#I can give you hundreds of women who didn’t fit the stereotype of ‘good mother’ that became mothers anyways and did an awesome job

[rabbits-of-negative-euphoria]

“some women just aren’t wired to be mothers.” define wired. what does it mean to be wired for motherhood, or not wired for motherhood. what’s your definition of a good mother? is it a stereotype? probably. if it’s not, what you actually mean to say is “some women are just too flawed to be mothers.” “some women are just too selfish/lazy/insane to be mothers.” that’s not something to normalize, it’s something to remedy.

[michyreadsthenwrites]

Plain Bad Heroines - Let Me Give You My Thoughts On This (Character Analysis)

**major maaaaajor spoilers ahead**

(Here we begin with the handful of characters from Danforth’s sophomore novel that have found their way into my heart and apparently, this Word document. It didn’t hurt that they were all women that love women. And I mean, they really loved women.)

 ·   Merritt Emmons is easily my favorite character. She’s got that dry, sarcastic humor and air around her that makes it really easy to love her and hate her guts all at the same time. (If she were here, she’d tell us that this was a talent, not a flaw.) I felt personally affronted when characters in PBH didn’t like Merritt, like they were overlooking the diamond in the rough right in front of their faces. Then, like most things, it became pretty clear: Merritt Emmons could be one hell of a bitch at times. But it really only made me love her more. I realized that I identified with her. Yes, about being a queer woman that really fucking loves other women, but also because she was a writer that wanted her writing to stay true to how she wrote it, especially with so many people traipsing all over it and trying to make it into something it’s not. That was where I realized I loved her early on; when she pitched a genuine fit over who was to play Clara Broward. It was something so petty and childish, something so very me to throw a fit in a packed room of professionals when you have no idea about that kind of world and what it demands. But she fought for what she believed in, alright. Until she didn’t. This made me love her some more, incidentally. We got to see Merritt’s character development throughout the novel, and more specifically, we got to watch her bounce back and forth between the person she was too scared to be but wanted more than she could ever admit, and the person she spent twenty long years being; the person she was oh-so-tired of introducing to people. This constant shift between new-Merritt and old, crabby, prickly-Merritt was a very raw and vulnerable thing for us to experience as an audience. Merritt was certainly a lot more refreshing than every one of the overdone-Hollywood-types we became acquainted with within the book. She was mean and arrogant and wildly insecure, yet somehow confident and sure of herself, when it came to her work or her knowledge or anything that had to do with any book written, ever. A walking paradox, that one. Merritt was a good way to remember that real people, not built-and-put-together-by-Hollywood-people don’t always have their shit together, and they can’t always get it together by the end of a novel, albeit a long, six-hundred-page one. I think I’ll cut myself off here, friends. Not that I want to, but I feel we have a lot to get to in these pages, and Merritt Emmons can’t be the star of all of them (lord knows I’d let her, though). To sum it up: Merritt Emmons was the star of this book, for me at least. And I hope for you too. (This means go get your ass over to your closest B&N and buy the damn thing).

  ·   Harper Harper is somewhat of a mystery to me. She was a major character in the story, as well as one of our three protagonists, our three heroines, and yet I have trouble finding her as authentic and outlandish as she tries to come across. What I’m still having trouble deciphering is if this is an intentional character flaw created by our Miss Danforth, or if Harper Harper really has nothing to her besides being completely reinvented and marketed by Hollywood. Even in saying this, I know I have to give Harper credit where it’s due. She’s a proud queer woman in the movie industry, as well as openly queer online and really with just anyone and everyone she meets. She’s known for various flings and love-interests of the week, which is still a gross misrepresentation and stereotype of (masc?) lesbians and how they’re emotionally unavailable and unfaithful, which again is a possibility of the author’s intentional writing, something that we can leave for further discussion. We do get a bit of a glimpse into Harper’s life – her real-life – about how her mother is struggling with her sobriety, how her little brother seems to be caught in the middle of her mother’s messy relationships, and how she really has mixed feelings about how she fits into her new movie-star life. That’s about all we get from Harper, though. And it really is almost enough realness to take away from the fact that everyone else in the world sees Harper as the face of Hollywood, as this thing of beauty and money and badassery instead of a real person. But still not enough. And I could be wrong, friends. I could be pulling all of this out of my ass because Harper Harper is a badass queer woman that took over the movie industry with barely any experience under her belt. Harper Harper took every room she walked into by storm, and she made everybody pay attention to her, and she became the character we had a little crush on, simply because she was that big of a deal. But nothing of substance, not really. Not ever. But perhaps she had been her most real self with Merritt Emmons, in between the quiet pages that we didn’t get to read entirely. Merritt, our dry and arrogant and favorite heroine, had been Harper’s favorite, too. The most credit that I find myself giving Harper is her aid in Merritt’s character development. She brought Merritt out of her shell in a massive way, though at times she did have a hand in driving her back into the said shell. It was flawed, their relationship, which is another authentic Harper Harper insight we saw, as little of it there was. They were hot and cold, on and off, but always so enthralled with each other. And while Harper seemed to have had an impact on Merritt (among other factors), it doesn’t seem like Merritt had the same effect on Harper. I could be wrong and do feel free to correct me, friends, but Harper Harper did not come out the other end of PBH a changed woman. She was not burdened with the weight of a life-changing revelation. She was Harper Harper, as she always was, floating and untouchable, the kind of woman you wished to know, maybe to be, but also the kind you see right through. They’re transparent, friends, that’s what I’m trying to get at here. And they tend to stay that way. And I realize as I’m nearing the end of this, that I sound harsh in my critiques and analysis of Harper. I don’t mean to come off that way, friends, I really don’t. The truth is I love Harper, she’s everything we wish we could be. She’s gorgeous and sought after, can land any girl she wants with the bat of her eyelashes and a lazy smile. But you have to remember, she’s everything we’re not. I can only speak for myself, friends, and I encourage you to speak for yourselves if you find you have anything to add. I never related with Harper the way I did with Merritt’s character, but that doesn’t mean that Harper isn’t a beautiful enigma waiting to be unwrapped. I just don’t happen to be the kind of reader that would know where to begin unwrapping her, if that makes sense. And because I’m afraid it doesn’t, I do believe it’s time to stop with the metaphors and wrap this up nicely for you, friends: Harper Harper is number two on my list of favorite characters from PBH, and that is not something done lightly or by accident. She was one of our three heroines, after all. And a proper heroine she was, friends. Don’t you ever forget it.

  ·   Libbie Packard broke my heart more times than I count, friends. You’ll notice I have kept her maiden name, then. This is intentional, friends, for our Libbie never wanted to be a Brookhants, not really. It wasn’t towards the end of PBH that we learned much of what we now know about Libbie, and how it came about that she had been married (to a man no less!), as well as the very young principal of an all-girls school. Throughout their chapters in the book, Libbie and Alex, her Alex, were seemingly at each other’s throats constantly. There seemed to be a mysterious tension that we as an audience weren’t privy to – but it didn’t stop us from speculating. I found myself drawn to Libbie more than I did her counterpart, and I still can’t point my finger as to why. Libbie seemed sad, right from our first introduction, and Alex always seemed angry and cynical (as a queer woman in 1902, is there any other way to seem?). This might serve as a dual character analysis yet, friends. I’m not sure how much I’ll have to say about our Alexandra Trills, but Libbie Packard deserves a long sentence, or two. You know when something finally clicks into place and you can’t help but just let out a long “ooohhhhhhh”? That’s a recreation of how I looked when I read the explanation of how Libbie Packard became Libbie Brookhants. Learning that she had become pregnant with a baby she didn’t want was mind-blowing enough, and it filled in the blanks of how young, gorgeous Libbie had become the wife of a rich, old, old man. Libbie gave up her child was because she didn’t want to be a mother, and she had originally rejected Harold Brookhants offer of marriage because she didn’t want to be a wife, regardless of false the marriage was. And for a while, Libbie’s new life was amazing; she got to live with her Alex in a beautiful house and became the principal of a promising school. This was the life she’d always wanted. Or was that just what we wanted to believe, friends? Only at the end did we learn that Libbie had rejected Harold Brookhants offer (to live a quiet, queer life with her lover and without the child she clearly didn’t want) because she didn’t want to be tied down; not to Harold, not to anyone. If you think about it, friends, this was exactly the life that she had been living for years to come now. The tension with Alex had much to do with the circumstances surrounding them at Brookhants and the evil that was unfolding before them, but it seemingly had even more to do with the fact that Libbie Packard felt smothered. She was hiding secrets from Alex, secrets that she felt could destroy this already fragile relationship that they had between them. How vastly different it was to read and experience their relationship at the beginning of their love; playful and full of joy, both women giddy with the promise of something new and exciting. To compare that kind of love to the broken, tight-lipped, empty vessel of the relationship they now pretend to have is heartbreaking. And yet, completely understandable. Alex had fallen in love with the Libbie she wanted her to be, not the Libbie she was. Our Libbie wanted to be eternally young; playful and happy, bouncing from city to city with Sara Dahlgren in a sea of eligible bachelors (and bachelorettes!). It was almost a shock to discover that this life Libbie tried so hard to defend and protect was not a life she had ever wanted for herself. Despite this, she loved her Alex and her students, and devoted her life to them. There was that whole business with cheating on Alex with Adelaide the housemaid (don’t even get me started on that broad) but I’d like to extend to you, friends, the fact that I won’t comment on this. Queer relationships in 1902 are definitely not what they are now, complete with century-old curses and dead schoolgirls. Libbie Packard became the 1902-lesbian-headmistress version of our stereotypical bored housewife, stuck in a marriage that she secretly wishes she could be free from. And my heart broke for her, friends, it really did. But she was a heroine all on her own. A deeply intelligent and remarkable woman. Make no mistake, friends. Libbie Packard and Libbie Brookhants differ by more than just a surname. Our young, vivacious Libbie disappeared the moment she accepted Harold Brookhants’ offer, and this is indeed the sad truth of it, friends: Libbie Packard was gone before she could ever find herself. But Libbie Brookhants was our gorgeous, brilliant, queer heroine that never got what she deserved. So, friends, let’s all have a moment of silence for our dearly departed Libbie Brookhants… wherever she is.

