Bit of Both: Motivation in the ‘Verse
Jan. 26th, 2009 03:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
A few days ago,shapinglight offered up a (completely on the money) rant about people “slagging Spike off”. (I love the way the British language works). Anyway, she begins by pointing to the anti-Spike folks who basically say that Spike never did anything good because all of his apparently good deeds were done for selfish purposes. There are a couple of ways to respond to the charge. One could point out how much these people have to stretch the facts to make the charge stick. How could Spike’s choice to keep fighting the fight in Sunnydale after Buffy was dead have anything to do with wanting to get into her pants? Alternatively, one can argue that the standard of judgment is just wrong. People just don’t have pure motivations. Most of our choices are “overdetermined”, by which I mean that you can explain them in multiple ways, any one of which would have been sufficient to result in the choice, but all of which might well have been in play when the choice was made. Am I writing this post because I have something to say, because I am hoping to get the strokes one gets when people respond to posts, or because I’d rather do this than work on the stuff I’m supposed to be working on? Well, truth be told, all of it is in play. Some of the motives might be perfectly good; others might be self-serving in a benign way; others might be downright ignoble, indefensible even. In a complex world that’s just how things are.
One of the things I love about the ‘verse is that it frequently calls attention to the ambiguity of what motivates us. So Spike’s critics aren’t just wrong because they stretch the facts to fit their case; they’re wrong because they use a standard that the ‘verse itself calls into question. Here are two examples to illustrate the basic point.
At the end of The Gift, Buffy takes a beautiful swan dive into a mystical portal, saving the world at the expense of her own life. We get moving music, a long slow-motion view of her flight, and a final epitaph for the fallen hero who saved the world a lot. People have written insightful meta about how Buffy’s noble sacrifice pulls together so many of the threads of her life into one final triumphant act. But it really isn’t that simple. A big theme of the season was that slayers die when they get a death wish, which was developed not just by Spike’s assertions on the subject, but by the fact that Buffy is visibly worn down by the tragedies that befall her and the burden she bears. She loses her boyfriend, and her mother. She is confronted by an enemy who is substantially stronger than she is, and by the possibility that the price of saving the world might be sacrificing her sister. Buffy’s response to all this is to give up – she becomes catatonic for an entire episode. Pulled out of her catatonia, Buffy goes back into the battle, but she declares to Giles that she doesn’t want to live in a world that forces such hard choices. Although she seemingly finds a way around the harsh choice between sacrificing her sister and saving the world by sacrificing herself, her final inspiring words to her sister are that “the hardest thing in this world is to live in it.” Inspiring music and visuals might let us gloss over this statement but it’s quite subversive of the moment. If the brave and heroic thing is living in the world, just what kind of sacrifice is Buffy making by choosing to not live in it? That might just be a discordant note in a satisfying conclusion to the hero’s journey, but Whedon and company devoted all of season six to exploring just how dark Buffy’s ‘inspiring’ words really were.
So was Buffy sacrificing her life to save the world? Or was she committing suicide leaving others braver than herself to cope with the real challenge which is living in this world? People argue about this as though it had to be one or the other. But really, isn’t it both? And isn’t the both-ness of it what makes it so great, so arresting?
Which takes me to my second example, where the question is made explicit in a scene involving Spike. In Destiny, Spike and Angel battle for the cup of torment, which is a battle about many things including who is the vampire of destiny. We could kill a forest talking about all the motives in play for both of them during that fight. It’s a great scene. But at the very end, right before Spike drinks from the cup, a defeated Angel tries to stop him:
“Spike, wait. Wait. That's not a prize you're holding. It's not a trophy. It's a burden. It's a cross. One you're gonna have to bear till it burns you to ashes. Believe me. I know. So ask yourself: Is this really the destiny that was meant for you? Do you even really want it? Or is it that you just want to take something away from me?”
And Spike pauses and then responds with a shrug: “Bit of both”.
Noble motives and ignoble motives. Not one or the other. Both. And not just both. A bit of both. There’s even more in the stew of motivation than those two motives. Language just never is adequate to what’s really going on with us.
