| Martin Spang Olsen har allerede sagt det der skal siges om den film i Smagsdommerne, men jeg havde ikke set eller læst nogen anmeldelser, så jeg tog ind og så den idag.
Nøj, hvor var den kedelig. Fuld af klicheer, alt for nemt at gætte alle gåderne, nem at forudsige, langtrukken, træls dyrkelse af mord og voldtægt af kvinder. Kvalmende, uintelligent og kedelig. Skuespillerne var allesammen gode, og nogle af dem var endda fremragende, men det er ikke værd at se filmen bare for det.
Jeg ved ikke så meget om det tekniske, men jeg kan da sige at jeg synes farven og lyset var kedelige, den var okay filmet, klipningen var flere steder påfaldende, og musikken var god. | comments: 2 comments or Leave a comment   |
| I've previously tried with a clematis on my balcony, but it died when I forgot to water it, and I never saw it bloom - the late blooming varieties are cheaper, and I just got the cheapest one.
This year I planted a white hollyhock. They're much hardier than clematis, and bloom early. They prefer full sun, but mine gets only half sun, so I hadn't been sure it would make it. It's only 1 m tall, where the ones I see other people have are usually 2 - 3 m. It also started blooming a bit later. The flowers are really pretty, large and crepe-y, and much more noticeable than I had thought they would be against the green leaves and yellow wall.
Yesterday one of the branches broke off my tomato. I had nipped it to make it branch out, and it grew three branches, all with many flowers. It's nice to look at, but it did block out a lot of the light from the window, and got in the way when I opened the fridge door. I have been faithfully shaking it every day to help with pollination, and the shaking plus the weight of the tomatoes was just too much for it. I like it better now it only has two branches. They both have something to support them too, so I think they'll be all right. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| The fic is Little Bit of Inertia, Little Bit of Momentum by ![[info]](http://s.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png) juice817, written for the Supernatural and J-Squared Big Bang. It's an RPS AU, which means it's an m/m fic about original characters, and the characters have been "cast" with the names and likenesses of real people.
[Edited to add, June 3rd. When I first read this fic, I came across some triggering content. I was upset, and went on a long ride to clear my head. I realized why some elements of the fic had disturbed me, and I tagged my bookmark of it on delicious with betrayal.of.trust involuntarily.being.tied.up involuntarily.being.shut.in.an.enclosed.space abduction involuntarily.being.held.down noncon/dubcon emotional.manipulation because those elements can be triggering to other people than me, and I thought someone might find the tags useful. I also commented on the fic annoucements with a greyed-out warning that the fic contained betrayal.of.trust involuntarily.being.tied.up involuntarily.being.shut.in.an.enclosed.space abduction involuntarily.being.held.down, I think. I no longer have the original comment. Now that might or might not be useful to other readers with similar triggers, but the fic was still bothering me. In an attempt to get it out of my subconscious, I wrote this entry which looks only at the triggering content, and which casts everything in the fic in a different light. It is a purely emotional reaction to triggering content, and not an attempt at a critical reading as some have assumed. It is a true and genuine reaction, but not the typical reaction or the reaction the author intended their readers to have. I welcome comments and discussion, but I will not put up with anyone harassing anyone else in my journal.]
The Ackles and the Padalecki family are good friends, and they introduce their two young sons, Jensen and Jared, to each other. Jensen does not want to go, and resists passively all the way to the remote cabin where the meeting takes place. Once there, he goes along with it so as not to hurt Jared's feelings.
The boys are brought together every summer. Jared seems oblivious to the arranged relationship, but Jensen is initially willing. One day they go walking in the forest surrounding the remote cabin, and get lost. This makes it clear that the cabin is indeed, very remote.
Jensen changes his mind about the arranged relationship when he learns that Jared has a girl friend. He's in college and living alone, and he cuts off all contact with the Padaleckis, and most of the contact with his own family. He refuses to spend his vacations with them, and screens his mail and calls.
Then Jensen's trusted friend and assistant goes behind his back and conspires with his family, to let his family know what his schedule is, and to make sure no one will miss him over the summer by clearing his schedule and telling his colleagues he's going on vacation.
Jensen's mom tells him he must come to the remote cabin, and he gets one chance to go voluntarily. Jensen refuses to go.
