole theory about how women have to have an emotional component to get off? I don't think Kara does.
I'm sorry, I was watching the end of 1408 and got distracted. Where was I?
Oh, right. Kara the abuser.
*reads over what's already on the page*
Hrm. I think I've covered that. All right, moving onto pistol-whipping Sam.
We dealt with that whole thing on fandomsecrets not that long ago, but to reiterate: Kara hit everyone, it wasn't personal, and it's not a reason to walk away from a marriage that you've put a lot of blood, sweat and tears into.
Especially when you're all twisted up about whether you're human or not. (and that goes for Kara AND Sam)
This is the thing: you cannot remove Kara and Sam's actions from their context. They happen because of the context, not because Kara and Sam are evil people who go around abusing everyone. (or Kara and Lee, though I don't particularly think 'beating each other to a pulp' is exactly healthy, but that's something other people have covered extensively)
There is so much going on in season four to fuck with their heads:
Kara: came back from the dead, driven to find Earth, going insane, doesn't know what she is, still has post-NC PTSD, is thrust into command, etc, etc. And that's not even covering that the man she considered a father has repeatedly told her she's a cancer and choke-slammed her (you want to talk abusive relationships? Adama vs Kara? Yeah. His main goal is cutting her to pieces and controlling her.)
Sam: Wife died, discovered he's a Cylon, wife is resurrected and doesn't know what she is, wife threatened to shoot him, DISCOVERED HE'S AN EVIL ROBOT THAT DESTROYED HUMANITY.
Is it any wonder these two aren't very healthy when they interact? They're both trying to reclaim their humanity, the only way they know how. With emotions, and blood, sweat and paint and sex.
The scene in Ties That Bind is their states of mind in a nutshell, right down to Sam finally getting to sex up his wife again. (ok, that last is gratuitous, but it is a good point: DEAD FOR X NUMBER OF MONTHS, and I don't think Sam had any company aside from Tory, and KARA IS STILL THE WOMAN HE LOVES. I totally do not blame him for stepping up and going, "sexnaopls")
To wit: KARA WAS DEAD. If you don't think that gives Sam a free pass to sex her up, even when she's being mean to him, YOU HAVE NO SOUL.
And the aftermath echoes between them all the way into Revelations, where she finally finds out. And then it all just clicks for her: why Sam has been squirrelly, why he's been using her as much as she was using him.
Because Sam was using her. She was a human connection to reality, after all.
If Kara's classed as abusive, then so is Sam. And so is Lee. The latter throws as many, if not more, punches. And he's also verbally abusive towards her, tearing her down as often as not (pilot who can't keep her pants on, anyone?) (not to mention: how squicky is the implication that KARA OWES LEE SEX for wearing a dress, and it's ok for him to punch her in the emotions and the face and make her come crawling back to him and apologize for it? That rings way more "I'm sorry I made you hit me, baby" than ANY Kara/Sam interaction. EVER) (also, that scene is even squickier if you paste it into gender-swap, since then it's the whiny girlfriend calling her bf on his sleeping around, and him just punching her instead)
AHEM. I got way off-track, there. Mostly because this is pretty stream-of-consciousness. I'm trying hard not to repeat myself and failing a lot.
So, yes, blah, found he was a Cylon, blah. Found her dead body on Earth, didn't talk to him until he was shot in the head...
It's funny, but Sam's "YOU OWE ME" line was sort of wince-worthy.
But before I get to that, can we talk about the whole gun thing?
One of the things I loved about BotS, was that Kara rescues
I. I. Ok. I'm going to read fandomsecrets before continuing, because my reaction to Sam getting shot and Kara making her decision that Sam is more important than anything else to her, it just. It makes me incoherent.
I don't think I've meta'd much about 4.5. Partly because it's sad-causing and partly because it makes me really angry. But I haven't really thought about Kara/Sam all that deeply. And now that I'm trying to, all I'm really coming up with is a jumble of emotions and babbling.
1. Sam gets shot, and Kara immediately is at his side. Right here, everything she's ever cared about is blowing up in her face. In that instant, it doesn't matter that he's a Cylon, that he lied about it, that she found her own corpse, that Leoben ran away, that Adama might die, that the ship is in the charge of someone who loathes her--
Sam is dying by inches, his eyes already going blank, and Tigh wants her to leave him behind.
