$0.02

[soc_puppet]

Wow, hey, totally meant to talk about this a long time ago ^^;

So a while back at one of our after-concert ice cream gatherings, the topic of CPR came up. Someone (I don't remember who, though I suspect it was nekokenchan's dad) said, "There have been studies done to show that you don't even need to do mouth-to-mouth; the chest compressions naturally drag in enough oxygen without it." I don't know if this is true, and if I ever have to do CPR myself, I'll probably end up doing it the way I was taught, but upon hearing this, one thought entered my mind:

"Hah! Take that, CPR-as-cheap-fanfic-device-users! Now you have no excuse what-so-ever!"

I'm sure that all of you in the audience who are familiar with fanfics know what I'm talking about when I mention fics that use CPR as an excuse for characters to not-quite-kiss. The first couple of times I read this, yeah, okay, I thought it was cute. These days, though, it almost makes me laugh.

I am a romantic to my bones. I can see the appeal of breathing life into your Special Person.

Using CPR as an excuse for one character to kiss another character s/he is secretly hot for though? Kinda tasteless.

When I was in Jr High and first learning CPR, our teacher read us a letter written by someone who had actually performed it on another person--not just a test dummy named 'Annie'. The letter talked about how people in Hollywood always gloss over the 'bad' things that can happen during CPR. No one in the movies ever gets lockjaw; no one on TV is ever puked over because the air went to the victems stomach instead of his or her lungs; I can't remember any time that someone on TV has died from CPR, though I'm sure it's more likely than these other things; and while we're on the topic or realism, does no one remember to pinch the victim's nose shut so the air does not escape through his or her nose? Let's face it people, the actual act of CPR isn't all that romantic. The letter also mentioned that there are support groups for people who've done CPR IRL. Support Groups. This is a traumatizing experience, not a romantic one!

Let's move on to characterization. Befor I get into this, I'd just like to say that I've never been in a situation where I needed to preform CPR myself; however, I think I might just be a little bit more worried about the fact that a person was potentially dying than thinking, OMG, noes! I'm being presented with an opportunity to lip-lock with the person I'm secretly hot for, except I'm still publicly denying it! My image of not really caring about this person in that way will be forever ruined! I think I would probably be more cought up in actually doing CPR and hoping to God that this person would come out of it okay/without permanent brain damage/etc. Still, characters in fanfic are always more caught up with swapping spit with the other person. It bugs me.

Finally, we have testimony to suggest that the lip-lock isn't even needed in CPR. Is it any wonder that I'm happy about this? It would be one thing if a lot more writers were responsible with things like realism and characterization; it's quite another when they aren't.

I can stomach reading CPR-in-place-of-kissing fics, really, but I do ask that those of you reading this do your best to consider the facts when reading or writing such things, and don't over-romanticize.

Okay, so that's not exactly the best essay I've ever written. I could probably go back and re-work it, make it come out better, et cetera, but for now, I'm leaving it as it is. I think it gets the point across okay.

And for those of you who missed the point, I'll try one more time:
CPR =/= Romantic

Edit: Also meant to put in the correct date =_= Wrote and posted this yesterday, not today. *sigh*

Comments

[soc_puppet]

....I'll work on it.