·   Alexandra Trills is a character that I don’t know where to begin with. Her end is not one that I saw coming, at least not in the gruesome and deranged circumstances that came to surround it. Or maybe, friends, I just didn’t want to acknowledge the clear downwards spiral that our Miss Trills had seemed to be heading towards. Her steadfast and growing obsession with the death of Florence Hartshorn and Clara Broward was apparent in every page we turned, and the following death of Eleanor Faderman did not aid in absolving Alex of her obsession with the one, single copy of a book they had all possessed at one point: The Story of Mary McLane. Alex grew hysterical in her investigation of the novel and whatever evil she believed it had brought to the students of her school. I remember feeling a bit hysterical myself at times, following along with Alex’s scrambled train of thought that never seemed to find a place to stop. She was right, you know, my friends. And now what does she have to show for it? A gruesome death and an eternity of haunting the same grounds, day in and day out? I may not have liked her, and felt like she had been the reason Libbie was so unhappy and stuck in a life that she did not want, but the way Alex’s story had ended really did take me by surprise and break my heart. She deserved a better ending than what she got; she deserved to reconcile and fix her strained relationship with Libbie. Damn it, they deserved to live quiet, happy lives with each other. Neither of them got the endings that they deserved, and God, did they deserve plenty. This, friends, is the hill I choose to die on tonight.

 Alright, friends, this is it for my character analysis of Emily Danforth’s Plain Bad Heroines! I have a special place in my heart for book characters that you can relate with (or characters that just really make you love them). The way that Emily Danforth brought our heroines to life was remarkable and highly impressive (I say this because it’s decidedly been a while since any book character(s) have weaseled their fictional way into my little heart). It’s rare that I give a book five stars (check out my Goodreads reviews) (oh god, please don’t), and yet halfway through PBH, I knew that this book deserved it. Good book characters are the ones that stick with you long after you’ve closed the book on them, and our heroines are stuck with me. And believe me, friends, I’m certainly not complaining. 

[fairydust-stuff]

Wendy Darling Embodiment of Motherhood

Here’s the thing ,I have never been a big fan of Wendy Darling from JM Barrie’s classic novel Peter Pan. Not only is she a cocktail of every bad stereotype about Victorian women casually thrown into a blender to make the ultimate Grimm’s fairy tale heroines are more bad ass then you smoothie. But Wendy is just straight up the most boring character in Peter Pan. That being said she does play a very important role in Peter Pan. Also it’s gotten the point where I’m a bit tired of seeing this idea that the Never land ladies have nothing to offer. If we don’t change everything about them or let’s just leave them out entirely trend via Hollywood. Seriously when is the last time Tink got more than a cameo and I’m not talking about the sugary princess clone Disney created from her mutilated body. Anyway I want to take a look Wendy Darling how she works, how she doesn’t work what she embodies and how she’s been portrayed in various adaptations.

First let’s take a look at some themes. Peter pan is at its core a coming of age story about accepting the inevitability of growing up. However Wendy as a point of view character is kind of an odd choice for this theme. In the original novel Wendy brings a flower to her mother who declares “Why can’t you stay like this” Then the narrator proceeds to talk about how Wendy knew she must grow up. So we already have a character who accepts the fact she must grow up on page one. In fact Wendy doesn’t run away to Never land as much as take a holiday, and to be fair John and Michel suffer from the same problem. Honestly I think the closest thing we get to a character arch in the novel is George Darling who is a seriously underrated character in my opinion. So Wendy just never struggles with growing up. However another theme of Peter Pan is motherhood and oh boy does Wendy fit into that.

“She used to come to me in my and I’d say pretty mother, now she has come and I’ve shot her” Tootles laments after thinking he shot and killed Wendy. Even Hook want to take Wendy to be the mothers of himself and his crew in typical pirate fashion coveting what Peter Pan and the lost boys have Wendy becomes a treasure for them to steal. Smee when carrying Wendy even promises “I’ll save you if you promise to only be my Mother” Every boy and man child in Never land craves a mother and want Wendy to fill the position. Wendy taking on the role turns her into a kind of ideal in the eyes of everyone in Never land even her own brothers get in on the treating her as the perfect mom.

In fact Wendy only gets to be a little girl in the narrative when Hook offers his hand to her and she takes it and only because the narrative felt the need to defend her submission to her own capture. But looking back that may very well be the point when you look at Wendy and Peter’s relationship without the shipping googles it’s actually quite interesting. You’ve got two pre teen’s on two different wave lengths. Wendy states in the novel “Peter what are true feelings towards me?” and is displeased with Peter’s answer “That of a devoted son” this seems up their relationship perfectly. Wendy uses the role of mother to try to basically become Peter’s wife something which he is deeply uncomfortable with needing constant reassurance that playing an adult couple is “ Only make believe” now whether or not Peter is flat out not interested or scared of his own feelings is up for debate. I personally lean toward the former because Peter is constantly surrounded by busty topless mermaids who like to flirt with him. So if he hasn’t had his sexual awakening yet it’s not happening ever, but the point is Peter uses the reaffirmation of Wendy as Mother to keep her at a distance. When Wendy returns home Miss Darlings offers to adopt Peter which he refuses. This highlights the fact when given the chance to have an actual mother he doesn’t want one.

Wendy is a reflection of Peter’s warped relationship with motherhood. He confesses to Wendy that he did at one point did return to his mother only to find the window barred and “There was another little boy sleeping in my bed!”  It could be argued Peter’s desire to stay a little boy forever actually steam from the fear of abandonment and being replaced. This shapes Peter’s relationship with Wendy in sense he wants a mother he can actually control. One who never makes him feels too grown up or who challenges him or his choices in a meaningful way. This shows that motherhood is important and that without a proper mom boys will never truly grow into men.

Wendy plays a similar role to the lost boys only she actually ends up helping them. While the lost boys clearly already have mommy craving’s Wendy gives them a taste of what having a mom is actually like or at least what an ideal mom from a Victorian upper middle class family structure would be like. So when Wendy wants to go home the lost boys who getting a taste of what their missing decides to go with her. Where they get adopted into the Darling Family and grow into respectable members of society who all get boring office jobs in the prolog which completely contrast their colorful energetic personalities, moving on. Wendy acts as kind of encouraging benevolent guide for the lost boys and Peter her inevitable goal being to encourage to move beyond the superficial trappings of childhood and take a step forward into adulthood. Peter is the failure, deficient as the novel itself states but the lost boys are a triumph of the power of proper maternal nurturing.

Wendy Darling has appeared in various adaptations and Spin offs though I’m mostly going to focus on Movies and TV because most of the Peter Pan book retellings where Wendy plays a key role just do not fill me with any positive feelings. And I want to mostly focus on the good today with some casual snark thrown in.

So let’s start with Wendy from the 2003 Peter Pan Live Action adaptation. I love this version it makes changes from the novel while still paying homage by using actual lines from the book. Though I have very mixed feelings about 2003 Wendy.

The movie heavily leans into the annoying I’m not like other girls trope. Here Victorian lady Wendy turns fairy tales into gore fests, and has an interest in sword play and pirates. I’m not saying girls from that era can’t have those interests but it just feels like their Wendy is the product of listening to too many focus groups not to mention she learns to be an expert sword fighter who can go toe to toe with adults after five seconds with Peter. And what is with the sudden unexplained blood thirst? Where did that come from?

Though I do like how the film unlike the novel actually gave Wendy an arch. Wendy’s aunt is mortified at her niece’s interest in becoming a novelist who travels the world.  She insists Wendy’s parents separate Wendy from her brothers and allow her to tutor, Wendy to teach her how to be a proper lady.   They also have a school teacher shame Wendy for drawing a picture of Peter flying above her bed. This seems to be subtext for the Victorian shaming of sexual expression from girls as dirty and shameful. This actually makes Wendy feel like her life is changing way too fast and it scares her. Since she is twelve and her family is already talking about marriage prospects.  While the scene where Peter and her meet is pretty much played like in the novel. There’s the added moment of Peter whispering in Wendy’s ear “ Forget them Wendy Forget them all come with me and we’ll never ever have to think about grown up things again” which unlike the novel frames Wendy as running away from growing up.

Then she develops a crush on Peter Pan and this being Hollywood they go with the scared of his own feeling interpretation. I guess her whining and screaming his name for a day was just too sexy to resist.  Wendy contemplates joining Hook’s crew because when your crush rejects you validation by pirate man children is good salve for your wounds. But then realizes she can’t remember her mother and much like the novel becomes scared that her and her brothers have forgotten their parents. Then they all get kidnapped by the pirates and Hook and Peter have a show down which is way better than the novel because here Hook attacks Peter’s abandonment issues and actually brings him to his knees. But then Wendy kisses Peter and he gains the strength to defeat Hook. Basically the implication is Wendy realizes growing up is ok because romantic love is a thing. Hey, I didn’t say it was a great arch but it’s more than the novel gave her or anyone.  I’m not a huge fan of this Wendy depiction but I’ve got to take my hat off to the writers for at least giving Wendy a coming of age narrative.

