Women, fiction, and authorial intent. And Battlestar Galactica.
Between the end of "Battlestar Galactica" and the recent Classica discussions, I’ve been finding myself discussing and thinking about authorial intent…in terms of romantic arcs, entertainment value, etc. I mentioned before how I had issues with Ron’s reading of Kara in the finale, but then Karen analyzed the thing for me in a way that worked, and I
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There was no fanwanking, no fanfiction, and no imagination. To me, it was the way it was.
Thank you, Walt Disney and religion, for giving such negative connotations of women that it made me hate who I am/was..oi tense, help. (And I've really been meaning to write a post about my ultimate hatred for Disney.)
I hated female characters in most media because they were everything I was not, and I could not relate to them at all. I always ended up relating to the male characters because - now that I think about it - they were actually treated like normal human beings and were more fleshed out. (Oh, and they usually didn't end up dead every time.)
At 5, I wanted to be a male because I thought females were stupid and, again, *helpless.* I cut my hair like a boy, I dressed like a boy, I even ran around in a Batman cape during Sunday church service. (And, thankfully, my family didn't mind my behavior at all. They thought it was cute, and they accepted me.)
Oh, I was also going through an Asian!identity!crisis, so I had a lot on my plate as a child. I was uncomfortable in my own skin.
Also, this is weird you mentioned Delilah because I was just thinking about this woman like not too long ago - last Saturday, I think it was. I guess I can say I have a thing for bad girls in media. But I never noticed it until I discovered Emma Frost. And back to Delilah - well - I remember reading about her in a Bible story and thought she was pretty cool, but I *always* suppressed that thought because I was taught she was a sinful person and was to be scorned upon.
IIRC, I thought Delilah betrayed Samson for money? At least, that's what the Bible states the reason she did that. It never occurred to me that she could have done it to save her country, too. (And her fate is not mentioned in the Bible, unfortunately.)
Also, I'm going to say it straight up front: the women in the Bible pissed me off. I was never interested in them, and I rolled my eyes every time I had to read a bible story about Mary the Virgin or, God forbid, that "whore" Mary Magdeline. It *annoyed* me so much that they always submitted to men, and I felt that's what I had to be in order to be a good "woman" - submit to men and elders.
But like you said: Leaving aside the acceptance path, they do one of these three things: Repress, reject, or reinvent.
That's exactly what my Sunday school teacher would do, or my parents would do.
"Oh, but female Bible characters are so cool! Mary had to travel on a camel to save baby Jesus, and that must have taken so much strength!"
Miriam, Moses' sister (IIRC), was a prophetess and spiritually led the nation of Israel, according to a "fun fact" in one of the several teen Bibles I own. But, in the Biblical text, it says she led the women in praise and worship.
Umm...why can't she lead the men, too? And, I'm sorry, but carrying a baby through a desert is not as cool as a little guy whacking a military leader in half.
Also, no matter what modern Christians say these days, it's totally true that men are treated so much better than women in the Bible. It's so true that it's not even funny. And I'm sick of today where people dilute and reinterpret biblical text to make it more suitable to what women are today.
Also, the women always end up doing something WRONG! It started with Eve and ended with - I can't remember. But I think you get my point.
We live in a misogynistic society, and it sucks. Women are treated like crap in this world, and, again, it sucks. If a man has sex with two women, then he's considered cool. But if a women has sex with two men - OMG SHES A WHORE SHE MUST BE STONED TO DEATH. OMG WHAT A WHORE SHE MUST DIE.
And, I totally blame religion for the world's view of women.
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But since learning about Frank Miller’s general issues, I’ve been less fond of it. Which bugs me.
Oh god, I feel bad for you. Luckily, I was able to learn about Miller's assholery through http://girl-wonder.org. I hate Frank Miller. That guy is such a god damn sexist pig, and he's disgusting.
His females character usually end up raped or dead. And, this one time, there was this script he wrote of Allstar Batman and Robin, which was posted on girl-wonder: http://girl-wonder.org/girlsreadcomics/?p=13
Why should I have to change my opinion on things I like or don’t mind just because I’m now taking into consideration the authorial intent?
See, for me, if I love a character and find out the author meant for a negative connotation of the character - that's it! I dislike the character and less and less and begin to hate on the writer. That's just me, though.
OK, now I'm starting to sound extremely bitter. :)
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See, for me, if I love a character and find out the author meant for a negative connotation of the character - that's it! I dislike the character and less and less and begin to hate on the writer. That's just me, though.
Whereas I'm more likely to reject the author's reading and continue to love my Emma Frost. Of course, you can only take so much of the crappy writing before Emma *becomes* a crappy character, but that's why I'm avoiding comics right now and avoided them before when they were doing this to Kitty. When I was reading Joss' run, I was, as the WORLD KNOWS since I posted about it only every day, I was very worried for Emma, but I knew that if Joss turned her evil, I was going to drop the comics. I also stopped reading the actual comics until he was done with the run so to not let him affect my Emma love.
Why should I let someone with a stupid Madonna/Whore complex get in the way of my Emma love? It would feel a bit like letting him win. Like he did with Cordelia and successfully did turn me into someone who couldn't stand Cordelia towards the end. And that still makes me so angry.
And we're all bitter.
