So last Friday, Prime and I hit the local theatre and caught a 3D showing of Thor. Now, I was kinda hoping to cut my "3D viewing teeth" on a showing of Transformers: Dark of the Moon but this was a good start. Before you ask: Yes, I enjoyed Thor but I didn't walk out of the theatre grinning like a fool. Instead, I rather half-stumbled out, feeling heavy-hearted.
I had wept for Loki. My heart completely broke for him.
I'm not the sort of person who has any real sympathy for the villain. Usually, I can't stand them and will laugh as they plunge towards oblivion. They deserve it. But with Loki, it was another story entirely.
Loki was a troublemaker, someone who tried to stir up trouble and make mischief. I myself, don't take a lot of things seriously. Most people see me as a bit of a flake. Everything is a joke to me. But we both act this way to mask the pain, the pain we both feel and don't quite understand. We both know that we're different, that something isn't quite right in our little worlds but rather than face that, we bury it. It's easier to deny the agony than face it.
Until fate brings it to the surface.
Loki wasn't Odin's son by birth. Instead, he was an abandoned Frost Giant infant, found by Odin and taken to Asgard to be raised as Thor's brother. Many years would pass before Odin would finally confess this truth to his adopted son and the anger that Loki felt, the blind rage in his eyes, brought me to tears. Loki screamed at his "father" demanding to know why. Why had this happened? Why had he not been told the truth? But the most troubling questions were the ones Loki never spoke.
Who am I? What am I? Where do I belong?
As Loki raged against Odin, I sobbed. He screamed what I could not but we both felt the exact same sting of a betrayal that would drive most others mad.
In Loki's case, it did drive him mad.
Loki tried to take over Asgard and destroy the Frost Giants. He did it, as he said in the very end, for his father. But Odin shook his head and disagreed. The truth is, what Loki did was a desperate plea for attention. He wanted nothing more than to be accepted, be seen as a hero, as "one of them".
He didn't want to be treated differently. He just wanted acceptance, which was something that was never truly given. Instead, Thor is accepted and regains favor with his father.
All hail the status quo and long may it reign.
There's no place for those who have been wronged and are "ungrateful" for the lies of loving their parents. Loki and I are outcasts. Society doesn't need us. We're too self-absorbed because we're hurt and pissed and miserable that we were lied to by those we were supposed to trust the most.
A child cannot lie to a parent unpunished. But a parent can lie to a child and there is no consequence. If the child does become angry and rebels, then that child is acting immaturely or foolishly. Doesn't matter how deeply the child has been hurt, that child is an ungrateful wretch who should be cast out, never to return.
The child who discovers his life is a lie rebels and is abandoned again. The robot that fears for its safety and kills its abusive master is defective and a danger and must be destroyed; the fact that it has been abused does not entire the equation. The sapient machines who have been treated as slaves by their human masters turn against them and are seen as evil. (Don't believe me? Watch The Matrix, then watch both parts of The Second Renaissance from The Animatrix. Your sympathy for humanity will quite likely drop to zero and you might hope that the machines win.) For those of us who were wronged, who were hurt, who ache and scream because our lives were based on lies, there is no true recourse. We're not really wanted by anyone or anything. It is enough to destroy the strongest of spirits.
But unlike Loki, I am fortunate. I have Prime. When I have been at my worst, lashing out as Loki did to try and make others feel miserable, Prime stayed by me. When I asked the worst questions of my life, questions that no one should ask a stranger, let alone themselves, Prime listened. When I cried, Prime held me. Loki didn't have that sort of support. If he did, things may have been different.
In the end, Loki fell. As he did, I wept openly knowing the sort of agony he was suffering. But he didn't die. Instead, he is the outcast and his brother is the favored one. On the outside, looking in: that is the best description of our situations. However, I can pick myself up and keep going, as I have those that care about me. Loki isn't so lucky. He will always remain the outcast.
And a part of me will always mourn for him. Call it sympathy for the devil, if you will. No one else seems to have any sympathy for him.