Kara knows that it's almost hopeless, but while Sam is breathing, she's going to give it a try. She's going to drag the guy who's probably got 100 pounds on her from where he fell to the infirmary, and he is not going to die on her.
2. Against the odds, Kara gets him there. She has some help, as I assume Romo really did help (despite not wanting to). Then the 4.5 monster strikes even further. Instead of Sam being Sam, he's got all of his memories and he's more than Sam. I'm not sure I'd be able to deal with that, but Kara, who's already lost everything anyway, can't let him go.
I love the fact that she makes the decision to operate, that she's the one who's being the adult here. (and it is an echo back to Demetrius, when Sam was the adult and she was the prophet)
3. The odds come back to bite her on the ass, Sam is comatose, then a hybrid.
And right there, Kara gives that speech about just wanting her Sam back AND OH MY HEART. Like they didn't own it before. Kara goes through more trials by fire, until she faces up to the reality:
4. Neither of them are the people they were, they've both changed irrevocably. Kara doesn't know what she is anymore, Sam is something that isn't Cylon or Human.
Kara and Sam are dead, long live Kara and Sam.
->>Note: I loathe the hybrid violently, but it's.... almost allowable, if Kara isn't Kara and Sam isn't Sam.
5. So, anyway, at this point, Kara and Sam are inextricably linked, and, and, well, then Sam flies into the sun and Kara disappears. And they lived happily ever after in angel-land, or got reincarnated, or just have lots of sex, or all of the above.
Also, Kara, who was changing all season long, had that last growth spurt and is an adult (she hit being an 'adult' sometime in BotS, she just didn't come to terms with it). And if Sam had lived as a human and she hadn't disappeared, they would have tromped off to become sea pirates.
...um. I had a point somewhere back there. I don't remember what it was anymore. SORRY. I got distracted by the whole MY OTP ARE AUGH-INDUCING OH MY HEART bit.
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That made me giggle for a really long time, and I don't know why. Like, I had to take a break and come back because I couldn't stop. I should possibly stop drinking now.
they would have tromped off to become sea pirates.
...and now I want Reincarnated Kara/Sam slash Pirates of the Caribbean crossover fic where Jack Sparrow and Kara drink everyone else under the table but have to call it a draw between them because they run out of rum.
I really need to stop drinking now.
I might have more thinky thoughts tomorrow. But this was lovely. A+ for awesomeness.
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*cackles*
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As you know. But it bears repeating, I think.
ARRRGH 4.5 why you gotta crush our souls THAT MUCH MORE????? (I mean, jeez, you know it's gotta be fucking depressing when any AU I can come up with isn't so heart breaking)
And also. I still am not over the hybrid thing. As much as I can accept it intellectually, I still LOATHE IT. A LOT. I think I've said before that one of the reasons I actually don't mind Daybreak as much as some is that the hybrid thing kind of broke me early, and after that it was uphill. :(
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I KNOW. And... I really need to get around to doing something AU, one of these days.
after that it was uphill
I think I had, at the time, resigned myself to "the worst has happened", but I still had ire, so everything else was just magnified, and I was more rageful about things.
BUT looking back, it still makes me rageful. And flaily. sigh.
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And This:
you cannot remove Kara and Sam's actions from their context. They happen because of the context, not because Kara and Sam are evil people who go around abusing everyone
Context is important for everything in a story.
And This:
I loathe the hybrid violently, but it's.... almost allowable, if Kara isn't Kara and Sam isn't Sam.
Like Liz says, I can almost tolerate it on an intellectual level. But in truth, my hate for that storyline, it burns. :(
But on the plus side - yes - There is an eternity of AU's. :)
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=D
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An abusive spouse usually thinks they're better than the other person and I've always thought Kara was the exact opposite. She knows she's broken in so many ways and she feels like she doesn't deserve Sam so she lashes out and pushes him away. Kara is always struggling with learning to be loved (which I think stems back to her relationship with her mom) and that is entirely different than an abuser who uses "love" as a means of controlling and hurting another person. I don't think she's ever really trying to hurt Sam...I think he's usually just in the way of Kara trying to hurt Kara (because he doesn't want to see her be hurt).
