Monstrum Doesn't Understand Medusa (A Response Video)
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- čas přidán 9. 06. 2022
- (Link to my teespring store: the-ravens-roost.creator-spri...)
I've defended Medusa before againt Extra Credits, but now it seems Monstrum is making some bad takes about my serpentine sweetie. Time for me to, once again, put on my teacher glasses and address the blatant inaccuracy and very obvious biases presented in this lackluster argumentation.
Hope ya'll enjoy. - Hry
Feminists like to interpret Lysistrata as a feminist heroine, even though the actual story is about how both men and women need each other.
Feminists are liars! They bend the truth to suit their own agenda! And that’s not a good thing. What does that teach us about feminism? That it’s only good if to become a feminist so long as you’re willing to fabricate everything and loose your own humanity? Ironically thought provoking
When I saw it was Medusa, I was like 'ah shit, here we go again.'
My theory has been that Medusa has always been more based on fear itself. My theory is that Medusa was a pre Hellenic fear goddess, and the story of Perseus was a mix of Greeks supplanting the original culture (similar to the Minotaur), and an early Bildungsroman.
Think about it this way. Perseus starts his story on Seriphos, carried there as a babe and grew a boy. When Polydictys comes and threatens his mother, he is forced to leave home. He is aided by a teachers (Athena and Hermes), and is forced to gain knowledge (the gray sisters). When he fights Medusa, he confronts his fear, conquering it. Medusa is fear incarnate, as what happens when we are most afraid? We freeze up, struggling to fight and flight. And this is further proof when Perseus confronts Cetus, and kills Polydictys. Perseus is the story of a boy becoming a man (or any child becoming an adult), and overcoming fear is a requirement of becoming an adult. Medusa’s gender is meaningless
That’s my interuptation at least. I could be wrong.
thats a really cool interpretation that makes a whole lot of sense
Thank you.
Is there no end to the abuse of Medusa?
By that I mean misinterpreting her
I am surprised that she didn't talked about Joseph Campbell's take on Medusa:
The legend of Perseus beheading Medusa means, specifically, that "the Hellenes overran the goddess's chief shrines" and "stripped her priestesses of their Gorgon masks" the latter being apotropaic faces worn to frighten away the profane. That is to say, there occurred in the early thirteenth century B.C. an actual historic rupture, a sort of sociological trauma, which has been registered in this myth.
Awesome video! Honestly I don't mind if someone interprets her in a more tragic way, but it seems like she's pushing her interpretation on the other versions of the myth. Like the versions where she's bad isn't trying to push that femininity is something to be terrified of. There's good and bad female characters in that myth and there's male monsters along with female monsters all throughout Greek mythology not everything is just about her being female. And going with the Ovid version of the myth and delving into the complexity of a victim turned perpetrator is compelling and can make a great story, but that doesn't discount or color other interpretations of her character.
That's like if I wrote a retelling of Frozen based on the original story and someone asked me where Anna and the sisterly love is. It's not that Disney can't make their extremely deviated version of the original story, but if someone accused me of hating sisters because I wrote a version of the story more closely related to the original that would be completely nonsensical.
Also even the original Ovid myth where she is a victim who turns bad still doesn't feel like a story about how people fear femininity, if anything it could be more interpreted as a story of someone who after being victimized and isolated turns into someone who victimizes others and continues the cycle of victimization just the different form of it by harming others who may not have been the original to hurt her. Or it could be interpreted as a tragic story of survival where she's put in a position where she has to keep freezing people because they want to kill her but it has nothing to do with femininity in that case it would be a story of an individual character.
I feel like a lot of modern progressive fiction expects characters to represent their entire demographic instead of letting them be individuals who can be good or bad without it representing the whole of femininity or all of a certain race or sexuality.
Oh for sure! I like Medusa as a tragic character! I think that's totally valid. But trying to imply that it's her feminine qualities that make her monstrous is.......ludicrous.
