Feminism

[Roderick]

So, I love that for ten seconds, in the back of my head just as I step into the real-life boxing ring, I get to pretend I'm Aeryn Sun

 

Have little to say about Thor, but damn if that's not awesome.

[Griddlelol]

And I love combat sports. I love the intensity of competing in them. I suppose I can't be a 100% non-violent person because of that. But I certainly don't think that actual violence solves anything, or should ever be practiced without express consent. I wish the world we lived in glamorized the hard work of training and the purity in competing, not in the money shot of someone getting their face caved in. r.

 

Absolutely miles off topic for this thread, but in the "fitosphere"  the training is glamorised a lot. When I need motivation to go to the gym, there's always someone who's talking about training, about the journey, rather than posting pictures of abs. 

 

Obviously there's still the money shot culture of pictures of veiny men or muscley women, but it's great that the training is glamorized by some (I can't decide if I like the UK or US spelling more) and has really helped me in my aim to not be a fat ass for the rest of my life.

[Gaizokubanou]

I also know that this is a big commercial property, and nothing marvel does - or will ever do - is because someone feels it is the right thing to do. Things get done because they are the commercially smart thing to do. The degree to which this reality is depressing drives me to go back to the boxing gym to punch things.

 

Am I the only one on this board who finds the idea of people pursuing good behavior out of profit to be desirable?  Like nobody here seems to be saying that corporations are inherently evil (or maybe some of you think so?)... just that they are inherently about profit and is thus ethics neutral... so then, what's so awful about coaxing corporations to achieve good through the only language they speak (which IMO is very important language (resource distribution) for ethics to begin with)?

 

I suppose I can't be a 100% non-violent person because of that.

 

And I'm into military hardwares and advanced weaponry in general.  So you can use me as a flameshield if people give you shit for your combat sport background to be too violent

[Mawd]

For the topic at hand I agree with Danielle.

Even if it is pretty close to tokenism it can still be pretty nice to see characters in media that don't follow the usual stock characterisation. I am usually left a little conflicted though because it feels like the big mainstream media is still a few years off from equal distribution or even just a big main character beyond a few things that target overlapping audiences. I'll be a lot happier when media takes a similar approach to how shows like In The Flesh dealt with gender and sexuality within the show.

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My perspective on capitalism might be a bit different because I don't live in a capitalism-riven society like America. I imagine it'd be a little more pressing for Americans.)

 

Not to be that guy. But, are you sure? Both the Aussie and NZ governments let their primary industries drive them around a fair bit. We're both super interested in ripping up national parks for minerals; last I heard it was a green light to build a port that dredges onto the Great Barrier Reef, and it's A-OK to conduct deep sea drilling in NZ waters -its even illegal to protest it.

 

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As for corporations bending the world to their will NZ is introducing plenty of laws for the White House on behalf of corporations. Heck we have this wonderful thing called the TTPA on the horizon that will introduce a whole load of new social drivers that I'm just sure everyone will love. Like medicine costs rising, leading to fewer people going to a doctor unless it's "absolutely necessary", leading to lower health overall.

Not that I try to be anti corporation. A lot of my growing up has been accepting the good that can come from mainstream sources while still being mindful of the problems they cause.

[Problem Machine]

just that they are inherently about profit and is thus ethics neutral...

I dunno, would we consider a human being who only cared about money and completely disregarded the wellbeing of others except as it affects those ends as ethically neutral...?

[Roderick]

Ethically disinterested, surely...

[Apple Cider]

I have so very many thoughts about Thor as a woman.

 

TLDR: I like tough women with traditionally masculine kinds of power, capitalism is a depressing reality, and I hope 7-year-old little girls will get something positive from reading about a woman Thor.