::pauses to sigh at another great Spike moment, and to remind self to not write pages of side commentary on how it’s just perfect that it’s Spike who says this::
The show isn’t about heroes and villains. Not about good guys and bad guys. It’s about people who have some good motivations and some bad motivations and who are usually operating from both sets of motivations at the same time. Which set of motivations we focus on are overwhelmingly determined by our affection or lack thereof for the character. Do you love Spike? His good deeds are reflective of his noble motivations, of course. Do you insist on seeing him as a villain? Pull up every lesser motivation you can find and pretend that Spike, and Spike alone, is motivated by such motivations. Such debates are pretty stupid. And annoying, of course, for those of us who really love the character who comes under such attacks. And really very much beside the point of the show itself.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-26 10:03 pm (UTC)No, he wasn't trying to get into her pants, but that doesn't make his motives selfless. You yourself pointed out that there can be multiple motives, and I think Spike did benefit from staying and helping - he got an outlet for his grief (taking care of Dawn, doing what Buffy would want), and he got the comfort of being with others who were also grieving. Plus, he gained acceptance into the group, something he's been working toward for quite some time now. If he'd left town, he'd be alone, and that's something Spike has always seemed to dislike.
So I wouldn't say they're "stretching the facts," just that this is one more example of a situation where multiple motives are involved, and not all of them are selfless. But, as your post states, that doesn't make the good deeds less good. (I actually do agree with most of what you said, but dismissing this interpretation as "stretching the facts" undermines your argument, IMO, because you're only considering the motivation that makes Spike look good, just as Spike's detractors are only considering the motivation that makes him look bad.)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-26 11:10 pm (UTC)Anyway, as I said above, we all act out of some sort of love. The question is what it is that we love. Staying to honor a promise or to be part of a community sharing in its grief are not hardly bad motives. And the problem with the yahoos is that they blow past the actual "selfish" reasons that Spike has to the silly one like its all to get in Buffy's pants. (And yes, there are people who say that. Though they could well be trolls.)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-26 11:53 pm (UTC)I wouldn't say "on my terms," since that wasn't what I was trying to say, but it is true to some extent. However, if that's the assumption you're going to make, then why bother engaging detractors in a debate about Spike's motivation at all? If there is no selfless motivation, then it doesn't matter whether Spike's motive was love, or trying to make himself feel better, or even to get in Buffy's pants (which, I'll agree, doesn't make sense), because the result is still the same.
However, I would say that motivation does matter. Even if nothing is purely selfless, there are good motives and bad motives, as you illustrated with your examples. And I think without the good motive to balance out the bad one, it's hard to see something as a good deed, even if the result is a positive one.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-27 12:42 am (UTC)The general point is that if the Spike-haters strategy is to say "if I can find one lower motive, or one potential motive that's lower, I can disqualify the goodness of the act entirely", they are missing the point that EVERYONE has multiple motives, and pretty much all of us could be disqualified if those are the grounds by which you want to judge. In other words, they are holding Spike to a different standard than the one they hold Buffy to or any other character whom they happen to admire.
I agree with you that the real conversation should be about the quality of the motivations, the type of 'selfishness' involved. Mother Theresa is "selfish" in the sense that she does what benefits her. But she's a saint because what benefits her is alleviating the suffering of others. Spike's taking torture because it would hurt him to see Buffy suffer is not as high up the scale as Mother Theresa, but it's pretty darned good. Spike's choice to stay and associate with people who are fighting the good fight is pretty good -- better than choosing to hang out with the lowlifes. etc. etc.
I still like the getting of the soul. But for reasons that are more complicated than the notion that a soulless person (oxymoron though that is) can't perform good acts.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-27 01:10 am (UTC)Yeah, I get that now. When I first read your post, not knowing the source of the debate, I read it as more of a general argument against "selfish motives negate good deeds" than specifically directed at the haters. So it seemed like it was your argument that was weak - "Spike's good because he's not trying to get into Buffy's pants" - not theirs.
In other words, they are holding Spike to a different standard than the one they hold Buffy to or any other character whom they happen to admire.
That seems to happen a lot, even on the show. Instead of expecting Spike to be a vampire and being proud of him when he goes against his nature and does good, the characters often expect him to act like a human, and then look down on him when he screws up.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-27 03:05 am (UTC)I can never decide whether the double-standard business in the show was unintentional or a lovely illustration of how preconceptions and social dynamics can pin people down. I go back and forth.