Torchwood ep 5 themey meta

[beccaelizabeth]

okays, thoughts under the cut
about age, and maturity, and when everything changes


So far we've had a lot about becoming the monster. Consistent theme, every ep. Mess with this stuff, become the monster. And again here we have Jasmine, who not only became the monster, she made a choice to do so.

Only - ages.

There's been a bunch of 'teen ages mentioned. Carys? Definitely the flashback girl Lizzie. I don't know if Estelle belongs on this list, but 17 when Jack met her.
Young, the way I count from my grand perspective of not-thirty-yet-for-agesmonths.

And now we've got a little kid.

Lizzie got in over her head trying to do something she was warned off.

Carys survived it, but hello to trauma.

Estelle lived a grand long life - hence the not being sure she belongs here. And then, dead, with Jack. Which makes it about Jack. And also... Well, if it was the Doctor, then the point would be, he's immortal, so she's still just so damn young.
However long she lived she was very young in terms of knowledge - she'd found the wider universe, the way things weren't quite how she'd learned in school, but she didn't know well enough how to threat assess or what to do once danger caught her.

Like a little kid walking home alone?

This little girl chose to go live forever in the lost lands with the fairies. But it isn't much of a choice. Below the age of consent, as that creep the paedophile highlights. Below the age she can know what she's choosing, or giving up. Or what the others want with her anyway.

So she chooses to become a monster, having had no clue that was a possibility, no idea what losing her humanity means.


So how does this figure as a theme?

Humanity, pretty damn young. They've been in this cradle called Earth for a while now, just venturing next door a couple of times. Pretty soon they'll be wanting to go out, meet people.

Have they got a clue how to handle that?

Or are they your typical teenager, with a self evaluation lightyears ahead of what they'll think was was in ten years time?



So are Torchwood any different?

Hell no. Seen that, over and over - becoming monsters started right there.


How about Jack?
... depends if he's a monster already.


Of course, I'd like to think, it isn't about age, per se. Just knowledge. Which is what makes what (the imaginary organisation) Torchwood does so foul - ignorance is poison, and there they are going around creating ignorance. Nasty.

Treat everyone like children. Keep them that way.
Not of the good.

Makes you wonder, who benefits? And why?



You know, with all this lit stuff I'm reading, I kind of want to point out, I don't necessarily say this stuff is in the text waiting to be found. I mean, it would be nice to think that way. But I try and say, can be read as. Or, can be read into, I know. How much of this is from the text and how much I pull out the back of my mind is entirely fuzzy.

But isn't this just fun?

Comments

[aeshna_uk]

Which is what makes what (the imaginary organisation) Torchwood does so foul - ignorance is poison, and there they are going around creating ignorance.

I don't think that this is necessarily true - a little knowledge, as they say, is a dangerous thing. Humanity in the DW-universe seems entirely capable of insane self-deception without any help from Torchwood (spaceships over London? a Cyberman in every home? Blame it on terrorists putting hallucinogens in the water supply! No wonder Jack seems disgusted with them) and giving them dribs and drabs of half-formed information about things so much bigger than they are would likely do more harm than good... if they even believed a word of it. Sometimes it's better to hold back until you're ready and absolutely certain of the validity of the information you have to hand - after all, it's not as though Torchwood is 100% certain what they're dealing with from one situation to another.

And as for Jack - everybody IS a child compared to him. He's stuck in the role of parent, trying his best to keep things under control, but well aware that he's the only one who actually has any idea of what might happen next and how potentially unpleasant the wider world/universe really is. He's playing a long game, may well have been doing so for a century or more now, and knows that there's no point in panicking the children until it's absolutely necessary. With guidance, they might survive this, but you don't just hand the cocky teenagers a pile of weaponry and tell them to be scared. All they'll do is shoot each other. ;)

The time will come when people are ready to accept things, and when the knowledge is in a fit state to be shared for the common good (the voiceover at the start sets out the philosophy fairly clearly, I think, cheesy though it is). In the meantime, it's not fluffy, it's not nice, and it's not subject to the Freedom of Information Act. But someone has to be the parent and stop the kids from panicking and for now that person is Jack. Which is probably not a role he ever expected to find himself in! :)

my second attempt at a comment (first was too long)

[beccaelizabeth]

Writing this up I realised I'm rather fuzzy on exactly what is publicly or officially known in the TWverse. So I'm arguing as if they're covering up absolutely everything, like they did with the Weevil attack. But I'm not sure it's a 100% blackout.

anyways, answer to your comment:

Saying 'humanity' on the one hand and 'Torchwood' on the other is an interesting distinction.

a little knowledge, as they say, is a dangerous thing
But the only cure is a *lot* of knowledge.

Right now the population at large *has* the proverbial little knowledge. They know Daleks, Cybermen, autons and bloody big spaceships over London happened. They're groping around for some explanation, one that they can act on to protect themselves in the future. And what data are they being given to supplement their little knowledge? Lies. So they do stupid things because they don't know they're stupid.

I mean, is it more logical to think there are hallucinogens in the water or cybermen in the home? It depends on your paradigm, where the edges of your real is.

Hallucinogens are common knowledge.

Cybermen? Known only to the few. Nobody else has that explanation available. And anyone that tries it?

