You know, the entire direction into which the “Marketing Fallen Angel” thread has skewed puts me in mind of “Soul Mates,” one of the two episodes I wrote for “Babylon 5.”
For that episode, I developed a storyline that, to me, made great sense: Delenn, with her newly acquired human characteristics, has a spectacularly bad hair day because she has no cultural clue how to care for her new mane. Ivanova is brought in to help the flummoxed ambassador cope with it, only to find herself speechless at the end when Delenn inquires as to these “odd cramps” she’s started experiencing.
When that episode aired, I got hammered by a number of female fans (and, of course, male fans expressing outrage on behalf of the females) for writing an episode that had two strong women worrying about haircare and periods. Interestingly, when I first arrived on the set of B5 and met Claudia Christian, Claudia told me with genuine enthusiasm, “I was so thrilled when I read this script! Finally, an episode in which we get to act like women!”
I’m sorry. I know it’s annoying to have one’s arguments dismissed as politically correct. But you know what? Women have curves. Men notice them. Some women like that notice. Some don’t. Some are flattered. Some aren’t. To me, the problem stems from the notion that women can *only* be appreciated if sexuality is ignored, as if it’s some part that can be surgically excised and set aside.
It’s a crock. Sexuality is part of everyone. It’s part of the package. Women and men are not the same, and sometimes emphasizing those differences can be fun. And sometimes it’s even fun to act like our genders.
PAD
• 
Amen, brother! Amen! A female friend of mine is constantly worried that she is fat (she’s not) because she is “soft”. She’s an athelete but not “chiseled”. I keep telling her that some men like a little softness in their women but she just keeps saying “Whatever!”
Fazhoul
You do understand women.
As Steve Martin said in L.A. Story, “I could never be a woman, I’d spend all day at home, playing with my breasts.”
The only women I ever knew who complained about that type of thing were either
a) okay (mentally) but loaded with low self-esteem or
b) were too butt ugly to ever get a mate.
And I bet the guys complaining on the ladies’ ‘behalf’ were the *same* hopeless slobs who’d never get laid by anyone sober.
I hate to be insensitive, but I’m sick of walking on egg-shells so I won’t offend people who’d complain about anything, just so they can hear themselves blather.
And yes, my girlfriend is *all* woman — curves, big muscles and all.
Peter, you’re right. It IS annoying to have one’s arguments dismissed as being Politically Correct.
Tha actual (unaddressed) point is that you said you were hoping to tap into the female audience, but the drift of a Dangerous Curves campaign would just plain NOT draw in this particular audience and well might turn that audience (as a conglomerate) away. By virtue of your writing and by virtue of having the series published by DC you’ve already got a built in starter audience. If you REALLY want to entice female readers it would probably be best if you didn’t hit the key points that often cause them to dismiss a book before bothering to check it out.
(As for Chadwick’s comment that he hates to be insensitive, a quick reading of his post belies that particular sentiment. You’ll do a darned good job drawing in that kind of audience, but since you’ve already got that particular sector covered it might be a good time to expand the audience.)
I suggest that the people on this board who feel they speak for women wait until they actually speak to one (outside of the LOTR chatroom) before doing so.
Take a look at any magazine aimed at women in the mass market. Or actresses and musicians that women love.
Despite the swoony protestations that “nuh-uh, he was too insensitive”, Chadwick hit the nail right on the head. Fat ugly women don’t like the idea of another series that has an attractive female lead and carries a suggested, suggested mind you, tag of “Dangerous Curves” because it flies in the face of the Trek fiction they write where Captain Kirk looks past the snotty Starfleet cheerleaders who never talk to Ensign Barely-Disguised-Author and sees that Ensign BDA has so much more to offer than what shallow people call “attractiveness.”
Sounds mean? Nope, just honest. Speaking as a male who isn’t posing for the cover of GQ, it grates on me everytime a missing link like Vin Diesel gets called an actor but the difference is that I don’t try to pretend “The Fast and the Furious” is a conspiracy against the non-car stealing, non-drag racing, coherent Male.
I know lots of regular women and they like being sexy, thank you very much, as long as they don’t have to check their brains and as long as the total person is sexy and not just her parts.
The truth is there’s absolutely nothing in the tag line “Dangerous Curves” that’s insulting, there’s just such a knee-jerk reaction to any issues that involve women or minorities that the High Priests and Priestesses of Sensitivity are like a parody of Robert Duvall’s lawyer character in “A Civil Action”: Even if you nod off, the first thing you say when you wake up is “I’m offended.”
“To me, the problem stems from the notion that women can *only* be appreciated if sexuality is ignored, as if it’s some part that can be surgically excised and set aside.”
To me, the problem stems from your apparently resolute inability to even consider the possibility that the phrase “Dangerous Curves” isn’t a good idea in terms of marketing this line to the widest reader base possible (including women).
To me, the problem stems from your apparently resolute inability to even consider the possibility that the phrase “Dangerous Curves” isn’t a good idea in terms of marketing this line to the widest reader base possible (including women).
It would appeal to males and to some women. I can live with that.
