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Although I've been supporting a friend of mine with her feminist blog
I still find some entertainment value, as dumb as it is, out of predictabo "hurr ur hips are moving on their own, filthy wumun"ish porn and the like.
I don't quite know how to feel about that.
Comments
http://www.socialjusticeleague.net/2011/09/how-to-be-a-fan-of-problematic-things/
Thank you for that, Wicked. It brings up a lot of good points.
While I agree with what the article's saying, rhetoric like this:
bothers me.
Why?
It's a social faux pas at worst. It's not an attempt to oppress the masses or the people or whatever. At least, in the context that the sentence is used (IE: deliberately derailing a conversation because you find the topic uncomfortable)
Toothpaste was a medieval invention and it was only the English who were against bathing, with pretty much everyone else cleaning themselves on a regular basis. Ironically, articles like this that make claims about the medieval period tend to do so in an anglocentric fashion rather than looking at Europe as a whole. This is understandable given that many people speak English as a first language and thus tend to look at English history first and foremost, but the vast majority of medieval stuff happened outside England and outside the British Isles at large. Hell, England wasn't even a major player all the time.
Alex gonna Al.
But seriously, these articles are always inaccessible to me because they always contain very specific readings of things. LotR seems to be a favourite, despite the fact that Tolkien took time out to say "These Middle Eastern and North African guys? Not evil. Wrong place, wrong time." within the book itself. Plus, if Eowyn isn't portray women in an even-minded and positive light, I don't do who does. She even refuses to submit to the restrictions of her male-dominated society.
The worst thing I can say about LotR in terms of social justice is that with the Orcs, Tolkien indulged in the concept that a race could be "always chaotic evil" -- but even then, his Orcs are minor demons.
I know this is besides the point, but it annoys me how these sorts of blogs will have very specific readings of things, and then claim that inequality being part of the setting isn't an excuse because it doesn't have to be that way. Except I sure as hell know Eowyn's triumphs would be a lot weaker if she was initially afforded the same authority as Eomer.
It's this bizarre kind of tick-off list. In fact, we've seen stuff like this before within history. Stalinist Russia had a policy where literature published had to contain certain elements -- the protagonist had to be working class, and the antagonist had to have some connection to feudalism or capitalism and so on and so forth. And then it becomes a whole load of bullshit when you start getting social blog opinions espousing opposite standards. According to Blogger A, we can remove all the nasty stuff from medieval stories because they "don't have to be there" -- but Blogger B says that doing that would be a trivialisation of the discrimination in that era.
I'm the kind of person who notices a lot of discrimination in a lot of places. I flat out refuse to buy Soul Calibur V because the series' treatment of female characters has reached the cut-off point for me (the advertising campaign mixed with cutting a lot of the old female cast because they're middle aged and replacing them with younger women, in combination with retaining a lot of the old male cast). I even have an interpretation of Alien vs. Predator, of all things, that witnesses the whole concept as a clash between the masculine and the feminine. It might be fair to say that I think about these kinds of things a little too much at times -- but the kind of article linked goes far beyond that in its analysis and implies a case in favour of censorship.
And what that kind of article always, always ignores is how the narration treats inequality. They look for content rather than technique -- there's nothing wrong with having a heavily patriarchal society in a novel. What is wrong is when it's treated as a good thing, but that requires an analysis of the way it's treated rather than identification of something being used.
AW FUCKING YEAH, you said it. Exactly the same way I feel.
If I may add to Juan's point, there's also: Thirdly you must acknowledge other, even less favourable, interpretations of the media you like.
I agree with "yeah, I heard you." But if there are arguments that just come off as nitpicking and outright trolling, I'm not giving them the light of day.
I think I should point out that while I don't like the interpretations it uses to make its points, I agree with the core idea that there's nothing wrong with liking something that you yourself find problematic from a social standpoint, provided that you understand its issues and do not pretend that they aren't there.
^ Also, that.
^^^ That kind of political censorship bothers me to no end, and to think that people I consider political and social allies whole-heartedly approve of it drives me up the wall.
Thirdly you must acknowledge other, even less favourable, interpretations of the media you like.
This also works the other way around. Insisting on one's own negative interpretation as gospel and refusal to acknowledge that most texts have conflicting elements in them instead of wholly verging towards progressive or chauvinistic(and by extension implying that the consumers of said texts are bigots) is just as asinine as the trivializing sentiment.
