Joe Michael StraczynskiCommander Jeffrey Sinclair on why space exploration is so important.
You know how some people are just completely thrown out of a work when something horribly misogynist comes up? Apparently I’m a little bit like that with misandry now.
La Quaintrelle: ally-wonderland: I sincerely believe that every white hetcis dude…
I sincerely believe that every white hetcis dude ‘feminist’ writer in North America needs to take a long look at Hayao Miyazaki and the films and characters he makes as examples of how to properly be a feminist-identified man writing female characters.
There’s never a question of “Is this going to pass the Bechdel Test” in his films. The stories he creates, the characters he writes, and how they grow and change in their narratives don’t have the Joss Whedon Action Girl or the Strong Independent Woman tropes, they are nuanced, diverse, flawed characters.
I just
Hayao Miyazaki is one of my favourite writers he just does things so well I like Ghibli movies a lot that’s it that’s the post.
The thing about Miyazaki is that he makes movies about people. Sometimes these people aren’t what some people think of when they think of people but Miyazaki portrays their personhood. Always
It’s not “Strong Independent Female Character”, it’s “person”. And that’s it.
I think you’ve missed the point of the original post a little bit.
First off, you’re absolutely right in the fact that Miyazaki makes movies about people who are nuanced and diverse and flawed and that’s fantastic! It really is!
However, the fact that Miyazaki is portraying women as full and diverse characters is something that’s especially important because women are all too often written into the “Strong Independent Woman” trope or other tropes that prevent any actual character development, usually for the sake of other white, heterosexual, cisgender characters in the medium.
Not to mention that Miyazaki is portraying WOC’s as full and diverse characters which is something that is incredibly important, and also something that I’m not equipped to comment more on, because I’m white.
So yes, Miyazaki does write movies about people, but the people that he writes about are not usually portrayed like people ,i.e. diverse and nuanced, in media in general and instead are reduced to tropes to stunt character development and reinforce the idea that anyone who isn’t a cisgender, heterosexual, white male is less than a person.
Octoswan: ally-wonderland: I sincerely believe that every white hetcis dude…
I sincerely believe that every white hetcis dude ‘feminist’ writer in North America needs to take a long look at Hayao Miyazaki and the films and characters he makes as examples of how to properly be a feminist-identified man writing female characters.
There’s never a question of “Is this going to pass the Bechdel Test” in his films. The stories he creates, the characters he writes, and how they grow and change in their narratives don’t have the Joss Whedon Action Girl or the Strong Independent Woman tropes, they are nuanced, diverse, flawed characters.
I just
Hayao Miyazaki is one of my favourite writers he just does things so well I like Ghibli movies a lot that’s it that’s the post.
I sincerely believe that every
white hetcis dude ‘feminist’writer in North America needs to take a long look at Hayao Miyazaki and the films and characters he makes as examples of how to properly bea feminist-identified manwritingfemalecharacters.I thought you had some extra words in there, so I fixed it.
You just completely missed the point of my post good job.
Okay so I also think that Miyazaki writes women really well - that is to say, he writes them as people, as nuanced, diverse, flawed people. And that is good and I like Ghibli movies a lot.
but also I like his male characters for being nuanced, diverse, flawed people. in fact I would go so far as to say that I like his characters, period, for being nuanced, diverse, flawed people
and men aren’t the only ones who write women badly
and white hetcis dude ‘feminists’ are not the only people who need to take a long look at how good writers, here including Miyazaki, write characters, particularly but not exclusively female characters.
and I around here am in the business of quietly diverting attention to the idea of not addressing groups of people by characteristics over which they have no control
and also I genuinely think that everyone can learn something from Miyazaki’s writing, and I had thought that the way in which I wrote my post pointed that out while not harming your actual point
which, as I said, I agree with
I like the way Miyazaki writes male characters too; this post was not about them.
I believe that Miyazaki writes nuanced, diverse, flawed characters in general as well; this post was specifically about his female characters.