PAD
The problem isn’t that “Dangerous Curves” is offensive, or anything like that. It’s that it doesn’t fit the apparent purpose of the advertising campaign. (At least, not as I understand it; correct me if I’m wrong.)
“Dangerous Curves”, to my mind, would be perfect if the idea was to emphasize the presence of sexy female characters who beat the crap out of people. That’s fine. But the campaign, as I understand, is supposed to attract female readers who aren’t reading about Catwoman, Elektra, or other characters like that, because that direction doesn’t interest them. The characters may fit into that mold, but that doesn’t sound like the image DC wants to project for these titles, at least not for now.
Do I offend anyone when I say Claudia Christian is pretty hot?
As I said before, the title emphasizes the sexuality. If that’s what the titles are about, that’s OK….but it’s still a trifle overdone, been-there, done-that.
If the titles don’t involve their sexuality (as opposed to their gender), then it doesn’t fit.
Too right.
A few years ago, an American woman living and working in Tokyo posted a complaint on a Tokyo-based mailing list to the effect that she was very frustrated and unhappy. The local males were mostly ingoring her because [she felt] they were scared of her assertiveness and self-reliance. She had about as much luck with her fellow foreigners as they ignored her in favour of the locals. She whined that she couldn’t compete with them.
The concensus was that, given her previous postings, it wasn’t so much that she COULDN’T compete, as that she wouldn’t lower herself to do so.
Well, if the opposition know what works and use it to good effect, and you won’t, it is difficult to complain when you come out second-best. Yet, many still do. No sympathies. And, no, I am neither terribly rich, nor especially handsome. I haven’t always done well in the dating game, but haven’t complained about it. C’est la vie. And I accept it.
Y’know, it’s easy to criticize and much harder to offer positive alternatives. But everyone’s full of advice, so why don’t we hear some suggestions? Just remember that they need to be a) witty or at least pithy, b) brief, c) nevertheless give an impression of what the series’ feel, tone, and subject matter are, d) appeal to as many potential readers as possible, and e) in no way be potentially offensive to anybody. How hard could it be?
I’m probably going to get in trouble for saying this, so I might as well just bite the bullet and say it.
Mr. David, you worked in marketing, so if you feel that strongly about this particlar slogan, go for the gusto, and Deity-Of-Your-Choice-speed.
What I’m seeing, though, is the fact that you asked for opinions. The first responses were from women. They did not call you a male chauvinist pig, but offered their input. Then the whole PC thing started.
Elayne’s last post sounds a bit frustrated, but I can’t entirely blame her. If someone asked my opinion on something and I offered it only to have it dismissed by the questioner and snidely put down as “PC” by others, my hackles would be a bit on the raised side as well.
I could understand if you responded with, Well, I appreciate your concerns but I’m going to go with this, but that’s not what’s coming through.
Is the issue offending women with the tag “Dangerous Curves”, or is the issue attracting women with the tag “Dangerous Curves”? Or perhaps it’s one in spite of the other.
Although it would be nice to speak on behalf of my gender I’m afraid that it would be impossible to do so. And with that said it makes the idea of a man speaking for the entire gender of women, a little ridiculous. Speaking for myself, an attractive adult female comic book reader, I would say that the tag “Dangerous Curves” lends the ideas of mysterious, strong, and dangerous women. And that, in itself, is something I would (and do) take interest in as a comic book. The kind of woman to be offended to a tag like “Dangerous Curves” (in my opinion) is the kind of woman that gets offended at dámņ near anything. The kind of woman who is appalled at anyone paying female physical features any kind of mind. These woman are both fat and ugly (as some previous posts so eloquently described) AND skinny and beautiful. Despite these things, trying to appeal to a female audience for any kind of comic book I think in itself is difficult. I live in NYC and I find that when I walk into any of the numerous comic shops here I am surrounded by men. They look at me like I’m a welcomed visitor from another planet as I swim through the crowds of five o’ clock shadows.
I’m now just realizing that I really don’t have a point to my posting, and that if initially I had one it’s been forgotten.
At any rate, Peter David, bad hair days really do suck.
I’m probably going to get in trouble for saying this, so I might as well just bite the bullet and say it.
And I’ll probably get in trouble for responding. So let’s jump into trouble together, shall we?
Go back and read the first message that started this. PAD never asked for opinions on the slogan. He just said he made a suggestion, one that may not even be used.
What I see happening is that opinions were tossed off, passed off as fact (“That will never appeal to women.”) and there is some hard feelings because PAD is saying, “You’re entitled to my opinion and rather than apologize and adopt your opinion as my own, I’m going to stick by what I know as a writer experienced in public relations, friend of women, husband of a woman and father of a few more.”
In the pages of the Marvel section of last month’s Previews alone there is enough to justify some real outrage. This response is just crazy.
