Body Bag Blondes: Why I Break Up With Stories.

[seanan_mcguire]

This is a topic that's been sitting in my rolling note file for a while, waiting both for the sting of the event that triggered it to fade, and for the actual event to recede far enough into the past that even a vague description wouldn't trigger a big red SPOILERS sign. So you know, it took more than two years. That's a long time, even for me

Comments

[trialia]

Uhm. Oddly enough, this is something a friend of mine who just read Feed and Deadline picked up as a point she didn't like about those two books - that it felt like "kill the girl" territory. It wasn't my original thought about them, but I can see why she might think that.

[seanan_mcguire]

OH GOD YES.

Part of why I insisted on a blatantly female pseudonym was that I looked at Feed and went "holy crap all the girls." But I was never killing women to cause male pain. I was killing characters to serve the story. I didn't mean for there to be so many dead girls. :( On the other hand...how many genre shows could have that many dead girls, because how many would have that many girls to kill?

[hoppytoad79]

On the other hand...how many genre shows could have that many dead girls, because how many would have that many girls to kill?

Excellent (and very sad) point. There's a high female body count, but only because so many were out there in the line of fire.

One thing I loved about Buffy is that she was a Queen of the Geeks and girly. Too often girl geeks only wear t-shirts and jeans and sneaks, aren't attractive (or if they are, they're clueless about doing their hair and make up), have no social skills,...you know the drill. Buffy was wicked smart and, yeah, her style might raise an eyebrow or two, but she had a style and she had flair and she had a social life.

[branna]

Girly geeks are definitely out there and deserve to be represented (I'd say that, I'm one of them).

Actually, there are also a lot of girl geeks who deliberately dress down despite knowing exactly what they're doing with girly stuff, simply because otherwise their geek cred isn't taken seriously. Which is a whole 'nother issue.

[hoppytoad79]

Down with the stereotype of geeks not having any fashion sense! Down with girls having to hide their gender!

[tiferet]

I'm a lolita and the fact that I'm either not taken seriously or expected to be sweet and demure all the time because I wear frills is seriously rage-inducing. But I don't feel like me if I'm not wearing anything feminine, except for very occasional moods that usually coincide with the desire to do some fun activity that isn't dress-positive.

[seanan_mcguire]

I love girly geeks.