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Nov. 16th, 2016 12:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
proximoceptionWD 7.2-7.4
In 7.4 Michonne's hunting problem recapitulates what had happened to the group with Negan: in trying and failing to wipe out an enemy, they got others killed.
Rick analogizes protecting Judith, despite her not being his, with giving in to serfdom under Negan. We're to understand this is wrongheaded, I think - an underdog's version of the "I get to care more about my kids than yours" logic he and Maggie had used when squeezing Hilltop. As we saw in the previous episode, Negan does not have a stopping point for squeezing: the man Dwight shoots gives on only because others are threatened, which we also learn is Dwight's own motivation. Rick wants to give Judith the kind of life she simply won't have under that system, where you either join the empowered, submit to being squeezed without mercy, or die. Negan takes pains to make it seem like others' assent is what creates their circumstances, i.e. that he is Hobbes' Leviathan. But of course others assent because he is the guy with the biggest stick and the fewest scruples about using it.
Ezekiel is set up as a contrasting sort of "monarch": he is self-deprecatingly ridiculous but committed to his act, which fits his attitude toward the necessary fiction of leadership - apparently the void must be filled, but attention should be pointedly drawn to how it's all a void anyway. He takes personal interest in each subject, asks things of them as personal favors, always offers to share etc. His second in command is clearly amused by him rather than afraid. The "well" motto equates exactly to to each according to his need, from each according to his abilities. There's wordplay on the second meaning of "well" that was highlighted by the dialogue at one point, I think. Ezekiel's connection to Morgan's original master is made clear by his words and by his becoming his second - Morgan is a full "knight" by the end. He makes sure the pigs (scavengers running amok, much like Negan et al.) he gives to the Saviors are "full of rot," a clear render-unto-Caesar allusion.
Carol sees the slaughtered zombies as people in their last moments. While it can be simply taken as an example of how fed up with death she is, the highlighting of Morgan's (continuing) vegetarianism makes me think the show's still committed to this as the standard of full morality.
The tiger is Carol, in a sense, but it also may represent the people in general. The people are the true Leviathan, not their ruler, of course (note Negan's attempt to short circuit this by making them identify with him), but carefully and well-treated they are no danger. This is the opposite sort of motivation system to Negan's (the torture music et al. are supposed to make us think hard about conditioning). Ezekiel claims he plays up the good. By constantly putting into people's thoughts how much worse he might make things if they don't play along Negan does the opposite. Given Ezekiel's silly wig, are we to take this as a Cromwell (or Charles 1?)/Hobbes vs. Charles 2/Locke distinction? I'm very rusty on those dudes, and on operant vs. classical conditioning, but vaguely recall that Locke's thing is about consolidating preexisting goods through acts of assent, Hobbes' the creation of spaces of non-awfulness out of a fear-based truce among awful parties. Ezekiel's holding court on a stage suggests this connection ("thy lovers were all untrue" encompassed Parliament, a weirdly mistress-based system of court power, and the Restoration theatre C2 blessed into existence). Benevolent compromise, selling out within certain limits, a recognition of pleasure's importance and its ability to assuage a degree of pain. I see no clear signs the show's undermining Ezekiel so far, except for the zombie stuff with Carol, though maybe the special favors the King reserves for himself (appointing Morgan to teach his friend's son, the fruits) are not as trivial as they seem. Is it right to kill the pigs to save themselves, for example? Or to feed them zombies? The deer Michonne shoots again gives me pause, and how Rick gives it electively to Negan, as a proof he will adhere to the spirit of the new system. Serving up innocents (their freedom to live as they choose, here, though not necessarily their lives) is never right, by Omelas logic. The way Enid and Rosita are treated seems ominous, no? And of course a deal where "a week" and "half" are fungible concepts is no deal at all. Offering nonviolence to violence and symbolic rather than real dissent, as the Kingdom does, might seem like a much better answer to extortion ... but it's still getting zombies and pigs killed.
The bit about "they still have the numbers" in 7.4 when alliance with Hilltop is mentioned may suggest that the calculation could change if the Kingdom were added.
Saviorville is fascism, Hilltop capitalism, the Kingdom socialism I guess? Not sure how far they'll care to push the latter identification.
The single-bullet motif is a powerful one in the series, but I'm not sure how Rosita's connects with Rick's/Michonne's.