Women are a complete mystery to every guy on the planet. I don’t why we studying other planets and orgin of life what we should be studying is women. There is study that takes years many many years. I love women they don’t always make sense to me but i still love them. I have a girlfriend who i have been with for about 2 years I love her very much. I have done alot for her including dumping my best friend so i could be with. See i had this female friend who i knew about 3 years before my girlfriend comes to picture then my girlfriend enters my life. I tell her about my best friend at first she likes her then she doesn’t like her and think i’m secretly attracted the my best friend and kinda dating her. Which was never true i was never attracted my friend. She just a friend i didn’t even really she her a as girl she was like guy to only with bøøbš and other women parts. So i end having to choose between my best friendand my girlfriend in the end i choose my girlfriend. You would think that would things and i would never have to hear about my exfriend. But i still do every know then those doubts come back and bite me on the butt. why do women do that why have think that men and women can’t be friends unless the guy is attracted to the girl and eventually wants more from the female friend? I do my best to understand women but i still don’t I know this kinda off topic but i just needed to rant.
I am in the increasingly uncomfortable position of being father to a 10-year-old daughter (11 next week) who is way ahead of her classmates in the Puberty Race. She’s already taller than my wife, can wear my wife’s old jeans, has strong muscle tone (she swims) and just recently had to go to a new bra size.
She has informed me that the girls make fun of her chest and the boys can’t stop staring at it. All I could say was, “Kiddo, guys are utterly fascinated with ’em, it’s never going to stop, so you might as well get used to it now.”
I mean, what else could I say?
JSM
Here bloody here!
Well said, Mr David.
Pack, you are quie correct. Opinions were not asked for, and thank you for correcting me on that point. On this forum, though, opinions tend to be offered whether requested or no, so, even if opinions weren’t requested, it shouldn’t be a surprise that they were offered.
What I see happening is that opinions were tossed off, passed off as fact (“That will never appeal to women.”)
I never took anything offered up as being passed of as fact. They were offered as opinions. In fact, the people arguing the “this may not appeal to this segment” were a darned sight more polite that the people saying “you’re just being PC”
As I said, if he feels that strongly about that particular phrase, go for it.
I think I missed a big portion of this, so can someone fill me in? Is this furor really just over the title of the marketing campaign?
Personally, I’ve never read a sexist or misogynistic work by Peter David, so if someone can clue me in as to what all the fuss is about, I’d be much obliged.
Oh, and I’m looking forward to Fallen Angel, because I want to learn what the source of her mystical abilities is, not out of any prurient interest (not that I saw anything particularly sexualized about her anyway… she wears a cloak, not a bikini…)
You know, there was a cop show called “Dangerous Curves.” Or maybe they were PIs. It ran for about three seasons on CBS late night in the early 90s, before Letterman’s show started. Women watched it. Rome did not burn.
If this new “line” is called “Dangerous Curves”, then I will have no more desire to buy it than if it were simply called “Peter David Writes One of These Books,” because the only reason why I’m even picking up another comic is because of Pad-Man.
“Do I offend anyone when I say Claudia Christian is pretty hot? “
You should see her movie, Hexed.
Just to tie it all together in a bow, Claudia Christian played the perfect film noir femme fatale in a Sam Spade-esque episode of Quantum Leap…definitly had dangerous curves:-)
She also appeared in a movie, I guess, called _Darth Vader’s Psychic Hotline_ which also starred, as the voice of Imperial Officer #2, a certain comic writer who’s website you’re reading right now.
who knew?
It would appeal to males and to some women.
How about saying it would appeal to some men and some women?
Well, this is certainly interesting. So many fascinating things being tossed around… all based on two words. PAD says he’s seen nothing but “crabbing.” Odd… I’ve seen a lot of engaging discourse.
For my part, the original question isn’t too huge a deal. As someone said, “All this over a hypothetical marketing hook?” So I won’t be rising to the bait of “come up with a better marketing hook than Dangerous Curves.” But the larger matter of gender issues is a fascinating one, and the exploration of it here is really appealing to me. I’ve been reading PAD’s work for thirteen years now, and as someone who is – in spite of being male — a fairly indoctrinated feminist, I have made the occasional observation of his work through that feminist lens.
PAD writes: “You know…I find that statement [the “female gaze”] horrifyingly patronizing. It would never occur to me to make the flat statement of how all females perceive anything.”
Doesn’t Claudia’s comment about your script finally allowing her to “act like women” imply a flat statement about how all women act? I realize you didn’t say this, Claudia did, but it doesn’t seem to bother you. I sense somehow that you didn’t find Claudia’s statement “horrifyingly patronizing.”
Doesn’t saying that “Dangerous Curves” will appeal to males imply “all” males?
Doesn’t saying that “women have curves and men like to look at them” make a flat, general statement about the way men perceive something?
When you wrote a Hulk annual in which Tyrannus was scared of becoming old and ugly, and Betty said, “Finally, a villain with motivations that a woman can relate to,” doesn’t that have some pretty limiting implications about the way women think?
To stop before this seems too much like an attack (if I’m not too late!), my point is simply that it’s unfair to characterize one’s use of the phrase “the female gaze” as horrifyingly patronizing. Especially when you say just a little later that “sometimes it’s fun to act like our genders.” So each gender has a certain way that it acts, but to imply that there is such a thing as a “female gaze” or a “male gaze” is horrifyingly patronizing?
