Cordelia and Slut-Shaming
I'm afraid I'm being repetitive but AGAIN, I have to call out Buffyofwinterfell. What can I say? There's just so much awfulness in her blog that typifies a lot of my least favorite Buffyverse fandom awfulness. Complaining that morphs into a essay
Buffyofwinterfell asserts here that "Growing up is realizing that maybe Willow and Xander were outcasts not because they were “nerds,” but because they were self-centered, judgmental slut-shamers, and Xander probably creeped on every female friend they had before Buffy right out of their social circle."
Which, I mean, so many things wrong with a simple (run-on) sentence. S1-3 Canon exhaustively covered the popular sets' grounds for bullying Willow and Xander- bad clothes, awkwardness, Xander's lack of talent for sports, Willow's obsession with school, lack of success with the opposite sex. Yes, I think that Xander's overly forward and embarrassing pick-up tactics hurt him; that was a little his fault and a little him being unfortunate enough to have the social cachet to creepily hit on students like Blaine/Larry/Darryl/the swim team/the guy that told recently outcast Cordelia that she wasn't good enough to date but he'd deign to neck with her/etc. IMO, it's damn near impossible to castigate Willow for not being a good enough person to be popular in high school. It's about as hard as it is to castigate Buffy for being unpopular. I'll grant that Willow was too focused on Xander and later Buffy to take note of some other people in school that I think wanted to be her friend.
However, part of the beauty of dumb posts, is that they can be great jumping-off-points for argumentative essays. In the tags, Buffyofwinterfell trots out the same tired argument about how Willow was a HUGE slut-shamer in high school. As in, Willow said the following high school.
Phases
Willow: Great. I'll give Xander a call. What's his number? Oh, yeah, 1-800-I'm-Dating-A-Skanky-Ho. (rolls her eyes)
Enemies
Willow: Faith would totally do that. Faith was built to do that. She's the do that girl.
Buffy: Comfort, remember comfort, here?
Willow: I mean, please, does Angel come up to Faith's standards for a guy? Let's see, is he breathing?
Buffy: Actually, no.
And arguably:
Halloween
Giles: And your costume?
Willow: I'm a ghost!
Giles: Um, the ghost of what exactly.
Willow: (covers her midriff with her arms) Well, this is nothing. You should see what Cordelia was wearing. A unitard with cat things, like ears and stuff.
And that's it for Willow slut-shaming others in high school. End of story. She slut-shames herself (and what her vamp self says about her) more frequently. Post high school, Willow called Faith a "cleavagy slut-bomb". However, wow, two to three comments in high school is Willow being a "HUGE slut shamer" in high school. Not by my standards.
However, the ironic thing is that Cordelia fans/stans really love the slut-shaming argument. That's the hill that they want to die on. Read through a few pages of a Cordedlia's fans blogs/posts and you'll find such strident, self-righteous arguments about Xander (all the time) and Willow (usually) are THE WORST because they slut-shamed and apparently, that's the worst sexist scourge affecting mankind. However, has anyone thought to examine when and how *Cordelia* slut shames?
I submit that Cordelia's slut-shaming is worse than Willow's slut-shaming. Examples:
Faith, Hope, and Trick
Cordelia (on an unknown Faith): Check out Slut-o-Rama and her Disco Dave.
Faith, Hope and Trick
Faith: God, I could eat a horse. Isn't it crazy how slayin' just always makes you hungry and horny?
Cordelia: I get it!
Faith looks at her
Cordelia: Not the horny thing. Yuck! But the two slayer thing.
Homecoming
Xander: Whatcha doin'?
Cordelia: Checking out the I-laughingly-use-the-phrase competition.... (disparagingly) Holly Charleston: nice girl, brain dead, doesn't have a prayer. Michelle Blake: open to all mankind, especially those with a
letterman's jacket and a car. (reconsiders now, concerned) She could give me a run.
Eternity
Rebecca is running away from Angelus-(lite), terrified for her life.
Rebecca: “Oh, thank god! - You have to help me. He’s trying to kill me.”
Cordy (assuming that Rebecca gave him perfect happiness through sex): “You slut!”
Rebecca: “Huh?”
Cordy: “You did it with him, didn’t you?”
Untouched
Bethany: "Yeah. Where I'm from, you know, they still just have coffee. Everything else is that L.A. stuff."
Cordy: "Yeah. Don't bone my boss."
Bethany: "What?"
Cordy: "Angel. He's strictly a no-bone."