I read Fortean Times. The response of the mainstream media to those people that believe they have met aliens is... not positive. There was a bit in the news lately complaining that a man would be allowed to give evidence in court even though he believed in the existence of extraterrestrials, as if that belief and sanity were mutually incompatible. There are social pressures to conform to the majority opinion, even in the face of the evidence of one's own senses. Even for events with multiple witnesses, the mainstream explanation is medical, not extraterrestrial.

So in the DWverse we have a massive event where just about everyone sees Cybermen.
What is the first explanation? From common knowledge, or outside it?

And then add the fact that in the DWverse there's an actual organisation of MIB who go around erasing evidence and planting false explanations... insane self-deception seems less like the accurate description. Majority opinion says they're insane to believe the truth, and the deception comes from others.


And as for Jack - everybody IS a child compared to him.
Well, the metaphor could be saying that. But the actual fact of it is, no, there are actual adults.
If adults can't make the correct decisions it is because they don't have the correct data to work with.
Teenagers might not be handed guns, but if guns are going to be a significant part of their future they need education about guns. Otherwise they arrive at calendar adulthood without the necessary knowledge to participate.
BTW - 18 is sign up for the army age, 16 with parental consent. They do hand teenagers weaponry. They just give them training too.

someone has to be the parent and stop the kids from panicking
The first step is to teach them not to panic, yes.
But the second step is to teach them what to do in an emergency.
Otherwise it's like telling children there is no fire until the smoke kills them, rather than telling them how to hit the alarm and what to do once they hear it.
In the TWverse, the 'children' are already playing in traffic, but they're being told the cars aren't real. How are they supposed to protect themselves in that case?


If the 'children' are in fact free willed individuals with a capacity to make unimpaired decisions that is just as good as that of the people withholding that choice from them, the parental attitude is unjustified.

The only difference between Gwen and those 'children' is that she's had a couple of weeks to get used to it and access to good data.

The only difference between Jack and the next guy is what he knows. And if he sets out to educate people, other people will know what he knows.


If instead the knowledge is withheld, it preserves the monopoly that keeps that minority in power making decisions for everyone. And is that ever in the best interests of the rest of the world?



... That's a rather long comment.
I, er, have long standing opinions on this one from Buffyverse discussions, so I get wordy.

Re: my second attempt at a comment (first was too long)

[beccaelizabeth]

and if that sounds shouty it's not *at* anyone is just that the making it less shouty takes more words

Re: my second attempt at a comment (first was too long)

[aeshna_uk]

Saying 'humanity' on the one hand and 'Torchwood' on the other is an interesting distinction.

Not really. It's the same sort of relationship as "the general public" and "the police". One is just a subset of the other with a particular set of responsibilities, and both TW and the police are looking after their own in that context.

But the only cure is a *lot* of knowledge.

Only if that knowledge exists in a form that can be safely and reliably explained, preferably backed-up by evidence. Otherwise it's a lot of guesswork and half-truths, which will likely do more harm than good. At this point in time, I don't think TW (and/or UNIT, etc - TW isn't the only organisation involved in this stuff in the DW-verse and others are more official and much more involved with what is passed on to the public) has enough in place to provide a reliable and believable body of information.

Even for events with multiple witnesses, the mainstream explanation is medical, not extraterrestrial.

And so it should be. You have to explore and exhaust the possibilities of the known before assuming the unknown - that's just good science. Only when the available facts fail to fit into the established parameters do you start to look beyond and see if you genuinely do have something new. And if later evidence comes to light that alters the overall picture, you adapt to it. Things aren't necessarily real/unreal just because people really want them to be one way or the other, you just have to go with the evidence presented.

Majority opinion says they're insane to believe the truth, and the deception comes from others.

In TW it's interesting to note that the hallucinogens thing is meant to be Rhys's belief, not an official explanation - Gwen doesn't seem to have an opinion either way and Jack thinks people are idiots for failing to notice what was going on. Which seems to indicate that it's not TW spreading misinformation on the big things - they're neutral in this respect. That's more likely to be the press and the government(s), maybe UNIT, if not just the general groundswell of popular belief.

If adults can't make the correct decisions it is because they don't have the correct data to work with.

And if the full and correct data isn't available to anyone? If it's not utterly concrete when presented (not that humans are the most logical creatures even with a full set of facts), then people will react in all the gloriously illogical ways they always do, and here that likely means a nutty cult on every corner (some all peace and love, some attempting to fit new information into established religions, some using it to promote why they should be ruling the world, some arming themselves to the teeth against the coming annihilation, some declaring that we should kill ourselves now before the alien scum eat our immortal souls....). From a TW perspective, muddying the waters like that would just make their work all the harder.

If instead the knowledge is withheld, it preserves the monopoly that keeps that minority in power making decisions for everyone. And is that ever in the best interests of the rest of the world?

When the alternative is every Tom, Dick and Harry going off half-cocked and raving, potentially yes. :) As presented, TW is looking out for the future of humanity. They're not out to preserve their own political/financial power base because, so far as we can see, they don't have one. The time isn't yet right to go too public and they still have a lot of work to do, but the suggestion is that at some point this century things will change, and they'll be there ready to help the world through it.

Plus, you know, the show isn't about the media helping humanity through the ABCs of first contact, etc. It's about a bunch of dysfunctional alien hunters in Cardiff. ;) There may be a place for the media thing elsewhere, but I suspect it'd be far less interesting to watch!

[beccaelizabeth]

actually while I think of it, part of the Bad of this episode was the idea of staying an immortal *child*. Keeping her a child forever = bad.