#mysogny in fandom

[thehollowwriter]

I was suddenly reminded of the Captain Marvel movie and I remember how much hate it got for Brie Larson and Captain Marvel herself. "Mary Sue" "woke feminism" (though that's not what woke means) "girlboss character" and more were all thrown around and it was dragged as the worst Marvel movie ever. People hated how much of a "bitch" Carol was and Critical Drinker's review didn't help things either. Was the movie good? Not really, but the hate was overblown, especially when you remember that other pretty meh Marvel movies or media with gary stus were defended to hell and back.

So why the hate for Carol? The obvious answer is mysogny of course, but I feel "people don't like strong, confident, and skilled women that's why" is only partially true.

It's a different genre, but I used to and still kinda do watch a lot of romcom movies with my mom. Stuff like The Cutting Edge or those generic Hallmark movies and whatnot. When I think about it, it was very common for the female love interest to be like Carol. Headstrong, confident, speaks her mind, serious, "too emotional", doesn't take shit, extremely skilled at what she does, etc.

But these characters didn't get that same reaction. I know it's not 100% comparable to a marvel movie, BUT it shows that strong women are not new in movies at all. Hell, just look at the first Jurassic Park!

So what's the difference? Why does Captain Marvel get so much hate, far more than what could he justified "bad writing"?Well, I think it's the existence of the male love interest. You see, in these other movies, these women would be the bitch character, the self-absorbed, prissy woman who needs to be taken down a notch.

This will be shown to the audience by her firmly putting other characters in their place, being unashamed of expressing her opinion, being confident in herself and her abilities and refusing to be treated like shit. The love interest would appear to be her rival turned lover, and he would "put in her in her place" and make her realise she ain't all that. She "improves", they get together, and boom happy ending.

Though funnily enough, if you look back you'll see the woman was often in the right. For example, in The Cutting Edge where the female lead got angry at her trainer screaming at her or saying things like "I want to see your ass in the air", or rightfully shut down the leas being a pos to her, or was strict on who her skating partner was because well- she's the one in a dangerous position!

Her constant rejection of possible partners is potrayed as her being stuck up, prissy and picky, but in reality, if her partner is the wrong weight or height, if he's not skilled or confident enough, he could drop her in one of the moves (where all he has to do is stand there and hold her up) and she could easily break her neck or something when she hits the ground! No wonder she's strict! But nope, lover boy is here to "tame the fire."

In many movies the "overly strict businesswoman" is potrayed as friendless and incapable of joy, and also is framed as a bitch for wanting to do her job properly and being frustrated at the male lead getting in the way of that. Then, she learns through him not to be so prissy and "high maintenance" ("traits" that would have a male character be called hardworking and no nonsens), she quits her job, they get together, happy ending. Boom! The fire is "tamed."

Captain Marvel, however? There is no love interest. There is no one whose role is to ensure Carol is "taken down a notch" or to "teach" her to not be so """bitchy""" (aka self-confident and firm even when opposed by a man) Hell, the guy who kept telling her to control her emotions got explode-ified.

No wonder so many people (mainly men) lost their minds. This was a real taste of a "strong woman".not tied to or watered down by a man. The actual quality of the movie almost felt irrelevant, as all anyone could focus on was how "woke" and "overly political" it was. (Ignore the Iron Man movie where Tony made weapons for the military and was also kidnapped by middle eastern terrorists)

Others have pointed out that the problem isn't that there was a strong female character. It's just that the writing was bad. But when some people are whining about how an "insufferable bitch" Carol was, and how "feminism destroyed movies", I know they don't actually give a damn about the writing. They just wanted to see either a male hero, or a strong female character get torn down and put in her place by a male character.

Or maybe I'm talking nonsense, who knows.

[charls-lamen]

Ok now that its 2025 and the alt right trying to get into every space possible to spread hateful rhetoric I feel like we gotta really start considering the impact of discourse that gets brought up. Especially in regards to minority.

Is there a poc character you think is poorly written and they annoy you? Talk about ways they can be improved but don't just shit on them you are giving racists a chance to co -opt that language to shit on them to be against poc representation while not being accused of anything.