You took a post that was about female characters, representations of women in media, and made it Not About Them; you made it about Everyone Else, because focussing on women and female characters, having discussions about women and female characters, is something that’s apparently bad?
You can talk about how Miyazaki writes nuanced, diverse, flawed characters all you want; you can even talk specifically about how Miyazaki writes nuanced, diverse, flawed male characters. That’s totally fine. But it’s kind of a jerk move to take a conversation that was about women and female characters specifically and say “We need to talk about everyone!”
Like this is a thing that happens so much.
And this is not to deny the need for intersectionally in characters and in discussions about characters and the need for reflection about intersectionality and positioning when people (in general) discuss media.
What makes me angry is when people take “we need to talk about everyone” to mean we can’t specifically talk about women—or queer people, or people of colour, or disabled people—we have to make sure we include the DUDES too.
THAT happens so much. Like I get it, I like talking about male characters too, but there’s a difference, a gendered difference, between looking at how culture (patriarchal heterocentric culture) privileges male characters and saying “hey I think we need to include everyone” and taking a discussion about female characters and saying “hey we need to stop being specific and talk about everyone.”
Have your broad discussions of the ways in which people write characters; good! Do that!! But there also needs to be allowance for people to be specific when it comes to characters who are marginalized.
I also genuinely think that everyone can learn something from Miyazaki’s writing and his philosophies of storytelling; I was referring to, as an example, people like Joss Whedon, who are lauded for being feminist writers but still have broad strokes of problems in their work (Whedon likes to punish women for having sex, likes mystical pregnancy plots, is horrible when it comes to writing people of colour, to name a few things) and the ways in which mainstream (and even not mainstream) Western media and writers interpret how to write nuanced, diverse, flawed female characters to mean certain things that typically fall under the Strong Independent Woman trope.
And while yes, I absolutely do agree with you that men are not the only people who write women badly, men are given access to write stories much more than women are because places like Hollywood are still Boys Clubs.
So when I make a text post on Tumblr about the specific ways in which I enjoy Hayao Miyazaki’s works and his female characters, the ways in which I think his philosophy of storytelling and creating female characters are superior to the ways in which female characters are written in the West, that’s what I’m talking about.
I didn’t want to make it about Everyone Else. I just wanted to talk about elements of discourse that I find both problematic and unnecessary, on my personal tumblr, and I honestly forgot that when you comment on a post sometimes the OP notices.
YOU NIQQAS WANNA LEARN ELVISH?! HERE YA GO!
this makes me think about the post about the two girls who didn’t want to get caught sendes notes in class so they learned elvish
When Tolkien himself wrote English in tengwar (on the LotR title pages), he did it the other way, with the vowel above the following consonant instead of the preceding one (don’t know if that necessarily makes it more valid; just throwing it out there).
In Sindarin Standard Mode, the vowels are placed on the following consonant, which is possible because Sindarin ends most words with a consonant. In Quenya Standard Mode, the vowels are placed on the preceding consonant, because Quenya ends many words with a vowel.
Lady Captain America and Lady Thor
Art by Yasmine Putri
One of the few female versions I’ve seen that portray the strength of the characters instead of being a vehicle to show Cap with a midriff or Thor with tremendous cleavage.
Hell yes.
I am very confident that both of these ladies could save the world and I would like to read all about it. Go ahead Marvel, better get a move on.
(via thatlowvice)
Octoswan: ally-wonderland: I sincerely believe that every white hetcis dude...
I sincerely believe that every white hetcis dude ‘feminist’ writer in North America needs to take a long look at Hayao Miyazaki and the films and characters he makes as examples of how to properly be a feminist-identified man writing female characters.
There’s never a question of “Is this going to pass the Bechdel Test” in his films. The stories he creates, the characters he writes, and how they grow and change in their narratives don’t have the Joss Whedon Action Girl or the Strong Independent Woman tropes, they are nuanced, diverse, flawed characters.
