Why River is more sane than you.
POSTED BY: jewelstaitefan
UPDATED: Thursday, January 17, 2008 18:34
VIEWED: 10061
PAGE 5 of 5
Quote:
Originally posted by mal4prez:
JSF - this not a judgement of River, or a dismissal of her abilities. She is still a very bright girl. But she is damaged. She is not herself. This has been stated by damn near every character, including River, and it's been spelled out by Joss. It doesn't mean we don't love and respect River, it's just how it is.
You hit the nail right on the head. After all, it's River herself who said: "You found me broken." Can't argue with that.
Also, insisting, at all cost, that River ain't broken is almost tantamount to saying she can't be loved otherwise. And I think one of the things that makes Firefly so special, is precisely the fact that Joss wrote it in such a way that we feel compelled to tap into our deep reservoirs of love and care, and direct those, with extreme prejudice, at not-so-well River. I still get choked up when I think back to the first time I saw the pilot. Sigh.
Yesterday I saw a character called Fran, on Stargate Atlantis. Heck, even posted about her. :) But I bring it up because all this reminds me of this one thing she said:
"One always wishes to fulfill one's purpose."
River, in all her brokenness, I think is the perfect catalyst to realizing our true purpose; to know that the human soul was created to love. One look at River, and you cannot help but have your entire being converge on the desire to help her. Powerfull stuff this is.
Not that I/we want to see River broken, of course. I'd love for her to be healed and lead a normal life (after all, we're teleological beings, too: we seek a purposeful development toward an end). But I'm saying, the fact that she IS broken is by no means a reason to love her any less.
--
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to only love
A person whole, and see her sane against outrageous evidence,
Or to find her broken in a sea of troubles,
And by your unending love, end them.
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Quote:
Originally posted by mal4prez:
I think there is a sane River. It's the little girl we see in the beginning of Safe, the teenager in the earliest of the River Tam Chronicle things, ...
Oops. :) Wee Freudian slip? A contraction of the "River Tam Sessions" and the "Sarah Conner Chronicles" perhaps? :)
Ennyhows, keep posting!
--
"Mei-mei, everything I have is right here." -- Simon Tam
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Quote:Naaa, I know it wasn't right and was too lazy to look it up. Hence the "things" tacked on.
Originally posted by asarian:Quote:
Originally posted by mal4prez:
I think there is a sane River. It's the little girl we see in the beginning of Safe, the teenager in the earliest of the River Tam Chronicle things, ...
Oops. :) Wee Freudian slip? A contraction of the "River Tam Sessions" and the "Sarah Conner Chronicles" perhaps? :)
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Quote:
Originally posted by mal4prez:
Hey, the fact that River knows of true things is beside the point - it's her inability to express and act on this information that pushes her out of the realm of sanity. Which - yeah, with good reason! What she's been through would make me stark raving nuts too!
Precisely. Let's have two doctors do the talking, about reality and sanity (caps mine):
DR MATHIAS
The neural stripping
does tend to fragment...
THEIR OWN REALITY MATRIX.
(...)
SIMON
What use do we have...
for a psychic
if she's INSANE?
I rest my case.
--
"Mei-mei, everything I have is right here." -- Simon Tam
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Quote:
If a person's reality includes the certainty that they can fly by flapping their arms and they jump off a building.. how valid does that aspect of their reality rate? Similarly to River's twigs and leaves in the cargo bay?
If a person stabs and eats babies because their reality demands it, are we wrong to classify them as insane?
