An Affinity for Horror as a Trauma Healer and a Queer Womxn
[STRONG TRIGGER WARNING: RAPE/CAR ACCIDENTS/MEDICAL/DISABILITY TRAUMA]
Fear, as a feeling, can evoke different responses in an individual. When we are in a state of fear, our sympathetic nervous system activates. What does that mean? When we are faced with fear, we have five responses: fight, flight, freeze, flee, and fawn. People are able to make quick decisions and, ultimately, our neanderthal brain instincts kick in. For example, I was in a really bad car accident; my car rolled down a hill and I was adamant about finding help. I still had full movement of my right foot/leg and was still able to climb up the hill so I could shout across a body of water. Luckily, it was still light out and people were in their backyards and they were able to call 911 (additional luck for the gray clouds started to loom in and they seemed to be heading back inside). If you had told me the probability of me surviving that night, I probably would have pulled 28% out of my ass. What saved me was my body's response to fear. And you know what was funny? I CALLED MY EX/FIRST LOVE. I was in such shock and he had hurt me so much, there's a theory about the break-up causing my brain inflammation, but that's for a different blog post.
After everything that I've gone through in my life, nothing really phases me anymore. I've literally faced death so many times, I'm kind of used to it? [Personally, I don't like making jokes about death though because there are people in my life who have dealt with grief due to death and would like to respect that]. Now, that doesn't mean I'm not afraid, in fact, I am terrified of real life situations instead of masked serial killers or clowns (or serial killer clowns, i.e. Art from Terrifier). I'm terrified of getting physically hurt because of who I am. I've been raped because of my disability. I rewatched I Spit On Your Grave, recently and I was so visibly uncomfortable because of the obvious power dynamic between the main character and a cop with a daughter and pregnant wife. Why did I add those two things? Because he was the main villain in the story, which is quite unfortunate because I tend to love villainous characters; Ursula from The Little Mermaid, Mommy Xenomorph from the Alien franchise, Samantha Carpenter from the recent Scream requel (I want there to be a Scream movie where the lead is Ghostface), Lady Dimitrescu from Resident Evil Village, and down right to literal fate in Final Destination. Incredible writing will make you root for the villain. And how can I forget that Psycho 2 is better than the original. I said it.
I've noticed that pattern within the queer community and the horror community. There is a Venn diagram and in the middle is where all us, gay people of color. It is true that there aren't that many people of color in horror movies, but I like to think of it as watching white people suffer. Is that so bad? It's all fiction! There is literal harm that is being done to the queer, BIPOC communities currently and it is absolutely atrocious and many of us are living our version of horror. Which is why we delve and immerse ourselves into horror in other forms because we are able to contain it. I also want to point out that George A. Romero's Night Of The Living Dead starred a black man. Good for you, George. I will be referencing an article by Maya Lotus relating queerness to gayness, and I heavily agree with a lot of the aspects of the article. Especially the quote, "LGBTQ+ representation often hides in the shadows alongside the monsters, but as poor evolves, we have seen characters queer people can relate to breaking down the closet door as heroes, vegetable anti-heroes or even relatable villains." I'm not saying that every character in a horror villain is gay, but the scenarios themselves have underlying gay themes. As listed by Maya Lotus's article, some include Jennifer's Body, Frankenstein, Rocky Horror Picture Show, Hellraiser, and The Lost Boys. Anything with vampires is gay, have you seen What We Do In The Shadows? Highly recommend because Guillermo is baby. All of these movies have one thing in common, yearning to be seen, but hiding. Reflectively, we are seeing more and more gay characters and creators in the horror sphere and cannot wait what queer stories we’ll see, whether purposeful or not. From The Haunting of Bly Manor, Fear Street: (insert year here), and Freaky, I love seeing queer characters finally being seen. Also, Psycho was essentially drag???
Movies and television are often escapes from our everyday lives. Queer people often have trauma simply because of who they are. I do believe that horror allows the LGBTQIA+ a form of escape. You cannot guess the amount of YouTube horror reaction channels I've subscribed to within the past 7 months and almost all of them are nasty gays. These channels were also showing me to become, uhm less PC, because I'm FUCKING TIRED OF CANCEL CULTURE.
BUT THAT'S FOR ANOTHER BLOG POST.
HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND! BE SAFE xoxo
