Pleasure Through Pain

Reading Between the Lines

2009-05-01T08:06:00.000-07:00

As much as I hate to admit it, the Odyssey is really the only classic epic poem that I had to read for high school. Also - I am even less proud to admit that I skipped most of it, finding it repetitive, violent, and boring. I also had the tendency in high school to read only novels written by Piers Anthony or Terry Goodkind (science fiction and fantasy), so you can see where my literary criticism skills were. It was really cool to see Professor Esposito-Frank use passages from the Iliad and the Aeneid to explore her topic: "Lines of Pain" this past Tuesday.

At first, I was wary. I knew that there was going to be a focus on these classics, and I was prepared to be bored. This is no reflection of Profesor Esposito-Frank, because she seems charismatic and bright. I just think about poetry in a very different way. My favorite poems come from much more contemporary sources for the most part. e.e. cummings, Lucille Clifton, Allen Ginsberg, Langston Hughes - I have just tended to expose myself to poetry that seems to speak to me. I assumed that anything too ancient was bound to be somewhat irrelevant. The only book I've ever read all the way through that is anywhere near as old as the Iliad is the Bible, First and Second Testament. And we all know what a thrilling read that is. All the begetting and thou shalts don't exactly get me all worked up into a literary frenzy. Plus - these epic poems WERE about religion as much as anything else. Or so I thought.

As it turns out, the passages we read together from these epic poems were, for the most part, very valid in comparison to current pain imagery and displayed emotion. We discussed Priam begging for Hector's body back to give him a proper burial - which is something I know is still done today between warring factions or countries. We witness Hector's wife, Andromache, lament his death in three ways - as a foreshadowing, as a heart-broken widow, and as a pissed-off ex. We can certainly find timely ideals here. I now have a summer mission - to read some of these epics all the way through and find just how much ancient pain mirrors contemporary interpretations.

I have actually decided to do my honors thesis about contemporary coping with pain. This material could help me a lot in gaining some perspective.

As a side note - that Saba poem, "The Goat" - rocked me. I love all of the different translations, and I think it was a really fun way to end a kind of heavy lecture. That goat to me is a Jew, a Human, Humankind, the poet, and a Goat all at the same time. Brilliant.

Yankee Doodle's Response to C.S.A.

2009-04-16T14:42:00.000-07:00

This film was amazing. I had no idea what to expect before I got to class. I thought it was going to be more of a narrative - but the format was actually much more like a History Channel special on American History. The Confederate States of America, that is.

The most offensive, painful (and therefore the most interesting and useful) parts of this film were actually the "commercials." Items like "Nigger Hair Cigarettes" seem horrifying, until you learn at the end of the film that this was an actual product. In the commercials there were suggestions about how to own your slaves - how to keep them from running away by drugging them. There were references to black slaves being treated by vets, as opposed to actual doctors. During these scenes, the entire room either giggled, or got uncomfortable. I think most of us were thinking how outrageous and preposterous this was.

But it isn't so far off. It isn't hard for me to believe that had the Confederacy won the Civil War, we could have very easily stayed a slave nation. Even worse - all of the richest countries in the world have slave trades - still to this day. Sex slaves and indentured servant-domestic workers exist in this country - it's just no longer sanctioned by law.

I thought it was really funny that this was supposedly a British television program (from the BBS, as opposed to the BBC) - because it gave both sides to the story. There was a very eloquent black woman (from Canada) who did some of the narration, and she made no secret of how f*cked up the Confederate system was.

I think this is an important film, and I know I will insist that many of my friends watch it. I think that it is, at times, offensive - but in a way that enables us to laugh, and also really think about race in this country. The pain of slavery is far reaching. Gigi and I discussed that upon leaving the classroom, we felt badly about ourselves. Not that Gigi nor I have ever owned slaves, black or otherwise, there is a terrible guilt that follows many conscientious or sensitive white Americans. I can't ever really understand what it might be like to deal with slavery as a black American, but I have to imagine it's probably more painful from that end. Films like C.S.A. make us all remember that our country was doing overtly racist things until, like, yesterday - and only now is trying bit by bit to make up for it.

Watching this film also makes me re-love Walt Whitman. I think I'll go read some Whitman now, as it is a sunny Spring evening and I've been thinking dark things for far too long.

Something Aesthetic

2009-04-16T14:36:00.000-07:00

This is a painting that I photographed while in London this past summer. I can see a lot of pain in this image. It is interesting that it was done by a Brit - or at least I assume so. Would the painting seem different if it were done by an American? Or - going back to our discussion of 9/11 art - how do you think this would have fared?

Triathletes

2009-04-09T15:42:00.001-07:00

The amount of pain people suffer to complete an Iron Man Triathlon is completely beyond me. I feel like this has to become a complete obsession. I don't feel the same way about the sprints and shorter triathlons, even though the training for even a half Iron Man must be tough. I don't just think people do it for the title. There is something inherently masochistic about the rigidity of the training and the massive endurance challenge the Iron Man represents.

I love sports, but I don't really love professional sports. I like playing sports, or watching people actually having fun playing. There doesn't seem to be any fun in an Iron Man Triathlon. I may be wrong - but the footage we saw in class would certainly make that argument. Like I mentioned in class, many of the female Iron Man triathletes looked to me like AIDS patients. The bones all poking out - it was ghastly. Especially watching these corpse-like figures struggling to get up and go on after their bodies give out time and time again.