Jensen and Jared's brothers abduct Jensen, tie him up and shut him in the covered back of a pick-up truck and transport him to the remote cabin. Jensen's mom had arranged the whole thing, and is only angry that they didn't tie him up in the cab and put a seat-belt on him.
Everyone starts emotionally manipulating Jensen, and guilt-tripping him about cutting off contact. He can't avoid spending time alone with Jared. Jared is no longer oblivious to the arranged relationship, he very much wants it. Jared very much likes seeing Jensen hold a cute baby, Jared's nephew who looks as if he were Jared's son, and Jensen's sister tells Jensen that she will surrogate for him and Jared once they are together.
Jensen gets drunk, alone in a tee-pee with Jared (I don't know how he gets drunk, I was kind of reading between my fingers at this point), and when he wakes up, woozy and confused, Jared is forcibly holding him down, using a blanket and his body weight. Jensen very clearly says "Get off me", but Jared does not. Instead he symbolically consummates the arranged relationship with a kiss.
Scary, scary stuff. I especially found the idea of Jensen's support network outside of the family betraying and manipulating him viscerally horrifying. In the fic, Jensen is living alone and has a good career as a chiropractor, so there's no reason that he couldn't escape if he really wanted to, though it would mean saying goodbye to his family forever, except of course for the obvious reason that the relationship was arranged by the author and Jensen's family and his friend have only the vaguest of reasons within the text to act the way they do.
In real life, this sort of thing happens all the time, and the young people trying to escape arranged marriages, quite apart from the constant guilt-tripping and emotional manipulation, and the knowledge that people they trust may turn against them for their own good or for the honor of their family, don't have the resources to live independently in hiding. In western countries with laws that value individual rights over society's rights they can go to the authorities, if they can get away long enough. Then they just have to hope and pray no one discovers their plans before the can arrange their escape, and live in fear for the rest of their lives.
I find it very interesting and unexpected to read a fic written from the moral stand point of the betrayers/abusers, rather than the victim. The author presents it as a morally unambiguous romance:
"Warnings/Spoilers: Schmoop. Childishness and obliviousness too.
Summary: Jensen has been avoiding his former best friend Jared for nearly ten years, but with their moms being best friends too, it couldn't last forever. When Jensen is roped into a summer in the woods, he learns that things were maybe not what he'd thought way back when. And that maybe you really can go home again."
The ending is happy, because once the relationship has been consummated and there is no escape, Jensen is "home again". The romance is "schmoopy". Someone is exhibiting "childishness" - is it Jensen for refusing to go to the cabin, both as a kid and as an adult, or is it the abduction which the brothers overdid in a childish way? I don't know, but "childishness and obliviousness too", by the way the two nouns are paired seems to indicate to me that the one who is childish is Jensen, since Jared is the one who is oblivious to his destiny for much of the fic.
I was scared and upset by the fic, though less so than I would have been had the author used canon characters or spent more time building up a relationship between Jensen and me, the reader. I firmly believe that an author should be absolutely free to write their metadata any way they please, with or without warnings, with or without details. And juice817 did attach warnings to their fic, just representing a different, equally valid reading.
Normally, I would not have done or said anything, but after the warning debate I've been following and taking part in, I have carefully considered my reasons for considering warnings voluntary, and for not asking for warnings, and I have also carefully considered how warnings can be useful to others. Perhaps in a case such as this, where the author has no reason to consider their fic horrifying noncon but I do, it would be a service to others for me to warn them.
At first I bookmarked the fic on delicious.com, but then I also thought it might be a good idea to put a warning in a comment to the master post. Then I decided it would be more helpful in the link from the comm. I don't know. I went for a long ride to clear my mind, but the fic just kept eating at me. I hope writing this entry about it will have moved it out of my subconscious, so I don't have to deal with it emotionally or in my sleep over the next several days.
ETA June 2nd: my comment with warnings has been deleted. I don't understand why, since I had greyed them out, but perhaps they hurt the feelings of the author? | | comments: 21 comments or Leave a comment |
| I signed up for Remix Redux this time, because for the first time ever I qualify. Well, after hurriedly writing two drabbles. I do feel a bit sorry for whoever drew my name, there's not much to choose from, but still very excited to see what they'll write.
I was extremely lucky with who I drew! They've written several fics in fandoms I know, and also some fics with very intriguing summaries in a fandom I don't know. It'll be easy for me to find a plot that speaks to me. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| An artist duo called The Art Guys, each of whom is already legally married, is marrying an oak sapling in a piece of performance art called The Art Guys Marry a Plant.
