beccatoria (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
beccatoria) wrote2008-08-22 07:00 pm
beccatoria) wrote2008-08-22 07:00 pm
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BSG Meta: Six vs Eight vs Identity
Well, I'm still in South Korea. Still plugging away. Very grateful it's the weekend and not really in the mood to bore everyone with talk of such things, so instead, I have written BSG meta for the first time in ages. Hurrah!
The first cylon-on-cylon opinion we hear about the Eights is a Six opining that her model is weak, which we, as the audience, understand to mean 'human'. Contrast this with Six - the first time we hear a cylon-on-cylon opinion about her is when Boomer talks about how the Sixes are usually so "hardcore" in Downloaded. We meet her committing genocide and infanticide. We meet her through Head!Six who is fascinating and in no way robotic, but also inhuman and terrifying. But Eight, we meet through characters with names. Through Boomer who spends the first season so terrified and through Athena (though back then I suppose she was still Sharon, but still, she claimed a name: Caprica had to be given one), the character who abandons everything for Love.
Six is set up as "all shall look on me and despair," sex-and-violence. Eight is set up as our window to the Cylon's capacity for humanity, redemptive love, evolution and gosh-darned adorable half-robot children. Six and Eight both try to negotiate the distance between human and cylon with their bodies - this constant battle, most obvious with Six but present as an undertow in Eight also, about whether love is sex is sex is love - but Six murders babies while Eight creates them, even though they both started off as Mata Hari. Caprica and Gaius before the mini or Athena and Helo after, they're both doing the same job.
So it's interesting to me that, in season four especially, I feel a strong ambivalence that I think exists in the text also, about this whole "hardcore Six" vs "softcore Eight" and how it might be exactly backwards as soon as you claw the slightest bit under the surface.
It's not that Boomer's observation about the Sixes was wrong, or that Caprica is different fundamentally, so much as Caprica is the first Six Boomer has ever seen - perhaps the first Six that's existed - on more than a...not quite superficial, but perhaps simple level.
It's not that Athena is lacking in naive optimism or a capacity for love, it's that she will also pick her side so damn hard she'll demand a sister's murder to solidify her identity, and the only reasons the Eights on the Rebel Basestar didn't quite get that yet was because they were still...simple. They hadn't had the experience necessary to realise they were going to break down and stick on a side just as hard as Athena one day.
It boils down to: Six is hardcore, but underneath the steel that lets her instigate an unwieldy Centurion uprising, there's a deep, enduring and desperate capacity and desire for love. Six loves the things she's killing and loves her enemies and wants them to love her. "Get it done, no matter what," is wrapped around, "love me, please."
Eight is softcore, but underneath the surface that lets her switch sides and hope blindly for a Lifetime Special ending against all evidence ot the contrary, she's angry and bitter and, well, hateful. Eight commits to hating her enemies and convincing herself it doesn't matter if they hate her too. "Love me, please," is wrapped arond, "Get it done, no matter what."
They're opposites. Though I think that Six's "no matter what," is rooted more in rage and Eight's "no matter what," is rooted more in hate.
Eights don't walk the space between human and cylon very well. Boomer tried in Downloaded and ended up, well, frakking over all the other Eights because she picked her side and it was "being a machine," and everyone else can burn. Athena picked her side and it was "being a human," and everyone else can burn.
It tool me a long time to believe that about Athena or want to. But I remember when she first showed up on Galactica. She was almost certainly lying when she denied knowing what the Resurrection Ship was. She flat out told Adama that though she helped kill the raiders in Flight of the Phoenix she wasn't going to turn over other cylon agents in the Fleet. But then, the comission, Helo, carrot and stick.
I'm not unsympathetic. In Athena's position - at least given what she wanted to achieve - half conversion wasn't an option. But still, I finally got it when Starbuck was trying to talk Sam down from shooting the Six that killed Barolay, and Athena was there, leading the "kill her" charge, complete with us vs them language.
I remember when she wouldn't kill D'Anna on New Caprica even though she would have resurrected and ever though she'd just told her that Hera was alive and Athena thought it was the cruelest lie a person could tell.
Now she murders unarmed women she knows will never come back because they were speaking to Hera. I actually think Adama fundamentally misunderstood why Athena shot Natalie, but I'm not sure he was wrong exactly when he asked if she hated her own people that much. Or at least if she feels she has to convince herself she hates them or she'll fall apart?