 

I have liked a lot of masculine/strong women, it's just in context unfortunately it's often the only kind of male creators think to make. I'm totally digging any women characters that I see that are morally grey, vulnerable, clever, etc. Even though they are both really villainous in some ways - Claire Underwood and Fish Mooney come to mind. But those are TV shows vs. comics where strength is a huge advantage, but I love women who are really flawed and complex but still sympathetic in some way. I think there's just room for every type of woman out there (even strong ones!)

[Roderick]

About Fish Mooney:

 

I'm really pleased with her current arc, inside the weird organ prison. I feel she's becoming more and more interesting. The way she's handling the situation, placing herself in power through a combination of intimidation, straight up leadership skill and inspiring her followers to go to a horrible extreme is the most interesting thing she's done so far.

[tberton]

Man, this conversation is really making me want to write/read a history of women in comics.

[Mawd]

I have liked a lot of masculine/strong women, it's just in context unfortunately it's often the only kind of male creators think to make. I'm totally digging any women characters that I see that are morally grey, vulnerable, clever, etc. Even though they are both really villainous in some ways - Claire Underwood and Fish Mooney come to mind. But those are TV shows vs. comics where strength is a huge advantage, but I love women who are really flawed and complex but still sympathetic in some way. I think there's just room for every type of woman out there (even strong ones!)

 

What do you think of a character like Sansa from Game of Thrones? She seems to get a lot of hate for either her femininity or her lack of agency. But I think she was portrayed as a very strong person (while still being a feminine woman) at least within the book well before the TV audience finally started to approve of her 

when she essentially became Littlefinger's protoge.

[SuperBiasedMan]

There's more than two genders. 

Bah, yes I'm sorry. I don't think I have enough conscious awareness of the gender plethora. I probably need to do some media education to make it more inherent rather than something I correct myself with.

 

Am I the only one on this board who finds the idea of people pursuing good behavior out of profit to be desirable?  Like nobody here seems to be saying that corporations are inherently evil (or maybe some of you think so?)... just that they are inherently about profit and is thus ethics neutral... so then, what's so awful about coaxing corporations to achieve good through the only language they speak (which IMO is very important language (resource distribution) for ethics to begin with)?

Technically yes companies can do good work, and certainly some do and some try to. But the issue is that the primary goal of capitalism is to make money. If your main goal is to make money, you'll find ways to make the most whether it's by cutting costs or finding a market to latch onto. This can lead to unethical but totally legal behaviour that could save a lot of money. For example, advertisements are big on using stereotypes especially to undermine someone and make them feel compelled to buy a product to 'fix' themself. A company with such advertisements can also then do a PR campaign that's pro feminism.

 

Consumers rarely seem to connect these things so essentially the company can have their cake and eat it too. This is exactly what you would do if you wanted a lot of money, and it has the appearance of being ethical to consumers that would financially support the stance while still using unethical methods to earn more money. This isn't a hypothetical by the way, if you look up articles about Dove's advertising campaign their parent company are literally doing this.

[Merus]

Not to be that guy. But, are you sure?

 

It's not as bad as in America, where this process seems to be mostly complete. We've got time and a history of daring progressivism. New Zealand and Australia were right on the vanguard of universal suffrage, after all.

 

I suspect that the TPP has taken so long to be ratified because every time it leaks they stop negotiations until they think we've forgotten about it. It's vile.

[Mawd]

It's not as bad as in America, where this process seems to be mostly complete. We've got time and a history of daring progressivism. New Zealand and Australia were right on the vanguard of universal suffrage, after all.

 

I suspect that the TPP has taken so long to be ratified because every time it leaks they stop negotiations until they think we've forgotten about it. It's vile.

Well the last women related thing I heard the government was involved in was pulling the funding from NZ's Rape Crisis centres. I'm sure more things positive or otherwise have occurred. But I'm not sure if I can pat an accomplishment from 1893 if only four years ago it was seen as a sensible business/economic move (by the still incumbent GOVT) to pull a few million from a national rape support network. Especially given the frankly insulting allocation of money for other less 'socialist' projects.