Now - I am all for shaking it off and playing. I've been hit in the eye with a softball hard enough to see stitch marks, and I kept playing. But the kind of pain a body must experience after eight hours or more of hard labor is on another pain plane entirely. I also wonder what effect this kind of race must do to a person's psyche. Obviously it's intense enough to convince women (and men too, I suppose) that they have to emaciate themselves for the cause. But what about the other issues inherent in competition? To battle for twelve hours or something, just to see yourself passed by someone older, or seemingly less fit - this sport seems to be about almost nothing BUT pain.

To me, I guess, it really boils down to limits. Our own - psychological and physical. I have no desire to prove myself on the Iron Man course in Kona, Hawaii - but I do set some pretty intense goals for myself. My own perfectionism in some areas of my life could be considered masochistic, too.

Feel the Burn

2009-04-03T08:08:00.001-07:00

I was so surprised by Professor Claycombe's presentation this tuesday. When I thought of pain and performance previously, I had thought about only circumstances like in "Angels in America" - actors portraying a false or mimed pain. I was alarmed and perversely interested in the other pain performances he showed to us.

"Sick" represents many things that are hard for me to imagine. The artist's Cystic Fibrosis, for one thing. To me, this is one of those insidious diseases that I know causes incredible pain for the sufferer, and there is no way for me to adequately wrap my mind around that level of pain. However - some of these acts of masochism performed by Bob Flanagan helped me to get a better (if horrifying) idea of the amount of pain he suffers. Seeing the images of his beaten, torn, shit-smeared body, I feel closer to him than I probably have a right to. He lets us, the audience, into his pain - so we can wallow there with him.

There is also that element of showmanship. He is a performer, after all, and he is definitely "taking it like a man." Who cares if he never played lacrosse or ran a marathon - he is taking cigarette burns to all of his most delicate parts. I think it is particularly interesting that he refers in his poetry to "taking it like a man" - and yet he is a male who has completely humbled himself before his mistress, Sherri Rose. She even sodomizes him - which lends a very interesting twist to that phrase. He sure is taking it. We saw that in all of its glory.

For me, it was less disturbing (yet even more interesting academically) to see Ron Athey's performances - probably because his masochism was displayed so differently. He was more concerned with the true "art" of the pain - and his religious tableaus (such as him playing the pincushion St. Sebastian) are representing pain on more than one level. There is his own pain and illness (HIV), there is the pain of St. Sebastian, and also a representation of a kind of religious/corporeal ecstasy that is missing in Rob Flanagan's work. I see Flanagan's pain performance as necessary for him, but I have no real need to be a part of it. Athey's work, however, has a beauty (in my opinion) that transcends physical pain and tries to tell more of a story.

I don't know much about art, but I know what I like. I do tend to like representations of pain, but to me - Sue Williams taking her pain and turning it into incredible paintings is more my speed.

Illumination

2009-03-25T14:17:00.000-07:00

What a fantastic film. All around - the casting and acting were superb, and visually it was incredible to watch.

As much fun as it was to see Elijah Wood play such an uncomfortable character and to laugh at the goofy, adidas-wearing Alex, the most incredible character, in my opinion, was Grandpa Alex Baruch. At first, he was so inherently unlikable. The only character less likable was the generation between Alex and Baruch - he was just a bitchy Tolstoy look-alike. Grandfather was, to me, just a crusty miserable old man at first. I have seen such characters before - my own paternal grandfather was very much as ornery and unpleasant. I think the actor who plays the grandfather does an amazing job of slowly gaining the audience's curiosity, then warmth, and then ends his role so beautifully in his death "repose."

Of course, everyone in this film deals with some kind of pain in their past, or discovers pain on this "most rigid search." Even the dog was deranged. Although - if I lived with Alex's family, I might exhibit deranged behavior as well. Seriously, though - the writer and main character, Jonathan, obviously has a lot on his mind. His intense neatness and strange collection habits definitely suggest a tightly-wound young man. His relationship with his grandfather, though it was close when he was a child, was very stressful for a young man who had little idea of his progenitor's history. Jonathan's fanny-pack of plastic baggies was at once very cool and unbearably sad. This young man was so afraid of forgetting his past - even his present - that he bagged countless strange artifacts that sometimes only very vaguely had anything to do with his family. Fear is definitely pain - a kind of pre-pain pain. It can be paralyzing.

On another level, the lone woman from Trachimbrod was sadness incarnate. She was surrounded by the most beautiful tomb on earth - surrounded by the bones of her life, and countless sunflowers. However, she wasn't the character who made me cry.

Grandfather Alex Baruch stood out to me the most because of his guarded emotional delivery of pain. His pain was not overt, nor was it immediately understandable. I think I was not alone in assuming that Grandfather Alex was one of the soldiers who did the murdering at Trachimbord. When it became abundantly clear that he had been a victim, I became even more involved in his character. Did his pain derive from the fact that he had this awful, traumatic thing happen to him? Or was his pain worse for having neglected his heritage - and his people - for so many years? The depth of pain was so aptly portrayed, and that last shot of him in the tub - was transcendental.

Lemons to Art

2009-03-25T13:51:00.000-07:00

I hate cliches, but I can't help but think of the old adage "if life hands you lemons, make lemonade" when I see the art and hear the story of Sue Williams. Her life was filled with so much pain - she suffered things on first dates that people don't usually face in war time. Her body was used and abused, and through this horror she has created such works of beauty. Not through, even. That's not the right word. Not "in spite of" either. It is truly as if the pain itself was a tool (or, dare i say, inspiration) for her incredible paintings.