I've always seen Lee/Kara as the more 'abusive' relationship because my view has always been that Lee thinks he's better than Kara and wants to 'fix' her. He can't accept or her love her as she is. He's always trying to make her better. And I don't see that dynamic in Kara/Sam at all. K/S make each other better by being with each other, but neither tries to fix the other one. With Kara/Lee, I feel like they become worse people together and Lee desperately wants to shape Kara into the person he wants her to be. But, of course, I'm biased and I'm sure others would strongly disagree with me. ;)
And GUH. Kara dragging Sam down that hallway is one of my favorite scenes in all of Battlestar even if it leads to Hybrid!Sam which I absolutely loathe. My only consolation in that was when Kara drops the dog tags into the goo tub and later disappears. Even though I hated Daybreak, the shipper in me was pleased that Kara/Sam are together for eternity.
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THIS, YES. All of it.
And it's not even that I condone/think Kara is a-ok/awesome for pushing people away. I don't. But I don't really see her as a classic abuser, either.
the shipper in me was pleased that Kara/Sam are together for eternity.
=D And I'm perfectly willing to leave it to Sackhoff and Trucco to confirm that stuff.
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Yep. And I don't think it excuses their behavior, but. *hands in the air*
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ok, so now I want fic where Kara forbids Sam to wear sleeves)
*DIES*
And I completely agree with you about this:And there is a big fucking difference in simply being an asshole and being an abuser.
Everything you've said is why the notion of Kara as "an abuser" (as opposed to a not-infrequent asshole *g*) is one I can't subscribe to. The control thing especially. And I'm certainly no expert, but I did get very familiar with a bunch of actual abusive husbands and boyfriends in my internship, and I got to learn from real experts, and the control thing is always present. Not letting their wives wear attractive clothing, not letting them have friends, doing everything they can to increase their dependence on them. Pushing the victim away would be unthinkable to an actual abuser, strictly speaking.
One of the things I loved about BotS, was that Kara rescues the damsel Sam, and they both immediately go for the ammunition. And Kara knows without looking that Sam is behind her grabbing guns when Lee shouts at her. That whole vibe is one of my kinks, you know. That instinctive "I rescued my man, and he is now gonna be gettin' him some guns." thing? OH GOD BE STILL MY HEART.
Word to everything about this. It's one of the reasons I can't bring myself to hate what happened to Sam, if only because the ending saved it for him and for them. Because - this is not entirely congealed in my head and I'm way overtired, but - I think the reason why Kara was such a not-infrequent asshole in her relationships was because that way, when Sam (or Lee, etc) inevitably stopped loving her, it would be because of something she did. Something she could control, and that she could point to and say "it's because I'm a frak-up," but know that it was her own doing. It wouldn't be because of who she was. Because Kara's mom was an (actual) abuser and really did leave her with that belief that she was fundamentally unloveable. And that was something I, for obvious reasons, really wanted her to get over. I also think she took for granted that she would be the one to die first. So "losing" Sam in a way that was beyond her control but had nothing to do with her worthiness or lack thereof, and having to face how much he meant to her and not being able to do her usual self-protective routine - I think that had a lot to do with her finally growing up in that respect. <3
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I think that gets to the heart of it. Because anything 'abusive' Kara said was pretty much for this exact purpose.
And your whole last paragraph is FANTASTIC. In a depressing way, since that's Kara's mindset, and Sam's life... :(
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All of that, yes. <3 Also, if the genders actually *were* reversed? Fandom would be making excuses for Kara and coming up with reasons why Sam actually needed to be 'punished.' And while I know it's not intentional deconstruction of gender dynamics (not entirely anyway), a large part of why I appreciate Kara/Sam is *because* it deconstructs those dynamics, and bringing this sort of fandom fail to the forefront is just one of those things. Not that that makes me any less bitter about the fandom fail, but still.
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And this here is why I try not to tread into places where fandom gets like that, because uh, what. I do believe that this might happen, but I don't want to believe it.
