This post and the resulting commentary are so beautiful that I might cry. (And no, I don't think that displays of emotion are disempowering. Heh.)
It always seemed clear to me that the metaphor of Buffy was explicitly that she was the anti-rapist; the anti-victim, if you will. She took back the night like whoa. So it never really works for me when she is put into the victim role. She can be emotionally hurt, like other people, which is plenty to be going on with, story-wise. I get that Joss is fascinated with the issues that he's fascinated with, and I think we are lucky to have his take on them. He hit the jackpot of transcendence of the essential problem his first time out, and that transcendence is like the Golden Snitch to people who are interested in these same issues. (Excuse the HP sidebar.) Buffy won, Joss won, we won.
But I also get that he wants to approach the essential problem from various angles, and I've mostly enjoyed the variations on the theme. But trying to turn Buffy into the victim has never worked, and it never will.
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It always seemed clear to me that the metaphor of Buffy was explicitly that she was the anti-rapist; the anti-victim, if you will. She took back the night like whoa. So it never really works for me when she is put into the victim role. She can be emotionally hurt, like other people, which is plenty to be going on with, story-wise. I get that Joss is fascinated with the issues that he's fascinated with, and I think we are lucky to have his take on them. He hit the jackpot of transcendence of the essential problem his first time out, and that transcendence is like the Golden Snitch to people who are interested in these same issues. (Excuse the HP sidebar.) Buffy won, Joss won, we won.
But I also get that he wants to approach the essential problem from various angles, and I've mostly enjoyed the variations on the theme. But trying to turn Buffy into the victim has never worked, and it never will.