Was Danny Abused as a Child (Pt 2) *possible spoilers*

Top41

Top41

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We discussed this at the end of season one, but I thought it was worth bringing up again because it resulted in a great discussion back then, and there's more to work with now. Basically, I theorized that Danny was abused as a child based on a lot of his reactions and interactions with his co-workers and suspects. We then got into a debate about what kind of abuse it might have been--emotional, physical or sexual (or all three).

Some of the stuff we brought up from season one: Danny's inability to mask his emotions, how he shuts down when Mac yells out him, how he physically recoiled from Mac when Mac chastised him in "Crime & Misdemeanor," how he seems to focus on how children are affected by crime, his emotional meltdown in "The Dove Commission," the way he confronted the pedophile in "ReCycling," etc.

I think there's more evidence in season two. Danny was a bit more mature, but when things got stressful or difficult, he still reacted like a hurt child. In RSRD, he seemed totally lost and passive--it was up to Mac and the team to help him out, because Danny himself seemed completely defeated. Danny's words at the end of the episode, to both Louie and Mac, came out like those of a child who didn't comprehend the situation he was in. His reaction to Aiden's death also showed how close his emotions are to the surface--he was so overcome when Mac showed the team the scan of the skull that he had to leave the room, and has several other outbursts during the course of the episode. He also takes cases more personally than any other CSI--in "Dancing with the Fishes" he vows to show up at the killer's trial, and in "Bad Beat" he screams at the cameraman who hit the anchorwoman on the head and left her to die. A lot of Danny's reactions suggest he didn't mature emotionally like most people do--he takes things so personally, and is completely incapable of masking his emotions.

I also wonder if the fact that he's drawn to Lindsay indicates something about his past as well. Danny is a very sexual character--everyone he encounters seems to react to him in a sexual way. He gets hit on or looked over at some point during cases quite often ("ReCycling," "Summer in the City," "Grand Murder at Central Station," "YoungBlood," "Risk," etc.). But Lindsay is about as unsexual a character as you can get in primetime. She responds to Danny, too, but it's less overt and aggressive than most, and I wonder if that's part of why he's drawn to her. The only time we've seen Danny actually respond to an overture on screen was in "Risk," when the girl on the train was checking him out. But she was kind of shy, and his response to her was shy, too, but he did go up to her in the end. Last season I thought the least likely possibility was that Danny was sexually abused, but now I'm not so sure. He seems used to being viewed in a sexual way, but gravitates towards Lindsay, someone who isn't very sexual at all.

I lean towards physical abuse as well--in RSRD, we saw Louie shove Danny to the ground, and Danny kind of just took it. I wonder if their father beat them and both Messers were used to that kind of treatment. I thought the moment when Danny recoiled from Mac--his surrogate father figure--in "Crime and Misdemeanor" was very telling as well, but Mac didn't really have any conflicts with Danny this season.

What do you guys think?
 
I really never thought of that, I just remember in the episode The Dove Commission when he told the kid he and his dad were beat up pretty badly by a gypsy cab driver.
 
I never really thought of it like that. I like the way you put everything, Top I could see where you could see that he was abused.
I think I'll watch my S1 DVD's tonight.
I do think he was close to his brother. That maybe his brother protected him when he was little. I think thats why when his brother pushed him in RSRD, Danny just looked shocked and took it.
 
I don't think he was sexually abused. The whole idea of him being drawn to Lindsay in that sense does not connect with me. I think the only reason why he's attracted to her was because he feels that he can be at her level. Unlike with Aiden, who told him right off the bat that she was out of his league, Lindsay seems fairly average and capable of perhaps not rejecting him.

But that's a different thread right there.

I do believe he was abused. With the examples you give Top, it shows in a sense the way that an abused child may act. Danny's very defense, always has sharp movements (quick on the feet, perhaps from defending himself a couple bit of times in the past?) and very quiet about his family. Yeah, so they've been tied to gangs and what not but it seems all we can really get is just information about Louie.

In a way, during RSRD, Louie may have taken the action of shoving Danny down as what their father may have done when they were both younger. But then we have to remember, if Danny was abused as child, does that mean so did his mother? Was it the father who abused the whole family? If so, that also leads to a lot of other cases were Danny flips out on.

I think he was. At the end of season one, I wasn't quite so sure but with this season finally at a close, I have to say I do.
 