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(Hey, remember when Chief Tyrol had a mental freakout and literally beat his tiny not-yet-girlfriend unconscious, and everybody totally understood it wasn't really his fault, then spent the next two seasons hating insanely on said girl? No? I totally must've dreamed that.)
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Hee, icon twins!
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He lashes out like a child, a lot of the time. Well, ok, and he's also ridiculously inconsistently-written, as the writers and JB had all sorts of ideas about who he was.
Control was part of what attracted him to Dee that she was willing (to a point) to bend for him and that she was young and idealistic enough to think of it as him molding her into something better rather than breaking her down
O.O
Oh, bullshit. Dee didn't 'bend', 'allow' or do anything else passively when it came to Lee. She actively confronted him on numerous occasions, and made him be honest with her. She knew her own mind and she decided he was worth it. Just because Lee's a fuck-up doesn't mean Dee was abused anymore than it means Sam was.
To be honest, I think Lee thought Dee made him a better person (as petty as his reason for marrying her in the first place was). And he respected her, her ideas and her opinions. (if only we'd had more scenes like the one in 4.5, where they click and connect like old friends)
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And I was afraid that if I posted, it would just be me blathering pointlessly again.But you got it exactly right. I agree that she's not trying to control Sam, unless it's to prove to him that she's not worth his love. And she does that to everyone she cares about, but Sam just doesn't respond back to her in the same way. (Hm, and Helo too. But since he's Helo, Kara doesn't typically push him away as hard.)And, um, yeah. Ditto to what you said for this.
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ok, so now I want fic where Kara forbids Sam to wear sleeves*snerk*
There's nothing I can add to this post except nodding in agreement over and over, so let's just assume I did that. *quotes everything, nods thoroughly* And eeee for 4.5 meta.
Kara doesn't know what she is anymore, Sam is something that isn't Cylon or Human. Kara and Sam are dead, long live Kara and Sam.
That is blunt and painful and utterly awesome.
Everybody's entitled to their opinion, but I could do without all this tsk-tsking about how Offended we all would be on Sam's behalf if we weren't such female chauvinists, y'know.
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Everybody's entitled to their opinion, but I could do without all this tsk-tsking about how Offended we all would be on Sam's behalf if we weren't such female chauvinists, y'know.
That whole thing just... baffles me. Because while I'm totally that girl who's going to complain about the white dudes taking over my tvs, I also... I don't like abuse.
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And it's very insulting to say that Kara/Sam was abusive and argue that Kara/Lee was not. (I honestly don't see either relationship as abusive AT ALL.) Both relationships were completely frakked up but being mean to someone and distancing yourself from them does not equal abuse. Was Kara cruel to both men at times? Absolutely. Did Kara use them both at times? Frak yes and there were times when they used her, too. Does any of that equal abuse? Hell no! (at least not in the way I think of abuse)...
So...yeah...basically ITA with all of this and I ♥ you for putting into words what I simply can not. :)
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YES THAT. I'm not sure if I made that clear, but I don't think either is abusive. I think they're both unhealthy and screwed-up (some bits more than others), but abusive? No.
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YES, YES IT WAS LIKE THAT. <3
And, um, everything else. Especially everything you say about this:
What she's doing isn't in any way a means to tearing down Sam (or Lee). In fact, it's a means to tear herself down.
Oh Kara.
I also love what you say about her becoming an adult, and how much it's tied up with dealing with what happened to Sam.
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See, I think Kara was sort of on her way there, already, but she needed something as a catalyst (or more time), and, well, it ended up being Sam going BOOM on top of EVERYTHING ELSe. SIGH.
And I really love the strength it took for her to face up to this idea that she was no longer herself (even if the logical next step is that she's MORe than herself, and now I'm getting metaphysical, I suppose)
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I've come to the same conclusion you seem to have made years ago. It's not abuse. You didn't address what I consider the most egregious example, which is actually their interactions on the Demetrius. That's when I think they're at their least healthy.
But I think you're absolutely right. Kara is guilty of degrading Sam's feelings in order to push him away...that's ugly to watch, but it isn't abuse. At all. And the context is hugely important.
And Kara knows without looking that Sam is behind her grabbing guns when Lee shouts at her.
I love you for saying this, and will rewatch that episode with an eye for this adorableness!