Not that her story matters. I mean, of course it matters - but her giant calligraphic pieces are incredibly beautiful just as visual art. Her use of line and color are astounding. She really does represent a new abstraction, and it is so appealing. An interesting question might lie here: Would she be able to (or even want to) create this incredible art without the pain she had suffered?

I have a friend (who will here remain nameless) who suffered traumatic illness and surgery at a young age. Left with no colon and other, more grievous physical and emotional injuries - she has created some of the most interesting and radical art that I have had the luck to see first-hand. For her, the illness itself is definitely inspiration - she actually used to talk about being thankful that she was sick, because it gave her an artistic purpose. I can't help but wonder, though, if she would have even turned to art if she had never been so close to death. Also - in a bizarre twist - she is having trouble finding inspiration lately, mostly because she now knows that she will not die soon. She explained to a good friend of mine that she never expected to live this long, so she has no real idea of what to do.

We all know the cliched idea that without pain, there can be no pleasure in life, and that we all must take the good with the bad and the hideous. So much art, whether visual, auditory, textual, is borne from pain. One rarely reads a poem or hears a popular song that isn't about pain of some type. To create art, I assume one has to have something to say. Without a message (about life, technique, SOMETHING) art is kind of relegated to craft. I always been somewhat disappointed that I never excelled at visual art as a kid, and it wasn't something that I had a passion or real talent for. I wonder if my pain wasn't enough for art - or maybe my way of expressing that pain is just different from those who can paint it. It would be a tough choice to make - would I be willing to take a bullet to the lung to create the kind of abstract beauty of a Sue WIlliams? Or would I suffer through life with no colon to feel truly artistic?

Free Falling

2009-03-09T10:29:00.000-07:00

I happen to think that the Falling Man is a beautiful representation of an ugly event. I don't see any inherent horror in finding beauty in something negative. I say, thank goodness for artists out there who are able to create something of aesthetic worth during a time as trying to the American people as 9/11 was. I definitely think there is a fine line with photography, though. On one hand, I absolutely see the necessity of having dedicated press photojournalists documenting important events, whether they be positive or overly negative. We often get mad at photographers, though. Many of us hate having our pictures taken, even when we look fabulous. I can't really imagine the disgust I might feel if one of these intrepid journalists took a picture of one of the members of my family - their body crushed and burnt, or falling through the air.

Those journalists on he day of 9/11 were doing their jobs, but we all know that alone is not really an excuse for everything. For example, should you really be worrying about lighting and composition when someone might be literally dying for your help? I cannot say what I would have done if I was in NYC on 9/11 - I would have probably beat feet to get the hell out of there as quickly as I could. The man who photographed "Falling Man" was brave enough to actually get CLOSER to the buildings - I have a nagging feeling like he should have done something other than documentation.

Eventually, however, I really think he deserves accolades and not derision for what he had done - as does the photographer behind that iconic photo of the napalm covered girl running, or even (in a lesser and almost vile way) those German soldiers who documented what occurred in their Nazi death camps. Without the imagery of war flickering on their TV screens, the American people might never have questioned the reasoning behind our sending young men to die in Vietnam. Unfortunately, I think that these days people are so desensitized to images of violence that many are not even appropriately horrified by the pictures and video from Abu Graib to question our military involvement in Iraq/Pakistan/Afghanistan.

Oh - and I loved that classical renaissance-feeling painting we looked at as a representation of 9/11. I admit that I would maybe feel differently if it was hanging in Taliban headquarters or something. However - no matter what its origin - I think that art is so important to human culture that it would be a damned shame to see censorship repress artists. Especially in a country that prides itself so much on individuality and self-expression.

Performance of Pain in Harold and Maude

2009-02-26T19:47:00.000-08:00

I can vividly remember seeing the opening scene of Harold and Maude when I was young. There is the incredible build up with shots of Harold's feet - I know my patience with entertainment has suffered since I'd first seen this film, because I was getting antsy. I wanted the money shot. Because I knew what was coming, I relied on others' reactions for the surprise and alarm. Rich provided a fantastic gasp and a "What the hell?" More striking than the image of Harold hanging, though, is his mother's decidedly lukewarm reaction. Harold's elaborately wrought suicide "attempts" are obviously a performance of pain - although the pain he is expressing is emotional and psychological. Perhaps one of the most telling moments occurs when his mother is reading him the questions aloud for the computer dating service. As she becomes less and less interested in what Harold has to say (although I must say I don't think he speaks to his mother until the very end of the movie) he takes the pistol he has meticulously loaded, and points it at her. This is unexpected, but completely understandable.