AlyssaluvsDanny said:
I never really thought of it like that. I like the way you put everything, Top I could see where you could see that he was abused.
I think I'll watch my S1 DVD's tonight.
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Thanks! Definitely check out "ReCycling," "The Dove Commission," "Crime & Misdemeanor," and "On the Job." I think Danny's behavior in those first season eps really kind of stands out.

I do think he was close to his brother. That maybe his brother protected him when he was little. I think thats why when his brother pushed him in RSRD, Danny just looked shocked and took it.
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Good point--I think that if Danny and Louie did get hit by their father, that was probably a devastating moment. Having his big brother do to him what his father did to both of them would have crushed him.

tuesdaymorning said:
I don't think he was sexually abused. The whole idea of him being drawn to Lindsay in that sense does not connect with me. I think the only reason why he's attracted to her was because he feels that he can be at her level. Unlike with Aiden, who told him right off the bat that she was out of his league, Lindsay seems fairly average and capable of perhaps not rejecting him.
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I'm not sure Danny's flirtation with Aiden was ever serious--not that he didn't like her, but that he probably figured they were just in the permanently friends category (whether that is true or not is definitely up for debate, though). I'm not totally sure about the sexual abuse, but I do think Lindsay isn't necessarily a threatening figure for him, and I wonder if that's part of his interest in her. If he was abused, someone who isn't very sexual might seem attractive and safe to him.

I do believe he was abused. With the examples you give Top, it shows in a sense the way that an abused child may act. Danny's very defense, always has sharp movements (quick on the feet, perhaps from defending himself a couple bit of times in the past?) and very quiet about his family. Yeah, so they've been tied to gangs and what not but it seems all we can really get is just information about Louie.
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I think the body language thing is a big deal. His posture is often rigid and like you note, defensive. In "C&M" I think on an instinctual level, he was expecting Mac to hit him.

In a way, during RSRD, Louie may have taken the action of shoving Danny down as what their father may have done when they were both younger. But then we have to remember, if Danny was abused as child, does that mean so did his mother? Was it the father who abused the whole family? If so, that also leads to a lot of other cases were Danny flips out on.
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I wondered about his mother hitting him, but I kind of think not because he called her "mommy" in RSRD. His father was "dad" but his mother was "mommy." But, I don't know that that means anything for sure...it was just a moment that made Danny seem very child-like and young. The way Danny just kind of takes it when people yell at him or hit him (Louie) suggests to me that on some level he feels he deserves to be mistreated.
 
AlyssaluvsDanny:I do think he was close to his brother. That maybe his brother protected him when he was little. I think thats why when his brother pushed him in RSRD, Danny just looked shocked and took it.
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Totaly agree, you can see the shock in his face. And then he said that the relationship with his brother changed at that point.

Top41:If he was abused, someone who isn't very sexual might seem attractive and safe to him.
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Interesting, never thought about that. It makes sense.
In "All Access" Lindsay is worried about Stella, but we don't know WHY she's also angry. Danny cared for her in that moments, he treated her like a baby. Maybe he undestood that Lindsay was hiding something of her past life, a terrible secret, maybe some violence in her childhood, and she was not worried ONLY for Stella.
Maybe he wants to stay with her because they had the same difficult childhood.

About his family...I read the books of CSI:NY and I think the writer had access to the characters files to write those books. He wrote that Danny's father and granfather were cops.
I gotta check it, to be sure. But I rememeber they were cops...
 
Part of the reason that his relationship with his brother changed in the flashback from RSRD was because his brother did it to protect Danny. Louie had to make Danny think that he didn't give a damn about him to keep him away from Tanglewood. At the time, if Louie would have told Danny why he did it, Danny probably would have gotten sucked back in to Tanglewood.

Maybe his brother's rejection is what had an impact on Danny. He probably kept trying to make up with Louie and Louie kept rejecting him. Did we ever find out why Louie wanted to meet Danny at the end of Trapped?

I too noticed that he said "mommy" which struck me as kind of odd. Not many grown men call their mom "mommy". He seemed so much like a little lost child.

Maybe we'll find out more about his past this season. TV Guide did say "Danny's challenged on a personal level because of his brother Louie (who may or may not be dead), and there's a deeper, darker problem. He just can't shake his previous life."

