What Makes a “Strong Woman?”

 

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.