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Mar. 6th, 2003 03:03 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rusty_haloI've been reading a lot of comments lately--many of them bitter reactions against a potential Spike spin-off--that claim that Spike is defined by his ability to love. Therefore any plotline that shows Spike moving on from Buffy would constitute an unforgivable violation of his character.
I'd argue that, while Spike's ability to love is one of his strongest traits, it's only one part of his larger defining characteristic, which is his desire to be accepted. Spike loves wholeheartedly, and he wants to be loved in return. But Spike doesn't just long for romantic love; he's the eternal outsider, the other, searching desperately for a place where he belongs.
As a human, he struggled (and failed) to belong to a social group (witness his submissive behavior towards the man who mocks his poetry, and later his (probable) bitter revenge upon those who didn't accept him). Spike's relationship with Joyce was so important to him because she was the person who "didn't treat [him] like a freak." His relationship with Dawn was meaningful for the same reason; Dawn was the only one (after Joyce died) who treated Spike like a person (and vice versa).
The final scene of "Beneath You" makes this abundantly clear; Spike longs not only for romantic love, but for belonging in a larger, and seemingly more pure, sense. Certainly Spike's desire to be loved by Buffy was part of his motivation for the soul quest, but that was only one part of his encompassing desire to be find acceptance. He wants "to fit," he wants "everyone to forgive and love" him.
This desire, which is at the heart of Spike's personality and motivations, raises a lot of interesting questions. How important is the basic human desire to fit into a social group? How far should we go to try and fit in? How much of our individuality should we give up in order to "fit" into someone else's definition of acceptable?
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kimberly_a wrote an interesting post here, in which she compares Spike's soul quest to other forms of social conformity that we recognize as destructive (such as the cases of women who struggle to obtain a socially constructed ideal of feminine beauty by starving themselves or mutilating their bodies). I don't think this comparison is entirely apt, because the soul does take Spike in a direction that actually benefits his growth as a person (although he was already getting there on his own and really didn't need it), while methods of achieving "beauty" are often destructive and don't involve personal growth at all. But Kimberly has a point that Spike's struggle "to fit" has often been extremely destructive and unhealthy for him. He literally couldn't function without Drusilla--"Lover's Walk" was funny because of how incredibly exaggerated Spike's response to the breakup was. Drinking himself sick, nearly setting himself on fire ... not exactly healthy behavior. His decision to tie Buffy and Dru up and threaten to kill them in "Crush" was motivated by the same emotional instability, as was his "stalker" behavior toward Buffy in season five and his near rape of Buffy in "Seeing Red."
Did Spike's soul quest have similar roots? Many fans commented that Spike "killed himself" by getting the soul, and it certainly seemed that the old Spike was dead at the beginning of the season, when we were greeted with insane Spike in the school basement. Spike has largely recovered since then, but it's questionable as to whether this is due to the soul or to the fact that he's finally being treated with a bit of acceptance and respect ("I believe in you, Spike" *sigh*).
I also think it's interesting that Spike tries very hard to define himself as someone who doesn't care about fitting in. His fabrication of the Spike personality in response to William's nerdiness, for example, or his constant stream of irritating comments designed to annoy the Scoobies. It's striking that the character who appears to care least about fitting in socially is actually the character who struggles the most to fit in. In large part I think it may be a defense mechanism; "Spike" is a reaction against "William" for example; he'll never be mocked like that again because he's become--superficially--the opposite. (Kind of like those chess club middle schoolers who turn into don't-fuck-with-me Goth badasses in high school).
So to get back to the "Spike must never move on from Buffy because that would be a betrayal of his character" point of view: I disagree. Moving on from Buffy could be exceptionally positive for Spike; if he did that, it would mean that he's starting to overcome this desperate neediness, this desire for the approval of others, and to begin to value himself as an individual regardless of how others perceive him.
No one exists in a vacuum; we are social creatures and we need to bond with others. The struggle is to balance the need for social bonds with the need to maintain individuality and to value ourselves as individuals. It seems that Spike may soon take a major step on the path toward balancing these needs: he realizes that his mother did love him (finds acceptance), which helps him come to value himself as an individual and to rely less on the judgements of others (ie Buffy).
I find these questions really relevant because I feel like this is a struggle that I deal with every day (and it's certainly why I have such a strong emotional reaction and attachment to Spike). I've always felt like a freak, on the fringes of whatever group I'm currently involved in but never quite fitting in. There's always this question: should I change myself in order to fit, or should I retain my individuality and always be the weird one who never really belongs? I'm pretty attached to my independence, so my choice has almost always been not to fit in (although of course, it's not always a choice--sometimes you're just a freak and there's nothing you can do about it. Although I do think that in most cases if I truly wanted to fit in with whatever group, I could; I've just never had the motivation because it requires leaving so much of myself behind). But of course the consequence of this can be terribly painful, and sometimes I just find myself drowning in the desperate need to belong somewhere. Which is why I can't blame Spike for choosing to conform; when he says in "Beneath You" that he just wants to fit, it breaks my heart every single time. (It's like Joss reached into the deepest part of me, took those feelings, and translated them into Spike's words in that episode.) But it would make me insanely happy to see Spike move beyond this paradigm, which is what I hope to see in ep 18 and in the potential spin-off.
