LifeCharacter said:
So she should have basically completely submitted herself to her abuser, happily birthed and raised the child of her rapist, and never attempted to escape or fight back, because that only made it worse for her?
Did I say that? No, I did not. In fact I pretty explicitly pointed out that this isn't black and white. It isn't "Be a loving caring wife", or "Abuse and provoke your captor". There is an in between. She picked not a bad option for her actions, but the
worst possible set of actions she could have taken. Doing literally anything else would have improved the situation. Getting back to WWII, prisoners in PoW camps managed to fight back against their captors through sabotaging the equipment they were working on. They didn't shout abuse and try to provoke their attackers into punishing them. That just sounds, and is, monumentally stupid. Especially 2 years later.
I don't even understand why you bring up the Holocaust as support for your argument and immediately point out all the people who escaped or fought the Nazis. Do you think life in the camps was somehow better than life as a guerilla fighter, or an escapee? Because that's pretty much what Anna's been trying to accomplish, getting the fuck away from the Baron, either by running away, killing him, or, when those don't seem to be working, killing herself.
I bring it up as if the majority had fought, everyone would have been massacred on the spot. It would have been a monumentally stupid thing for them to do. Some did. Many who tried, died. Some succeeded. In a sample population of millions, I acknowledge that a relative handful were successful.
The point here is, those in the camps suffered arguably worse trauma than Anna initially. They watched their homes, their families, their loved ones and friends burn. They were beat and abused, they watched the sick shot dead on the spot simply for admitting to being sick. They marched hundreds of miles across the land to what they likely knew was death. They stood on. Yes, these things can break people, take it as most of the Holocaust Jewish being amazingly heroically strong if you want, or you can take it that Anna likely had the chance to be better, but repeatedly took the worst actions, beginning a downward spiral of things just getting worse and worse.
Was life better in the camp than being a Guerilla or escapee? Who knows, both would have been pretty damn hard. Life in the camps as they were, however, was better than life in camps where the Germans are provoked into torturing the Jewish at all waking hours. Its not that life in the camps was good, its that it could have been so much worse had the prisoners not shown the slighest bit of common sense in trying to not make things any worse.
That he's so in love with someone that he murders her lover, abuses her, rapes her, and holds her prisoner should not be considered "reasons," especially when put in comparison with Anna's reasons for not being a good, meek wife to the man she despises.
He's so in love with her that he murders her lover, that's it. That's where that line of causation turns to Anna.
Anna who, in her grief, decides lets make the situation worse.
By mentally torturing the Baron [Potentially unintentionally through grief early on, later on it was almost certainly deliberate], he reacts - much like she was reacting - out of pain, and abuses her.
She reacts to this abuse by abusing him back. And so the cycle begins.
Each reacts to the other's abuse, but laying the blame on the Baron for murder, abuse, rape and imprisonment purely because of his love that caused him to make the initial mistake? No. Murder and imprisonment yes, abuse and rape are a mix of PTSD, and Anna provoking that PTSD.
Yes. Especially so when he follows it up by keeping Anna prisoner and violently beating her for years.
Ok, so a man suffering from mental illness and instability, who is constantly abused by his wife, is reprehensible because he abuses his wife, but she's a-ok, free from all criticism for her abuse, because he killed her husband?
I'm sensing some real lack of understanding of the effects things like PTSD have on ones life. I'd also I doubt we'd be defending the Baron so vigorously were their positions to be swapped. We'd be blaming him for being psychologically abusive of his wife, and cheating in the first place, and assume that he must have been able to get over his lover's death much easier than we'd assume Anna would. Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm seeing a great bias of "The guy should be tough and strong", and "The girl can be greatly affected by emotions" here, excusing one partner's actions from their trauma, yet ignoring the other's so we can blame them completely.
If we're blaming Anna's actions on "She was upset", then a defence of "He had PTSD" is perfectly valid for the Baron as well. Of course, the Baron should just get over this because he's a guy, whilst Anna is fine to milk it for all its worth. Yep. Seems legit.
Here's the thing, what exactly is Anna supposed to be guilty of here? She verbally abuses the man who beats her, rapes her, and refuses to let her leave, all after murdering the love of her life and feeding him to dogs. Other than that, she makes poor choices in a desperate attempt to not have the child of the man she despises, which only harms herself. The Baron, on the other hand, violently abuses Anna and keeps her prisoner for years. He doesn't make some pact with witches that results in him and only him suffering consequences, he just forces other people to suffer.
To quote you, why do you ask what Anna should be guilty of, then acknowledge she abuses someone?
