Trying not to find this creepy, failing
Dec. 14th, 2014 04:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ljwritesI read a Guernica article called La Milonguera which was about the author's experience living in Buenos Aires and rooming with a milonguera, female tango dancer whom the author gave the pseudonym Romina.
I found the piece itself sort of boring and pointless, to be honest. At places it captured the atmosphere of the city's tango scene in interesting ways, and the way Romina lost her tango career to an accident was genuinely sad. From there, though, it was just one thing after another without any clear point or context and lost steam toward the end.
Also I found the author Tamzin Baker's behavior downright unethical at one point. While nursing an injured Romina back to health, the author finds photographs of Romina looking happy with a man. Baker then goes on to do this:
What the hell? Why not, you know, ask like a grown-ass adult? You friggin' live with the woman, it's not like you lack the opportunity! I couldn't believe how cavalier and entitled the author was being was about something that could be very sensitive for Romina. Worse, there's no acknowledgement on Baker's part that she did anything wrong or was violating any boundary.
Even if the two routinely looked through each others' things as roommates, there's a difference between borrowing a dab of perfume without explicit permission (which was what the author was doing in Romina's bedroom) and going on a focused search through documents and keepsakes to find information that Romina had not yet chosen to disclose. Romina does tell Baker later about her relationship with the man in the photographs, but that's no excuse for Baker's actions.
Even worse, I found this about the author in the bio at the bottom of the article:
Yeah, snooping without any remorse whatsoever is really reassuring behavior for a future therapist, and gives me perfect confidence that she's going to respect her clients' boundaries at all times.
That's not the part that creeped me out, believe it or not. The creepy vibe I got was from this comment to the article:
I was immediately repulsed by Christopher's sentiments, then honestly tried to see it in a positive light. He's, er, in love with Romina and wants to protect her. Okay, that's... well-meaning and benevolent, I guess? It's not like he's ever going to meet Romina, in all likelihood, so no harm done. Right? Right?
Yet no matter how I tried I couldn't help finding the comment scary as hell, so I decided to unpack those feelings in writing. I've always been better at expressing feelings in writing than in speech anyway, maybe because I have too many memories of being shut down when I tried to reveal myself.
Since i can't recommend in good faith that anyone go read the article (the first half is rather interesting, though), I'll summarize what the readers, including most likely Christopher, know about Romina from the piece:
1. She was a skilled and sought-after tango dancer who was truly passionate about her craft.
2. Her tango career ended when she shattered her foot rushing out of a bus.
3. She grieved the loss and, when (barely) healed enough, took an office job to support herself. Keeping busy helped her keep her mind off things.
4. She later revealed to the author that she had been in a relationship with the guy from the photos, who turned abusive when he learned she was pregnant. He abandoned her and then showed up weeks before her due date, when he pushed her during an argument and caused the death of the unborn baby.
6. Before the author's departure from Buenos Aires, Romina sewed her a blouse and surprised her with it.
7. Her other passion seems to have been fashion: While browsing through Romina's things the author found sketched clothing designs, and she sewed a blouse for the author as mentioned above.
8. She didn't seem to be in contact with any family, which was why the author was her main caregiver during her injury.
So here we have a vibrant woman who suffered some really awful things, was dedicated to her art, and had a great deal of warmth and caring for the friend who helped her through her injury. A complex and full person, in other words. And yet the only aspect of her Christopher seemed interested in was what she had suffered, not who she is and what she did. And the way his heart broke for her, or rather that part of her, caused him to want to help and protect her, even though there was little indication that she needed protection or help. More disturbingly still, he ties the role of protector to the role of lover as though one blends seamlessly into the other.
The question then becomes, say that he meets Romina (hopefully never) or some other person he similarly sees as a Broken Bird and triggers those same protective/romantic urges in him. What happens if she doesn't want anything to do with him? Or if she accepts her help only to find out later on that it came with romantic and sexual strings attached, and refuses the latter? What if she does become romantically involved with him, only to displease him in some way, such as by wanting to break up or making a life decision he doesn't agree with?
Under Christopher's mindset, being a broken woman's (I hate to say that, but that's the way he seems to see Romina) protector seems to mean that he is entitled to her romantic and sexual affections. If she breaks that script, what else would he feel entitled to? The likely answers to that question scare me.
So try as I might to view Christopher's comment in the best light, I still find his white-knight complex about Romina disturbing. This probably has roots in my own background: My father's sincere and overwhelming desire to protect me from all harm, well into adolescence and now adulthood, all too often led to verbal and emotional abuse when I wouldn't comply with his demands and, in his eyes, endangered myself. The need to protect someone who isn't in need of it, the urge to see someone who is fully capable as being helpless--those are all too often code for a need to control the person, and I know not to trust the offer of such "protection."