Disney’s classic Peter Pan pulled a similar move taking the focus from Peter and putting it entirely on Wendy. The implications at the end imply that Wendy’s adventure was all a dream and that Tinker bell and Tiger Lilly were reflections of her own manifesting sexuality. Peter Pan her desire not to grow up and Hook I’m going to guess that he was her daddy issues.

I actually think Walt did Wendy a solid in her characterization. This is one of the few Wendy’s were her concern for her brothers and the lost boys don’t feel tacked on. Since most adaptations do very little to build Wendy’s dynamic with the other kids. Here it’s in every face wipe and tearful good bye and every “Do be careful” thrown over Wendy’s shoulder.

Also the Disney movie does a one eighty from everyone in Neverland worshiping her to Neverland treating her rather badly. It takes Wendy’s annoyance from called her squaw from the Novel and has the Indians bully her into fetching firewood instead of joining the celebrations. Also the mermaids not only try to drown her but Peter thinks is all a big joke. Disney’s Wendy constantly stands up for herself but often gets brushed off or forced to walk the plank. In this version you can one hundred percent understand why Wendy is so done with this place and ready to grow up. Here the reality of what it’s like to experience everyone acting like a self-centered child is here on full display.

Also Disney’s Wendy is not perfect she gets angry and loses her temper attacking mermaids or yelling at Indians. She gets jealous of Tiger Lilly being all over Peter and is sour towards him.  Wendy is dreamy eyed, and polite but this version of her also doesn’t take anyone’s crap and will let you know if you’ve crossed a line or if you’re flat out awful.   But she’s still pleads with Peter on her attempted murder’s behalf. Wendy also reminds Peter that Tiger Lilly is drowning when he gets caught up in celebrating his cleverness. She still makes sure she can say goodbye to her brothers and the lost boys before Hook kills her. Even on her worst day Disney’s Wendy is a kind person even when those around her are less so.

But my favorite portrayal of Wendy has got to be from the 90’s classic “Peter Pan and the Pirates” TV series which aired on Fox was about one season then got cancelled.  While it doesn’t really focus on Wendy a whole lot since its more concerned with the relationship between Peter Pan his lost boys and Hook’s crew. 

She still has a pretty important role.  Wendy often serves as a voice of reason to the group which doesn’t go against her original role in the novel since she takes a cake that’s been left out all night away from the lost boys. Which does present her as the one with the most common sense but the show lets Wendy tell Peter this is a bad idea way more often than the book and blow up at him after he does the stupid thing every one told him not to do. Also Wendy gets to be more of a moral center lecturing Peter for stealing the picture of Hook’s mother in the episode “Hooks mother” and encouraging him to return it and even getting Peter to take care of Hook after he’s injured. This is in a positive change in my opinion because it actually expands on Wendy’s role as a guide to adult hood. Here Wendy Darling encourages a kind of good behavior she helps build moral character in her boys. Wendy has strong ideals and this adaptation actually has her stand by her principals for better or worse. This not only gives her more of a central role in the story but also gives her more chances to be active. Yay character agency!

Also this version of Wendy was the first to have a bit of an interesting relationship with Hook. (Who is voiced by Tim curry and does an excellent job.)  While the writers got rid of the almost pedophilic undertones of Hook wanting to keep Wendy from the novel and the “My beauty” pet name.  Thank god for that even in the novel i thought it was too much.     There’s still a bit of a dynamic even if its way more innocent.

In the episode  In Peter on Trial Wendy not only lands on the ship unharmed but reminds Hook executing Peter without a trial would not be proper form at all. She then hits Hook in the ego by declaring “Surely you don’t doubt your powers of debate against that of a mere girl” And not only gets a trial but manages to win even when the trial is rigged against them. Hook even congratulates her before proceeding to find his own loophole and kill Peter Pan anyway. The point is this suggests this Wendy has a bit of an insight into Hook maybe more so then Peter. She knows he’s obsessed with good form and has an ego that prides its self on being the smartest person in the room.

This cuts both ways while Wendy is capable of manipulating Hook, he also consistently manipulates Wendy by offering his word as a gentlemen when he intends to break it as a pirate. This dynamic highlights Wendy’s flaw of trusting dangerous people and allowing them to hurt her friends. Hook has picked up that she trusts or wants to trust him. In this version Hook actually treats Wendy as opponent vs the usual she belongs to Peter and I want to steal her like in most adaptations. Also despite Hook being terrifying Wendy has no problem being all “There’s no need to get cranky Captain” and I kind of love how comfortable she is with the guy despite him being an enemy.

This proves Wendy doesn’t have to be a sword wielding “Who are you to call me girlie” action girl to be a good character. She can be flawed but still remain a good person and giving her a spine is always appreciated.

Wendy Darling is at her core a guide into adulthood with a strong moral character and a voice of reason who is used to shine a light on how important motherhood is since the result of mothers abandoning or neglecting their children shape the Peter’s of the world.  This makes her important to the overall story and themes of Peter Pan.

[christinaroseandrews]

Randomization and You: How to ask the right questions, know when to roll the dice, and decide when to invoke the word of God

One of the problems that writers often run into is when they’re world-building, plotting, and character-creating, is finding the answers to every foreseeable question ever.  Which is your main character’s dominant hand?  When were they born?  Did someone get pregnant from unprotected sex? Who dies in this horrific event that didn’t happen in canon? What race is this random side character? You get the picture.  

You can answer all of these questions on your own, and if they’re important, you absolutely should.  But when it doesn’t matter, when you don’t care, or if you’re unsure, sometimes randomization can help.  Randomization takes out bias. Or, conversely, a roll of the dice can clarify the direction that you actually want to go. 

The two of us use randomization a lot.  Not just in our fanfiction, but in our original works as well.  We do it for everything from character birthdays to ethnicity to who a background character might end up with to who lives and who dies.  Randomization is a nifty tool if you know how to use it.

In this meta, we’re going to go over when and how to randomize.

A note: there are major spoilers for some of our fanfic and minor spoilers for some of our original fiction.  If you want to know what those spoilers are, please feel free to message us.

oOo

When is it a good time to randomize?

Randomization is best done in the planning stages.  It’s not something you want to do halfway through the story (although you can, if you discover you need to -- we certainly have!), but it’s best done early on, when you’re still world-building, plotting, and creating your characters.  

Say you’re creating a fantasy world.  You know you have three countries that are going to be your primary focus.  But does the world have more nations?  You might not know the answer to that.  In which case, it might be time to randomize.  

It can also be used in character creation.  Sure, you’ve got your main characters and you know what their main traits are, but do you know when their birthdays are?  Or other seemingly unimportant details that may end up being important later, like religion, physical characteristics, or taste in entertainment.  This is especially important when you’re dealing with secondary characters who may not be as fully fleshed in your mind when you’re in the character creation phase. Because seriously, unconscious bias will come into play here. The number of books and stories we read where the only characters are the ethnicity of the author is staggering. This is especially problematic when it comes to creating accurate representation. Randomization can solve this. Want to write a story about 5 friends who kick ass and take names? You can literally randomize every major trait -- age, gender, sexuality, race, religion, skillset… you name it. You don’t have to randomize everything if you have a vision, but you should randomize things that “don’t matter” like the doctor or the secretary or the janitor. Randomization can remove stereotypes and bias. It’s colorblind casting but for the author. 

You also can choose ranges within which to randomize -- for example, if said story is about 5 teenagers, your range can be 14-18.  You are definitely not required to use all possible options while randomizing.

Then there’s randomization when you develop your plot.  Say you’re writing a romance.  You know your main characters will end up together.  But what about your secondary characters?  Your main characters’ best friends/siblings are going to end up meeting.  Do they hook up?  Are they interested?  Believe it or not, Prim and Bing getting together in Floriography was entirely randomized.  (Floriography has since been turned into an original work, The Language of Flowers -- but we kept said randomized relationship.)

Another thing -- in a romance, you know your main characters will end up together and you may know how they get there.  But what if you don’t?  You can randomize where they have their dates (using both typical and atypical choices such as a restaurant or a monster truck rally), other events that might interfere, and various other beats in your plotting.

Or the biggie... who dies in a major event? Plot Armor is lovely. The trio in Let Me Fly has Plot Armor. (We are not killing our trio, stop asking!) But everyone else… nope… no Plot Armor. That meant when Johanna Mason failed her rolls to survive the flu, she died. We love Johanna. Love her. She’s a blast to write. But she wasn’t crucial to the story we wanted to tell, so she died. The same is true for a lot of other people in our stories. Some deaths we’ve planned. But some that happened ended up changing the story… we’re looking at you, Third Quarter Quell deaths in Let Me Fly. Don’t think we don’t see you. Justice for Justus, indeed!

So yeah. Randomization can completely change your plot and understanding of the characters. It can even help you out of an “I don’t know what to do!” slump.

You want to go wild with the randomization?  Go to TV Tropes and pick a list of tropes that would make up a main character.  Pick a list of villain tropes.  Pick a list of plot tropes, romance tropes, whatever.  Number them all, shove them into a list, use a randomizer, and pick ten of them.  Congratulations, you now have the outline for a short story.  Think this doesn’t work?

Well… here goes.

We went to TV Tropes Character pages first to get our protagonists and antagonist. And this is what we picked.

  Sounds fun, right? I bet you can start imagining stories that could fit these tropes already. 