I hear Tony Abbott does wonderful work as the self appointed Minister for Women. Why I seem to remember he listed his greatest contribution for women in 2014 was to repeal the Carbon Tax. :/

 

"Well, you know, it is very important to do the right thing by families and households," Mr Abbott replied. "As many of us know, women are particularly focused on the household budget and the repeal of the carbon tax means a $550 a year benefit for the average family."

 

Okay I'm trying to balance my above views with things I wasn't or am not aware of, but should be.

So hear is an official report for the Status of Women in NZ from the latest (five years old) CEDAW report for my and anyone else's interest.

Also the Ministry for Women has a good explanation for what their focus is on for women in NZ.

[Apple Cider]

I'm an unabashed Sansa lover. People who hate her need to check themselves as to why - she's absolutely part of this spectrum of women trying to navigate an entirely hostile political situation in a multitude of ways and she's playing the game the way it was meant to be played to be a survivor. It's really awesome. 

[Problem Machine]

it did take her a while to grow into that though. Her naivete was pretty infuriating early on. Also, while I think she works as a character, man if Catelyn doesn't play into some of the worst hysteria tropes.

[feelthedarkness]

I also know that this is a big commercial property, and nothing marvel does - or will ever do - is because someone feels it is the right thing to do. Things get done because they are the commercially smart thing to do. The degree to which this reality is depressing drives me to go back to the boxing gym to punch things.

 

 

I feel like acknowledging that the commercially right thing to do is to diversify a bit is a kind of success. At least in the game world, that is half of what we want, right? I guess that's like acknowledging the symptom rather than seeking a cure, but it's a start, which is also part of how I'd respond to Argobot's concern over the lack of nuance. 1 luv to the Thumbs comic fans, but Thor probably isn't the best place for literary nuance, but if it's a foot in the right door.

 

Also, for ass whooping women in stuff, have you seen Chocolate? Thai action movie from the makers of Ong Bak with a female lead, Jeejee Yanin, who is just nuts. Story is absurd: "autistic girl learns martial arts from repeatedly watching kung fu movies", but as for physicality the actress does a great job emulating famous fighters, Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan's Drunken Master.  It's on Netflix streaming.

[Bjorn]

I also know that this is a big commercial property, and nothing marvel does - or will ever do - is because someone feels it is the right thing to do. Things get done because they are the commercially smart thing to do. The degree to which this reality is depressing drives me to go back to the boxing gym to punch things.

 

I really appreciate the rest of your post, and either agree with it or appreciate it as an insight into how you approach things. But this part mirrors a lot of the other talk in the thread about capitalism and corporations. Which, there is a lot of truth there, but one thing that gets lost in that talk is that there are individuals in corporations whose decisions are affected by their own ethical compass and who do care about things like feminism and diversity. Some of these changes in comics aren't coming because the bean counters think they'll be profitable, they are coming because there are individuals who think they are the culturally right thing to do and valuable beyond simply their monetary worth.  It simplifies out the individual fights that do occur with corporations. 

 

On a more general thought, I also get somewhat frustrated with the vague way capitalism is talked about.  The problem is usually big corporations, and the unethical and amoral people who run them, the type of corporations who have the deep pockets to shape society and government.   Several of the Thumbs are capitalists (in that they are business owners), but I trust that their business decisions are informed by their individual moral compasses.  I trust that if Danielle were to start her own businesses, she wouldn't suddenly become the type of business owner solely fixated on maximizing profit.  Capitalism is a system, but not one that I'm convinced is inherently evil or even broken.  It's that as a culture, we have encouraged and valued the kind of terrible behavior that drives many corporations. 

[Apple Cider]

it did take her a while to grow into that though. Her naivete was pretty infuriating early on. Also, while I think she works as a character, man if Catelyn doesn't play into some of the worst hysteria tropes.

 

I was a teen girl once. I can't fault Sansa for being sheltered from a world that is terrible or being naive or whatever. She was like, what, 12 when the books started? Cmon now. 