Hiding Maggie's whereabouts was an odd issue. Technically it endangers everyone - what if she's spotted at Hilltop when they collect its tribute? That it's volunteered not by Rick but by the priest may suggest it expresses a universal value - a line people will accept risk defending rather than allow to be crossed. Thus that left to his own devices Rick might not have made the right choice. As with earlier church meetings I think we're to understand Rick is wrong and the qualms of the people in the pews are right. Whether to give up Maggie is exactly like the line Dwight and his wife failed to defend, leaving them pretty much in hell despite eating slightly better, and maybe internalizing the invading police state's mentality about the two guns seems tinier but is essentially similar. Rick's threat to Spencer, while stopping short of being a death threat, was a disturbing one to deliver given all the head-smashing he'd been witnessing. I think we're to understand Alexandria is becoming Vichy, and that Rosita and Spencer are starting the Resistance. Using fascism/WW2 as go-to place for metaphors fits Morgan's slight swerve from killing-no-humans - he's like Gary Cooper in whichever that movie where he's a Quaker is.
The two dead zombies at the gate were a rather blatant metaphor, but the fact that the second warning was delivered *after* full compliance may be lost on Rick. Can't tell what relationship Michonne's head-severed zombie bears to Negan's, though their two skulls seems cloven in about the same way. Maybe meant something like: in fighting back, as they had done, they had killed their enemy AND their friend. But in not fighing back exactly as much is lost? Spencer's insistence that a deal could have been reached may suggest he'd have been Alexandria's equivalent of the King in his dealings with Negan, with the small amount of food, alcohol, and guns he'd hoarded both echoing the King's admission that his schtick's "a little bit for me." Probably also suggests the life the Kingdom is able to live, where the bitter is swallowed to preserve some sweet (the half-filled bottle of alcohol?), but also to permit some self-defense if needed. Richard's lip is bloodied but the King's way stops anyone from being killed.
Seems unlikely that the show will fully vindicate dignified defeat over resisting tyranny, though. But it might vindicate it as proper in certain situations, no longer so once the balance is changed by events in Alexandria (like whatever Rosita's planning). So maybe the King will step up. He does tell Morgan to bring his gun, which is pretty much the equivalent here of whatshisname's having one gun locked in a box. Ohhh, yeah ok. That would explain the one bullet: violence for self-defense, and even for defense of freedom (the box one is used for suicide, thus release from pointless pain/indignity, life not worth the name) SHOULD be kept as an option, but only as the last ditch one. Michonne's shots at the zombie are not last ditch, which is why they miss - they're prematurely preemptive strikes, like the nighttime massacre of Negan's outpost was. But even though Rick signs away all self-defense, it doesn't mean all of his people will. Suggests they cannot, even: there will be resistance to tyranny, which will bring that tyranny down. In the long run, anyway.
Rick refuses to fight back because of those, esp. the children, who might die if he does. Daryl refuses to kneel because of those who have already died. The man Dwight kills (out of pity? Anger? Does even he know?) claims he is kneeling for the last time, but he is wrong in spirit (can't remember if his corpse kneels factually at the end by the fence?). The very fact that he kneels in the middle of an essentially suicidal gesture is striking - more conditioning, I guess.
So mostly I'm left wondering if there's anything wrong with the Kingdom's approach. The King's success with Carol is striking - since she can't accept being in (accepting offers of safety that may not be permanent) or out (refusing to admit it exists) he comes up with an equivalent to his king-and-no-king duality. (Morgan's lowering of the mailbox flag indicates he too sees Carol as semi-attached to the new group.) The fiction makes as little sense as reality, but for that very reason is not obviously rejectable. Re. the Derridean scapegoat/wall stuff, this king has accomodated a possible rogue element rather than imprisoning or exiling it (Rick's having instead done the latter was a crucial bad-karma domino). Some of the language he uses about his people suggests they're not fooled in quite the way the Alexandria people were, which fits the cobbler vs. chocolate distinction. The sweet is needed, but not to excess. Whether the pomegranate of life under Negan is ever worth it is ... at least left a bit troubling.
Dwight's wife seems ambivalent about being pregnant at all, which fits Rick's being wrong to accept this compromise because of Judith. The reduction to the first letter of the place Negan thinks you're from, in Daryl's case, or of one's name, in Dwight's, is interesting. Means that Daryl, by not become another "D," has embraced patriotism? Or rather that his true name is still his (since he gets to say it). No clue what the unmissable Scarlet Letter allusion might be about beyond that. Was a chapter entitled "The Cell" in there? As compared to Prison House or whatever?