Now I'm all for poly marriages, as long as all of the partners are consenting adults, and I'm all for tree loving. It seems to me that people who fall in love/lust with plants or inanimate objects in some ways have it easier than most people. I'm assuming they don't have to worry about unrequited love.
But these guys are not in a poly relationship, it seems they've not asked or received their wives' permission for this stunt, and they don't love the tree or even want to be around it.
In this article one of The Art Guys is asked about the gay marriage debate: "I don't even care about that," says Galbreth of the gay-marriage issue. "It doesn’t even warrant discussion. I'm happy that the issue is out there because it helps promotes us, in a crude sense, when the people mistakenly think that it's a political gesture, which to my mind, it's not."
Until now, I've never understood how the conservative Christians could believe that same sex couples wishing equal civil recognition of their partnership and/or a religious blessing of their partnership was in any way an affront or threat to them or their marriage. But I get it now. This is what it feels like when someone makes a mockery of an institution I cherish and value so highly I'm willing to fight for my right to partake in it.
The Art Guys are fucking douche-bag trolls who mock marriage between two people, poly marriages and people with plant/object fetishes. Now I've gone and given them more attention, but I sure hope no one gives them any money for this repulsive stunt. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Science writer Simon Singh has written an article where he questions the use of chiropractic in the treatment of asthma and other infant conditions. Now The British Chiropractic Association has sued him for libel. UK libel law is special in that in places the burden of proof on the defendant, and the trials are very costly.
This is clearly an attempt to silence him, and for the BCA to avoid defending their medical treatments through discussion of the peer reviewed medical literature or through debate in the mainstream media.
If you want to stop questionable medical practitioners being able to silence debate about their methods by using the libel laws, please sign here. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| I updated my website. It's been 5 years since I updated it last O_o
Took me three hours, and I had to correct the same mistakes over and over again when I got tired and uploaded the corrected file to the wrong folder. But now it's finally done!
Including the last two Permutations fics by Swtalmnd and Ximeria. My webcounter was telling me that people are still reading the series, so it's really too bad that I hadn't uploaded the final parts until now.
I changed the lay-out a bit, to hopefully make the site easier to navigate. I really need a new look for it too, but I had better save that for another day. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| I have two friends who are really creative. They both write fic and make fanart, and though they beat themselves up for not producing "enough", their output makes me boggle. My only fannish activity that isn't lurking has been beta-reading, for the longest time. I've missed being creative, but I've learned that I can't make myself sit down and write unless I feel that I'm communicating with someone, not just putting a message in a bottle and hoping it arrives to someone somewhere.
My two friends have been involving me more and more in their fannish activities, luring me to watch their shows, read their fic, look at their art, volunteer for the OTW, and it's such a great feeling to be involved again, and share a fandom with someone I know personally.
A few days ago, I felt that I was ready to take the plunge back into writing fic. Partly it's procrastinating from real life duties, but if it hadn't been for them I would have found some other way to get my mind off the stuff I have to do. Thank you ximeria and nicci_mac!
Anyway, I knew the window of opportunity was brief - I can talk myself out of writing even better than I can talk myself out of vacuum cleaning, and vacuum cleaning is my most hated house-hold chore. I quickly looked up as many challenge communities in as many fandoms where I knew the canon reasonably well as I could. When it comes to writing, I need someone else to tell me what to do, a deadline, and a target audience, or I end up just making up stories in my head to amuse myself, without bothering to write them down.
My final choice: sga_flashfic, because I got the premise confused with the one where you only have half an hour, or whatever, to write. I looked in the rules, but it seemed that you had two weeks and were expected to put some thought and effort into your fic, and further inspection of the fics posted seemed to bear this out... However, I decided to pretend not to know this, for reasons of being cripplingly perfectionist and nit-picky, and needing excuses for handing in something I'm not perfectly satisfied with.
Through my many years of schooling this has usually meant writing essays on the bus or in the break before class, or in university the night before papers were due. Lalala, it's not my fault such and such and such could use some serious editing, it's actually pretty good for something I just wrote when I got up at 4 am this very morning! This mature and efficient time-managing which higher education has imparted upon me will surely serve me well in my future professional career.