We ran these through the randomizer and got the following:

A Gentleman Thief and a Big Beautiful Woman Wake Up in a Room on a spaceship wearing matching rings. The door opens to reveal a notorious Space Pirate who congratulates them on their Accidental Marriage. Unfortunately they won’t be able to enjoy the honeymoon Mwah-ha-ha-ha! While they are making their escape, they end up someplace where they have to truly pretend to be newlyweds and they realize that somehow along the way they’ve Become the Mask and are truly in love. YAY! 

Sure it’s pretty rough and there are some parts missing, but it’s an absolutely viable plot… and I’m fairly certain I’ve seen something like this before. This is a great way to get out of a writing slump or even your comfort zone.

It’s all about asking questions and deciding if you know the answer, if the answer is necessary, and what the possible answers can be.

oOo

How do you randomize?

Randomization isn’t always as easy as rolling a die or flipping a coin.  Sometimes it takes creating spreadsheets or lists, while other times it involves understanding probability and percentages.

For example, say you’re writing a fantasy novel that features swordplay.  Knowing if someone is left or right handed is actually plot-relevant.  However, fifty percent of the population isn’t left handed.  Here, Wikipedia is your friend.  Knowing the percentages will help you know what numbers to use.

Another common time to do randomization is pregnancy.  Depending on what method of birth control and/or pregnancy prevention your characters are using, you can research the failure rates.  For example, when figuring out if Katniss was going to get pregnant during the arc of Brand New Breeze (second arc of Let Me Fly), we looked up the failure rate for the rhythm method and applied it to each menstrual cycle she had -- which, by the way, the length and duration of her menstrual cycle was also randomized.  She did okay for the first few months, and then all of a sudden, right around the time that the three of them got married (which was not randomized), she got pregnant.  

That opened up a whole slew of other randomizations, including: did the egg implant?  Did she have a miscarriage?  Was she carrying twins?  Who was the father?  Was the baby a boy or a girl?  What were its eye color, skin color, and hair color (based off of the parents and what was genetically possible)?  How difficult was the pregnancy?  When exactly did she give birth?  How long was the labor?  How difficult was the labor?  What time was the child born?  What were its length and weight?

You notice that was a lot of questions.  But they came in order.  The first question that got asked was: did she get pregnant?  The rhythm method is one of the least reliable forms of birth control.  Without proper medical data, Katniss was guessing, which increased her chances.  According to the Mayo Clinic, thirteen out of every one hundred women get pregnant.  Because of other reasons, we upped it to twenty percent for Katniss.

Using random.org, we rolled on a 1 to 100 scale for each menstrual cycle, with a roll of 81 or higher being a pregnancy.  Katniss did not get pregnant on her first two; she did on her third.

After conception, there are two primary hurdles to a pregnancy.  The first is implantation.  Many fertilized embryos never implant.  The numbers change based off of the age of the mother, the health of the mother, and other environmental conditions, but it’s estimated that at least 30% of fertilized embryos never implant.  So Katniss got randomized on that with a roll of 30 or below being a failed implantation.  She rolled higher.

Then there’s the risk of miscarriage, which, considering Katniss’s environment, health, and activity levels, we gave her a flat 30% chance of miscarriage.  Again, she did not miscarry.

Then it was just answering a lot of yes/no questions and looking up pregnancy-related details.  Did you know that the chance of twins is about 10%?  Identical twins is 1%, so the other 9% are fraternal.  If there are fraternal twins, they can have different fathers.  

We didn’t roll for anything higher than twins because the chances of Katniss surviving a pregnancy with triplets or more with no medicine are extremely low, and that’s if she even got pregnant with more than two babies at once -- which is highly unlikely.  We did not roll for Katniss dying in pregnancy.  That was us invoking the word of God.  

But wait, you ask.  Didn’t Katniss have a chance of dying?  

And you would be correct if this were the real world and not words on a page, Katniss would absolutely have a chance of dying in pregnancy.  However, that was a direction we were not interested in exploring, and that’s when invoking the word of God becomes necessary.  You have to know what you are comfortable writing as an author.  Not everyone wants to write a pregnancy, so they might say, “Nope! This unprotected sex did not result in a pregnancy!”  While others, like us, will occasionally roll for this -- while other times we’re like “Nope!” Trust us, we’ve totally noped Katniss getting pregnant… random.org has it in for her, I swear!

Some people might’ve said “oh hell no, I’m not dealing with a pregnancy in this story” and that’s perfectly fine.  They wouldn’t even have rolled for it.  It depends on what you’re willing to do as a writer.  But often that’s something that randomization can help you with… knowing your own mind. Because oftentimes people don’t know where to go next because they have choice paralysis… randomization can help solve that problem. 

oOo

So when do you invoke the word of God?

Well, here’s a secret.  The two of us invoked the word of God when it came to both of the Hunger Games in Let Me Fly.  

For the 74th Games, the original randomized winner was the girl from Three.  Unfortunately, that did not work with our plot.  Three was too far from our group for Cressida and her group to flee from there and conceivably make it to our characters, which was a plot point we wanted to happen.  So we rerolled with an eye toward what would work, and Taylor, the girl from District Eight, won.

For the 75th Games, the initial randomized winner was the woman from Eight, and -- having plotted the 74th Games -- we realized that the Capitol really wouldn’t be okay with back-to-back winners from an outlying semi-rebellious district.  So we rerolled and got Chaff.  (By the way, some of the side characters -- the infant for instance -- had zero chance of making it out of the bloodbath alive, and each other character had a percentage for what their chances of winning were based on their age, skill, and other factors, and we used a 1-100 scale for randomization.)  

However, there was another thing that happened that basically has colored our plot from the moment that it happened.  

Justus came in second.

The six-year-old kid only had a two percent chance of being picked at any specific time.  But he came in second.  And we took that and ran with it.

That is how randomization can end up creating plot for your story, and also why you want to do it fairly early on.  If your outline changes, you may need to do it later.  Or if you’re a pantser.  But if you’re a plotter, you’ll want all your ducks in a row before you get started.

In reality, randomization is all about asking questions and figuring out probabilities.  And sometimes the questions can tell you which way you want to go -- and you end up answering the question itself without randomization ever coming into play.  Or the randomization tells you which choice you wanted… something you often know by your reaction to the choice you rolled.  (If you groan at something you roll, it is probably a choice you’ll want to override.)

Remember that you are not bound by your randomization.  If you absolutely hate something that randomized and can’t figure out how to make it work, throw it out!  It’s still giving you valuable information, because it’s telling you something about where you don’t want the story to go.  

Sometimes it’s even fun to work with the hard things, the complicated things, the stuff you never expected to roll.  Making something surprising work is a challenge -- and a way to grow as an author.  But if you can’t or don’t want to, you can always toss your randomization. 

oOo

So why would you want to randomize?

One of the downfalls of being a writer is that you know everything about your story.  Where it’s going, the relationships, everything.  Randomization creates that feeling of wonder that you experience when doing something new.  It allows you to brainstorm, and it can force you down paths you might not otherwise have chosen to take.

The two of us were very hesitant about pairing up Prim and Bing in Floriography (later The Language of Flowers).  They were the siblings of our main characters, they were seven or eight years apart in age, they lived a good four, five hour drive away from each other, they’d just met… and would they even want to be together?  We asked the question on a whim.  And then we rolled it.  And then we ran with it.  And it’s become one of our favorite pairings ever.

We would’ve never paired the two together if it weren’t for the randomization.

We’ve even done this when writing whole fics… like we didn’t know what we wanted to write, just that we wanted to play in a particular fandom. So we rolled what characters we were going to play with.  This is how we ended up with a Darcy/Tony/Sif threesome because Why Not? 

We also do this with original fiction all the time. As stated above, it deals with the unconscious bias that we carry in regards to racism, sexism, and a whole slew of other -isms/-phobias. It can also help shape directions where you might take a story. Like our Adeniyi Siblings Series… we initially had all of the siblings paired with white characters… but then (thankfully) we realized the serious Unfortunate Implications… so we broke out the randomizer. Other than Paige (who we’d already written her story). All three of the other siblings’ significant others changed, and it made our series better in the long run. 

In addition to removing bias and answering questions, randomization can be fun.  Even if you never incorporate what you’ve randomized, you’ve got these little details, special things that you know about the character or the plot or the world.  We can tell you EVERYTHING that Katniss and Prim hunted and gathered in Damaged, Broken, and Unhinged. We can tell you every single character who got sick from the flu in Let Me Fly. This is information that none of you need, but gosh darn it it was fun to find out, and it colored how we wrote the story even if the specifics never made it on the page.

As we’ve hopefully explained, randomization can be a powerful tool in the writer’s toolbox.  But like any tool, it’s about knowing when and how to use it. We recommend using it to answer questions. Develop plots and even plot twists. And most importantly, remove unconscious bias. 

Now if you’ll excuse us, we have a Gentleman Thief and a Big Beautiful Woman demanding that their story be written.

Until next time!

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[3nlight3n3d-b0y]

Learning: Ella Enchanted

Introduction:

I’d like to introduce all of you to a new project of mine.

Come to think of it the concept around my blog is based on absorbing feminine content and not producing it, so I thought some more about it and came up with the idea of reviewing a book with a strong female protagonist. I didn’t really know where to start for my first book of this type considering I’m more used to reading Lovecraft and Adam Smith rather than any books with a feminist spirit. Luckily since I’ve been on Tumblr I made friends with @yourgfdpunk who is really into exactly that type of stuff and who helped me out a lot with this, so go send her some love as well!

After a short talk with her she suggested Ella Enchanted as a good book. It’s meant for kids which I wasn’t used to; even as a kid I didn’t read kids’ books. However I thought it would make a good starting book for this project since it’s pretty wholesome and was probably an early book for a lot of girls out there when they got into reading. I do plan on continuing this “Learning” series as I like to call it, and my next plan is to begin the Lunar Chronicles series with Cinder.