Of course, your point about fun is well-taken. “Dangerous Curves”, the thing that started all of this, is a perfectly fun play on words. The Tyrannus joke in that Hulk annual cracked me up the first time I read it. I never watched the Babylon 5 episode you refer to above, but I’m sure it was lots of laughs. Nothing wrong with a bit of fun.
But, there’s also nothing wrong with examining some of the ramifications of these things that we read. Elayne was just asking a question about what would be implied by a tagline such as “Dangerous Curves,” and got trounced for it.
A lot of people I’ve talked to on the Hulk message board (and not just the usual bozos, PAD, I promise) found that Tyrannus joke to be sexist, and they have a point. What’s the implication, after all? Men can have all sorts of motivations for their actions, but women are only motivated by a desire to look good? (I’m not saying that this was PAD’s message. But stories are always open to interpretation.)
TIH was a comic book in which Marlo is constantly being defined by “the male gaze” (to get into that dangerous territory again). From Bruce looking a bikini-clad Marlo up and down in issue 353 to Rick’s implied erection upon seeing Marlo in a sexy dress in issue 442 (or thereabouts), she was a character who was constantly being defined by her physical characteristics, and men’s reaction to those characteristics. (“Six foot tall and *really* built” was a phrase repeated more than once when she first came on the scene.)
Now, to take stuff like this and go in and say, “Peter David is a misogynist” is ridiculous. “Peter David is a sexist”? Again, based on a few gags about Marlo’s body or Tyrannus wearing makeup… absurd.
But, are those jokes sexist? Arguably, yes. Not that that’s a problem. Lots of humor is offensive; often times, that’s the point. Some of my favorite humor is deliberately offensive.
But, the flip side is to look at this stuff and say, well, it might be harmless jokes, but at the same time, it’s not doing women any favors. A dream sequence in which Marlo fantasizes about Betty stripping for him and then transforming into Marlo? Not doing women any favors. Putting Rick in a bedroom with a harem of women who all want to pleasure him… ? Not doing women any favors.
I know that pointing out this stuff and calling it sexist is often seen as reactionary, but we still live in a society in which women are objectified; they’re a collection of pretty parts and their worth is often decided by their physical appearance. And anything that reinforces that notion of women (such as using the buzz phrase “dangerous curves” to encompass a group of female characters) is probably not, in the long run, a good thing.
It’s not a terrible thing. Not something punishable by death. But still, to quote a certain CBG columnist, “It’s not something they pin a medal on you for.”
Hmm, I was at I-Con one year when Claudia Christian was a speaker. She had mentioned the episode you’re talking about. Her comments of what she said at the time were more along the lines of ‘Come on guys, give her a little diginity.’ and that the period thing was dropped. I’m paraphrasing here as I don’t recall exactly what she said, but they were definitely along those lines.
Perhaps my memory is faulty, but her comments stuck with me because the hair scene was so funny and I didn’t remmeber any reference to cramps when I had watched it on tv.
‘Dangerous Curves’ does emphasize female sexuality and I can see how it would upset some people. Characterizations of women in the past have often begun and stopped at their sexuality. Rather than sexuality being portrayed as a part of a complete human person, it was all that was portrayed. The love interest, the damsel in distress, etc.
So when there’s an emphasis on female sexulaity there is a bit of a backlash. Having been confined so long, there is a reflex to break down any wall that might once more confine women into traditional, subordinate roles.
Whether this will turn off potential female readers of the these new comics I don’t know. But if the biggest seller graphic novels, supposedly doing well with teenage girls, are titles like Love Hina, then I wouldn’t worry about the feminist sensibilities of the target market. Because a single volume of Love Hina has more T&A and risque situations than a whole month’s worth of marvel comics.
Comics’ biggest problem attracting women is that they’re action movies with maybe a little drama, rather than relationship dramas like the best selling mangas like Love Hina, Chobits, Mars. Girls like that weepy, emotional, relationship stuff.
Yeah, hugely stereotypical of me, but I can’t help remmebering when my niece and her boyfriend spent 10 minutes arguing over whether to watch Predator or Sleepless in Seattle.
Men and women are certainly different. I am married. I know :-).
Unfortunately it is also true that “male” interests are differently looked at than “female”. Star Trek shows this very well. When O`Brien and Dr. Bashir go to the holosuite and play Alamo or spy stories, people react amused. The same applies to Paris passion for cars.
On the other hand, I read some quite nasty comments when Janeway made a blanket for the first (and only :->) baby born on Voyager or her interest in romance novels.
This is probably what Claudia Christian meant, that the episode actually addressed something female for a change. I enjoyed the scenes in question. As did my husband, by the way.
I don`t think there were any protests when Garibaldi built his motorbike in his quarters?
I find this attitude very regrettable and to me it is one indication that we still live in a male dominated society. Women are encouraged to be more “male”, like the kick-ášš women I wrote about earlier. “Dangerous Curves” sounds to me like these are stories with female characters who are tailored to the male audience.
Ok, I’m female – I enjoyed that episode. (PAD – Which other one did you write?).