[Problem Machine]

On a more general thought, I also get somewhat frustrated with the vague way capitalism is talked about.  The problem is usually big corporations, and the unethical and amoral people who run them, the type of corporations who have the deep pockets to shape society and government.   Several of the Thumbs are capitalists (in that they are business owners), but I trust that their business decisions are informed by their individual moral compasses.  I trust that if Danielle were to start her own businesses, she wouldn't suddenly become the type of business owner solely fixated on maximizing profit.  Capitalism is a system, but not one that I'm convinced is inherently evil or even broken.

Well, I think the way we regard corporations as legal entities kind of is. I mean, it's not a problem with small privately-owned companies, which are essentially a business extension of the will of the owners, but when you get into large publicly owned corporations you've created a situation where the people running it are then legally culpable for choosing a course of action which doesn't maximize profit, even if they believe it's more ethical. With the system as it is now, we've incentivized behavior which I think runs awfully close to how we define evil -- that is, choosing profit to the exception of all else, which is what I was kind of getting at with my earlier post.

 

 

I was a teen girl once. I can't fault Sansa for being sheltered from a world that is terrible or being naive or whatever. She was like, what, 12 when the books started? Cmon now. 

Oh, yeah, absolutely, but just because it's reasonable and accurate doesn't mean that I as a rational adult can't be frustrated by a dumb kid's bullshit. That's what being an adult is all about!

edit: Actually it occurs to me that it's rather interesting that Arya's naievete, in the form of Axe Cop style "chop off all the bad guy's heads", isn't nearly as frustrating as Sansa's given that it's much more closely aligned with the actual, and actually really fucked up, ethic of justified force that that world operates on. Just because the shit Arya believes is echoed by grown-ass men who should know better doesn't really make it any less childish or naive than the shit Sansa believes, just more popular. It's kind of an interesting lens through which to view the characters that hadn't occurred to me before.

[Apple Cider]

This is why Sansa's so compelling to me: she's actively sheltered in a romantic notion that's more closer to how I was as a teen girl and in that world in particular? Almost radical. I don't know, I have a huge soft spot for women who use traditionally feminine pursuits and mechanisms to navigate a world and to recognize that they have value. 

[Mawd]

From what I can remember by tv standards it was sort of subtle to watch her transition from being a naive young girl to a performer that wore that role like armour. From the show directly I think the point that transition became loud was late season 2 when the author rote the screenplay.

It was easier with the books because of the internal monologue and a few moments cut from the show that built her character.

I mean she goes through some hefty development while being an abuse victim and while saying and expressing the things her abusers expect of her.

Which is why for the longest time she plays to the idea of being this immature mess who doesn't act for herself. She's hyper aware that her agency has been taken from her and that she can't rely on anyone to save her because she fully knows her status as political prize.

That said I don't believe she was always acting. Plenty of times audiences have thought of her as a stupid little girl she was playing to expectation out of absolute desperation. At least that's my takeaway from experiencing similar forms of thought/behaviour abusive control.

[Bjorn]

Well, I think the way we regard corporations as legal entities kind of is. I mean, it's not a problem with small privately-owned companies, which are essentially a business extension of the will of the owners, but when you get into large publicly owned corporations you've created a situation where the people running it are then legally culpable for choosing a course of action which doesn't maximize profit, even if they believe it's more ethical. With the system as it is now, we've incentivized behavior which I think runs awfully close to how we define evil -- that is, choosing profit to the exception of all else, which is what I was kind of getting at with my earlier post.

 

Bolded part is not, and never has been, true. It's a truism that both defenders and detractors of capitalism love to repeat. But it ain't true.  The only time that corporations are required to maximize value is during the sale of a company, and there are historical reasons for that protection to exist (boards selling companies at well below value to friends, family or partners to the detriment of shareholders). 