It's interesting that first act of cylon-on-cylon violence is committed by Athena when she shoots another Eight at the end of season one, when Helo works out who and what she is. It's committed in an attempt to abandon her people and walk off on her own path, at their expense, with things that also matter to them. While the first known and credited act of cylon-on-cylon violence is committed by Caprica, though she does it in an attmept to bring her people with her and share what she's learned.
I'm not really sure what I think all of this means, except perhaps, that Eight is good at crossing lines, while Six is better at living between them?
Hell, maybe that's why Eight is often coded in the show as being more human. Another watershed Eight moment for me was the Eight who dabbled with Athena's memories and how, to her, it was completely not a violation, it was probably something closer to love and it was certainly something she had every right to do because there is a sense of shared communal ownership that crosses between the models, and she hadn't yet realised that Athena had stopped being one of them, at times violently. We've seen how Athena reacts to the slightest notion of communal ownership of Hera or her own life: I really, really don't think she would have liked knowing that the other Eight took her memories. Well, that's it, isn't it, did she "take" them or did she "share" them? Is Captain Agathon married to the entire production line? Sort of, yeah. It's just Athena would rather stop being what she is than admit it.
Because that's what we've seen with the Cylon. Slowly they stop being who they are. You must die. You must not share your mind. I honestly am all for the Cylon evolving, becoming more individualised as seems to be their natural tendency when given the space to do so. But at this point, it seems less like, "You must 'grow up' to the point where you are no longer a danger to those around you," and more like, "You must 'grow up' to be just like the humans."
I wonder...if there's something we're missing here.
We're so programmed to fear even partial gestalts. To dismiss them as unhealthy, or communist, or in this case alienbadalien.
Which is maybe the real point of all of this. Six is more alien than Eight. And she keeps moving toward us - toward "human" - without scarring herself in order to get rid of everything that might still brand her as "cylon" the way Athena did.
How do we deal with that?
She's far more loving and more generous than Eight, but she's alien. She's not human. So too often, it's easy not to notice.
/Meta.
The first cylon-on-cylon opinion we hear about the Eights is a Six opining that her model is weak, which we, as the audience, understand to mean 'human'. Contrast this with Six - the first time we hear a cylon-on-cylon opinion about her is when Boomer talks about how the Sixes are usually so "hardcore" in Downloaded. We meet her committing genocide and infanticide. We meet her through Head!Six who is fascinating and in no way robotic, but also inhuman and terrifying. But Eight, we meet through characters with names. Through Boomer who spends the first season so terrified and through Athena (though back then I suppose she was still Sharon, but still, she claimed a name: Caprica had to be given one), the character who abandons everything for Love.
Six is set up as "all shall look on me and despair," sex-and-violence. Eight is set up as our window to the Cylon's capacity for humanity, redemptive love, evolution and gosh-darned adorable half-robot children. Six and Eight both try to negotiate the distance between human and cylon with their bodies - this constant battle, most obvious with Six but present as an undertow in Eight also, about whether love is sex is sex is love - but Six murders babies while Eight creates them, even though they both started off as Mata Hari. Caprica and Gaius before the mini or Athena and Helo after, they're both doing the same job.
So it's interesting to me that, in season four especially, I feel a strong ambivalence that I think exists in the text also, about this whole "hardcore Six" vs "softcore Eight" and how it might be exactly backwards as soon as you claw the slightest bit under the surface.
It's not that Boomer's observation about the Sixes was wrong, or that Caprica is different fundamentally, so much as Caprica is the first Six Boomer has ever seen - perhaps the first Six that's existed - on more than a...not quite superficial, but perhaps simple level.
It's not that Athena is lacking in naive optimism or a capacity for love, it's that she will also pick her side so damn hard she'll demand a sister's murder to solidify her identity, and the only reasons the Eights on the Rebel Basestar didn't quite get that yet was because they were still...simple. They hadn't had the experience necessary to realise they were going to break down and stick on a side just as hard as Athena one day.
It boils down to: Six is hardcore, but underneath the steel that lets her instigate an unwieldy Centurion uprising, there's a deep, enduring and desperate capacity and desire for love. Six loves the things she's killing and loves her enemies and wants them to love her. "Get it done, no matter what," is wrapped around, "love me, please."