Did you not understand the ideology of Objects in Space at all? River *knows* what the material reality that is being induced by the individuals surrounding her entails but she also has a sense of the innate meaninglessness that encompasses objects and is able to apply this awareness to confabulate an entirely different meaning. Physical objects are, ultimately, meaningless, unless organised minds classify and imbue them with certain connotations and create a classification system by which to perceive them. River's visual and conceptual processing is so advanced that she can see beyond the classification and create a 'new meaning' with said objects, regardless of their size, shape and phenotypic composition, because these attributes are only superficial contrivances conceived by the human psyche for it to be able to understand its physical reality. The twig represented this by visually conveying how the conceived phenotypic composition and imbued definition is totally impertinent; the physical reality only consists of 'objects in space' which can and have been manipulated by the individuals urge to create meaning in his or her immediate environment.Quote:
OK, you may say Simon's knowledge is limited. If you want. But Joss is the expert, right? He created the character River Tam, he knows her inside out, he defines her.
You'll note that in the movie commentary, I forget exactly where it is, but in a scene where River is spouting nonsense, Joss says that he wanted to show that she really was off, that there was something really *wrong* with this girl. I forget his exact words, but the impression I got was that it's just not being a reader that gets to her, but she's actually a bit nuts.
Now, that's enough to convince me!
Okay, for one thing, River would never spout nonsense; her expressions are always communicating something in some way, no matter how obscure they may seem to be. Many of River's statements give the impression that something is 'wrong' with her. In fact, pretty much all of them do. These comments, however, are not insane or nonsensical. There is clearly something dramatically wrong with River; otherwise she wouldn't act the way she does.
Quote:
As for the idea that if what a person's doing makes sense to them, they are by definition sane...
1) Most insane people do things that make perfect sense to them! Many a sober alcoholic will refer to their past selves as insane, because while drinking they did some crazy shit. While they were drinking it made sense, but their minds were all twisted up. Once they're dried out and thinking straight, they realize how off they were.
2) River's actions often don't even make sense to her. "I don't know what I'm saying, I never know what I'm saying..." "The voices, they talk to me..." etc... She is not in control of herself.
Those two statements contradict each other. You say that a person is insane if the illogical or irrational thing they are saying or doing makes perfect sense and seems absolutely sane to them. Then you say 'River's actions often don't even make sense to her'. That wouldn't imply that she’s insane but, yes, it does support the argument that she is not in control of herself, with which I agree. I think before her brain was tampered with she still understood the 'objects in space' theory and had the intuitiveness, along with other enhanced abilities, but, somehow, an area which helped control the maintenance of these notions and abilities was damaged and she lost control of them.
Quote:
And I think that's the key: during the series and most of the movie, River is unable to be her true self, to pursue the things that make her happy. She isNOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Lexan:
Okay, for one thing, River would never spout nonsense; her expressions are always communicating something in some way, no matter how obscure they may seem to be. Many of River's statements give the impression that something is 'wrong' with her. In fact, pretty much all of them do. These comments, however, are not insane or nonsensical. There is clearly something dramatically wrong with River; otherwise she wouldn't act the way she does.Quote:
....
Those two statements contradict each other. You say that a person is insane if the illogical or irrational thing they are saying or doing makes perfect sense and seems absolutely sane to them. Then you say 'River's actions often don't even make sense to her'. That wouldn't imply that she’s insane but, yes, it does support the argument that she is not in control of herself, with which I agree. I think before her brain was tampered with she still understood the 'objects in space' theory and had the intuitiveness, along with other enhanced abilities, but, somehow, an area which helped control the maintenance of these notions and abilities was damaged and she lost control of them.Quote:
...
I agree, though I still couldn't use that term with no apprehension to describe River. As I said before, River’s character, which is what's important, is always the same but her personality, which encompasses her temperament, is not constant (this is mainly due to her having to put up with the temperaments of others, so she is rarely able to penetrate her own), so we never really saw River's superficial tendencies and attributes, in other words her normal, ‘sane’ behaviour clearly defined. Personality is supposed to be the temperament of an individual, while character is how the individual affects other people’s temperament. At times, we can obviously see how River can make the other characters feel, especially Simon, despite her desensitised condition.Quote:
...
