• LittleBorat3@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    They have been taught that by their woke teachers around the world for more than a century, imagine that!

  • Broadfern@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    Engaging with the slop by making a post about it is also succumbing to the clickbait, unfortunately.

    The sun is just another garbage tabloid that gets plastered on the internet.

  • dariusj18@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    So far, there have been no comments on the parallels between Frankenstein and his creature and the Christian god and theirs. I think many people also assume the word creature has a negative connotation, but I would not be surprised if that stemmed from the effect this book had on society, and its use was mostly literal.

  • Getitupinyerstuffin'@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    What’s funny about this? He WAS a victim. He was the creation of pride and hubris. Only shallow judgement made him a “monster”

    • frightful_hobgoblin@lemmy.ml
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      2 months ago

      Only shallow judgement made him a “monster”

      You mean the monster’s own bad judgement, or Frankenstein, or the humans in the book in general?

      • jve@lemmy.world
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        2 months ago

        Frankenstein immediately labels him an abomination as soon as he comes to life, and he never gives him a chance to show that he’s anything but a monster.

        He also hides out trying to help this family for a long time, and as soon as they see him, they assume he’s evil and terrible and run away as well.

        The monster kills a few of Frankensteins family members, and stalks him for the rest of his days though, so he did kinda become the thing he was thought to be.

        Victims turning into monsters because of abuse is kinda the whole point of the book.

      • DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social
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        2 months ago

        You could probably call the first one a tragic accident that is ultimately the doctor’s fault, but he’s killed at a minimum four people by the end.

        • Lobster@lemmy.ml
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          2 months ago

          You could

          Frankenstein! you belong then to my enemy—to him towards whom I have sworn eternal revenge; you shall be my first victim.’

          The child still struggled and loaded me with epithets which carried despair to my heart; I grasped his throat to silence him, and in a moment he lay dead at my feet.

          I gazed on my victim, and my heart swelled with exultation and hellish triumph; clapping my hands, I exclaimed, ‘I too can create desolation; my enemy is not invulnerable; this death will carry despair to him, and a thousand other miseries shall torment and destroy him

          …but I didn’t read it that as an accident. Imagine using that defense in a courtroom: “I wasn’t trying to kill the child, I was trying to kidnap him for revenge. I killed him by accident when choking him to silence him.” Especially given the physical mismatch of a huge heavyweight versus a tiny child.

          As I said earlier, “I think the problem is the students are giving too much credence to the monster’s monologues”

    • Lobster@lemmy.ml
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      2 months ago

      I think the problem is the students are giving too much credence to the monster’s monologues, but “He is eloquent and persuasive, and once his words had even power over my [Frankenstein’s] heart; but trust him not.”

      All that aside, you can’t look past strangling a 4-year-old boy. It’s reasonable to call anything that strangles a 4-year-old boy a monster, even if it felt lonely/abandoned.

      And even the monster has the self-insight to know that he’s fundamentally evil: “I had cast off all feeling, subdued all anguish, to riot in the excess of my despair. Evil thenceforth became my good.”

        • bunjiman@lemmy.world
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          2 months ago

          There are two kinds of people in the world, abusers and victims, with no overlap or nuance whatsoever /s

          • curbstickle@anarchist.nexus
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            2 months ago

            If you really want an answer, I think we need to start early…

            The monster is naive, curious, and good natured at the beginning. Delighted by fire, choosing to touch it - and then feeling pain. No one there to teach right and wrong, or even safe and dangerous. Just a naive child in a grown up body.

            He finds a small hovel, and lives there observing. Taking food from them to keep himself fed, later discovering - because no one taught otherwise - that taking from others hurts those people. He doesnt want them to be hurt by him though, so he eats berries and nuts. I think this shows he is good natured, not wanting to hurt others.

            Then we have his first interaction with the village. Some run, but others attacked him with stones and other weapons. He even commented not only that he was physically hurt, but seriously hurt by them (I think “grievously bruised” is the right quote).

            He hid in a place so far removed from the village that the cottages seemed like palaces in comparison. He understands he looks different than others, but didnt understand how his looks would make him not just shunned, but hated. The villagers based everything on how he looked, and now this naive and good natured being had a direct look at just absolute cruelty.

            Skipping ahead, the final part that makes him turn to being cruel himself is being told he will be alone, always.

            At this point he hasn’t experienced kindness from others, just cruelty. The neglect, the hopelessness, the physical pain from being attacked - this is the only expression towards others he experienced himself.

            So the abused becomes an abuser. He takes out the pain and anger on others, showing them the pain he felt. He knew only pain and being alone, and his rage at his creator made him want his creator to feel the same.

            I’d say its a pretty obvious tale of victim becoming the perpetrator.

            • Lobster@lemmy.ml
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              2 months ago

              The worst people in real life have both an abused background and an organic brain/genetic problem.

              The monster’s abnormal reaction to rejection (becoming a serial killer), I read that as he’s probably got a bad brain/nature too. And why wouldn’t he, given how he was made?

              • curbstickle@anarchist.nexus
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                2 months ago

                Generically speaking, nurture is the common thread. In this book, and in my experience.

                I can’t get behind blaming genetics/nature for people being good/bad. All that reminds me of is phrenology.

                • Lobster@lemmy.ml
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                  2 months ago

                  Right, and that fits with what the profs are saying here: that modern sensibilities view monsters (even serial killers) as victims.

      • tomkatt@lemmy.world
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        2 months ago

        I agree, the creature (monster?) is not innocent, and eventually becomes a monster but Victor himself absolutely is a monster, from the beginning. He gets into an absolute fervor to create life from nothing but cadaver parts, finally succeeds, only to abhor what he created. But then, the creature, seeking guidance and understanding is shunned at every opportunity, treated as an aberration, and vilified by Victor… for simply existing.

        The book was a very difficult read for me, as Victor makes the wrong choice at literally every turn, but somehow still places the blame externally onto his creation. How it ended was for the best, for all parties involved.

      • Treczoks@lemmy.world
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        2 months ago

        The “journalists” of The Sun. They are good at inventing stories, but proper journalism and background research is not exactly their strong point, to put it mildly.

          • Treczoks@lemmy.world
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            2 months ago

            That is a good question. I’ve read The Sun occasionally (actually mostly for school purposes, it is a good example for a low-quality British tabloid when teaching about “The Press”), and always wondered if the people who produce this can walk and breathe at the same time…

              • Treczoks@lemmy.world
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                2 months ago

                Yes. And as usual with a tabloid, they take one or two sentences from the source, and invent their own story around it.

    • kirk781@discuss.tchncs.de
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      2 months ago

      Folks who have heard about the book know that Frankestein was the monster.

      Folks who have read the book know that Frankestein created the monster.

      Folks who understand the book know that Frankenstein was the real monster.

  • Lobster@lemmy.ml
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    2 months ago

    Nick Groom, external, a professor of English literature at the University of Exeter, who has written a new introduction to mark the novel’s 200th anniversary since publication.

    “It’s interesting when I teach the book now, students are very sentimental towards the being,” Professor Groom wrote.

    “There’s been a gradual shift… for years Victor Frankenstein’s creation was known as the Monster, then critics seemed to identify him as a victim and called him the Creature. That fits more with students’ sensibilities today.”

  • dalekcaan@feddit.nl
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    2 months ago

    On one hand, Frankenstein’s monster was a victim, but on the other, he was also a giant piece of shit.