Zuko, Mai, and Ty Lee: Abuse, Guilt, Amends, and Self-Forgiveness

attackfish:

Not long ago @lj-writes posted a gifset comparing and contrasting the ways the Fire Nation, Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee treat the Kyoshi Warriors and the ways Sokka, and later Ty Lee, treat them, in order to point out the differences between cultural sharing and cultural appropriation [Link]. This reminded me that I’ve been wanting to write a meta about one of the really unique things Avatar the Last Airbender gives us, which is an inside view of how abusers convince their victims to do things that hurt others and make them feel guilty.

This particular tactic of abusers has a couple of purposes. The first is that it helps to isolate victims. If other people know about the wrongdoing, they are often unsympathetic to the victim and unwilling to help them. If an abuser has more than one victim,
getting them to hurt each other can keep them from banding together. We see Azula attempting this when she gets Ty Lee to help her humiliate Mai as children in “Zuko Alone.” If the wrongdoing is secret, it can be used for blackmail purposes. This is why abusive leaders will often bind their followers together with a shared act of criminality. But lastly, it makes the psychological cost of leaving an abuser much higher. The wrongdoing a victim has done at their abuser’s behest means that leaving their abuser, and admitting that what their abuser has been doing to them is wrong also means admitting that what they did for their abuser was wrong.

In canon, we see the last of these effects of wrongdoing done for and abuser most obviously with Zuko. It takes him two and a half seasons to confront the fact that his father is terrible and the things he has done for him are wrong. It’s only after he is able to internalize the idea that his father, and therefore himself, were in the wrong, that he is able to confront his father and leave to teach Aang and work to make right what he helped put wrong.

We also see this with Mai and Ty Lee. Mai comes to her limit. She cannot help Azula kill Zuko. She helped Azula capture the Kyoshi Warriors and engineer the fall of Ba Sing Se, and even fought with Azula against the resistance in Omashu as they held her brother hostage, but she cannot allow Azula to kill Zuko. With this breaking point, Mai is forced to acknowledge that Azula’s will is wrong out loud. Later in the comics, Mai and Azula have a conversation about the time Azula manipulated Mai into stealing from Mai’s mother. Mai lays the blame at Azula’s feet, while Azula, reminds her mockingly of how she took an active part.

As for the more noteworthy acts of wrongdoing Mai commits at Azula’s urging, we see her with the people she once hurt, Suki of the Kyoshi warriors, who she both captured and helped free, and the rest of the Gaang, in the city of Ba Sing Se. Given the hostility with which much of the Gaang greeted Zuko at first, and the lack of hostility she is shown, it is likely she and they come to some sort of peace off screen. Mai is later shown asking the Kyoshi Warriors for help, and them giving it. Ty Lee also goes to the people she hurt at Azula’s behest. After she is thrown in prison for defending Mai and turning on Azula, she joins the Kyoshi warriors, teaching them how to use the chi blocking technique she once used against them.

Unfortunately, neither Mai nor Ty Lee’s acts of making amends to those they have wronged on their abuser’s behalf are shown explicitly on screen or in the comics the way Zuko’s are. They are only heavily implied. However, the fact that this process of doing terrible things at the encouragement of or on the orders of an abuser is shown for multiple victims, and those victims are shown to be redeemable and ultimately deserving of their freedom from abuse is as powerful as it is rare.

Yup I mean it’s so common for abuse victims (especially women), at least when labeled as such, to be portrayed as perfect saints who do no wrong. I have no doubt this sort of thing is well intended, but it’s not the reality of abuse victims. This narrative also has the really insidious effect of implying that victims are only worthy of dignity and protection if they’re perfect, as you pointed out. A lot of villain-minion dynamics in media are abusive in nature, but don’t often seem to be recognized as such.

On the flip side I really love how it was made clear that abuse victims who injure others at the behest of their abusers are still responsible and need to make amends. I, too, wish this process had been made clearer for Mai and Ty Lee.

sithchirrut:

@skispeederfinn’s post about this scene

Int. Starkiller Base – Junction Area – Day

Finn, Han and Chewie take cover, Chewie pulling some explosives out of a duffel. Blast doors nearby.

FINN: We’ll use the charges to blow that blast door. I’ll go in and draw fire, but I’m gonna need cover.

HAN: You sure you’re up for this?

FINN: Hell no – I’ll go in find and try to find Rey – (improvising, fast) – The troopers’ll be on our tail. We have to be ready for that. There’s an access tunnel that’ll leads –

made me think about how unique it is that Finn allows himself to be emotionally vulnerable with Han and how it shows how deeply he trusts Han on an emotional level.

Because it sure as hell isn’t something he’s used to doing with an adult, as most if not all adults in Finn’s life so far would have been authority figures who would have condemned him at the very least for such a “weakness” as the one he so readily shows to Han.

Contrast this on how he acts with Phasma, an important adult figure in Finn’s life.

After his return to the Finalizer after the massacre of Tuanul Finn is having a breakdown. He seeks out a private place to have it, knowing that it wouldn’t be an acceptable reaction to have.

As he walks into the darkened corridor he even looks over his shoulder to make sure he’s unobserved and unfollowed before removing his helmet and allowing himself to panic over what just happened.

Enter Phasma.

Finn’s behavior changes the moment she’s there. Despite still very much being traumatized and in a state of panic, he immediately straightens and tries to get a hold of himself. Phasma is not emotionally safe for him, he knows this.

