Mm, I'm not arguing those points on consent. (And uh, if I haven't mentioned it yet, I love this fic very much, which is why I must immediately sink my teeth into canon, it's so -fascinating-.) What I'm talking about is John flying on auto-pilot versus John paying attention to the cues. Auto-pilot being the mission mode where he does not stop to justify whatever he does. There is a set procedure, a tangible goal, and he does it.
And professionally speaking, he has default modes with both Rodney and Elizabeth, the stuff we see in the show. With her, he always waits for her okay. Especially at this point, after Hot Zone. With him, he always pushes until he gets the inevitable yes.
My point is, with the shooting, he recognizes the difference between his auto-pilot and the personal relationship. You can't imagine Bates or Caldwell or any of those hard-bitten Marines saying anything other than a laconic "You all right, ma'am? Let's go." whereas John was freaked that he'd freaked out Elizabeth, the person who hovers over their football-viewing party and steals popcorn.
And to me, it's not so much that Rodney is giving off the *typical* signals of intent. It's that there are so many subtle examples of John cutting through and pointing out that Rodney does not mean what he says -- and that Rodney does not always give off the typical guy cues all the time.
The thing is that at this point in the show, we haven't really seen John and Rodney interacting on a casual level beyond Hide and Seek. Almost every scene we get is actually in a professional setting. Where Rodney has never denied John anything, from naming the puddlejumpers to going out in the field. By contrast, why not ask Teyla? Because Teyla *always* says no to John. Her boundaries are loud and clear. She questions him at every step both personally and professionally. Rodney and Elizabeth have been giving John professional go-aheads all year long.
My question, which affects my reading of John's place in this, is whether Rodney and John have ever differentiated their professional and personal roles. I mean a cop and his partner are going to act differently in the squad car as in the bar after hours. And so on: was John aware of his own auto-pilot, that it's the same way he treats Rodney all the time? Was John aware of Rodney's ambivalence after spending a year giving him reality checks? It changes the reading massively, to know or guess those answers.
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Date: 2006-05-31 02:27 am (UTC)And professionally speaking, he has default modes with both Rodney and Elizabeth, the stuff we see in the show. With her, he always waits for her okay. Especially at this point, after Hot Zone. With him, he always pushes until he gets the inevitable yes.
My point is, with the shooting, he recognizes the difference between his auto-pilot and the personal relationship. You can't imagine Bates or Caldwell or any of those hard-bitten Marines saying anything other than a laconic "You all right, ma'am? Let's go." whereas John was freaked that he'd freaked out Elizabeth, the person who hovers over their football-viewing party and steals popcorn.
And to me, it's not so much that Rodney is giving off the *typical* signals of intent. It's that there are so many subtle examples of John cutting through and pointing out that Rodney does not mean what he says -- and that Rodney does not always give off the typical guy cues all the time.
The thing is that at this point in the show, we haven't really seen John and Rodney interacting on a casual level beyond Hide and Seek. Almost every scene we get is actually in a professional setting. Where Rodney has never denied John anything, from naming the puddlejumpers to going out in the field. By contrast, why not ask Teyla? Because Teyla *always* says no to John. Her boundaries are loud and clear. She questions him at every step both personally and professionally. Rodney and Elizabeth have been giving John professional go-aheads all year long.
My question, which affects my reading of John's place in this, is whether Rodney and John have ever differentiated their professional and personal roles. I mean a cop and his partner are going to act differently in the squad car as in the bar after hours. And so on: was John aware of his own auto-pilot, that it's the same way he treats Rodney all the time? Was John aware of Rodney's ambivalence after spending a year giving him reality checks? It changes the reading massively, to know or guess those answers.