Almost Human

It's criminal, the way we love, the way we hate;

It's almost human...

WARNING: Once Upon A Time SPOILERS (if you're watching it)

I watch quite a few programs on TV - one of which is Once Upon A Time. It's quite an interesting program - a bunch of fairy tale characters are cursed into our world where they have no memory of their pasts and the savior (daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming) has to break the curse. In the second season the curse is broken and now they can't get back to their world or leave their town.

Anyway, the reason I bring this up is because of the villains of the show. They're brilliant. They take "evil" characters such as the Evil Queen, Rumpelstiltskin, Captain Hook, and they make them... believable. Human. How? Their motivations, for the most part are routed in Love.
C.S. Lewis talked of how love can go wrong without some element of selflessness (Charity) in The Four Loves - it's actually rather applicable here. A particular paraphasing comes to mind here:

"[Love] begins to be a demon the moment he begins to be a god."

Once a love starts to take over, it destroys.

How? Here is as follows.

Captain Hook a.k.a Killian Jones
I'd say one of the least sympathetic, Killian was a philandering, murdering pirate. His True Love, Milah, was killed by Rumpelstiltskin, and so he swore vengeance - taking a portal to Neverland to preserve his life while he figured out how.
In the current story line, he switches sides like a revolving door and has displayed absolutely no mercy - especially towards Belle, the woman who Rumpelstiltskin loves. As far as motivations go he kinda has the weakest.
His love is Eros (Romantic Love), and when it goes out of control he only wants to ruin Rumpelstiltskin's love because he was denied his.

Regina Mills a.k.a. The Evil Queen
Regina Mills is the woman who cast the curse - she was known as the Evil Queen. When we meet her we know that she's been trying to kill Snow White, her step daughter, for some reason and that she cast the curse so that she would be miserable. No more happy endings.
It's revealed that the reason she wants Snow dead is that when Snow was 8 years old she told Regina's mother, Cora, that Regina was in love with a stable boy named Daniel. Cora, a powerful witch, didn't want Regina running off with a stable boy when she could marry the King - so she killed him.
(Cora also arranged the meeting between Regina and the King - by having Snow's horse go wild and Regina riding to rescue her)
However, this wasn't the start of Regina's fall from grace. She tried to escape her marriage but mother dearest would always stop her. Until one day she called up a powerful being - Rumplestiltskin - to help her. He helped Regina trap her mother in a mirror (in Wonderland incidentally where she became the Queen of Hearts).
Rumples took her on as his apprentice and by pretending to try and help her bring back Daniel (it was an elaborate plan to destroy her last bit of goodness by pretending the procedure failed so she had nothing left) he finished the foundation for the woman who would become the Evil Queen. This woman would proceed to try to kill Snow White for frakking with her chances of love, and then go on to cast the curse that would deny everyone their "happy endings".

In Storybrook (the town they live in our world) she is the mayor and she has adopted a boy, Henry - who happens to be the son of Emma, the aforementioned savior. Henry suspects the curse and thus doesn't like his mother.
(I think he's a bit of an asshole - I mean, the woman has raised him for 10 years and with the exception of trying to have his psychiatrist convince him that his theory is madness hasn't been a bad mother)
Her actions in the series are primarily aimed at trying to keep Henry - however, she doesn't do it the right ways since while it's clear she loves him, her only real examples of parental love are her passive father and her b*tch of a mother. At the beginning of season two she was working to redeem herself in Henry's eyes, but thanks to Cora's intervention she's now back to the "dark side".

Regina started out on Eros with regards to her desire to destroy Snow White but has since moved onto Affection (family love). She loves Henry - so he must love her back. She exhibits the "need-love" aspect of Affection - it wants to be returned, it wants to be loved.

Cora a.k.a The Miller's Daughter (from Rumpelstiltskin)
Honestly the biggest b*itch in the series. While she only wants the "best" for Regina, she doesn't allow Regina any choice in the matter and has even used magic to restrain her. Basically, rather than true concern for her daughter, she would rather live out her failed ambitions through her. In the most recent episodes, she framed Regina for murder to turn Henry against her and then used this new divide to convince her daughter that she could only get Henry back through use of magic.
She helped Killian to get his revenge on Rumplestiltskin in order to chase her daughter into a new world and "assist her in her greatest time of need".
In C.S. Lewis's the Four Loves, we can see that Cora's "love" is when Affection goes wrong. Affection needs to be needed, such that it will manufacture reasons why it must still be needed. Cora does this throughout the series and thus exhibits the "give-love" aspect of Affection - the need to be needed.

