Yes it is. I've spent 40+ plus years watching horrible bullshit - and it's unconscionable that we're no better off than we were four decades ago in some respects.
But then again I watched Tara die only two years ago and I'm still in mourning. I refuse to watch AtS for that very reason. I will not watch them destroy Cordy and Fred. I finally had to turn off Bones this year - a silly bit of entertainment that happened to have three dynamic, ethnically and racially diverse professional women in the sciences, and focused on them in their careers - because they turned the female protagonist into a de facto moron. They didn't kill her but they broke her. And people are ok with that.
The fact that those ladies existed at all is something to celebrate. The fact that "fridging" is still considered ok as a "plot device" is horrifying.
and then in the middle those (like yourself) who just sigh and say: "ugh this is ugly I am so put off by fandom I don't want to talk about it" and THE ENTIRE CONVERSATION can't even begin.
I don't want to misunderstand you too fast - but I feel like I'm being somewhat misrepresented here. Certainly I've been called worst things - I've been labeled an "abuse apologist" because I love Buffy but ship Buffy and Spike in S7. I've been called a Willow hater because I dared question someone's position that Tara was partly responsible for Willow's treatment of her in S6. I've been told I'm an angry bitch and not angry enough.
But I'm not sure what you mean here. I get angry and I'm told to shut up. I try to love, I pick my battles carefully so I don't burn out and stay in the fight the distance, and it's - somehow not enough?
those in the middle are tired of the "love" that is splashed all over and they don't want to even think about how it COULD be interesting if looked at more interrogatively.
I DO think about it - again, I feel you're mischaracterizing me here if you're lumping me "in the middle".
Yes I do know people who have dropped out of fandom because they don't have the time or energy to continue to fight the fights. Some wonderful voices are lost, and that's too bad. Everyone has to make that choice for themselves.
I'm determined to "stay in the game" - keep talking, keep writing, keep making icons, keep recommending the work by people - like yourself - who do love female characters, who speak on these issues more effectively than perhaps I can.
Because I am angry. But I don't have the elegant intellectual phrases and fancy arguments. I can't compete with that. I don't have the energy, physically or mentally, that I had twenty years ago. What I can do is talk about who I love and why, over and over. and make an effort to reconsider characters who are hard for me to love and why. And it works, in very real ways. I've seen it happen.
If that's not sufficient in someone else's judgment, well - that's what I have to give.
I think if fandom had an uprising and there were more female-centric conversations and people started prioritizing females, eventually TPTB would notice.
I agree - and that's why we do what we do here in fandom. It's why clockwork_hart1 has switched from largely shippy fic to friendship and female-oriented fic in the last year. When I talk about Joyce, I find that a character no one is "interested in" is - actually of interest to quite a few people. You've generated interest in Dawn that never existed before. It just needed ONE person to say "look again".
We are the change we want to be, even if we go about it differently.
Because media is a long-term battle and if we change OUR dialogue, eventually the rest of the world will take note.
Over four decades I've seen so many moments when I've thought "this is it, things are really starting to change". And then they backslide, and the pendulum swings back and forth, conservative to liberal and back again.
What we need is to get OUT of that pendulum swing altogether and acknowledge an entirely new paradigm. It hasn't happened yet, but I'll keep trying. I trust we are allies in this fight.
Re: (pt 2)
That's unconscionable.
Yes it is. I've spent 40+ plus years watching horrible bullshit - and it's unconscionable that we're no better off than we were four decades ago in some respects.
But then again I watched Tara die only two years ago and I'm still in mourning. I refuse to watch AtS for that very reason. I will not watch them destroy Cordy and Fred. I finally had to turn off Bones this year - a silly bit of entertainment that happened to have three dynamic, ethnically and racially diverse professional women in the sciences, and focused on them in their careers - because they turned the female protagonist into a de facto moron. They didn't kill her but they broke her. And people are ok with that.
The fact that those ladies existed at all is something to celebrate. The fact that "fridging" is still considered ok as a "plot device" is horrifying.
and then in the middle those (like yourself) who just sigh and say: "ugh this is ugly I am so put off by fandom I don't want to talk about it" and THE ENTIRE CONVERSATION can't even begin.
I don't want to misunderstand you too fast - but I feel like I'm being somewhat misrepresented here. Certainly I've been called worst things - I've been labeled an "abuse apologist" because I love Buffy but ship Buffy and Spike in S7. I've been called a Willow hater because I dared question someone's position that Tara was partly responsible for Willow's treatment of her in S6. I've been told I'm an angry bitch and not angry enough.
But I'm not sure what you mean here. I get angry and I'm told to shut up. I try to love, I pick my battles carefully so I don't burn out and stay in the fight the distance, and it's - somehow not enough?
those in the middle are tired of the "love" that is splashed all over and they don't want to even think about how it COULD be interesting if looked at more interrogatively.
I DO think about it - again, I feel you're mischaracterizing me here if you're lumping me "in the middle".
Yes I do know people who have dropped out of fandom because they don't have the time or energy to continue to fight the fights. Some wonderful voices are lost, and that's too bad. Everyone has to make that choice for themselves.
I'm determined to "stay in the game" - keep talking, keep writing, keep making icons, keep recommending the work by people - like yourself - who do love female characters, who speak on these issues more effectively than perhaps I can.
Because I am angry. But I don't have the elegant intellectual phrases and fancy arguments. I can't compete with that. I don't have the energy, physically or mentally, that I had twenty years ago. What I can do is talk about who I love and why, over and over. and make an effort to reconsider characters who are hard for me to love and why. And it works, in very real ways. I've seen it happen.
If that's not sufficient in someone else's judgment, well - that's what I have to give.
I think if fandom had an uprising and there were more female-centric conversations and people started prioritizing females, eventually TPTB would notice.
I agree - and that's why we do what we do here in fandom. It's why
We are the change we want to be, even if we go about it differently.
Because media is a long-term battle and if we change OUR dialogue, eventually the rest of the world will take note.
Over four decades I've seen so many moments when I've thought "this is it, things are really starting to change". And then they backslide, and the pendulum swings back and forth, conservative to liberal and back again.
What we need is to get OUT of that pendulum swing altogether and acknowledge an entirely new paradigm. It hasn't happened yet, but I'll keep trying. I trust we are allies in this fight.