Anyway, the best part of posting fic is the feedback. Without feedback, you're left with only the satisfaction of having done a good job. And that level of satisfaction for that level of effort is just not good economic sense. Having attended business school for one glorious full-of-practical-challenges, void-of-brain-hurting-thinking year, I knew to set up firm criteria for success in advance. They were: get a friend to look it over prior to posting, and tell me it did not suck too badly - accomplished! - and get one (1) comment from someone I'm not personally acquainted with, favorable or unfavorable irrelevant - accomplished!
You girls and guy, I am so happy! I am really so, so ridiculously pleased. I didn't even know how much I had missed this feeling. I'm already making big plans to write a fic and spend more than the time it takes my shoulders to get sore using this dinky keyboard on it! I'm talking having it beta-read, editing it, putting it aside for at least one night and thinking about how to make it better!
Meanwhile, every time I get an email notification it's like scratching a scratch-card, because it might be that someone read my fic and felt moved to comment! Yay! One time at work, we all got advent-calendar scratch-cards from Santa and/or our boss, that was kind of awesome. It was 24 days of fun daydreaming about paying off student loans and not spending my vacation in the local park with all the bums and flashers (I live in an apartment building and don't have a lawn for lounging on with a good book and a cool drink). And you know what, I actually won 25 kr, which was almost enough for a free lunch. This experience with the fic posting and receiving fb is a lot like that one, except with feelings of accomplishment and validation. | | comments: 20 comments or Leave a comment |
| Heterosexuality = everything that is good and normal
Homosexuality = it's about sex, and not for kids
I get so tired of hearing this all the time. What do these people imagine? That I'm heterosexual when I get up in the morning and brush my teeth, that I'm heterosexual when I shop in the supermarket, that I'm heterosexual when I play with the neighbor's cat when it comes running over to say hello, and then when I go to kiss a girl I do some sort of deliberate, mental mode-switch and in that moment only am homosexual? And then afterward, I go back to the default heterosexual mode? | | comments: Leave a comment |
| I have created a new community for Astrid Lindgren fic: ![[info]](http://s.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png) bullerbyn.
Please pimp it, so it can be ranked on google, and people who are interested in Astrid Lindgren's books will know where to find it. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| When I first started out in online fandom, it was a bad idea to admit to not having English as your first language. People would ignore your fic, assuming it to be poorly written, or they would interpret what you wrote in very strange ways, thinking you couldn't mean to say what you actually wrote, since you wouldn't understand what it meant.
After some years fandom had become international enough that a lot of people who had been passing as first language English speakers came out, some subtly by using their .de or .se email addys and website URLs, some boldly stating their first language.
But that's only English language fandom. rodo has posted this interesting poll about different language fandoms, and the language background of fans. Please take part, no essay questions, simple check boxes/radio buttons.
I've been passive in non-English language fandoms, such as Danish, French, German, and Japanese movies and TV shows, followed canon for English language media translated or dubbed, and even read fic and meta in Danish (Norwegian, Swedish), German (Dutch, Afrikaans) and Spanish (French, Portuguese, Italian, Latin).
I could imagine writing fic in Danish for a specifically Danish fandom, but most of the stuff I've felt fannish about has been aimed very squarely at kids, and I would feel weird and out of place writing adult fic in for example Freddy og monstrene. Some has been aimed at adults, and has an international presence, such as Riget and Little Soldier, and while I could write in those fandoms in Danish, that would needlessly restrict my already very small audience.
As for Swedish language fandoms like Alla vi barn i Bullerbyn and Mumintrollen which I've read exclusively in Danish translation, I could write fic in Danish, and other Scandinavians could probably struggle their way through it, but honestly I think English is more likely to be understood and appreciated.
I can't imagine writing a fic in German or Spanish. The few German fandoms I'm into have an international presence, and I'm not into any Spanish language fandoms.
Okay, now I've gotten all interested in Lindgren fic - the fantasy worlds she's created in Mio, min Mio, Bröderna Lejonhjärta and Ronja Rövardotter lend themselves excellently to fic, and don't have the drawbacks of unfamiliarity with the setting like Bullerbyn, Emil, Madicken and Kalle Blomkvist would have for non-Swedes (and young Swedes, maybe). | | comments: 31 comments or Leave a comment |
| I just saw the new Star Trek movie with ximeria. It's great! I feel that this is my Trek, much more so than TNG or any of the other movies ever was. The only fly in the ointment was that there was only one female main character, but what a character she was!
