#feminist analysis

[maxdibert]

The nickname “Snivellus” derives from the word “snivel,” which means crybaby. So, Snivellus was basically a way of mocking the fact that Severus might show his emotions—that instead of toughing it out like a stereotypical, macho, strong, hairy-chested man, he cried. I don’t think I need to explain why this nickname is problematic—any nickname used to bully someone is problematic—but a nickname that also references a supposed weakness, stemming from the expectations of a patriarchal society for men to display “unmanly” behavior typical of “weak” men, is not just problematic due to the bullying itself but also because of the misogynistic implications it carries. Because yes, misogyny and hegemonic gender roles also affect men by demanding certain traits from them to validate them socially. And I know the Marauders lived in the 1970s, and that Rowling is one of the worst when it comes to gender issues. But I find it quite ironic how Marauders Stans or Slytherin Skittles, who have built their trash fandom and constant Snape-bashing around the topic of LGBTQ+ themes, have the audacity to mock Snape using a nickname that directly attacks gender nonconformity and justifies a toxic, traditional masculinity that shames men who cry or show emotions, labeling them as less valid.

The Marauders weren’t social justice warriors, and James and Sirius, in particular, embodied the classic values of male success through the performance of stereotypical “macho” characteristics: as leaders, as “alphas” of the pack. Both are violent; both are cocky men who try to stand out and mark their territory. Both exhibit behaviors that have typically been excused in men just because they are men, such as abusive and reckless behavior. Their nickname for Severus stems from the idea that showing emotions—especially crying—if you are a man, is a reason for ridicule and mockery because men don’t cry. Men are supposed to be strong, puff out their chests, and keep going because that’s what men do. It’s a misogynistic and archaic mindset that continues to be perpetuated in social models and relationships to this day. And I find it incredibly hypocritical that certain people who claim to hate J.K. Rowling for being a transphobe then go on to appropriate the horribly sexist nicknames she created for a group of heterosexual men embodying toxic masculinity to bully another man for not performing the traditional masculine model expected of someone like him.

Because Severus wasn’t a “macho”. Severus was a studious introvert with a more passive character who didn’t fit into the masculine vision of the time. Everything about him, including his appearance, demeanor, and interests, is unmasculine from a hegemonic perspective given the historical context. But these people don’t care. They’re so limited, so ignorant, and so cynical that they not only ignore these kinds of nuances but even find it funny to reproduce insults that any real-life James Potter would probably have used against them.

Make no mistake: James Potter and Sirius Black wouldn’t have been your friends. They would have tortured you as much, if not more, than Snape. And that’s the most pathetic part of their fandom, unfortunately.

[melancholypilled]

As a woman, watching men claim that the worst form of humiliation is to be penetrated- “like a woman,” is depressing. All it does is tell us that penetration in a patriarchal society that disregards female sexuality is inherently degrading. men remind us of that all the time, why do you think “fuck you,” “suck my dick” and threats of rape are insults? However, this humiliation of women is necessary for the continuation of our species. It is tradition for women to suffer degradation. No matter how powerful a woman is in society, her biology, and hateful men, will remind her of her place, she is destined to be humiliated.

Is this truly the case though?

Women are the only ones capable of creating life, men play such a minor role in the grand scheme of pregnancy and the creation of life inside a woman’s body, so why have they pushed the narrative that penetration, something necessary for reproduction makes us inferior? A society that values male pleasure and depravity, as well as fetishizes female suffering isn’t normal. However, most cultures have adopted this mindset.

Why is this our reality? It doesn’t make sense.

[brownwomanisland]

Currently watching some "butchfemme" discourse on Twitter and why do people act like the person viewing the phenomenon through a critical lens for analytical purposes is puritanical, offensive, erasing lesbian history or whatever other term they're using?

Our ability to not evaluate the things we cling to and then be babies about it online is so tiring. You're always going to be yourself but not because something is sensitive to you means that it's not to be discussed lol especially on a platform like Twitter where you have to insert yourself into the conversation and then get mad lol.