Which leads me to: what a ridiculous character is the mother? I mean - every character in this film is a caricature, but she is so overbearingly unlikeable. Is she realistic? Is it important that she be? I guess that's part of what makes the film appropriate as a comedy. Without the laughs we get from the likes of the uncle and the priest, the tragedy of love and death could overwhelm the film. As it is, the film deals with the topic of death in such a way as to bring the viewer closer to the idea of their mortality, but in a comforting way. Harold's last "suicide" leaves that part of him in his past - as he is ready to embrace not just life, but his own mortality.

the big V

2009-02-24T12:50:00.000-08:00

I was lucky enough to get to see the Vagina Monologues this year - I caught the Sunday matinee with my boyfriend, sister, and her friend. There are so many ways in which I could connect vaginas and pain (specifically, the idea of birth makes me dizzy and need to sit down) but I think what struck me the most this year during the Monologues was the issue of female circumcision. In my mind, the idea that this happened to even one woman is horrifying, but the fact that it happens regularly to women in dozens of countries is just incomprehensible. In some places, only the clitoris is removed. In others, every outside part of the vagina is removed - clitoris, inner and outer labia. This truly renders a woman "a hole." Some of the excuses given for FC include the "fact" that women are inherently uncontrollable sexual beasts, and if they had their clitorises, society would fall apart. What kind of weird, archaic nonsense is that? The truth is that these surgeries are usually incredibly dangerous, and many times a woman is left with chronic pain. Other times, a fistula is formed, and a woman cannot control her bladder releasing. To me, this is not only a women's issue, but one of simple human rights. This kind of practice should be unequivocally stopped, in my opinion - to hell with tradition or religion.

On that note: I also hate the idea of male circumcision. I think that taking any body-part off of a person without their express permission is wrong on so many levels. Now - if we're talking about a tail or webbed feet - ok. Get rid of that shit. No kid needs to be tortured by classmates for their harelip or eleventh toe. Really, though - what use is it to get rid of the skin at the end of a penis? I have had this conversation before with many people that I see as being intelligent and humane, and most would agree completely about eradicating FC, but see no problem with young boys having their penises surgically altered before they have the right to assert themselves one way or the other. Circumcision is possible on older boys (I know of one young man who had it done at 14) so why mutilate a child? I use the word mutilate, realizing that it will probably provoke debate. Bring it. Also, I must admit that I have experience only with circumcised men, but that is surely because I am an American. Almost everyone here is chopped! Not so in Europe or Asia, and certainly not in South America. I cannot accept cleanliness as a reason for slicing the foreskin of a baby boy, because if your foreskin is keeping your penis dirty, chances are you're just dirty in general. Foreskin can be pulled back, and an uncircumcised penis can surely be effectively cleaned. So why, then, other than tradition, do we let this happen (and do it to our own children)?

As an end-note, I'd like to point out that I do not see male and female circumcision as the same thing. MC is to FC like ripping of a hang-nail is to amputating a hand. But although I see a difference in degree, I think there is an obvious similarity in kind.

Dr. Nick Ealy and Celestina

2009-02-24T12:32:00.000-08:00

I realize that it's taken me forever to get to this. My apologies! The truth is, I absolutely loved this discussion. In fact - it's class sessions like this that make me want to hang out in academia forever!

It was certainly useful for Dr. Ealy to point out the stereotypes of the Dark Ages before he started in on Celestina. The idea that these "Dark Ages" were dark due to ignorance and superstition is fallacious. Instead, he pointed out, we can find plenty of enlightened philosophy, if we care to look further than stories of limbs rent, etc.

"The Romance" story was a new ethos, according to Ealy, and the best kind of fantastical glory now came from love, rather than war and the battlefield. In Celestina, we see an example of this unfulfilled erotic love become a kind of exquisite pain for the two main characters. "Love batters me, though no wound is visible." This unfulfilled love has transformative properties - becoming enobling and transcendental. We see this kind of love in so many love stories - where the lovers elevate each other to impossible heights, and there is inevitably a fall. Celestina does not disappoint - the heroine literally "falls" from her window, torn apart as she is from her requited yet impossible love - and of course Celestina herself is killed as a direct consequence of her meddling.

The problem in many love stories is that there is an obvious gap between fantasy and reality. When her lover comes to her, they both become confused when the physical expression of their "love" is less satisfying than the pain they felt apart. If looked at from a modern perspective (which, I guess, I cannot help but do) this story becomes more tragic than ever. I mean, truly - who ever had a satisfying, let alone transcendental time losing their virginity? OF COURSE it was disappointing. For these two, that was just the first step leading to their literary doom. Ealy said that her life was based on empty dreams, and I think that was probably true of many medieval people. Hell - it's true now! I know countless people who think that if they only had that jacket, those shoes, that house, that boy - they would be truly happy. It never works out that way. We love to want things! Ealy calls this "a fundamental unavoidable lack." This renders us human, and can be a positive force until we fallibly think that an object of our obsession is the "one true answer."

Ealy also posits that love cannot be "the answer" because there isn't an answer. "Life is a search; enjoy the journey."

What Constitutes a Rape Act?

2009-02-13T13:01:00.000-08:00

During Nels' excellent lecture, even as I was paying rapt attention, my mind kept wandering back to the idea of a definition of "rape" or a "rape act." There are non-sexual definitions of rape (i.e. plunder), but I am not interested in those. I think I might like my own definition of rape, to then petition all 50 states to adopt my over-arching denotation. In trying to find what I consider to be rape, I looked up plenty of others' efforts.

"the unlawful compelling of a woman through physical force or duress to have sexual intercourse" and "any act of sexual intercourse that is forced on a person" were the top two definitions on Dictionary.com. The first obviously is gender-specific, and therefore nonsense, in my opinion. The second is still not right - sexual intercourse cannot be the only act included in the idea of rape.

MedicineNet.com has an extremely long definition (being medically inclined, I suppose). They include the possibility of any gender being a rapist and/or the victim, and also include the anus in their category of "rape-able" orifices. They discuss the important distinctions between regular "rape" and statutory rape - and also give date-rape a loose definition.