I remarked to Ximeria after we had seen the movie that Uhura seemed like L. A. Graf's Uhura: smart, competent, and with an actual, sensible job description beyond switch board operator.
Then I read this article about a possible sequel, where the script writers explicitly state that they read Trek novels and fanfic for inspiration.
I miss the old Trek novels, back when they were written by fans, and were often gen-ified slash or shipper fic. There was such love, such loyalty to characterization, and such inspirational and fun dedication to Trek as science fiction, as speculative fiction. The copyright owners killed the novel franchise when they started insisting on canon-repercussion free plots and following the party line.
The new Star Trek movie brought back the good old days, and made me want to read and write some fic. I used to be a McCoy/Spock slasher, and I still am, I guess, for time line #1 obviously, but also a tiny bit for tl#2, since they kept the snarky/flirty tone between Spock and McCoy, and McCoy was so quick to stand shoulder to shoulder with Spock when it served the purpose of needling Kirk.
I've never been much of a K/S'er, and this movie hasn't turned me into one. I didn't think new Kirk and Spock had any sexual chemistry at all, but I caught a real spark between new Kirk and old Spock after the mind meld. Not necessarily a sexual spark, but a strong emotional spark - it seemed like Kirk could barely hold himself back from reestablishing physical/mind contact when Spock broke it, and Kirk could still feel his devastation. It was very fine acting from Chris Pine, I think.
Mostly I just really love the Spock/Uhura relationship, and I don't want any slash pairings to mess that up. Kirk can keep hooking up with sexually voracious Orions. (BTW, love the Orion woman being in Star Fleet! Maybe that Orion slave girl was not an actual slave, but a liberated woman who knows what she likes, having a fulfilling BDSM lifestyle? That's a retcon I can get behind.)
Oh, and Chekov! So cute. Sulu, not as handsome as George Takei, but seriously hot with his intelligent face and bad-ass fencing moves. | | comments: Leave a comment |
|
- Helping you identify users by associating a picture (=face) with a name.
My user icon is an example of this. It's not my face, it's the face of the actress who portrayed the character I named myself after when I had to come up with a pseud in a hurry, but it serves the purpose.
- Helping you filter posts by users who post on many different topics.
Many users have fandom specific icons, icons for stream of consciousness fannnish glee, icons for being thinky and all meta, etc. The best icons have a common thread, such as a particular artistic style or the name of the user written on the icon itself. Most seem to prioritize filtering by fandom over identifying users. That's oddly self-effacing.
- Ad space for pimping or politics.
For example the recent Dreamwidth and OTW campaigns, or the wanky OTP wars in SGA fandom a while ago. It's a useful method for viral distribution of a message, but not very helpful for identifying users. It prioritizes group-identity over individual identity.
- Hindering you from blocking other users' annoying mood themes from your reading page.
Some users have an icon to go with every mood. The only person in my experience to ever do it right is ratcreature, because much as that huge bulbous nose on the ratcreature thingy unsettles me, at least I can tell who she is.
- Displaying the world's most horrible, juvenile, tacky, glittery, bouncy sticker collection.
Yeah, don't do that. It's really annoying.
Dreamwidth layouts seem to take it for granted that no-one uses icons for the sake of helping other people identify them. The user name is on the left (= before the entry), and the user icon is unassociated with it, mere decoration. With some users, this is helpful to me. Seeing the user name in isolation, rather than in a new different combination every time, helps me recognize it as a unique identifier. With other users, the ones who care to use a consistent style of icon, I miss the strong visual coupling of name and pic.
Many of you probably think I'm being extremely silly and nitpicky about this, but that's because you don't understand that I genuinely have difficulty processing "same username + icon 1" and "same username + icon 2" as identical. I am strongly visually oriented, and images always trump words. (Written words form a visual shape too, of course, but the sameness of the font and the typical length of user names make them less obviously distinct that icons.) | | comments: Leave a comment |
| ( Sorry for not hiding my long posts behind a cut )
Just now I thought reading metafandom might be fun. Big mistake! I can rant about feminism all day, and while I do take it seriously I can also have fun with it, argue just for the sake of arguing (except when it's with certain people whose opinions matter too much to me), and agree to disagree and get along and respect each other anyway. But when it comes to homophobia, biphobia and queer rights I cannot let go of my emotions.
