The rape of Medusa - the victim, the culprit, the misunderstood. A symbol for feminism?

[Illusive_Man]

Medusa - a monster, a Gorgon, the most hideous face imaginable and with living venomous snakes in place of hair. So ugly looking into her eyes would turn onlookers into stone.... yet..... there's a story untold.

Medusa was originally a ravishingly beautiful maiden , a virgin in fact.

"The jealous aspiration of many suitors," as was told by Ovid in the book of Metamorphoses.

But Poseidon - the God of the Sea ...raped her in Athena's - the goddess of law's temple, the enraged Athena blames Merdusa's beauty for Poseidon raping her and transformed Medusa to....what we know as today.

2000 years has since passed from the creation of the myth of Medusa and yet....her name remains yet to be justified. Still ... a monster, an eater of men. Still to be blamed for being rape all simply because of her beauty and yet....people still believe it even to this day and age.

Perhaps.... that says something about the civilization we live in today.

[Anonymous]

I think her story has more to do with the injustice of the Gods. It explains why Gods would allow misfortune to befall innocent humans. In other words it is about why bad things happen to good people. A problem modern religion still has a problem addressing. Unlike today, they didn't believe their gods to be perfect and loving, so showing them as cruel made more sense to those people.

Pretty much all of these stories ended in tragedy no matter the morality of the person in the story. In her case it was a case of a woman that pleaded for protection of a goddess, and ended up pissing that goddess off for bringing her troubles to her temple. In other words, humans can't always rely on the gods, and no matter what we do the gods could turn on us.

Throughout history the worse life was for people, the more cruel the gods were, and the worse the afterlife was believed to be. When times were good, then they were more likely to have kinder gods, and a happy afterlife.

[KBob93]

She's a Greek tragic hero.

[Opinion Owner]

Most Greek hero's were tragic. That's because the gods were represented more as a dysfunctional family that was evil and bitter towards humanity than they were seen as represented as being all goodness and kindness that we associate with divinity today.

[harakiri]

This is the version I know:

"She was originally a golden-haired, fair maiden, who, as a priestess of Athena, was devoted to a life of celibacy; however, after being wooed by Poseidon and falling for him, she forgot her vows and married him. For this offence, she was punished by the goddess in a most terrible manner. Each wavy lock of the beautiful hair that had charmed her husband was changed into a venomous snake; her once gentle, love-inspiring eyes turned into blood-shot, furious orbs, which excited fear and disgust in the mind of the onlooker; whilst her former roseate hue and milk-white skin assumed a loathsome greenish tinge."

So it really was love that destroyed her. And the wrath of a scorned goddess. Maybe it's a symbol for feminism in that sometimes... women are most poisonous to their own kind. Women, moreso than men in my opinion, have made feminism the farce that it is today.

[zorro8888]

Yeah that's the one I learned too, the maiden who fell in love with Poseidon.

[harakiri]

@zorro8888 sad story is sad :/

[zorro8888]

Yeah very sad, there was also a lot of jealousy from the other goddesses about her beauty

[Bandit74]

You're anti-feminist?

[harakiri]

@Bandit74 egalitarian :)

[Bandit74]

oh, that makes more sense

[KBob93]

This made my morning! I'm a Grecophile, so I love anything about Ancient Greece.
I love the philosophy behind this story. It's very synonymous to how women tend to slut-shame each other, the "what were you wearing in the first place?" argument, and turning into someone you don't want to be after a trauma happens to you that society blames you for. I was molested in May 2013 by someone I went to high school with, & I wonder if things would be different for the better had it not happened. I wonder if I would've been a better person this whole time. I wonder if I wouldn't have slept with as many people as I did. I think I did that to try to neutralize the assault with partners I consented to, making me feel like I had some sort of control again. I'm emotionally detached from men generally now, although I don't want to be like that, because I hope to find an exception & he deserves a girl who holds out best she can. As to why I practice the sexual lifestyle of the Greek goddess Hymenna, who forbid vaginal penetration until marriage but allotted everything else.

[FinnishBeautyGirl]

I love Angient Greek as well :D ♥

[inamorata]

I think it can work as a metaphor, but not your retarded feminist interpretation where you imply people still believe women are to be blamed for their own rape.

But it does work like this...

Poseidon is communism wanting to overtake the West, raping its schools and popular culture, creating a new climate and social pressure to preserve it.

Athena is feminism, movement of fat, ugly and/or homosexual women resentful of benefits and praise most women receive from men, feeling inferior and slighted.

Medusa is a beautiful, female, useful idiot (coffee shop feminist) whose femininity and value to society is destroyed because she belongs to the temple of Athena (feminism). And being the dedicated idiot she is, she's powerless to stop it.

[PT1911]

Goddamn it I love your posts

[inamorata]

@PT1911 Haha, thanks. ^^

[Bluemax]

I believe Medusa has very little impact on civilization today. I would wager somewhere around 90% of people you would interview on the street have no idea what the origin story of Medusa is.

