Like I've said before, I think there can never be a happy medium when it comes to female characters in fandom, or trying to defend them, at least. Either I'm always labeled a raging feminist, or a complete misogynist when I'm neither.
Yeah, any major female character, from my experience with fandom, is a clinging shell of petite femininity or a raging Mary Sue - and that's an inclusive or. And I don't think it's possible to avoid the Mary Sue label with a female OC of any importance. *checks* Okay, not true, Elizabeth Phelan didn't get any reviews to that effect. But it really does seem that way sometimes.
And I don't think it's possible to avoid the Mary Sue label with a female OC of any importance. *checks* Okay, not true, Elizabeth Phelan didn't get any reviews to that effect. But it really does seem that way sometimes.
I have a lot of issues with that. I mean, I'll admit I think that there ARE a great many fics that are written where the OC and Harry just... take off in the sunset, and Ron, Hermione, and Voldemort don't exist because Harry and said OC are snogging and that's all there is. But you're right, there's plenty of authors who have been able to do it well, such as Fern Withy with Elizabeth Phelan.
I happen to think that sometimes fandom is just so quick to scream misogyny (some people complaining about Zoe came to mind).
Someone in the comments above said that most writers are male, that's true, but what about the female writers, who are aplenty in the books medium? I don't dabble in enough fandom to judge, but if Harry Potter is anything to go by, sometimes fandom is just downright unforgiving toward women. I keep wondering if men have the same problems.
I happen to think that sometimes fandom is just so quick to scream misogyny (some people complaining about Zoe came to mind).
What do you mean? Quick to scream misogyny about a portrayal of women ("Tonks is misogynist because she cries!") or quick to call someone misogynist because they dislike a female character? Or both?
It's more the former than the latter. With the portrayal of women, the crazier reaction to Ginny and Hermione having children ("They're turning into barefooted baby producing machines!") comes to mind. I actually have never encountered people calling each other misogynist because they dislike a female character. Once in a while I can see some people accusing slashers of being misogynist or something to that effect.
But regarding my example, Zoe of Firefly is quite far from being a victim of sexism and yet people still call Whedon misogynist for creating a woman character who is a capable subordinate of a male character. Somehow the fact that Zoe used to serve under Mal in the military and therefore she's calling him 'sir' by that habit completely escapes them.
Man, I'm not quite sure if you mean what I think you mean when you reference the "crazier reaction" to Hermione and Ginny having kids-- what you come off as saying to me is that not liking the way almost all of the top female characters in HP had either had kids or died (after having kids) by the end. Let me know if that's how you intended your comment or not.
But, for the sake of the argument, I'd like to lay out my point of view, as one of those who might be seen to be having said crazier reaction. I have nothing against female characters having children; what I had a problem with was every single female character I cared about in the HP series going down that path.
Neither do I feel like motherhood disqualifies a woman as a potentially strong character. On the contrary, I loved and will always love Cordelia Naismith's portrayal in Barrayar (or was it Shards of Honor). I have a soft spot in my heart for Lily's stand. What I dislike is when that is the only model for female strength presented or upheld in a book or series.
For example, Cordelia was a damn fine soldier before she had Miles and kicked ass to protect him, and afterward, she was a force to be reckoned with in Barrayaran society. Lily was a damn fine, er, ah, er...did we even find out what her profession was before she had Harry? After, total pass on that, but before? I would sure have liked to hear more anecdotes about what she (and James, heh) were up to in that period where they supposedly defied Voldemort three times. I would have loved to see some defying, up close and personal. Instead, the most satisfying kind of defying I got to see up close was Narcissa, imho, and that was shaded as cowardly to some degree.
In conclusion, for me the sucky portrayal of female characters in HP is more the whole thing taken together than the individual parts. There's no one portrayal in the books that might not have been just fine on its own, or been fine when read together with everything else if it was cast in the right light. Lily The Passive is fine when balanced by Narcissa, Molly, Bella, Minerva, and Tonks The Collective Active, and so forth. But, uh, the only living, unmarried central-ish female character without children by the end of the story was Minerva, iirc. Like I said, the whole thing together just annoyed me a lot, especially when JKR keeps being held up as some kind of feminist idol. She herself may be someone to look up to, but her writing, and the way she wrote her female characters? Not so much.
When I think of female characters to look up to, I think of Sabriel. I think of Cordelia Naismith, of Buffy (and Anya!), of pretty much every female character Scott Westerfeld's ever written. Lily Potter? Eeehh, no. Same for pretty much every character in the books, save for maybe Narcissa and Minerva.
What's wrong with having kids, though? I don't think having children is antifeminist.
It is true we never learn of Lily's profession, but we don't really learn what James did either, although I believe in a chat JKR actually implied they never really worked - they were very much soldiers.
Yes, the Potter women chose to have kids. Except McGonagall, who is actually pretty damn strong - elderly, but strong. And the women who DID have kids didn't let it stop their careers - Tonks kept fighting, and Hermione still worked at the Ministry when she could've been a stay at home Mom.