Often a phobic comment from a person I don't even know, whose opinion I don't respect at all, will still hurt me deeply, not because I care about that person or getting along with them, but because they're just repeating the shit I deal with every day, the low background noise of the Binary Ideal ("man - male - masculine - sexually and romantically attracted to women - platonically attracted to men" vs. "woman - female - feminine - sexually and romantically attracted to men - platonically attracted to women"), daring to make it explicit and thus giving me the choice of putting up and shutting up or having to articulate my opinion and experience in a clear, concise and polite way.
The first choice is unacceptable, the second choice is a huge effort often with very little pay-off. ( I do think tone is important. )
Therefore, I don't take part in a discussion without thinking carefully about what I want to say and how I want to say it, to avoid people misunderstanding me. The particular discussion that upset me just now was very polite and friendly in tone, but I am so powerfully emotionally invested and feel so vulnerable and marginalized in real life that I found myself completely unable to hit "submit", even knowing I would get a kind answer, just in case the answer reflected an internalized Binary Ideal, or Homosexual Modified Binary Ideal (a lot of gays and slash fans are surprisingly hostile to bisexuality and gender queerness. I guess every depreciated social group needs someone to feel superior to), and right now I just really don't have the spoons to articulate complicated, emotionally-charged issues without getting defensive.
That said, feel free to comment here. This is unlikely to be a fast-moving discussion with many different participants, and I can certainly deal with the few people who read this. | | comments: 2 comments or Leave a comment |
| When I was in Smallville fandom, back in 2001-2002 I used to hang out with some fellow fangirls in an AIM chatroom. We were all slashers, and all pretty open minded about slash pairings, including incestuous slash (Lex/Lionel). However we disagreed very strongly about the character Lana, to the point where we had to stop even trying to discuss her. The general consensus was that Chloe was everything that is awesome (and if anyone disagreed, they didn't dare say so), but Lana was continuously bashed.
( I think there were several reasons for this )
I wanted to look beyond the poor writing and uninspiring acting, suspend my disbelief and just go with who Lana supposedly was, taking it as a challenge to flesh her out, since she was a key figure in Clark's life, and I needed to make her worthy of his love in order to respect Clark, rather than out of any feminist desire to have a realistic girl on TV, but I gave up when my attempts were met with indifference or even rabid fury by other fans. I left Smallville fandom shortly after, and since then I haven't bothered rolling that particular boulder up the hill.
A lot of the women others have mentioned in their celebration of female characters are more or less of the same type as Lana. Their onscreen lives revolve around male characters, they're there to comment on male characters; to be sexual opportunities or challenges for male characters; to show that male characters are so wonderful that they can hang out with women, often two-fers; to be damsels in distress; to be mother-figures; to be the loving child figures without the tension of the expected power-struggle between sons and fathers (because girls never grow into women, at least not until they reach menopause or if they're ugly); they're there to unsettle male characters, lead them into temptation and attack them with their foul sexuality, etc. etc.
Often someone will say to me, isn't so-and-so a kick-ass heroine? I'll probably politely and not very convincingly agree, all the while going "meh" on the inside and feeling disgruntled. I don't want to have to do the leg work on fleshing out those characters! I'm done with that, and I'm done with being satisfied with substandard writing like that. I will not be silenced by a sop like an idealized, beautiful, smart, courageous, bantering kick-ass lust-object for fanboys like the hateful Lady Christina de Souza in Doctor Who. "But, but... she kicks ass?!" All the more to be a good trophy for the Doctor when she begs to accompany him, my friend.
The female characters I'm going to celebrate use their powers of awesomeness for their own good, rather than for the good of a male characters. They are the heroes of their own lives, not the supporting characters in some dude's life. I don't care how smoking hot Zoë Washburne is (very in case you're wondering), she is not the kind of character I want more of. I say that as a bitterly disappointed fangirl who was thrilled about Zoë after watching one episode of Firefly, only to realize the evil bait and switch Joss was playing on female Buffy fans.
