In which CyberNev rants about the problems with female characters. Blame Swank-mo-tron, he said she should do more stuff like this!

It’s a well known fact that in most media, girls tend to get the short end of the stick. Media is somewhat behind the real world there in some respects. Not that the real world doesn’t often give girls the short end of the stick, but that while the real world is full of amazing, strong women, media likes to pretend they don’t exist. And if they do exist, that the boys are so much better.

Some girls identify with guys as easily as girls. I like to have girls to identify with. Not that some of my favorite characters aren’t guys, or that I CAN’T identify with guys, but when I like a story, I actively seek out strong women to identify with. It’s just a thing I have, and that I’ve had since age three. This habit has led me to discovering one of fandom’s saddest truths.

The first girl I ever identified with in media- be they movies, books, whatever- was Nala from The Lion King (Yes, I know she is a lion. Just go with it for a sec.) I was about three.

For some reason, despite Nala’s infinitely smaller role in the movie, I latched on to her equally as strongly as I latched on to Simba. Because see, she was smart and funny and could kick Simba’s ass in a fight, so therefore she was just as cool. So why didn’t she get to do as much as him? Why did he have to save her in the Elephant’s Graveyard? Why wasn’t SHE the star of the movie? (I am aware why she isn’t the star of the movie, because it’s basically Hamlet with lions and a happy ending, and sometimes main characters just happen to be guys. The more apt question would be why are girls stars of movies less, but that wasn’t how my brain worked at the time. I was three.) These questions nagged at my young brain, but I shrugged them off. So Nala didn’t get to do as much as Simba. At least she got to be kind of cool.

That was the first act of settling.

You have to do a lot of settling if you’re looking for girl characters to identify with. You have to settle for them doing ALMOST as much as a guy hero would do. You have to settle for the fact they will be more prone to random fits of incompetence. You have to ignore those moments when they should have fought back, but they didn’t.

The Lion King was left behind (though not entirely, it is still one of the best movies ever in my humble opinion) and I moved to other fandoms, actively seeking out girls to identify with. I’ve always had to settle to some degree. And everyone else settles too. A movie gives a female character one cool scene, you’re supposed to settle for that, even if she’s incompetent the rest of the movie and the male character gets more cool scenes. Lots of lame attempts at Strong Woman ™ are made to get the girl veiwers to settle. Strong Woman somehow always mysteriously takes a backseat to a guy, though.

There are exceptions to the rule. There are shows, books and movies that either consciously or unconsciously treat their female characters with as much respect as their male characters in every way. See, not wanting to settle doesn’t mean a female character can’t ever get badly hurt or fail, even fail spectacularly. It’s about a female character being given the same importance as the male characters in the writers mind, not being thought of as a woman, but as a person. Or lion. For her to be just as important to the story, and just as much in control of herself and her situation as your average Male McHeroGuy. Not to be ridiculously sexualized or demeaned, not to take a backseat and let the dude do the work.

The fandom where I’ve had to settle most is superhero comic books. You have to settle for the good writing with the bad writing. And you have to settle with the female characters. “Oh, so what if she wears less than all the dudes, she’s…kind of cool.” “Oh so what if she was iced in a fight, she still got to throw a punch.” “So she died to give her boyfriend angst, calm down.” “So she’s more incompetent than everyone else, that’s just how her character is.”

Take Wonder Woman. Wonder Woman fans have to settle for her not getting a movie, always coming in third place in the Trinity, wearing a bathing suit, getting the crappy relaunch while the guys got good ones, not having as many titles (this may change if you believe recent interviews. I have my fingers crossed) and not getting as many epic stories, getting punked more often in battle than Supes or Bats…you name it.

I feel like I settle with my favorite superheroine, Stephanie Brown,  a lot. In fact, it goes without saying. She’s constantly being relegated to the back seat in Tim Drake’s Redbird. My first experience in settling with her was something I asked myself when I first read the Steph!Robin issues was- shouldn’t Steph have been easier to train as a Robin than Tim? Tim came into the business with no martial arts or danger survival training whatsoever. Stephanie had been a superhero for two years when Batman got his hands on her. She’s shown the ability to take down criminals twice her size with NO TRAINING AT ALL. Shouldn’t she have soaked up, at the very least, the martial arts skills incredibly fast? Detective skills are another thing- on one hand, Steph has snuck up on Tim several times and even on Batman before she became Robin and had experience solving her dad’s clues and tracking games in real superhero business. But Tim figured out the best kept secret of all time or whatever and stalked Batman for years.

But of course, I didn’t, in my naive early comic reading stage, take into account the writers wouldn’t want to explore that, because Steph needed to be set up to fail. Also, while Bats trained Tim in every conceivable situation, sent him to Dick, then sent him to Lady Shiva, he made Steph do…push ups. So, of course poor Steph was still the lesser Robin.

How does this connect to my point? I settled then as a reader by putting my confusion to rest by shrugging it off “I guess Tim’s just better?” But I’m not now. I’d like Steph to get some real good training and become *gasp* maybe almost as good as Tim! All evidence leads to her soaking it up incredibly well. She can do all she does now with erratic training, clearly she’d be amazing with proper training.(Suggestion: Steph and Lady Shiva team up! No seriously. This would be awesome. And Steph even has an in, what with Cass, Shiva’s daughter, being her best friend)

I’m not settling anymore. I want better for Wonder Woman.  She deserves epic writing, a movie and the same level of respect as Bats and Supes. I want better for Steph, for her to stop being Tim’s sidekick, or some person “testing” him and do her own thing and be respected as much as Tim. Tall order, but I think it can be done. I want more women in leads. I want better for all female characters. I want more diversity.   I want more acceptance.

Heck, I’m tired of settling in real life too. Of ignoring insults and atrocities, racism and sexism no matter  how small. Of having to see atrocities like rape and hate crimes. Settling is everywhere.
So no, I won’t settle down, guys. I’m not settling at all. And neither should you.