I think that the best place to start my definition of rape would be at the word's origin. Rape is derived from the Latin word "rapere" - which means "to seize." I think this is totally applicable, and would say that perhaps rape should be defined as any sexual act that is forced - any person who "seizes" anyone else's body part (vagina, anus, mouth) for their own sexual enjoyment (or general perversion) should be considered a rapist. Those boys who ejaculated all over a sleeping girl's face? Rapists for sure, in my book.

I am really interested in what other people think about this definition in progress. Please leave a comment if you have a suggestion - and I may work more on my definition as the semester goes on...

Say it Harder, so They can Feel it

2008-12-01T18:54:00.000-08:00

I just so happen to have read all four of these pieces before. The Sedaris piece (like all of his work) I've read over and over again, and the other three essays were assigned in the class that I am preceptoring with Dr. Nels. I think these four are excellent examples of personal essays/memoirs. Each one deals with pain on some level, but each uses a distinctly different tone to do so, and to connect with their intended audience. Also - I've come to realize how very important a strong beginning is to a successful memoir.

Sedaris' essay deals with his mother's death - a tragedy which seems almost incomprehensible to me. I think it might be easy to lose my attention with overt melancholy, but instead of being morose Sedaris skillfully uses humor to disarm some of the horror of the story. His opening is particularly appealing to me, dealing with both latent homosexuality and recreational drug use. I think another clever thing Sedaris does to draw a reader in and keep the story interesting, is to use his sister's marriage (a typically happy and life-affirming affair) as a counterpoint to his mother's looming lung cancer.

Beth Richards' essay was not necessarily about death, but the slow failure of her grandmother's mind toward the end of her life. Richards' strength, I think, lies in her amazing gift for description. Her first paragraph is some of the best description I've ever read. The character of her great-grandmother becomes so clear in so few sentences. Richards chooses her words so carefully - I could tell that even if I didn't know her habit of revising a piece over and over again. I am immediately drawn into her story, because I want to keep listening to her voice.

You certainly can't argue with Strayed's first line. "The first time I cheated on my husband, my mother had been dead for exactly one week." Wow. Obviously an attention getter. Also - it sets the tone for a very raunchy story. It can almost act as its own warning. Do not read on if you don't want to encounter something kind of nasty. I don't know if I could ever be this nakedly honest in a memoir of my own - especially about something sexual. I might be willing to kiss and tell - but not betray. Her tone is effective, but not something I could necessarily use myself.

Beard's story I found to be an engaging story, but definitely the least effective of the four, for me. Specifically, her first paragraph is kind of sappy, and it doesn't really set the stage properly for the rest of the story. In fact - the whole first couple of pages seems slow to me.

For all of this memoir reading, I still have little to no idea of what I want to write about for the final essay.

Push It

2008-11-18T15:45:00.000-08:00

This was absolutely the most depressing book I've ever read.

I read this before the class even started, and being so removed from this type of situation (extreme poverty/welfare/incest) I reacted unusually to it. With most fiction in general, I am able to get into the character's head and really relate - even when the book is fantastical or strange. However, with Push, I literally had to "push" myself to even read on to the next page. I hate to admit that I was actually revolted a little by Precious, not least because her name was f*&%ing Precious. She was so undereducated. It was not her fault, certainly, but she comes across as very unappealing to me.

"Precious'" writing style bothered me particularly. In the case of many Irvine Welsh stories, he writes dialog (and sometimes narrates) in a Scottish brogue. This can make it tough to read, but enhances the reality of the stories and characters introduced. This brand of Ebonic-type language that Sapphire uses does help to lend legitimacy to the story, but does not endear me to her characters. I don't like this about myself. It makes me uncomfortable that I would allow myself to stay so disconnected to this story while reading it. Especially once I learned about her HIV positive status - I wanted nothing to do with her emotionally. This is not typical of my attitude about AIDS (in fact - I will be going to see the UHA performance of Angels in America this weekend!) but it was like the last Jenga brick that just finalizes everything. Precious means nothing to me, excepting as a potential example of why I care about education and racial/gender equality.

Even more disturbing than my blatant dislike of most (if not all) of the characters (even Rain!) is the fact that the only time I "really" tuned in to the story was during the sex scenes between Precious and her father. This is not because I have any kind of experience with incest (thank goodness), but because the scenes were described so vividly. I tend to be a bit of a sexual person, and I will most often key in to the sexual aspects of a work of fiction. It is just upsetting to me that the "sexy" aspects of this novel were entirely unsexy. Even then - she describes orgasms (and sexual pleasure in general) in such a cool way, but I cannot even enjoy these images, because I am inexorably brought back to the thought that this is happening with her biological father, and that it's also rape. That's far too much kink for me.

songs to slit a wrist to

2008-11-11T15:36:00.000-08:00

I was so pleased that our assignment this week involved music. Music is a medium through which artists have been expressing pain for centuries. Films are cool to dissect, but there could never be as many films as there are songs. Plus - a song is a mini-art form. Large, orchestral compositions aside, a pop song contains a simple message - usually conveyed in under five minutes.

Starting with Nirvana was awesome. Kurt Cobain has been echoing my loneliness and inadequacy since I was in the seventh grade. "Smells Like Teen Spirit" is a freaking classic. The driving guitar and Kurt's strained voice express a deep apathy and sadness - both of which are emotions to which I have no problem relating. All three of the Nirvana songs are made even more poignant by Kurt's eventual suicide. I realize as I write this that I am referring to him by his first name - and I think this is because his music has made me intimately familiar with him. Well - that's not quite right. I never knew the man, but because he describes pain in a way that is familiar to me, it makes me feel inherently comfortable. There have been many times in my life when I depressed and miserable - and at those times I like to put in Nirvana's Unplugged, and just wallow for a while in our shared misery. It helps. I don't know why, but it helps.

