[40] The Avengers: Negative Space 20in20

[youcallitwinter]

So this happened:

Me: omg, it's so exciting, I wonder what Elena will look like with her game face on!
Friend: ...like Katherine with her game face on?
Me:

Moving on.

Comments

[upupa_epops]

LOL, I just came back from a walk with a friend who's reading 50 Shades now. She gave me a full rant about how terrible female sexuality is in this book, and told me never to read it, because, knowing my attitude, I'd, idk, implode. Or something. AND NOW YOU'RE TELLING ME THAT THIS BOOK IS CONSIDERED FEMINIST? Do those people know what feminism is?

[youcallitwinter]

YOU HAVE SMART FRIENDS, HOLD ONTO THAT ONE. No, but seriously, I think that's the promotion for the book. That it's bold and daring and is opening up female sexuality, etc, and people are buying into it and I just don't know. This sort of stuff really gets to me D:

[upupa_epops]

MEH. Now I sort of want to read it and write a feminist rant about it :(. But I also want to have a feminist rant about TVD fanfiction, and female agency in TVD fandom. I'm just full of feminist rant lately :(.

[youcallitwinter]

Don't even bother, trufax, it's too much like writing a feminist rant on some random bad smut!fic that is very, very obviously misogynistic, there'd be no point D: (Although if Ian does do the movie, THEN you can write the rant for sure xD)

omg, but HELL YES to the TVD rant though! Ohh, fandom and fanfiction, that would be really cool. WHAT ABOUT THE SHOW? There is a lot to rant about in the show itself /nods

[upupa_epops]

Yes, the show itself is problematic as well, but this rant idea is fandom-only. Basically, when you compare Elena-bashing, some Elena fanfiction (D/E in particular) and 50 Shades of Grey, things start adding up. Elena is criticized for "making decisions" (because it always leads to a ~catastrophe). At the same time, fanfiction portrays Elena as completely devoid of sexual agency, innocent (much like the heroine of 50 Shades), but, at the same time, experiencing extreme sexual pleasure. She almost blacks out. Her body betrays her. She can't help it. The passion is too overwhelming. And it's actually a pretty accurate depiction of how female sexuality works in our culture? Women are "free" now, we're allowed to have sex, we know that sex should be fun. But, at the same time, we haven't dealt with the Victorian baggage yet. We still operate on Madonna/Whore rules. We're allowed to have sex... but we aren't allowed to pursue guys! We're allowed to have sexual pleasure, but it's slutty to be sexually active. So instead we get rape-like

Pt 1 lolwut

[youcallitwinter]

Oh, is it an Elena-specific rant? That should be so interesting! I haven’t read much fic in this fandom for some odd reason. Most of the Elena-bashing I’ve seen is divided into three categories; those who follow the Madonna/Whore dichotomy and blame her for stringing the Salvatores along, playing them etc. etc. And those who believe that the show is not self-conscious enough in their writing and are trying to portray her a certain way and completely failing. (Like, they want her to be manipulative and selfish and everything, but with the show’s self-consciously portraying her as that, instead of trying to make her out to be selfless martyr etc. etc.) and those who are simply bored with the character and the triangle and things, which, y’know, personal choice I suppose. :s

It’s terrible, but all that you mentioned is common to the portrayal of pretty much all female characters by fandom and I don’t even know why. You know, the oddest thing is that TVD fandom is actually still better than most, because of how well Katherine is received

Re: Pt 1 lolwut

[upupa_epops]

Well, it's Elena-specific, because I mostly have Elena-related data. If you have examples of themes like that (a female character loses her virginity to an experienced, dominant man; a female character loses control over her body during sex; romanticized dub-con/non-con imagery that ends with mindblowing orgasms; a female character being completely passive during sex, while the guy does all the job; a male character "mentoring" the female character), I will love you forever!

Hmmm, I'm a mod on a huge, multifandom Polish forum, and, since the forum is huge, you can find all sorts of people there. A good sample, that is. And, from what I've seen, Katherine is not well-liked at all. People say she's selfish, manipulative and incapable of love.

Re: Pt 1 lolwut

[youcallitwinter]

Haha, yeah, I figured that after posting; it's a good idea to concentrate; there's lots to rage about-- channeling is A+++ :D And the strangest thing about those fics is that Elena wasn't even a virgin when she met Stefan; she lost her virginity to Matt, that's canon D: WHERE DO PEOPLE GET THEIR INFO FROM? And Damon is going "blow her mind" and be so much "better" than Stefan, and sex=true love. just, ugh, shut up, fandom.

