Vampirism as Victorian crime
Feb. 8th, 2010 06:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethI been thinking on my irritations with Being Human, and a lot of other vampire shows, and I think the basic problem is equating vampire attacks with murder. To theorise a vast network of killers that uses techniques of organised crime to cover up murder... It doesn't resonate with me. There aren't that many serial killers, and gang crime, at least around here, isn't of that scale... as far as I know.
If we're talking about crime that goes on all the time, but rarely if ever gets prosecuted, where the victims can speak up and will not be believed, then the comparison isn't murder, it's rape, and domestic violence. Official statistics say 6% of rapes result in a criminal conviction. The vast majority of those crimes happen without getting caught, and even those reported don't result in anything helpful. Domestic violence happens and keeps going and going and nothing gets done about it. Crimes that can hide in plain sight, criminals with a hidden face, and the up close and personal nature of the bite? That's the crimes you're talking about.
But reading for cultural studies about Victorian crime I noted something else about the vampire thing. The male attackers are vampires, monsters, but after the attack so are their victims. That doesn't seem to track, until you read the garbage Victorian stories come up with. There a woman, having been raped, becomes a monster herself, fallen, suited only for a life drawing men into darkness. The idea that a woman who was raped would have no option but a life of prostitution is absolutely abhorrent, yet apparently plausible at the time. The idea that prostitution makes you a monster is pretty crappy too, but the imagery of two out of three texts we've read goes there, all about the darkness and evil under the artifice. And then not just men by force or with money but women by guile and for their own profit go out and recruit more women. Or, in that particular moral panic, children. It's grotesque. And it's very much like the classic vampire setup. Which makes the whole vampire thing... possibly import some grotesque assumptions.
There are real world cycle of violence problems too. One person does vengeance, someone else does vengeance on vengeance, it keeps going and going. And the organised crime and violence thing is a story with a lot of world behind it too. Bullies make bullies. Violence begets violence. But if we're talking domestic violence, and cycles of that, in a story that turns women into vampires, then the story is saying that domestic violence makes women go out and be violent. And, well, do the stats support that? I don't know.
Telling a vampire story as a private addiction where one man has angst about what he's done seems to skip all of that. And keeping it focused on murder leads to the situation where maybe someone 'needs killing' to protect others (which is stupid and only because the proper prison type mechanisms aren't used or working), suggesting excuses, and really, no. If the whole thing is a closer comparison to rape then having someone throw a vampire at someone they think 'deserves' it is even more twisted. And trying to find a girlfriend to inspire angsty man to do better is really really messed up.
I think there's stories that know the complications, and I think there's some that just have the idea of a pretty white man feeling guilty about hurting people in the past, in a way we're supposed to sympathise with. Which can get full up of problem. And not always problem that knows it's a problem.
Horror stories... they're kind of exhausting.
If we're talking about crime that goes on all the time, but rarely if ever gets prosecuted, where the victims can speak up and will not be believed, then the comparison isn't murder, it's rape, and domestic violence. Official statistics say 6% of rapes result in a criminal conviction. The vast majority of those crimes happen without getting caught, and even those reported don't result in anything helpful. Domestic violence happens and keeps going and going and nothing gets done about it. Crimes that can hide in plain sight, criminals with a hidden face, and the up close and personal nature of the bite? That's the crimes you're talking about.
But reading for cultural studies about Victorian crime I noted something else about the vampire thing. The male attackers are vampires, monsters, but after the attack so are their victims. That doesn't seem to track, until you read the garbage Victorian stories come up with. There a woman, having been raped, becomes a monster herself, fallen, suited only for a life drawing men into darkness. The idea that a woman who was raped would have no option but a life of prostitution is absolutely abhorrent, yet apparently plausible at the time. The idea that prostitution makes you a monster is pretty crappy too, but the imagery of two out of three texts we've read goes there, all about the darkness and evil under the artifice. And then not just men by force or with money but women by guile and for their own profit go out and recruit more women. Or, in that particular moral panic, children. It's grotesque. And it's very much like the classic vampire setup. Which makes the whole vampire thing... possibly import some grotesque assumptions.
There are real world cycle of violence problems too. One person does vengeance, someone else does vengeance on vengeance, it keeps going and going. And the organised crime and violence thing is a story with a lot of world behind it too. Bullies make bullies. Violence begets violence. But if we're talking domestic violence, and cycles of that, in a story that turns women into vampires, then the story is saying that domestic violence makes women go out and be violent. And, well, do the stats support that? I don't know.
Telling a vampire story as a private addiction where one man has angst about what he's done seems to skip all of that. And keeping it focused on murder leads to the situation where maybe someone 'needs killing' to protect others (which is stupid and only because the proper prison type mechanisms aren't used or working), suggesting excuses, and really, no. If the whole thing is a closer comparison to rape then having someone throw a vampire at someone they think 'deserves' it is even more twisted. And trying to find a girlfriend to inspire angsty man to do better is really really messed up.
I think there's stories that know the complications, and I think there's some that just have the idea of a pretty white man feeling guilty about hurting people in the past, in a way we're supposed to sympathise with. Which can get full up of problem. And not always problem that knows it's a problem.
Horror stories... they're kind of exhausting.