As I made my way through the rest of the songs, I realized that my connection with these songs depends on two things. One, I have to understand the type of pain felt, at least to some degree. Two, I have to like the genre of music that the song represents. The country song? Eh. Tears on my guitar is a pretty goofy line, if you ask me, but I am not a good judge, being pretty vehemently anti-twang. The Travis song, the Clarkson song (gag me gag me gag me) and those two explicit "Fuck it" songs were uninteresting to me, either because I couldn't relate (as I couldn't to Travis's brand of melancholy) or I dislike the sound of the song.

One theme that I recognized that ran through a lot of these songs regardless of genre was that the vocals in many of them alternate from soft and sweet to yelling or strained. All the Nirvana songs are like that, "You Oughta Know" was, etc. I obviously have a good grasp on why I don't like some of the songs, but I think the only reason behind me really FEELING the song lies in the basic message. For instance - I love the new Beyonce track - "All the Single Ladies" or some nonsense like that. It's a hot beat, and it's produced well. However - I don't really FEEL what Beyonce is saying, because I don't believe in her basic message. With the Bleeding Love song - I could cry every time I hear it, because I believe it, and I know it, and I FEEL it.

I think this collection of songs makes it obvious that people write music about many different kinds of pain. I am way more into subtlety usually in art, but I like my pain songs to be sung by the likes of Alanis and Kurt. Anger, rage, deep and impenetrable sadness - these are things that deserve lines like "every time I scratch my nails down someone else's back I hope you feel it" and "I'm so ugly - that's ok, cause so are you."

Are You Kidding Me With That Hand/Saw Thing

2008-10-27T15:18:00.000-07:00

How horrifying.

Not the gore, although I had my issues with that as well. I'm talking about the acting. Why is it a prerequisite for any Hollywood horror film that the actors are lifeless and unconvincing? My personal favorite was the blonde chick who gets offed first - who happens to be the cousin of a friend of mine. She was such a perfect, lovely, and useless character. A throwaway. In fact - most of the people in this film (with the weak exception of Jigsaw himself) were completely useless, excepting as targets for the violence. I have a hard time justifying hours of my life to entertainment that is just trash. Maybe I could have gotten a bit more into the film by seeing the other four, but that was just too daunting a task. Leaving the theater, I thought, "What was the point of this film? What do people get out of it?

Gabrielle Murray's article offered a few reasons why people may be attracted to this kind of torture porn - one of which is that this kind of imagery makes us "feel things." Aside from bored and antsy, I suppose that the movie did make me feel something. Kinda sick. The second-to-last ultraviolent scene in the film occurred when two victims were forced to place their hands into a mysteriously-overly-complicated sawing device. They were to be bled almost to death. Now - there is no way to know exactly what that kind of thing might look or sound like - but that didn't stop the director from eternally drawing out the scene. The sound of bones being sliced through was unpleasant, but not scary. With no genuine tension in the film, I just didn't see the point.

I thought the plot was weak and predictable. Jigsaw picks "imperfect" people for his schemes. This is classic horror movie stuff - if you sin, you die. Sexual deviance, swearing, being a minority - these are all crimes for which one must be punished! I think the film would have been much scarier if his choices of victims were random. As it was, I didn't even have nightmares. How disappointing.

So - there was a definite effect on my psyche after seeing this film. Murray discusses a human desire to get in touch with our mortality. I do that enough on a regular basis (I have been known to be an outrageous hypochondriac), so I didn't really appreciate coming face to face with such explicitly graphic violence. It doesn't matter that this is a fictive story. My reaction is strong and visceral. The dude who gets cut in half on the rack-like device? Please. I will be thinking about a pointed blade slicing through my skin, and then my liver until further notice.

The Quest for Narrative

2008-10-21T16:05:00.001-07:00

This book, while a bit lofty and abstract for my taste (especially coming from a medical doctor!) made a lot of sense to me. I think that if I had read it ten years ago, it might have done little for me. To explain, perhaps I will tell a small narrative of my own.

I lived with my friend M (name withheld) for just under a year, and in that time I learned more about her body than I ever wanted to know. No, it was not a sexual relationship - we were just friends. However - when she was between the ages of 10 and 14, she underwent many surgeries and procedures - all dealing with her digestive system. She nearly died. One surgeon cut a wrong nerve, and ended up severing all feeling to her bladder, and most of the feeling in her sexual organs. I could go on for pages with the horror of what she's been through - mostly because she had a great need to share her narrative.

Her narrative was rather interesting, though, because she often "told" it with her visual art. I went to a show she did - and I was really blown away. She had an entire wall installation of illeostemy bags, and some amazing hand-stitched fashion-forward covers for them. She had an installation of toilet seats, cast of ceramic, with random people's toilet thoughts written right on them. Again - I could go on - but let's just say that I was impressed.

This book showed me that M's story is a Quest Narrative. She knows that she will never be back to "perfect health" - she has had permanent damage done to her body. She is truly amazed by her experiences, and almost grateful for them. As much as it can get frustrating when a friend obsesses on a topic (or themselves in general) I could not help but be impressed by this positive attitude.