Cuz I'm actually liking the thought of how rad fem literature leans to abolishing gender but I also like wondering about seemingly American lesbian butchfemme culture and how that can also play into gender roles despite the power imbalance and hierarchy of heterosexual roles not existing there. Like damn, 2 things can exist at the same time and it's really interesting to think about, personal feelings on it aside.

There was also the line that "masculinity" doesn't belong to men from some rad fem account and I just briefly thought ... isn't that a little weird for a rad fem to say? If femininity doesn't exist, doesn't masculinity not exist either?

Like when I read fanfic, sometimes I can't stand certain themes because they feel like heterosexual shit even though I exclusively read lesbian ships. I tend to leave the things I don't feel interested in alone but maybe because of how things feel a bit "straight" to me is why I avoid it because it feels like gender roles where I don't want any.

Anyways, thoughts? Don't be a reactionary though, save that shit for Twitter.

[brainrotarchive]

some thoughts on Good Omens and male privilege

Crowley and Aziraphale (as well as all other celestial beings) are canonically genderless icons. However, through all of history they present masculine and I think the reason for that is pretty obvious. It‘s not like their personalities simply align with masculine traits and that‘s why they choose it most of the time. They both love traditionally feminine (meeting up for fancy wine dinners to talk about life and gossip about their bosses) and masculine (cars) things. And Crowley in season 2 explicitly does not identify as a "lad". Also, the definitions of masculinity throughout history are neither logical nor consistent and they more than anyone would be aware of how made up gender roles really are. I also don‘t think that Above or Below are patriarchally structured especially in the show. They are supposed to be completely indifferent towards gender so why do they always choose to present as men?

I think it‘s because they are both lazy when doing their jobs and choose the path of least resistance. Think about the Arrangement, for example. If there‘s a way to make their job easier, they‘ll do it. Being a woman is and always was limiting in some way. Especially when trying to influence humans (men) into doing either good or evil, being perceived as a woman makes things harder. And as observers of human cultures they‘re very aware of that and they probably, over the years, got very comfortable with their male and white privilege and use that to make their lives easier. Aziraphale also imo got attached to his appearance at some point and doesn‘t want to change anything about it.

The only time Crowley appears as a woman, it‘s as Nanny Ashtoreth. Here, again, she benefits from traditional gender roles (woman=trusted to care for children) to reach an end goal. So, I think overall they just present as the gender that‘s most convenient at the time which is usually male.

[depressedhangrybitch]

OK I have been waiting to talk about this for a while and now here it so. ..

THIS PISSES ME OFF TO THE CORE!!!!

I think we need to stop letting men in general to design costumes for women.

That's it.

And even if u do let men to be your costume designer. Do it with proper research.....

Because stuff like this happens.

Like what is the point of those costumes in justice league???

They don't serve any purpose except maybe make a fashion statement and demean Amazonian warriors by making them look incompetent.

Amazonian were great warriors and this....

speaks VOLUMES.....VOLUMES!!!!

That despite so many waves of Feminism emphasizing on female autonomy there are still cases of blatant female sexualization even in Hollywood and they are responsible for the American society as a whole...since what they show influences millions.

And they are demeaning history.

AND DONT EVEN GET ME STARTED ON HARLEY QUINN.

This resonated with me most because I myself realized this when I first watched birds of prey.

When I saw Harley in birds of prey I immediately began to compare her to suicide squad's harley and concluded that this one is ugly when in fact in contrast to the squad's Harley she is much more comfortable in her costume. This in turn made me realize that Beauvoir was right that we live so closely connected to our oppressors that we don't realize we are being oppressed.

I was seeing Harley from a male gaze rather than a female gaze.

This shocking realization made me look deep into myself and surprise....surprise

So many things were wrong with my perception.

I was so accustomed to looking at the world from a man's pov that I forgot that I have my own perspective.

I have sought to build my perspective since then and it's going well.

Honestly speaking I think some women may also agree with me.

Men or straight men in general should not be allowed to design costumes because they focus more on what pleases their eye rather look into project practically. These are some examples that I know.

I dont know how many are there that I am unaware of.

