| 1 | Catharsis exists in all media -- the term "catharsis" as applied to art comes from Creator/{{Aristotle}}'s ''Literature/{{Poetics}}''[[note]]Prior to then, it meant ritually discharging pollution, and appeasing whatever god was angry with you and causing your problems[[/note]] -- but for most of history, most people had to watch others suffer and triumph, and they had to use empathy to connect the dots. |
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| 3 | Sometimes, the audience of a work finds a part satisfying and stress-relieving, such as, but not limited to, if a character they dislike has something bad happen to them, but perhaps the reaction comes from [[SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome an event viewers find awesome]] for a different reason. However, this is subjective -- stress relief for one viewer can be frustration for another, even on things that people agree are calming. |
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| 5 | Note that, in RealLife, [[RealityIsUnrealistic most psychology experiments suggest that catharsis is not as cut-and-dried as popularly supposed]]. While cathartic events ''do'' make you feel better at the time -- hence their popular appeal -- they don't really make you less tense or angry and [[HollywoodPsych they don't actually let you "vent off" emotion]], especially when you stop doing them and go back to whatever it was you ''were'' doing in the first place. Experiencing such reactions regularly or frequently will more often than not make you even ''more'' prone to stress and anger fits, since it becomes a habit that gets readily associated with tense situations. In other words, if you punch a pillow to deal with stress, you are more likely to hit something at an inopportune time when stressed. |
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