Do you want more female representation in fandom ? Talk about your fav ships with women start those weeks on Ao3 where people write for certain ships and make more of those for m/f and f/f ships.

Don't correlate liking m/m ships to be about internalized mysogny and centering men. Don't correlate making a f/f side ship in a fic to being about caring about m/m ships more. You are creating a situation where the only way to ship discourse free is to ship a straight ship. This kind of argument will definitely be used against LGBT media. Don't get me wrong. Suggesting that being a fan of gay things and enjoying them is anti women somehow has always been homophobic.

And the tendency to double down on hating poc has always been racist.

But with the rise of faccism just across the world and the real threat of massive censorship looming in the States i feel we really can't afford this level of bigotry. These arguments that seem minor will have their language co-opted and used as a progressive way to censor stop indulging those arguments.

If you want more of a certain kind of content encourage it create it. Don't shit on content for being popular, don't discourage people for making it.

Shame doesn't inspire passion. And fan works are free art you need that passion for content.

[burnt-tortellini]

mini rant/controversial marauders takes

“the marauders fandom is mysoginistic-“ it is a RARITY for a marauders fan to not either be a cis teenage girl or a teenage transmasc, both of which have experience being women. either all of you have internalised mysoginy/developed mysogny during your transition OR the media is just male centric

male centric/a fandom for a media that has predominantly male characters ≠ mysoginistic please stop watering down words

the characters we know the most about are sirius, remus and peter because we see them on screen. the second most is james because we see him in a flashback and third most is lily because we hear about her through her relationship w other characters. of COURSE people are gonna focus on sirius/remus/peter/james

regulus is focused on becasue his character (raised death eater who directly revolts) is interesting, the fandom is entirely self motivated if you want to see more lily make more lily.

jegulus isnt a thing because youre ignoring lily its a thing because you lot love gay men

wolfstars personalities got switched for 0 reason, remus isnt some bad boy he was actually terrified of people discovering hes a werewolf esp authority figures

the “remus sells drugs to buy his rich friends presents :(” trope is weird! as someone who was a part of the british lowerclass its really weird!

the marauders were canonically popular arseholes who bullied people

every single marauders character has become an OC/projection atp. tell me three canonical things about peter… ill wait…

ok thats all, have a good day, be respectful in the replies please xx

[kanamori-kamper-moved]

23, 18, 16, 1, 7 for the askgame :-)

23. Ship I’ve unwillingly come across?

Probably skyshipping or the fact that there are like 10 yusho x Yuya (which is literally FATHER AND SON INCEST??) fics on ao3. Life is pain.

18. A ship this fandom has been sleeping on

DEFINITELY Kazuma x Vetrix from Zexal. They literally have chemistry and like a good half of the WDC arc is dedicated to Vetrix planning his revenge on Faker because he believed he killed his boyfriend. Vetrix was in LOVE with that man I tell you. There are multiple times where Vetrix says how Kazuma was the most intelligent and crafty man he knew, and even if he was evil, his plans were started with good intentions. YUGIOH OLD MAN YAOI IS REALLLLLLL

The character everyone gets wrong

it’s either Syrus or Yusho for me. It feels like the GX and Arc-V fandom has a hateboner dor both of them when both of them have done almost no wrong. Syrus is literally just a Self conscious teenager who’s worried he won’t amount to anything and while Yusho is kinda stinky poopoo for leaving his family, by the time he was reintroduced to the story it was at the time where the shows writing was imploding on itself so technically it’s not his fault. HES JUST A DAD WHOS TRYING TO BE JOYOUS

16. I can’t understand why people like this thing

I don’t See the appeal of main girl x main guy yugioh ships. I was a big fan of peachshipping when I was a child but now I’m just kind of annoyed with it.

Yugiohs writing has an issue with mysogny and general sexism, to the point where the woman don’t do anything unless it’s for the sake of a man. Hell, it’s even worse in Zexal. Half of Yumas female friends are just apart of his harem and have no personality than “I like Yuma” and contribute nothing else to the plot. It’s really sad because their designs are VERY cute yet they do nothing with it.

