Privacy in Torchwood

[galadriel1010]

This is a trope that I find a bit disturbing, so I'm probably come across as judgey as a judge, but this is not a post to say “don't do this ever” so much as “please can you think about this and engage with me in discussion about it”.


The trope I'm thinking of is the one where Tosh hacks into the CCTV archives to retrieve deleted or protected footage of Jack and Ianto having sex.

There is no trope in Torchwood fanfiction that makes me backbutton faster. Even if the footage weren't password protected or deleted, that would be weird, but to deliberately and determinedly invade the privacy of not just your friends, but the man who saved you from UNIT's clutches?

That's not just creepy and a betrayal of their friendship, it's also illegal. The extent of the illegality is questionable, as there is no privacy law in England and Wales, but it would be comparable to the current case regarding the News of the World, who hacked into people's answering machines to get stories. As this is a current case, no one knows what the outcome will be (ETA: Four months later and it's bringing down the government), but if you want to look at the legal arguments surrounding it you can look at the arguments being put forwards in the media about that case and then subtract the celebrity element and put friendships in, for added squick.

Not that Torchwood cares about the legality of things like that all that much, but I suspect they would care more if it were their own privacy at question.

If we look at this trope from the start:

Stage 1: Jack and Ianto have sex at work. This could be because they're exhibitionists, or it could be because they live in the Hub. Going with option 2, they live in the Hub because someone has to be there to monitor the Rift and take the night callouts, so they are in the Hub, having sex there, so that Tosh and the others don't have to be.

Stage 2: They, being covered at all hours, delete the recorded footage of them having sex. Or maybe they just put it into a special folder and put a password on it so that they can access it later but no one else can get at it.. Either way, they ensure that their teammates can't get at it.

Stage 3: Tosh (or Gwen, but usually Tosh) breaks through the passwords or retrieves the deleted footage.

On what planet is that okay?

And to top it off, it's with Jack – the one who guards his secrets like Cerberus does the underworld, with lots of growling and not-fun biting if you get too close – and Ianto – the one who guards his secrets like... you can see where this is going.

So before you have Tosh oh-so-cleverly hacking through the layers of passwords, or carefully retrieving the deleted footage, please think about what she's about to do? And maybe how you'd feel if one of your friends – on whom your life often depended – was watching you having sex without your knowledge and consent.

Jack and Ianto have little enough privacy as it is. I'm sure Tosh wouldn't begrudge them what they tried to hold on to.

Tl;dr: There's a reason peeping Toms go to prison or get restraining orders.

Comments

[welsh-scotsman.livejournal.com]

thank you for posting this. this is exactly what i think whenever i see a fic with tosh watching cctv of jack and ianto having sex. i don't read it for this very reason - it's an invasion of privacy and an abuse of trust.

what also really annoys me is that in most of the fics, jack and ianto seem to be perfectly okay with it! what canon are these people watching?????

aside from the fact that jack and ianto are both just as private about their relationship as well as their personal lives, tosh doesn't seem to be that kind of person at all.

surely she out of all of them would understand the need for privacy and i also cannot see her then sending that footage to other members of the team or keeping it for herself. it just *shudders* it doesn't work for me and i really don't see how it works for others.

[fide-et-spe.livejournal.com]

The thing I don't get is how Tosh became this voyeur in fanon? I really don't get it. There is nothing in canon to hint at it. To be honest I don't think that the authors of the stories see it in the way you do, I think that it's quite way out there in things that really are totally AU in that sense, and not at all realistic. At least I really hope so, because I know Tosh is lonely, and in love with someone who ignores her etc, but even in my most depressed and lonely, the last thing I would want to do is watch two of my friends having sex!

I have only read these stories if from an author I like, so it's pretty rare that I read them. The authors I read tend not to write them, or if they do they are pretty tame. However I do remember once coming apon a story, which I didn't actually read much of, where Tosh and Gwen and other TW women (Martha maybe?) were having girls night's in to watch DVD's of Jack and Ianto having sex. It was just beyond ludicrous. I think maybe also that's the thing, people writing it don't think that through, and just write it for the porn value, or something. It's a fantasy, that in real life would be rather nasty, as you have pointed out.

[aviv-b.livejournal.com]

You raise a good point. I've seen (Ok and read) numerous stories with this trope. It's almost become a part of fanon it occurs so frequently.

I would agree that Jack and Ianto are both private people, but Jack is pretty open about sexual matters with his teammates. When Gwen catches them in the greenhouse, Ianto is visibly embarassed. Jack invites her to join in.