[haggishlyhagging]

Sarah Grimké, like prior commentators, stressed the early version of Genesis as decisive. She argued that Creation was filled with animals who could have been companions to Adam but that God wanted "to give him a companion, in all respects his equal; one who was like himself a free agent, gifted with intellect and endowed with immortality." She interpreted the Fall as showing Adam and Eve equally guilty, an interpretation we have previously encountered on the part of a number of writers. But Sarah Grimké's interpretation of God's curse on Eve—"Thou wilt be subject unto thy husband, and he will rule over thee"—was innovative. She argued that the curse is

simple prophecy. The Hebrew, like the French language, uses the same word to express shall and will. Our translators having been accustomed to exercise lordship over their wives and seeing only through the medium of a perverted judgement . . . translated it shall instead of will, and thus converted a prediction to Eve into a command to Adam; for observe it, it is addressed to the woman and not to the man.

The "prophecy" interpretation of this section had been earlier made by Mary Astell, but there is no evidence Grimké knew of it. Her effort to base her interpretation on linguistic grounds is original with her. More important is her insistence on the bad faith of the translators and her feminist effort to historicize their gendered view of the text. Sarah Grimké pursued that theme vigorously in succeeding letters. She charged that man had exercised "dominion" over women "for nearly six thousand years" and continued:

I ask no favors for my sex. All I ask our brethren is, that they will take their feet from off our necks and permit us to stand upright on that ground which God designed us to occupy. . . . All history attests that man has subjected woman to his will, used her as a means to promote his selfish gratification, to minister to his sensual pleasures, to be instrumental in promoting his comfort; but never has he desired to elevate her to that rank she was created to fill. He has done all he could to debase and enslave her mind; and now he looks triumphantly on the ruin he has wrought, and says, the being thus deeply injured is his inferior.

Here Grimké moved far ahead of her predecessors and her contemporaries. Men have not only degraded women, but have made them mere instruments for their own comfort. They have enslaved women's minds, deprived them of education and finally robbed them of the knowledge of their equal humanity. These charges will not appear anywhere else until the 1850 Woman's Rights Convention held in Ohio and even there they appear in isolation, not as part of a feminist world view which dares to challenge patriarchal thought.

Sarah Grimké proceeded to build her challenge to patriarchy by critically surveying various aspects of women's conditions at different times and in different places. She gave a cursory overview of women's status in Asia and Africa and in various historical periods ranging from Ancient Mesopotamia to Antiquity, through European history to the American present. She attacked discrimination against women in education, law, economic opportunities and within the family. Her exposure of the sexual exploitation of women in marriage was particularly advanced for her time. She argued for women's equal access to the ministry and outlined in detail all the biblical passages authorizing women as teachers and prophets. Her analysis of St. Paul was historical and critical, and she pointed out every contradiction in the biblical account. She asked, if women are not allowed to preach or teach, why then are many young women now employed as Sunday school teachers, ostensibly breaking the Pauline injunction and yet "warned not to overstep the bounds set for us by our brethren in another? Simply. . . because in the one case we subserve their views and their interests, and act in subordination to them; whilst in the other, we come in contact with their interests, and claim to be on an equality with them in . . . the ministry of the word." In an earlier passage she had summarized the most advanced part of her analysis, which would be "reinvented" many times over by future generations of feminists:

I mention [this] . . . only to prove that intellect is not sexed; that strength of mind is not sexed; and that our views about the duties of men and the duties of women, the sphere of man and the sphere of woman, are mere arbitrary opinions, differing in different ages and countries, and dependant solely on the will and judgement of erring mortals.

Here, Sarah Grimké, reasoning by way of a close reading of the scriptural text and relying only on her own judgment and interpretations, defined the difference between sex and gender and stated, in terms which would not be as clearly stated again until late in the 20th century: gender is a culturally variable, arbitrary definition of behavior appropriate to each of the sexes. Feminist Bible criticism had reached the point where it led directly to a feminist world-view.

-Gerda Lerner, The Creation of Feminist Consciousness

[yaniasogames]

lacey’s flash games and the horrors of womanhood: part 1, lacey’s wardrobe!