Bethany: "I wasn't... (Cordy raises her eyebrows at her) Cordelia, I don't wanna sleep with Angel."
Cordy: "The thing about Angel, he's old-fashioned - *old* fashioned - like the age of chivalry. He sees you as, pretty much, the damsel in distress. - I think it's a little more complicated than that."
Bethany: "W-why are you... I never..."
Cordy: "I think you're kind of dangerous. - I'm not being mean. I like you. I do. But - you come on all helpless and... I mean, people that have thought that you were helpless before - have died."
Couplet
Wesley: I do not believe it. On my desk?
Gunn: Well, it did used to be his. Maybe he was just kinda - reclaiming it.
Wesley: How? By marking it? - This isn't like him.
Cordy: What? This is totally like him. Doing the mystery dance with some cheap blonde?
Fred: Brunette. She was a cheap brunette.
Cordy: You're right. This isn't like him.
That Old Gang of Mine
Furies: "Only Angel is equipped to make good on this debt."
Cordy: "Angel. (Rude noise) I don't know. For a guy, who's a couple of centuries old - not very big with the wise investing. (Looks at the smiles on the furies faces) And when you say 'equipped' that isn't what you mean, is it?"
Furies: "Mmm, Angel."
Cordy: "Got it. And 'eww!'"
What I'm getting is that Willow felt justifiable, well-earned antagonism towards Cordelia for years of bullying and Faith for, by Enemies, framing Buffy, killing without remorse, assaulting Xander, and according to Buffy's tales of woe, making a play for Angel. (Also, Willow's more self-centered motives in the mix like Buffy treating Faith like her New Best Friend.) However, as a high school girl and one time as a college freshman, Willow expressed her antagonism wrongly by reaching for the standard, easy jibe of attacking for Cordelia and Faith for their sexuality instead of for their actions/gender-neutral character traits. It was all informed by how Willow felt her own dollop of shame for being overly sexual- and it took becoming sexually active and then, figuring out that she was gay for Willow to address the roots of that dysfunction.
However, Cordelia slut-shamed women that she never met or was just meeting for the first time- Faith, the Furies, and the assumed blonde that "Angel" had intercourse with in Couplet. Some of that was a Willowesque "talk behind the insultee's back so no one is really being *shamed* so much as defamed", but some of it was Cordelia telling Faith and the Furies to their face that they and their feelings are gross.
Cordelia slut-shamed Buffy as one of the "cheap blondes" when Buffy was mainly good to Cordelia and Cordelia has zero grounds to even say that Buffy is "cheap" by any metric of that stupid, sexist, classist, judgey, basically ALWAYS suspect insult. (Cordelia defamed Darla too- but Cordelia has a right to her Darla-resentment even though Darla, actually, didn't hurt Cordelia as personally and viscerally as Cordelia and Faith hurt Willow. Also, Cordelia, adjust Darla's standard price in the 1600s for inflation. You'll find that Darla was an *expensive* blonde.) And to cap it off, while Angel is many things, he's not a Lothario. He's hardly *always* having sex with blondes. And maybe if Cordelia wasn't idiotically slut-shaming Angel for shit that he REALLY doesn't do, she could play a productive role in coming to the rightful conclusion that there was something mystical afoot.
Cordelia slut-shamed Rebecca and Bethany- women that Cordelia was supposed to be *helping* instead of judging. And Cordelia managed to do it when both were terrified and traumatized, like they don't have enough on their mind, without Cordelia playing the Morality Police. IMO, "slut" would be a bad place to go even if Cordelia knew that Rebecca drugged Angel without his consent when she said it. Not the least of which because "slut" doesn't adequately and correctly describe the wrongness of Rebecca's actions. However, Cordelia didn't even know that Rebecca drugged Angel when Cordelia called Rebecca a slut. Cordelia just thought that Rebecca seduced Angel to become an eternally youthful vampire- with no understanding of the Perfect Happiness Curse or the nature of Buffyverse vampires (as opposed to other canon's vampires).
The Bethany-situation is a classic example of why genuine-article-feminists who wanted to solve actualfax problems got into the slut-shaming game. Rape victims have enough shame on their plate. They should be encouraged to open up to trusted counselors who want to to help them, instead of take advantage of them. One of the worst things that you can do to a rape victim to harshly lecture them for getting close and opening up to someone who has volunteered to be their mentor and counselor (as Angel had).