I found the piece itself sort of boring and pointless, to be honest. At places it captured the atmosphere of the city's tango scene in interesting ways, and the way Romina lost her tango career to an accident was genuinely sad. From there, though, it was just one thing after another without any clear point or context and lost steam toward the end.
Also I found the author Tamzin Baker's behavior downright unethical at one point. While nursing an injured Romina back to health, the author finds photographs of Romina looking happy with a man. Baker then goes on to do this:
I searched for more relics of this time, looking through her drawers, through the boxes she stored beneath her bed, and in the manila folders stacked on her window ledge. But I found nothing [...]
What the hell? Why not, you know, ask like a grown-ass adult? You friggin' live with the woman, it's not like you lack the opportunity! I couldn't believe how cavalier and entitled the author was being was about something that could be very sensitive for Romina. Worse, there's no acknowledgement on Baker's part that she did anything wrong or was violating any boundary.
Even if the two routinely looked through each others' things as roommates, there's a difference between borrowing a dab of perfume without explicit permission (which was what the author was doing in Romina's bedroom) and going on a focused search through documents and keepsakes to find information that Romina had not yet chosen to disclose. Romina does tell Baker later about her relationship with the man in the photographs, but that's no excuse for Baker's actions.
Even worse, I found this about the author in the bio at the bottom of the article:
Tamzin Baker is a journalist and training to become a psychotherapist.
Yeah, snooping without any remorse whatsoever is really reassuring behavior for a future therapist, and gives me perfect confidence that she's going to respect her clients' boundaries at all times.
That's not the part that creeped me out, believe it or not. The creepy vibe I got was from this comment to the article:
Comment by Christopher: I am in love with Romina. My heart breaks for her I just want to hold her and comfort her. Help her, be her lover, be her protector. I love this story. Thank you for writing it.
I was immediately repulsed by Christopher's sentiments, then honestly tried to see it in a positive light. He's, er, in love with Romina and wants to protect her. Okay, that's... well-meaning and benevolent, I guess? It's not like he's ever going to meet Romina, in all likelihood, so no harm done. Right? Right?
Yet no matter how I tried I couldn't help finding the comment scary as hell, so I decided to unpack those feelings in writing. I've always been better at expressing feelings in writing than in speech anyway, maybe because I have too many memories of being shut down when I tried to reveal myself.
Since i can't recommend in good faith that anyone go read the article (the first half is rather interesting, though), I'll summarize what the readers, including most likely Christopher, know about Romina from the piece:
1. She was a skilled and sought-after tango dancer who was truly passionate about her craft.
2. Her tango career ended when she shattered her foot rushing out of a bus.
3. She grieved the loss and, when (barely) healed enough, took an office job to support herself. Keeping busy helped her keep her mind off things.
4. She later revealed to the author that she had been in a relationship with the guy from the photos, who turned abusive when he learned she was pregnant. He abandoned her and then showed up weeks before her due date, when he pushed her during an argument and caused the death of the unborn baby.
6. Before the author's departure from Buenos Aires, Romina sewed her a blouse and surprised her with it.
7. Her other passion seems to have been fashion: While browsing through Romina's things the author found sketched clothing designs, and she sewed a blouse for the author as mentioned above.
8. She didn't seem to be in contact with any family, which was why the author was her main caregiver during her injury.
So here we have a vibrant woman who suffered some really awful things, was dedicated to her art, and had a great deal of warmth and caring for the friend who helped her through her injury. A complex and full person, in other words. And yet the only aspect of her Christopher seemed interested in was what she had suffered, not who she is and what she did. And the way his heart broke for her, or rather that part of her, caused him to want to help and protect her, even though there was little indication that she needed protection or help. More disturbingly still, he ties the role of protector to the role of lover as though one blends seamlessly into the other.
The question then becomes, say that he meets Romina (hopefully never) or some other person he similarly sees as a Broken Bird and triggers those same protective/romantic urges in him. What happens if she doesn't want anything to do with him? Or if she accepts her help only to find out later on that it came with romantic and sexual strings attached, and refuses the latter? What if she does become romantically involved with him, only to displease him in some way, such as by wanting to break up or making a life decision he doesn't agree with?
Under Christopher's mindset, being a broken woman's (I hate to say that, but that's the way he seems to see Romina) protector seems to mean that he is entitled to her romantic and sexual affections. If she breaks that script, what else would he feel entitled to? The likely answers to that question scare me.
So try as I might to view Christopher's comment in the best light, I still find his white-knight complex about Romina disturbing. This probably has roots in my own background: My father's sincere and overwhelming desire to protect me from all harm, well into adolescence and now adulthood, all too often led to verbal and emotional abuse when I wouldn't comply with his demands and, in his eyes, endangered myself. The need to protect someone who isn't in need of it, the urge to see someone who is fully capable as being helpless--those are all too often code for a need to control the person, and I know not to trust the offer of such "protection."