In 7.4 Michonne's hunting problem recapitulates what had happened to the group with Negan: in trying and failing to wipe out an enemy, they got others killed.
Rick analogizes protecting Judith, despite her not being his, with giving in to serfdom under Negan. We're to understand this is wrongheaded, I think - an underdog's version of the "I get to care more about my kids than yours" logic he and Maggie had used when squeezing Hilltop. As we saw in the previous episode, Negan does not have a stopping point for squeezing: the man Dwight shoots gives on only because others are threatened, which we also learn is Dwight's own motivation. Rick wants to give Judith the kind of life she simply won't have under that system, where you either join the empowered, submit to being squeezed without mercy, or die. Negan takes pains to make it seem like others' assent is what creates their circumstances, i.e. that he is Hobbes' Leviathan. But of course others assent because he is the guy with the biggest stick and the fewest scruples about using it.
Ezekiel is set up as a contrasting sort of "monarch": he is self-deprecatingly ridiculous but committed to his act, which fits his attitude toward the necessary fiction of leadership - apparently the void must be filled, but attention should be pointedly drawn to how it's all a void anyway. He takes personal interest in each subject, asks things of them as personal favors, always offers to share etc. His second in command is clearly amused by him rather than afraid. The "well" motto equates exactly to to each according to his need, from each according to his abilities. There's wordplay on the second meaning of "well" that was highlighted by the dialogue at one point, I think. Ezekiel's connection to Morgan's original master is made clear by his words and by his becoming his second - Morgan is a full "knight" by the end. He makes sure the pigs (scavengers running amok, much like Negan et al.) he gives to the Saviors are "full of rot," a clear render-unto-Caesar allusion.
Carol sees the slaughtered zombies as people in their last moments. While it can be simply taken as an example of how fed up with death she is, the highlighting of Morgan's (continuing) vegetarianism makes me think the show's still committed to this as the standard of full morality.
The tiger is Carol, in a sense, but it also may represent the people in general. The people are the true Leviathan, not their ruler, of course (note Negan's attempt to short circuit this by making them identify with him), but carefully and well-treated they are no danger. This is the opposite sort of motivation system to Negan's (the torture music et al. are supposed to make us think hard about conditioning). Ezekiel claims he plays up the good. By constantly putting into people's thoughts how much worse he might make things if they don't play along Negan does the opposite. Given Ezekiel's silly wig, are we to take this as a Cromwell (or Charles 1?)/Hobbes vs. Charles 2/Locke distinction? I'm very rusty on those dudes, and on operant vs. classical conditioning, but vaguely recall that Locke's thing is about consolidating preexisting goods through acts of assent, Hobbes' the creation of spaces of non-awfulness out of a fear-based truce among awful parties. Ezekiel's holding court on a stage suggests this connection ("thy lovers were all untrue" encompassed Parliament, a weirdly mistress-based system of court power, and the Restoration theatre C2 blessed into existence). Benevolent compromise, selling out within certain limits, a recognition of pleasure's importance and its ability to assuage a degree of pain. I see no clear signs the show's undermining Ezekiel so far, except for the zombie stuff with Carol, though maybe the special favors the King reserves for himself (appointing Morgan to teach his friend's son, the fruits) are not as trivial as they seem. Is it right to kill the pigs to save themselves, for example? Or to feed them zombies? The deer Michonne shoots again gives me pause, and how Rick gives it electively to Negan, as a proof he will adhere to the spirit of the new system. Serving up innocents (their freedom to live as they choose, here, though not necessarily their lives) is never right, by Omelas logic. The way Enid and Rosita are treated seems ominous, no? And of course a deal where "a week" and "half" are fungible concepts is no deal at all. Offering nonviolence to violence and symbolic rather than real dissent, as the Kingdom does, might seem like a much better answer to extortion ... but it's still getting zombies and pigs killed.
The bit about "they still have the numbers" in 7.4 when alliance with Hilltop is mentioned may suggest that the calculation could change if the Kingdom were added.
Saviorville is fascism, Hilltop capitalism, the Kingdom socialism I guess? Not sure how far they'll care to push the latter identification.
The single-bullet motif is a powerful one in the series, but I'm not sure how Rosita's connects with Rick's/Michonne's.