Eight is softcore, but underneath the surface that lets her switch sides and hope blindly for a Lifetime Special ending against all evidence ot the contrary, she's angry and bitter and, well, hateful. Eight commits to hating her enemies and convincing herself it doesn't matter if they hate her too. "Love me, please," is wrapped arond, "Get it done, no matter what."
They're opposites. Though I think that Six's "no matter what," is rooted more in rage and Eight's "no matter what," is rooted more in hate.
Eights don't walk the space between human and cylon very well. Boomer tried in Downloaded and ended up, well, frakking over all the other Eights because she picked her side and it was "being a machine," and everyone else can burn. Athena picked her side and it was "being a human," and everyone else can burn.
It tool me a long time to believe that about Athena or want to. But I remember when she first showed up on Galactica. She was almost certainly lying when she denied knowing what the Resurrection Ship was. She flat out told Adama that though she helped kill the raiders in Flight of the Phoenix she wasn't going to turn over other cylon agents in the Fleet. But then, the comission, Helo, carrot and stick.
I'm not unsympathetic. In Athena's position - at least given what she wanted to achieve - half conversion wasn't an option. But still, I finally got it when Starbuck was trying to talk Sam down from shooting the Six that killed Barolay, and Athena was there, leading the "kill her" charge, complete with us vs them language.
I remember when she wouldn't kill D'Anna on New Caprica even though she would have resurrected and ever though she'd just told her that Hera was alive and Athena thought it was the cruelest lie a person could tell.
Now she murders unarmed women she knows will never come back because they were speaking to Hera. I actually think Adama fundamentally misunderstood why Athena shot Natalie, but I'm not sure he was wrong exactly when he asked if she hated her own people that much. Or at least if she feels she has to convince herself she hates them or she'll fall apart?
It's interesting that first act of cylon-on-cylon violence is committed by Athena when she shoots another Eight at the end of season one, when Helo works out who and what she is. It's committed in an attempt to abandon her people and walk off on her own path, at their expense, with things that also matter to them. While the first known and credited act of cylon-on-cylon violence is committed by Caprica, though she does it in an attmept to bring her people with her and share what she's learned.
I'm not really sure what I think all of this means, except perhaps, that Eight is good at crossing lines, while Six is better at living between them?
Hell, maybe that's why Eight is often coded in the show as being more human. Another watershed Eight moment for me was the Eight who dabbled with Athena's memories and how, to her, it was completely not a violation, it was probably something closer to love and it was certainly something she had every right to do because there is a sense of shared communal ownership that crosses between the models, and she hadn't yet realised that Athena had stopped being one of them, at times violently. We've seen how Athena reacts to the slightest notion of communal ownership of Hera or her own life: I really, really don't think she would have liked knowing that the other Eight took her memories. Well, that's it, isn't it, did she "take" them or did she "share" them? Is Captain Agathon married to the entire production line? Sort of, yeah. It's just Athena would rather stop being what she is than admit it.
Because that's what we've seen with the Cylon. Slowly they stop being who they are. You must die. You must not share your mind. I honestly am all for the Cylon evolving, becoming more individualised as seems to be their natural tendency when given the space to do so. But at this point, it seems less like, "You must 'grow up' to the point where you are no longer a danger to those around you," and more like, "You must 'grow up' to be just like the humans."
I wonder...if there's something we're missing here.
We're so programmed to fear even partial gestalts. To dismiss them as unhealthy, or communist, or in this case alienbadalien.
Which is maybe the real point of all of this. Six is more alien than Eight. And she keeps moving toward us - toward "human" - without scarring herself in order to get rid of everything that might still brand her as "cylon" the way Athena did.
How do we deal with that?
She's far more loving and more generous than Eight, but she's alien. She's not human. So too often, it's easy not to notice.
/Meta.
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I'm quite convinced by your reading of both Six and Eight. I found Athena's shooting of Natalie to be quite out of character, because her actions have always seemed much more... calculated than that was, but when you put it in the context of her other acts of violence against the Cylon it makes most sense.
I'm not sure that the movement toward individualism rests as strongly in any of the Cylon models as it does in Six. Eights appear s a group except when they're put in position by a plan from higher up, and even the wannabe-Athena gets her individuality by joining with another. But Sixes separate themselves and develop individuaity on their own from experiences that don't necessarily force it upon them. Where did Natalie get her name? Even the Six who was traumatised by drowning let that experience change her in ways that the other Cylon might not.