Well, I hope that made some kind of sense.
I'd argue that, while Spike's ability to love is one of his strongest traits, it's only one part of his larger defining characteristic, which is his desire to be accepted. Spike loves wholeheartedly, and he wants to be loved in return. But Spike doesn't just long for romantic love; he's the eternal outsider, the other, searching desperately for a place where he belongs.
As a human, he struggled (and failed) to belong to a social group (witness his submissive behavior towards the man who mocks his poetry, and later his (probable) bitter revenge upon those who didn't accept him). Spike's relationship with Joyce was so important to him because she was the person who "didn't treat [him] like a freak." His relationship with Dawn was meaningful for the same reason; Dawn was the only one (after Joyce died) who treated Spike like a person (and vice versa).
The final scene of "Beneath You" makes this abundantly clear; Spike longs not only for romantic love, but for belonging in a larger, and seemingly more pure, sense. Certainly Spike's desire to be loved by Buffy was part of his motivation for the soul quest, but that was only one part of his encompassing desire to be find acceptance. He wants "to fit," he wants "everyone to forgive and love" him.
This desire, which is at the heart of Spike's personality and motivations, raises a lot of interesting questions. How important is the basic human desire to fit into a social group? How far should we go to try and fit in? How much of our individuality should we give up in order to "fit" into someone else's definition of acceptable?
kimberly_a wrote an interesting post here, in which she compares Spike's soul quest to other forms of social conformity that we recognize as destructive (such as the cases of women who struggle to obtain a socially constructed ideal of feminine beauty by starving themselves or mutilating their bodies). I don't think this comparison is entirely apt, because the soul does take Spike in a direction that actually benefits his growth as a person (although he was already getting there on his own and really didn't need it), while methods of achieving "beauty" are often destructive and don't involve personal growth at all. But Kimberly has a point that Spike's struggle "to fit" has often been extremely destructive and unhealthy for him. He literally couldn't function without Drusilla--"Lover's Walk" was funny because of how incredibly exaggerated Spike's response to the breakup was. Drinking himself sick, nearly setting himself on fire ... not exactly healthy behavior. His decision to tie Buffy and Dru up and threaten to kill them in "Crush" was motivated by the same emotional instability, as was his "stalker" behavior toward Buffy in season five and his near rape of Buffy in "Seeing Red."Did Spike's soul quest have similar roots? Many fans commented that Spike "killed himself" by getting the soul, and it certainly seemed that the old Spike was dead at the beginning of the season, when we were greeted with insane Spike in the school basement. Spike has largely recovered since then, but it's questionable as to whether this is due to the soul or to the fact that he's finally being treated with a bit of acceptance and respect ("I believe in you, Spike" *sigh*).
I also think it's interesting that Spike tries very hard to define himself as someone who doesn't care about fitting in. His fabrication of the Spike personality in response to William's nerdiness, for example, or his constant stream of irritating comments designed to annoy the Scoobies. It's striking that the character who appears to care least about fitting in socially is actually the character who struggles the most to fit in. In large part I think it may be a defense mechanism; "Spike" is a reaction against "William" for example; he'll never be mocked like that again because he's become--superficially--the opposite. (Kind of like those chess club middle schoolers who turn into don't-fuck-with-me Goth badasses in high school).
So to get back to the "Spike must never move on from Buffy because that would be a betrayal of his character" point of view: I disagree. Moving on from Buffy could be exceptionally positive for Spike; if he did that, it would mean that he's starting to overcome this desperate neediness, this desire for the approval of others, and to begin to value himself as an individual regardless of how others perceive him.
No one exists in a vacuum; we are social creatures and we need to bond with others. The struggle is to balance the need for social bonds with the need to maintain individuality and to value ourselves as individuals. It seems that Spike may soon take a major step on the path toward balancing these needs: he realizes that his mother did love him (finds acceptance), which helps him come to value himself as an individual and to rely less on the judgements of others (ie Buffy).
I find these questions really relevant because I feel like this is a struggle that I deal with every day (and it's certainly why I have such a strong emotional reaction and attachment to Spike). I've always felt like a freak, on the fringes of whatever group I'm currently involved in but never quite fitting in. There's always this question: should I change myself in order to fit, or should I retain my individuality and always be the weird one who never really belongs? I'm pretty attached to my independence, so my choice has almost always been not to fit in (although of course, it's not always a choice--sometimes you're just a freak and there's nothing you can do about it. Although I do think that in most cases if I truly wanted to fit in with whatever group, I could; I've just never had the motivation because it requires leaving so much of myself behind). But of course the consequence of this can be terribly painful, and sometimes I just find myself drowning in the desperate need to belong somewhere. Which is why I can't blame Spike for choosing to conform; when he says in "Beneath You" that he just wants to fit, it breaks my heart every single time. (It's like Joss reached into the deepest part of me, took those feelings, and translated them into Spike's words in that episode.) But it would make me insanely happy to see Spike move beyond this paradigm, which is what I hope to see in ep 18 and in the potential spin-off.
Well, I hope that made some kind of sense.