And yes, psychological abuse is actually a pretty major deal, its not lesser than physical by any means, and honestly I wouldn't be surprised if its responsible for more deaths through suicide too. Any abuse is shit, seeing as there seems to be a sort of attitude here that psychological abuse is 'just words' and not actually a thing.
She abuses her husband [Physically and mentally, actually, conveniently enough], she cheats on him, she tries to kill him and fights and beats him. She makes a deal with the closest thing this game has to a devil, and aborts a life out of hate for the father. During all this she has her daughter around, whom rather than try to protect or give a happy life, she constantly endangers to try and provoke the Baron, and the hags in the swamp, more. She has made a ton of mistakes. Yes, we look at her and say "She suffered trauma, you can understand why", yet we can also, as said, do this to the Baron.
Additionally, this lacks a bit of cultural understanding of the world and time that makes being forced to stay with your abuser less appealing than it would be in that time. This isn't the modern day. A woman can't just leave a man's household and move on with their life. If they do so, its the end of their life, often literally. The world is dangerous, and not being sorceresses, they're not equipped to defend themselves. Additionally, even should they survive, they have nowhere to go, at least nowhere that would accept them. Its a really shit time for women, yeah. Whilst the Baron is likely acting predominantly from a wish to keep Anna and Tamara, him stopping her from leaving is akin to him stopping her from suicide, and killing his daughter with her. We view that sort of imprisonment in today's context and say its horrible. At the time, it wasn't, in fact it was pretty standard. That doesn't make it acceptable behaviour, but the reasons behind why it was more standard behaviour - which do exist beyond simply "Patriarchy!" - do inform the context of the Baron's actions, and actually give his actions some utility for Anna. To be quite honest, given the war going on, had she run and not been caught by the hags, the most likely outcome would have been her imprisonment, rape and torture at the hands of soldiers. With the Baron, at least he cares about her well being and wants to improve things - even if she does continue to provoke him into acting against these interests.
As a further note to this, I actually think she knew this and agreed, during the times where her mind was more salient than when she was gripped by her depression. I would find it a remarkable convenience if this was the first time in the last 3 years that she knocked the Baron out during one of their fights, or that he passed out after getting too drunk. As shown this time, its quite possible for her to escape during these times. The funny thing; as far as we know, she didn't. I get the feeling the Baron would have mentioned it if she had, or he'd be more prepared, or the guards would know or... Yeah, I've seen the argument "The Baron would have just hunted her down and bought her back", but honestly that requires a higher level of salient thought than those here give her credit for. She's a hero of sorts for fighting and abusing the Baron, because its the only thing she apparently can do, yet she likely had plenty of opportunities to escape over 3 years, but she
didn't. It would seem she knows that her only chance is with the Baron and is staying partially by choice, partially as forced by the circumstances, and is certainly salient enough to know that her abuse sends the Baron into a rage - and her actions are quite likely not entirely driven by her trauma.
The Almighty Aardvark said:
And it's good that they always saw the Baron as in the wrong. It'd have been a lot worse if they didn't and they determined that the Baron. She's not innocent in the way that someone who steals a candy bar and gets their hand chopped off isn't innocent, but if someone told me that they chopped off their hand for stealing a candy bar I'd say "How is that the slightest bit of a justification"
Eeeeh, not quite. Going with that analogy, its someone who steals a gold brick from the bank, gets arrested, and their partner killed by the over-eager police, then begins to beat and abuse the guards, resulting in them getting their hands chopped off.
The only thing Tamara did is not cheat. Its the action that set off the whole chain of events, but it isn't the only thing she ever did that was wrong.
He tries to make things better sure, because he wants her in this relationship. She doesn't want to be in this relationship. Why is she supposed to try to make a relationship work that she's not willingly engaged in? If it was a relationship with a coworker sure, if it was a relationship with an alcoholic, violent, murderous baron who won't let you leave, that's a different story.
His violence was non existent until she began to provoke it. Drunkeness? Yes, though again it seems he wants to cut that down and is abused into drinking by Anna. For all intents and purposes, she could turn this into a relationship with a co-worker, by
not dishing out as much or more abuse than the Baron. Honestly she doesn't have to try and make the relationship work, she just has to not provoke the Baron to violence and drinking. Sure, maybe he won't be fully happy. I doubt he'd be violent were she not to abuse him to make him so, and that's a great increase in her position already.