Overview:

Ella Enchanted was written by Gail Carson  Levine and was published in 1997, which makes the book about a year older than me. The book also shared its name with a very bad movie. It’s meant for kids and early/pre-teens, and the story is centered around Ella, a girl born to a vague level of nobility.She is cursed from birth by a fairy to follow any command, yet despite this she becomes an extremely rebellious and strong-willed young lady.

The story is an emotional roller coaster from the end of the first chapter to the epilogue, and the story truly begins after (spoiler alert, but the book’s 20 years old and it happens in Ch. 1) Ella’s mother dies and her world falls apart, as she and her mother were very close and her father is estranged and ignorant of her curse. The next two hundred pages or so are the trials and tribulations of Ella in her quest to find the fairy that cursed her and get her to remove the curse. In doing so she overcomes challenges from finishing school to hungry ogres.

My Thoughts:

The story is very touching, and if I could find one word to describe it I think I’d go with endearing. The story is packed with an ever-growing sense of anticipation and emotion, and along with the story comes some very humorous writing and dialogue such as:

…. Dame Olga agreed. “Ella is not outfitted in accordance with her station, Sir Peter. My girls have eight trunks between them.”

“Hattie has five and a half trunks, Mother. And I have only—” Olive stopped speaking to count on her fingers. “Less. I have less, and it’s not fair.”

Father cut in smoothly. “It’s most kind of you to take Ella with you, Dame Olga. I only hope she won’t be a bother.”

“Oh, she won’t bother me, Sir P. I’m not going.”

Father winced at the abbreviation.

It’s written for kids in middle-school so I give it a pass for being pretty simplistic is terms of pacing and plot devices, like the prince showing up out of nowhere every once in a while. However that doesn’t stop it from managing to pull your heartstrings as Ella copes with her desires and her own dreams to throw off a curse while struggling with patriarchal expectations being forced on her.

What I Learned:

I wasn’t sure what I was going to learn reading this book when I first got it given that it seemed rather simplistic. However I think this book is filled with subtle commentary and symbolism throughout, starting with the first chapter. For example, the story begins with Ella being born and being cursed by the fairy Lucinda with obedience in order to make her stop crying. Both Ella’s mother and her midwife beg Lucinda to remove the curse and she won’t, and I see this as Lucinda, who is represented as the stereotypical ultra-girly fairy, cursing Ella with the patriarchal societal expectation that women and girls must be obedient.

The fact that the mother and midwife also beg to remove the curse I think symbolizes the understanding and fear that a woman has when she has a daughter knowing the societal and gender norms that are going to try to keep her down. Additionally I think Lucinda fits a kind of “toxic femininity”, at least for most of the story, being a mostly two-dimensional stereotype that goes around making the lives of everyone harder as she reinforces toxic social norms. These aren’t the only points of symbolism that capture society in the book, they’re just the beginning (literally) and this book got pretty deep throughout the story considering it’s for kids. I think I also found points in this book particularly enlightening because as a male I was never raised with issues like these and the book manages to really explain a lot about them while saying little.

Aside from the writing and the background, I also wondered: what did Ella teach me? After thinking about it for a while I think Ella taught that strength can be found on the inside, and girls particularly must rely on their inner strength until they can find their voice and be able to assert themselves. Ella is no knight or assassin or wizard, she’s just a girl, and a small one at that, because girls weren’t allowed to be brought up like that; no, she had to go to finishing school to sew instead. For breaking patriarchal norms it can seem like even more of a challenge for girls in which they are raised to be docile, but Ella teaches that you don’t need to be a fighter or magician to be strong, you just have to find the strength inside you despite the world trying to put you down from birth for your sex or gender.

Conclusion:

I liked the book more than I thought I would. It was simple of course, but it was also very charming. The author’s charisma can be seen in the ink with interesting characters, funny dialogue, and her ability to make us feel endearment and sorrow. The book also packs a meaningful message thinly veiled under its charm about girl power and overcoming misogynistic norms that is neither easy to overlook or ham-fisted.

I’d give the book 4/5 stars.

Will I read it again? Probably not.

If I have kids will I make them read it? Definitely!

I hope you guys like my first real piece of original content! I actually put some effort into this and I hope to do more of them.

[feministgrungepunkgrrrl]

Why Abortion is a Tool of the Patriarchy

Men often pressure, force, or coerce women into abortions. They threaten us into it or otherwise try and manipulate us. Men (not all but too many to not talk about) use abortion as a way to use women as reusable and disposable sex objects so that they can have sex with them all they want without having to take care of their responsibilities. There are even movements called "bro-choice" and “men for choice” that ironically point this out, with "bros" talking about how abortion is good for them specifically because of that reasoning....and somehow the “no uterus no opinion” idea conveniently doesn’t apply to “pro-choice” men. It treats our bodies as garbage disposals; as in, what you put into us can just be chopped up into little bits and the bloody mess taken out so that you can use us over and over again. Abortion is a deadbeat dad's favorite thing. Rapists use it to continue to rape and control their victims, as it gets rid of the “evidence” (not only DNA evidence to prove he was the rapist on trial, but suddenly having a child is evidence that she is being raped to everyone around her as well) and thus they can get away with raping her for longer, and pressuring her to abort is another way to control her too. This happens with standard rape and statutory rape as well, and some abortion clinics have even lied about the age of statutory rape victims or didn’t contact social services when she comes in with an older man, so that they can give underage girls abortions. Alice Paul, the feminist who created the Equal Rights Amendment act (ERA) has stated, “Abortion is the ultimate exploitation of women.”  There are so many ways in which that rings true. Men also have killed many women for not aborting, or otherwise harmed them by throwing them down stairs etc. to try and cause a miscarriage, or slipped them the abortion pill without them knowing it. Without men and the patriarchy, abortion wouldn't exist. Not only that but it was the men of NARAL who sold abortion to feminists and the world in the late 1960s by making up lies. One of those men, the abortion doctor Bernard Nathanson, flat-out admitted that they lied. And it was men who were the ones to vote on Roe V Wade and men have always been the abortion doctors, and prey on women by telling them that their children are not children but clumps of cells etc., so that they can get their abortion dollars. Some of them have admitted they make lots of money from abortion. Also, male bosses make women feel like they can't be mothers while working and that abortion is what they should choose, which is just another way to coerce. Same with being single or poor or going to school or what have you. Women get abortions because of the mother shaming society we live in making them feel like they have no other choice. If men could get pregnant, abortion wouldn't exist, because people don't tell men that they can't be career men and fathers at the same time yet women get constantly told that we can't be career women and mothers at the same time so abortion is necessary for our success. This is one of those tactics that those men from NARAL used to get support for abortion. It's just sad that it worked. The abortion-and-pro-choice-industry tells us that the wombless male body is normative and that in order to have equal rights to men and compete in a male-dominated world, we need have abortion so that we aren't "bothered" and "bothering them" with the concept of having children. Instead of raising women to the equal rights level of men as we are, we are taught to get rid of what makes us uniquely female because it is a "burden", and that we should lower ourselves to what we deem as the worst kind of men--deadbeat dads. Instead, we should be empowering pregnant and parenting women, and telling them we CAN do it. You CAN be pregnant or a mother while going to school, you CAN be pregnant or a mother while working, you CAN be pregnant or a mother while a teenager, you CAN be pregnant or a mother while single, and you CAN be pregnant or a mother while poor. Rosie the riveter is a great example of the "yes we can" concept yet somehow when it comes to pregnancy we have turned it into "No you can't, have an abortion." Having kids does not mean you have to give up a life worth living, yet that is what the abortion industry wants us to believe, but it goes against everything feminism stands for. There are many women who regret their abortions, and have depression from it, PTSD from it, suicidal tendencies from it, or have actually killed themselves from it. You can find their videos on youtube or their stories in writing, just by looking up "I regret my abortion" or "abortion regret" on google or youtube. Because women are basically told in various ways that we have no other choice to abort yet people turn around and say it is somehow “our choice” when debating abortion, we are the ones who end up as the scapegoats and thus have to deal with all the heaviest feelings from it. We are told we can’t regret it because it was “our choice” despite the fact that we choose it because we are told we have no choice. The men who pressure us into it get out without having to deal with it because it reinforces old-fashioned stereotypes that anything having to do with babies is “women’s work.” There are so many women who feel this way that there are endless amounts of organizations around to help women with post-abortive regret, which wouldn't be able to be around if women never regretted it, yet these women constantly get ignored so that the abortion industry can act like women rarely regret it to keep women supporting pro-choice politicians and coming into the abortion clinics and giving them their hundreds of dollars for each abortion. Women's voices of regret are being swept under the rug like crazy. That is what misogyny looks like. Although not all men do the things I am describing in this article, and in fact abortion can hurt men and make them regret lost fatherhood just like many women regret their abortions as well, it still happens far too much. Also, it truly shows we are oppressed when people act like somehow we need to have a right to treat our children the way we have been treated by men, by oppressing them and treating them as our property to be disposed of as we see fit, and instead of giving us actual help for our situations. Offering abortion is an easy way for people to blow off our problems and act like they helped us. An abortion doesn't make a poor woman not poor or a raped woman un-raped or an abused woman not abused etc., it just throws women right back into these situations after she leaves the clinic. All it gives her is a dead child on top of the problems she has, it doesn't help the problem at all. It doesn't solve the root problem. On top of all of that, sex selective abortion kills females in the womb just for being females because people want sons. This happens in various countries including our own but in the ones where it is most prevalent, there is a gap between the amount of men and women, as a decent chunk of women were killed in the womb. Pro-lifers believe in women's rights, we just go one step further and say that ALL women should have rights, not just the born ones, for we truly don't have rights if they don't start when we first exist.  Women deserve better than all of this. We deserve better than being given a bad choice that no one really wants and we basically just choose because we are told we need to choose it. No woman walks into an abortion clinic happy to do it. This is something that both pro-choicers and pro-lifers agree on. We just need to understand that that horrible choice that no one likes or really wants shouldn't be held up as an example of wonderful women's rights. It's something that comes from our oppression and is something we should always be fighting to end, because it hurts us too. All of these things are why when I was 14 and found out what abortion was, I was pro-life *on the specific basis* that I am a liberal feminist. I started off by having many feminist reasons to be against abortion before I could even know the politicizing strategies of each side. And when I started to hear the stereotypes that abortion was supported by feminists and opposed by those who aren't, I automatically assumed people were joking, because that would never make any sense. Abortion is pure violence, on our children and us. It would never fit in with feminism. It is just more evidence that we are oppressed. For more information on Pro-Life feminism, google or facebook search (or enter in the websites of) the organizations: Feminists for Life : http://www.feministsforlife.org/ Feminists for Nonviolent Choices : http://www.ffnvc.org/ New Wave Feminists: https://www.newwavefeminists.com/ Feminists Choosing Life of New York Action:  https://www.fclnyact.org/ and Pro-Life Feminists:  https://prolifefeminists.wordpress.com/