 

There are a few outliers in which shareholders challenged corporations about some decisions in regards to maximizing profits, but the few decisions I've seen on that ended up being far, far more complex than simply being about maximizing profit. 

 

My understanding is that corporate culture has changed radically in the last 40 years.  Not that corporations were run by saints before then, but that mantras like "profit above all else" were elevated, and ideas about being socially responsible to the communities they existed in were minimized. 

[Mangela Lansbury]

I really appreciate the rest of your post, and either agree with it or appreciate it as an insight into how you approach things. But this part mirrors a lot of the other talk in the thread about capitalism and corporations. Which, there is a lot of truth there, but one thing that gets lost in that talk is that there are individuals in corporations whose decisions are affected by their own ethical compass and who do care about things like feminism and diversity. Some of these changes in comics aren't coming because the bean counters think they'll be profitable, they are coming because there are individuals who think they are the culturally right thing to do and valuable beyond simply their monetary worth. It simplifies out the individual fights that do occur with corporations.

The idea can come around because someone wants more, but it's only executed on the basis of profits. The individual wants to express feminist ideas and the corporation wants to make money -- so great, the corporation is doing a nice thing, but they're only doing it by chance.

It's not bean counters alone, but it's not good intentions either. And the intentions end up not mattering anyway -- often, the intentions behind an ethical message are stripped away when the idea is commodified. The intention of feminism or representation or whatever it may be are replaced with intentions to make money, reducing feminism to a shiny plaque a corporation can put up in Cash Mountain (a secret cigar lounge to be constructed out of the fat stacks of cash that pushing a benign, inoffensive, populist interpretation of a progressive or radical idea will make them). The individuals aren't disregarded, they're just put in the context of the larger system that they necessarily work in.

[Problem Machine]

Bolded part is not, and never has been, true. It's a truism that both defenders and detractors of capitalism love to repeat. But it ain't true.  The only time that corporations are required to maximize value is during the sale of a company, and there are historical reasons for that protection to exist (boards selling companies at well below value to friends, family or partners to the detriment of shareholders).

Hm, okay, I guess I was misled in this particular, but regardless of whether it's a legal incentive it's certainly a cultural one, and such a strong cultural incentive that the 'ethics' of a corporation could be seen as being more in line of what will create the most good for the shareholders, IE maximizing share value, IE maximizing profits, rather than creating a global good. Which STILL creates an artificial entity with the rights of a human being but the sole motive to collect profits regardless of human cost, behavior which is largely regarded as unethical in a human being. Changing that culture is tantamount to changing our understanding of what a corporation is and is for -- whether it needs to involve a change of the laws themselves does not, I think, substantially shift the parameters of the problem itself.

[Danielle]

I have liked a lot of masculine/strong women, it's just in context unfortunately it's often the only kind of male creators think to make. I'm totally digging any women characters that I see that are morally grey, vulnerable, clever, etc. Even though they are both really villainous in some ways - Claire Underwood and Fish Mooney come to mind. But those are TV shows vs. comics where strength is a huge advantage, but I love women who are really flawed and complex but still sympathetic in some way. I think there's just room for every type of woman out there (even strong ones!)

 

I do wonder, on some level, if some of this badass lady stuff is tied into queer identity for me. A topic for another post, I suppose!

 

I think you're right, also - the 'strong badass lady' trope is the only one that pops up w. certain forms of genre fiction (i.e. the only women who can function in a 'man's world'). So, I hear that. I also love women with more complexity (though, I'd argue that Aeryn and a few other of my lady-badass examples are decently complex), with vulnerability, shades of gray, and deeper thoughts than 'punch/shoot that guy' Chiana, another Farscape character (can you tell I love this show?) is an interesting example.

 

She's every bit the 'woman who uses sex to get what she wants' trope, and simultaneously infinitely more complicated than that. She's wily and smart and sexy, and also vulnerable and warm and kind. She's a sort of opposite-world Aeryn, and handled with enough care to not fall into gross stereotypes.