Rumpelstiltskin a.k.a. Mr Gold, a.k.a. The Dark One
If we want to trace back everything that went wrong in this world, it comes back to Rumpelstiltskin. He taught Cora magic, he gave Regina the curse, he killed Killian's True Love. But why?
Well, Rumpelstiltskin was once a poor man with a son, Baelfire. His wife had left him long ago and the town hated him because of his cowardice in running away from a battle. And now his son (not yet fourteen) was being recruited into the same long running war.
He had heard that he could control a great entity called the Dark One if he had it's dagger - a dagger currently kept by the man sending the children to war. So, with Baelfire's help he stole the dagger and summoned the Dark One. After an argument Rumpelstiltskin accidentally killed the Dark One - and became him.
After this Rumples defeated the ogres in the war and brought the children back... but the power went to his head. Nothing was to hurt his son. They would never be looked down on again. However, Baelfire grew afraid of his father and wished for him to return to normal so he consulted the Blue Fairy. The Blue Fairy gave him a magic bean, the "last in the land" (revealed to be a big fat lie) that would take them to a world without magic. However when Baelfire went into the portal, the coward in Rumples resurfaced such that while he was freaking out the portal closed. Since the Blue Fairy said there was no other way, Rumples started to try and find the Curse so that he could return to his son.
It was this event that lead to his teaching Cora magic, his corrupting of Regina, all to get to this "world without Magic".

Again we see Affection, but I think Rumples is more motivated by guilt. It was his cowardice that caused his wife to leave him and that caused him to lose his son. But it was the total disregard for anything but his son that did the most damage. He lost his True Love Belle twice to this - as a kiss from her would break the curse of the Dark One and he would lose the power to find his son. In Storybrook he and Belle struggle with his dark side.

Rumpelstiltskin works a bit differently to the other characters since he is sharing his body with an evil entity that sort of boosts his dark side. However, the biggest fan backlash was about his actions towards Killian. I mean, it didn't serve his purposes of finding Baelfire so it can't be justified by that. And, honestly, of all his crimes I'd say that this was the most... well... human.

I mentioned that Rumpelstiltskin's wife had left him, yes? She did - for Killian. But she didn't outright walk out on him. She pretended that she had been kidnapped and then Killian challenged Rumples to fight for her. Rumples who had a limp. And a very young son who would be an orphan if Rumples died. And thus Rumples couldn't fight - he was afraid. Rumples carried that guilt with him for at least 10 years - that it was due to his cowardice that Baelfire didn't have a mother.
Once he became the Dark One he tracked down Killian to avenger Milah - only to find she was happy with him. In exchange for their lives she offered a magic bean (told you the Blue Fairy was a liar). When Rumples asked her why she left Baelfire she said it was difficult but she had to be free "never loved [Rumpelstiltskin]".
Now... the woman who he married and had kids with, the woman whose "kidnapping" he felt guilty for for several years, the woman who he obviously loved just told him she never loved him and hated him so much that not only did she wished he died in the Ogre wars but chose to leave her son just so she wouldn't be with him. In a rage her killed her and left - and so Killian stole the bean and used it to get to Neverland.

A lot of people hate him for that... but I really view it as his most "human" action - I mean, all this information was just dumped on him. What else would he feel besides rage?

Anyway... I guess I made this post because I don't see that many really good villains - these guys may not believe that they are doing the "right" thing, but they are working towards real goals. And it's nice to see a villain where the "love" that motivates them isn't about power or lust.

Chemical: the way we love, the way we love;

It's quite inhuman...

Tourniquet

I tried to kill my pain
But only brought more
So much more
I lay dying
And I'm pouring crimson regret and betrayal
I'm dying, praying, bleeding and screaming
Am I too lost to be saved
Am I too lost?