[canihldthemic]

The Transcendence of Stereotypical Norms in Media Texts

Since I was a young girl, my mother always made sure to raise me in diverse settings in hopes to develop my adaptability skills and well-roundedness. All of my life we lived in an African American upper-middle-class neighborhood in Washington, D.C. I went to schools in low-income areas like Anacostia and wealthy areas like Georgetown. Although my mother had good intentions with her school choices for me, I struggled to find my identity in both of these settings. I found myself posturing and conforming to what I thought was acceptable; even then I felt like an outcast. I was always asked about my hair and “why it looked like that” or asked, “why I talked so white”. These issues of shifting and isolation are not uncommon among Black women in America. We are constantly trying to fit into molds or break out of the ones cast for us. This is especially hard to do when society’s understanding of us is formed by stereotypes reinforced by the media. There are hundreds of examples in contemporary media where negative stereotypes of Black femininity are portrayed. However, in recent years there has been an increase in more dynamic depictions of Black femininity. One example is found in the 2018 film Bad Times at the El Royale, where character Darlene Sweet transcends the traditional tropes of Black femininity.

Bad Times at the El Royale is a neo-noir thriller film that follows the stories of seven strangers who meet in a mysteriously isolated and run-down hotel in 1969 Lake Tahoe. Each character has their own motives as to why they found their way to this whimsical hotel and as the plot develops the viewers are able to understand the complexities of each character’s narratives. First, we meet Father Daniel Flynn who is introduced as a priest but is actually a bank robber named Dock O’Kelly who came to the El Royale to recover money he stole 10 years prior. Next, is Laramie Sullivan Seymour, who is an arrogant vacuum salesman who doubles as an FBI agent that came to the El Royale to recover surveillance devices from the hotel. Then we meet Miles Miller, who is the hotel's only employee. By the end of the movie, it is revealed that he is a traumatized Vietnam War sniper who has killed over 100 people. Lastly, is the twisted cult escapee Emily Summerspring who kidnaps her younger sister, Rose Summerspring (who is under steadfast control of the sadistic cult’s leader, Billy Lee). The hotel itself also has a very bizarre past as it used to be bustling with high profile celebrities and politicians, but behind closed doors, hotel management would record their guests’ sexual encounters and sell them. As the movie’s plot develops the viewers are able to understand the depth of each character and all of their grueling pasts. However, there is one character who provides hopeful relief to this gory film, songstress Darlene Sweet. Unlike her fellow characters, Sweet’s identity remains the same throughout the film. This does not take away from her dynamic role in the film's plot and her robust personality. Initially, the audience is able to understand her as a former background singer who is traveling to Reno, California to fulfill her dreams of being a lounge singer. Sweet is full of poise, wit, determination, and modesty. Ultimately, Darlene’s character challenges tropes widely portrayed by Black female characters.

There are a number of oppressive myths that are constructed and circulated which contribute to how Black women are seen, understood and classified. Three of these myths include Jezebel, Mammy, and Sapphire. Each of these myths are rooted deeply in slavery and the social, economic and political persecution of the Black woman. Jezebel suggests the myth that Black women are sexually promiscuous and irresponsible. It reduces the value of the Black female to the efficiency of her body. The Mammy myth speaks to the social limits of Black women during slavery which categorized them as domestic, loyal, motherly, and overly-submissive. The Sapphire myth portrays the paradox of unwavering strength in Black women; often characterizing us as unfeminine, invulnerable, angry and loud. These stereotypes maintain the social foundations that uphold white supremacy and patriarchy within this society. It is important for both Black women and other demographics to see representations of Black femininity that challenge the typical architypes of Black women. Darlene Sweet’s character is the perfect example of this challenge. Her character does an outstanding job of being, “neither a martyr nor a magical negro. Neither a mammy nor a jezebel, nor is she a token or a helpless damsel. She is smart and cautious and ready to fight, but only if she has to. And this is a refreshing sight compared to how we normally see Black women written and conceived of in films … especially as the sole Black character” (Brown, 2018). Throughout the film, Darlene Sweet encounters many of the microaggressions, stereotypes, and the oppression experienced by Black women in America every day. Nevertheless, her reactions to these experiences display her character as transcending the tropes historically portrayed by Black women in media texts.

In the second scene of the movie, Darlene Sweet and Father Flynn meet Laramie Sullivan in the lobby of the El Royale as they wait for Miles to check them in. As aforementioned, Laramie is very arrogant and narcissistic and this is unwavering throughout this scene. He does everything from belittling Darlene by referring to her as “girl”, to forcing a cup of coffee in her hand after she insisted she didn’t want any (Goddard, 10:44), then suggesting that she was a prostitute when she didn’t want to room near Father Flynn, “Miles! She doesn’t want to room near the priest. It’s not like we didn’t see her walk in her with her own bedrolls under her arms”(Goddard, 16:35). All throughout Laramie’s microaggressions, Darlene held her composure, focused on what she came to the hotel for and remained respectful (however, only to those who deserved it).

In the scene titled “Room Five” (Goddard, 35:10) the audience gets an in-depth look at Darlene’s backstory. The scene opens up in a recording studio, where Darlene is one of three background singers. During her recording session, she decided to insert her creative genius into her background vocals by adding unrehearsed runs to the melody of the song. Immediately, the producer of the record label cut the recording to have a private meeting with Darlene where he gave her an ultimatum, “Darlene, I think you have a choice here. Give me one year of your time and I can make you a star…. or you can continue to treat my time as disposable and keep scrounging for back up gigs until they dry up”(Goddard, 38:51). In this scene, Darlene’s male counterpart is constantly divulging his power by waging his job against hers in hopes of intimidating her into submission. Both the lobby scene and “Room Five” scenes reflect the constant oppression Black women face socially and professionally, whether in passive (Laramie) or aggressive (the record producer) ways. Darlene does not use loyalty, submission, ignorance or cooning to make the situation less uncomfortable in either scene. Instead, she uses calculation to focus her intentions and actions. The end of “Room Five” alludes to Darlene quitting her job as a background singer so she could focus on saving money to fund her career as a lead singer in Tahoe; her dream is realized in the final scene of the movie.

The relationship between tropes in the media and ideologies formed in society is circular. On one hand, we internalize what is portrayed of us and work hard to prove these archetypes wrong. On the other hand, we work hard to conform to what the greater society considers normal. However, focusing on characters that transcend the widely circulated stereotypes of Black femininity, like Darlene, can teach both Black women and the rest of society valuable lessons about the true essence of being a Black woman. Characters that transcend historic caricatures teach us that we can be both attractive and smart, driven and feminine, opinionated and poised, challenged and respectful, Black and talented.

In one of the closing scenes, when the plot reaches its peak, Darlene, Miles and Father Flynn are being held hostage by Billy Lee when she says, “ I’m not even mad anymore, I’m just tired. I’m just bored of men like you. You think I don’t see you for who you really are? A fragile little man preying on the weak and the lost” (Goddard, 1:57:00). Darlene’s relentless words to the man who has her life in his hands is parallel to the perspectives many Black women have across the nation. Those who have power hide behind their titles, gender, and race to oppress Black women on all scales, but many Black women take Darlene’s approach and refuse to submit to them. Black female leaders like Michelle Obama, Beyoncé, Audre Lorde, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and hundreds of others choose to step out of the molds cast for them every day for the sake of Black femininity. In conclusion, more realistic representations of Black women in media texts are essential to making opportunities and respect equivalent across genders and races.

References

Goddard, D. [Director/Producer]. (2018). Bad Times at the El Royale [Motion Picture]. USA: Goddard Textiles, TSG Entertainment, & Twentieth Century Fox.

Brown, S. J. (2019, April 16). The underrated brilliance of cynthia erivo as darlene sweet in ‘bad times at the el royale.’ Retrieved October 21, 2019, from The Black Youth Project website: http://blackyouthproject.com/the-underrated-brilliance-of-cynthia-erivo-as-darlene-sweet-in-bad-times-at-the-el-royale/

[itishypatiaofalexandria]

Sometimes, for reasons unknown to you in retrospect, you pass up great books because you think that they will not interest you. When you finally stop and read them, you can only despair over what you have missed for so long.