I don't think having kids is unfeminist either. As I said in my comment, it only rubs me the wrong way when every female character in a story goes down that road. It is even worse when the mothers in a work don't seem to have anything to them beside the fact that they have kids. Now, not every female character in HP ended up exactly like that, but the fact that the only "good" unmarried, childless woman alive in the series at the end was an old woman, and not really a central character.
Also, re Lily and James's jobs, why should we have to consider JKR's interviews to see what they did? Why wasnt the fact that they were awesome soldiers important enough to make it into the books when the name of Draco's kid was? James and Lily were Harry's parents, for god's sake. Also, iirc, James was also said to be an Auror. Lily? Errrrr...soldier?
That is the sort of smaller annoyance that adds to the others and pisses me off.
No, James is not an auror. (You are maybe mixing him up with Frank Longbottom? Though in that case, Alice is an auror, too.) The only thing we know about him is that he is in the Order, just like Lily. That's without JKR's interview! She just confirmed that there is nothing more to their careers in her mind.
Are there many central male characters who are alive but unmarried and don't have children by the end of the series? Or any?
I think regardless of gender, a happy ending ideally includes kids for JKR.
But what I mean, using the example above, is that there are people who thinks that by having Ginny and Hermione marry and have children they are examples of anti-feminism. I do not support that view and think that they're just people looking for something to detract against JKR. This is what I meant by some people are just too quick to cry misoginism. And I used crazy because some actually use "baby-producing machines" as actual words in regards to Ginny.
I understand why you don't like that every female in HP seems to be headed for marriage. I can't argue for that either; off the top of my head I can probably use arguments such as the author is a married mother, or the theme of the series is love in family, or the wizarding world does need a lot of new children to survive, or we don't see the future of a lot of Harry's generation. Arguing with those would mean that I'm grasping at straws, honestly.
That does clear it up. I'd say I couldn't believe someone called either Ginny or Hermione "baby-producing machines", but hey, fandom :D.
the theme of the series is love in family, or the wizarding world does need a lot of new children to survive Those are valid and interesting themes, actually. But I guess I kept getting the impression that JKR had everyone having kids because she thought it would be a neat way to end the story. Not that that isn't a neat way to end any story, but in addition to everything else that rubbed me the wrong way about the books...bleh. It's one thing to have themes, and it's another to focus the story on them clearly (which, by now, you can probably guess I think JK did not :P).
That's what I figured. :D I agree. I once thought through how several of the big "misogyny" complaints about HBP - Tonks was too weepy, Ginny dated too much, &c. - would have still been considered misogynist if they had come out the opposite way in canon (if Tonks hadn't seemed to care she would have been heartless, if Ginny had saved herself for Harry that would have been ridiculous).
I read an essay once that was basically "Why Joss Whedon Hates Women and How He Rapes His Wife," and I'm not making that up.
I think that fandom tends to be hypocritical about female characters, but that's just an extension of society's hypocrisy about women - although some areas of slash fandom have their own special issues. When it comes to OFCs, though, fandom gets especially nasty, and willing to dish out the label willy-nilly.
Ino, ino, but this is one of those things where I tend to think someone who doesn't see it just doesn't want to see it.
I guess it depends on fandom experience, though, now that I think about it. I don't really know that I would be quite so intolerant of fandom misogyny if my friends hadn't pointed some of it out to me a long time ago, and if I hadn't seen more and more and more examples from various fandoms.
I chose depends, because fandom is also way to quick with calling others hypocritical when it comes to female characters. Misogyny is used as a convenient argument to prove that everyone who criticizes your favorite character is in fact evil, if you are lucky enough that your favorite character is female. It's really tiring.
In the second option I chose depends, because the MAry Sue paranoia can also be explained by the fact that there are so many more Mary Sues in the female dominated fandom. (female authors = female wish fulfillment characters)
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author_by_night) wrote2008-07-01 06:08 pm
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I have a lot of issues with that. I mean, I'll admit I think that there ARE a great many fics that are written where the OC and Harry just... take off in the sunset, and Ron, Hermione, and Voldemort don't exist because Harry and said OC are snogging and that's all there is. But you're right, there's plenty of authors who have been able to do it well, such as Fern Withy with Elizabeth Phelan.
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Someone in the comments above said that most writers are male, that's true, but what about the female writers, who are aplenty in the books medium? I don't dabble in enough fandom to judge, but if Harry Potter is anything to go by, sometimes fandom is just downright unforgiving toward women. I keep wondering if men have the same problems.
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What do you mean? Quick to scream misogyny about a portrayal of women ("Tonks is misogynist because she cries!") or quick to call someone misogynist because they dislike a female character? Or both?
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But regarding my example, Zoe of Firefly is quite far from being a victim of sexism and yet people still call Whedon misogynist for creating a woman character who is a capable subordinate of a male character. Somehow the fact that Zoe used to serve under Mal in the military and therefore she's calling him 'sir' by that habit completely escapes them.
