This is always a grey area on the show, isn't it?:-)
Otoh, there's the fact that it is in Dean's character to talk the way he does and be less than p.c. Otoh, there really isn't always a reason for the show to make the decisions that it does about female characters. I'm not always bothered by it, but sometimes their choices do seem to present a certain view of the world that I don't always think is accurate. I don't know, for instance, that widespread rape in the Congo means they have to overrepresent women as victims on the show. On the contrary, I think they overrepresent women as victims more based on their own fantasies or just the way they think stories should go. Saving the girl is a pretty common western idea, after all.
As for the whore line, I'm afraid I don't see it in as optimistic a light here. I know about the Whore of Babylon in the Bible, but I think making her a girl so that Dean can say "some days you get to kill a whore" intentionally linked the word to Dean's usual insults to evil women. I mean...it's hard to explain but...using the word "whore" to refer to a city in the Bible imo is not removing the connection to women and female sexuality. It's using a word wrapped up in judgments about female sexuality and women in general and applying it to something else.
I think the word whore has been more disconnected from that in modern language, actually. Like when people say someone is a "famewhore" it can, I think, apply to a man or a woman and refers more to the act of selling out for money than it does to female sexuality. I remember after the episode a lot of people asking why the show just didn't cast the Whore as male and so avoid yet another scene where our young male heroes gang up to kill a whore--I think that would have been a great idea. Making her a girl I think just made Dean's line a double joke. He was killing the Whore meaning the character referred to in the Bible, but he was also killing yet another evil woman, which he usually refers to as whores anyway, using sexist language, even if that sexist language is accurate for how that character would probably talk.
Grey - absolutelysu_darklilyApril 16 2010, 13:48:47 UTC
Oh I knew I was inviting trouble when I tackled the 'whore' line.
I just wanted to try to create a discussion where we could distinguish between what was happening in the show, and what we projected onto the show. I don't think I was completely successful in that but your response keeps me hoping that we'll get there.
What I was hoping to establish (and I don't think I did this explicitly so here goes) was the point that given the extent of violence against women in real life (which was the point of examples like the rapes in Congo - where every woman, including young children, have been raped, or will be raped), the amount of violence shown in SPN against women is neither excessive nor exploitative. From the western pov, maybe. But then, if you start looking into the so called safe part of the world, you get stories like the Fathers who keep their daughters locked up for over twenty years and beget multiple incestuous children etc. There is no safe place for women. I don't think SPN is being slanting bias in showing violence against women, I think that SPN is reflecting the violence against women, right here, right now, in our world.
Mind you, my point was not to in fact make a defend the specific elements of the show, like in the case of your comments about the judgments made by the production in the casting of the Whore. After all, you are completely right in that the 'Whore' could have been played by a male actor as well as a female actor. In fact, you could start arguing whether or not the show could have looked into setting up all of the town in 5.17 to be the 'Whore' - this is because up to the end of wedding sequence, I was starting to get all excited as I was wondering if everyone in town was 'in on it' and then got a bit deflated when I realised as they went off on to their merry way to hunt the demons, that no, we were going to go for the MoW stereotype. I was sort of disappointed that they went down into limiting the role to one person, never mind the gender!
I think that it's valid and healthy to question the choices made by the show, and I remember when I was a fan of Star Trek shows and Babylon 5, that there was a pretty strong debate in the fandoms about how minority races were selected in primarily to play 'aliens' on these shows, in reflection of their 'alien' status in a white centric world.
I just think there's a difference between using our social context to question whether there is an element of sexism in the process used in casting or regarding any other aspects of production and in condemning the universe created within the storyline as being sexist based primarily on these choices in production, without regard for whether these choices were consistent within the internal structure of the text. Did that make sense?
So I do absolutely agree that treatment and portrayal of women in SPN is a serious matter for debate and discussion.
You really do raise great points for me to think about Sister Magpie. Please keep it up.
Re: Grey - absolutelysistermagpieApril 16 2010, 14:28:24 UTC
Thanks! And I am very glad you are writing meta for the show--I really enjoyed it. You are brave to take on this subject as well! ;-)
I do think your thoughts about it make sense--and it is a good thing to discuss. Because it does often come down to the question of imagining someone like Dean, for instance, speaking differently. A lot of the words he uses do make sense for the character. The language is sexist, but it's also common. And just as in the real world, Dean's use of the language doesn't necessarily make him a black hat who doesn't respect women at all. There's plenty of situations where a woman would be far better to be with Dean than with another guy who didn't use that language--and there are plenty of times on the show where we see Dean respecting women as well.