What exactly does that mean? What "previous life" is he trying to shake?
 
i jus cant wait til season 3 starts over here in uk.... i wanna find out about this deeper side to danny's life, and from wat i have read from some postings everyone has got some great ideas... i think there is some posibility that he was abused, but im not sure it would have been sexual.. violent abuse i can see but not that one
 
It's true that for a long time Danny didn't know that Louie had pushed him away that night to protect him, but Danny took it so hard and personally that I have to think it was more to him than just his big brother telling him to get lost. If Danny was seeing some of his father's behavior in the way Louie treated him that night, it would go a long way to showing why Danny was so devastated by the incident.
 
Excellent thread, Top! This was a great discussion thread when we had it before. Good call starting it up again. You did a great job laying out the evidence. Perhaps season 3 will provide even more.

I've often thought Danny might have been emotionally or physically abused. If his father was in the mafia, I imagine he ran the household with a pretty tight fist and ruled by fear. Danny's emotional immaturity and physical reactions would certainly tend to support an abusive upbringing.

However, I never gave any consideration to possible sexual abuse until this --

Top41 said:
I also wonder if the fact that he's drawn to Lindsay indicates something about his past as well. Danny is a very sexual character--everyone he encounters seems to react to him in a sexual way. He gets hit on or looked over at some point during cases quite often ("ReCycling," "Summer in the City," "Grand Murder at Central Station," "YoungBlood," "Risk," etc.). But Lindsay is about as unsexual a character as you can get in primetime. She responds to Danny, too, but it's less overt and aggressive than most, and I wonder if that's part of why he's drawn to her. The only time we've seen Danny actually respond to an overture on screen was in "Risk," when the girl on the train was checking him out. But she was kind of shy, and his response to her was shy, too, but he did go up to her in the end. Last season I thought the least likely possibility was that Danny was sexually abused, but now I'm not so sure. He seems used to being viewed in a sexual way, but gravitates towards Lindsay, someone who isn't very sexual at all.
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I never saw it like that before. I certainly wondered what the hell the attraction could be for Danny. Sure, I get the whole City Boy and Country Girl dynamic, but gimme a break, this country girl is no Jessica Simpson. However, your sexual abuse theory could put some sense into a completely illogical attraction.
 
maybe danny jus likes lynsey because she is different, i mean she is pretty and she knows her stuff!!! ;) maybe its jus wishful thinking on my part that the sexual abuse thing didnt happen... as with someother carmine posters im guessing??? sorry if im wrong lol im new to this!! lol :p
 
It's possible that Danny was abused when he was younger. May it be physical, emotional but I doubt sexually.

We have yet to establish his relationship with his parents. He longed for attention from his big brother whom he looked up to as his "hero". I mean, every baby brother has his dad or big brother as his hero, right? He wanted to be like Louie thus he went as far as going out with Tanglewood. That can also root from the lack of attention he might've got for his Daddy.

His inability to bottle up emotions - he seems to wear everything on his sleeve - may point to a previous event in his life where he's forced to keep quiet. Post-traumatic stress something, idk, I'm no shrink (I just see one... for real). He acts on impulse which led him to ruckus more than once. Maybe he got tired of playing the good boy.

I think him looking up to Louie more than to his Dad points to a problem between the two of them.
 
I would say yes. His behavior so far on the show indicates that he's a lot more defensive and wary than most people. You can definitely see it in his interaction with the team ... But as for who abused him, I'd lean more towards the father rather than Louie. I think he and Louie were extremely close prior to the stadium incident, maybe due to Louie also suffering under their dad's abuse. I also think that's why what Louie did to him that day 15 years ago hurt him so badly. It was as if he'd lost his strongest pillar of support at the time.

As for the D/L thing (and I'll discuss it since it seems that's how the TPTB are writing it so far), Danny might have picked Lindsay exactly for the reason that they come from very different worlds. Danny's past is one filled with disappointment and hurt, as hinted by his behavior, as well as tidbits of his past from various episodes (I'm sure you Danny fans can instantly think of them all ;)). So, picking someone who's so different from himself would also probably mean that they won't pair up well together.

In other words, he's deliberately setting himself up for disappointment ... because that's all he knows. As he mentioned to Mac about not joking around about love and marriage, it's very possible there's a part of him that doesn't want to find love, and does everything it can to sabotage any chances of it happening.

No love = No hurt. That make sense? :p
 
What happens when you miss an episode (Heroes) twice? You run out an buy it on itunes then watch it and observe.