(trigger warning for discussions and possible depictions of: sexual assault/rape, stalking, abuse, violent misogyny, gore)

so i guess it’s a bit awkward for me of all people - someone who is a girl but not assigned one at birth or passing - to be writing this post, but i just wanted to talk about this aspect of this series cause i think it’s a big part of why it feels so unique and why the horror works for so many people.

the lacey’s series is pretty often praised for it’s great horror and scares, as well as it’s depiction of trauma, but i think more specifically it deserves praise for taking subjects such as stalking and sexual abuse and executing them in a way that’s deeply sympathetic and yet still so shocking and effective.

in the first ever lacey’s video, lacey’s wardrobe, we of course follow the titular lacey in the titular game as she gets dressed for multiple occasions. a picnic, going to the mall, and a date with the “cutest guy.” all that is disrupted, though, by her stalker, a man who follows her in near every area of the game, proclaiming his love for her in a totally not creepy and invasive and wildly inappropriate way.

throughout the video, lacey seems to have no privacy, and no relief from her stalker. besides not even being safe in a public place like this one, some of the most terrifying events in the video bar the finale happen while she’s still at home. she gets threatening phone calls and a grotesque gift from the stalker that make her feel trapped, and there’s whole segments where the stalker is seen peering through her window and is heard knocking furiously on her door. all while she’s in her own bedroom getting dressed.

the videos ending consists of the player dressing up lacey and forcing her to go outside alone at night, even when she breaks the fourth wall and begs and begs and begs them not to. lacey gets cannibalized by her stalker, with audio of her crying and shots briefly flashing by of her dismembered corpse. unless, of course, her stalker kept her alive through all of this torture. said stalker’s reason for doing this?

this video on it’s own already carries a lot of dark subtext with it. it’s not uncommon knowledge that many people in real life experience stalking, with most victims being women. it’s also not uncommon knowledge that in many parts of the world, walking home at night as a woman is very unsafe and carries the risk of your wellbeing being in danger, which is why many women carry pepper spray and why products such as rape whistles exist. lacey is aware of her stalker, and pretty clearly feels unsafe throughout the whole video. her permanently smiling face and the music distort after the first call from the stalker, and she begs at the end not to go outside. she knows how vulnerable she is against this threat, but she has no agency as a video game character simply there to be dressed up and beautified by the player. it’s like watching prey get dropped right into the cage of a predator, despite all the fear it’s showing at the sound of the predators roars.

this feeling extends to how out of all of the ways lacey could’ve ended up at the end of the episode, the specific choice is made to have her be eaten. to be gruesomely consumed by a man who claims to “love” her. consumed so that he can keep a woman who shows zero interest in him all to himself, not even caring that she’s crying and in immense pain as he literally rips her apart. it’s entitled. it’s greedy. it’s horrifying. and everything about this video shows how many stalkers view their victims, and how many men view women in general - as something they consume, they indulge in. as pretty dress up dolls who only serve to fill them up and be the objects of their affection, even when those women don’t want it.

another thing to note (although i am definitely not trying to victim blame poor lacey in any capacity) is the outfit lacey wears at the end. while a common shitty excuse that rapists make to put down their victims is that “they were asking for it!!1” because of the clothes they chose to wear, lacey pretty obviously doesn’t have a choice in this situation, and for her date, the player chooses to put her in a red jacket, choker and daisy dukes, a color and articles of clothing that are often associated with flirtiness and sexuality by society. these would be great choices if lacey wanted to go on this date of her own volition, but it’s made unsettling because, again, she doesn’t have a damn choice. in two of the shots, there’s even deliberate focus on her torso and therefore chest and legs as she meets her demise. could these possibly be from the stalkers POV?

a piece of media that this all reminds me of is silent hill 3, an (actually real) horror game that also taps into the many fears women commonly face, and how it feels to be a girl in a world that largely sees you as nothing but a target, an object, a tool. while not directly tying into the main plot of that game, in the area of the brookhaven hospital, you can find letters directed to main character heather from an unseen man named stanley. these letters are very… purposefully uncomfortable. the whole vibe of this part is made even worse by the fact that 1) the sound design, way the letters are written and the fact that earlier letters disappear when you go back to them support the idea that stanley is actually in the hospital watching heather from afar, and 2) heather is still a teenager, only being 17 years old throughout this whole game. not even her young age protects her from these circumstances. hell, many girls that age are already thought of as being “woman” enough.