Probably the reason it gets talked about so much is that the show's lack of thought about it probably reflects the lack of thought about it in the real world, if that makes sense.
Otoh, there's the fact that it is in Dean's character to talk the way he does and be less than p.c. Otoh, there really isn't always a reason for the show to make the decisions that it does about female characters. I'm not always bothered by it, but sometimes their choices do seem to present a certain view of the world that I don't always think is accurate. I don't know, for instance, that widespread rape in the Congo means they have to overrepresent women as victims on the show. On the contrary, I think they overrepresent women as victims more based on their own fantasies or just the way they think stories should go. Saving the girl is a pretty common western idea, after all.
As for the whore line, I'm afraid I don't see it in as optimistic a light here. I know about the Whore of Babylon in the Bible, but I think making her a girl so that Dean can say "some days you get to kill a whore" intentionally linked the word to Dean's usual insults to evil women. I mean...it's hard to explain but...using the word "whore" to refer to a city in the Bible imo is not removing the connection to women and female sexuality. It's using a word wrapped up in judgments about female sexuality and women in general and applying it to something else.
I think the word whore has been more disconnected from that in modern language, actually. Like when people say someone is a "famewhore" it can, I think, apply to a man or a woman and refers more to the act of selling out for money than it does to female sexuality. I remember after the episode a lot of people asking why the show just didn't cast the Whore as male and so avoid yet another scene where our young male heroes gang up to kill a whore--I think that would have been a great idea. Making her a girl I think just made Dean's line a double joke. He was killing the Whore meaning the character referred to in the Bible, but he was also killing yet another evil woman, which he usually refers to as whores anyway, using sexist language, even if that sexist language is accurate for how that character would probably talk.
Reply
I just wanted to try to create a discussion where we could distinguish between what was happening in the show, and what we projected onto the show. I don't think I was completely successful in that but your response keeps me hoping that we'll get there.
What I was hoping to establish (and I don't think I did this explicitly so here goes) was the point that given the extent of violence against women in real life (which was the point of examples like the rapes in Congo - where every woman, including young children, have been raped, or will be raped), the amount of violence shown in SPN against women is neither excessive nor exploitative. From the western pov, maybe. But then, if you start looking into the so called safe part of the world, you get stories like the Fathers who keep their daughters locked up for over twenty years and beget multiple incestuous children etc. There is no safe place for women. I don't think SPN is being slanting bias in showing violence against women, I think that SPN is reflecting the violence against women, right here, right now, in our world.
Mind you, my point was not to in fact make a defend the specific elements of the show, like in the case of your comments about the judgments made by the production in the casting of the Whore. After all, you are completely right in that the 'Whore' could have been played by a male actor as well as a female actor. In fact, you could start arguing whether or not the show could have looked into setting up all of the town in 5.17 to be the 'Whore' - this is because up to the end of wedding sequence, I was starting to get all excited as I was wondering if everyone in town was 'in on it' and then got a bit deflated when I realised as they went off on to their merry way to hunt the demons, that no, we were going to go for the MoW stereotype. I was sort of disappointed that they went down into limiting the role to one person, never mind the gender!
I think that it's valid and healthy to question the choices made by the show, and I remember when I was a fan of Star Trek shows and Babylon 5, that there was a pretty strong debate in the fandoms about how minority races were selected in primarily to play 'aliens' on these shows, in reflection of their 'alien' status in a white centric world.
I just think there's a difference between using our social context to question whether there is an element of sexism in the process used in casting or regarding any other aspects of production and in condemning the universe created within the storyline as being sexist based primarily on these choices in production, without regard for whether these choices were consistent within the internal structure of the text. Did that make sense?
So I do absolutely agree that treatment and portrayal of women in SPN is a serious matter for debate and discussion.
You really do raise great points for me to think about Sister Magpie. Please keep it up.
Reply
I do think your thoughts about it make sense--and it is a good thing to discuss. Because it does often come down to the question of imagining someone like Dean, for instance, speaking differently. A lot of the words he uses do make sense for the character. The language is sexist, but it's also common. And just as in the real world, Dean's use of the language doesn't necessarily make him a black hat who doesn't respect women at all. There's plenty of situations where a woman would be far better to be with Dean than with another guy who didn't use that language--and there are plenty of times on the show where we see Dean respecting women as well.
Probably the reason it gets talked about so much is that the show's lack of thought about it probably reflects the lack of thought about it in the real world, if that makes sense.
Reply
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