Now, I think that someone can compellingly argue sympathetic reasons for Cordelia actually oftentimes goes the slut-shaming route. Even as an 18+ year old who took on a job in the big, exploitative city of LA devoted to "saving souls" and "helping the helpless" who should really know better for her own sake and for the sake of her *clients*. As opposed to a high school girl who doesn't claim to "save souls", but just pitches in to help save lives for free in between classes. As an intellectual exercise, I've been trying to find a sympathetic, 3D view of Cordelia that is aware of her failings but doesn't go straight to ATTACK.
However, the first step there is to cut the hypocritical bullshit that permeates Cordelia-stanning and Xander/Willow-hate. I would agree that Cordelia has her own hang-ups on sexuality. She felt that her demonic pregnancy in Expecting was a punishment for having sex too early. She was preoccupied with whether necking with Xander in the car meant that her dad wouldn't consider her a "good girl". She was deeply ashamed of wearing a itsy-bitsy yellow polka dot bikini on national TV and how the asshole director of the commercial treated her for taking that job. Like high school Willow, Cordelia also applies these harsh standards of how to be sexually interesting without being a slut to herself. However with Cordelia, it's even more painful and more lasting because Cordelia chose to become an actress on the strength of her looks and a manpire's Girl Friday. Cordelia is trapped in her high-wire act to be the "right kind of sexy girl" because of her retro occupations more than college student Willow. Which is why Willow grows out of the slut-shaming while Cordelia continued to do it into the last year of her real life.
Moreover, Cordelia does her most offensive slut-shaming against Rebecca and Bethany in LA because Cordelia is Angel's Emotional Guard Dog. In fairness to Angel, Angel didn't ask or intimate to Cordelia that he wants her to start bashing on anyone who uncomfortably wants him. Cordelia came up with that idea entirely on her own. However I do think it's natural that when Cordelia is so closely emotionally guarding super-strong, blood historied, Batman confident Angel, Cordelia feels a need to exaggerate Darla, Buffy, Bethany, Rebecca or Eve into contemptible uber-dangers to make the case why they're the problem in the duo while Angel is all blameless and vulnerable and just needs to be protected and cossetted.
Yet ultimately, the point that I feel the strongest on in this essay is that Cordelia-stans should really take a good, long hard look at their fave before they turn slut shaming into the ultimate cause célèbre, particularly as a method to prop Cordelia as especially righteous or justified in her other classist, vicious, sexist remarks.
Buffyofwinterfell asserts here that "Growing up is realizing that maybe Willow and Xander were outcasts not because they were “nerds,” but because they were self-centered, judgmental slut-shamers, and Xander probably creeped on every female friend they had before Buffy right out of their social circle."
Which, I mean, so many things wrong with a simple (run-on) sentence. S1-3 Canon exhaustively covered the popular sets' grounds for bullying Willow and Xander- bad clothes, awkwardness, Xander's lack of talent for sports, Willow's obsession with school, lack of success with the opposite sex. Yes, I think that Xander's overly forward and embarrassing pick-up tactics hurt him; that was a little his fault and a little him being unfortunate enough to have the social cachet to creepily hit on students like Blaine/Larry/Darryl/the swim team/the guy that told recently outcast Cordelia that she wasn't good enough to date but he'd deign to neck with her/etc. IMO, it's damn near impossible to castigate Willow for not being a good enough person to be popular in high school. It's about as hard as it is to castigate Buffy for being unpopular. I'll grant that Willow was too focused on Xander and later Buffy to take note of some other people in school that I think wanted to be her friend.
However, part of the beauty of dumb posts, is that they can be great jumping-off-points for argumentative essays. In the tags, Buffyofwinterfell trots out the same tired argument about how Willow was a HUGE slut-shamer in high school. As in, Willow said the following high school.
Phases
Willow: Great. I'll give Xander a call. What's his number? Oh, yeah, 1-800-I'm-Dating-A-Skanky-Ho. (rolls her eyes)
Enemies
Willow: Faith would totally do that. Faith was built to do that. She's the do that girl.
Buffy: Comfort, remember comfort, here?
Willow: I mean, please, does Angel come up to Faith's standards for a guy? Let's see, is he breathing?
Buffy: Actually, no.
And arguably:
Halloween
Giles: And your costume?
Willow: I'm a ghost!
Giles: Um, the ghost of what exactly.
Willow: (covers her midriff with her arms) Well, this is nothing. You should see what Cordelia was wearing. A unitard with cat things, like ears and stuff.