Recently I’ve been thinking of suicide – not thinking of suicide as in “suicidal thoughts” but just thinking about the concept of suicide and its implications. Specifically religious implications. Probably because I've been listening to Tourniquet a lot lately - hence the title.

Okay, while not all religions were against suicide – for instance in ancient Japan it was believed to be more honourable kill oneself than to surrender and some mythologies were similar – those descended from Judaism were vehement on the matter: it was forbidden.

In the original versions of the Seven Deadly Sins that Despair was originally a mortal sin because it symbolized a loss of faith and hope – no longer trusting in God. Suicide is taking God’s most precious gift and getting rid of it. Those who take their own life cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

This is where my musing actually starts – what about drugs? So many medications out there, especially anti-depressants, include suicidal thoughts as a side-effect.

Also, take into account mental illness - it's estimated that 87%-98% of suicides had a mental disorder. The obvious ones are Depression and Bipolar Disorder, but there are others. Of suicides, mood disorders are present in 30%, substance abuse in 18%, schizophrenia in 14%, and personality disorders in 13% of suicides. These are all chemical imbalances - either caused by the illness, causes the illness, or by the medication for the illness. (In Swing a Little More I mention that while Lithium is the most effective medication in regards to suppressing suicidal impulses/thoughts, the medication to stop the kidney damage from lithium increases such thoughts.)

Even without looking to specific mental disorders, it's been found that those who attempt suicide have low seratonin levels (mood modulator and neurotransmitter), and those who complete it have the lowest levels.

Is a chemical imbalance someone willingly throwing their life away? Or would it be considered differently? Are there exceptions, a rule, a second chance?

My next question is this: what about those who willingly endanger their lives?
Just to clarify – I am not saying that my following examples should be considered the same as suicide-by-free-will. My thoughts are... odd on this matter so I’m trying to properly categorize them. How is saying “Hey, I don’t care if I die” different to saying “I don’t want to live”?
If those who are chemically imbalanced towards hurting themselves in a fatal way get penalized (forgive the word), what happens to those who are mentally healthy but through themselves off cliffs attached to a chord, or diving into the rift, or other “thrill seeking” activities. I mean, I know we all take risks with our lives just by leaving the house but we don’t run in front of the cars! These guys sign contracts that explicitly state that if they die then it’s not the company’s problem!

Ok, I know that may be irrational but I don’t see why if someone who is supposedly in full possession of their faculties could care so little about their lives that they may as well throw them away...
I know that they probably don’t think that it’s possible that they may die – at least it’s not in the forefront of their mind. Like for surfers – they don’t have to sign a contract to go in the ocean.

Not on the “thrill seeker” side of things there are soldiers – men who willingly risk their lives for what they perceive is a worthy cause. They know full well that they could die. I know they aren’t happy with the idea and they aren’t seeking to die but they know it’s a risk.

I guess it’s that a suicide intends to die, while the soldier accepts that it’s a possibility but doesn’t want to, and the thrill seeker doesn’t really consider it. It is intention.

I’m not saying that stupidity or honour is on par with actually taking one’s life – what I am saying is that since suicide could be the result of mental illnesses and drug side-effects can they really be considered to be taking their life of their own volition? I mean real free-will? I know some can resist these impulses – but what if the imbalance is that bad or the illness that far progressed?

I’ve never read an exclusion clause. I’d like to think that there’s something to help but I don’t believe in reincarnation or past-lives despite the romanticism behind them – mainly because I don’t like the idea that my personality as it is has nothing to do with my soul and I could have just as easily been a male born in 1955. However, I know that Judaism has explicit mention of past-lives, and that Christianity isn't mutually exclusive with the idea. Hell, a younger me thought that it was a good explanation as to why Heaven wouldn't be overcrowded.

Actually, I’d be likely to believe such a theory if said second chance took the form of them being reborn without said illness or imbalance thus giving them a chance to relive their life over... however that would be unfair to those who don't get a second chance unless everything except said imbalance/illness was the same but that would go against the concept of free-will which is something I believe in thus I couldn't believe that theory anyway...
Not to mention that it would seem to imply that I either I monumentally frakked up my past life attempts and am on my nth chance with God, or that I haven't frakked up but am still supposed to live all this out again and risk on of my future lives frakking up the afterlife for all of "me". On top of that I have no small amount of distaste for the idea that if I could have married multiple people already at that once I die whatever vows I made/make ultimately mean nothing. But that's getting into my personal weirdness.

