It's all in your head

[andrewducker]

[Poll #1759985]

I'm including everything here from romantic comedies to rape porn comics, via computer games, roleplaying games, and the works of Shakespeare. All of fiction, in any form, that plays into any kind of ideal that we might covet, lust after, or wish to embody. Personally, I wanted to be Luke Skywalker when I was 11 - then I'd show the school bullies not to mess with me. Your fantasy might have been different :->

Comments

[kerrypolka.livejournal.com]

Some are good and some are bad? And I don't think it's the fantasy bit that's harmful, it's validation of fantasy as normal, desireable, worth doing in real life, what real life is actually like, etc. when it isn't.

[andrewducker]

Interesting - what do you see as providing that validation?

[kerrypolka.livejournal.com]

Constructed narratives that are similar to it being presented as true? I hope borusa doesn't mind my quoting from his brilliant review of One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest last year:

There's no room for any shading at all, and as a result the "nasty evil ball-breaking woman and her negro sidekicks repress the poor fragile white men" theme becomes unavoidable. ... It's a shame that so much skill, talent and artistry has been wasted on a film that has such a dark heart, and it's an even bigger shame that it seems so many people get swept up in the anti-establishment fervour and don't think about what was chosen to represent that establishment. In the end, this is a movie that stands up and says "I am saying something true."

It's lying.

News stories, anecdotes from friends, etc. are all constructed narratives too, of course.

[andrewducker]

Aaah, gotcha.

So, if fantasy is presented in a style which is too close to truth then it makes it easier for people to become confused (probably not even consciously), and make assumptions about the way the world is based on it. Therefore fantasies that are entirely unlikely are in some ways to be preferred, if we don't want people to apply the lessons from them to real life?

Not, I'm sure, that there isn't a fantasy so unlikely that _someone_ won't take it seriously.

[kerrypolka.livejournal.com]

I don't think it's the setting or the plot of the fantasy that has potential danger, but what it says about the way the world works (especially, but not exclusively, people). A magical sword-and-sandals film with a ludicrous plot may be unbelievable in style, but if all the white-looking men are honest and brave, the nonwhite-looking men are cheats and villains, and women of all appearances are helpless and incompetent, it reinforces the fantasy that all those things are true.

[andrewducker]

So it's whether there are already negative things that are being presented as true that are being presented in the fantasy? And thus they're reinforcing that?

[kerrypolka.livejournal.com]

Not even just negative things, but harmful things (and I think all inaccurate beliefs about how the world works are harmful eventually if enough people believe them).

[andrewducker]

It's the "If enough people believe them." bit, and how much fantasies affect that.

I think that belief in "The One" is harmful, for instance, but I trust that most people that read romantic fiction don't actually believe that there's a magical process that means that there is one other person out there who is magically matched to them, and anyone else is a mistake. I assume that them reading fantasies about that kind of thing isn't going to warp their fragile little minds and cause them deep unhappiness.

[kerrypolka.livejournal.com]

Yes, I agree with that. I think the troublesome and difficult bits are the ones that sneak into fantasties/constructed narratives that aren't so obvious to catch. To run with the romantic comedy example, people will consciously say "oh, I recognise that there isn't actually a One for everyone and that was a fun fluffy piece of entertainment", but they might not necessarily say "oh, I recognise that Black women have lives and feelings just like everyone else and don't just exist to prop up the lives of white women" if it is one with a Sassy Black Friend. The parts that people aren't paying attention to are the most potentially harmful ones.

[andrewducker]

Certainly, if every time they encounter a black woman she's falling into one of a few common stereotypes (like "Sassy Black Best Friend", which is apposite, as I'm midway through season two of Ally McBeal at the moment) then eventually it will seep in subconsciously, particularly if there are no real black people in someone's experience to compare them to. It's not like there are no "Sassy Black Best Friends" in real life, but if that's the only way you ever encounter black women then that's the overall impression you're going to get.

So, the problem with fantasies are the simplifications (and untruths) which can be used repeatedly in such a way that a person doesn't realise that they're building up a picture of the world which is incorrect, because it's never foregrounded and they don't have any real life experience to compare it to, or countervailing images in other fantasies?

[kerrypolka.livejournal.com]

I'm a bit confused as I feel I've repeated myself a few times - please let me know where I'm not being clear!

[andrewducker]

I'm checking that I've understood you.

The best way to do that, in my experience, is to feed back to you what I think you're saying, in my own words.

If I've got it right then all I need is a "Yes!" :->

[kerrypolka.livejournal.com]

Oh, I was reading your questions as requests for clarification and I was racking my brains trying to figure out how to rephrase it again! I don't tend to read questions in LJ comments as anything but an invitation to continue a discussion!

[andrewducker]

I shall try to be clearer in future!

[kerrypolka.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[innerbrat]

Needs an "all of the above" category.

[andrewducker]

They always do :->

Also - can I steal your icon?

[innerbrat]

Of course you may! I made it myself, so just credit me?

[andrewducker]

Will do!

[star-tourmaline.livejournal.com]

What makes you think this is an either-or?

[andrewducker]

I don't.

I really ought to write a post about the GOOD/BAD polls, and why I used them. I keep explaining in the comments, and never have anything I can just point people at :->

(Giving people a dichotomy in which neither side is right is a method of stimulating discussion, because people consider their views, try to make them fit either option, fail, and leave a comment instead.)

[octopoid-horror.livejournal.com]

You complain when I present situations as black and white, yet you keep presenting choices that way :-D

[andrewducker]

I complained that applying black and white choices to real life didn't work. The polls aren't supposed to work, as I just said in that comment you replied to.

