Fandom meta: The links between shipping and empathy/sympathy for fictional characters

[chameleon_irony]

When I learn new theories in class, often the first thing I think about is how they can be applied to fiction and fandom. "So when Anakin did this, this is what was happening in his head... If Padmé were to do that, this is how she might justify it to herself; these are the defense mechanisms she might use..." Occasionally, there's also "So this is

Comments

[reg_flint]

I find it much easier to relate with and create more IC characters without pairings. It seems much easier to nip a peek into a gen situation. Great meta, a speed read that makes me think.

[chameleon_irony]

Gen fics tends to be more IC, I've noticed. But we don't choose to ship or not ship. Unfortunately, it just happens.

I'm glad you liked the post.

[moralrelativist]

I've always favoured slightly awkward pairings, pairings that have no conceivable cannon basis but which have a very specific dynamic. I'm a big fan of Hermione/Lucius, for example, and I was a Snarry fan for years. In a similar (but less extreme) way, they're a bit like your Harry/Bellatrix example: canonically impossible, and probably requiring some serious character re-alignment for fic purposes

[chameleon_irony]

I used to write Lucius/Hermione, but I mostly lost interest in it. I'm not sure why.

what psychological keys make a fic pairing work?

I don't think there are any universal "keys" that can make a pairing work for everyone. There are things that can make it work for certain types of people, but there will always be others who won't like it.

To find any such keys, we need to understand what makes people ship pairings. I'm working on a theory, a rather complex one, with formulas.

I'm in the psychophysics dept. of psychology. We're all about people as manipulatable machines.

I've studied behaviorism and the theories of learning (classical and operant conditioning), which theoretically suggest you can make people feel/do anything with the right training. The possibilities are fascinating. It doesn't work with everyone, though.

We once managed to condition a lecturer into accidentally falling off the lecture stage.

Wow. How did you guys do it?

[moralrelativist]

Psychophysics is a bit different to behaviourism and learning, as it's (technically) a type of neuroscience. Rather than controlling behaviour, the logic goes that if you can stimulate specific brain areas you can trigger a measurable, predictable response, and that the same programming underlies everyone to some extent. My speciality is the visual cortex, from which you can provoke spectacular responses in this manner

[chameleon_irony]

That sounds very impressive. There are people who don't believe that kind of conditioning works at all - we like to believe in free will and self-determination. So stories like that one shock and amaze us. I'm jealous because the stuff you are learning seems much more interesting and practical than what I'm learning. ;)

[irnan]

If you've never felt that kind of hate for a pairing, I hypothesize you've never experienced that extent of fusion with a character either.

It's not the only possible reason - for instance, you might loathe a certain character with all your soul and thus not be able to ship them in a pairing, especially with someone you find fundamentally sympathetic as a character, which is what I feel for Snape and Snape/Lily. HATE HATE HATE, not so much because I identify with her, although she is HBIC and FTW, but because I despise the way he acted towards her.

ALL THE THOUGHTS going on here. Really interesting.

[chameleon_irony]

It definitely isn't the only possible reason, or even one of the most common reasons. There are many pairings I dislike/don't read, for various reasons, but I can say I don't hate any of them with quite this intensity, and I've always been able to easily discern why I don't like them. But there was one pairing for which I couldn't understand or explain my loathing. The pairing is very similar to other pairings that I ship, and I even used to like it. Then I changed a lot as a person and suddenly I couldn't stand it anymore. It took me a long time to realise why (and accept it - ouch).

widening the sample size!

[elizabeth_hoot]

Hmm.

Personally, there are very few characters I identify with to a significant extent (Darcy in Pride and Prejudice is the only that jumps right to mind, and I'm completely onboard with the canon ship). There are lot of characters that I align myself with as I watch/read, but it's rarely because I feel that much affinity with them; I just like them, or find myself fascinated by them even if I don't, or admire them, or some combination (I don't think I'm much like any of the Skywalkers, for instance, or Faramir, who are up there with Darcy as some of my favourite characters

Re: widening the sample size!

[chameleon_irony]

There are a lot of reasons to intensely dislike pairings.

Absolutely. I dislike a lot of pairings, for a lot of reasons. But there is one I dislike above all, for no discernible reason: it isn't too weird/OOC or badly written (usually), I don't have any squicks, the characters aren't asexual, and it's similar to other pairings I like. I even used to like it. Then I changed, fundamentally, as a person, and suddenly I couldn't stand it. My meta was the result of a lot of attempts to understand what the problem was.

[irnan]

*back with thoughts

[chameleon_irony]

This is what makes me a bad slasher, because I'm not very good at reading subtext ;)

The "subtext" slashers talk about is often only in their heads. ;) There's nothing wrong with not seeing everything in a sexual way, which, let's face it, is what usually happens when we're talking about "subtext". The funny thing is I do it too, and not only with slash pairings. But my type of "shipping" is fascination with a dynamic between characters, and wanting to see that dynamic explored in any way, gen or romantic/sexual - it makes no difference.

I never identify with characters in that way because I always trust that the author knows them better than I do.I do too. But why would that interfere with identifying with characters? I've never thought I know the character I identify with better than the author does. As well as, maybe, but better? The author had a certain kind of person in mind when they constructed this character, and this kind of person happens to be the kind of person I am. The author wrote the character very realistically and

[irnan]

There's nothing wrong with not seeing everything in a sexual way, which, let's face it, is what usually happens when we're talking about "subtext".

This pretty much sums up my problem with a lot of incest ships - the reinterpretation of sibling interaction to give it some kind of sexual "meaning".

The author had a certain kind of person in mind when they constructed this character, and this kind of person happens to be the kind of person I am. The author wrote the character very realistically and I admire them for that.Sorry, yes - you're absolutely right. I guess I was thinking along slightly different lines and had in mind the sort of dynamic you see in (HP) fandom when shippers are dissatisfied with romantic pairings because they think their identification with the character means they understand the character better than the author. That's never happened to me; I've never been disappointed in a pairing the way you describe either. Whether that's because I always end up loving whoever "my" character loves or because I tend to

[irnan]

erm, sorry about the length of this.

Lily was the only thing that ever made him happy, and the lengths to which he went out of his (frankly disturbing) devotion to the memory of her... I don't think it's possible to love a person that much and at the same time believe people like that person are inferior.

I can see him coming away from those beliefs after she's dead; after all, he might have loved her but he didn't start listening to her until she'd shuffled off this mortal coil and joined the choir invisible. But considering how Snape manages to genuinely and utterly despise who Harry is (his father's son) while at the same time keeping him safe because of another aspect of who he is (his mother's son), I don't see a problem with his ability to do a similar thing with Lily.

Generally speaking I think it's perfectly possible - what happens is that you convince yourself the person you love who belongs to the group you despise is different, is not like the others, is special, and then fail totally at understanding why they don't