And that's it for Willow slut-shaming others in high school. End of story. She slut-shames herself (and what her vamp self says about her) more frequently. Post high school, Willow called Faith a "cleavagy slut-bomb". However, wow, two to three comments in high school is Willow being a "HUGE slut shamer" in high school. Not by my standards.
However, the ironic thing is that Cordelia fans/stans really love the slut-shaming argument. That's the hill that they want to die on. Read through a few pages of a Cordedlia's fans blogs/posts and you'll find such strident, self-righteous arguments about Xander (all the time) and Willow (usually) are THE WORST because they slut-shamed and apparently, that's the worst sexist scourge affecting mankind. However, has anyone thought to examine when and how *Cordelia* slut shames?
I submit that Cordelia's slut-shaming is worse than Willow's slut-shaming. Examples:
Faith, Hope, and Trick
Cordelia (on an unknown Faith): Check out Slut-o-Rama and her Disco Dave.
Faith, Hope and Trick
Faith: God, I could eat a horse. Isn't it crazy how slayin' just always makes you hungry and horny?
Cordelia: I get it!
Faith looks at her
Cordelia: Not the horny thing. Yuck! But the two slayer thing.
Homecoming
Xander: Whatcha doin'?
Cordelia: Checking out the I-laughingly-use-the-phrase competition.... (disparagingly) Holly Charleston: nice girl, brain dead, doesn't have a prayer. Michelle Blake: open to all mankind, especially those with a
letterman's jacket and a car. (reconsiders now, concerned) She could give me a run.
Eternity
Rebecca is running away from Angelus-(lite), terrified for her life.
Rebecca: “Oh, thank god! - You have to help me. He’s trying to kill me.”
Cordy (assuming that Rebecca gave him perfect happiness through sex): “You slut!”
Rebecca: “Huh?”
Cordy: “You did it with him, didn’t you?”
Untouched
Bethany: "Yeah. Where I'm from, you know, they still just have coffee. Everything else is that L.A. stuff."
Cordy: "Yeah. Don't bone my boss."
Bethany: "What?"
Cordy: "Angel. He's strictly a no-bone."
Bethany: "I wasn't... (Cordy raises her eyebrows at her) Cordelia, I don't wanna sleep with Angel."
Cordy: "The thing about Angel, he's old-fashioned - *old* fashioned - like the age of chivalry. He sees you as, pretty much, the damsel in distress. - I think it's a little more complicated than that."
Bethany: "W-why are you... I never..."
Cordy: "I think you're kind of dangerous. - I'm not being mean. I like you. I do. But - you come on all helpless and... I mean, people that have thought that you were helpless before - have died."
Couplet
Wesley: I do not believe it. On my desk?
Gunn: Well, it did used to be his. Maybe he was just kinda - reclaiming it.
Wesley: How? By marking it? - This isn't like him.
Cordy: What? This is totally like him. Doing the mystery dance with some cheap blonde?
Fred: Brunette. She was a cheap brunette.
Cordy: You're right. This isn't like him.
That Old Gang of Mine
Furies: "Only Angel is equipped to make good on this debt."
Cordy: "Angel. (Rude noise) I don't know. For a guy, who's a couple of centuries old - not very big with the wise investing. (Looks at the smiles on the furies faces) And when you say 'equipped' that isn't what you mean, is it?"
Furies: "Mmm, Angel."
Cordy: "Got it. And 'eww!'"
What I'm getting is that Willow felt justifiable, well-earned antagonism towards Cordelia for years of bullying and Faith for, by Enemies, framing Buffy, killing without remorse, assaulting Xander, and according to Buffy's tales of woe, making a play for Angel. (Also, Willow's more self-centered motives in the mix like Buffy treating Faith like her New Best Friend.) However, as a high school girl and one time as a college freshman, Willow expressed her antagonism wrongly by reaching for the standard, easy jibe of attacking for Cordelia and Faith for their sexuality instead of for their actions/gender-neutral character traits. It was all informed by how Willow felt her own dollop of shame for being overly sexual- and it took becoming sexually active and then, figuring out that she was gay for Willow to address the roots of that dysfunction.
However, Cordelia slut-shamed women that she never met or was just meeting for the first time- Faith, the Furies, and the assumed blonde that "Angel" had intercourse with in Couplet. Some of that was a Willowesque "talk behind the insultee's back so no one is really being *shamed* so much as defamed", but some of it was Cordelia telling Faith and the Furies to their face that they and their feelings are gross.
