On reactions to female characters

[hsapiens]

Saw this linked in rydra_wong's LJ and found that it resonated with me. Thus, I'm passing it on:

From fabu's discussion of fans and female characters:

No one is saying that you must like every single female character or you're a bad fan/bad feminist. However, if you *habitually* find yourself criticizing female characters for behavior you admire in male characters/dismissing female characters as boring (even though you spend hours developing walk-on male characters into well-rounded characters for your stories)/accusing female characters of being "Mary Sues" for having skills that you accept unquestioningly in the men, perhaps you might want to think about the bigger picture.

~~**~~

And in other news: When it's a relief to get to the refuge of work, that's a bad way to start the day. Luckily, this day hasn't gotten any worse. :)

Comments

[tejas.livejournal.com]

Ok, I went and actually read the post (my bad, I didn't read it before, just responded to the quoted passage ;-). This looks like the typical anti-feminism crap that's been on the rise for years. Yes, we *should* use the same standards when we judge male and female characters. One of the things that means is that we're going to slam female characters who are jerks (or who are so badly written it's hard to tell *what* they are - Carter comes to mind). And, as one of the commentators on that thread mentioned, we bring our own personal morality to the table when we do. I, for example, am pretty much a monogamist. Serially, at least. :-) I will view a character who 'cheats' on a boy/girlfriend/spouse with disdain. It isn't that they're being sexually 'free', it's that they're breaking a trust (assuming exclusivity was expected by the partner). I put cheats in quotes simply because there can be all sorts of 'slippage' I'll accept in fiction that would have me walking away from someone in a New York minute if it happened in real life. Life's too short to put up with untrustworthy people in my life. If a person will break trust with a lover or spouse, they'll break trust with a friend. At least that's been my experience. Doesn't matter, btw, if they're male or female. I've never quite understood the carte blanche some men seem to think they have to behave like randy goats and not have anyone call them on it. (If I hear the phrase 'boys will be boys' one more time, I'm liable to explode. My ex-mil used to say that... no wonder her sons were so screwed up. ;-)

[hsapiens.livejournal.com]

It's sad that this topic has to be raised time and again but such is the way of consciousness raising. It's done in steps and has to be reinforced. This was the first time I thought about the Marty Stu vs. Mary Sue issue and I had the realization that I *do* view them differently. Hopefully being aware will help me free myself from that aspect of prejudice. One bit down; two thousand or so more to go.

I do view characters through my own moral lens, absolutely, but I suppose I also see that life isn't black and white and people aren't always perfect. I have my issues that I can't get over: rape, child molestation, and the like so I can totally see how infidelity is a "no go" deal-breaker. I don't think that's a problem or what's being discussed in this essay because that's an issue and not a "it's ok when men do it but the woman must DIE" reaction.

My annoyance comes not from a character's flaws but the writers' inability to see that they're flaws or to use those flaws to explore a topic or character. It's like writing a rape fic so that two characters can get together and have "healing sex" without ever understanding or acknowledging the devastating nature of rape. Just, no. And now I'm far afield from the point so I'll stop rambling. ;)

[tejas.livejournal.com]

I agree about the difference between a character's flaws and flawed writing. I can accept a character as realistic (even if I don't like them) when they're jerks and well-written as such. Snape comes to mind. No way would anyone confuse him with a 'nice guy'. Yet (and I'm a book behind, so don't tell me ;-), he's apparently at least making a serious attempt to redeem himself... without changing his basic personality, which is disagreeable in the extreme. I don't like Snape as a person, but I *adore* him as a 'good guy' antagonist. He fits his milieu.

Carter, on the other hand, has been so poorly written as to be nonsensical. Is she strong? Is she independent? Is she a freakin' Air Force officer? Who can tell? They tell us one thing while showing us something else, but the consequences don't match up with what we see. They're trying to tell us the sky is green even though we can see darn well it's blue. With a character like Snape, we *know* his flaws and they're consistent. What we don't always know is where his loyalties lie and that's intentional. We're *supposed* to question his every move. But his actions are consistent with what we *do* see and know. They're also consistently ambiguous where they're supposed to be, if that makes any sense. Carter's just all over the map. Is she 40 or is she 12? Who knows?

Farscape was a great example of women characters (and men, and others, for that matter ;-) who were pretty darned consistently written and not entirely black and white, or even sane. :-)