As a female with fuzzy hair I related as much to the hair knots at the cramps. I also remember my first cramps (sorry if I’m freaking any males out here) and they are something of note – not of being a ‘sexual woman’ but of being a grown up (and pain!) a right of passage that should be noted. And yes, the innocence of ‘what is is?’ it was funny – but just because we know what is is (and what will follow) But God! No! I did not at any point see it as a feminist thing (I don’t see much as feminist and don’t have much time for what is obviously so) but also didn’t see it as taking the p**s out of females – it happens – deal with it, laugh about it, but please, don’t take it too seriously.
Anyway, back to point. PAD – good episode, don’t let anyone take that away from you.
Well, as a woman comic book reader and store owner, “Dangerous Curves” does not make me want to pick up and read it. All I can invision is a cover that had some bigs bøøbš on sexy women. YUCK! There are far too many of these on my shelves. However… “Peter David’s Dangerous Curves” might get me to look inside because I know him to be a great writer. Women look for story not, hot looking characters.
My main beef with “Dangerous Curves” is that it’s a very tired cliche.
“Fallen Angel” sounds very interesting. Why cheapen it with any kind of cheesy slogan?
Certain people, male and female, just like complaining about everything. It makes them feel important.
**Hmm, I was at I-Con one year when Claudia Christian was a speaker. She had mentioned the episode you’re talking about. Her comments of what she said at the time were more along the lines of ‘Come on guys, give her a little diginity.’ and that the period thing was dropped. I’m paraphrasing here as I don’t recall exactly what she said, but they were definitely along those lines.
Perhaps my memory is faulty, but her comments stuck with me because the hair scene was so funny and I didn’t remmeber any reference to cramps when I had watched it on tv.**
You’re right: Your memory is faulty. What Claudia was undoubtedly referencing was that Mira was uncomfortable with the cramps line, and when they were shooting the final scene, they wanted to shoot additional coverage to what they already had. And Claudia expressed to them that she thought they had all they needed already in the can.
PAD
I think my head is going to explode. sigh
Mr. David is most definitely not a sexist, mysognistic pig. Phooie on any fool who says so. If he were such a pig, he’d be a horrible daddy to those little girls of his, and that’s obviously not true. So there.
However, sigh yeah, assuming that focus on hair is only a typical female trait is– sputter For pete’s sake (ack! pun!), has no one here ever been to a club? ( Or even one of those meat-markety bars. MEN focus on the state of their hair and how they look. Manly men with impressively bulgy… cough muscles and large shoes and mad b-ball skillz. Or whatever is supposed to be impressively manly according to this month’s parade of glossy magazines.
Men and women both have to deal with objectification according to gender. Both sexes are required to conform to constantly changing and usually unrealistic physical ideals as well as ridiculous and arbitrary (and equally mutable) behavioral ideals. Men and women both worry about how they look and behave, sometimes to frightening extremes.
Unfortunately, it’s still mostly a problem of the objectification of women, the focus on the physical appeal of a woman taking priority over any other aspect of her self. It exists and it’s exhausting and anyone who says it doesn’t exist anymore hasn’t had an office job in a while.
There is so much more which could be said on this point, but I’ve a feeling that there’s no way I could possibly persuade anyone who reads this to think in any manner but, “Oh, this chick’s complaining. She must be unf*ckably ugly!”
(I think having studied critical theory as an English major, I’ve a lot of theories I could toss everyone’s way on exactly why this sort of campaign is completely wrong, but, really, who the hëll cares what an English major thinks? Bleh! Phooie on that.)
I think perhaps, in the end, I might be somewhat irked by yet another comic campaign selling the bøøbŧášŧìç adventures of the sexy-sexy yet kick-ášš femmes. I mean, again? I don’t have an alternative campaign idea, as this is pretty much the only kind of campaign I’ve seen. It’s one of the reasons I don’t read most mainstream comics. Bøøbálìçìøûš, magical-spandex-clad, “strong” women/tween mášŧûrbáŧìøņ aides. Yeah, that’s writen with a non-lesbian female reader in mind. Uh-huh. Just thinking about it makes my head spin.
I won’t go ape over the campaign, as it’s just a freakin’ comic book campaign not a political platform. Anyway, I’ve had to deal for some years now with my bosses and supervisors having entire conversations with me while staring at my chest. It’s a pleasant surprise when men actually look me in the eye. It would be a pleasant surprise if the focus of the marketing weren’t on T&A, but as I can’t think of a way to sell the comics myself (not having extensive knowledge of either marketing or the item being marketed), I’ll simply ignore the campaign, as I always try to do: focus on what’s important, which is who’s working on the comic. As this comic’s being written by Mr. David, a writer whose work I have enjoyed in the past, I’m interested. The marketing won’t turn me away.
I am a teensy bit disappointed (and wishing for eye contact), but another objectifying marketing ploy won’t keep me from reading good writing.
(Apologies for incoherence. Again, I’m trying to keep my head from exploding and from writing equally-insulting comments to respond to some very offensive and piggy statements made by a very few other commenters.)
