As social justice trudges tirelessly forward, kicking and screaming, like an unsupervised child, we attempt to chip away at the restraints holding us all back. The journey to human equality has been, and continues to be a long one, prying that screaming child’s fingers out of the dirt one by one unfortunately takes a long time.
Usually out-groups are populated by a minority, it’s easy for the powerful majority to disenfranchise a much smaller population so it’s interesting (from a sociological standpoint) to note that one of the longest standing social problems is the discrimination of women. Unlike other out-groups, this one has the distinction of being able to claim roughly one half of the human population. Which maybe makes it the most dangerous; climbing a ladder becomes terribly difficult when you tie one hand behind your back.
The arts, unfortunately, aren’t immune to this problem. People unfortunately have biases, and the arts are created and consumed by whom? People.
As with most arenas in life, the rules and dividing lines were set down ages ago and changing them, while simple on the surface, has proven to be quite difficult. Boys play with toy soldiers and girls play with dolls, likewise- boys can write science fiction and fantasy, while girls can write romance. After all, what do men know about love and what do women know about ‘splosions?
The answer in reality is that in a modern world we probably all have roughly the same experience. Unless you work for the military, (which as far as I know, employs both men and women. Say what??) your personal experience with battles and explosion is probably super minimal, and unless you are certifiably insane and/or own and operate a remotely located cattle ranch, your experience with extraterrestrials is probably nil. Which means that the real qualifications for writing good science-fiction/fantasy/romance/whatever-the-hell are a good idea and the gumption to put it down on paper.
Studies show that how much you rock or suck has no direct correlation to genitalia.
This was the topic of a panel held Friday at Fan X titled “No Girls Allowed? Not Anymore: Girls who make Sci-Fi/Fantasy Chic.” The panel consisted of authors Laura Hickman, Lisa Mangum, Rebecca Moesta, Jaleta Clegg, Mette Ivie Harrison, Natalie Whipple, Aneeka Richins, and Cindy Grigg.
They spoke of their experiences in writing science fiction/fantasy as women authors and the barriers they’ve encountered along the way. What we learned to no surprise is that women are perfectly capable of writing fantastic science fiction/fantasy. In fact, the genre itself can perhaps be laid at the feet of Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein.” Shelley wrote “Frankenstein” in a contest with three men, her story blew theirs out of the water and has continued to blow the world’s collective minds ever since. It’s curious that the sentiment that women can’t write this type of story ever developed when considering that the story that created the genre and remains one of its pillars was written by a woman.
We develope a guidebook to life in our formative years. The guidebook lays out the paths we should take and the ones that are out of bounds. The good news is that we write the guidebook and we can easily throw it out. Clutching to it means only that we limit the paths we allow ourselves to take and in so doing limit the perspectives and experiences of ourselves and everyone around us.
Let’s throw out the book, take whatever paths feel right, and allow ourselves to see a bigger picture. All we have to do is support good work, regardless of who created it, and whatever limiting labels may have been applied to them.
Happily, the general consensus of the panelists and the crowd was that things are getting better, barriers are breaking and there is a bright future ahead. Go get yourself some good lady geek fiction.
Cheers.