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I feel a strong ambivalence that I think exists in the text also, about this whole "hardcore Six" vs "softcore Eight" and how it might be exactly backwards as soon as you claw the slightest bit under the surface.
I keep saying to watch Boomer. And the Eights. And Sharon. Not because Sharon hasn't proven herself. She's done the best she can. But because, like Six, she isn't human. And Boomer? Boomer is bitter. Sharon took her life, would be nothing on that ship without their memories of Boomer. She has a right to some rage of her own. I almost want her to be angry. But I also want Boomer, and the Cylons as a whole, to kind of get over the Galactica and the fleet. I once thought they had a potential to be something beyond human. Maybe even better than human. But it doesn't seem where the show is going. And maybe that's just my imagination stretching.
It's interesting that first act of cylon-on-cylon violence is committed by Athena when she shoots another Eight at the end of season one, when Helo works out who and what she is.
A friend of mine mentioned that the first act of cylon-on-cylon violence was when Sharon killed Six (some Six) when Six kissed Helo on Caprica. Now that may have been planned violence, like Six beating up Sharon to convince Helo she's on his side, but look what just trying to join with one human drove them to! I get the feeling they weren't violent with each other before this.
I really, really don't think she would have liked knowing that the other Eight took her memories. Well, that's it, isn't it, did she "take" them or did she "share" them? Is Captain Agathon married to the entire production line? Sort of, yeah. It's just Athena would rather stop being what she is than admit it
It's funny. I think she would mind! But didn't she do the same to Boomer? Why does that make Eighthena wrong? I wish Athena would just admit what she is. We all know. They all know. We know she's trying. Broke my heart to see Adama take her child from her, she had worked so hard and loves him so much. But. I think I'd trust her more if she just said, "I'm a Cylon and I don't know what that means. I don't know what I might do. And it scares even me." Because that would be real. And upfront and honest.
"You must 'grow up' to be just like the humans."
Noes! Becoming more human is not the answer! Stay away from us! We're bad, bad, bad! Gosh, I should be more deep about it, but this is how I feel. :-)
It's not wrong to be not human. At least I don't think so. I keep thinking of the opening, "They evolved." One day humans might evolve. Into what? Hopefully something better, right? I don't think the Eights can see that. They are too full of Boomer and their own flaws to see it. But the Sixes? I think they see possibility. It will be interesting to see where the Sixes end up. Yes, and our dear Caprica. Where does she fit in the end?
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I disagree that Athena "couldn't bear" to kill Three on New Caprica. The way I interpreted the scene, Athena had no way of killing the Three and making it permanent. Thus, incapacitating her rather than killing her was the choice least likely to blow the whole evacuation plan. However, I do agree that Athena thought D'Anna was being needlessly cruel by bringing up Hera, and I suspect Athena chose to shoot her in the kneecaps precisely because it was the best way she could get back at her. Kneecapping is supposedly THE most painful method of incapacitating someone, and Athena would've known that she was condemning D'Anna to several hours of agony. So I don't think Athena's changed that much between "Exodus" and "Guess What's Coming to Dinner". At the time she shot D'Anna she simply had fewer options than she did when she shot Natalie. Besides, we've seen her kill someone permanently as early as Season 2, when she double-crossed Zarek's henchman on Kobol and killed him with the gun he gave her. She never seemed to suffer any pangs of conscience over that.
Now, one could argue that permanently killing a fellow Cylon is much graver morally than killing a human (at any rate, the average Cylon would probably see it that way, although humans would beg to differ). Zarek's henchman (so forgettable I can't even remember his name) was just a human traitor she barely knew, and who was trying to manipulate her into doing his dirty work. Natalie, however, is family. Estranged, but family nonetheless, so it's a much more personal murder. But again, I don't think it's a new development. A few episodes after she kneecaps D'Anna, permanent Cylon death becomes an issue for the first time, and she goes along with the genocide plan with no resistance. Arguably, if she'd had the opportunity to kill D'Anna permanently back on New Caprica, she might well have taken it.