Ooh, I did not know this :O All that I've seen of fandom is very, very pro-Katherine. I've seen the selfish and loves herself argument, but not by many people. And most of those people are Damon stans who hate Katherine for what she did to him, so I simply don't count their opinion /shrug. That's sad, I really thought something must be right if Katherine got all the love she gets.

Re: Pt 1 lolwut

[upupa_epops]

And the strangest thing about those fics is that Elena wasn't even a virgin when she met Stefan; she lost her virginity to Matt, that's canon D: WHERE DO PEOPLE GET THEIR INFO FROM? And Damon is going "blow her mind" and be so much "better" than Stefan, and sex=true love. just, ugh, shut up, fandom.

Some authors "solve" this "problem" with oral sex: Elena isn't a virgin, but Damon is the first guy to go down on her.

Re: Pt 1 lolwut

[youcallitwinter]

OHHH, YES. I've seen that A LOT. It's so weird how that's totally a prevalent fandom trope for pretty much every fandom. It's like they all want to revirginify the woman so she can fully appreciate the man. :s

Re: Pt 1 lolwut

[upupa_epops]

Also, you know what? There's absolutely NOTHING in canon that would confirm that Elena lost her virginity to Matt. We just ASSUME she did -- because when she first sleeps with Stefan, she shows initiative. So, obviously, she couldn't have been a virgin, because virgins are innocent and sexually passive. We can't imagine a scenario in which a virgin has sex with a more experienced partner and it's her who calls the shots, and him who's hesitating.

Re: Pt 1 lolwut

[youcallitwinter]

Ohh, I never thought of that-- but I think it's actually canon? Like, as far as I remember Caroline once said something about how Elena and Matt were each others' firsts. And I remember someone else mentioning it too, while we were having a discussion about this very trope of people writing Elena-as-a-virgin. But otherwise, it's true, if a virgin does show initiative it's hot because her inexperience is adorable. Lol, I did not know I had so many feelings about ridiculous fic tropes.

Re: Pt 1 lolwut

[upupa_epops]

Like, as far as I remember Caroline once said something about how Elena and Matt were each others' firsts.

Yes, but I think she says it to Stefan (I'm not sure?) so it would be awkward if he was informing her friend's boyfriend about said friend's sex life... I read what Caroline said as "Matt was her first real boyfriend", not "her first sexual partner". It's ambiguous in my opinion. Matt could've slept with her, he could've just had oral sex with her, or maybe they just got to second base? We don't know. But we automatically assume that she didn't lose her virginity to Stefan, because she was the more active partner during their first intercourse.

Re: Pt 1 lolwut

[youcallitwinter]

I don't know, but I'm pretty sure it's canon? Elena mentioned it too somewhere, while talking about Matt. I think it's still veiled, so I suppose you could read it alternately, but I think it's kind of definitive that that was what the show meant. I've only seen any episode of any season once, so I don't remember much, but there have been discussions and I think it was kind of established that Matt/Elena happened. There WAS a lot of discussion about it because everyone wanted to know if she lost her virginity to Stefan, and I think everyone always quoted the show!

[youcallitwinter]

I thought the worst fandom has ever been in terms of its misogyny was re: Caroline/Damon and Damon/Andie. I mean, I still can’t think of it without going into a rage (and I have made several rage-y posts about it). Caroline was a ‘slut’ for sleeping with Damon in 1st season and after that all the compulsion is nullified (also because, hey Damon is hot. Hot guys forcing you into sex isn’t rape, everyone knows that!) And that thought still exists, because Caroline is awesome ‘NOW’ as according to fandom; when she was this insecure girl who slept with a guy because she was feeling down and he showed some interest in her, she was the most hated character in fandom. I remember every D/E fic at the time villianized her and made out Elena as being ‘so much better’ than that slut Caroline and obviously Damon would like her more because she didn’t throw herself at him like Caroline did. Andie didn’t get that same level of hate, because no one really cared about Andie, including the narrative, but THIS:

[upupa_epops]

UGH THAT ANDIE MACRO :(((((((((.

And that thought still exists, because Caroline is awesome ‘NOW’ as according to fandom; when she was this insecure girl who slept with a guy because she was feeling down and he showed some interest in her, she was the most hated character in fandom.

I wasn't actually in TVD fandom back then, and I don't particularly like early s1 fic, so it always baffles me when you say something like that. Why so awful, fandom? :(

Because you can’t blame the author and you can’t blame the reader if the social situation itself doesn’t allow for anything else. But the thing is, this sort of creates a cycle because it’s women propagating stereotypes about women and then influencing a whole readership and ugh idek really.

Exactly! I more or less know WHAT is wrong with fandom, but I keep wondering why...