Stalking Is Love: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

Say you have a [[Stalker with a Crush]]. He relentlessly pursues his love interest, watching her as she sleeps, resorting to superfluous and often very disturbing lengths to protect her if he feels the need. She's probably going to be creeped out, right?

Instead of outright rejecting this guy's advances on the first go, the object of these advances isn't even irritated. [[I Can't Believe a Guy Like You Would Notice Me|She's completely dazzled and views them as romantic]], completely overlooking the stalkerish implications of what he's doing.

 

 

There is an unfortunate [[Double Standard]] common in the depiction of this trope. Stalker type behavior in a man can make him a romantic hero but the same behavior will almost always make a woman dangerous or pathetic. Interestingly, the [[Stalker with a Crush]] trope features an exactly opposite [[Double Standard]].

* In ''[[Koharu no Hibi]]'' while Akira ''is'' freaked out by Koharu's [[Stalker with a Crush]] tendencies he still eventually ends up dating her because as he said he can't leave her alone.

* In ''[[Rosario + Vampire]]'', Mizore constantly stalks the main character by hiding in a dozen various places and spying on him because she has a crush on him. [[Above the Influence|Too bad he never notices]].

 

 

 

== Fan Fiction ==

* In ''[[Code Geass: Mao of the Deliverance|Code Geass Mao of the Deliverance]]'', Mao travels hundreds of miles to find C.C. again while listening to her voice constantly [[Headphones Equal Isolation|on his headphones]]. She actually recorded this for him, however, and he is really just trying to {{spoiler|save her life (albeit against her wishes)}}.

* Most([[Sturgeon's Law|but not all]]) [[Glee]] fanfics that involve Kurt/Dave Karofsky will have this trope.

* In Ovid's ''Metamorphoses'' (specifically the Daphne and Apollo chapter), Apollo tells Daphne that he chases her not as a foe, but from love, making this trope at least [[Older Than Feudalism]].

** Not really; ''she'' certainly didn't see it that way.

** In ''[[The Phantom of the Opera]]'', Raoul's claim to Christine's love is that he's been obsessed with her since he met her when they were children, becomes jealous and possessive the moment he suspects she's seeing someone else (Note that at this point he hasn't even spoken to her since they were children). And then he waits in the darkness outside her dressing room so he can sneak inside and search for The Phantom. And smell her clothing.

* In ''[[Twilight (novel)|Twilight]]'', Edward Cullen starts out by flat-out stalking Bella and watching her as she sleeps. Does she mind? No. Even as he tells her how dangerous he is, she still finds him attractive. He eventually takes Bella away from her human friends (that she never really liked in the first place) and her old life (that she hated) and she goes along willingly the whole way. He even [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshades]] this in the aborted prequel ''[[Midnight Sun (novel)|Midnight Sun]]'', becoming disgusted with himself when he sneaks into Bella's window to watch her sleep and berating himself as a creepy stalker who ''should not be doing this''. [[Ignored Epiphany|It doesn't stop him from going ahead and doing it anyway.]] [[Paranoia Fuel|Repeatedly.]] When he does finally confess that he has been watching her sleep, she is flattered. Yes, you read that right. She is flattered. By someone watching her sleep. [[Memetic Mutation|WHAT THE FU-BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM]]?!?!?

== Live Action TV ==

* [[Heroes]]: West, toward Claire. He flew around outside her window (gee, can't imagine why). She is at first irritated, but accepts him a little too easily. Then again, Claire has a ''lot'' of issues. And whether this is stalking in the romantic sense is debatable since he seemed to be doing this to find out if she has powers, not in order to see her naked.

* In ''[[Oz]]'', Ryan O'Reily gets his brother to [[Murder the Hypotenuse|murder Dr. Nathan's husband]], forces kisses on her, kills her rapist to avenge her, and out-and-out stalks her. At first Gloria isn't happy when she learns that Ryan [[You Killed My Father|had her husband killed]], and initially suspects that O'Reily was the one who arranged for her to get raped after she rejected him. But after she learns Ryan had nothing to do with her rape and killed the guy who did attack her, her opinion of him starts to change. So it ''works'' (eventually), and she ends up falling in love with him. Though the show lampshades this as not being a very healthy relationship.

** Beecher and Chris have an off and on relationship mostly because of how possessive and violent Chris can be, seeing as how he killed every one of Beecher's former lovers. Even after Beecher tells Chris he wants nothing to do him, Chris continues to pursue him. At the end of the series, despite everything, Beecher admits he truly loved Chris.

{{quote|'''Maynard:''' I don't think I can stalk you anymore.

'''Jenna:''' No! You don't mean that! }}

* On ''[[American Idol]]'', contestant Paul Marturano wrote [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=py6Y9j6WGfU this song] for Paula Abdul in which he sings about stalking her.

* Ross on ''[[Friends]]'' OBSESSES over Rachel in seasons one and two.

* ''[[Cracked.com]]'' has posted this as one the [http://www.cracked.com/article_18756_6-romantic-movie-gestures-that-can-get-you-prison-time_p2.html "6 Romantic Movie Gestures That Can Get You Prison Time."]

* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDlUWur3kEE The "Stalker Song"], which is sung to the tune of "Happy Together".

* In [[Red vs. Blue]] season 9, Church's plan is to {{spoiler|find and rescue Tex from the memory storage unit they're both trapped in by going down levels within the unit, which sort of replicates the outside world (including, he hopes, replicating the memory unit, in an [[Inception]] "dream-within-a-dream" sort of way), hoping that eventually, in one of the levels, they can meet up and escape}}. Tucker points out that he's essentially chasing {{spoiler|a dead girl and every time she escapes him, he either resurrects her or follows her down another layer}}, and says it's stalking. Church protests that it's not stalking, it's romantic, to which Tucker points out that "romantic" only happens in movies.

 

== Western Animation ==

* Despite giving a page quote, ''[[Up]]'' is an aversion. While Dug does follow Carl around, Dug is a [[Talking Animal|talking dog]] that's only interested in the platonic relationship of a dog and his owner. Besides, this is pretty much how dogs display affection.

* Like Heloise, Helga from ''[[Hey Arnold!]]'' takes her crush for Arnold to stalking levels at times ([[Stalker Shrine|including the shrine]]) but is portrayed sympathetically. Although when she finally admitted her feelings to Arnold in [[The Movie]] he was more shocked than impressed, and that's without even knowing the details.

* In ''[[The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes|Avengers Earths Mightiest Heroes]]'', [[Hospital Hottie|Jane Foster]] doesn't seem to mind Thor following her around.

 

 

== Real Life ==

* Lampshading this trope has been a staple of stand-up comedy for years. Usually with a reference to a restraining order as the punchline.

* Wal-Mart once sold a men's shirt with "Some call it stalking, I call it 'love'" printed on it. In a red font. That looked like dripping blood. Cute.