That said, I find easymodo readings fuming at the bigotry within by-the-numbers genre texts a tad uninteresting: it's far more fruitful to pick at the supposedly more progressive texts to see what they do right and what they're still doing wrong.
Reading that blog I have to wonder if she could find any antagonist in fiction that isn't supposed to be a negative/bigoted portrayal of their social class/sexuality/race/gender/age/other traits.
^Well, of course not. After all, unbigoted fiction would have to take place in a flawless world without any form of conflict, and as such, can't have an antagonist. Or much of a plot. Or a reason to read it.
You know that's not what "bigoted" means, right INUH?
Yes, but in any story with conflict, someone can interpret it as an attack on whatever group the least positively-portrayed character happens to be a member of.
>And what that kind of article always, always ignores is how the narration treats inequality. They look for content rather than technique -- there's nothing wrong with having a heavily patriarchal society in a novel. What is wrong is when it's treated as a good thing, but that requires an analysis of the way it's treated rather than identification of something being used.
I agree with this a lot. A big problem I have with a lot of social justice complaints about fiction is that they demonize a show/book/comic for even having things like racism, inequality, etc. in them rather than how they have them and that writers seem to have some sort of obligation to create a perfect world where no one would ever have any thought of inequalities.
Which would of course result in dull stories.
I mean vampires by and large are one extended rape metaphor. However, it's also what makes vampires compelling monsters (and the resultant trend of them become sex gods)
>That said, I find easymodo readings fuming at the bigotry within by-the-numbers genre texts a tad uninteresting: it's far more fruitful to pick at the supposedly more progressive texts to see what they do right and what they're still doing wrong.
I also find this to be true.
Admittedly, in most places I've just stopped discussing social justice with the vast majority of people into it because tensions run high pretty quickly and arguing over whether the reaction to a piece of fanart where Korra's skin is slightly lighter is reasonable is just not worth the headache.
^Now I'm reminded of Lex Luthor of Earth-23 telling that world's (black) Superman 'I am not a racist! It's everything else that I hate about you!'
But how much condemnation is necessary to justify the inclusion of bigoted structures in fiction? I mean, speaking about Game of Thrones, for example, I don't really think it spends that much time condemning the characters' mistreatment of women compared to how much of it actually ends up occuring in it. At some point, you have to weigh how much you really need to include ideas and practices you don't agree with against the risk that these things will end up being misinterpreted (which Game of Thrones very often is by its fans).
I don't buy it because the amount of fighting styles is just not large enough.
As much or as little condemnation as gets in the way of the story. Media doesn't work well when it's constantly shoving an agenda down your throat; instead, it should aim to lead you towards a conclusion rather than give it to you flat-out. And this is what ASoIaF, for all its flaws, does. It doesn't have to say that treating women as commodities is wrong, because a significant portion of the perspective characters are female and we learn first-hand how this affects them. The message is carried because we're shown first hand why this is a bad thing, rather than the author taking time out to say "This shit? Wrong.". And it's pretty much just an adherence to the old adage of "show, don't tell", which is a major point these kinds of blogs don't seem to get.
The narrative techniques in a book are like mechanics in a video game. Like how, in Zelda, you can't attack townspeople, but in GTA you can bloody up almost anyone. So Zelda's restriction tells you that the game is about heroism and fighting the true bad guys; GTA tells you that it's about freedom and running amok at the expense of innocent civilians. So when an author leads you to feel a certain way about something -- such as Sansa's mistreatment in her arranged marriage -- it's generally because they've set it up that way.
Also, there's the fact that stuff like GoT sometimes condemns injustice and sometimes gives it no commentary, but absolutely never celebrates it.
One of the important parts of fiction is letting the reader sit and think about the events he just saw. When the writer is telling you what you should think about an act, it simply breaks suspension of disbelief and immersion. I'm not saying that condemnation of an act in-story is necessarily a bad writing tool, mind you. But that it's incredibly hard to pull off without causing a break from disbelief simply because when you notice the commentary, you "remember" you're reading a book written by a person with a purpose and so on.