The worst example of this is the fact that people legitimately ship Kaito x Droite/Dextra when it’s origin comes from sexism. Dextra was randomly made to have a crush on Kaito just so Vetrix could beat her ass in a duel like five minutes later, then her crush was forgotten entirely after this.

In conclusion, straight ships in yugioh are not that good!!!

7. What character did you begin to hate not because of canon but because of how the fandom acts about them?

No character, but I have mild annoyance when I watch Vrains because the way people treat Aoi Zaizen is absolutely disgusting, stop acting like she’s a damsel in distress and that Yusaku has to save her like HOLY SHIT. Also Yusaku is canonically gay so nice job calling yourself out on your bigotry!

That’s it, I think

[cartoon-yuri]

I relate, a little, with both points. It’s a very sad situation, in my opinion, that the wlw fandom is in this actual stage where not only it suffers from mysogny, it also suffers from purity culture and TERF ideology.

I can hardly find a fic nowadays where the characters don't seem to be saying things that I would easily find in psychological books/sites/videos when they shouldn’t even know how to react. There's so much OOC and so little interesting dynamics or plotlines, that I am losing interest to read fanfictions (which is sad as fuck, ‘cause I barely read wlw on a normal basis, seeing that it rarely has the type of stories I crave for).

I don’t feel like I belong there, on the wlw fandom. I have tried to make a place for me in some serves in my language, but it simply didn’t happened. People are always so far from reach, never really interested in talking about things or trying to form bonds.

I used to see people on twitter complaining about everything while using a wlw icon, I saw people whining about having a lack of fics to read while also doing nothing to support writers or to go around barrier language. I see people mixing morality with fiction, arguing that you can’t write in any way that isn’t like what they want and putting restraints on writers. I see event weeks with such boring prompts that I feel no spark of being creative. I see a fandom dying, and no one doing anything to make it stop.

Even so... I don't know how to stop. I just... can't. If there is no place for me, in fandom, then I just got to make one — I'm used to not having too many friends, feedback or fan content to work with. If I want a fanfic or a meta about a character or/and a ship, I know in the end I will be doing it myself; be it in a DM with the few friends I still have or here on tumblr, in one of my many accounts when I have the courage to do so.

I kinda diverted the topic — at least I think so —, but yeah. It feels like the wlw fandom has no space for people who... actually want to be there and have a community. For people who want to talk about GL content, be it about series, mangas, animes, games or books/light novels. For the ones who want to share their experiences, who want to discuss the history, the queerness of the relationships between the characters that aren't just friends and also aren't dating. For those that want to write about the darkest plot ever and then, on the next day, post the most sugary thing because they crave both the violence and the comfort.

I don't know... It just now hit me that maybe fandom is cutting all the human messy feelings out of us because it's wrong and bad.

I'm really sad. Let me tell you why I'm sad

So this whole debate is going on over on twt about wlw content and I see a lot of people giving their experiences with the wlw fandom and it's really disheartening. And from what I see the problem is not that the rest of the queer fandom is overwhelmingly mysoginistic or lesbophobic, it's that the wlw fandom is unbearable

No, really, there are so many people talking about how they've tried joining the wlw fandom but it was too toxic or they were afraid of doing it in the first place because they've seen people who had to deal with them. And the people saying this are not only gay men and transmascs, they are overwhelmingly other queer women

And I understand this, hell, I am one of those ppl afraid of the wlw fandom. That's because every time I've witnessed it they were harassing and dogpilling people for the most minor of things. I can still remember one particular occasion when the author of Percy Jackson tweeted that he sees Artemis as ace and qrts were full of people borderline threatening him and being aphobic until he backed down on it

And this is not the only time. I've seen people getting threats for headcanoning a character as bi or pan, shipped a character with a man or headcanoned a character as ace/aro. I still remember how it was in the SU fandom with Peridot

I wish it wasn't like this. I know for a fact there are nice and civil wlw fans, but a large number of people, myself included, can barely fucking find them behind all the assholes