She expresses and acts on the information in ways that she feels she can. Psychologically, she’s obviously not in control of what she can and what she can’t communicate. Resultantly, she uses other, often transcendental means of communication. Saying this is what ‘pushes her out of the realm of sanity’, is perhaps the most plausible argument supporting River’s insanity I’ve encountered but it still isn’t enough evidence to make this assumption. If you define insanity as ‘severe mental malfunction’ and dismiss other meanings, I would almost be inclined to say that the term is applicable to River.Quote:
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While I’m not sure if that is actually what River would have said, had her mental state not have been malfunctioning it is true that she would communicated differently. But as I said before, she has an enhanced clarity and cognition which is so intense that it distracts her from other things, like telling the crew about the dead bodies, blue gloved men and Jayne’s dishonesty. Intellectuality is a factor, it’s just not as prominent because all these situations and what a normal person would have done and said did not require it.
Thanks for reading this thread and contributing. I think you have understood many of my points and helped express some of them more clearly.
Regarding one of the exchanges above, I don't think River would classify herself as insane, but she would wonder if she was insane at times - because everybody around her was in a different world of perception and could not understand her.
I also may have neglected to point out that, besides having no family around during her Institute captivity, no stability for self, and then being released/thrust into a crew who does not understand what she says, she also has been going through all of these sensory and conceptual developments while developing physically, during and after puberty. The onslaught of hormones also creates confusion, and this is a seperate development from mental capacity and physical or emotional control.
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Quote:
Originally posted by Lexan:Quote:
If a person's reality includes the certainty that they can fly by flapping their arms and they jump off a building.. how valid does that aspect of their reality rate? Similarly to River's twigs and leaves in the cargo bay?
If a person stabs and eats babies because their reality demands it, are we wrong to classify them as insane?
Oh, trust me I do. I wouldn't call it an "ideology", for certain, but I do know what the episode is about.
I do not think that this has any impact on whether River is sane, though.
Nor do I think that "Objects are meaningless" is supposed to imply that they do not have a physical reality at all. What she ends up holding is still an object that really exists. She sees it differently, but it has a phyical reality and THAT is the point, not the dozens of other twigs and leaves that she also sees but that ARE NOT THERE. The imbued meaning is the point where they all have a chance at communicating, where River's reality intersects with the physical world, not the completely halucinated other twigs and leaves that have no representation in the physical world.
We do share a physical reality that we experience in similar ways and it is what enables us to communicate at all. River is unable to communicate fully (whether you choose to "blame" the others for being unable to understand her or whether you allow it to be a neutral fact that doesn't require constant qualifying) and that is what makes her insane.
I brought up the quantity of the twigs because for all of River's perception, she couldn't beat someone with one of those imaginary twigs because they are not there. They are a way of River's mind speaking to River but it is not something she could use to communicate. She is, essentially, a prisoner of her own mind's images because they are so far removed from the physical reality she needs to inhabit in order to connect with other people.
I find it interesting that no one so far has bothered to comment on the fact that flappy-arm person would be splattered on the ground and what this means for the twigs-image.
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Lexan, I want a lot of philosophical jargon thrown at me, I'll talk to a philosopher. :) In earnest, we all listened to Joss's Director's Commentary for this ep. In short, Joss explains that both River and Early "imbue" meaning to objects: Early in nasty ways, and River, as Joss puts it, because she has a good heart, "imbues them with kindness." River's famous "Just an object. It doesn't mean what you think." line is akin to what Joss said: "A ball is to be thrown, but it's also just a round thing." It still, as Early would say, has purpose.
Now, all the existentialism notwithstanding, kindnesss != sanity. River's choice of meaning is benign one. But it don't say nuttin' about the WHY of it. Now, I say for the twig we need to visit those layers of psychosis. The crackling sound, heard the moment she steps on that twig, immediately triggers an association with the cocking of a gun. Or rather the other way around, actually, seen from River's perspective: when she loads the gun (Jayne: "I don't leave my guns around, Mal. And I don't leave 'em loaded."), her highly associative mind connects the sound to stepping on a branch, and suddenly she's off to fairy land again, holding a gun-shaped twig in her hand. Possibly she's dissociating at the time.
