#Men writing women

[lgbtqwriting]

imagine if people wrote queer characters like so many men write women. “she gayed gayly down the rainbow sidewalk”

[pacific-rimbaud]

I'm going to start describing the breast tissue and/or nipples of every male character my protagonists encounter no matter how wildly inappropriate the context.

By the time I arrived at the station Detective Jones was already seated at his desk, going over the riverbank murder case. He reached for his coffee, and I couldn't help but notice the smooth, mounded pecs shifting under his flimsy button-down as he moved. The air conditioning was on full blast, and a pair of large, pert nipples strained against the taut fabric. I ducked a hand discreetly under my skirt to adjust my tights.

[sewer-party-friends]

every MTF describes “being a woman” the same way that male authors do

[nondelphic]

having a writing tumblr is so annoying cuz i'll take a break and go on tumblr where i'm told "GO BACK TO WRITING!!!" and i'm just like yesss i will and i promise i won't procrastinate! today is not one of those days!!! but i can't say that cuz no one will believe me!!! because the writing community has a serious problem with procrastination and daydreaming about writing but not actually writing!!!!!

[lydiaxxxxx]

So much of misogyny comes down to the subject-object dichotomy. We view men as actors and women as being acted upon. The most obvious manifestation is the dehumanisation of women and the dichotomy is clear in things like objectification and gendered violence, or in how men don't care nearly as much about their appearance as women do. It doesn't really matter to them how they look; they aren't being look at, they're the ones doing the looking. Still, the dichotomy is present absolutely everywhere else too, even when it's more subtle.

It's normal for what are perceived to be gender-neutral children's stories, for example, to have male protagonists, but if a story has a female protagonist it's often labeled to be "for girls" and boys aren't expected or encouraged to engage with it. Sure, one part of this is that things aimed at women are seen as less-than, but another part is that men aren't expected to have to relate to and put themselves in the position of women, to stoop down from subjects to objects.

I think this is very well illustrated by the whole men writing women thing, like women can write well from a male perspective because we're socialized to see everything through male narratives, but men are awful at writing from a woman's perspective because they're not used to having to look at the world from there.

[victusinveritas]

Ah yes, she breasted breastily while having the body of a small dancer with the frame of a "war plane"

Neuromancer - William Gibson. Gibson once described Neuromancer as an adolescent fever dream (I might be paraphrasing a bit), and he's not wrong.

[mintaikk]

"Women write men weird too!"

I'm not denying that, but when reading, I keep on noticing a clear difference in most books on how they describe attractive characters of the opposite sex.

Men write women as if they're pieces put together. They mention how she looks, how sexy she is, everything about her body. The protagonist looks her up and down like she's a painting. A painting that they think is there's for the taking and not like she's her own person. They objectify, not sexualize. Like she's just an object of desire meant to fill the male protagonists needs.

Women will sexualize men, but not objectivfy them. They talk about how his smile quirks up when talking or how the tone of his voice sounds when he is talking about something he is passionate about. Or they mention his eyes and how much emotion they hold. They talk about him as if he is a whole person, focusing on his body language and emotions and how he expresses himself. They sexualize, but keep him human.

I'm not saying men can't write women well or women only write men like this. I'm just saying this is what I've noticed.

[kingdoms-and-empires]

So, uh, there's something that i want to ask, but i don't know if i should? You've pretty open to NSFW asks, so i got kinda curious about the hair style of the RO's, you know, hair style... down there...

(Just ignore this if you don't think it's cool to answer this)

When writing i dont think ima describe their hair or whatever down there, it just feels really icky as a male writer lmao

Dont wanna do a case of "Men writing women" and end up like:

[hoechlinth]

fanfic authors be like the blond blonded blondily about a confirmed brunet

[going2hell4everythingbutbeingbi]

listen. some ladies can do very impressive parkour and sprint and fight in high heels. that being said when your action girl picks her outfit for battle she probably wouldn't go for her stilettos

[ladyphlogiston]

- excerpt from The Persuader, a Jack Reacher novel by Lee Childs

It's not the most feminist of series anyway, but seriously, what the kriffing heck is this???

[oddlyhale]

"Would RWBY Be Better If The Main Characters Were Male?"

No, and here's why: the show desperately needed female writers on board to help flesh out the titled team from a woman's perspective. It's clear that the writers we've been stuck with don't know how to write women, and you can tell they're far more comfortable with writing men (Jaune, Ren, Oscar, Ozpin, etc.) Even RvB has a large male cast and that is RT's favourite project.

After 7 years, they finally bring Kiersi on. The only female writer. Even then, it feels like they're giving the reigns to Eddy Rivas to lead them. A male writer. If CRWBY ever took advice from a woman's POV, it feels like they just used it half-heartedly. Even RvB's writers are mostly male.

Can men write women successfully? Yes, when you can find the right male writer who can do it right, they can. But the men writing RWBY aren't the right ones. They're struggling like crazy with balancing these women characters for so long, I'm not surprised that they shift over to Jaune to take a break from the titled team.

[nondelphic]

men writing a "strong female character": "she’s not like other girls because… she’s damaged! 😩" *gives her zero personality outside of her trauma* #feminism 💪✨

[regularsystemdeez]

He pussied vaginally down the stairs.

[milaisreading]

I AM ON THE FLOOR

[victusinveritas]

Like Zorro, he says.