stanley, similar to lacey’s stalker, is convinced that himself and the girl he’s stalking are meant to be together, and he objectifies heather through his writing and the way he sends her a doll as a gift.

stanley is shown as well to be a physical threat to others. you can find out he stabbed another patient at the hospital completely unprompted, and in one of his final letters, the doll that was a gift to heather? it’s broken into pieces.

the parallels to lacey’s stalker are apparent, as he both shows signs of violence against others before harming lacey (yells and demands her to come outside over the phone and sends her a gift of blood and guts), and is shown to have broken lacey into pieces when he eats her. just like children with their dolls, violent and dangerously misogynistic men often decide to rip apart and carelessly destroy the women they view as their playthings when they aren’t getting what they want. they desire control and for women to feel like their tools, and their victims are often left feeling like they have nowhere to go that’s safe. not a picnic with friends, not the shopping mall, not their own house, nowhere at all. it’s profoundly isolating and calls to mind how many abusers function, with the typical victims of both domestic violence and stalking usually being - you guessed it - women.

while all of this is heavy stuff for one video, as the lore of the series expands in the following videos and you learn more of lacey’s situation, the themes of the abuse, objectification and unwanted sexualization women face are strengthened, and become even more integral to why the lacey’s games are the way they are.

as rocio, the in-universe creator of the series states, these are the real girl’s games.

[justanotherbloodywoman]

A post here made me realize how hard women's "intuition" is met with contempt and disdain, and how long I've thought I was too picky or something until I realize I was just being thoughtful where men don't care to be.

The post was about how women watch and observe if their partner is in any mood to contemplate sex before suggesting anything, so men barely have any need to refuse sex, because their partners were always silently taking note of their partners' mood and stuff.

While men don't do it. Men don't care about making sure their partners are well taken care of in other ways. Men, in general, would just go for it and then they would get mad if they were refused.

And then I realized. It's not that women are too insecure or demanding when they don't communicate (through words) their desires and needs. It is that men don't care to listen, to observe, to keep their SO's little likes and dislikes in mind. Of course they don't, they don't see us, generally, as people or people actual worth knowing deeply about.

Women just want the care they give to men, but most men don't care to give anything back.

[maxdibert]

Lily’s not selfless because she didn’t want her baby to die. Anyone who isn’t a psychopath doesn’t want their baby to die! Defenceless Petunia also throws herself in front of a wand for her baby! Narcissa lies to Voldemort’s face and goes behind his back to Snape for her baby! Both of these women are selfish creatures! By book 6, JKR has firmly made the point that Lily’s actions were admirable but unexceptional in this universe. Joining the Order out of school is arguably her most selfless act (yeah, she’s personally affected, but she could’ve run to Australia).

Lily’s attraction to James is pure ego. She’s flattered the hot rich elite publicly validates her by desiring her. An actually selfless person would think of James’ victims (and I’m not just talking Severus here). Her condescension to Severus is ego (she enjoys having a worshipful puppy who won’t call her out on anything until he finally snaps and bites back - neither of them see each other as a person). We know a lot more about her than ‘she was selfless’ through her relationships, and not all we know is flattering. Which is good! Because the angelic figure the fandom makes her into - when JKR gave us more than that even in the little page time she has - is so fucking boring.

Absolutely, I couldn’t agree more. What I find especially interesting is how so many Lily fans insist that pointing out her flaws is misogynistic, when in reality, they’re the ones preventing her from being a fully realized, three-dimensional character. By reducing her to nothing more than a morally flawless young woman and a sacrificial mother, they’re stripping her of the very things that make characters compelling—nuance, contradictions, and the ability to make mistakes.

It’s ironic because these same people will often argue that female characters should be treated with the same depth and complexity as male characters. But if we’re unwilling to analyze and critique female characters the way we do male ones, then we’re falling into the same trap we claim to oppose. What’s the point of demanding better female representation if we’re just going to infantilize female characters and refuse to engage with them critically? If we want true narrative equality, we have to be comfortable with the idea that women in fiction—just like in real life—can be selfish, can make questionable choices, and can sometimes just be plain unlikable. And that’s not a bad thing. That’s a good thing.