I realize that my narrative here is not my self-story. I have a self-story about illness, I suppose, but it's just not as good as M's. I tend to dislike talking about my pain - it makes me feel weak and needy. Especially when serious things are happening with my body - it is usually something I try to deal with on my own - or I surround myself with people and drugs that can help me forget my predicament.

This book brought up some excellent points about ill people, however, I wish it was a bit easier to read sometimes. Brian, in his blog, kind of writes about what I mean. He uses some weird, highfalutin language to describe what seem to be basic concepts - he almost masks them with obscure language.

I ain't afraid of no ghosts.

2008-10-20T16:25:00.000-07:00

Torture porn usually doesn't freak me out. Some video images can make me wince - like that wretched scene in American History X when Ed Norton puts that kid's teeth against the curb - but I usually have a strong stomach. In fact, I don't think that my sickness while watching "The Ghosts of Abu Graib" had to do so much with the bloody images of torture, but the smiling faces of American soldiers while it was all happening.

Is it just me, or were these service people the dumbest, most bovine, honky-ass, short-bus soldiers ever? I realize that we need soldiers, but why aren't we doing a better job of spreading the brains around the operation. These were military police, and most of them sounded like legal morons. This surprises me, because most of the army/navy/marines I know are bright people. The idea that America's military leaders ordered torture is scary - but it is even more scary to think about ineptly supervised rogue squadrons, wreaking havoc on villains and civilians alike.

What has happened to this country? Or - maybe a better question is - where have I been? Why am I not constantly outraged? Since watching this film, I haven't written any letters to government officials - I've not made much of a stir, outside of a few conversations with professors and my dad. The topic drains me, and I am reminded of my friend Patrick, who said to me, "Blind patriotism is always a negative force." I agree that some patriotism/nationalism can be a destructive force, but I never thought about how much damage it could do. These soldiers who "softened up" the Iraqis really believed that it was in the best interest of their country. I cannot imagine how torture could ever be in any one's interest.

Torture is surely a slippery slope. When does simple stress or strain become permanent damage? How much is too much? These questions are hard to answer. More importantly, how can one possible ethically defend the use of torture in the year 2008?

America is now known as a country that allows torture to go unpunished (even when resulting in death). The worst penalty any of those soldiers got was 10 years. It's shameful. The pain that I, myself feel about this unjust war has been amplified by this horrible look into the realities of our government's procedures during said war.

Regarding Sontag

2008-09-30T15:51:00.000-07:00

pg 3 "Men make war. Men (most men) like war, since for men there is 'some glory, some necessity, some satisfaction in fighting' that most women do not feel or enjoy....the killing machine has a gender, and it is male."

I wish I didn't agree with this - but I totally do.

pg 5 "War is an abomination; a barbarity; war must be stopped."

I am sooo glad that I agree with this.

pg 12 "The destructiveness of war...is not in itself an argument against waging war unless one things...that violence is always unjustifiable."

It truly is.

pg 18 "If it bleeds, it leads."

Hey - this is just capitalism at work. "Good taste" seems largely irrelevant. The government can't make laws governing EVERYTHING.

pg 20 "...a photograph has only one language and is destined potentially for all."

And yet - one's culture will help dictate what is taken from the photograph.

pg 23 "Beauty will be convulsive, or it will not be." -Andre Breton

A little confusing - but what an amazing idea. That which is boring, even-keel, cannot be beautiful. I don't necessarily agree unconditionally - but I understand the gorgeousness of what is new, unexpected, shocking.

pg 24 "...photography [keeps] company with death."

pg 29 "...its meaning...depends on...words."

Language persists in importance - even when talking about a captionless photo!

pg 35 "Most wars do not acquire the requisite fuller meaning."

Does this increase the pain felt? Decrease empathy?

pg 39 "The photographer's intentions do not determine the meaning of the photograph."

pg 40 "Suffering from natural causes, such as illness or childbirth, is scantily represented in the history of art."

I'd like to research this more...

pg 41 "...the appetite for pictures showing bodies in pain is as keen, almost, as the desire for ones that show bodies naked....There is the satisfaction of being able to look at the image without flinching. There is the pleasure of flinching."

The pleasure of flinching - like going punch for punch. I don't really understand it - but I practice it."

pg 42 "...there is shame as well as shock in looking at the close-up of a real horror."

pg 49 "...that invaluable substitute for war, international sports."

Haha. Also - mostly male-dominated, like war. Injuries, great battles - oh yeah.

pg 59 "To catch a death actually happening and embalm it for all time is something only cameras can do..."

I like looking at old-school funeral daguerrotypes.

pg 60 "More upsetting is the opportunity to look at people who know they have been condemned to die."

I really don't want to know.

pg 63 "...the 'terribly distinctness'...gives unnecessary, indecent information."

Indecent. What exactly crosses the line?

pg 75 "The image should appall, and in that terribilita lies a challenging kind of beauty. That a gory battlescape could be beautiful...is a commonplace about images of war made by artists."

Epic films about battle are always beautiful - but real life is so difference.

pg 78 "A photographer that specializes in misery - Sebastiao Slagado." !!!

Interesting job title!

pg 80 "...the spectacular is very much part of the religious narratives by which suffering, throughout most of Western history, has been understood."

Those crazy Catholics. Kidding. But seriously - the Crucifix is a horrible icon for a kid to have to deal with. I liked church somewhat when I was a kid - but that dead body nailed to the splintering wood was most disconcerting.

pg 82 "Habituation is not automatic."

pg 83 "People want to weep."