The explanation, which I gathered from queer women active in the fandom or who used to be part of it, is that the wlw fandom is INFESTED with radfems top to bottom. Which created a hostile environment for EVERYONE including some queer women, especially bi women. All of it leading to a space dominated by radfem ideas, exclusionism and antis. And also to a very stifling creating environment, as many queer women with experience in the fandom I've seen talking about it have said that anything straying from wholesome is heavily policed

And I find it horrible, because so many queer women felt the need to distance themselves from a fandom that is FOR them, because of how toxic it is, depriving themselves of what should have been a wonderful fandom experience alongside other people that can understand and relate to them on that level. I hate it how radfems have infested every corner of the community, warping it and creating conflict. To a point where many of us get red flags when seeing someone with a lesbian pfp because of past experience. It should not be like this. I don't like doing it this, doubting my own family, but I feel like I have to, for my peace of mind at least. And yes, I mean family, because as hard as lesbian separatists tried to drive us away from each other, to make lesbians as insular as possible, to paint transmascs and bi women as traitors to womanhood, lesbians are still my family, just like any other queer out there, and it breaks my heart seeing them becoming the boogie man of online queer spaces and a shield for TERFs

Idk where I am going with this anymore it's just that. . . I'm sad, I wish it wasn't like this

[bonnieschmonnieee-blog]

@ People who make alternate universes where a mlm or wlw relationship is altered so that one of the two is the opposite gender, you come off as extremely homophobic, sexist, and transphobic, if you act like being the opposite gender-most commonly a woman- is traditionally more soft, dependent, and caring then their male counterpart.

Please please pleaaaase stop doing this, it's super transparent that you're projecting outdated and offensive views into your work, whether or not it's intentional doesn't matter.

This isn't meant to be an attack, just an observation based on how fandoms tend to label the pairs in a relationship "the man" and "the woman", and the problems that kind of stereotyping arises.

You can either take this as a place to grow, given this information, or a post to be a clown on, so it's your choice.

[strawberry38]

Attention! Mysogny alret!!

I really don't like Fandom's bratty and spoiled segment of the fandom.

(Rant: This painfully oblivious people don't understand how much and how many struggles it took from some effing decent real feminists to adress issues on gender inequality and make themselves seen, heard, represented, respected, unabused. Only for obnoxious fan brats enter the internet and start to give a hard time for the writings of the female characters. You know you need a long time to sit in the corner and think what your doing until then please do us a favor to stfu)

[mogai-sunflowers]

Maybe im too meh about alot of things and this is kind of a vent

but i honestly hate that nowadays (mostly white) people wont reblog an important post about privilage in society or a post with links about a crisis cause the op dosent 100% align with someone elses opinions despite the fact that post has nothing to do with it. Like awhile back i saw a black person's post spreading around a bunch of super important links regarding the buffalo shooting and how to help the families just to see some white mogai individual refuse to mess with the post and yell at their other (white and poc) muturals for reblogging it cause op didnt specfically support emojipronouns. Like i understand that that makes them nbphobic and emoji pronouns are important but there is a bigger issue here that is very important. They refuse to support people unless they can slide themselves into their perfect image of a perfect progressive person which is why it takes so long for news to meet this community.

Im not saying you should never vet your sources and you should give notes to bigots but when it comes down to huge issues like racism, mysogny and communally-external lgbtphobia, wether or not that one person likes mspec lesbians, endogenic systems or neopronouns dosent really matter. Its about information reaching as many people as possible, the rest is infighting smaller issues that are very niche and dont matter in comparison. Im a poc, i use neopronouns, im an mspec lesbian and im a collective but im not gonna pretend someone whose only exclusionary view is not liking pnc gays/lesbians to a raging racist. Our community needs a bit of reality check concerning what is big issues and what is small issues and the mogai/liom communities are an echo chamber wether we like it or not. Internet discourse and national law are 2 very different problems and i see alot of abled white people conflating the 2 because they get all their news and live their lives on tumblr. I know because i used to do that, once tumblr wasnt my main app anymore, i learned alot more about the world around me.