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Why should I let someone with a stupid Madonna/Whore complex get in the way of my Emma love? It would feel a bit like letting him win. Like he did with Cordelia and successfully did turn me into someone who couldn't stand Cordelia towards the end. And that still makes me so angry.
What exactly is a Madonna/Whore complex? I MUST KNOW!
Also, I think comic canon is completely different from actual literature (yes, I just sliced comic books from literature, but I didn't mean to). So, a writer's intentions in literature are much different than a writer's intentions in comics, because comic interpretation is always changing because of the never-ending cycle of writers.
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I do find Mary compelling, in the context of Greek mythology. You have to realize that in Greek mythology, we have many women who are visited upon by the gods and impregnated to give birth to magical babies who cause them much suffering. And the thing is, I always wonder if anyone *asked* Mary whether she wanted that baby? I love the idea of her having a POV, somewhere. And I've definitely read fic on it. *hides*
As for Mary Magdalene, there's a whole another school of thought on her that sees her as an important figure and holds that her actual myths have been repressed. There's a website somewhere that looks at how all these myths are coming to us from Pagan myths and how they were, at some point, more women-positive.
As for Eve, I'm fond of her. In Milton's "Paradise Lost," she was the only person who made sense to me. She gives up God's grace and a chance to live forever so she could have KNOWLEDGE. Do you see the kind of stuff we can read into this? She's the only one who wants to think for herself and not just go along with everything, and then her punishment is to be subordinate to a man. Which, tragic, but you can still read awesomeness into her character.
But do you see what I mean? There are hints of awesome backstories in most of these stories if you're willing to look for them. And I guess I've always sort of been inventing things in my head, and this made it easier. I, thankfully, NEVER wanted to be a boy. OR, worse, BATMAN! ;)
But I completely understand where you're coming from, and oh, I must make you read the stories of Inanna! They're the oldest religious texts that we have today, and they're all about this awesome goddess who is all powerful and heroic. Religion can be non-oppressive. You just sometimes have to approach it from a non-mainstream POV.
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But yeah, in biblical text, Delilah is mentioned in about three verses. Evil!woman comes to betray good!man. Good!man falls for evil!woman, and good!man goes insane. Then, you never hear about her again.
As for Eve, I'm fond of her. [...]
I should probably clarify that I'm not directly mad at the women in the Bible, but I'm more so angry over the negativeness the Bible (and most of the world) gives them. And, really, the women in the Bible were just acting completely human. I know if I were Eve, I'd take the fruit too. :) I think my bitterness comes from the part that people were damned because of something that God gave them - which was free will. Of course, bringing that up, I could get into an entirely different tangent and rant about how I think the Christian God screwed the world over.
Also, according to the Bible, Eve was created second and came from Adam's rib. So, basically, women are a sub-creation of men. That annoys me greatly because women and men are both equally capable beings of doing good/bad things/whatever, if you get what I'm saying.
I, thankfully, NEVER wanted to be a boy. OR, worse, BATMAN! ;)
LOL. *hides* I thought Batman was awesome back in the 90s, especially with all those godawful movies they made for him.
But I completely understand where you're coming from,[...]
I'll have to look into that. And now that you explained different interpretations of women in lit, I can now say that women in media haven't always been portrayed poorly - I've just been exposed to cheap characters and/or different interpretation. I haven't explored any ancient text yet, but usually when it's touched upon, the focus is on male characters.
As for religion having the ability to not be oppressive - I agree. But, personally, I tend to be a very black and white person. "it is what it is." I either follow it all or I don't follow it all, so that's why I have a hard time reinterpreting text to my own likings, especially with women.
Whereas I'm more likely to reject the author's reading and continue to love my Emma Frost.
And with Emma - well - I just LOVE her too much, so I'm completely ignoring what's going on with her now. Her current writing doesn't make the slightest sense, so it doesn't deserve to go into Emma's history books (at least in my Emma history book). She was awesome until the end of Whedon's run. And, she's still awesome, but I'm just mad that readers have these awful images of Emma because of poor, poor writing, and people are starting to like her more because writers are trying to write her as likable. DO. NOT. WANT. I do NOT want people to like Emma!
And, do you think Whedon ruined Emma? I don't think he ruined her during his run (I fell in love with Emma during Whedon's run...or it was Morrison's? I can't quite remember!!!), but I think he might have ruined her after his run. Because, now people are writing her as extremely lame, and I think that's because writers feel that Whedon gave Emma a change of heart all because Kitty got stuck into his giant-size, metaphorical penis. (Giant-Size Astonishing X-Men was basically Joss' Giant-Size Metaphorical Penis.) EW, now that I think about it - DO YOU THINK JOSS DID THAT TO KITTY SO THAT NOBODY ELSE COULD "TOUCH" HER??? Initially and skeptically, I didn't think it was Joss' idea have Kitty lost in space - I wondered if Quesada forced him to write that shit ending because Q didn't want Kitty dead and wanted an easy way out just in case if he wanted her back for another story. And, we never got any interviews or comments from Joss after his Astonishing X-Men run...he just left! So sad. (And John Cassaday was interviewed, so it made me skeptical.)
PS...I saw the leaked version of "X-Men Origins Wolverine." And..umm...ummm....umm....I wanted to kill somebody after watching that movie, but umm...umm...I'm not going to say anything more unless you ask.
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