I like your suggestion that Medusa was a character who was victimized and that isolation and shame turned her into a victimizer herself, angry at a world who rejected her. Another possibility is that she became afraid of what she was, fled to hide herself, but the world won't stop trying to kill her, so she does what she must to defend herself, which adds the false narrative that she's a monster, so Perseus killing her becomes even more tragic. There are lots of ways to make that story work, ya know?
And you hit the nail on the head: progressives want characters and plots to be clear cut allegories or analogies to what they want. Medusa is a female monster who was raped according to Ovid, therefore she must be a feminist symbol. I feel that's disrespectful to Medusa herself. Imagine if you could sit down and talk to Medusa and say 'do you agree with how they represent you?' I feel like she'd say "Poseidon raped me, and Perseus decapitated me, but now random people want to lie about me? When will the abuse end?"
@@RavenKnightYT ooh your suggestion it good too! Also your example brings up the point that Perseus doesn't have to be immoral for Medusa to be a victim. He could genuinely be trying to do good, but doesn't know the truth.
It's a shame they want every character and story to represent a larger allegory, because to me the appeal of a story is the individual journey of the characters as a person with their own desires and fears, attributes and flaws. It seems individuality is being replaced with category.
Poor Medusa can't catch a break😢
@@RavenKnightYT The thing I also notice is this. Why just Medusa? I mean Greek myths are full of female monsters and people wouldn't say that they monsters "because of their femineity". Honestly, why the hell does Medusa get a feminist treatment of being a victim, when you have Lamia and Medea in the myths, which I'd argue from the original Greek sources are more of a victimhood villanesses then Medusa originally was. It seems almost hypocritical for these idiots to take a revised story (Ovid) and treat that as one of the original sources, but not use characters who were actually victims in the myths. And even then, Medea for example didn't stand out bitching and moaning, she actually took control of the situation.
A male Medusa would be called Medudesa
Also you did a really good job reading the poem it sounded so much better when you did. I'm not very good at reading poems like that and probably should try to learn how to be better at reading them because I've always struggled with that. Lol
P.s. I died when you said Zeus would be proud of Japan... I never thought of that but it's so true 🤣
Thank you. As a former English teacher, I had to educate students on how to read and write in iambic pentameter, so it's something I had to learn. ^^ Poetry is a passion of mine. I just rarely share the poems I write.
And yeeees. Zeus would very much like Japan and it's anime industry. Haha.
Interesting about one of Japan's interpretation of Medusa, the Medusa from the Fate series, actually does not have Posidon have anything to do with what happened to Medusa.
To summarize, Athena became jealous of Medusa's beauty and cursed her to be hated instead of loved. Due to how she didn't know why people just suddenly hated her, she started to develop a hatred for humanity especially when they wanted to "save" her sisters from her who weren't cursed. Eventually all the killing she did decayed her beauty to make her more of a monster that people said she was (7:32) and her immense hatred for humanity ended up taking its toll on her when she eventually killed and ate her sisters.
When her final fight with Perseus came about, Perseus actually would have outright lost the fight but some in-universe magical items ended up rebounding on Medusa that showed her the despair of being alone and having killed her own sisters that she willingly allowed herself to be killed by Perseus.
My idea about Madusa turning Men to Stone is that it is some kind of revenge for what Poseidon a Man did to her.
He had to get hard for that to happen so in a twist her hatred of what happened to her manifested in a power to make Men be hard forever just not in the fun way.
Medusa ( Oh you like getting hard ay ill help with that ) Snake Stare of Death.
Gentleman, I found your channel through For Honor stuff, but your literature stuff is underrated. Subscribed
Thank you! That means a lot
@@RavenKnightYT No need to thank me. Just keep up the good work.
I was just watching this with my boys on discord. We had so much fun, really great video. I liked the part where you said ''Wait? Did u just assume her gender?''' I never laughed at a video this much thank you. 16:35 { best moment in the video}
“And she keeps losing her head”
… n-no… she lost her head once. That’s kinda the thing about decapitation, you can only really do it once. Unless you’re the green knight, I guess.