I'm not saying you or anyone else is over-reacting btw, im just tired of seeing people comparing xenogenderphobes locking people out of nonbinary servers to anti-immigration laws and Trump's walls. There significantly more damage from one than the other and the comparison is always done by someone who only faces the lesser issue.

Ill just sign myself off as 🌿

i completely agree. i've seen this before too and it pisses me the fuck off, like I saw a Black person talking about fandom racism and how to support Black people in fandoms, and people were like "but they dont support bi lesbians" and it's like??? okay yeah that sucks but that's not relevant to the actual issue here and it's very disrespectful to ignore someone's input on their own oppression just because they have one opinion you don't like. like, just the other week, a bunch of white queer people started attacking a Native Two-Spirit trans guy who was talking about what's currently going on regarding the ICWA, and this person was reblogging the post saying not to listen to him because he asked not to be called queer because he thought it was a slur and im like. get out of your fucking ASS jesus fucking CHRIST. and im not like, saying that to try and distance myself from whiteness, i've caught myself having that kind of chronically online mindset before and had to evaluate myself. just agreeing with you anon, it's massively stupid the way people, especially in the mogai community, prioritize interneet discourse over things like structural racism and queerphobia. it's bullshit.

[hakuna-machete]

This is what happened to the original Teen Titans cartoon. It was massively popular with girls and instead of marketing and selling to girls they just canceled the show

[thehollowwriter]

It sure is interesting watching the Arcane fandom celebrating Maddie's death and hating her when I know for a fact that if she was a guy everyone be like "our beloved master manipulator" "rip king" "he prioritised work over his love life and died terribly isn't that relatable" "I wish he had more screentime" and making edits and shipping him with a male Caitlin

[willowways]

I know we all love Sofia x Katya posting (I do too they’re great) but we need to address the sexism in the film

Katya is treated like a typical feme fetal when her behavior is a clear result of her being ABUSED and that abuse is sexualized more often than not

Also (and I know this is more of a fandom thing but still) NO OTHER WOMAN BESIDES KATYA IS TALKEDABOUT

Elaine nope

Luciana nada

Sofia … god help the sole who Stan’s Sofia

Hell when Katya is talked about it’s either people misinterpreting her and goncharovs relationship or complaining that she “gets in the way of goncharov and Andrey” like she doesn’t HAVE HER OWN FUCKING CHARACTER ARC AND TRAGEDY

The mysogny in this fandom is unbearable at times

[thesharondefenseleague]

why is Sharon so hated?

like i get ship wars are a thing and i get mysogny is a thing but like i feel like it especially bad for her compared to others

my only guess is lack of content and poor characterization if u a mcu only fan and that in combination with ship wars and mysogny created this situation but it just feels like i missing something else

It’s always been shipping. Steve is one of the most widely paired characters in the fandom, but she has the most canon validation, so others need to take her down so their ships are less “threatened” by her existence in the MCU.

~Mod R

[aiuragf]

yall saying the saiki k fandom is getting toxic as if the fandom is already pretty shitty already *cough* internalized mysogny aka hating on the girl character like teruhashi, ignoring the wlw representasion *cough*

[charlesleclerrc]

i love gaby and 100% agree that the hate around her is ridiculous and comes from mysogny and racism, but acting like emily doesn't get hate from this fandom is just not realistic

[taciturnrebel]

If you hate female muses and women in general. We can't be friends or mutuals, simple as. I shouldn't be surprised tbh to see mysogny in this fandom where there are so many strong female characters. 🙄🙄🙄

[h8theam]

I don't want to respond to the original post because I don't want to be unnecessarily mean but listen, I know shipping is fun and guessing what the narrative will do is fun and all, bones is not the thing holding bkdk back.

I saw this post implying that bones was obsessed with 'heteronormativity' and boy will they regret it when they catch up to the Manga like? Have you looked at Horikoshi? The 'romantic subtext' you see is built on mysogny, this happens over and over again. The narrative refuses to write well developed, compelling relationships with women because it doesn't respect them so the Fandom turns to the relationship that is getting developed which is between men. In the end, the underdeveloped m/f relationship will win because that's what the narrative believes women are for.