(no subject)
arabian, I saw the post in your journal about the "Why Steven Moffat Isn't All That" article first, and when I read the comments, there were things I wanted to say, but you and butterfly said them very well. Still, I'd like to say them, and since they are concerns about Who under Moffat, I figured I'd just post them here.
The first reason is that it's positive reinforcement. You don't need to be Pavlov to understand that if you get rewarded for something, you're going to keep doing that same thing in the hopes of more rewards. Which is what Moffat has done, and has happened. He gets rewarded for writing all these female characters who never break away from being stereotypes and conforming to traditional gender roles. This tells him that he's doing the right thing--and more than that, it tells other people that he's doing the right thing.
There are a lot of people those "other people" can be. They can be other writers, who might look at Moffat's success and try to emulate it by doing some of the things he does, which perpetuates the casual misogyny. They can also be the audience, who see these views validated and held up as a pinnacle of good writing.
Doctor Who is a family show, so that audience is heavily made up of kids. Kids are impressionable. There are reasons parents try not to curse in front of young kids--those kids will pick up on the behavior and try to copy it. And for an incredibly popular show like Doctor Who, one that is endorsed by parents and society, kids are going to find role models.
To get one thing straight right up front, I have absolutely no problem with women being wives, mothers, even stay-at-home moms. If that's what they want, if that's what they choose, then good for them. It's their choice to make, and I'm glad they've exercised it.
I don't have any children, but the thing is, if I did have daughters, I'd want them to understand that they can choose other things as well. Moffat doesn't show those other options. Nancy is a mother--even before we found out she's Jamie's mother, she's a mother-figure to the homeless children. Reinette is a professional Love Interest, and we basically never see her step outside that role. Larry Nightingale doesn't stand out in any way and we don't see any particular attraction between him and Sally Sparrow throughout the episode, yet Sally finishes her mystery and walks away with him holding hands. River Song is an archeologist, but the focus in these episodes is on her relationship with the Doctor, and in the end, we see her becoming a mother figure as well, with her last scene showing her with the kids, in a dress she'd never be able to wear while working.
I don't think there's anything wrong with women being mothers, mother-figures, and love interests. Those are real facets of a woman's character, and they have their own impact. But I want women to have significance beyond those roles. I want Sarah Jane, who goes on being a kick-ass reporter despite being nostalgic for the Doctor. I want Diana Goddard, who takes over Henry Van Statten's operations. I want Yvonne Hartmann, in charge of Torchwood. I want Martha Jones, who doesn't need a relationship with either the Doctor or Tom to be awesome. I want Queen Victoria, who misses her husband but still kicks ass. I want Harriet Jones and Lynda-with-a-y and Gwyneth and Mrs Moore/Angela Price and Rita and Ida Scott and Tallulah and Joan Redfern and Astrid Peth and Jenny and Agatha Christie. I want Donna Noble, who picked herself up after her failed marriage and went off to have adventures. I want Rose Tyler, who proactively went after the man she loved and helped save the universe along the way (not to mention everything she did as a companion as well).
There is nothing wrong with being a mother, a wife, a girlfriend, a lover. Where Moffat fails is that he rarely shows women having facets beyond those--and if it does happen, he reduces them back to those facets by the end of the story anyway. A lot of School Reunion is about Sarah Jane dealing with how the Doctor left her, but the reason they meet again in the first place is because Sarah Jane is being awesome and investigating things, and we end the episode with Sarah Jane going off to live her own life. Reinette, on the other hand, is Madame de Pompadour, a woman who led an incredibly interesting life, yet on screen, the only thing we are shown as an adult that does not have anything to do with her relationship with a man, either the Doctor or the King, is calming down Versailles. The only thing. And then in the end there's the letter that shows she waited for him until the end, and the fact that the episode ends on that makes it seems as if that's what her life was.
Most of the episodes of Doctor Who empower women, show that they can be their own person as well as lovers/wives/mothers. Moffat's episodes show that everything a woman is boils down to lover/wife/mother.
This is a damaging mentality, for boys as well as girls. The girls think that that's what they ultimately boil down to, but the boys think that as well, which is what gives rise to more casual misogyny.
I use the phrase "casual misogyny" because that's what it is. It's not overt. Often you really have to think about it to notice the depth to which it penetrates. It's casual because society has made it casual; people like Moffat have made it casual.
But it is this kind of thing that leads to things like unequal pay for equal work. It leads to the slow destruction of a woman's self-esteem as she is bombarded by validation from society, and the men who think like Moffat, of the idea that she is not worth as much as a man, that it's her job to support the man who saves the world rather than try to do it herself, that she can have no aspirations beyond being a lover/wife/mother. It leads to things like that awful "Open Source Boob Project", where women might feel pressured into letting other people freely touch what should be their private property, their bodies.
Casual misogyny is insidious. It tempts people into believing that it's not a big deal, because it's just one TV show, after all, and the guy writes interesting plots with some really clever lines. The writing makes up for the message, doesn't it?
Does it? Does it really? Letting this sort of thing go condones it. It says that it's all right if the message stinks as long as it's packaged prettily.
Maybe this doesn't matter to some people. Maybe they don't think it's as significant a factor as I do. I can't say that's fine with me, but I can't expect everyone to take on my pet causes and think of them with the same importance that I do. I can get along with people who love Moffat and don't see or don't care about the subtle message he sends.
