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The “Women in Refrigerators” trope in literature

TRIGGER WARNING: dead bodies, mentions of sexual and physical assault, corpses, etc. SOURCE: “Women in Refrigerators” The term “Women in Refrigerators” or “Fridging” was most notably coined by female comic book writer Gail Simone. Simone is best known for her work on Birds of Prey, Deadpool, and Wonder Woman. The term came from Green Lantern #54, where Kyle Rayner is horrified to find his girlfriend, Alexandra DiWitt,  murdered and stuffed into his refrigerator. 

Kyle finds out she was killed by Major Force as a way to get under his skin. Simone was shocked to see Alexandra being used as little more than a plot point to further the story of the leading man, and was sick of women characters being treated like a dispensable commodity for writers. Many writers of all genders have taken her words to heart, and “Fridging” has become a topic of huge debate. The trope usually has 3 common occurrences 1. A female character (not just a love interest) is brutalized beyond repair in some way: killed, physically assaulted, mind broken, de-powered, or sexually assaulted. 2. A villain is responsible and only does it to provoke the hero. 3. The woman’s injury/death provides vengeful motivation for the hero to fight/kill/defeat the villain The reason “Fridging” is harmful trope is because it objectifies female characters, turns them into plastic story devices, and their character development just serves as motivation to the male protagonist. It’s the same reason why “damsels in distress” is a stereotypical trope; it gives the illusion that women cannot fight for themselves. These tropes are not just limited to love interests, but anyone woman in the male hero’s life. But the trope most often applies to a love interest. It’s considered more tragic and grief-inspiring for the hero to lose the women he’s devoted his life to. This isn’t a call for untouchable female characters; as long as the female’s death is more relevant to the story than just as the hero’s motivation. Regardless, I find it almost frightening to think about how common this is and how often it still happens.  One counter-argument being made against the term “Fridging” is the idea that women do face these situations and it’s a real thing happening today.  This argument is ridiculous, because the deaths of these women are never the central focus of the story, and their brutalization is never the theme. It’s the death of a woman for the interest of a plot point that makes it fridging. The other big counter-argument against the WiR trope is that men are killed all the time in literature, and singling out the deaths of females is simply being selective. This argument brought about the “Dead Men Defrosting” or “DMD” trope, designed to show how men being murdered as motivation and women being murdered for motivation were starkly different. Firstly, role-reversal (a super-heroine's love interest being killed off to further her story) is not half as common as those arguing this can make it sound. Additionally, men are not killed in the same manner as most female characters are. The death of a female character is far more often due to torture and/or exploitation or assault of a sexual nature than their male counterparts. Men that die often die in a very admirable or heroic manner, such as Steve Trevor in Wonder Woman (2017) who takes a plane full of explosives into the sky to save all the people below. Although it is used to further Wonder Woman’s anger so she can defeat Ares (the god of war), Steve sacrifices himself in a fiery explosion of glory and heroism, much unlike Alexandra DiWitt. The objectification of women in literature is a long-standing issue that needs to be far more seriously addressed. A woman is not just a love interest, not just a motive. It becomes extremely boring when female comic fans have to sit and read through 1-dimensional women after 1-dimensional women. Giving your female characters a personality and abstaining from reducing them to a plot device not only makes them far more interesting, it also forces you to come up with a better plot. Don’t write a female. Write a three-dimensional character.

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A thought about Anti-Vaxxers

So we’ve tried explaining vaccines using science and that scared people

but what if instead we told them that vaccines actually contain magic rocks or healing energy

“We left this rabies vaccine in the light of a full moon to cleanse it, so it’s safe.  everyone knows about the link between rabies and full moons :)”

“Vaccination is an ancient practice going back at least hundreds of years that draws on your body’s natural healing abilities to let you fight disease naturally” “This vaccine has a special healing quality and comes with free essential oils to ensure proper activation! ;) If it takes this much for them to vaccinate themselves and their children, then I’m willing to do it. 

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This!! There is a long history of Jewish people being compared to goblins.

This article by Rayne Weinstein goes into fantastic detail but I’m just going to sum it up!

“Goblins are a mythological creature that are characterized by their small size, grotesque looks and their cunning, greedy and mischievous nature... They share their stature and their ugliness– as well as their exaggerated noses.” Keeping this in mind, there are certain characteristics that have long caricatured stereotypical Jews: “…physical deformity… grotesque physiognomy… exaggerated, elongated, broad or hooked noses.” These are also all traits we see in goblins.

This isn’t to say that goblins originated in antisemitism—most European cultures actually never associated goblins with Jews! Increased popularity of fantasy and magic was what actually began to make this connection.