Well, this is certainly interesting. So many fascinating things being tossed around… all based on two words. PAD says he’s seen nothing but “crabbing.”
Nooo, I said I’ve seen “all these people” crabbing.
PAD writes: “You know…I find that statement [the “female gaze”] horrifyingly patronizing. It would never occur to me to make the flat statement of how all females perceive anything.”
Doesn’t Claudia’s comment about your script finally allowing her to “act like women” imply a flat statement about how all women act?
Nooo, Claudia’s comment was referring to the fact that she believed Ivanova and Delenn acted pretty much in a gender neutral manner, and she felt the script was anything but that.
Doesn’t saying that “Dangerous Curves” will appeal to males imply “all” males?
Yes. Then again, I’m a male. I have no trouble making flat statements about what “appeals” to males. But I wouldn’t say what all men think. And I sure wouldn’t say anything about what appeals to all women or what they think.
Doesn’t saying that “women have curves and men like to look at them” make a flat, general statement about the way men perceive something?
Men don’t like to look at them?
When you wrote a Hulk annual in which Tyrannus was scared of becoming old and ugly, and Betty said, “Finally, a villain with motivations that a woman can relate to,” doesn’t that have some pretty limiting implications about the way women think?
Nooo, that implies that Betty has that opinion. Interestingly, when I have a demented murderer make societal observations, no one wonders if he’s speaking with my voice.
To stop before this seems too much like an attack (if I’m not too late!
Yup, too late.
My point is simply that it’s unfair to characterize one’s use of the phrase “the female gaze” as horrifyingly patronizing.
And yet I did it all the same.
Especially when you say just a little later that “sometimes it’s fun to act like our genders.”
Yes. When one celebrates the differences, that’s fun. When one gender berates the other because the other isn’t pretending those differences don’t exist, that’s not so fun.
So each gender has a certain way that it acts, but to imply that there is such a thing as a “female gaze” or a “male gaze” is horrifyingly patronizing?
No. Making flat assertions that all females will feel a certain way about a topic is pretty patronizing, though. The implication is that if they don’t agree with the speaker, something’s wrong with them.
Elayne was just asking a question about what would be implied by a tagline such as “Dangerous Curves,” and got trounced for it.
Trounced? My reading of the thread had a majority of people chiming in going “Yeah! Women will be offended!” It became so pervasive that people were acting as if the title of the book was “Dangerous Curves.”
A lot of people I’ve talked to on the Hulk message board (and not just the usual bozos, PAD, I promise) found that Tyrannus joke to be sexist, and they have a point. What’s the implication, after all? Men can have all sorts of motivations for their actions, but women are only motivated by a desire to look good?
To me, the point is we’ve become such a dámņëd humorless society that even a throwaway joke is scoured for hidden meaning and (un)intended offenses if it doesn’t toe the politically correct line.
TIH was a comic book in which Marlo is constantly being defined by “the male gaze” (to get into that dangerous territory again). From Bruce looking a bikini-clad Marlo up and down in issue 353 to Rick’s implied erection upon seeing Marlo in a sexy dress in issue 442 (or thereabouts), she was a character who was constantly being defined by her physical characteristics, and men’s reaction to those characteristics. (“Six foot tall and *really* built” was a phrase repeated more than once when she first came on the scene.)
Because of course in real life great looking women are *never* referred to or defined by their physical characteristics. And how many “Halle Berry is really hot” observations were made during the Oscars?
Please. Marlo as a character was defined by far more than her looks, and the vast majority of stories her physicality was not a factor at all. What we’re seeing here are observations not germane to the story or character, but instead people reading those stories through the prism of their own perceptions, isolating stray comments, and deciding that the entirety of the body of work is defined by a handful of references because those references snag their particular concerns. “I hate when women are objectified–oh! Look there! Someone noticed Marlo’s breasts! The character is entirely defined by her physicality!” Christ.
And by the way, I kept saying in dialogue when she “first came on the scene” that she was six foot tall and really built because you sure as hëll couldn’t tell it from the artwork. I wanted to underscore that she was close to as tall as the Hulk and physically very strapping which would enable her to handle physical relations with him…neither of which was clear from the way the artist rendered her.
Now, to take stuff like this and go in and say, “Peter David is a misogynist” is ridiculous.
You haven’t been paying attention. I hate men, remember? Not women. Or perhaps I hate both. Perhaps I’m just a misanthrope.
“Peter David is a sexist”? Again, based on a few gags about Marlo’s body or Tyrannus wearing makeup… absurd.
And yet…
But, are those jokes sexist? Arguably, yes. Not that that’s a problem. Lots of humor is offensive; often times, that’s the point. Some of my favorite humor is deliberately offensive.
But, the flip side is to look at this stuff and say, well, it might be harmless jokes, but at the same time, it’s not doing women any favors.
This reminds me of the sequence in “1776” when Congress is busy gutting the Declaration because they’re worried about offending Parliament. And Adams explodes, “This is a revolution, dammit! We’re going to have to offend somebody!”