I just
Hayao Miyazaki is one of my favourite writers he just does things so well I like Ghibli movies a lot that’s it that’s the post.
I sincerely believe that every
white hetcis dude ‘feminist’writer in North America needs to take a long look at Hayao Miyazaki and the films and characters he makes as examples of how to properly bea feminist-identified manwritingfemalecharacters.I thought you had some extra words in there, so I fixed it.
You just completely missed the point of my post good job.
Okay so I also think that Miyazaki writes women really well - that is to say, he writes them as people, as nuanced, diverse, flawed people. And that is good and I like Ghibli movies a lot.
but also I like his male characters for being nuanced, diverse, flawed people. in fact I would go so far as to say that I like his characters, period, for being nuanced, diverse, flawed people
and men aren’t the only ones who write women badly
and white hetcis dude ‘feminists’ are not the only people who need to take a long look at how good writers, here including Miyazaki, write characters, particularly but not exclusively female characters.
and I around here am in the business of quietly diverting attention to the idea of not addressing groups of people by characteristics over which they have no control
and also I genuinely think that everyone can learn something from Miyazaki’s writing, and I had thought that the way in which I wrote my post pointed that out while not harming your actual point
which, as I said, I agree with
Fun fact time: many of my old acquaintances still make joking comments whenever they see me wearing pink, because as a child (and honestly pretty much right up to high school) I would refuse to associate with any pink objects.
It wasn’t because I didn’t like pink, it was because since I appeared female I was supposed to/ it was immediately assumed that I did and therefore it pissed me the ever-loving fuck off. I was ashamed to like it, which is terrible because pink is an awesome color. But when you shove it down young girls throats it gets really old, really fast.
Give the child the fucking rainbow, and if they pick pink, it’s not because they are female and/or effeminate, it’s because they like the color pink.
THIS.
Gosh this
(Source: feminishblog, via nudistfeline)
** CAUTION **
Please tell every dog or cat owner you know. Even if you don’t have a pet, please pass this to those who do.
Over the weekend, the doting owner of two young lab mixes purchased Cocoa Mulch from Target to use in their garden. The dogs loved the way it smelled and it was advertised to keep cats away from their garden. Their dog (Calypso) decided the mulch smelled good enough to eat and devoured a large helping. She vomited a few times which was typical when she eats something new but wasn’t acting lethargic in any way. The next day, Mom woke up and took Calypso out for her morning walk. Halfway through the walk, she had a seizure and died instantly.
Although the mulch had NO warnings printed on the label, upon further investigation on the company’s web site,
This product is HIGHLY toxic to dogs and cats.
Cocoa Mulch is manufactured by Hershey’s, and they claim that “It is true that studies have shown that 50% of the dogs that eat Cocoa Mulch can suffer physical harm to a variety of degrees (depending on each individual dog). However, 98% of all dogs won’t eat it.”
*Snopes site gives the following information:http://www.snopes.com/critters/crusader/cocoamulch.asp.asp>
Cocoa Mulch, which is sold by Home Depot, Foreman’s Garden Supply and other garden supply stores contains a lethal ingredient called ‘Theobromine’. It is lethal to dogs and cats. It smells like chocolate and it really attracts dogs. They will ingest this stuff and die. Several deaths already occurred in the last 2-3 weeks.
Theobromine is in all chocolate, especially dark or baker’s chocolate which is toxic to dogs. Cocoa bean shells contain potentially toxic quantities of theobromine, a xanthine compound similar in effects to caffeine and theophylline. A dog that ingested a lethal quantity of garden mulch made from cacao bean shells developed severe convulsions and died 17 hours later. Analysis of the stomach contents and the ingested cacao bean shells revealed the presence of lethal amounts of theobromine.
**PLEASE PASS THIS ON**
so uh… the science in this is phrased really terribly but yeah, cocoa shell mulch is poisonous to dogs and cats for the exact same reason that chocolate is. fyi.
(via nudistfeline)