5:58 Source: “Trust me bro”
It’s not the most implausible theory I’ve ever heard but it does lack any shred of support.
6:08 “Why is Medusa female?”
Because there’s only two choices
8:20 “Perseus was reframed as a hero”
Uh, no, the Greeks did that. As far as I’m aware there’s no point in history where Perseus is an out-and-out villain. The concept of heroism is what changed: heroes in ancient Greece did great things but were not necessarily good people.
9:38 If Olympus is suddenly revealed to actually be Mt.Fuji I will not be surprised.
12:35 Of course feminists think the stone gaze is a good thing. Wait till they find out in one version she got turned to stone because she broke her vows to her goddess and slept with her worst enemy IN HER TEMPLE! They’ll love her even more.
15:22 “You wouldn’t actually say-”
Penny in the air…
15:49 Well, that, and iirc originally it’s Medusa’s incredible ugliness that turns you to stone, not some kind of magic laser…
16:20-16:35
AND THE PENNY DROPS, NEARLY A FULL MINUTE LATER, NEW RECORD FOLKS!!
19:08 Solid rant, sir, I salute you.
21:30 Sounds like a very nice pair of stories, cheesy as the latter is :P
Yeah, the modern idea of Hercules is hilarious compared to what he was in the myths, Heroism in greek myths wasn't exactly concerned with morality as it is today. Perseus wasn't actually a terrible person, but it wasn't his morals that made him a hero. Hell, all that made him a hero was he essentially got superhuman powers from the gods.
You can do it more than once with the hydra.
@@samiamtheman7379 I guess, but Medusa isn't a hydra
Woah boy, with the words: "Now the heart of the matter." I already knew this was going to be a doozy
Oh man I love them simple cheesy romance stories with a happy ending and if it's with Medusa as the main heroine... damn
My beloved Classical Mythology! What have they done to you!?
I will point out, for a feminist talking about womanhood being Medusa's defining characteristic, she doesn't do anything to discuss the unique character of women's hair as a sign of domestic intimacy, which is what my feminist professors would have remarked on.
Monster Musume? You are truly are a man of culture
All this feminist interpretations and changing of Medusa's character and everything else...
...all originating in a story that Ovid wrote because he was mad that Augustus kicked him out of Rome.
I know that both are amazing in their own rights, but which is better: Monster Museme or Monster Doctor?
Excellent question. It's hard to say. Monster Doctor definitely does a better job of convincing us that they are in a world of monsters and humans, as we see monsters all over the place.........but Monster Musume was able to flesh out its cast a lot better.
I think I prefer Monster Musume just a little more, if only because I see the potential it has to incorporate these monsters in a modern context. I think it's FAR more shameless with its ecchi than Monster Doctor, but at least it kind of embraces it to an extent. Glenn (from MD) and Kimihito (from MM) are two different protagonists. One could argue that Kimihito is worse because he's just standard anime protagonist. He has no real personality outside of being nice and accepting. But is Glenn really better? Glenn doesn't have much personality either, and he acts almost completely unaware or unconcerned about the ecchi moments he's involved in. To me that makes it a lot less funny if the character himself is not impacted by anything.
If Kimihito accidentally touches Miia's breasts, he freaks out and apologizes. Funny response.
If Glenn touches a monsters breasts, he has no response because he is intending to do it, regardless of how the monster girl reacts. It doesn't impact him and thus it's not as funny a pay off.
I guess it really depends on what you're looking for. Monster Musume has a wider variety of consistent monster girls who have very clear and defined personalities and with excellent art, with a genuinely funny lead male character.
But Monster Doctor has a more fleshed out world to work with, as well as a more practical set up to its character and why he interacts with monster girls.
But I will DEFINITELY say that I prefer Sapphi to Miia. Sapphi is INFINITELY better.
@@RavenKnightYT Yeah, Monster Doctor had better world building while Monster Museme had more funny characters. Saphie for the win.