There is a children's literature series, Goddess Girls if memory serves, that portrays Greek gods and goddesses in high school (let's see how many other mundane, worldly settings we can shoehorn Greek deities into). One of which centers on Medusa and it largely portrays her as a misunderstood girl (almost like a Goth girl).

[NateInAk]

If someone is forced into evil, and then fully embraces it, are they evil?
Now for the victim blaming aspect to your post.
Victim blaming is wrong.
Dur dur DUH.
It is in no way a woman's FAULT if she is raped. The blame lies squarely on the rapist.
However, that doesn't excuse women acting like idiots.
There are evil people out there, DISGUSTING people, who will do terrible things. Maybe non evil people should take evil people into account instead of saying, "They shouldn't do that! That's mean!" And expecting them not to do it.

[Phoenix98]

It wasn't rape or "men" that destroyed her it was the unnatural love between a god and a mortal and pity jealousy of a scorned goddess. Despite that what happened to her does not justify what she did and that rings true in any situation whether it mythological or not the end does not justify the means.

[KBob93]

It's not justified, but no one's perfect.

[Phoenix98]

Mmhm.

[PT1911]

Definitely a story on how jealousy and lust can destroy an innocent person.

Not so sure about the feminist angle, as there is clearly a visible difference between feminism in the democratic western world vs areas like the Middle East and really any country where oppression of women is country policy

[Hephaestus]

Just a random bit of trivia for you,
when Perseus cut medusa's head off, pegasus came out...

[Illusive_Man]

WHAT?
Which book is that in?

[Hephaestus]

It's in his basic mythos :3
Just a little less known

https://www.myth-and-fantasy.com/pegasus/plore.html

[NateInAk]

I thought Zeus created Pegasus?
Or did I just get that from the Hercules movie?
(I swear I used to know all these myths)

[Hephaestus]

That's from the movie ^_^
@NateInAk
I guess showing a horse with wings emerging from a pool of blood by a dismembered gorgon was a tad too hardcore for the screen lol

[NateInAk]

Well that certainly makes sense, Perseus killed medusa and rode Pegasus... So it all ties together. I remember now.
Pardon my brain fart.

[therussianconcussion]

yes its a perfect symbol for feminism one look and it can kill any human alive. perfect
and it wasn't a killer of men it was anyone who looked into her eyes.
www.greekmythology.com/.../medusa.html

[EtherBot]

Perhaps the greatest reason or this is that there is more than one telling of the Medusa story. Kind of like Atlas.

Some of them involving her simply sleeping in it. The majority of stories are about her having some kind of sex, and a lot of historians would tell you that Poseidon had nothing to do with Medusa.

Over all, it really is a story though, None of these people were real. And if you found out a serial murderer was raped in her teenage years, I doubt that would exclude it.

[EtherBot]

Let me remind you however, that Medusa is classically seen as a lonely and pitiful creature more than an ugly monster. Despite that being the most literal way to describe her.

She's usually not even seen as a villainous character in greek lore. Perseus only killed her to prove himself and stop a wedding. Unlike some other type of greek monster like the Minotaur.

[EtherBot]

Anyway, I doubt this would work as a symbol for feminism either way.

Medusa kind of soured on humanity after Athena cursed her. Throwing that into the entire range of Female humanity as some sort of mascot has some troubling implications that Women are monsters who will kill you because of something that happened to them ruining their lives.

A better Greek substitute would be a character like Artemis. Also female. Also considered beautiful. Also a virgin. A god of something water based tried to rape her too. But she however was kind hearted, Powerful, GODLY.

She even turned a peeping tom into a girl. That is just hilarious.

[hypno-trip]

Oh wow just saw this what an interesting story... I guess people have been used to thinking men can't control themselves for a long time. A sobering reminder for us to use our senses and place more responsibility on guys for rape cases...

[Coffinspire]

Omg I was so sad when I heard this story! I saw it on clash of the gods and I was appalled. I mean all greek stories are a little fucked up though. Did you read the one about the minotaur? Eek.

[Themostabsurd]

WHat if you looked at her?

[martyfellow]

A lot of modern feminists have slept with Don Trump. Have the gods made them ugly and man devouring monsters in revenge for sleeping with Don Trump

Gee, this never occurred to me before!

[kxera]

I love Mythology! Although; I don't think it was a feminist type story, but you've just inspired me to do a take on some old tale (undecided). Love the second pic by the way.

[MonaAmour]

Reminds me of the retelling of 'Malificent' from Sleeping Beauty.

[kxera]

I didn't even think of that, but true. I honestly love Maleficent.

[Bards]

Wow. I didn't know about her story :/ I like how she looks too. Hmm. Makes sense.

[Anonymous]

Greek mythology (and other mythologies) fascinate me; still some have interesting points on today's society after all these years.

[Bonnie12I27I12]

we aren't as amazing as nature. we are just living creatures. no matter how many computers we create we will always be what we were thousands of years ago.

[Despondency]

"The Boy Who Cried Rape: Illusive_Man's GAG Legacy"

[zell0is0my0name]

Oh, I pity Medusa! :(((

[Themostabsurd]

what if you looked at her though?

[RainbowFanGirl]

Great take! I love reading about mythology.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for this mytake :)