Cordelia slut-shamed Buffy as one of the "cheap blondes" when Buffy was mainly good to Cordelia and Cordelia has zero grounds to even say that Buffy is "cheap" by any metric of that stupid, sexist, classist, judgey, basically ALWAYS suspect insult. (Cordelia defamed Darla too- but Cordelia has a right to her Darla-resentment even though Darla, actually, didn't hurt Cordelia as personally and viscerally as Cordelia and Faith hurt Willow. Also, Cordelia, adjust Darla's standard price in the 1600s for inflation. You'll find that Darla was an *expensive* blonde.) And to cap it off, while Angel is many things, he's not a Lothario. He's hardly *always* having sex with blondes. And maybe if Cordelia wasn't idiotically slut-shaming Angel for shit that he REALLY doesn't do, she could play a productive role in coming to the rightful conclusion that there was something mystical afoot.
Cordelia slut-shamed Rebecca and Bethany- women that Cordelia was supposed to be *helping* instead of judging. And Cordelia managed to do it when both were terrified and traumatized, like they don't have enough on their mind, without Cordelia playing the Morality Police. IMO, "slut" would be a bad place to go even if Cordelia knew that Rebecca drugged Angel without his consent when she said it. Not the least of which because "slut" doesn't adequately and correctly describe the wrongness of Rebecca's actions. However, Cordelia didn't even know that Rebecca drugged Angel when Cordelia called Rebecca a slut. Cordelia just thought that Rebecca seduced Angel to become an eternally youthful vampire- with no understanding of the Perfect Happiness Curse or the nature of Buffyverse vampires (as opposed to other canon's vampires).
The Bethany-situation is a classic example of why genuine-article-feminists who wanted to solve actualfax problems got into the slut-shaming game. Rape victims have enough shame on their plate. They should be encouraged to open up to trusted counselors who want to to help them, instead of take advantage of them. One of the worst things that you can do to a rape victim to harshly lecture them for getting close and opening up to someone who has volunteered to be their mentor and counselor (as Angel had).
Now, I think that someone can compellingly argue sympathetic reasons for Cordelia actually oftentimes goes the slut-shaming route. Even as an 18+ year old who took on a job in the big, exploitative city of LA devoted to "saving souls" and "helping the helpless" who should really know better for her own sake and for the sake of her *clients*. As opposed to a high school girl who doesn't claim to "save souls", but just pitches in to help save lives for free in between classes. As an intellectual exercise, I've been trying to find a sympathetic, 3D view of Cordelia that is aware of her failings but doesn't go straight to ATTACK.
However, the first step there is to cut the hypocritical bullshit that permeates Cordelia-stanning and Xander/Willow-hate. I would agree that Cordelia has her own hang-ups on sexuality. She felt that her demonic pregnancy in Expecting was a punishment for having sex too early. She was preoccupied with whether necking with Xander in the car meant that her dad wouldn't consider her a "good girl". She was deeply ashamed of wearing a itsy-bitsy yellow polka dot bikini on national TV and how the asshole director of the commercial treated her for taking that job. Like high school Willow, Cordelia also applies these harsh standards of how to be sexually interesting without being a slut to herself. However with Cordelia, it's even more painful and more lasting because Cordelia chose to become an actress on the strength of her looks and a manpire's Girl Friday. Cordelia is trapped in her high-wire act to be the "right kind of sexy girl" because of her retro occupations more than college student Willow. Which is why Willow grows out of the slut-shaming while Cordelia continued to do it into the last year of her real life.
Moreover, Cordelia does her most offensive slut-shaming against Rebecca and Bethany in LA because Cordelia is Angel's Emotional Guard Dog. In fairness to Angel, Angel didn't ask or intimate to Cordelia that he wants her to start bashing on anyone who uncomfortably wants him. Cordelia came up with that idea entirely on her own. However I do think it's natural that when Cordelia is so closely emotionally guarding super-strong, blood historied, Batman confident Angel, Cordelia feels a need to exaggerate Darla, Buffy, Bethany, Rebecca or Eve into contemptible uber-dangers to make the case why they're the problem in the duo while Angel is all blameless and vulnerable and just needs to be protected and cossetted.
Yet ultimately, the point that I feel the strongest on in this essay is that Cordelia-stans should really take a good, long hard look at their fave before they turn slut shaming into the ultimate cause célèbre, particularly as a method to prop Cordelia as especially righteous or justified in her other classist, vicious, sexist remarks.