Stockholm Syndrome Songs

[james_davis_nicoll]

[Lifted from rasfw]

As I recall, the plot of Toy Story II, "When She Loved Me" is about the love a toy has for its owner. What makes it creepy is that in the Toyverse, children are fickle and while the toys may feel an undying affection for their owners, the reverse is _not_ true. Eventually the toy will be misplaced and forgotten, left in the trash or sold to a stranger. As I recall, the song is used during a montage that shows how this processes worked out for Jesse (a doll thematically related to the movie's Uncle Tom, Woody), so it isn't like this is a mere subtext. They put it right out there for you to see.

Am I the only one who sees Toy Story 1 and 2 for the unblinking looks at abusive relationships that they are? Woody is reconciled to his eventual fate but if there's ever been a more clear example of Stockholm Syndrome in a movie it does not come to mind.

There's at least one other song along these lines: Puff the Magic Dragon, a cheerful story about a dragon who faithfully serves a boy named Jackie Paper, for which Puff is repaid by being forgotten and left to die. At least in this case Puff is unhappy, unlike Woody. Of course, the fact that the song is always sung with a "whee hee! Now the faithful servant dies a miserable lonely death! Yay!" air compensates for any acknowledgment that the situation is not optimal for Puff. Did Ayn Rand write Puff the Magic Dragon?

Given that the subgenre of Abusive Love Songs is pretty large and given this subgenre (whatever it is called)seems to be related, it seems to me that there should be more than two songs along the lines of "When She Loved Me" and "Puff the Magic Dragon". I cannot recall any. I am not sure whether to be disappointed in my powers of recall or relieved that the field is so small.

Comments

[sunshaker.livejournal.com]

Some people have argued that the lines
A dragon lives forever but not so little boys
Painted wings and giant rings make way for other toys.
One gray night it happened, Jackie Paper came no more
And PUFF that mighty dragon, he ceased his fearless roar.
indicate that Jackie Paper is the one that dies and Puff is heart Broken by the death. Others say that Jackie just grows up or moves on too newer and better toys.

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

The second line says to me Jackie just grew up.He stopped being a little boy but he didn't die.

[sunshaker.livejournal.com]

*nods* I know, they point to the first line saying he died. I tend to go with the he grew up one, but I have yet to beat this opinion into those who insist that he died.

[pauldrye.livejournal.com]

*Little* boys don't live forever. They turn into adults.

[pauldrye.livejournal.com]

I could swear there was a song related to the Island of Misfit Toys in the Rankin-Bass "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer", but googling around shows no sign of it.

[jeriendhal.livejournal.com]

You aren't imagining it. I just watched the DVD last night with my son, and they did have a song during their introduction to Rudolph and Co.

[marith.livejournal.com]

Aren't both of them building off "The Velveteen Rabbit"? Admittedly, that one has a more pro-toy ending, but the story concept is the same.

Hm, how about Shel Silverstein's "The Giving Tree"? That one always squicked me.

...and now that I think about it, perhaps these stories are aimed at parents. No matter how much you love your children and they love you, as they grow out of childhood they will pull away and reject the relationship. You're supposed to accept this as a natural part of life, mourn the loss of the kid and wait patiently for whatever scraps of attention the teenager can spare you.

Which in turn reminds me of J.M. Barrie, and also makes me wonder if people raised in very close-knit multigenerational families react to this toy genre differently. Hm.

[del-c.livejournal.com]

Not a song, and not as good a film as it wanted to be, but AI exists in this genre too. As does its original, Brian Aldiss's short story "Supertoys Last All Summer Long". Creepily, in Aldiss's story it's the parent who casts the "child" off, having acquired new interests, and it's the "child" who can never adjust.

[eub.livejournal.com]

(♥ your userpic)

[papersky.livejournal.com]

I agree about Puff being aimed at parents.

The relationship between parents and children is in fact very peculiar, and this doesn't get much attention. Most relationships are about getting closer, the parent/child one is about getting further apart -- for a mother, the child starts off inside your body, needs the most intimate care, lives in your house for years, and ends up maybe calling you a couple of times a year, and this is the healthy expected outcome.

I wonder whether immortals would go on having and raising children, assuming they could, and in what spirit they would. I think of Lazarus Long saying there's nothing more miraculous than a baby, but having children who have been strangers for centuries.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

The idea that kids move away from their parents is only one possible way of handling the relationship. Maybe immortals will find that there are advantages to being in big close clans. If they've figured out how to be emotionally sane and competent, it might even be a good future.

