I kinda don't buy the all-angsty childhood for that reason:
But Family is very very clear that she had a very strict, controlling and rigid father, in a region/family in which rigid and old-fashioned gender and familial roles were upheld. I don't recall if religion is mentioned but they read as "southern fundamentalists" or somesuch thing. (Damn you Joss and your outdated southern "redneck" stereotypes. There are plenty of "rednecks" in the north, let me tell you.)
So yes, angsty - I think that's as clear even if there wasn't any physical abuse, there was definitely shaming - Tara learned to be ashamed of herself, of something at her core that couldn't be fixed. Buffy, Faith, all the SG have something of the same. Shame about who they are, not what they've done, something that can't be fixed.
because Tara is also strong at her core. Because of her mother? Because of other people influences? I feel like she knew pain but also love and goodness.
But it's not either/or. Buffy and Tara both have loving mothers who are their emotional source, the women who teach their daughters how to love. But they aren't perfect: Joyce's anger at Giles and Buffy's slayerhood is mostly swallowed down, only to pop back up when under the influence of alchohol/drugs or a spell (gingerbread), or misdirected (Dead Man's Party). Tara's mother never leaves the situation she's in, never takes her daughter away from it, and is only able to leave by dying. There are probably reasons - economics, sickness, her training that you have to "stand by your man" etc. But she gives tara the strength to leave.
So they're flawed but loving women who model love to their daughters however imperfectly, and that's something that links Buffy and Tara, and why it seems appropriate that Buffy & Dawn name Tara "family" and Tara returns the favor on several levels, becoming close to both of them.
I think I identify with both of them on that level because I had a very angsty childhood - I know you've read my Ted meta - but also a very loving mother for all her flaws. We endured years of physical and emotional abuse but I'm not afraid to touch, to hug, to be emotionally intimate with someone because I had that foundation from my mom.
Forgot to add this part...
But Family is very very clear that she had a very strict, controlling and rigid father, in a region/family in which rigid and old-fashioned gender and familial roles were upheld. I don't recall if religion is mentioned but they read as "southern fundamentalists" or somesuch thing. (Damn you Joss and your outdated southern "redneck" stereotypes. There are plenty of "rednecks" in the north, let me tell you.)
So yes, angsty - I think that's as clear even if there wasn't any physical abuse, there was definitely shaming - Tara learned to be ashamed of herself, of something at her core that couldn't be fixed. Buffy, Faith, all the SG have something of the same. Shame about who they are, not what they've done, something that can't be fixed.
because Tara is also strong at her core. Because of her mother? Because of other people influences? I feel like she knew pain but also love and goodness.
But it's not either/or. Buffy and Tara both have loving mothers who are their emotional source, the women who teach their daughters how to love. But they aren't perfect: Joyce's anger at Giles and Buffy's slayerhood is mostly swallowed down, only to pop back up when under the influence of alchohol/drugs or a spell (gingerbread), or misdirected (Dead Man's Party). Tara's mother never leaves the situation she's in, never takes her daughter away from it, and is only able to leave by dying. There are probably reasons - economics, sickness, her training that you have to "stand by your man" etc. But she gives tara the strength to leave.
So they're flawed but loving women who model love to their daughters however imperfectly, and that's something that links Buffy and Tara, and why it seems appropriate that Buffy & Dawn name Tara "family" and Tara returns the favor on several levels, becoming close to both of them.
I think I identify with both of them on that level because I had a very angsty childhood - I know you've read my Ted meta - but also a very loving mother for all her flaws. We endured years of physical and emotional abuse but I'm not afraid to touch, to hug, to be emotionally intimate with someone because I had that foundation from my mom.