Famine and starvation are realities. But would you in that case condone someone kidnapping someone else who might eventually be a victim of famine and starvation, bringing them into a rich life of luxury on the contingency that they love them? All against their will? This scenario sounds pretty horrible even without adding in the context of "They also killed your lover before deciding to protect you from the world"
As said above, I find it amazingly surprising, and somewhat telling of her character, that she has not tried to escape yet, but has consistently abused the Baron. Either way, she's had the chance to run away before, and near we can tell, hasn't taken it
As for what you just described, welcome to marriage in its entirety in that day and age. Oh, but the guy paid their family to let him kidnap them. Marriage wasn't this grand romanticised thing it is these days, and there are a shocking number of stories where the husband and wife are together by convenience, more than because they love each other. Yeah, there are some who do, there are tons that don't.
In either case, if we were to throw in a few more facts that are relevant to this situation, you'd be arguing that we today should release the mentally ill out into the streets to kill themselves, rather than keeping them contained whilst they're highly unstable, and on suicide watch if they're that bad. Put simply, its a very different situation to getting a healthy young woman and holding her captive. The whole situation is fucked up on so many levels its not even funny.
You are arguing what would be the smartest option for a completely objective person, not what is morally acceptable of a prisoner. The fact that we're comparing her position in this marriage to being a prisoner of ISIS doesn't really give a glowing impression of her situation. Sure, the objectively smart thing for her to do would be the perfectly loving wife and try to make things work because escaping isn't much of an option. There's just two problems with this.
People aren't objective. She can't just turn off loathing and suicidal thoughts and do the objective smart thing. She loved the man the baron killed, and she's forced to be kind, gentle and loving to the man who murdered him. I couldn't do that, I honestly don't think many people could. Someone murdering someone I love would make it impossible for me to in a loving relationship with them. In fact it'd sicken me to have to pretend to be.
Secondly, this isn't about what the smartest thing to do, this is about what she's culpable for. In the situation where someone was kidnapped by ISIS, screamed at them and shot, would you respond to the situation like "Well, ISIS did some wrong, the prisoner did some wrong, they both made mistakes."
It's also worth noting that she wasn't trying to avoid the stillbirth, the spell that the crones used was draining her life as well. She got the protection to save herself from the negative effects, not to save the child.
I can't emphasize enough that he murdered someone she loved, and then expects her to be happily married for her. To me, that's not something anyone should be expected to just get over, particularly not to the extent that they could be married to the murderer. She made mistakes, no question. His mistakes were just on a whole different level. Cheating on someone, versus murder, holding prisoner and beatings.
Honestly, his "Sympathize with me" story just put every thing he did in a worse light, rather than a more positive one.
Well, sure, its the smartest thing to do, rather than a circumstantial thing to do. The thing here, we blame the Baron for the actions he takes, after Anna's actions push him to those actions. When we blame the Baron, everyone forgets the stress that he's been put under by that, and the dissonance is something I'm trying to show. You go on to say that's she's not of objective right mind, and is affected by her trauma to cause her to take these actions, yet the Baron is the same. We don't use them to excuse his actions, however.
We excuse the moral wrongdoings of Anna, and her actions, on the grounds that the Baron is abusing her, yet ignore that the whole reason he does abuse her is because she abuses him. We absolve her of her actions by saying she's simply reacting to trauma, whilst we blame the Baron for his actions and ignore the trauma he has faced that impacts his actions. I mean, lets be honest, by all accounts he was a rather non-violent man until he got PTSD out at war. His namesake was a misunderstanding, and honestly he isn't presented as the most rash or violent sort of man. Then he gets PTSD, and his mind and actions are affected by this trauma. Rather than trying to help, Anna just goes looking for another lover. Honestly, from the start, she has not made a morally right choice. You can
maybe excuse her abuse of the Baron as grey, but certainly not uphold it as an actually moral action.
The culpability of her actions? Two wrongs do not make a right. Were someone to know about one ISIS member's sick daughter, and yell and scream that he hoped his daughter got raped and died... No, its not moral for ISIS to kill him, but his abuse of that ISIS member just because of captivity was far from moral either. The Baron's abuse does not excuse Anna's abuse, physical and mental, just as her abuse does not excuse his.
Cheating on someone vs murdering the cheater also wasn't that out of hand in those times. Different moralities, and hell, as has been pointed out its been accepted as OK in a relatively modern world in some areas until quite recently as well. Both are inexcusable by old moralities, however our societies changing views on sex in general mean we are more accepting of it these days.
And after that it becomes abuse vs abuse, which honestly I'm not going to get into a discussion where one abuse is worse than another. Any abuse is horrible, and just shouldn't happen.