But Han on the other hand has earned Finn’s emotional trust over the course of the story by actions such as:

Thanking Finn for bandaging Chewie. Finn’s reaction here makes it clear that he never expected thanks for it and he’s both pleased and uncertain when Han does.

Not only not condemning Finn when he decides to leave on Takodana, but telling him to keep the blaster rifle he just lent him. This might be a bigger deal to Finn than it appears to be on the surface, remember how afraid Finn still is and how he frantically searched for a weapon on Jakku? By giving him the means to defend himself Han might have been giving Finn a bigger gift – from an emotional perspective – than a blaster rifle might normally seem to be.

Asking Finn if he’s okay after saving his life during the First Order’s attack. Finn is not used to others looking out for him or checking how he’s doing outside of a purely functional perspective. But Han’s concern here has nothing to do with Finn’s ability to perform, it’s purely emotional.

So when Han asks him if “he’s up for this” (i.e. the attack) Finn does something that for him must be very usual, even unique. He lets his highly competent soldier side step aside for a moment and lets Han see the frightened, vulnerable young man that he also is.

It’s only for a moment and then the soldier side of him is back to planning their assault, but that Finn – willingly and knowingly – lets Han see that side of him at all, does nothing to hide it… that says a lot of how much he’s come to trust Han emotionally in the short he’s know him.

It also makes me wonder how losing Han in the way he did, seeing him murdered by his own son, will affect Fin’’s journey going forward.

I HAD NOT EVEN THOUGHT ABOUT THIS OMG and I’m really kicking myself here for fixating on Han and Rey’s bond to the exclusion of the much more understated but also crucial relationship between Han and Finn. Smh at my own sexist and racist biases here.

I agree with all the instances you mentioned, plus there’s also another crucial interaction: when Han saw through Finn’s lie about being a big deal in the Resistance and told him as much but chose to let it slide, even handing Finn a blaster nevertheless.

This is huge for someone who grew up abused. Not only do many victims turn to deception protect themselves, being discovered in a lie is often the ultimate nightmare because you’re now going to be mistreated for the truth you were trying to hide and be punished for lying.

Instead Finn is given a message he probably never had been before: I know you’re lying but I’m not going to pry because I respect your boundaries. I’m sure you have your reasons and you’re smart enough to handle your own business. But you know, just fyi, she’s going to find out. Also have a deadly weapon while we’re at it because why not?

I respect you. I believe in your capabilities. I know you’re a good person. I trust you with my life.

Those four sentences are, at minimum, the basis of a damned good friendship and a solid familial relationship as well. I’m pretty sure most of us can name at least one family member we couldn’t convincingly say all four to.

This also ties together in interesting ways with Finn’s distrust of authority, since Han never approached Finn as any kind of authority except in the sense of being older and more knowledgeable. He treated Finn as an equal, one he trusted and respected, and I think it was just what Finn needed at that point in his life. Han should have taken Finn a little more seriously than he did, though, because Finn was right about there being First Order spies at Maz’s and taking BB-8 out in public was a huge mistake.

I wonder if, in addition to suffering from the loss of Han and feeling a lot of rage at Kylo Ren, Finn will end up adopting some of Han’s style toward those who look up to him? Finn is probably not going to be a conventional authority figure given his experiences and the ways he reacted to them. I think treating those who look up to him as friends and equals, trusting their judgment and letting them make their own mistakes like Han did, would be more suited to who Finn is. I look forward to seeing if his relationship with Rose bears this theory out.

youcouldnthavepickedaworseship:

One of the things that I can’t shake from r*ylo is how much it reminds me of, not one, but a good total of THREE of my old abusers. And only one of them was someone I was romantically involved with. The whole “You know I can take whatever I want” sounds a lot like “You know you can’t hide from me” and “I’ll know if you told someone” and “Everything you have belongs to me”.

“It’s just one line, and only you interpret it that way!” Sure, whatever, but at the end of it all I know I’m not the only person who associates that interaction with abusive encounters with toxic people from their past. And that’s just?? One of MANY things between the two of them that’s a red flag for telltale abuse. We’re not over here just slapping dirty labels on things we don’t like for the sake of winning a debate. There is a REASON so many people can’t get behind r*ylo(“potential” familial relations and anti-blackness aside???)

Y’all, I’m tired. I never considered this ship to even be a possibility until Tumblr basically flooding the TLJ tag with that mess. I don’t KNOW for a fact if it’ll be debunked in December, so I can’t say it will be. But I was certain I wasn’t going to have to worry about a pretty triggering interaction between the protagonist/antagonist being the build up to yet /another/ unnecessary white/het romance. And now, I do. Cause y’all can’t fucking let up. I don’t understand your ship, and I honestly could have just ignored it in silence, had it not been shoved down my throat every waking moment since I logged back into this website. Crosstagging, overanalyzing everythjng, etc. If the ship does become canon(I’d be SHOCKED), then kudos to you for seeing something the rest of us didn’t. But if it’s debunked?? Can we maybe chill in the general tags?? I’m so tired. I love Rey. I even genuinely enjoy Kylo as a “complicated” villain(all gross r*ylo interactions aside). But god damn, if you love Kylo so much, make a self insert. Put them on equal footing. Make them?? Get along?? Maybe?? Don’t subject Rey to that bullshit because you’re projecting onto her. I’m a fan of the enemies to lovers trope as much as the next guy, but this is taking it too far. I don’t get it.

If reylo becomes canon (it won’t be) Star Wars is dead to me. I have no reason to give any support or thought to a franchise that validates abuse and excuses fascism.