Hiding Maggie's whereabouts was an odd issue. Technically it endangers everyone - what if she's spotted at Hilltop when they collect its tribute? That it's volunteered not by Rick but by the priest may suggest it expresses a universal value - a line people will accept risk defending rather than allow to be crossed. Thus that left to his own devices Rick might not have made the right choice. As with earlier church meetings I think we're to understand Rick is wrong and the qualms of the people in the pews are right. Whether to give up Maggie is exactly like the line Dwight and his wife failed to defend, leaving them pretty much in hell despite eating slightly better, and maybe internalizing the invading police state's mentality about the two guns seems tinier but is essentially similar. Rick's threat to Spencer, while stopping short of being a death threat, was a disturbing one to deliver given all the head-smashing he'd been witnessing. I think we're to understand Alexandria is becoming Vichy, and that Rosita and Spencer are starting the Resistance. Using fascism/WW2 as go-to place for metaphors fits Morgan's slight swerve from killing-no-humans - he's like Gary Cooper in whichever that movie where he's a Quaker is.
The two dead zombies at the gate were a rather blatant metaphor, but the fact that the second warning was delivered *after* full compliance may be lost on Rick. Can't tell what relationship Michonne's head-severed zombie bears to Negan's, though their two skulls seems cloven in about the same way. Maybe meant something like: in fighting back, as they had done, they had killed their enemy AND their friend. But in not fighing back exactly as much is lost? Spencer's insistence that a deal could have been reached may suggest he'd have been Alexandria's equivalent of the King in his dealings with Negan, with the small amount of food, alcohol, and guns he'd hoarded both echoing the King's admission that his schtick's "a little bit for me." Probably also suggests the life the Kingdom is able to live, where the bitter is swallowed to preserve some sweet (the half-filled bottle of alcohol?), but also to permit some self-defense if needed. Richard's lip is bloodied but the King's way stops anyone from being killed.
Seems unlikely that the show will fully vindicate dignified defeat over resisting tyranny, though. But it might vindicate it as proper in certain situations, no longer so once the balance is changed by events in Alexandria (like whatever Rosita's planning). So maybe the King will step up. He does tell Morgan to bring his gun, which is pretty much the equivalent here of whatshisname's having one gun locked in a box. Ohhh, yeah ok. That would explain the one bullet: violence for self-defense, and even for defense of freedom (the box one is used for suicide, thus release from pointless pain/indignity, life not worth the name) SHOULD be kept as an option, but only as the last ditch one. Michonne's shots at the zombie are not last ditch, which is why they miss - they're prematurely preemptive strikes, like the nighttime massacre of Negan's outpost was. But even though Rick signs away all self-defense, it doesn't mean all of his people will. Suggests they cannot, even: there will be resistance to tyranny, which will bring that tyranny down. In the long run, anyway.
Rick refuses to fight back because of those, esp. the children, who might die if he does. Daryl refuses to kneel because of those who have already died. The man Dwight kills (out of pity? Anger? Does even he know?) claims he is kneeling for the last time, but he is wrong in spirit (can't remember if his corpse kneels factually at the end by the fence?). The very fact that he kneels in the middle of an essentially suicidal gesture is striking - more conditioning, I guess.
So mostly I'm left wondering if there's anything wrong with the Kingdom's approach. The King's success with Carol is striking - since she can't accept being in (accepting offers of safety that may not be permanent) or out (refusing to admit it exists) he comes up with an equivalent to his king-and-no-king duality. (Morgan's lowering of the mailbox flag indicates he too sees Carol as semi-attached to the new group.) The fiction makes as little sense as reality, but for that very reason is not obviously rejectable. Re. the Derridean scapegoat/wall stuff, this king has accomodated a possible rogue element rather than imprisoning or exiling it (Rick's having instead done the latter was a crucial bad-karma domino). Some of the language he uses about his people suggests they're not fooled in quite the way the Alexandria people were, which fits the cobbler vs. chocolate distinction. The sweet is needed, but not to excess. Whether the pomegranate of life under Negan is ever worth it is ... at least left a bit troubling.
Dwight's wife seems ambivalent about being pregnant at all, which fits Rick's being wrong to accept this compromise because of Judith. The reduction to the first letter of the place Negan thinks you're from, in Daryl's case, or of one's name, in Dwight's, is interesting. Means that Daryl, by not become another "D," has embraced patriotism? Or rather that his true name is still his (since he gets to say it). No clue what the unmissable Scarlet Letter allusion might be about beyond that. Was a chapter entitled "The Cell" in there? As compared to Prison House or whatever?
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Date: 2016-11-16 11:41 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-11-16 05:26 pm (UTC)