Mehitabel Parr
One of three main characters in Sarah Monette's books Melusine, The Virtu and The Mirador. I came for the delicious slashiness, I stayed for the humor, suspense, and vivid characters and settings. The books are narrated from each of the main characters' POV, with very strong and individual voices. They overlap often, leading to interestingly contrasting views of the same events, but each character has their own life and subplot. Mehitabel grew up in a traveling circus, but ran away from home to become a classical actress in a respectable theater. She's good at her job, interested in other people, and in many ways just an ordinary single woman struggling to make ends meet in a stressful world and maybe find some happiness along the way. Because she's one of the main characters in a fantasy novel, of course she has to deal with a lot of challenges along the way, and she proves to be vulnerable, but with an unbendable spirit; unfair and kind of distant to her friends sometimes, but loyal and good when it comes down to it; funny, but kind of mean... she's totally awesome. She has believable flaws, and is no superhero, and when she triumphs or gets in a good zinger, it's impossible not to cheer for her.
Cordelia Naismith
The main character in Lois McMaster Bujold's books Shards of Honor and Barrayar, and an important supporting character in the rest of the Vorkosigan saga. Shards of Honor reads like slash. Cordelia is the captain of a survey ship who crashes on a planet where the only other person is a fearsome warrior from a paternalistic, very traditional culture that has recently been at war with Cordelia's people. In Cordelia's culture, sex and gender are a matter of personal preference, and many different sexual and gender orientations are recognized and celebrated. She happens to be female and a woman, but mainly identifies as a scientist and the leader of her crew in this context, but she is aware that gender roles are rigidly defined by society, not individual preference in Aral Vorkosigan's culture. Now the bookish geek must win the respect of and form an alliance with the aggressive and very physical warrior in order for both of them to survive. It's the perfect union of action adventure and a respect -> like -> love story free of icky gender roles.
To be continued | | comments: Leave a comment |
| I am now on dreamwidth here: noracharles
I am going to be crossposting to both dreamwidth and livejournal as long as fandom is still equally active on both. I've pruned my friends list somewhat. If it's been so long since we've talked that I no longer remember who you are or how we met, I've removed you. Those of you still on my friends list have been added to my circle on dreamwidth, so you can read both or either using open id. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Josh Frühlinger writes the very funny and clever The Comics Curmudgeon blog, which often pokes fun at gender-stereotyping and male-chauvinism. I think he's actually more feminist than I am, considering his loathing of and contempt for the comic strip Cathy, with its premise of Men are from Mars, Women are Hysterical and Irrational which, I admit, often gets a chuckle out of me.
He's written a very interesting article about gendered marketing of gadgets, especially netbooks, and how it works to a certain extent, but can also offend and put off potential customers.
When I needed a portable computer, I chose to buy a netbook rather than a laptop. I was aware that netbooks are girly, but I think they're girly in the functionality-over-small-penis-compensator way, not in the form-over-function way marketing people seem to assume. My netbook is ultra portable, cheap, uses little electricity, and has a normal sized keyboard. It does not have extra unneeded RAM or a powerful graphics card, or whatever else men get shamed into paying for though they don't need it.
When it comes to form over function, I think both men and women appreciate beautiful design. A cell-phone which you always have lying on the table next to you, or keep in an outside pocket is just as likely to be blinged out as a wrist watch is. I used to work in a store where we sold lots of tacky plastic stick-on jewels and rhine-stone danglies for phones, and both boys and girls wanted to customize theirs, but there was hardly any "decorations" aimed at boys. Adult men of course, just buy a new phone in the latest chrome detailing look, but the school boys can't afford that. (What do they do, anyway, just stick to having the latest sock and ring tone for it, or do they paint them with speed markers?)
One of my female co-workers bought a phone in pink chrome that almost looked like a make-up compact to go with her pink purse, but regretted it when it was impractical to use. One of my male co-workers bought a pretty white laptop with softly curving edges, even though he was studying computer science and it didn't actually have the technical specs he needed in order to do his homework on it, but he just couldn't stand the idea of having some ugly, clunky, black computer. Most people, both men and women, of my acquaintance put function over form, but do value form. Men are often willing to pay extra for function they don't need, and both men and women are willing to pay extra for form.
I didn't pay extra for my netbook's color, but I did settle for a demo model in black, rather than buy the hot pink they had in stock, because I don't want a fugly computer when I have a choice.
This has been another gender-stereotyping post from yours truly. Please feel free to correct me, I'd love to know that I am wrong about how men think. | | comments: 2 comments or Leave a comment |
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noracharles_fic and on my website Dystopia