Why do we?

pg 86 "...the photographs of genocide have gone under the greatest institutional development."

pg 88 "Americans prefer to picture the evil that was there."

Ha - I certainly do!

pg 89 "Narratives can make us understand. Photographs do something else: they haunt us."

pg 93 "...we have a duty to look at lynching pictures..."

(do we, as Americans?)

pg 95 "Not all reactions to...pictures are under the supervision of reason and conscience."

pg 95 "...images of the repulsive can...allure."

pg 97 "...we have a degree of delight...in the real misfortunes and pains of others."

Tangerine

2008-09-30T15:41:00.000-07:00

I had forgotten how very depressing that movie is.

Well - I may not have been affected quite so much the first time I watched this film. At the time, I was very happily engaged. Now that I am dealing with the end of a relationship that was not all bad, my reaction to the movie has changed considerably. I always thought that the premise of the movie was ridiculous. Why ever would you want to erase someone - or need to? You see - usually when I end a relationship, it is just that: I END IT. Perhaps I never really thought about how rough it might be to be on the other side of that - or even to end a relationship through the desire of both partners. Relationships ending - this kind of stuff was never particularly painful for me.

Now - I still think that it would be ridiculous to try to erase my fiance - and even if thinking about him does cause me pain (and oh yes - it does) - our relationship was far too important to me to want to eradicate the memories completely from my brain.

There are some types of pain that I do get rid of when possible, and I will admit that I have used certain substances to temporarily erase hurt from my consciousness. If my muscles ache, or I have a wound of some type, I run for the Ibuprofen. When I get sinus infections (horrid, disgusting things) - I drink gallons of fluids and take codeine for the splitting headaches. Emotional pain is so different, though. It can SEEM physical, but it truly has different implications. Taking ibuprofen every day until a wound heals is one thing - drinking tequila every night to take the edge off of a bad break-up is quite another. While the ibuprofen allows the wound to heal anyway - many methods (at least - the ones I've tried) for getting rid of emotional or psychological pain don't work in the same way. If I drink until I can't feel feelings anymore - my mind is not dealing with the deeper issues - like the body CAN when under the influence of Advil.

A Few Thoughts

2008-09-16T15:24:00.000-07:00

Firstly, this was an amazing book. I was a little wary once I got into some of the medical jargon, but even those bits were so interesting I couldn't skip paragraphs.

I had read a V. C. Andrews book regarding a kid who couldn't feel pain, and I thought it was a totally far-out idea. I definitely didn't think it was an actual condition (congenital analgesia) and I must say it creeps me out. Especially the bit about these kids later in life - how they eventually can develop the ability to feel pain, and that that type of pain can actually kill. Death by pain sounds terribly romantic, and I can't imagine this happens a lot - but what a terrifying way to go.

I find it rather interesting when the book touches on pain as it relates to stereotypes. Women (who sometimes have to go through that whole pesky "childbirth" thing) are seen as "the weaker sex" by many, and apparently many cultures have strange ideas about what kinds of people can "take" pain. In my experience, it can go many ways. I think of myself as being kind of a wuss (although - not as wussy as Gigi), but when I cut my thumb wide open with a steak-knife (sorry, Gigi) I had no problem pulling the wound apart to inspect it, clean it, line the pieces up as closely to the original as I could, and wrapping it. In the book - it was a decorated military man who swooned and fainted at the approach of a sterile needle. Because pain is so subjective and varied, it seems silly to try an put a label on a group of people as "stoic" or "weak."

I would question the information on page 65, if only from personal experience. The author claims that statistics would show that men wait and suffer before seeking medical treatment, and that women are much more quick to see a doctor. In my opinion, there are two types of people who are quick to seek medical attention- those more prone to hypochondria, and those of us who are particularly brave and like to face challenges. In my experience, most people don't like the idea of having something wrong with them. I haven't seen any correlation between this and gender.

The description on page 81 of a toothache made me want to cry. Having my wisdom teeth out was, by far, the most traumatizing experience of my life (at least - of things that happened to my own body). Pain in the head is just so much more awful than pain in the extremities, in my opinion. I couldn't escape it. It wasn't just my body suffering, either. I was an emotional mess. I was so messed up from not eating, and then when I tried to eat a few days after the surgery, I ripped apart any healing tissue, and swallowed so much blood that I was up vomiting all night. That kept me from taking my painkillers, which just compounded the problem. Have you ever thrown up with a mouth that can only open a centimeter? Yeah - it was horrifying. I am sure I will write more about that experience later, so I won't keep boring you now.

"heroine as a particularly powerful narcotic they claimed was free of an addictive potential" - page 112. Ha.

I love codeine - boy, do I love codeine.

"Gentle Tissue Massage: Delightful" - page 123 (I completely agree. Go get one done professionally if you never have. It's LITERALLY like having all the "bad stuff" rubbed right out of your body.)

The placebo response amazes me. The fact that the brain can do so much about our pain/illness/physical state unconsciously makes me wonder at the incredible machinery that is the body. Not just humans, either. Amazing.

When I read on page 150 that doctors thought that infants couldn't feel pain, I wanted to smack 80s doctors upside the head. What on earth kind of logic is that? Regardless of the cortex-development - hadn't we learned by the 80s that there is no way that we will ever fully understand the human brain? Plus - if babies can't feel pain, then why would they cry? It seems so ridiculous - I had never heard that before.