Personally, what I think is that there's nothing that should stop a story from featuring rape, racism or misoginy, as long as it doesn't glorify it (And as long as it makes sense with the tone of the work and the plot). But I don't see the point in condemnating it simply because of the same reason you don't think a journalist is glorifying rape when he writes an article reporting such an event in his neighborhood or whatever. It's an event that happens in the story. It's an action that on it's own denotes a morally bankrupt action (In other words, if I said "X raped Y", you wouldn't think of X as a good person, provided you don't have a rather...um...skewed understanding of how human relationships work)
With that said, I also feel that such storylines that feature these heavy topics tend to handle them badly, not out of malice, but simply because they are not exactly easy topics to handle, in many ways.
I think a problem I have with a lot of this kind of stuff is that it puts too much blame on the writer and not enough on the people who end up getting that mindset. Fiction can certainly push or reinforce or awaken, but I kind of doubt it creates these issues in a person. If a kid puts on a superman cape and jumps off a building is it Jerry Siegel's fault? No, the kid was a dumbass for not being able to differentiate fiction and reality.
i.e. the person who writes this kind of blog is like a Jack Thompson for literature.
Some more elaboration on the blog's ideas towards fiction.
Apparently it is okay to have assholes screwing people over in fiction, but only if the text takes time to say "hey this is not okay!". Because the audience are dense or societal norms are so predominate that blatant shouting is the only way to get through to people according to them.
The linked blog was far too nuanced for that comparison. Fiction is a product of its culture thus subtly reïnforces certain dominant viewpoints and while the artist does not have a responsibility to adhere to agendas, he sorta needs to handle his material well purely on the basis of quality. Take rape as cheap drama: it's not bad because it trivializes the act or that it's a creepy focus on the degradation of a human being, it's bad because it's overused, written in a stock manner and tacky.
With games it would be the difference between Carmeggedon and Manhunt.
> he sorta needs to handle his material well purely on the basis of quality.
Well yeah. The only real responsibility a writer has is to tell a good story.
Technically, I'm not sure if they have a responsibility to tell a good story so much as it's advisable that they do for the sake of their career.
I think it's ridiculous to call Tom Hansen a misogynist nice guy from the get-go. I get that the core idea of the movie is that he has an erroneous understanding of how love and relationship works, but he also doesn't assume that Summer should be his girlfriend because they were friends for a time. It just happens. In the movie they spend some time together, and then Summer comes up to him and kisses him over the photocopier. The issue and conflict comes from their opposing views on their relationship, as Tom thinks that she's the one and blah blah blah, whereas Summer doesn't see relationships as something about love, but about parnership and trust. In other words, Tom sees a girlfriend and Summer sees a friend with benefits. It's something that either or both should have addressed at one point, specially considering that their first conversation is precisely about how they see love and relationships.
So, yeah, I wouldn't say Tom is really a misogynistic asshole or whatever, and I'd argue that the scenes after the break up where we see his most bitter sides are not based around the fact that Summer is a woman, so much as the fact that Tom thought he had gotten the thing he was searching for, but didn't get to keep it. Which is a childish sentiment that Tom grows out of, as it is the whole point of the movie (That women are not relationships and all that jazz), but it doesn't come out of Tom's sentiments towards women by and large, but specifically about himself and Summer.
Most of the blog seems to operate on the premise the consumers of the cultural artificats are morons or at least don't want to think about their entertainment, and thus morals/come-uppance of bad behaviour should be more straightforward and less ambiguous. Wonder whether that's more effective in making Joe Average think or not.
The problem with having a misogynist society in your medieval fantasy novel, like many things, is not when you do it alone. The problem is when EVERYONE does it. (Except, at least relatively, the actual Middle Ages, which were really quite nice for women compared to either Rome or the revival of Roman law codes in the Rennisance.)
But the point is, creating a landscape where a woman can't read about certain periods without being reminded she would've been considered a second-class citizen is not cool. If you can ignore the laws of physics in your novel you can damn well ignore what gender relations were like. Or at least not make them up FFS.
^^ Honestly, I don't know. Personally, even though I am far from being opposed to inserting a moral agenda into a story, I find hamfisted moralizing to be annoying and tend to automatically dismiss it. However, if the moral agenda that is present is more subtle and intellectualy engaging, it has far more effect for me. That may be just me, though - I don't know about Joe Average, but I guess that when he sits down on his couch, opens a can of beer and turns on his TV, he expects cheap entertainment and not lessons of morality, and such lessons may well go over his head.
^ Eh, if something that would make the readers/viewers/whatever uncomfortable is there and isn't supported by the author or the work, but still serves a purpose and helps tell the story, there's no reason why it shouldn't be there.