Humor will generally offend someone. I write a lot of humor, and there’s very little I consider not a potential target. So I’m going to offend everyone at some point in the long haul. If I constricted what I wrote because of who I might offend, I wouldn’t be doing ANYONE any favors.
I know that pointing out this stuff and calling it sexist is often seen as reactionary, but we still live in a society in which women are objectified; they’re a collection of pretty parts and their worth is often decided by their physical appearance.
As are men.
And anything that reinforces that notion of women (such as using the buzz phrase “dangerous curves” to encompass a group of female characters) is probably not, in the long run, a good thing.
And yet a woman came up with the phrase “Dangerous curves.” And a female editor approved it. Loved it, in fact. Said “Babe, my curves *are* dangerous.” Go figure.
It’s not a terrible thing. Not something punishable by death. But still, to quote a certain CBG columnist, “It’s not something they pin a medal on you for.”
Not letting oneself run scared? Perhaps they should pin a medal on.
PAD
The idiot pretending to be Brian Bendis is nothing of the sort. The problem is that he logs on via AOL, and since AOL assigns IPs randomly, anyone logging in with AOL can wind up being unable to post (including me.) So while we work to get rid of him permanently, I would ask that no one respond to him. We will continue to delete his posts as they come up.
PAD
CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH!
The idiot
I am, in fact, not fit to lick the boots of any person on this board.
Hey PAD,
The “CRASH!” make it hard to reply to your last post, because I can’t refer back to it. I have to do this by memory (my copy and paste function isn’t working here..). But I want to reply to a few things…
1.) The thing about the “crabbing.” I apologize. I misread it (or read it too fast.)
2.) “Too late” to not be perceived as an attack. Again, I apologize. I’m a fan of your work, I’m a fan of this blog. I enjoy the discourse, and that you’re out there constantly defending your point of view. It’s really cool. I was trying to engage in debate and do so objectively. If this made me seem hostile, I am truly sorry.
3. I can say what appeals to men because I’m a male. But why couldn’t Elayne say what she thinks appeals to women without being patronizing?
4. Men are also judged by physical appearance. True, but I don’t believe it’s on the same scale. Men are still more empowered than females in so many aspects of life, and females are treated as sex objects a lot more often. So, yes, men DO like to look at women’s curves. Wouldn’t it be a nice world if men wanted to listen to a woman’s words as often?
5. I know not everything your characters say is also what you believe. I argued this point in your favor on the Hulk board once, actually. (Do I get any points for that? No? Sigh… okay…) Hey, Betty’s line about Tyrannus made me laugh out loud. But as I also said before, stories are open to interpretation.
If that dialogue is there in Betty’s word balloon, then a reader can look at it and say, “Well, what is the author trying to say with this?” Nothing in that particular story *contradicts* Betty, so it’s a reasonable interpretation. It may be incorrect, but that doesn’t make it cretinous, does it? The idea that it makes a person “humorless” to scour a punchline for meaning is valid, but still open to debate. Jokes, for all their glibness, don’t exist in a vacuum. Humor can still have a point of view. So is it that bad if someone attempts to discern that point of view?
6. Okay, Elayne wasn’t trounced. My mistake.
7. Ach, as I said, my copy and paste is all messed up. But I’m looking at the paragraph that began with “Please” and ends with “Christ.” Regarding that paragraph… indeed. Well put. This is the kind of discourse that I love! I absolutely see your point, and I will have to look over some of my TIH issues and possibly revise my opinion.
But, genuinely, it seemed like Marlo’s physicality was an overwhelming aspect of the character when I read those stories. Perhaps this was partly because of artists’ increasingly anatomically exaggerated renderings of her over the years. I just remember copious references to her looks, so many that it seemed gratuitous. Perhaps it is simply to do with my personal threshold.
In any case, if this is just me not seeing the overall forest of your stories because of my personal idelogical trees, then… well… I can change my mind.
8. You quoted “came on the scene.” Presumably to point up the grammatical incorrectness. Oops. Okay, when Marlo “arrived on the scene.”
9. Okay, I’m going into double digits and I didn’t plan to write this much… but to sum up: basically, I think that gender politics is a *very* complicated issue. Feminism gets a bad rap because it deals in a lot of contradictions. An ex-girlfriend of mine used to criticize feminists for “wanting it both ways,” and in a way, I suppose they do. A black author once wrote something to the effect of, “If you want to be my friend, the first thing you have to do is forget that I’m black. The second thing you have to do is NEVER forget that I’m black.” Similarly, I think your typical female feminist (though not every female feminist; we don’t want to generalize, do we?) wants you to forget she’s a woman, but also never forget that she’s a woman. And how the hëll does one do that?
I don’t know. I could write about this stuff all night (getting even less coherent as the night went on than I am presently). I wrestle with it constantly. That’s what you’re seeing now, I suppose. I just think it’s interesting to talk about, and was excited to see the subject be pursued on this blog.
But it does really suck that I came off as though I were attacking. It’s certainly not my intention to pìšš øff one of my childhood idols.
If these thoughts aren’t welcome, I can stop posting them. My hope was that they’d be enjoyed; I certainly enjoy your responses. They always give me plenty to think about.
