Only Men Are Allowed To Be Perfect

[mysticalchild_isis]

Further Thoughts On Fandom Misogyny

You know, I'm disturbed by how often the male characters who treat people (especially women) like crap are the fandom darlings. They become the woobie who can do no wrong, because he's deep, he has layers, he's had bad things happen to him, he's misunderstood (especially by all those evil female characters). They often have huge communities devoted to them and metric tons of fic describing how wonderful and perfect they are. I'm not trying to criticize people for loving the characters they love. We all have our preferences, and deeply complex characters are interesting, and often feel more real.

What's really bothering me here are the gender politics that go on in fandom, and the double standard between the way female characters are treated versus male characters.

Let's take Tony DiNozzo from NCIS. Yes, I like him too. He is a complex character, he's had some wonderful moments of heroism, and he has struggled with some tough times in his life. But let's be honest: he's rude, he's dismissive, he bullies people, he objectifies women constantly, and he also tends to blame women ("it's always the wife "). Before anyone jumps in to accuse me of misunderstanding poor Tony, let's take a step back and deconstruct things a bit.

Take some time and really, truly, and honestly think about this: if Tony was instead a woman, let's say Tonia, what would you think about her? When she constantly objectified men while simultaneously dismissing and blaming them, how would you feel? When she bullied, belittled, and tormented Tim, would it seem just as funny (because, after all, she really does love Tim like a brother, right)?

There are some people who can truthfully say they'd love Tonia just as much as Tony, because it really is just about what they like about the characterization, regardless of gender. Tonia has probably also gained some brand new fans, who like her because she turns the dominant paradigm on its head- they'd enjoy watching a woman constantly objectifying men, and running roughshod over everyone.

But be honest: how many people would call Tonia a slut, a bitch, a whore, or a harpy? How dare that uppity woman torment poor little Timmy! Who does she think she is?

Let's try an opposite sort of example, and take Rose Tyler from Doctor Who. Rose consistently gets accused of being a Mary Sue, a selfish brat, a chav, and all sorts of other similarly offensive things. Imagine, however (honestly and deeply), if Rose was instead Ryan, played by someone like Bradley James. Let's say we now have a young man who doesn't have much in the way of education, but who pick things up pretty quickly, someone who's compassionate and friendly, and who loves the Doctor deeply. Ryan is suddenly reminding me a lot of a modern version of Jamie McCrimmon. How many people hate on Jamie, or call him a Gary Stu, or accuse him of being selfish for loving the Doctor? Just how many of the people who despise Rose would hate Ryan just as much?

Try taking any female character you dislike, and transforming them into a man... how does this change how you look at them? There are still going to be plenty of characters you dislike, regardless of gender, because they're still a cat hater, or a Yankees fan, or they look just like that math teacher who used to call you stupid. But how much time would you spend bashing them? Do you think there would be whole communities devoted to hating them? Would they be constantly vilified in fanfic?

But what does it matter if we bash female characters? They're only fictional, after all. I'll just say this- I don't think it's a good idea to spend a lot of time disparaging and despising women, even if they aren't real, as that's the sort of thing that can become a habit.

Yes, I'm oversimplifying things, being judgmental, and the people who see this are almost certainly the last people on earth who need to read it, but I had to throw it out there.

Thoughts, critiques, attacks, opinions?

You're very welcome to share this/link to it.

Comments

[silverkit.livejournal.com]

Paging Supernatural fandom. Supernatural fandom. You have a call!

I love this post. I think this can be applied to so many of the shows I love, but SPN comes to the forefront of my mind the quickest. Because no one can hold a female character up to impossible standards while doting on the male characters like SPN can.

Two seasons full of them introducing women who were supposed to be side characters (Jo and Ellen in season 2 then Bela and Ruby in season 3) and those characters got hated on like you wouldn't believe. They got hated on before they'd even shown up!

Meanwhile Bobby and Castiel are BELOVED. Bobby has been showing up since season one, and Castiel is the new fandom pet.

And I'm not saying you must love Jo, Ellen, Ruby or Bela or that every single fan even likes Bobby or Castiel (I actually like the whole group of them if anyone was curious), but you have to admit that the pattern is a little suspicious.

Here via verasteine's journal!