But for me, I can't condone it, because I think it's a symptom of something worse, and a step in that direction.
I probably need a soapbox icon, after that. XD
The first reason is that it's positive reinforcement. You don't need to be Pavlov to understand that if you get rewarded for something, you're going to keep doing that same thing in the hopes of more rewards. Which is what Moffat has done, and has happened. He gets rewarded for writing all these female characters who never break away from being stereotypes and conforming to traditional gender roles. This tells him that he's doing the right thing--and more than that, it tells other people that he's doing the right thing.
There are a lot of people those "other people" can be. They can be other writers, who might look at Moffat's success and try to emulate it by doing some of the things he does, which perpetuates the casual misogyny. They can also be the audience, who see these views validated and held up as a pinnacle of good writing.
Doctor Who is a family show, so that audience is heavily made up of kids. Kids are impressionable. There are reasons parents try not to curse in front of young kids--those kids will pick up on the behavior and try to copy it. And for an incredibly popular show like Doctor Who, one that is endorsed by parents and society, kids are going to find role models.
To get one thing straight right up front, I have absolutely no problem with women being wives, mothers, even stay-at-home moms. If that's what they want, if that's what they choose, then good for them. It's their choice to make, and I'm glad they've exercised it.
I don't have any children, but the thing is, if I did have daughters, I'd want them to understand that they can choose other things as well. Moffat doesn't show those other options. Nancy is a mother--even before we found out she's Jamie's mother, she's a mother-figure to the homeless children. Reinette is a professional Love Interest, and we basically never see her step outside that role. Larry Nightingale doesn't stand out in any way and we don't see any particular attraction between him and Sally Sparrow throughout the episode, yet Sally finishes her mystery and walks away with him holding hands. River Song is an archeologist, but the focus in these episodes is on her relationship with the Doctor, and in the end, we see her becoming a mother figure as well, with her last scene showing her with the kids, in a dress she'd never be able to wear while working.
I don't think there's anything wrong with women being mothers, mother-figures, and love interests. Those are real facets of a woman's character, and they have their own impact. But I want women to have significance beyond those roles. I want Sarah Jane, who goes on being a kick-ass reporter despite being nostalgic for the Doctor. I want Diana Goddard, who takes over Henry Van Statten's operations. I want Yvonne Hartmann, in charge of Torchwood. I want Martha Jones, who doesn't need a relationship with either the Doctor or Tom to be awesome. I want Queen Victoria, who misses her husband but still kicks ass. I want Harriet Jones and Lynda-with-a-y and Gwyneth and Mrs Moore/Angela Price and Rita and Ida Scott and Tallulah and Joan Redfern and Astrid Peth and Jenny and Agatha Christie. I want Donna Noble, who picked herself up after her failed marriage and went off to have adventures. I want Rose Tyler, who proactively went after the man she loved and helped save the universe along the way (not to mention everything she did as a companion as well).
There is nothing wrong with being a mother, a wife, a girlfriend, a lover. Where Moffat fails is that he rarely shows women having facets beyond those--and if it does happen, he reduces them back to those facets by the end of the story anyway. A lot of School Reunion is about Sarah Jane dealing with how the Doctor left her, but the reason they meet again in the first place is because Sarah Jane is being awesome and investigating things, and we end the episode with Sarah Jane going off to live her own life. Reinette, on the other hand, is Madame de Pompadour, a woman who led an incredibly interesting life, yet on screen, the only thing we are shown as an adult that does not have anything to do with her relationship with a man, either the Doctor or the King, is calming down Versailles. The only thing. And then in the end there's the letter that shows she waited for him until the end, and the fact that the episode ends on that makes it seems as if that's what her life was.
Most of the episodes of Doctor Who empower women, show that they can be their own person as well as lovers/wives/mothers. Moffat's episodes show that everything a woman is boils down to lover/wife/mother.
This is a damaging mentality, for boys as well as girls. The girls think that that's what they ultimately boil down to, but the boys think that as well, which is what gives rise to more casual misogyny.
I use the phrase "casual misogyny" because that's what it is. It's not overt. Often you really have to think about it to notice the depth to which it penetrates. It's casual because society has made it casual; people like Moffat have made it casual.
But it is this kind of thing that leads to things like unequal pay for equal work. It leads to the slow destruction of a woman's self-esteem as she is bombarded by validation from society, and the men who think like Moffat, of the idea that she is not worth as much as a man, that it's her job to support the man who saves the world rather than try to do it herself, that she can have no aspirations beyond being a lover/wife/mother. It leads to things like that awful "Open Source Boob Project", where women might feel pressured into letting other people freely touch what should be their private property, their bodies.
Casual misogyny is insidious. It tempts people into believing that it's not a big deal, because it's just one TV show, after all, and the guy writes interesting plots with some really clever lines. The writing makes up for the message, doesn't it?
Does it? Does it really? Letting this sort of thing go condones it. It says that it's all right if the message stinks as long as it's packaged prettily.
Maybe this doesn't matter to some people. Maybe they don't think it's as significant a factor as I do. I can't say that's fine with me, but I can't expect everyone to take on my pet causes and think of them with the same importance that I do. I can get along with people who love Moffat and don't see or don't care about the subtle message he sends.
But for me, I can't condone it, because I think it's a symptom of something worse, and a step in that direction.
I probably need a soapbox icon, after that. XD