This is
a topic that’s been on my mind lately, and when I talked on the blog about Black Widow and Meg Murray in quick succession, I was struck by the huge
differences between these two that I consider to be strong female
characters. (Now, at 14, Meg isn’t a
woman and hasn’t had any sort of training, but regardless, she was always going
to grow into a woman far removed from Black Widow.) At their cores, the two characters have a
similar strength that manifests in different ways. However, there are many more Black Widows in
fiction, especially film and TV, than Meg Murrays, and the Black Widows seem to
get a great deal more credit for their strength.
I have
nothing against action heroines – not at all!
You’ve already heard how I adore Black Widow, and I love Brienne from Game of Thrones, Zoe from Firefly, Katniss from The Hunger Games, and Starbuck from Battlestar Galactica, to name a few. It’s thrilling to see these women kicking
butt and taking names, women who, when they’re in trouble, can save themselves rather than wait for a man to
rescue them. They’re tough, smart, and
active in their own stories, and they don’t let their foes see when they’re
afraid. At the same time, the best
characters of this type have flaws and vulnerabilities, and all the women
listed above fit the bill nicely.
But
like I said, strength means more than handling oneself in a fight. Meg is strong enough to face her
insecurities, and she’s not alone. Watson
from Elementary has intelligence and
agency, and she holds her own against the frequently-stubborn Sherlock. Verity from An Adventure in Space and Time fights, not with her fists, but with
her words and her determination, and makes headway in a male-dominated industry
during a sexist time period (plus, she’s even more awesome for having been a real person.) Even mousy, painfully shy Fanny from Mansfield Park stands up to her uncle
with her knees knocking, weathering a tide of disapproval even though everyone
expects her to roll over.
I love
these women every bit as much as I do the physically-capable characters
above. And yet, their sorts of strength
get less attention than the more action-oriented sort. It’s particularly noticeable in genre fandoms,
and I’ll confess that I’ve not always been immune to this thinking. On Game
of Thrones, Sansa manages to stay alive in the viper’s nest of King’s Landing
by being savvy and keeping her head down, but her sword-wielding sister Arya is
more popular with fans. Is Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s efficient-and-deadly
May stronger than Simmons, even though Simmons demonstrates brilliance in the
face of incredible pressure and has proven willing to sacrifice herself for the
safety of her fellow agents?
Part of
my issue here is a desire to see a wider variety of rootable female
characters. I want complexity, and I
want the same plethora of options that men have. But beyond that, there’s an uneasy trend at
work in the popularity of action heroines.
By and large, the women lauded for their strength are physically strong,
often unemotional, and generally characterized as being decidedly “not girly.” Again, nothing wrong with these traits, but
all of them are coded as masculine. When
female characters are mainly praised for qualities associated with men, we run
into the unconscious suggestion that the only way for a woman to be strong is
to be like a man. Some, like my beloved
Buffy, possess fighting prowess and
feminine-coded interests; however, when Buffy is lauded, it’s not for her femininity. Let’s make more noise in support of heroines
of all types, reminding writers that
strength of character isn’t a gendered trait.
No comments:
Post a Comment