And the reason I hated _The Velveteen Rabbit_ was partly the equation of love with getting damaged, but mostly that the real rabbits were so obnoxious. What's the point of working so hard to be real if that's the result? Alternatively, how can a story where the author completely undercuts the point to squeeze out one more little bit of emotion be considered a classic?

[selenite.livejournal.com]

What timing--the kids are watching Toy Story 2 now.

I think the really harsh bit in "When She Loved Me" is when the teenage girl pulls the cowgirl out from under the bed while looking for nail polish, takes her to the hill where they used to play (insert blissful look of hopes fulfilled), and drops her in the Goodwill box (insert look of total shock and despair). At least Puff got to have his hopes slowly fade away instead of the final bait-and-switch.

OTOH, considering the alternatives of storage box and museum display, "loved and lost" may not be such a bad deal. All hypothetical for my kids' toys. Can't see any of them surviving to the teen years at the current destruction rate.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

A few months ago I read a book titled something like Imaginary Companions ... I forget the author but could find it again; it's a semi-scholarly (it's got many footnotes, but the text is interesting) look at imaginary friends, where they come from, what they do, and where they go. Those with a real aspect (toys, stuffed animals) and without are considered as parts of the same phenomenon.

The startling thing to me was how many imaginary friends -- when they don't simply fade away, or stop being talked about -- meet gruesome ends. Yes, one kid's imaginary dog may stay with grandpop to run his (electric) garage door opener, but distressingly many get squashed when they're sat on, or when the hand they're resting in is grabbed, or they accidentally run into the street when a car comes past, or whatever. There's a lot of virtual death out there.

Another fascinating point -- to me, anyway; I never had an imaginary friend that I recall -- is that the assumption everybody gives up whatever imaginary friend they might have isn't really justified; it's thought that questions like ``When did you stop talking to your imaginary friend?'' or stories and songs where the toy becomes Just A Toy in the end might be biasing the responses.

[aethereal-girl.livejournal.com]

Apropos, have you seen papersky's post about her imaginary friend, and what happened to him?

[mishalak.livejournal.com]

On the other hand children cannot stay children forever. I think it more the logical extension of the relationship between immortals and mortals. Eventually the mortals change. Children also give a lot of themselves to their toys and they can't do that forever, we have to grow up and do things like work for a living unless we're trust fund babies.

[oldsma.livejournal.com]

We love our toys so we can learn to love our children, I think.

MAO

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

Analog once ran a story whose idea was that people have kids so they can keep playing with dolls. The reaction was, hrm, heated.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

I hated _Toy Story_, though I saw it as being about downsizing and emotional slavery rather than abusive relationships in general. I'm amazed that most people aren't horrified by it, but I suspect people aren't because the toys just accept their condition.

To my mind the horror of it and the way it isn't that much like human abusive relationships is that the humans have no way of knowing that the toys are sentient. I suppose that could be seen as an allegory of human cluelessness, but the movie doesn't feel that way to me.

[porcinea.livejournal.com]

I hate, hate, hate those movies. (Ditto the Velveteen Rabbit. For similar reasons.)

[mayakda.livejournal.com]

Neat thread.
Puff was one of my favorite songs as a kid. It was so sad but I knew, with a child's certainty, that I would never grow up like Jackie Paper. I remember being indignant when someone told me the song was about marijuana.
I hated the Velveteen Rabbit.
In the dvd of one of the Toy Stories, there's a short film about a baby and a toy drummer on wheels. It highlights the theme. Yes, it's a one-sided, unreciprocated love -- but they need it. Maybe I'm biased, but I do think it's about parental love having to be unconditional, selfless, and courageous. Or maybe I'm a stockholm syndrome victim. :)

[oldsma.livejournal.com]

Or maybe I'm a stockholm syndrome victim.

Aren't all kids who are reared by adults?

MAO

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

No. Trust me on this.

[oldsma.livejournal.com]

What are the differences? Is "Stockholm Syndrome" hard-edged, or is it just a magnitude on a scale?

MAO

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

It's inappropriate warm feelings for an abuser.

[oldsma.livejournal.com]

Is it the abuse that makes it "stockholm syndrome" or the totality of control?

MAO