I’m talking about Seanan McGuire’s October Daye series.

They have been sitting on the shelf at my local library for years, and I had consistently passed them up, because of a little faded sticker that reads paranormal romance. Which is not to say that romance is bad, I do read it occasionally, if I am assured that it is really good, or has some other feature that I know I will like. But as I am A) a lesbian, I tend to have less than zero interest in men who are described as devilishly handsome, or rippling muscles, ect.; and B) somewhere  on the grey-ace scale, so I tend to have higher standards in romance than see them, must have them, or love triangles, or this person is attractive and rich, lets get married (I know its a fantasy, but it just doesn’t do it for me). Paranormal romance tends to be the worst of the lot, especially in the post Twilight world. So I tend to steer clear.

Then I read Every Heart a Doorway. When I say read, I mean devoured once, reread slowly again, left for a while, reread, put on my Christmas list, didn’t get it, bought it myself, and read at least two more times. If you haven’t read that book you should do so immediately. It has everything, an interesting idea, a fascinating mystery, engaging characters, and rarest of rarities in a semi-mainstream bestseller, queer characters and themes. (Also Jack. She quickly became a fictional crush for me at least.) It was all wrapped in gorgeous and heartbreakingly clear prose and style.

Anyway, that book was ridiculously good. So the other week when I saw her name on this series that I had ignored for years, I thought, yes, I trust this author. There are some authors whose books you will read even if you know nothing about them, or even if every sign points to them not being you cup of tea. People like Niel Gaiman, or Terry Pratchett, or Brandon Sanderson, or Megan Whalen Turner, or Katherine Addison, or Seanan McGuire. So I check out the first two and I definitely do not regret it.

I’m currently partway through the third book and wow does this series deliver. The main character is a half-human, half-fae woman who is a a PI for the local courts of faerie named October ‘Toby’ Daye. I knew I would like her from the moment she said that she wasn’t a lady, she was a sir (because she is a knight). The books have the same sort of fantasy noir tone to them as Jim Butcher’s Dresden books, but exquisitely done and much more cheerful. (It also feels like, just like the Dresden books, this is going to sprout a complex and well executed myth-arc any second now. I eagerly await.)

The plots are mysteries, as befits a fantasy noir setting. They are also really well done. In the first one I just have to applaud the narration, which despite being first person, made it very clear that the villain was super creepy/suspicious, even though the narrator trusted them implicitly. The second book had an excellent variation on a locked room mystery, where the murders seemed impossible by the known laws of the world, but were happening anyway. (Also, wow does that book go hard. I wasn’t expecting that high of a death count. It really wasn’t high at all numerically, but it was like the literary equivalent of a kill em all horror film.) The third book is changing the formula, where we know who the kidnapper is, its rescuing the kidnappees that is the problem.

Worldbuilding is starting out good, with clear signs that it will only improve. It is clearly based mostly on Celtic mythology, with Sidhe and selkies and the Wild Hunt, as well as Oberon, Maeve, and Titania (by the way, even time it is mentioned that they are missing, my myth arc senses tingle). McGuire easily fills in plot holes, using things like glamour and the nightgasts to explain how a society of non-humans hide. She also doesn’t limit herself to European Mythology either. There have been several kitsune characters, and mentions of Djinn and Peri, which makes the setting much more diverse and realistic. I really enjoy the weird streak of practicality, like mostly nocturnal fae working at twentyfour hour grocery stores, and cell phones that don’t work in deep faerie unless you get a dwarf to magically fiddle with it, or shapeshifters needing to raid goodwill for clothes that will fit their new form.

Characters are many and varied. There are a lot of excellent characters, and many of them are introduced quickly and concisely, so that you really get a feel for what they are like from a single scene. SO many of them are recurring. It gives a real feeling of weight to them, to know that this knight will still be upright and honorable (Sir Etienne-very little screen time so far, but checks so many of my boxes. Also, Toby doesn’t like him. I really hope he comes into focus in a future book, I need to know more about him so that he can become a favorite character.) and this undine will still offer healing and sanctuary (Lily of the tea gardens, who has healed Toby many times so far. You get the feeling that they go way back. I am so not here for the blatant foreshadowing that she doesn’t have the power to protect Toby from anything powerful, because you just know that she would try.). Also, there is the way that previously minor characters come into focus and are more important in different books, like Quentin, who had two minor scenes in the first book, but was one of the most important characters in the second.

I’ve compared these books to the Dresden Files, so I feel like I should say at least one thing that these books are doing a hundred times better. The women are so much better written. There are so many of them, with different personalities and priorities, from Lily, guardian healer spirit; to January, mother and scientist; to Dare, a kid who is in a bad situation and wants to get out; to the extremely dangerous Luidaeg, who is older then all the other immortals, and lonely; and many, many more. It’s amazing. Every book passes the Bechdel test easily.

Finally the romance. Three books in and I’m still not sure why that sticker was on these books. There really hasn’t been much of a romance subplot. When the character of Connor was introduced I thought here we go, but the books are nicely subverting my dread. Connor seemed at first glance to be the stereotypical nice guy/childhood friend/Betty (though not really a “Nice Guy”, thank you Seanan McGuire) of the common love triangle, but it is much more complicated than that. He’s actually an ex of Toby’s and their past relationship didn’t work out, and is now unhappily married. Although he seems interested in rekindling his relationship with Toby, she is much more practical, denying him off the bat. She is very conscious of the way it didn’t work in the past, and of her honor, which I really appreciate. The Veronica of our tale seems to be recurring character Tybalt, but so far (two and a half books in) Toby doesn’t seem to realize it. My grey-ace self is really enjoying this, because the romance is being played so, so subtle. From assuming that Tybalt didn’t like her when he was obviously flirting with her, to very casual displays of trust, to him obviously worrying about her being in dangerous situations, to her wondering where he is when he doesn’t show up to bother her. Three books in and Toby has only now admitted to herself that they are sort of friends. It’s slow and very well done, and like I said before, not really important. The romance plot takes up less than 5% of the action, which is an excellent ratio.

As you can probably tell, the Dresden Files are one of my favorite series. These books feel like someone asked me what my favorite aspects of that series are, and what disappointed me, and then tailor made these books for me, personally. I am enjoying them wholeheartedly, and cannot wait to read the rest.

[gaiatheorist]

Will it change?

Sexual harassment. Everywhere you look, even if you try not to. I don’t even know how to spell the noise I made when I read that sport-coaches are to be banned from having sexual relations with 16-17 year olds. I’d assumed that was ‘a given’, the age of consent in the UK is 16, but anyone working with under-18s should always have been bound by a duty of care not to take advantage of their charges? 

There is hand-wringing, and panicking amongst ‘some’ men, ‘some’ women are encouraging a shut-up-and-put-up approach, and a certain UK celebrity chef has banned his daughter from posting ‘selfies’ on Instagram. (Watch her other platforms, Daddy, it’s a brave move to come out and say you’re policing her profile, but you are only one of many push/pull factors in her life.) Gods, that’s an odd side-spin, the ‘Daddy’ angle, and I need to mind myself not to go off on a tangent of “As the father of daughters...” My mother saw me as a commodity, and wanted to parade me around grotty wine-bars in short skirts and low tops, my father had already laid the foundations of eroding my self-esteem to a point where I should have been ripe for the picking. In a way, I suppose I was.

Away from my possibly-unusual developmental experiences, with my father trying to keep me princess-pristine, and my mother trying to whore me out, I’m observing an attitude-shift, and I’m hoping it catches on. ‘Too late for me’, I suppose, but I will, eventually, re-engage with the world, and influence other people, in whatever way I can, that nobody has to ‘put up with it.’  Not just the sexualised angle, I’m currently ‘having a wobble’ about the gas-men. I don’t know which gas-men are coming to fix my heating today, more to the point, I don’t know if anyone’s coming at all, but that’s just the lettings agents being slack, and not confirming when they said they would. The heating has never worked properly, and I’ve reported it at every gas-safety inspection, and every condescending rental inspection for nine years. The landlord did have the boiler exchanged about four years ago, but putting a new boiler into a system that doesn’t work didn’t fix the heating, it just gives him a better ‘energy efficiency’ rating if he decides to sell the house. 

I’m hardly likely to come across as ‘bored housewife’, and, unless I actually mention it, nobody knows I’m that most fearsome of things, a single 40-year-old-woman. I’m wrapped in multiple layers of clothing, no make-up, no hair-do, I don’t ‘dress like a woman’, I dress like a human. If it’s the horrible old gas-man that usually does my safety inspection, I might not ‘bite my tongue’ this time. (In the ‘verbal inhibition’ sense, not the faux-coy 50 shades sense.) I avoid interacting with him as much as is possible, not because I’m a ‘nice girl’, or because he rambles on about different types of pipe-fittings, but because he infuriates me. He’s old-school, and me not being barefoot and pregnant upsets his view of ‘women.’ I have, on occasion, ‘talked back’ when he’s been offensive-assumptive, the only reason I usually stay out of his way is to avoid him making complaints about me to the lettings agents, and me ending up on some sort of list of ‘difficult tenants’. 

He, like the “Don’t try to lift that, lass, I’ll pick it up, it’s heavy.” father-in-law, are ‘too old to change.’ Defeatist? I don’t think so, more realistic. 20+ years of ‘lifting that’ didn’t stop the mole-man insisting I shouldn’t attempt multiple tasks or activities, due to the fact that I’m female. Old dogs, new tricks etc, a proportion of the population, regardless of the configuration of their genitalia, have very fixed perceptions of gender-roles and such. I don’t, but I’m just a collection of meat no-one eats, my son seeing that has taught him that the old ‘pink or blue’ rules are nonsense. Fair enough, that’s given rise to multiple identity-crises in him, but he knows he’s ‘not done yet’, and, as horrible as the wobbles are when he has them, he comes through the other side every time.  