The rise of the fantastical assisted in antisemitic beliefs that Jewish people were like these greedy mythical creatures and unless I have the wrong information, increased public belief that goblins were evil because of their association with Jews.

just… remember to be careful with antisemitism in goblincore with things like “ugly” green creatures that hoard precious stones and coins

have fun with it, absolutely! let it be empowering! just be aware that goblins are known to be used as antisemitic caricatures 

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If you ever want something completely different,

watch Black Mirror: Bandersnatch on Netflix

warning: (mild) spoilers below!

The concept is incredible. The steady flow of choices and fourth wall breaks keeps you entertained and engaged throughout the entire experience. It’s incredible to follow Stefan through his life, to see the types of choices you have to make. The consequences of each action are so drastic, and yet you’ll keep making them no matter what. As Stefan’s reality begins to crumble around him, you slowly begin to realize that much like his own game, you never really had a choice.

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leaning back far enough in your chair turns your spine to Pop Rocks

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Reblog if you're a girl who snorts when you laugh, if you like girls who snort when they laugh, or can't wait for the inevitable fall of capitalism.

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i just talked 9 of my friends into just giving me their phone cases it’s very funny to me.

i wonder what else people are willing to just hand over?

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more inspo for my project!!!!

also, below is what i roughly want it to look like (going to have a transparent panel painted like the first one slide open to reveal the second image)

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gen z culture is scrolling down your feed and seeing a post about the terrible state of the world and right below that post is one that literally just says ’yeet’ in big fancy letters

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Idea that my friend and I had!

ft. friend hands

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Bathroom Art

ft

Me drawing

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The thing about how women in comics used to be drawn and sometimes are still drawn, you can only really understand the difference between an action girl being forced into unrealistic sexual, sensual positions, and an actual strong and well posed, empowering but still sexy female character, when you see what it looks like to have male characters depicted in overtly sensual poses

And I’m not talking about the Hawkeye Initiative or any given parody

I actually want to draw a comparison using art by Kevin Wada

Kevin Wada is a proud part of the LGBTQ+ community and he has this unique ability to sexualize mainstream male heroes without it looking like a parody. He draws covers for multiple big comic companies and his style reminiscent of old fashion magazines, drawn largely in traditional watercolor, has made him a stalwart of the industry.

He also draws a lot of naked Bucky Barnes.

Anyway, I want to talk about how interesting his art is, the difference between his power poses and his sexy poses for male and female characters.

A typical power pose for a male comics character would look like this

Whereas every so often with female heroes you get something like this

Not all the time, of course, but it happens and it happens in the wrong places. You wouldn’t be posing like a cover model in the middle of a battle, you really wouldn’t.

But when it comes to Wada and male and female characters, the difference is pretty clear.

When he draws male characters, they more often look like this

Sensual, in a pose you wouldn’t usually see a big, muscular hero doing. If not that, then playful, sexy, for looking at, but nothing about their anatomy overly exaggerated

How he draws women is also very clearly different from many other artists, from sexy pose to power pose.

Still posing for the camera, still to be looked at, but very, very different from how we’ve seen female characters portrayed in mainstream comics in the past.

And I guess it’s really just a matter of variety? Objectification in art is a long time debate and appears everywhere always, but for all that we can argue about its impact on popular media, there are a few things I know for sure:

1) having a female character pose like a playboy cover girl in the middle of a battle scene is just Bad Art and y'all need to find better references

2) female power poses will never look quite as right as when they’re drawn by people who know the value of expressing personality through pose (it’s basic animation principles and some artists still need to learn it) and who actually know what a female character’s personality beyond “sexy”

3) Iron Man or Batman posing like they’re about to beat somebody up is 100% not the same as a fashion drawing by Kevin Wada where a Typical Beefy Action Guy gets to pose like a flirty pretty boy

4) the MCU films have figured out the value of pandering to female audiences by sexually objectifying all their male action heroes while simultaneously appealing to the male demographic’s action movie power fantasy. Quoting Chris Hemsworth and Taika Waititi: “I’m not a piece of meat” “Uh, yes you are.”

They definitely struck some kind of balance there.

Also, more important than this entire post: y'all should follow @kevinwada on Tumblr and give him love because his art is divine and his talent beyond words

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This is very satisfying

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Inspo Soundtrack

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-bvY5xhrqI&list=PLT4aE8ojSTIYkTTHAnKvy8wRWRMAilrEv&index=113

Echo Lake - Pierce Fulton

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Process of finding my reference images! Realistic doll>Azusa Chiyoda doll>Pretty doll head as a base. This is when I got the idea to use a skull because I thought it looked similar to one. Skull>The idea for the melting>Human mandibles to use under doll head!

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repost from @/banksy on Instagram.

I absolutely love this and im not sure I can explain why. Maybe it’s because Banksy has always been so clear about wanting to put up his paintings for free and for everyone to see. Maybe it’s how no one noticed an entire handmade shredder in the frame for years. I don’t know. But Banksy doing this is such a powerful statement to me.

I’m also a fan of many other works of his, but this especially spoke to me.