(Of course, you might also have been saying that in order to start conversation, in which case I applaud you!)

[octopoid-horror.livejournal.com]

A painfully binary poll would put me off and discourage debate for me, since it would suggest the person framing the argument possibly didn't understand the situation.

[andrewducker]

I'd like to think that both of the options I presented (and generally do present) are over the top enough that people realise they aren't to be taken seriously.

Of course, I'm liable to fall for a corollary of Poe's Law.

[channelpenguin.livejournal.com]

both. such is the beauteous contradiction of human beings...

[don-fitch.livejournal.com]

It seems to me that _some_ people take at least some of them seriously. Maybe too many, too seriously. Not that I expect that anything effective can be done about this.

[alitheapipkin.livejournal.com]

It depends on both the person and the fantasy I think. For example, for me roleplaying games are harmless fun and occasionally a helpful outlet for frustrations caused by living in the real world. This is because a) I do live in the real world (as much as an overeducated homeworking academic can) and b) I know who I am and pretending to be someone else for a while doesn't threaten this. However, I know people for whom it is a deeply unhealthy pastime. And I've also left games because the other players' failure to separate the game from reality began to disturb me (I don't know whether you are familiar with Unknown Armies, but don't play it with a bunch of occultists if occult goobiness freaks you out in RL!).

[andrewducker]

I definitely agree that there are always going to be some people who do not differentiate well between fantasy and reality. And it's not something I really want to be around!

(I've played Unknown Armies. I liked it. But yes.)

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

Can I have the second answer without "that nobody takes seriously"?

Fantasies are very serious and important, as far as we can tell. They also don't work anything like how we expect them to. I wish people would treat them rather more like dream interpretation (complex and a PITA) rather than "he likes watching violent films so HE'S GOING TO MURDER SOMEONE!"

[ratmist.livejournal.com]

In some ways, I think I do take it seriously though, even though I am obviously capable of telling the difference between fiction and reality.

I read a lot of romance and erotic fiction. From the age of about 11 or 12, I've read these books. They were hugely eye-opening for a lot of obvious reasons, but they were also my only means of sexual education in Texas. My school district did not show us how to use a condom, or go through the safe sex options at all. A lot of erotic and romance fiction does not contain safe sex, but some do, and I picked up on all of it. The books helped me not be afraid of sex, when all I was told at school and at church was to be avoid it like the (AIDS) plague until I got married. The books helped me enormously to become confident about myself and my sexual needs, which is something no other form of media helped me with.

That said, there is a double-edged sword to them. You can end up comparing your relationship or sex life to the books, and that is never a good idea. But it's really not about wanting to be a duchess or princess or whatever. It's about wanting to have instant communication no matter what; a baddie to unite against; a simple misunderstanding that is fixed up by the end of the book; the vicarious enjoyment of another world that does not exist. These are all things that all kinds of fiction provide to readers, not just erotic or romance novels.

[atreic.livejournal.com]

Chocolate cake:

Dangerous food substance fuelling the obesity epidemic

A normal part of a healthy diet when eaten in moderation with other foods.

It's about not getting carried away with things, innit?

[tysolna]

I think the word I am looking for here is "This!" :)

[andrewducker]

Innit indeed!

[gwendally.livejournal.com]

I know a great many men whose lives appear to have been drastically altered by porn. Most of my six brothers are not married or in significant relationships and I think this is because no woman measures up in real life to the ease of the relationship they ahve with the fantasy women they jerk off to.

[andrewducker]

Frankly, if all they were looking for in a partner was an orgasm production unit then their putative girlfriends are better off without them.

(They might change if they gave it a go, of course.)

[erratio.livejournal.com]

Were you the one who posted a link a while back to a paper showing that violent video games increase tendency to violence, but that the time spent playing those games more than balances it?

In any case, all my psych reading suggests that everything primes you and perverts your expectations of real life, and should be taken with varying degrees of seriousness. But the real danger only appears if you're spending more time immersed in that fantasy and getting it validated by others than you're spending exposed to reality and getting your perceptions readjusted to normal.

[ashfae.livejournal.com]

Normal part of human behavior that sometimes are taken seriously.

Without fantasies, I'd never have had any ambitions.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

With such a broad definition of fantasy I would suggest that fantasy goes further than being a normal part of human life and begins to tell you what a normal aspiration is. Shared and approved fantasies tell you what you should be aspiring to be. Stories, as a distillation of the truth, tell us what an acceptable truth might be.

For example, I think societies’ view on what constitutes manliness is influenced by the stories we tell ourselves to the point where they become self-referential and self-re-enforcing. Our stories tend to present a version of manliness that is action orientated, has a tendency to resolve dispute through violence or physical exertion and is emotionally robust or unaffected.*

I’m thinking of heroes such as Robin Hood, Julius Caesar, Luke Skywalker, John McClane, Dirty Harry, Leonides, William Wallace, Nelson and Wellington.

I’m not saying that this is the only type of hero on offer but I suggest that versions of acceptable hero and therefore role model and therefore acceptable behaviour are passed through a cultural filter that uses this version of manliness as a basis.

Further, if you try and construct a version of manliness that is not like this version of manliness your version of manliness is “other manliness” in the vein of Real Men Eat Quiche.

Same for the American Dream of physical wealth earned through independent hard work and invention (perhaps coupled with a nuclear family). The acceptable way to be an American is to participate in capitalism and to do otherwise is to risk being branded Un-American.

So, in someways, what is an acceptable fantasy tells us what is an acceptable way to live our lives.

*Noting the exclusion of John Riggs and Maximus Decimus Meridius, both of whom are driven by a somewhat nihilistic response to extreme emotional trauma.