That ‘family’ dynamic must have been difficult for him, there’s the ‘normalisation’ angle, in that small children just accept and absorb their environments, but, as he started to develop his own identity, I can imagine that the polarisation of ‘me’, and his dad’s family raised some questions in his mind. The ones he asked, I answered. His dad wanted to be ‘looked after’, I hate people doing things ‘for’ me. His grandma, aunts, and female cousins like cake, and flowers, and soap operas, I very much don’t. I made myself this way, as a protective mechanism, rejecting the perceived-vulnerabilities associated with femininity, I won’t have other people’s less-than perceptions projected on to me. The kid spent more time with me than his Dad during his formative years, I worked 20 hours a week, and the ex established a routine of his parents caring for ‘the grub’ during most of that time, grandma was ‘better’ with babies than the ex, and the ex never made any effort to improve his own ‘babysitting’ skill-set. He was 32 when the kid was born, not quite in the ‘too old to change’ bracket, but he chose not to change, handing over his infant son to the grandparents because he didn’t know ‘how’ to interact with the tiny, helpless thing. Neither did I, at first, one of us learned. 

The ex won’t change. He still wants to be the centre of attention all of the time, he ‘sits on’ the kid, when the boy’s busy reading, studying, or doing whatever else 19 year olds do. The man has no perception of personal space, he’s like a cat, if he wants your attention, and you don’t give it to him immediately, he sits on you. The ex has been raised to see a divide between ‘male’ and ‘female’ tasks, the mother-in-law must be in her eighties now, but she takes in his laundry, and cleans his flat, because he works. I worked. I worked full-time and then some, but he was somehow exempt from household chores, asking me to ‘have a quick tidy round’ when he had friends or family visiting. I should have said no, I allowed that to continue.  

There needs to be change. I’m exceptionally cautious on who I interact with because I genuinely don’t have the energy for arguments, that is a defeatist attitude, but I’m still in self-preservation mode. My ‘social circle’ is minuscule, in part because I hate the ‘justifying myself’ aspect of interacting with people, single-disabled-unemployed, and the audacity to be female as well? ‘Most’ people want to fix me, or fix me up. I’m broke, I’m not broken, I don’t need ‘fixing’. I fully accept that I’m the different/difficult one, and that ‘most’ people aren’t intending to be patronising, condescending, or offensive, they’re just ‘trying to help.’ In a way that reinforces the hetero-normative gender stereotypes partly responsible for this whole mess. (The world, not me, I’m almost entirely responsible for my own personal mess.) 

“Ooh, you can’t be on your own in the house all the time!” I can. 

“Do you want me to fix that for you?” No, I can fix most things myself.

“You ought to go out more, and have some fun!” Going out really isn’t fun when you have brain injuries, it’s overwhelming-exhausting. 

“Oh, I didn’t realise you’d split up! Are you ‘looking for someone’ now?” HELL, no, I’m a viable entity in my own right, I don’t ‘need’ to be part of a couple to exist. (Mad cackle, there, at the time I shocked my former managers into silence with “I have no desire to belong to anyone, or anything.”)

It’s a weird one, while-ever females continue to take advantage of their perceived enfeeblement, nothing will change, and some males will take advantage of the power imbalance. We’re not that different physically, and I doubt we’re as different emotionally as old fashioned thinking would have us believe. We’re all just mobile meat, with these invented-accepted rules and societal norms and such. (I walk on the side of the path closest to the road when I’m with my son, fifty, or a hundred years ago, that would have raised eyebrows, because it’s the male party that’s supposed to take the road-side, not the female. He’s taller and stronger than me, but neither of us carries a sword, so it doesn’t matter which of us walks on which side. I take the road-side so that if a vehicle does mount the kerb, it hits me before the boy.)  

For me, the ‘accepted’ could do with examining. Old fashioned good manners are one thing, but the assumption that all females are weak and feeble creatures, incapable of holding a thought in our pretty little heads needs to go. I’m under no illusion that I’ll see equality in my lifetime, but I’m hopeful that, as unpleasant as some of the disclosures are, that they might start a shift in attitudes; this gender power-imbalance needs to be challenged, and it needs to change.  

[feministthe-blog]

Jasmine

Feminism makes the people that advocate for it better. Many men and woman find themselves a better version of themselves as I study and get deeper into the political movement that has been around for decades. Feminism is not about fitting into a stereotype or doing something by the book. Feminism is about fighting for women while being the truest form of yourself, even if you fit into the stereotype. Feminism with Jasmine..... Do you consider yourself a feminist or a womanist? Do you prefer to not categorize yourself? Explain why. I am a feminist. I am a feminist because I truly want for women to have equality and freedom. Women have been held down by patriarchy for decades. We have been suffocated and been in the shadows for so long. I truly want women to have a place in this world that is not circumstantial or dictated by a man. Women deserve equality. How do you define feminism/women's rights/womanism? Would you want your mother to make less than a male co-worker, for the same job when they have the same qualifications and work ethic? Would you want sister to be told she is cannot make decisions for her own body? Would you want your daughter to deal with sexism? Feminism to me is adjusting society for women's equality. Women did not have a place in this world before and we're fighting a long and hard fight for equality. How has feminism, womanism, or women's right's shaped your perspective? Feminism has made my perspective widen and clear. I see things for what they are and it's like a curtain has been lifted from my eyes. I see now that the comment that that man made about women was not just a joke, but very sexist. I see that it's not this company doesn't have any hiring positions open, they have positions open, but not for women. These are things that I have dealt with myself and things that feminism has opened my eyes to. Why are you advocating for women's rights? I want all women and myself to exist is this world peacefully and with purpose and equally. I will never fathom how men decided that they were the superior and they dictated everything in this world, but it is not right and it was never right. Women are vital for human life and without women you have nothing. I want every woman and every girl to have rights to everything and absolute freedom and liberation. We deserve it. We should have it because it's basic human rights. Has becoming an advocate for women's rights changed you and the way you see the world? Explain. Yes. I see everything in depth now. I don't sexism as a joke or take things as "tradition." The more I learned about women's rights and the deeper I dug into the history of women in society, the more I learned that we were never considered and that there is more to everything that what one says or sees. Feminism has allowed me to see beyond the layer on things and get to the raw and real. Is there a person that encouraged you to become a feminist/women's rights advocate or womanist? How has this person helped you in your journey? There are many women who have helped me and guided me. My friends, my women teachers, my grandmother, and my mother most importantly. I am a feminist. I am a lesbian. I am a black woman. These are a lot of things to be at once and society tends to hate each and every one of the things that make me, me. My mother never once questioned me, my sexuality, my political views, my thoughts and feelings. Growing up it was hard for me to find my footing because I was a black lesbian feminist. I fit into that misconception that all feminist are lesbian and I would see that sinister smirk that would cross someone's face when they discovered I was a lesbian and a feminist. It's demeaning and it's infuriating, but my mother hasn't allowed me to feel pity for myself or anything. She makes me feel proud of who I am, who I love, and what I support. My mother has helped me become a better feminist and a better woman from her guidance. Was there a moment that you realized women and men were not treated equally? If so, how did this make you feel? I have four brothers. I am the middle child, the only girl. Growing up I was surrounded by a large amount of masculine energy and I definitely soaked in it. I did everything my brothers did while also maintaining my own femininity. When I got to high school I wanted to play on the football team. I've played every sport under the sun and I'm exceptionally good at football. I wanted to be a quarterback for my high school and just my luck, the quarterback was horrible. I thought I had it in the bag. My brothers weren't comfortable with my trying out, but I didn't care. I wanted to do something and I wasn't going to let my gender stop me. I didn't even get to try out for the team. The boys and girls of my school broke me down to the point I was ashamed to even show my face at school. I was bullied and experienced so much sexism that it made my stomach turn. I listened to adults tell me I should find something else to do. Something more "girly". I will never forget a classmate of mine, male, saying "you can like girls and all, but you're still a b*tch. You don't have a place on the boys football team." I was more than hurt, but I finally get a taste of the inequality. With all the doors that the women's rights movement has opened for women, what do you feel should be the next thing to shed light on and help towards? I don't think there is something specific we should focus on. Being a woman in America is not a great thing right now and the leaders of this country are trying to diminish and take away our every right. We have a rapist, sexist, and racist man running the country right now. He's taken away education programs for girls, trying to take away planned parenthood, and the right we have to our own body's right now. It's scary and I feel like it's exceptionally hard being a woman right now. I feel like every single problem we are facing is the most important right now. What do you think of the way the women's rights movement is portrayed in the media? The media can be very harsh and inaccurate when it concerns the women's rights movement. Feminism does not mean you hate men, you're a lesbian, you're entitled, or whatever they like to paint feminism as. The women's rights movement is not pointless. We are fighting a true fight, but the media loves trying to destroy the true image and purpose and meaning of women's rights. I think that it's disgusting and it has to stop. Women are under constant attack and you wouldn't believe it's because we've decided that no longer will we stand for inequality. Women seeking to be a mans equal has started a nasty war and the media does nothing, but make it even worse with its slander to the movement. The media has also helped the movement in a big way. There are hundreds of people being able to get more information from the media about the movement. When I was coming up I didn't have the teachnology we do today. It's so many resources to get information from now. You're not just hearing information from one site or one station and this, I believe, has also helped the movement because now we can tell our truth. We are the media. We can give the facts about feminism and the women's rights movement.