Lily is an interesting character because she isn’t just a saintly martyr. She clearly had an ego, she was flattered by James’s attention, she tolerated Severus’s bigotry for far too long, and when she finally did cut him off, it wasn’t out of some grand moral reckoning but because it affected her personally. That’s not a bad thing—it makes her human. And as you said, her sacrifice, while undeniably tragic and moving, is not some uniquely selfless act in this universe. Plenty of characters put their children before their own survival, and many of them—Petunia and Narcissa included—don’t get the same moral pedestal that Lily does. The difference? Lily is framed by the narrative as an untouchable paragon of goodness, and fans have followed that lead uncritically.

The reality is, if we actually want better-written female characters, we need to stop being afraid of giving them flaws. Otherwise, we’re just trading one kind of misogyny (women as lesser) for another (women as perfect). And neither of those is real progress.

[melancholypilled]

I’ve been replaying bloodborne and the dlc is so beautiful, and i’ve been having thoughts

TW for sexual violence

Kos is obviously a symbol of womanhood and motherhood, her name is “mother kos” and she is designed to almost resemble a human woman laying on her stomach, as present in the official art. This contrasts ebrietes, blood starved beast and moon presence, who are all female but appear scary for the horror effect. She also resides in the only ocean like area in the game, the fishing hamlet. Water of course being a literary symbol for birth and fertility, and the boss is literally her child wielding his placenta.

This concept is not only in her appearance but is made present within the lore, and reflects a much larger issue. Kos was once revered, but was later grossly violated by the hunters, as they used the parasites inside her body as well as her blood, and it can be inferred that more was done to her as her corpse is drastically more deformed compared to her normal appearance. The violations of mother kos can possibly be an allegory for rape and other sexual violence, as the term “violated” is frequently associated with rape, and her possibly unwanted pregnancy may have been a result of this, metaphorically speaking.

It is confirmed that Lady Maria committed suicide over the tragedies at the research hall, and the fishing hamlet. She obviously did this because of the trauma that she endured for witnessing Kos being mutilated and watching over human experimentation. However, Maria is the only hunter shown to have been psychologically impacted by Yharnam’s violence. This is a stretch, but perhaps Maria felt extra sympathy from Kos, as they are both female. The universal suffering of women affected her more than Gehrman or Ludwig, because she could relate to Kos

it’s a graphic allegory for the sexual violence that women face, bloodborne is full of this idea, but Kos’s tragic story highlights the universal suffering of women

[analysisroulette]

We actually did not discuss Taylor Swift once in this video, because one of us forgot she existed. We did discuss gender, LARP, and the great man theory of theme park design!

[brainrotarchive]

my grandpa used to tell me the original fairytales when I was a kid (the ones that they scare americans with online) and I was just thinking about the "evil stepsisters" in cinderella and how they chopped off part of their feet to fit the shoe and become a princess. and the obvious interpretation is that they are greedy and would rather lie and hurt than accept that this is for another girl. but fitting the slipper isn't just about a rise in class it's also a recognition from society as a woman (being a wife of a powerful prince). but that's just what it means to be a woman under the patriarchy. there isn't a shoe that fits everyone that will bring you acceptance so we are made to hide/hurt parts of ourselves and compete with others to bring them down. the shoe is ruined and stained by blood.

[haggishlyhagging]

As Voyagers move away from ignorance we begin to discover innocence. The term innocence is derived from the Latin in, meaning not, and nocere, meaning hurt, injure. We do not begin in innocence. We begin life in patriarchy, from the very beginning, in an injured state. From earliest infancy we have been damaged, no matter how "happy" our childhood appeared to be. Even before birth we injured our mothers, albeit unwillingly, draining their energy, and even by the fact of being born we caused and experienced pain. Once damaged by "education," we began our sub-conscious complicity in the damage, injuring others. The Voyage is not one of re-gaining "lost innocence," but of learning innocence.