And then we look to those who were dying and then committed suicide. For instance, a person dying of a particularly painful disease. They have days, weeks, maybe months to live but all in complete agony. Is it so bad that maybe they don't want to wither away like that? By that same token, would a person refusing further medical help be considered suicide if said treatment could extend their life? Personally, I don't know - I'd imagine my thoughts may change if a relative/friend chose such a route.
I so love chasing myself in a circle... not.
This post doesn’t involve me coming to some sort of brilliant conclusion, a minor epiphany, or even some weird little decision. It’s just me wondering what is going on here.

My wounds cry for the grave:
My soul cries for deliverance.
Will I be denied?
Christ!
Tourniquet!
My suicide...

Wrong Role Models

Recently I've been thinking about how the media can effect people. Particularly their view on relationships and such.
I don't just mean TV, I mean music and movies too.

This idea came to me while I was sitting through an episode of "Friends" - a famous American sitcom which my Mum loves and which I watched for the sake of one character. Those familiar with the show know that for most of the series we sit on the edge of our seats, waiting for Ross and Rachel to get together. I realized that Ross was a horrible male "role model" - that is a horrible model of a male for women. He cheats, he's spoilt, he's arrogant, he's not a good catch. At all. But we're supposed to think he is.

Then I realized that this happened in most sitcoms, especially the ones of note.

Happy Days had the Fonz, whose influence upon society was so great that when he bought a library card in the show US library card sales skyrocketed. With the exception of a short story line, he has multiple girls on his arms and is never seen with the same one twice. And despite him going through women like tissues all the girls still wanted him and the guys wanted to be him. In the Happy Days universe, everyone treats him as something special.

The aforementioned Friends had Ross Gellar and Joey Tribiani. While I know quite a few people who despise Ross, we still had to hear the "audience" ooh and aaah over his every action. Cheat on Rachel? But look how sad he is! Say Rachel's name when getting married to Emily? Awwww, he's in love with Rachel. Some guy leaves Rachel a phone message? Oh of course hide the message Ross, that's the mature thing to do. But he's in love with her! Never mind that he can date other women!
And then we have Joey, who will sleep with anything. Sure he's sweet and kind to his friends - just hope you're not one of his one-night stands.
The only male left is Chandler - who is pretty much the butt-monkey of the group despite being the only one whose One True Pairing isn't disfunctional as hell.

Finally, the worst of all offenders, and I know this isn't a popular opinion, is How I Met Your Mother - my sister's favourite program and one that I have seen every goddamned episode of.
I'm not going to mention Barney though - Ted's the one I take issue with. The lead character, the one out for "true love". One one-night-stand at a time. I understand that we have a girl-of-the-week show here so I shouldn't be expecting long term relationships. I know that he was serious about Stella (that was a sad storyline - I do feel sorry for him there). But look at the how many girls - look at the breakup with Robin. He, like Ross, got all up in arms after Robin started dating one guy despite all the girls he had dated since. Also, we do realize that he's telling his kids these stories? And not in a cautionary way or anything.
Not to mention how the "moral of the story" of each show almost always results in "Ted's right". And even if it doesn't result in that we have things like "Nothing good happens after 2am". Really? Blame it on the time? I've stayed up later than that and still managed not to act like a douchebag. Barney at least owns up to the fact that he's a manwhore - more importantly, so does everyone else in the program. Ted is just "looking for The One" - and that's how everyone treats it.

Finally, take some pop music from the 70s or 80s and listen to the love songs in particular. You will be hardpressed to find one where the theme isn't "I'll die without you", or "Let's get physical (and that will fix everything / show how much I love you)". Mum says that the music my generation listens to is bad - at least it's not trying to disguise it's meaning. The songs of her generation seem to spout the myth that sleeping with a person is the magical fix-it to every relationship problem which, when combined with the sitcoms and even on it's own, is a bloody awful message.