Now if only we could get a spin off with the MON girls with Ms. Smith in an action show. That'd be awesome.
anybody else realize that snakes are just a leg with a lizard head?
Oh my god, can we bang it! I am laughing my shaman main ass off!!!
Interesting that she leaves out that Perseus did what he did to Medusa to save his mother from a lecherous king. Convenient. It’s also theorized that Athena was all but ready to have Medusa cursed as her beauty was drawing people to the temple for her and not for the worship of Athena at her own damned temple
"turned to stone" is a relatively common idiom among different cultures for "dead". most cultures agree, rocks are not alive. so to say one is "turned to stone" can be to say "turned from alive, to dead"
I laughed way too hard at the "Zeus would be proud" joke.
I really hope if this dosnt get copy striked
Seeing with what happened to actman I fear your hope is misplaced
You never cease to both entertain and provide an informed perspective on a variety of topics. The tragedy lies in the small size of your audience. Can't help but hope you get more viewers and subs soon
A-ah, well, you see, Athena was born from Zeus' head after it was cleft open by an axe, therefore she represents an ideological perception of the female in the perception of men therefore she helped Perseus kill a true feminist icon and rabble rabble rabble...
great video as always, shame I didn't see it when it came out
one thing I should mention is that while Freud did have his bizarre obsessions, he is still seen as the father of modern psychology for his study on the idea of the Id, Ego and Super Ego are still seen as fascinating understandings of human actions and how we do things.
I understand that your point is that he is not an example for analyzing a Greek myth since he is a psychologist, not a literature professor, just thought to make it clear that he is still taken seriously for a lot of his theories
7:33 Thats the scariest portrayal of Medusa
Never thought raven was a monster musume type of guy. Everyone's got their schtick I guess. Just have fun with the right end. Buddy and I had a huge argue over a regular or reverse mermaid would be better because of which half could be used. We ended up settling on neither in hindsight
you should cover their video on Mapinguari.
they have this weird take that you can't use natural animals to explain mythical creatures.
in this case the ground sloth.
and they state that it's colonialist to do so.
when you can use natural animals to explain mythical creatures, the Sasquatch being bears, and also it's not even colonialist to do so! the Japanese have a whole book explaining yokai origins.
Really hate how monstrum used two sources from literature, ignoring most of the Greek writings on the gorgons; centered everything on Ovid, even though Ovid was a poet from the rule of Agustus Cesear and is considered a dubious source for most information due to him not being represenative of wider Roman culture from his own lifetime; and completly ignored basically all the artistic depictions of the gorgons from both Greece and Rome, even though they predate the first written accounts by a wide margin. Gorgons where typically depicted facing the audience which is notable in classical Greek art, because it shows the fearsome power of the subject.
Here's the comment I left on the original monstrum video.
It's sad when the band Anthrax is more accurate.
I once had an idea/comic thing for a story where Medusa was a good guy and joins Perseus to help him out. A bit like Perseus being a fighter and Medusa being a magic user type story. Think it could be fun?
I’d read it
@@RavenKnightYT Maybe I will do something with it.
kind of random but another character that is made in a similar light is Morathi from age of Sigmar very cool character.
Why punish her why not punish Poseidon or at least leave Madusa alone & give Poseidon a good talking to if she couldn't punish an Olympian God.
Poseidon wasn't just an olympic god he was her uncle and much more power Athena couldn't do anything or say anything
4:36 And the ROMAN POET!!! NOTHING MORE TO SAY, IT WAS ROMAN PROPAGANDA!!!! I said it once, I'd said it twice, and I'll say it a thousand times more.
This video was amazing
Monstrum is a living meme that's insane.
4:12 that reference had me dead.
Hey Raven, I think that Gorgons are quite interesting, and it is sad to see that they are being propagated for a feminist message. Anyway what is YOUR main interpretation of the Medusa myth?
P.S., What if there was a full race of gorgons that’s blood has become diluted, and they can only activate their stone gaze in intervals and Strong wills can resist the gaze?
