Polyamorous Vulpine

It is simply staggeringly offensive on so many levels that the narrative supports Damon - that we are supposed to feel sympathetic - when he says ‘I love you’ to Elena. He abuses her.

Abuse. Is. Not. Love.

It’s disgusting and shameful that we have to remind full goddamn grown adults of this fact. It’s disgusting that when a woman tells a man no and he forces himself on her anyway, continuing a pattern of abusive and controlling behaviour, when she later reminds him that she isn’t grateful for his violations and manipulations, he throws a violent temper tantrum - that is narratively supported as a good thing because it saved somebody’s life - and she is made to feel ashamed for it.

She is made to feel ashamed for telling her attempted rapist she doesn’t want him.

This show, ladies and gentleman! This show.

I honestly think that rather than ‘this guy is treating her like shit and she’s finding ways around it’ we’re supposed to view Damon’s controlling abusive behaviours towards Elena and her rebellion as a morally or emotionally conflicted situation rather than a victim circumventing a rapist’s control. And that, in case anyone needed to be updated, is a huge damn problem.

Also Matt Donovan continues to treat ladies like shit. I'd give him a pass for it this evening if it wasn't a reminder of the way he treats all women he doesn't think he's gonna get something out of. (Or Caroline, his devoted emotionally fragile abused girlfriend, whom he knew that he would get something out of no matter how badly he treated her.)

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Tanya Huff's heroines are incredible, her storylines are delicious, her humour is hilarious. Her women are active, independent, in control and at the helm of the story; snarky, flawed, clever, practical. I love them one and all, and I love reading their adventures.

So why does she have to write such insufferable heroes?

Dean is okay. Sweet. Michael Cellucci is a disgusting creep who abuses police resources out of simple jealousy over a woman he isn't even dating and follows her out of town because she's going with another guy like some skin-crawling psycho stalker. And she ends up spending the rest of his life with him which just goes to show, being a controlling asshole does get the girl!

Ryder is loathesome. He's smug, he's stupid, he's an opportunistic vulture that profits off of other people misfortune. He insist on going into a situation that's potentially highly dangerous, knowing that he doesn't know what the hell he's doing and that he could get people killed because he's a dumbass civilian in a military environment, and not giving a shit because giving them the best chance to get out of there alive would mean he doesn't get to profit.

Oh, and he thinks it's 'fun' to harass women who don't like him. Can that goddamn well stop being a trait considered positive in heroes? It doesn't make you charming, it makes you an entitled flat-out jerk who considers his personal enjoyment of more importance than a woman's comfort. I just loooove the bits about his own comfort zone later, and how he freaks out about it and it's accorded respect and concern, because he's got a dick and that makes him god.

The whole thing is played as charming and rakish and funny, and I loathe him, and I'm kind of ticked off that I love Torin so much I'll keep coming back for more, even with this dipshit taking up more and more page time and space.

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Lynn Viehl -- who I already complained about -- is really, really horrible on the relationship dynamic bit, and she keeps reminding me.

I like the StarDoc novels. I love Cherijo, cranky and irascible as she is. But I haven't been able to read them for some time.

( cut for spoilers )

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Curran was tolerable because Kate kept him on his toes, baulked at every turn, slapped him down and outwitted him more often than not.

Declan has the upper hand and uses it to terrorize Rose, keeping her believing that she's going to be torn away from her family, kidnapped, imprisoned and raped for most of the goddamn book. He is also explicitly condescending. Rose gets to call him on it once or twice, but when he patronizingly tells her "you don't date." after she doesn't respond well to his sexual harassment I wanted to scream out loud and throw the book at the wall.

( cut for spoilers )

I expected better of you, Ilona Andrews. I really did.

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Okay, so. This guy bullies her into engagement, tells her how to raise her son -- including telling her not to go after a ten year old when he leaves the house in the middle of the night and shoving her when she's having an argument with the boy -- physically manhandles her where he wants her to go against her explicit will, gets in her car and drives off with her in it despite her telling him to stop and not do so, and finally refuses to leave her house when she tells him she wants him gone. This guy is a certified grade-A creep, and we're supposed to view him as the ultimate sweet, romantic guy.

Yeah, I'm...so totally not feeling the narrative's expectation of recriminations for cheating on him. Which she hasn't done yet, but I'm told she will.

It got so bad I skipped to the last episode just to see if I would be wasting my time and/or raising my blood pressure finishing it. I would be. So I won't.

There's some TV I'm just not made for!

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I'm watching a drama from 1998 that, I sincerely hope, is a product of its times, because the guy they're trying to get me to like -- and who is concerned for and generous towards his newly discovered family -- is being a total creep to the heroine. He's hounding and bullying her into accepting his proposal of marriage, including putting her on the spot in front of everyone at his father's funeral. After she repeatedly states that she's not over the tragedy that killed her husband, she's not interested in a new relationship, and tells him, flat-out, to leave her alone. He can't, he reports, because he's interested in her. His interest apparently renders him incapable, because who gives a shit what she feels.

He apparently believes that because he's been pining after her for some number of years without a word, acting as her friend, she owes him something. Nice Guy much?

This kind of stuff is pretty damn prevalent nowadays, but I like to think it isn't so blatant. Though probably I'm just suppressing. >.>


And then they have her accept his proposal, without the slightest previous romantic interest in him, which mostly makes it look like he's just made her feel bad enough about it to say yes. Uggggh.

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