I guess I agree with almost everything you say, but I frame it in a less oppositional way. Maybe because I:
a) adore both the Sixes and the Eights
b) have always found Six (or at least certain versions of her) at least quasi-sympathetic, even going back to Season 1.
That said, I hope you're right that the show is going in that direction, not simplistically having made Caprica Six "bad" and Athena "good", then flipping and simplistically making Caprica "good" and Athena "bad", but continuing to blur those lines and make them both complex, imperfect personalities. I don't want Athena to become a villain, but I would like the show to explore that ruthless side of her, the one she's always had in canon, but which has always been downplayed by the show prior to "Guess What's COming to Dinner". What I definitely DON'T want is for the show to take the lazy way out and just turn her bad offscreen, like they did with Boomer in Season 3.
So, in conclusion, utterly brilliant analysis, and I have to get over my kneejerk "Well, she's not THAT bad" defensive reaction re: Athena. And yes, I realise you're recounting the narrative the show is telling, but I get defensive anyway. I also get defensive about Caprica Six being woefully underused, and many other things.
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because i am verbose, Part 2
even more thoughts, because this post keeps me thinking
Anyway, the various things you say above are a wonderful way of putting it (if I can get past my kneejerk defensiveness). I love the point you’re making, but I think one thing you haven’t really addressed (yet, anyway) is WHY the Sixes are this way. And I wonder how much the Cylon God and faith have to do with it.
The average Eight seems devout enough, but the individualized copies are less so. Boomer’s probably atheistic. Pre-activation she wasn’t very devout in the polytheistic system, and IF she now believes in the Cylon God, she probably hates his guts. No wonder she gets along with the Cavils.
Athena is calmly certain of God’s existence in Seasons 1 and 2, but in Season 3 onwards, God becomes pretty irrelevant to her except when she uses Caprica Six’s faith to manipulate her in Rapture. Bottom line, an Eight’s faith rests on a shaky foundation, and when a crisis hits, God is too distant to have much impact. They need someone closer to home, more tangible to follow and provide them with inspiration.
In contrast, the Sixes are defined and energized by faith. They believe passionately in this rather abstract concept. Even Gina continued believing in God (incidentally a loving, forgiving God), and if her experiences didn’t rock her faith, I doubt there’s much life could do to any Six that would turn her into an atheist. But Gina’s conception of God allowed her to kill hundreds of Cylons who wanted to live in Resurrection Ship and hundreds of humans who wanted to live in LDYB Part 2. Their belief system may be solid, but the beliefs can be scary-destructive.
I think you’re right that the Eights are less generous than the Sixes, but they’re also less destructive when they’re angry. Boomer participated in the Occupation on New Caprica but wasn’t the driving force. She also participated in Cavil’s extermination plan, but again, it doesn’t seem to have been her idea (just as Athena didn’t come up with the idea of genocide in AmoS, but went along anyway). It doesn’t make them blameless by any means, having stood by passively, but they’re not the pioneering type. Eights seem a lot easier to influence than Sixes. They get swept up in events, in other people’s crusades. Hardly surprising the majority of them went along with Natalie’s fervour, then freaked out later when the consequences became apparent.
They’re joiners rather than leaders, which could partially explain Athena’s desperation to be more human than the humans. Being secure in Helo’s love for her seems to have been a constant for years, but clearly romantic love and being part of a family unit isn’t enough. She needs a social circle, a sense of belonging in a group, rather than just to be part of a couple. That’s human, and not unhealthy on its face, but it doesn't work out so great longterm.
So it’s kind of a six of one, half a dozen of the other type situation. Sixes can accomplish great things (using “great” in a value-neutral sense), and drag their whole society along with them through willpower and belief. Eights have a smaller worldview, and are less likely to either kill or save others. Which, depending on whether or not you’re an obstacle to a Six’s grand plan, is either good or bad. At any rate, a Six is more likely to either kill you or save you deliberately. An Eight is more likely to just not intervene in someone else’s plan to kill you or save you. Which isn’t to say Eights are entirely passive, but they are reactive rather than pro-active. Sixes are always pro-active, far more rebellious and individualistic in their own way than Eights who break away but still just want to belong (they just switch their sense of identity to a new group).
Re: even more thoughts, because this post keeps me thinking
Re: even more thoughts, because this post keeps me thinking
Re: even more thoughts, because this post keeps me thinking