[troubleinchina.livejournal.com]

I'm really bothered by the questions you ask here. When you ask "Just how many of the people who despise Rose would hate Ryan just as much?", I don't know how to answer it. It becomes proving something unprovable, since there isn't a "Ryan" in New!Who to compare to. [1]

Plus, I keep thinking about all the other things that would change drastically if Ryan's gender is the only thing that changed about his storyline. Ryan would become an openly gay character on the show - a show that's shown to mainstream audiences as a kids' show. He wouldn't be tragically dead or tragically evil at the end of his story arc. The Tenth Doctor would have a love interest who was male - and it would be explicit rather than the implicit bits of Jaime/Doctor. (I haven't seen previous Who.) You'd have a gay man in an inter-racial relationship from the beginning - which means Mickey would be a gay black man, something I don't see a lot of (actually, I can't think of any) in mainstream television. You'd have a canonically bi-romatic Doctor, because the Doctor's love for Ryan would be part of the same season that included his romance with Madame du Pompadour, and later seasons would show his implied romance with River Song.

There are huge impacts on the story if Rose is Ryan and nothing else changes, and while they are tied into gender, they are also tied into sexuality and what stories people are allowed to tell on "children's" television.

I think it's more interesting to discuss how people have reacted to characters within a show that share many of the same traits. Why is Gwen "the whore of Cardiff" on a show that has Jack Harkness as the lead? Why is Jack's unrequited longing for the Doctor okay, but Martha's unrequited longing for the Doctor makes her weak & wishy-washy? (And are those two things again tied into sexuality as well as race?)

[1] I actually have little opinion on Rose as a Companion, although I found the "Doctor pines after her for a season and a half afterward" a bit tiring.

[mysticalchild_isis]

I have to admit I haven't ventured into Supernatural, probably in part because I keep hearing all these stories about it.

[mysticalchild_isis]

I definitely over-simplified things by switching Rose to Ryan without considering the huge impact it would have. There's a huge amount of meta that could come from that- as you say sexuality and what stories people are allowed to tell on "children's" television. It's possible (even likely) that Mickey might have been Michelle, which would have also vastly shifted the landscape of the fandom.

[bofoddity.livejournal.com]

people were talking about how they didn't like Olivia on Fringe because she was boring and it wasn't realistic that she was so special

This makes me think of another double-standard that fandom has. If a show stars a female character, like BtVS and True Blood, fans often complain that the show focuses too much on them and it should pay more attention to the other character. If a show stars a male character, like House or Dexter, fans often complain every time when other characters get more screen-time and say that the focus should be on the main character only. Female characters don't deserve to be the stars of their own show?

[odannygirl7.livejournal.com]

*here from metafandom*
I was trying to figure out how to say something like what you said but in a way that didn't seem derailing off into sexuality stuff. lol. But I think the two issues are tied together. Are fans more willing to forgive Jack's problimatic-ness because of him being non-heterosexual? Is there more wiggle room because non-heterosexuality is a newer thing to be seeing? (like with Martha, it's cliche to see a girl pine over a boy, but a boy pining over a boy? It's new and maybe it has it's problems, but if we complain they might not let us have any more?) IDK.
And can this then be applied to other shows that have a strong slash fanbase? (I'm assuming that a lot of female character bashing comes from the non-het side of things. I don't go over to the het side too often, so... *shrug*)

Of course this is only one facet of the issue, but it's an interesting one.

[pensnest]

Temperance, in 'Bones'? I've only seen the first two seasons, but I *adore* the fact that she's blunt and 'masculine' in a lot of her attitudes. I hope that doesn't soften in subsequent shows.

[sailorlum.livejournal.com]

Here via ravenstar84

I don't watch NCIS or Doctor Who, but I've seen enough of what you're talking about in Harry Potter fandom to grok to your vibe. *nods*

Try taking any female character you dislike, and transforming them into a man... how does this change how you look at them?

This sounds like a fun thought experiment. :) Hmmm, let's see...I'll choose Dolores Umbridge from Harry Potter (she's pretty much a Complete Monster type of character and is one of my least favorites along with Voldemort). *ponders male!Umbridge* LOL, well, the only thing different is now I have made the connection between cat loving baddie Umbridge and cat loving villains Blofeld from the Bond films and Dr. Evil from Austin Powers. Umbridge didn't have a Mr. Bigglesworth, but she did have a bunch of animated kitten plates and a cat Patronus, LOL. If Umbridge had been male, I might have made the connection sooner (I've seen more male baddies than female baddies have a Right Hand Cat, although that's technically subverted with Umbridge).

[moljn.livejournal.com]

I agree with all this, although I think the hate for Rose might be rooted as much in what happened after she left, both on the show and in fandom, as in her actual character. Doesn't mean it's not unpleasant to read, of course, because it's really hard to separate the issues.

Concerning some earlier comments (and I don't recall if or what you replied to that, so this is just in general), I don't think it's helpful to say that the double standards tend to come from the younger segments of fandom, though. It's true that most of us have changed from when we were teenagers, and I'm guilty of the occasional ageism myself, but there is simply too much misogyny coming from fans who are in their thirties, forties, and older, to think that it's "just" or even primarily the younger fans.