A lot of times in fanfic their relationship is shown to be more permanent/secure/comfortable than it is on the show. So would they be comfortable with someone watching them on tape in these circumstances, I don't know?

[coldwater1010.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm not a huge fan of this trope although I've read a few fics with it in and I'm not sure I buy Tosh as this obsessively voyeuristic type, but there are other kinks that get fandom's motor running that I find far more disturbing and I agree that a lot of these kinks would be illegal in the real world and would probably land the characters in jail and if things like slavery and dubcon are acceptable tropes for fiction voyeurism strikes me as pretty mild in comparison.

[coldwater1010.livejournal.com]

With regards to Jack and Ianto, I have a hard time believing Ianto would be happy having his colleagues watching him have sex especially since just talking about his relationship with Jack seems to make him uncomfortable. Jack? I don't know. He's pretty open about sex, but being comfortable with sex and your sexuality doesn't automatically translate into wanting your private business spread around or being happy to have people watch you in a private moment without you're consent. Plus even if he was comfortable with it if Ianto isn't I would hope he'd have enough sensitivity and consideration for the person he's sleeping with not to encourage behaviour they'd be uncomfortable with. So Ianto giving Tosh said cctv footage stretches my credibility more than a little bit. Jack handing over cctv footage of he and Ianto having sex without Ianto's consent just makes Jack seem like an inconsiderate tool.

[sariagray.livejournal.com]

If anyone (and I will admit to being guilty of playfully using this trope with Tosh before...) is going to hack in and watch, it's John Hart.

Actually, that's a fic I would like to read. Yes, it is. So, if anyone wants to use a voyeur, use him. For me? Please?

Ahem. Anyway. To your point, I do agree that it is a senseless trope. However, yeah, I'll read anything well written. And I can see (canon) Tosh doing that ONLY if she has reason to believe that Jack is abusing Ianto, or something. And even that's a stretch and certainly much more analytical than pleasurable. Pleasure could be a side effect, though?

So really, I'm just rambling now. Don't mind me. Ultimately I agree, but am guilty, too. The end. :-/

[51stcenturyfox.livejournal.com]

Voyeurism is totally a kink, and I think labeling a story where someone watches other characters on CCTV as "voyeurism" is doing fandom a service because people look for that kink. Just sticking it in a Jack/Ianto story randomly as a fetish of Tosh's is kind of weird, though.

Owen, we know, would watch and record people shagging on CCTV, since he was perving on Gwen and Carys kissing. And nobody was really horrified that it could be observed. Tosh, on the other hand, wasn't too pleased with the mind-reading voyeurism she experienced wearing the necklace, so I don't think she'd randomly look at footage hoping to run across shagvids.

Appropriate icon is appropriate!!! :D

[lone-star-woman.livejournal.com]

Okay, because I wrote a Tosh as a voyeur fic a couple of days ago, I feel as though I should respond. And I will admit to being glib about it as I have a tendency to be with most kinks. Heck, I once even wrote a fic about bondage -- something that I don't understand, much less want to take part in -- but it came out as totally tongue in cheek. What can I say? I find most kinks absurd to begin with.* It's not excuse, nor a justification; it's not even an apology. But I don't think I'll use the trope again because well... I don't have an interest in exploring it further at this point.

After reading the other comments, I really don't know what to add. We all have our lines that we will not cross. For me, it's non-con.

Now, is voyeurism something I would actually enjoy in real life? I joke about it, but back in university, I was on the roof of an apartment building with a friend and my roommate. We were just chatting and drinking beer when all the sudden my friend noticed a couple having sex in their apartment. I was the one who freaked out and had a hissy fit while the others watched. Yeah, I'm all talk, and the internet is the place where fantasies get let loose.

*I've also toyed with the idea of writing clown kink because of a footnote I read in Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex by Mary Roach. That's neither here not there for the purposes of this discussion, but probably illustrates that fic lets out my inner freak.

[idamus.livejournal.com]

I have a serious voyeur kink when it comes to Jack/Ianto, but not the spying via CCTV, that's a bit too creepy, no I want someone to accidentally walk in on them, unnoticed, and just not be able to turn around, I do prefer them not having sex but just shoving a caring side towards each other

[citrinesunset.livejournal.com]

For me, this trope is kind of a fine line.

For one thing, I think agree with your differentiation between a kink and a joke. When it feels like it's being written as voyeurism kink, I think that's cool. Same for if the writer gives it an interesting take. When it seems like more like it's being played as a joke and taken for granted as cute and funny, I can see your issue with it.

The feeling I get from this trope sometimes is that Tosh is being used as a self-insert for the writer, and that feels kind of odd to me, too. (Of course, not all fics are like that.)