Ultimately, my problem here is that these males are being portrayed as "good". Really look at them. They're men who believe that they are entitled to a sexual past but the women they want aren't - or a future after them. Everything bad that happens is never their fault. Basically, they're full of double standards - and they're portrayed sympathetically. It's much like the biggest complaint about Twilight - Bella doesn't even recognize that the relationship is abusive.

The message is that this is what a good man is. Maybe for some women this is their dream guy, but a show needs to portray them for their flaws too and not try to turn those flaws into some sort of "awww how cute" thing.

The media needs to realize the subtle messages it's sending. It's not the Barneys who's dangerous to the generations watching him - it's the Teds because their flaws aren't addressed in-universe (at least not for more than one episode). If those around the problem don't recognize it, then the viewers (especially the younger ones) don't recognize it as one.

Mad Love

"There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness."
- Nietzsche

Yes, I know that I was supposed to have continued the Disturbing the Disturbed series.
Yes, I know it's late.
Yes, I know that this post is unrelated to the series.

What's possibly more disappointing is that I'm not even really making a post now. My sister came across an article that she wanted me to talk about and since it was thematic with Valentine's Day, as well as the fact that there's SCIENCE in it.

The February 2012 Edition of the Australian Reader's Digest had an article entitled "Crazy in Love". Now, I'm not going to discuss the chemical reactions that make people fall in love - firstly, because it's been done to death, butmainly because while psychologists have decided that that takes between 90 seconds and 4 minutes to decide you fancy someone on a physical level (the domain of oestrogen and testesterone) it seems to discount the scenario where someone falls for someone's personality. Think about it - asexuals aren't interested in sex but some are interested in romance.

Not to mention the experiences of myself and friends that pretty much say "Appearance? Meh. Personality? Yay!" and it takes a lot longer than 4 minutes to get ahold of a person's personality.

Don't get me wrong - I'm not saying that the scientists are wrong, attraction does play a factor. I'm just saying that you have to take into account different sexualities beyond that of heterosexual and homosexual and that there are other ways of getting to the state of being in love.

(Also, Pride and Prejudice where it took the leads ages to fall for each other. Yes, I know it's a book. Do I care? Not really. There are real-life circumstances like it.)

Instead, I'm going to talk about what "love" does to a person on a chemical level once they are in love since people don't actually cover that very often.

Now... stuff from the article - this love applies to lovers and family love.

Helen Fisher, an antropologist, found that when people look at the picture of their beloved, their brains register an increase in activity in the primordial centre - the part that powers survival instincts and controls the release of dopamine.

Dopamine is that hormonone that is stimulated by chocolate and drugs - you know, addictive things. It suppresses seratonin, the mood stabilizer. Combined these guys cause craving, elation, energy, and focused attention(dopamine effects); and incessant thinking, and "involuntary irresistable ruminations" (lack of seratonine effects). This is similar to the effect of drugs.

Furthermore, in 2000 the University College London's Neurobiology lab found that romantic love disables the primal parts of the brain that help with social judgement - thus blinding them to faults.

So far you're probably thinking that you've heard this all, but wait! There's more!

You see, our brains aren't stupid - they know that we can't live blind to faults. Thus it adapts with the introduction of two new hormones: oxytoxin (in women) and vasopressin (in men)... the "cuddle hormones". :3 In women, ocytoxin not only strengthens the attachment between her and her beloved but actually turns back on the sections of her brain that were turned off.

In a note vaguely related to my series, the inability to secrete oxytoxin and thus feel empathy is related to sociopathy, psychopathy, narcissism and general manipulativeness.

When tested on animals vasopressin made the males "turn from their wanton ways" (*giggle*) and become protective of their loved ones.

This article ties in nicely with all those marriage advice things that say that the best way for couples to stay together is by doing new things (increasing dopamine) and by being affectionate (increasing vasopressin and oxytoxin). The reason I actually bothered reposting it was because it explains the chemicals behind staying in love too - too many reports and studies just hand-wave love as a necessary chemical reaction for human survival and eventually endes, which when coupled with the 50% (or so) divorce rate is a bloody depressing thought for a romantic like myself.

And yet people still fall in love and stay married until they die - so there's something they're not telling us.

Now, you can probably see why I chose the above quote. Yeah, there's some madness in love, but it's the reason (when it kicks in) that actually helps it work.