[webbgirl.livejournal.com]

Here from the ncis_newsletter.

So I started and stopped several responses to this post. I have very conflicted feelings about it and about the use of Tony as the example. I am a Tony fan, however I'm not blind to the character's faults and I have massive issues with how the character has been presented for the past couple of seasons. He's gotten progressively dumber and more juvenile with a few rare exceptions. He's also taken his share of lumps from the fandom as a whole. A couple of years ago there were threads and threads on one of the mailing lists about how he should be fired or in jail.

I'm also one of those people who gets called a Ziva Hater and gets told that it's because I don't want her to hook up with Tony. And that if I haven't ranted for pages about anything and everything that Tony and Gibbs have done wrong then I can't rant about Ziva. Anything else I say tends to get dismissed with that by folks who assume they know better than I what my motivations are. To be clear, I'm not accusing anyone here of that. Just giving a little perspective of where I'm coming from.

I will fully admit that I tend to hold many female characters to a higher standard. This doesn't mean that I want them to be perfect. I would just like them to be well written. With NCIS as the example, there are a total of TWO regular female characters. Perhaps because of the disparity, I have a lot less tolerance for suffering poorly written ones.

With NCIS, I suppose that I should just give up because there have been some pretty hefty gender issues going back to almost the beginning. I guess I just keep holding out hope that the writers will fix them. Sadly, the females on the show (with the exception of Abby who I also currently have issues with) tend to end up in three categories. Love Interest. Evil. Dead. Some can even be all three. (I liked Agent Lee dammit!)

I liked Ziva in the beginning. I liked that she could hold her own against Tony and throw him off his game. Then she started mooning over him and apparently lost all ability to uncover the weakest undercover op in history in the process.

I also have issues with the fact that she was excused for behavior (knocking over a wounded teammate and pointing a gun at them) that would have been loudly decried had the gender roles been reversed. It's like the writers want to tell us that she's kick ass but pull out the "she's just a girl and therefore emotional" excuse when it suits them.

Sorry, I know this went in a different direction than the original post, but I wanted to give one perspective of why in this case I do rant louder about a female character than a male one.

I do want to say that I agree there's a level of misogyny that happens in fandom as a whole that should give many of us pause. The comments I've seen when a guest actress is even announced for some shows is cringe-worthy.

[meredith44]

Apparently at least 134 out of 394 people hate her. (Discussion of why is in the comments, especially on the second page, when I tried to debate someone on it, but they didn't engage. In fact, that is what really made me love this article so much, because one of the claims was that the person hated Ziva because she got away with more than the guys while still being liked by fandom because she was a girl. *headdesk*)

As a newsletter editor, I've read lots of posts in which Ziva and/or Cote de Pablo is not only disliked, but bashed. [SPOILERS FOR 7x01 Truth or Consequences] In discussion for the season opener, more than one person blamed her for being caught and tortured, saying basically that she was reaping what she sowed for how she treated Tony in the season 6 finale and Tony was "dumb as a doornail" for going after her because she didn't deserve it. Her actions at the end of season 6 (the entire thread at FandomSecrets), especially how she treated Tony are a big reason why a lot of people dislike her.

I'm fine with people not liking characters. Heck, there are a number of characters on various shows that I don't particularly like. Some of the attitudes I've encountered, however, really disappoint me.

Sorry for the treatise. TL;DR Yes, a lot people dislike Ziva, sometimes with a passion, and they have their reasons, whether I think they are rational or not.

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah, and some people will just not like a character, period, for reasons that have nothing to do with internalized misogyny, too.

In discussion for the season opener, more than one person blamed her for being caught and tortured, saying basically that she was reaping what she sowed for how she treated Tony in the season 6 finale and Tony was "dumb as a doornail" for going after her because she didn't deserve it.

Oy vey. One of the things I continue to like about NCIS is the way everyone gets called on their bullshit sooner or later; and everyone has bullshit to get called on in the first place. Makes them more real.

[yuchun.livejournal.com]

Here via metafandom!

When are the male characters ever written up as being blinded by love? And fueling the angst on the show? I think if you had had a male character portrayed as wanting to deal with the romantic situation (and getting distressed about it), he'd be seen as a whiny character (a lot of people disliked the Doctor for pining over Rose for so long). On women it works a lot better than it does on men, even if it's a hit/miss for a lot of people.