Spinning is creating an environment of increasing innocence. Innocence does not consist in simply "not harming." This is the fallacy of ideologies of nonviolence. Powerful innocence is seeking and naming the deep mysteries of interconnectedness. It is not mere helping, defending, healing, or "preventive medicine." It must be nothing less than successive acts of transcendence and Gyn/Ecological creation. In this creation, the beginning is not "the Word." The beginning is hearing. Hags hear forth new words and new patterns of relating. Such hearing forth is behind, before, and after the phallocratic "creation." It is truly, as Nelle Morton has said, "a complete reversal of the going logic."

-Mary Daly, Gyn/Ecology

[burstsofenergy]

One of the arguments that seem to always come up when discussing Naruto with my boyfriend (who has watched naruto back when it first dropped and has knowledge about the fandom I'd argue) is that it is a Shonen.

Like I will criticise the narration, the plot holes, the inconsistency (boy how much I like to rant about the inconsistency) and the argument is nearly always that because Naruto belongs to the shonen genre, that is something of a given(?!?). And I am not a big expert in anime or anime culture or categorization or all but after confirming with wikipedia shonen is basically just the name for a special target group.

And I get it that shonen anime might be more focused on the fights and the power scaling and the action. Which are all things that I can not only understand but also appreciate, I stand firm in my believe that just because an anime is aimed at teenage boys, this should not mean that one cannot have expectations and quality requirements when it comes to world building or inner logic? Because really, boys also deserve to have animes that are packed with amazing fights and fighting systems additionally to a consistent world building and engaging narration.

And honestly, I expected a lot more from an anime that is as popular and successful as naruto really. And while the second argument always made is that the anime and the original manga aren't always aligned with each other, my argument still stands.

Despite a very sad lack of attention to detail, the world building is sloppy at best. Ideas and systems are introduced but never really realized. This deficiency has to be picked up then by the characters and the plot, I guess. And the animation/art. And really I can acknowledge that Naruto has a lot to offer for fans. There is a huge variety of characters which are engaging and interesting. And the plot is also really interesting in its basics. But I would still argue that the execution is again lacking.

[maxdibert]

Cho and Lavender were villainized by the narative in favor of Ginny and Hermione

Rowling despises teenage girls with traditionally feminine interests. She only treats those who don’t want to be like “other girls” or the pick-me girls well in the narrative. It’s clear she projects a deeply personal issue onto certain female archetypes, which makes me think she must have a lot of unresolved resentment, probably dating back to her childhood. She portrays Lavender as foolish for being desperate over Ron, when in reality, that’s not foolish at all—it’s completely normal for a teenage girl experiencing her first relationship and not knowing how to handle her emotions. She also mocks Lavender and the Patil twins’ interests, like Divination, girls’ magazines, or gossip, as if those things were inherently frivolous and shallow. It’s as if being a girl and enjoying “girly” things automatically makes you stupid or as if femininity itself is incompatible with having depth and other, more “serious” interests.

Likewise, through Harry’s praise of Ginny for not crying—contrasted with Cho, who does—she implies that sentimentality, emotional expression, or a lack of self-control are negative traits, while repressing emotions (which is traditionally associated with masculinity) is a positive thing that makes you “tougher” or “stronger.” Narratively, Rowling always favors Hermione for “not being like other girls” and turns Ginny into the ultimate pick-me girl. She’s a character who barely matters or has any relevance throughout the series until she suddenly transforms into the perfect cishet teenage boy fantasy: the girl who is super hot and sexually desirable but at the same time doesn’t waste time with “girly stuff” because she’s too busy acting just as aggressive as any macho guy, being hyper-focused on sports, and being “one of the boys,” cracking jokes, being rough, and acting cool. She’s a girl bro, the embodiment of the perfect woman according to male fantasy, not female. It’s as if she were designed by a hormone-driven teenage boy rather than a woman in her thirties.

Ginny is a disaster of a character from a gender analysis perspective—truly atrocious. And then there’s Luna, who doesn’t bother anyone because she’s too weird, yet she’s accepted by the “not-like-other-girls” girls precisely because of that weirdness. She’s the Manic Pixie Dream Girl, completing the trifecta of contemporary misogynistic female stereotypes embodied by Hermione, Ginny, and Luna—the only teenage female characters who are curiously treated positively and praised by the narrative. The rest are torn down at some point, specifically for reasons directly related to their gender.