From: "Richard Lawson" <sterman@sprynet.com>
That was part of the same disorder. An interesting statistic I found
in =
researching domestic abuse is that 90% of people who go to counseling =
for domestic abuse do so *involuntarily*. It's part of the same =
disease.
Sure, and how much slack do we cut those people? They still get thrown
in jail (hopefully) for their assults. Now, you might argue that it's
different in Akane's case because she has a genuine mental illness,
but..... see below.
Once or twice she could be excused for, but Akane *knew* that there =
was=20
something wrong, that she'd lost control, and still she refused to =
act. =20
To absolve her of all responsibility is ridiculous. She was =
criminally=20
negligent. Some would say she is paying sufficiently for her
crimes,=20
but where does that give TiL Ranma the right to pardon her? She=20
murdered two people, and it happened because of her own indifference
=
to=20
the suffering her rage disorder was causing.
Look at it this way: a woman is driving a car. She has a heart
attack. =
She falls unconscious; the car swerves off the road and hits two =
people, killing them. The woman, however, survives the heart attack.
=
How much of it is her fault? She had a serious medical problem that =
caused her to lose control in an important situation. The result was =
tragedy.
Ahhh, but I accounted for that. Look at it this way. A woman has a
heart attack, swerves, and thank god, no one is injured. However, she
refuses to admit anything ocurred, doesn't go to a hospital, and
continues to drive. The next day it happens again and again no one is
hurt. She doesn't go to a doctor and continues to drive. After a few
weeks of this, she finally swerves and kills two people. Wouldn't you
say she was criminally responsible?
constantly running away from his problems. If you read the story =
carefully, there is not one person who is not guilty in some way. =
Ranma, Kasumi, Nabiki, Nodoka (especially her), Genma, Ukyo, Ryoga... =
*all* played a part in the tragedy that followed. I blame them much =
more than I blame Akane. Akane was sick, that's all. Part of that =
sickness prevented her from voluntarily seeking a cure. It was up to =
Perhaps my understanding is wrong. As I read it, she was generally
rational at least some of the time. She'd already seriously injured
Ranma several times, yet remained willfully blind to her own actions. I
would make a comparison to alcoholism. Sure alcoholism is a disease,
but if you kill someone while drunk driving, you're still held
responsible.
*ARE*=20
Akane's fault.
But not *entirely* her fault. In my opinion, not even *mostly* her =
fault.
Well, we have an honest disagreement there.
Or, another way to look at it, it *was* her fault, her *fault*, a =
genetic twist that gave her an extremely serious mental disorder. Who
=
should we blame? God, if you believe in a supreme being? Her parents
=
for passing on those genes?
She was only completely out of control during the actual 'rage attacks'.
Zen actually tells us her thoughts. She *does* realize what's happening
but her own pride prevents her from acting on that realization. Instead
she buries it under a flood of self-justification. Akane isn't
portrayed as schitzophrenic. She is aware (except during the actual
attacks) of the consequences of her actions.
How can she ever get better until she accepts her own=20
culpability?
Exactly. And how can she do that unless she allows the doctors at the
=
mental hospital to cure her? TILma helps her start on the path to =
healing. After she's healed, then there can be acceptance of the sins
=
she's committed, and the results they came to. But again, her blame,
in =
my opinion, is much less than that of the people around her at the
time.
In conclusion, let me echo what Zen said. You admitted it was a rough
draft. How about tweaking the relevant scene to make it clear TiL Ranma
is offering BE Akane *forgiveness* rather than *absolution*?
Richard, why must you always take these things so seriously?
Why would you think that I wouldn't? All of my stories are serious, =
except for the occasional spamfic and "Manual Not Included", my one =
attempt at comedy. I am a serious writer; I try to write "realistic" =
stories, where actions have consequences. If you don't like that style
=
of writing, don't read my stories. I don't mean that in a spiteful or
=
sarcastic way; I'm just saying that most of my stories are going to be
=
like that.\
I have to humbley apologize here. I have no business telling you what
kinds of stories to write. The fact is, I do enjoy your "serious"
stories, but I didn't enjoy this one as much. At the time, I thought it
was too serious, but after thinking about it for a day or so, I realize
that wasn't it at all.
My problem was that the ending was too similiar to the TiL/TOP crossover
you recently released. That is, at the end , TiL Ranma's marriage is
only strengthened by the experience, and at no point has A&R's
relationship been affected negatively. The problem is that that's
pretty much the previous crossover offered.
At the end, Ranma pretty much tells TiL Akane that she can keep
occasionally hitting him, and that's perfectly OK with him. In my first
post I accused you of having the characters learn the "Lesson of the
Day". Now I realize, maybe my real problem was that the TiL characters
didn't seem to have learned anything at all. Wouldn't Akane at least,
maybe want to go talk to a therapist or someone just for the sake of
reassuring herself? Wouldn't this have been the perfect time for Ranma
to admit to her that her hitting him really does bother him? Instead
both happily agree that they certainly don't have even the faintest
echoes of *those* kinds of problems and that's that.
Perhaps the ending was just too abrupt. At the very least, I would have
like to have seen Ranma, after hearing about the BE events, give TiL
Ukyou a hug for being a friend, even if he didn't tell her why.
I hope you can excuse all that "wacky" stuff from my first post. My
only excuse is that it was late and I couldn't understand why the story
hadn't wowed me as much as the concept had. I latched onto the wrong
reason and posted before I'd had a chance to think about it.
Um... why were you expecting that kind of story? And why should I be =
put out that I didn't write a story that met your expectations? Again,
=
Hey when i see a writer who normally writes "great" stories and the
story stikes me as only "good", I try to stir up a little discussion. :)
Again, if you want to see wacky, *write* wacky. I like to see serious,
=
studied stories, so that's what I write.
Yeah you're right to do so. It was 2AM. I didn't know what the heck I
was saying. :)
------
Matthew Campbell
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