For me I have a harder time liking female characters, because they will often be written as the lesser species that has this Teen Twilight mindset come out and play whenever the guy needs to come out on top. Even though I'm not equally as apt to scrutiny when it comes to men (because the world has grown up finding a lot of bad qualities/actions excusable when it comes to them. I've even tested this theory out on a lot of fandom folk to see if they would like me any less if I behaved as a rampant jerk-face—which admittedly, in itself, is a jerk thing to do—and I've had people like me better for those things whereas they would complain about the same attributes in their female friends), but I will be turned off by the negative character traits if they appear. Albeit nobody can be composed of just good traits, but to glorify a person's negative side seems to be an utterly backwards mindset. I don't want to find myself disappointed in fandom, but a lot of people need to stop being stuck in the 50's.

The one thing I dislike (in either gender) is when a character is written to be the amazingly Bad Ass of Bad Assery. It just reads/plays off as Mary Sue to me. Only a few people can portray this role, and that's always because they tend to fail at their attempts of being Bad Ass or that it backfires. (Which then isn't a character who is Bad Ass.)

Who I like and who I dislike is based on character (and a shallow level of me thinking the character is hot, but that in turn comes from character personality. Sue me, I'm gay. I'm allowed to be biased to the male persuasion!). A character grows with you, in good and bad. If I dislike a character I won't stop watching the series and I won't come at fen comms with a mallet to bash my hate away. If my best friend started dating a person I could not stand, I wouldn't stop being friends because of their dating choice. Seems rather petty. Hate for a person (fictional or real) can't overshadow the love for someone. Cue a cheesy 'Love conquers all' song.

For example, Rose was my favourite companion, but I couldn't stand any of the others, male or female. On Billie Piper's new series, I love Belle/Hannah and Bambi but I can't stand the male main/supporting characters (the clientele excluded) because they're just being a bunch of twats.

But at the end of the day, the "worst" character might become my favourite simply because of their bad behaviour. See my icon for reference (Nathan from Misfits).

I hope this comment made sense with all the abuse of the parenthetical side-notes. That and I just had to comment on this entry despite my brain still trying to boot up fully from sleep. ;)

[featherxquill.livejournal.com]

Or imagine if Snape were a woman. A female teacher who was an unattractive bully who appeared to enjoy belittling the main character and was often cruel. Actually, that does sound rather like Umbridge, doesn't it? Of course, that's oversimplifying things - by the end of the series, we know far more about Snape than we ever learned about Umbridge, but it's still interesting, since most rabid Snape fangirls were that way well before we knew all of his history. That's not to say I don't like Snape - I do, a lot - or do like Umbridge - I try to have an open mind when it comes to reading fic about her, but I just can't like her - but it's an interesting thought.

There is definitely the double standard just as much in HP as any other fandom. Rita Skeeter is one of my favourite characters, and I once wrote a fic for an exchange that paired her with a character one particular reviewer couldn't resist reading. She left a comment to that effect, that enjoyed it despite thinking Rita Skeeter was one of the most deplorable characters in the whole series. I didn't mind someone disliking my favourite character, but I was kind of surprised by the comment, considering I knew that the fan in question was a huge fan of Fenrir Greyback and various Deatheaters.

[troubleinchina.livejournal.com]

[I apologize if this posts twice.]

I think it's a hugely complicated issue, discussing how we'd view different characters if their genders were different. I mean, there was a discussion elsewhere about Castle and the role of hand-holding the genius that Beckett ends up stuffed in, and I have to admit - I've always wondered how people would react to that show if everything else was the same but Castle was female and Beckett was male. I think it would totally change everything about how the show is perceived, even if the only dialog ever changed were gender pronouns.

I think it's really important to talk about how people judge (straight) female characters, and the criteria that seems to be expected of them, because it reflects back on us in "real" life - be sexual, but not too sexual, take care of your man, but don't be "clingy", be open to sexual advances, but not too open. And we don't really have this same set of rules for male characters or, in general, heterosexual men.

I just find, for me, that "how would you feel if X character was a different gender" just doesn't really talk about the issue that it's meant to. The real issue is "Why is the bar so high for female characters?" And I think the answer is in my second paragraph there: because the bar is so high for women in general.

I don't know what to do about it. I have no answers. I wish I did - I would sell them for MILLIONS OF DOLLARS and then start making awesome television about Space Pirates.

[vikingwriter.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Here's the thing.

There are lots of characters I like who, for lack of a better word, are jerks. (House, Tony, Snape in later books, Bones) Some of them I would never want to meet in real life, because I'm not sure I could restrain myself from slapping them silly or throwing them out a window. (House, Snape) Others I would love to meet because in addition to being a jerk, they are smart, funny, wicked quick and show great potential. (Bones) Others I just can't stop watching to see where they end up. (Tony, Bones, House)

I put up with more from my fictional characters because, well, they're fictional. I do not have to interact with them, I can just watch them. So maybe I don't hold them up to the same standards. (I put up with Harry Potter being a whiny teenager because I'm not his mother and so I could just watch him change. And I think he did.)

