And for the Federation in general, I kinda try to have Kirk call out that she treated differently than she would if she were a man ('plenty of guys').
I did feel that in places which is why I was wondering which way you were writing this (and why I thought you might be open to discussion and therefore decided to leave the comment).
I also think the question of Vulcan society is open to broad interpretation--in no small part the question of whether Vulcan women experience pon farr or just the men plays a role; versions of canon and fanon built around the idea that just the men do posit that the women have to make themselves available for this uncontrollable mating urge the men have, while versions that posit both have pon farr, that they're equally slave to this biological phenomenon, would imply that some of their marriage practices are intended to protect both sexes from dying of lust, not just the men, and maybe we just happened to see Spock in the throes of it but not T'Pring and her time was next year. Who knows. And there's additional questions about Sarek and Amanda's marriage--I could see a lot of the stuff about their relationship being racial, not particularly gender-related, at least contextually. Like, Sarek, in his or his people's minds, married a noble savage that he needs to keep from unseemly emotional display. Which is its own kind of problematic and could be read metatextually as enforcing rational men/emotional women stereotypes. There's all kinds of ways to crack it open.
So I guess what bothered me about the way this story cracked Spock open is that on the one hand he's claiming that of course he would not try to change anyone he loved and if he were in a relationship with Jen, it would be fine if Jen were still who she was, ie flirty/slutty/whatever. Except that he also disapproves of her behavior, and I think it's probably true that he would disapprove regardless of Kirk's sex, but doesn't that disapproval imply he *does* wish Kirk would change? Relationship or no? And once they *are* in a relationship (and I am not entirely sanguine about how fast that goes and how little time Spock gives Jen to think about it, nor, arguably, any real hint of what she's agreeing to beforehand) he's textually jealous, jealous, jealous, ripping her clothes off, marking her as his--that seems to me to contradict all his earlier claims about not wanting to change her, not caring what else she did.
Here's the thing--I don't think it's true that in a healthy relationship you don't make any changes for your partner. I think that in a healthy relationship, *both* (or all, if you wanna talk poly) parties would make changes to accommodate their partners, and it's only problematic when one party expects the other to change without expecting to have to change at all him/herself. It might be reasonable for Spock to say "I want to be exclusive with you, please to be stop sleeping with other people," but only if he recognized that she might want him change too, or that she might find the change he requested unacceptable and reject the relationship on that basis.
No, my problem is: Spock contradicts his words with his behavior, and also doesn't really discuss anything with her before pushing her hard and fast into mindmeldy marriage without explanation.
no subject
I did feel that in places which is why I was wondering which way you were writing this (and why I thought you might be open to discussion and therefore decided to leave the comment).
I also think the question of Vulcan society is open to broad interpretation--in no small part the question of whether Vulcan women experience pon farr or just the men plays a role; versions of canon and fanon built around the idea that just the men do posit that the women have to make themselves available for this uncontrollable mating urge the men have, while versions that posit both have pon farr, that they're equally slave to this biological phenomenon, would imply that some of their marriage practices are intended to protect both sexes from dying of lust, not just the men, and maybe we just happened to see Spock in the throes of it but not T'Pring and her time was next year. Who knows. And there's additional questions about Sarek and Amanda's marriage--I could see a lot of the stuff about their relationship being racial, not particularly gender-related, at least contextually. Like, Sarek, in his or his people's minds, married a noble savage that he needs to keep from unseemly emotional display. Which is its own kind of problematic and could be read metatextually as enforcing rational men/emotional women stereotypes. There's all kinds of ways to crack it open.
So I guess what bothered me about the way this story cracked Spock open is that on the one hand he's claiming that of course he would not try to change anyone he loved and if he were in a relationship with Jen, it would be fine if Jen were still who she was, ie flirty/slutty/whatever. Except that he also disapproves of her behavior, and I think it's probably true that he would disapprove regardless of Kirk's sex, but doesn't that disapproval imply he *does* wish Kirk would change? Relationship or no? And once they *are* in a relationship (and I am not entirely sanguine about how fast that goes and how little time Spock gives Jen to think about it, nor, arguably, any real hint of what she's agreeing to beforehand) he's textually jealous, jealous, jealous, ripping her clothes off, marking her as his--that seems to me to contradict all his earlier claims about not wanting to change her, not caring what else she did.
Here's the thing--I don't think it's true that in a healthy relationship you don't make any changes for your partner. I think that in a healthy relationship, *both* (or all, if you wanna talk poly) parties would make changes to accommodate their partners, and it's only problematic when one party expects the other to change without expecting to have to change at all him/herself. It might be reasonable for Spock to say "I want to be exclusive with you, please to be stop sleeping with other people," but only if he recognized that she might want him change too, or that she might find the change he requested unacceptable and reject the relationship on that basis.
No, my problem is: Spock contradicts his words with his behavior, and also doesn't really discuss anything with her before pushing her hard and fast into mindmeldy marriage without explanation.