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But, for the sake of the argument, I'd like to lay out my point of view, as one of those who might be seen to be having said crazier reaction. I have nothing against female characters having children; what I had a problem with was every single female character I cared about in the HP series going down that path.
Neither do I feel like motherhood disqualifies a woman as a potentially strong character. On the contrary, I loved and will always love Cordelia Naismith's portrayal in Barrayar (or was it Shards of Honor). I have a soft spot in my heart for Lily's stand. What I dislike is when that is the only model for female strength presented or upheld in a book or series.
For example, Cordelia was a damn fine soldier before she had Miles and kicked ass to protect him, and afterward, she was a force to be reckoned with in Barrayaran society. Lily was a damn fine, er, ah, er...did we even find out what her profession was before she had Harry? After, total pass on that, but before? I would sure have liked to hear more anecdotes about what she (and James, heh) were up to in that period where they supposedly defied Voldemort three times. I would have loved to see some defying, up close and personal. Instead, the most satisfying kind of defying I got to see up close was Narcissa, imho, and that was shaded as cowardly to some degree.
In conclusion, for me the sucky portrayal of female characters in HP is more the whole thing taken together than the individual parts. There's no one portrayal in the books that might not have been just fine on its own, or been fine when read together with everything else if it was cast in the right light. Lily The Passive is fine when balanced by Narcissa, Molly, Bella, Minerva, and Tonks The Collective Active, and so forth. But, uh, the only living, unmarried central-ish female character without children by the end of the story was Minerva, iirc. Like I said, the whole thing together just annoyed me a lot, especially when JKR keeps being held up as some kind of feminist idol. She herself may be someone to look up to, but her writing, and the way she wrote her female characters? Not so much.
When I think of female characters to look up to, I think of Sabriel. I think of Cordelia Naismith, of Buffy (and Anya!), of pretty much every female character Scott Westerfeld's ever written. Lily Potter? Eeehh, no. Same for pretty much every character in the books, save for maybe Narcissa and Minerva.
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It is true we never learn of Lily's profession, but we don't really learn what James did either, although I believe in a chat JKR actually implied they never really worked - they were very much soldiers.
Yes, the Potter women chose to have kids. Except McGonagall, who is actually pretty damn strong - elderly, but strong. And the women who DID have kids didn't let it stop their careers - Tonks kept fighting, and Hermione still worked at the Ministry when she could've been a stay at home Mom.
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And we don't know Minerva McGonagall doesn't have kids, since we don't meet her till she's 60 in PS, and Harry doesn't meet her till she's around 70.
Sorry for butting in, just wanted to say my two cents.
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Sorry for butting in myself, but this is another prime example of what I mean ;)
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Also, re Lily and James's jobs, why should we have to consider JKR's interviews to see what they did? Why wasnt the fact that they were awesome soldiers important enough to make it into the books when the name of Draco's kid was? James and Lily were Harry's parents, for god's sake. Also, iirc, James was also said to be an Auror. Lily? Errrrr...soldier?
That is the sort of smaller annoyance that adds to the others and pisses me off.
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Are there many central male characters who are alive but unmarried and don't have children by the end of the series? Or any?
I think regardless of gender, a happy ending ideally includes kids for JKR.
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But what I mean, using the example above, is that there are people who thinks that by having Ginny and Hermione marry and have children they are examples of anti-feminism. I do not support that view and think that they're just people looking for something to detract against JKR. This is what I meant by some people are just too quick to cry misoginism. And I used crazy because some actually use "baby-producing machines" as actual words in regards to Ginny.
I understand why you don't like that every female in HP seems to be headed for marriage. I can't argue for that either; off the top of my head I can probably use arguments such as the author is a married mother, or the theme of the series is love in family, or the wizarding world does need a lot of new children to survive, or we don't see the future of a lot of Harry's generation. Arguing with those would mean that I'm grasping at straws, honestly.
I hope that clears it up.
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the theme of the series is love in family, or the wizarding world does need a lot of new children to survive
Those are valid and interesting themes, actually. But I guess I kept getting the impression that JKR had everyone having kids because she thought it would be a neat way to end the story. Not that that isn't a neat way to end any story, but in addition to everything else that rubbed me the wrong way about the books...bleh. It's one thing to have themes, and it's another to focus the story on them clearly (which, by now, you can probably guess I think JK did not :P).
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I read an essay once that was basically "Why Joss Whedon Hates Women and How He Rapes His Wife," and I'm not making that up.
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I guess it depends on fandom experience, though, now that I think about it. I don't really know that I would be quite so intolerant of fandom misogyny if my friends hadn't pointed some of it out to me a long time ago, and if I hadn't seen more and more and more examples from various fandoms.
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In the second option I chose depends, because the MAry Sue paranoia can also be explained by the fact that there are so many more Mary Sues in the female dominated fandom. (female authors = female wish fulfillment characters)
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