Was Pinkie Pie an Abused Child?

[Shanks 10,811]

Though her parents were extremely uptight and strict I don't think she was abused but she clearly wasn't very happy in that situation and eventually left the rock farm in part because of that. Pinkie Pie simply decided that that lifestyle wasn't for her.

[DrReprise 172]

Didn't personally see much evidence to suggest that she was abused, however, having to work the rock fields every day for hours and hours could be considered abuse. It seems like the family itself may have been living inside a social bubble that lives by different (social) standards vs the other ponies.

[Starlighty 790]

I fon't thi k she was abused... There really no evidence to even prove she was abused.., she was misunderstood bevause she was the outcast of the family but thats really all she was.

[Widdershins 9,955]

  I think your entirely right. Well, partially so.

On 12/4/2014 at 4:39 PM, DrReprise said:

It seems like the family itself may have been living inside a social bubble that lives by different (social) standards vs the other ponies.

   And there we come to the heart of the matter.

 You see, what I think most kind of gloss over is that Abuse, like so very much in life, comes in very many shades. Her parents simply being 'boring' is enough for me to call abuse. One doesn't need to cuff your child or actually physically abuse them nor does outright emotionally berating them verbally consist wholly of what abuse is. It can be argued that ignoring, not providing enough attention or just not being the best example to your child as representative as everything in the world they can accomplish can be just as detrimental. I'm sure any parent could tell you that parenting is really just a gamble. Parents are just as mortal & fallible as their kids, and that's kind of the issue here. When your a kid and ALL you have are your family and especially your parents, you kind of grow up assuming that their word shapes reality. Especially in a very small world of just a farm where everything kinda has to be managed by those parents so you can see how much of an impact they have.

  That's the gag & main character traits of the Pie Parents. They're obscenely dull. They said that in Hearthbreakers, that they married solely just because tradition ordered them to. We don't know what this "Choosing Stone" is (anyone else get a weird, vaguely cultish vibe there?...) but it was obeyed blindly. Neither knew or cared to know each other before that point, but once they did marry, then they started loving each other and it did work out for them. A positive point for arranged marriages, I must say. Sometimes that works. ...but, that quickly developed a very weird ecosystem for their foals.

   I get into this when I started getting all deep about Limestone. Does anyone else notice the simply ridiculous array of personality types in the Pie family? I know, it can be said that in making a large cast of characters you have to differentiate them as much as possible, but in real life, when you spend so much of an early, formative part of your life with only a very small, select cast of characters there tends to be a teensy bit of overlay in personalities, just a few parts where you share qualities. But the Pie Sisters have huge, thick, bold lines bordering each of their personalities. As if each mind was grasping at any straw they could to differentiate themselves as much as possible.

   I should say that Cloudy Quartz & Igneous Rock do indeed love their family. I'm reminded (constantly) of that one scene in Hearthbreakers, not unlike the example given by the Original Poster, of the situation coming to a head and the Pie family all looking at Limestone for her to make up her easily-incensed mind. Those are looks that convey that they all know each other on a deep & abiding level. They are a very close-knit family that knows each other so well as to already know what each other are going to do in any situation, but won't push each other further than they know they're willing to go.

  ...and that's a bad thing.

   How many times have we seen the sentiment expressed on television that a mind kind of needs to grow beyond just their family? That sort of situation where a large family gets snowed in in the mountains and people start complaining about how just being cooped up with their family drives them crazy. Or the typical teenager complaint about how their family "just doesn't get them." In the environment Pinkie came from it was moving rocks, maybe on occasion some Rock Vendor came by to pick up a shipment or something, and their family. That was it. There wasn't even any way to tell that there was an outside world. A life built by two parents who were entirely content with such monotony. That's what that rainbow explosion was for Pinkie. A sign to her that there was an outside world, that there always was more to explore, to experience, to feel. That's why she's grown into the albeit hedonistic mare she is today. She wasn't given options as a foal because creativity or being happy just wasn't something important for life on a rock farm. Now she can start living and feeling. And her parents fully support her leaving the farm if need be, they still seem like the couple that doesn't want to surpress or order around their foals. They ultimately want them to make their own decisions & be happy.

  But think for a bit about those sisters who didn't have that revelation. The Pinkies that could have been. That were never given the idea or concept that live could change & grow, that there was a world to discover.

  Maud turned out fine. She grew accustomed to boredom & accepted it. She likes rocks. It's what she's good at. So now she's going to explore the world to learn more about rocks. Cut & dry. What more needs to be put to it? That's how Maud likes it. Rocks are always there. Dependable. Like life. Rocks.

  But that leads us to the other two, lesser developed mares. The two eldest have fled the farm, they've found their lives. But what about the Rock Farm? Tradition is clearly something oppressively important to their parents. They might not press the matter, but clearly, some mare needs to stay behind to take care of it.

   Marble's the whipping colt of the family. I might be reading too much into this, sure, but there's one little thing that leaves a bit more of an impact than it probably should. Her one & only character trait is that she can't even talk. She's not just sensitive as Fluttershy, she's entirely crippled. Given an oppurtunity, she still communicates solely through cowering. She's likely the biggest point towards their environment being abusive. Each of her sisters are notably more ambitious & proactive. You don't think it's been clear to her that she's the weakest link in the family? The one to just go along with whatever has been planned, who nearly has to be physically pushed to get her to move? Who is clearly going to be the one who lives her entire, uneventful life in this expressionless pit of boredom and likely die there as well?

   ...okay... m-maybe I k-kinda s-s-symapthize a bit too much with h-her...

  Then everything comes down onto Limestone's shoulders. I've talked enough before about her, so I'll be brief. With two other much more expressive & out-going sisters (yes, that includes Maud. She's a real firecracker once you figure out how to read her!) and the youngest being so cripplingly shy to need to have a sister to lean on, she has to be the one to take things seriously, she needs to fill her given role. "Mom & Dad may run the place... but this farm is mine!" She needs to be strong, because life hasn't allowed her to be anything else but. And you questioning her doesn't help the matter. Yes, and you coming into her grey, dead world and sticking out like a sore hoof is enough to question everything in her hardscrabble life.

   I adore the Pie Family, for how stellar of an example they set to show Nature Vrs Nuture, of how the mind can be so very malleable to so many examples despite given the same environment. How... how Life is what you allow it to be.

  Was Pinkie and her family abused? Yes, but not by the parents, but by their situation. It's like spreading a small tarp over your lawn. The grass underneath becomes a sickly white, thick stemmed and sits there waiting for the time it can grow to meet the sun it knows is there.

[Castle Bleck 19,167]

No.

 

They're visibly good to her; they just don't quite "sync" with her -- that's all.

[cmarston1 5,952]

Why do people keep on making topics like these?

[LyricaDreamy 42]

The rest of the family probably have autism.