See, this is why I always lose at debates. I start out with a straightforward argument, but as soon as the counter-arguments start coming in, I go, “Aaah, that’s interesting. Hmmm, let me think about this…” And then the person I’m debating gets annoyed at my wishy-washy-ness and stops answering me. I guess I can’t blame ’em…
Thanks for listening. Now I’m going to bed. 🙂
Okay, this is what I get for reading in reverse order.
1) Jeff Moris — you’re right, but only in part 1
part 2 send her to her mom or sisters to talk about different kinds of bras and styles. Talking to dad about “minimizers” isn’t the way to go.
I recommend the WIRELESS bras from Bali if she’s really big. They stretch nicely and have a lot of mostly cotton modles.
I hate underwires, they don’t work.
2) I understand the points about being easily offended. See my post on the other topic — perhaps a happy marketing medium is the adjective BODACIOUS after Bodica, the Celtic heroine. I don’t think there’s a good ajective based on Queen Ester’s name, but anybody know what it was in aramic or ancient persian? Maybe there is word that has the root in her name. Just try not to use “ladies” or “babes” — I know its tempting to go with Babes once you have bodacious, but I think the ideas metnioned on the other thread about beauty and but-kicking might get you there.
3- I do take offense to “fat ugly” as there are those who are fat and pretty, fat and cute and fat and beautiful out there.
Hmmm. A fascinating debate. Not much I can add to it.
However, I wonder if PAD or the rest of you have heard Tom Smith’s filk about the B-5 episode in question, “The Curlers of Delenn.” Yes, PAD, it’s a filk of a certain song from Pochahantos.
(And for what it’s worth, Tom Smith also did a filk summing up all of B-5 to the tune of “One Week.”)
What I have to say isn’t nearly as poignant as Crash repeated 60 times, nor is it entirely on topic, but it seemed as good a place as any to voice my question.
You mention the two episodes of B5 that you wrote. Why haven’t you ever written any Star Trek episodes?
From what I can tell you’re probably the most respected Star Trek novel writer out there. I got into Star Trek on the tails of Rock and a Hard Place and Imzadi.
As a fan of Star Trek overall and someone who would love to see some better writing on Enterprise, I’ll bet I’m not alone in wishing you’d kick in Berman’s door and politely making him shoot a couple of your ideas.
Then again maybe you’re not even interested in writing Star Trek episodes and it’s already been mentioned in the past.
I’m new here.
When you add passwords you should add an Edit feature so that we can retroactively not look as stupid when we post something like, “kick in Berman’s door and politely MAKING him”
I feel like I translated myself poorly from Japanese to English.
Interesting discussion. A couple points:
1) PAD does an excellent job writing characters, because the outlook and treatment is consistent with that character. Marlo is physically robust because the Hulk is physically robust. That always made sense to me. The writer who changed the Invisible Woman from her established character to a wonton babe with a bad costume is an example of a bad writer (and, as I recall, in the Hulk bachelorette issue, PAD fixed that, too.)
2) I don’t follow comics anymore, so from an “unbiased” viewpoint, “Dangerous Curves” strikes me as very clever. From what I’ve seen of the Fallen Angel concept (which is minimal and only from this blog) it doesn’t seem to fit in that marketing concept. But I don’t know enough to know if I’m right.
3) Men and women aren’t different, EVERYONE is different. My wife is the picture of physical beauty, however, overt sexual remarks or characters would probably offend her. She believes her sexuality is reserved especially for me and no one else. It is not for display for anyone else. So she doesn’t read this kind of stuff. Nothing wrong with that. (I really disliked Young Justice. It took me a while to figure out PAD wasn’t writing it for me. *DUH* Not everything is written for everybody. He’s smart because he knows that and he’s successful because he DOESN’T write for everybody on everything.)
4) Philosophically and politically, PAD and I don’t agree on much, but I appreciate him opening this forum up to everyone, nonetheless. I come here because I enjoy his writing, and even if I don’t agree with his politics, he lays out his arguments in an enjoyable manner, as do many of the people on this board.
5) Thank you!
I think this applies to virtually anything written. Particularly on the internet where you can receive immediate feedback.
It’s been my fortune to know some truly powerful women in the world of business–presidents and CEO’s of corporations.
Not one of them thinks to much about “empowerment”. They have it. They think about doing their jobs.
Not one got to where they were by “being male”. They were powerful AND they were feminine.
Based on knowing these women, I feel the belief that a women has to surrender her interest in fashion, hair, or nail polish to become empowered is an utter myth. These things bring pleasure to some women the same way a low golf handicap and Super Bowl tickets can bring pleasure to some empowered men.
I never thought you were offbase, PAD. Empowered women come in many variations just as un-empowered women do.
The image I do object to in pop culture is when empowered female characters are portrayed as men with breasts. That’s a type of woman I have not encountered in real real life.
Maybe these things are perpetuated by people without power who have been fed the myth.
Relax, PAD, there’s nothing politically correct about your argument here, it’s very well written, and I appreciate your bringing it forth. Thank you very much.