Anna's only mistake was not cheating. It is not the only thing she's done that was wrong.
And regardless of saving the stillborn or not, she still had at least periods of clarity where she didn't want to die, and saw another way to move on with life.
And again, I'm not saying she should be happily married and A-Ok with it. There is a huge difference between that and all out household war though. Its not a black or white, lovely marriage, or horrible abuse, situation. She just needed to not be abusive herself, and things would have improved immensely for her, the Baron wouldn't have beat her, and odds are she'd be much happier, whilst also not performing an action that is morally wrong - even if we justify it with "She's had trauma" or "She's received abuse". Its wrong, and it puts her daughter in danger, which is even more wrong. Subtle rebellion, not all out war, would be to her advantage, and far more morally justifiable.
As for the ISIS comparison, they're about the only well known group these days who would behave remotely the same under most circumstances. You could replace them with the police if you wanted to, but the police tend to not abuse prisoners. Well, depending on where you go anyway.
And I've kept saying that dialogue choice was poor reasoning. I think it's poor reasoning, the developers think it's poor reasoning, the Baron's can't be blamed for his wife's cheating by being away at war.
And I provided an explanation for this somewhere in all my posts. Its the last avenue of discussion that hasn't been explored. Everything else the Baron has answered to. This is the one 'crime' that he hasn't. And yeah, no shit he defends himself against any accusations made against him. He ain't going to just accept them. Overall the only option you really have to go on is that its both their fault, and they included an option to follow through and try to pin one last thing on him - 'cause lets be honest, he's rejected any other claim you could make against him already, it'd be a waste to say "But you killed her husband!", and have him say "But she cheated on me!" - we already know that.
EternallyBored said:
Even ignoring the emotionally charged context, your comparison to the holocaust seems to do more harm than help to your point.
The Jewish people that fought against the Nazis and escaped or fought back are generally seen as heroes, their actions are usually viewed as not only justifiably moral, but generally laudable in the context of their situation.
The only thing your example points out is that many people accepted their fate in the camps, which is understandable, and there would be little point in looking down on them for something that most people do in such similar hopeless situations, but those that resisted are generally viewed in a more positive light, even by survivors that accepted the situation. A lot of survivors write or talk highly of those brave enough to resist the Nazis in some fashion.
Especially now, after the fact, the comparison is even worse, those that kept their heads down were only saved by outside circumstances, if the Allies didn't win, those people that accepted their fate would all be dead, most of them killed in an absolutely brutal fashion. Other genocides in history did not have the advantage of one side coming in and freeing those rounded up to be killed, those that accepted the situation may have had an understandable reaction, but it doesn't change the fact that those that acquiesced died and those that resisted at least stood a chance of escaping and surviving.
What a terrible comparison, by the logic of the holocaust, pretty much everything Anna did to try and hurt or escape the Baron would be considered morally justifiable, as accepting the situation would be understandable, but in a comparison to the holocaust would mean Anna basically leaving it up to fate that either the Baron is killed in action or she is inevitably beaten to death in one of the Baron's drunken episodes.
The main thing I'm pointing to, is that had everyone in those camps tried to revolt, it would have been slaughter. Things could have been SO much worse for them, and yet, despite the huge amounts of trauma they had faced, they made the most of the situation, and lived as best they could. They didn't try to make things worse, and yes a handful escaped and were counted as heroes. That was an exception, rather than the rule. Additionally,
Anna didn't try to escape. Until that last moment. Point to me an example of a Jewish prisoner walking up to the Nazi guards and yelling and abusing them, throwing things at them and attacking them, and being counted as a hero. I'll wait. There may have been a handful of examples at best, because everyone knew that would be a monumentally stupid decision.
And yes, emotionally charged context. I said I'd probably regret it, but I use it as people use the "She's suffered trauma" excuse to vindicate her of any responsibility for her actions. Had you pointed to a normal prisoner or something, you could argue things are different from her, as she has suffered trauma and they didn't. With the Jewish in WWII, you cannot argue that they didn't suffer unimaginable trauma. Yet they still managed to persevere. I don't think anyone reached Nelson Mandela levels of "Bring the peace", but they persevered. Even after seeing their families and friends killed, homes and possessions stolen, the few survivors culled even further, being persecuted for doing no wrongs, simply for their very identity, and marched on foot on a journey a fair number never survived. They went through hell, yet they didn't do anything like what Anna did. Yes, trauma can affect one's actions, it doesn't have to to the extent she let it.