TRIGGER WARNING Question re Cyteen, CJ Cherryh

[derien]

Don't read below if any mention of sexual abuse may trigger you.



I've been (very slowly) reading Cyteen, and I'm confused about one thing: The advice that the first Ari Emory leaves for the second Ari Emory about sex. AE1 tells AE2 that it's not a good idea to have sexual feelings for someone who doesn't have the same feelings for you. But AE1 not only had such feelings, she acted on them, and she really didn't give a shit. It's pretty explicit that she sexually harrassed and abused Justin, repeatedly. It seems out of character for her to tell her replicate that choosing friendship and good working relationships is more important than sexual gratification. Or is this just me?

Comments

[daegaer]

Thing the first: I love Cyteen, it is actually a comfort read for me.

Thing the second: Cyteen is full of terrible, awful, messed-up shit. (And Cherryh knows that).

AE1 is AWFUL. HORRIBLE. And literally the cleverest person on the planet (as far as anyone can tell) - ehhh, maybe Denis comes close. She is totally messed up about sex - I don't know if you've got that far, but it's made clear that she was abused by her uncle as a child after her mother died. (Child!AE1 never admitted this and claimed that Florian1 was the one who had been abused).

The sexual harassment is two things in one - Justin experiences it as harassment, but eventually realises that AE1 was actually filling out a psych-evaluation for him so that she could write really effective interventions that were supposed to take place over a long period of time and that would warp him into a tool for her use. Much as Jordan had been, but Jordan was too strong minded in the end for her liking. (so she was the one to suggest that Jordan have a clone - she wanted to have Jordan-level smarts but moulded to her needs). As it panned out, she only got to run the first of those interventions, when Florian1 is made to rape Justin.

So I think that's the answer: Justin (and Jordan before him) had nothing to do with sexual gratification at all - it was using sex as an intervention to force someone into a pattern where they would become a better working partner by being totally focused on her.

[derien]

Ah... using sex as an intervention to force someone into a pattern where they would become a better working partner by being totally focused on her. ...even more twisted and fucked up.

Somehow, in the way it was written, I had the distinct impression that AE1 probably was primarily the one abused by her uncle, and that she only stood up to him when he moved on to Florian as well.

I'm curious - What is it about this book that makes it a comfort read for you? It certainly is something you can dig your teeth into - I've been reading it off and on for months, now, and I keep coming back to it. Is it the strong Justin/Grant relationship? Grant is amazing.

[daegaer]

I wouldn't be surprised if Geoffrey Carnath had abused Florian1 - and possibly Catlin1 - as well. What we're told, though is that AE1 and her azi move out after an "incident" between her security and her uncle's, that ends up with Florian1 in hospital, and AE1 making the abuse charge. She could have told them to attack Geoffrey's security once she found out about Florian being abused, having lost her temper - but Florian and Catlin would have wanted to plan, and lay a trap instead, almost certainly. The way it's described sounds more like an outright fight, which I think could only possibly take place if Florian (and Catlin?) had gone to her rescue while Geoffrey was abusing her, and his security intervened. GC was clearly a scumbag, one way or the other.

I love the book because it's so meaty - there is just so much there there. We're introduced to Justin and Grant even before we meet Ari1 (the description of the PR-foetus and the experimentally changed foetus in the "educational" section at the start) and then we get - although we don't yet know it - the foretaste of what's to come with a brief flash of innocent child Ari1 contrasted with old and corrupted Ari. I love it because for all the understanding that personal and political circumstance - and later personal choices - moulded Ari1 into the brilliant monster that Union needed, the new generation just can't bring themselves to do that in its entirety to Ari2. Jane and Ollie are not Olga and Patrick. Denis is not Geoffrey. Ari2 is loved by a whole lot of people, while it's a fair bet that the only two people who ever loved Ari1 were those who got killed by lethal injection after her death.
I love the book for showing us the sheer stupidity of the ruling class: there is a whole alien society right in front of them that they are ignoring. We are given all sorts of smug CIT views on the azi, and then every so often we get an azi viewpoint that will turn it all on its head. And the very people that those smug CIT views assure us are content and designed to be content, the happy slaves - they see the horror in the system and they "whisper" amongst themselves that if they're very good, some day they'll be free.

It is , of course, also Justin and Grant, and Florian and Catlin. I love them all!

[(Anonymous)]

first let me say I haven't read the book but reading the comments
transported me to Homeland and some of Carrie's behavior ......the line she
often walk up to and sometimes fell off ....using sex as tool.
LTA

[(Anonymous)]

Also, not the same, but in a similar vain The Americans
often used sex as a tool(Not to mention an obvious plot device.....
just saying
LTA
I mean sex, money, power the unholy trinity
or when is a cigar just a cigar???