I'd say OiS is already giving us a glimpse into what the Alliance did to her:
DR. MATHIAS
We can monitor and direct
their subconscious...
implant suggestions.
It's a little startling
to see at first,
but results are spectacular.
(...)
She'll be ideal
for defense deployment...
It's entirely possible the whole twig scene is part of her military conditioning. Like how she sees a pen shoved in her forehead, but which is, in fact, a nasty, big-ass needle. I wouldn't put it past them that they used similar tricks to have her handle guns, and assassinate folks, while having her think something else is happening.
Now, it's River who chooses to imbue a friendly meaning to a gun. And that's a commentary on her. But WHY it is happening, and WHY she's suddenly walking around with a gun in her hand, that's got nothing to do with Jean-Paul Sartre and his florid prose. But I say the relationship between that twig and the gun is as far away from "innate meaninglessness" as Jiangyin is from a Core planet.
--
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I said: "You'll note that in the movie commentary, I forget exactly where it is, but in a scene where River is spouting nonsense, Joss says that he wanted to show that she really was off, that there was something really *wrong* with this girl."
Lexan replied: "Okay, for one thing, River would never spout nonsense; her expressions are always communicating something in some way, no matter how obscure they may seem to be."
Easy with the getting literal, Lexan! You're nitpicking at the wrong thing. My point is - Joss made an effort to show us that there is something fundamentally wrong with River. The Man came right out and said it. Um... are you saying he was wrong?
As for "nonsense" - recall the bit with the food can labels. To the regular viewing audience and the other characters in the scene, River is spewing nonsense. Sure, those of us who later study the script find out that there's information in her words, but in the scene it's nonsense. So... I may refer to the spells where words that make no sense in the moment come bubbling out as the "spewage of nonsense." Give it no more weight than that my friend. 
Quote:I wasn't trying to have two points that build on each other logically. I was showing two reasons why JSF's assumption is flawed. The fact that a person's internal reasoning makes sense to that person cannot be equated with sanity OR insanity. It made sense to River to cut Jayne's chest. Does that make her action sane?
Those two statements contradict each other.
You and JSF seem to define River's sanity based on her "enhanced" knowledge and abilities. (Well... and JSF is adding points about superior intelligence that are just... well... out there.
) Sure, River acts on true information. The odd things she says and does have a reason and may follow some kind of logic - whether the crew understands it or she understands it herself. If we the viewers understand it, then it's sane. Is that really what you're saying?So... people get institutionalized because their brain chemicals are so inbalanced that they're slaves to their emotional impulses. The emotions are completely reasonable, but acting on them - not so much. These people are missing the ability to control themselves. It seems to me that, by your logic, none of these people are actually insane. Or do the special rules only apply to River?
As for my personal definition of insanity , let's turn to dictionary.com.
Insanity
1. Mental illness or derangement. No longer in scientific use.
2. Law
1. Unsoundness of mind sufficient in the judgment of a civil court to render a person unfit to maintain a contractual or other legal relationship or to warrant commitment to a mental health facility.
2. In most criminal jurisdictions, a degree of mental malfunctioning sufficient to relieve the accused of legal responsibility for the act committed.
3. Extreme foolishness; folly.
4. Something that is extremely foolish.
3.
1. Extreme foolishness; folly.
2. Something that is extremely foolish.
An inherently non-violent person (which I believe River to be) coming at a man with a knife because of associations she has with his tshirt.... I think that fits the above. It's not sane. Or should she be held criminally accountable for that action?
Quote:See, I think we're going to find that we're in argeement once the terms are better defined. What are your other meanings to "insanity"?
If you define insanity as ‘severe mental malfunction’ and dismiss other meanings, I would almost be inclined to say that the term is applicable to River.
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