That scene in the hospital with Danny and the abused woman was telling. I didn't think at all about the possibility of his drama queen behavior --as we so fondly refer to it-- being rooted in abuse. But then, watching his flat-oout attack on the woman, I began to think that perhaps he was physically abused, and perhaps his mother and siblings as well.

It seemed to me that his anger at this woman was more along the lines of why didn't you get the hell out of there and save yourself? She should not have taken it and why did she attack the one person who was trying to save her? It seemed more than just peripheral anger from Aiden's death in the same episode but something a lot deeper and far more personal than that. He may have seen his mother fail to protect herself, him, and his brother as well?
 
MrsGiovinazzo said:
Excellent thread, Top! This was a great discussion thread when we had it before. Good call starting it up again. You did a great job laying out the evidence. Perhaps season 3 will provide even more.

I've often thought Danny might have been emotionally or physically abused. If his father was in the mafia, I imagine he ran the household with a pretty tight fist and ruled by fear. Danny's emotional immaturity and physical reactions would certainly tend to support an abusive upbringing.
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I'm pretty much convinced Danny was emotionally and physically abused by someone. His father makes the most sense, and that might explain why he seems to try to cut himself off from his family. The way he treats Mac like a surrogate father figure is unusual, too, and suggests he really craves that kind of approval.

However, I never gave any consideration to possible sexual abuse until this --

Top41 said:
I also wonder if the fact that he's drawn to Lindsay indicates something about his past as well. Danny is a very sexual character--everyone he encounters seems to react to him in a sexual way. He gets hit on or looked over at some point during cases quite often ("ReCycling," "Summer in the City," "Grand Murder at Central Station," "YoungBlood," "Risk," etc.). But Lindsay is about as unsexual a character as you can get in primetime. She responds to Danny, too, but it's less overt and aggressive than most, and I wonder if that's part of why he's drawn to her. The only time we've seen Danny actually respond to an overture on screen was in "Risk," when the girl on the train was checking him out. But she was kind of shy, and his response to her was shy, too, but he did go up to her in the end. Last season I thought the least likely possibility was that Danny was sexually abused, but now I'm not so sure. He seems used to being viewed in a sexual way, but gravitates towards Lindsay, someone who isn't very sexual at all.
Click to expand...

I never saw it like that before. I certainly wondered what the hell the attraction could be for Danny. Sure, I get the whole City Boy and Country Girl dynamic, but gimme a break, this country girl is no Jessica Simpson. However, your sexual abuse theory could put some sense into a completely illogical attraction.
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Yeah, it's just that there's no obvious draw there. It goes beyond opposites attracting--I've bought that in plenty of situations, but she's such a stick in the mud compared to vibrant, sexual Danny. That's why I initially saw Lindsay and Mac together--they're both kind of square and a little repressed. But the idea that Danny, who is so overtly sexual, would seek out someone who is the opposite, makes me wonder about the motivation. Does she make him feel safe, and why does he need that?

I'm not sure about the sexual abuse, but I think it's more of a possibility than most seem to feel it is. Homicide: Life on the Street did it a few years back with one of their leading men, Tim Bayliss--his uncle molested/raped him when he was a kid. Danny's abuser wouldn't have to be in his immediate family. I think Danny was odd with the pedophile in "ReCycling"--the way he put his body in front of the guy and asked, "What, am I too old for you?" was basically challenging the guy to look at him in a sexual way. Most guys--most people--wouldn't do that.

Kimmy, I agree that it was probably his father, not Louie who abused him. I think Louie's behavior that night was so shocking to him maybe because it mirrored their father's, and that may have been the most hurtful thing to him.

I also think what you say about a relationship with Lindsay being doomed to failure--Danny does seem to set himself up for that, doesn't he? She's also not very nice to him some of the time, which could be part of the attraction too, as messed up as it sounds. He craved Mac's attention/praise in season one, and Mac was mean to him quite often. Now he's doing it with Lindsay, and she's kind of prickly to him, too. It's obvious to us she's trying to hide her attraction to him, but maybe that isn't clear to Danny. It's kind of off and a little sad how he tries to win the approval of the people who treat him the worst.

Springmoon good point about his reaction to the abused woman murdering the guy who tried to save her in "Heroes." Maybe Danny saw some of himself in her, or saw his mother in her? If he and Louie were being abused by their father, part of him (a subconscious part, no doubt) might blame his mother for not getting them out of that situation.
 
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