He specifically said he views Medusa as a Greek monster. I assume he views Medusa as a monster and the myth largely as it was written and therefore will base his assumptions on the myth itself. Since he's an english teacher I assume he also knows that most myths are just metaphorical stories that describe generally mundane life or ideas in that culture as a fantastical story right? Myths are meant to be vague and give a lot of room for interpretation so more people can relate to them and draw their own conclusions. This is different than using a Myth to push an idea as we see too frequently in the modern age. We draw information from the myth to make a conclusion, not use the myth to get to our predetermined conclusion.
As far as Gorgons as a race and your idea? That's where it gets fun.
If it fits well with the story you want them to be in and it's executed well then that's awesome! If you wanna talk if there was a real life race like that? Then you gotta do some world building. When did they start to lose power, where were they, how did the cultures in their range treat them, Did they try to use their powers to gain, or try to hide their powers to try to survive, I imagine with any population you got Gorgons trying to do both and everything between, so how did that turn out for them? Did the world lose record of this somehow? Or does the world still have records of gorgons in the past other than what we have, or maybe all records were lost? The more questions you ask, the more interesting, understood, and well put together any idea will be.
Im just here cause of that time you wrecked the horrible analysis of the little mermaid
I bet some one out there will do something similar to Dragons lol
Fruiede really is a joke completely misunderstanding the lesson of one of the Greek myths I'm assuming is a way to project his own list for his own mother.
Ah I see a fellow man of culture
Great video and yes I love monster girl doctor anime.
Raven this was great and very entertaining. I definitely think you should do more comedic and entertaining response videos. Keep up the great work, I'll be looking forward to seeing more of your content.
Thanks for the misogynistic jokes in the first minutes! Knew I had to turn this off before continuing. Shame your critique didn't manage to land.
@@NewAge374 Pray tell...what were the misogynistic jokes? 🤣
And on that note, how could you know if my critique landed if you turned off the video early?
Japan, turning your favorite mythological monster in to waifu since.......... 1999 (This is a wild guess)
Well, did some research, not that kind I assure you, just some normal PG google searches... And then maybe some more google searches... Anyways, 1932 is the latest possible first Japanese hentai (So, 90 years ago) although depending on semantics Japanese hentai might have been around for several hundred, if not thousands of years.
Still watching the video but the comment "And the Japanese say 'Can we bang it?'" at 9:41 got an automatic like (and a big laugh) out of me. 11 out of 10.
Given your willingness to cover One Piece content from CBR and the like, and your liking of the series, any chance we could get your thoughts on Drizzt’s “The Downfall of One Piece” videos?
He's a Mauler wanna be who thinks being longwinded makes him right. Not worth listening to.
That’s fair.
@@RavenKnightYT
spoilers for chapter 1043 and beyond
i would love your interpretation of joyboy/nika from the creation of a mythology standpoint
Women try not to make evil things good challenge (impossible)
Raven, I am ashamed of you! How could you give into the horse when you have ether Tio, Zombina or Polt to chose from! Have you no pride as a Knight?
But the horse IS a knight! XD
And as for the others, as they weren't a part of the primary harem, I didn't consider them as options. If I could expand, Tio would indeed be an S Tier choice!
@@RavenKnightYT You limit yourself my good man! And speaking of the MG Doctor... Memé is a much better choice! She can make better arms and armor for you! If she can make needles for surgery on a Dragon kin, she make anything! XD
oh no! are they going too perpetate the "nedusa is a victim and perseus the evil man" narrative?
I don’t understand why y’all people want to argue about something that’s not real its fake I mean seriously
respect for watching dubbed anime, also more of a cerea guy
It’s alright man, we’ve all written cringe in some form or another.
What is it with Athena and turning women into monsters
Im more of a miia kinda of guy myself
The beautiful Medusahead is already in existence in in the roman dominated part of Antiquity! Rennaissance is doing nothing new (as always XD) with the beautiful Medusahead.