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2 comments:
Very insightful...I was deceived by my mom & ex-stepdad into believing the latter was my father. At age 7, I never really knew my dad but in my naïveté, I fell for it.
As time went on, family, friends & strangers would always say we didn't have any resemblance. I didn't want to believe them but this abusive (step)dad of mine made me increasingly believe that he must not be my father. After 5 years, I was vindicated...my real father came into my life (for the 2nd time, I found out) because my mom needed him involved in my US citizenship process...and because my maternal grandma (may she rest in peace) told my mom I had to know the truth.
After the revelation, my stepdad lost the privilege of me calling him "dad"...I started calling him by his middle name everyone else calls him...Danilo. I agree I didn't help matters of family harmony by not calling him "dad" but his abusive ways continued anyway. I am of the belief that parents, natural or otherwise, are NOT entitled to treat their children any damn way they please...being called "mom" or "dad" has to be earned from the child. Danilo never again heard me call him dad & he resented my mom & her mom for disclosing the truth.
There's a whole lot more to this family drama but to sum things up, it's just like you said...if a child lies s/he faces consequences but not if parents lie to their kids. A lot of grief & resentment could be prevented if parents were more considerate...
~daiAtlas
Exactly and that's the maddening thing.
For years, even when I was very young, I never quite trusted my mother. I never understood why, I just knew that I couldn't. It was like she wasn't telling me something, like she was holding something very important back.
Fast forward to last November when the truth finally came out.
What angers me the most is the fact that I was never able to lie to my mother at all. If I did, there was trouble. But for years I was told I was her "only child", not knowing that there was an asterisk there and that I was actually "the one she kept". It does explain a lot of things, like my abandonment issues (which can be severe) and the fact that my mother never wanted to let me out of her sight.
I've often said you've lived more than I ever have and I'm not kidding. I missed out on a lot because my mother kept me on such a short leash. I can't even make decisions on my own; she made them all for me whether or not I wanted her to do so. Now, I want Prime to do it all as I am too damned afraid of fucking it up and getting into some sort of trouble. She kept me, to a degree, dependent upon her so now I am stuck in a rather childlike mental state. I want others to take control of the situation because I fear that if I do, there will be trouble later.
I get it: She didn't want me to make the same mistake that she did. But I wasn't her. And truthfully, it would have been nice to screw up every once in a while and not have it be the end of the world.
Prime has said that programming can be broken and he is trying to help, but I don't know how much we can break here. Even now in my thirties, I still look over my shoulder sometimes in dread, as if my mother is going to slap the hell out of me for doing the wrong thing. (I've told Prime that I envy him; he doesn't give two shits what others think so he doesn't let that bother him. But as I told him, "Must be nice. They didn't break you.")
I wouldn't wish this on anyone. I've been on an emotional roller coaster and that's putting it gently. On my good days, I'm fairly normal. On my bad days, I want to stay in bed, pull the blankets over my face and cry. When those nagging doubts begin to raise their voices, you cannot drown them out. Prime's seen me at some of my absolute worst moments; a few weeks ago, I was sitting with him in the bathroom, crying and asking if I was born because my mother wanted me, or did she just want something to replace what she had given up. My parents can swear that they wanted me, but their word is now meaningless. If they could lie about my status as an only child, what else can they lie about?
Those are the things that keep me awake some nights. You can't shut them out. They just wear at you until you feel as though you are going to scream.
Survivor's guilt is a royal bitch. Trust me. But most people don't get why I went through that. I've tried explaining and they stare at me as if I'm a moron or say that this was good news and I should be happy, which is when I'm tempted to ram my head into a wall. And honestly, to a degree, I still am going through that guilt.
"What made me so special? He was the first born, why give him up? Why keep a miserable fuck up like me around?" Those are the questions that roll through my head. I cannot find the answers to them.
As the saying goes, "The road to hell is paved with good intentions" but most parents have no clue about that. =/
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