As for switching genders on characters? I think that would be like imagining House didn't have a limp, or Ziva wasn't Israeli, or Tony wasn't born to a rich family. I don't believe people are born with traits genetically attached to their sex chromosomes. But we are raised as male or female (for the most part), and are thus treated accordingly. And so, we grow up with different expectations, different pressures, and so forth. So while I don't personally like overbearing bitchy women who try too hard (in my real life or in fiction), I understand the drive to have to be better, to have to prove we're as good as the boys (which means, use dirty tricks more than they do), to have to go through life taking no prisoners. Personally, I feel there's a better/different/more effective way, and I want to live my life on my own terms, not in reaction to the world around me. But if everyone I knew or read or watched was like that, I'd be bored senseless.

And I'm not sure if any of this makes sense, matters, is applicable, but I'm throwing it out there regardless.

(Oh, and am here from ncis_newsletter. Thanks for the interesting conversation.)

Re: I do what I can, no more...

[troubleinchina.livejournal.com]

Can I recommend "Guardian of the Dead" by Karen Healey? It just came out, so I'm not sure of the availability (it was about 20$ new from my local indie bookstore), but it is awesome and feminist and kicks ass. Ellie is a great feminist hero.

[mysticalchild_isis]

Oh god, I know what you mean- I edit the House newsletter, and I've been exposed to a lot of bashing of the female characters.

[mysticalchild_isis]

I remember seeing this a lot back in the more active days of Buffy fandom- it seemed like there were a lot of fans who took their love of Xander to something of an extreme, and would write fic bashing Buffy, and making Xander into the heroic, powerful, strong hero star. Missing the point of the show, much?

[mysticalchild_isis]

I understand that- I adore Alan Rickman. (But I like him best as Colonel Brandon, I will admit. But Dogma and Galaxyquest are not far behind.)

[mysticalchild_isis]

"how would you feel if X character was a different gender" just doesn't really talk about the issue that it's meant to.

::nods::

You're very right- I oversimplified things by a lot and didn't consider anything outside of gender. I just wanted a quick way to make people look at who they were bashing, and think about what might be behind it.

The real issue is "Why is the bar so high for female characters?" And I think the answer is in my second paragraph there: because the bar is so high for women in general.

I think this is definitely a conversation that needs to be held. I'd love to see some meta on it.

[mysticalchild_isis]

I've never been involved in the HP fandom, so I didn't feel qualified to speak to it, but some of the stories I've heard were definitely at the back of my mind while writing this.

[mysticalchild_isis]

Oh, I agree. I think a lot of the dislike for her character came with the way she was written in S2, and then the way the Doctor was written in S3.

There's actually a discussion somewhere upthread involving the much older fans, so we've got the ageism at both ends. I think it's easy for people to write off the sexism as coming from teens "who don't know any better" (or, as the discussion upthread says, on bitter 40+ women), rather than consider there are all sorts of people of all ages participating in this.

[mysticalchild_isis]

I will fully admit that I tend to hold many female characters to a higher standard. This doesn't mean that I want them to be perfect. I would just like them to be well written. With NCIS as the example, there are a total of TWO regular female characters. Perhaps because of the disparity, I have a lot less tolerance for suffering poorly written ones.

::nods:: There's been some discussion in this post about the difficult line that exists between disliking a female character because she is poorly written or stereotyped, disliking her because she doesn't live up to one's personal ideal, and disliking her because of internalized misogyny. The lines are often very blurred, especially as characterization can vary from writer to writer.

[mysticalchild_isis]

For me I have a harder time liking female characters, because they will often be written as the lesser species that has this Teen Twilight mindset come out and play whenever the guy needs to come out on top.

This is definitely a huge problem- poor writing/characterization of female character... but it bothers me that the same bad writing applied to male characters is much more easily ignored or forgiven.

Albeit nobody can be composed of just good traits, but to glorify a person's negative side seems to be an utterly backwards mindset. I don't want to find myself disappointed in fandom, but a lot of people need to stop being stuck in the 50's.

This is definitely one of the things that confuses me. Especially the way the "bad" guy often is the fandom darling, which, fine- villains can be interesting- but said character usually has reams and reams of fanfic in which he gets rehabilitated... often at the cost of women. I suppose redemption is a fascinating trope, but why does so often involve misogny?