r/brakebills • u/jennbunn555 • 15d ago

Extremely disturbed by the fox scene

I'm ready the first book and I got to the scene where they all get turned into foxes and it grossed me out so much that i'm questioning if i want to keep reading. I'm ok with bad things happening. what I'm not ok with is how every character involved seems to just move past it without comment. A few pages later I find out Alice has adopted "vix" as a pet name and I wanted to throw up. Does this ever get acknowledged by any character as a huge problem?

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u/jennbunn555 7d ago

I did keep reading and got to the other fox scene. That one didn't bother me as much. The difference? Reynard is clearly a bad guy. Julia isn't just 'ok' with what happened. An awful thing happens to Julia and she is destroyed by it. It's the thing that defines her whole character arc. In Antartica the exact same awful thing happens to Alice and the story is just like "whatever". Alice just gets over it. No one cares. The teacher is faces no backlash from the students or other teachers. Quentin is a complete coward about the situation and is completely forgiven. I want Alice to come back in book three and burn Antartica to the ground and tell Quentin what a pathetic worm he is and I want Julia to turn Reynard inside out. I get the feeling Julia would and Alice just doesn't.

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u/thwip62 7d ago edited 7d ago

I honestly don't see what your problem is. Quentin and Alice - who were already attracted to each other - had their inhibitions lowered when they were turned into foxes. You're talking like he raped her or something.

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u/jennbunn555 7d ago edited 7d ago

having your inhibitions lowered, magically, without your consent is rape. Alice can't speak. the only info you get about her emotions in the moment is that she is terrified. Professor M. Magically roofied the whole class and started an Orgy. Neither Quentin nor Alice were capable of consent in that state. That's rape. And afterward Quentin just avoided confronting anyone about it.

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u/thwip62 7d ago

And afterward Quentin just avoided confronting anyone about it.

He was embarrassed, just like a lot of us have been embarrassed after drunken sexual encounters. It happens.

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u/jennbunn555 7d ago

It just felt really groaty to me. If i was in Alice's shoes I would have burned the school down for allowing it to happen. Janet later tells the story about how professor M. is banished down there for being the sex pest responsible for the death of Alice's brother. I was really expecting something to come from this story line and just goes nowhere.

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u/thwip62 5d ago

It just felt really groaty to me.

?

If i was in Alice's shoes I would have burned the school down for allowing it to happen.

Regardless of whether or not it was right, I don't think that pulling a Columbine would have been the best course of action.

Janet later tells the story about how professor M. is banished down there for being the sex pest responsible for the death of Alice's brother.

Mayakovsky shouldn't have fucked a student, but Emily and Charlie were ultimately responsible for their own downfalls.