Why do males complain about female-led stories or too many female characters when the majority are still dominated by males?
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Yes, but not like that
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First, you’re generalizing males. It comes off as you asking this question rhetorically and in bad faith.
Second, you do realize that movies are for entertainment purposes, right? How many non-activists do you know who watch movies with the mindset of caring which gender is dominating in lead roles or whatever?
I’m a male and I prefer to keep politics out of my escapism, thank you very much.
I could say there are plenty of movies I enjoy that have female lead roles. I could say that there are also movies with female lead roles that I didn’t enjoy. But in the end, would you even care? It’s clear with your post that you’re not really asking anything and just wanted to make a political rant.
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The avatar bit is kinda funny because, if anything, between Ang and Korra, I (male) find Korra more relatable. Their ages had a bigger impact on that than their genders.
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I'm a woman, and what bothers me is when the woman is not believable in that role. Men are generally stronger than women -- that's just a fact. But some women are exceptionally strong and trained in combat. If you're going to cast someone in a role that's supposed to show us a strong woman, then for fuck's sake, she'd better be a strong woman, not a gorgeous woman who just looks great in a tank top and a sheen of sweat. It's obvious she would be easily overpowered by any of her male opponents, but we're supposed to believe that she's kicking all their asses.
Someone else suggested Alien would be accused of wokeness had it been released today. I don't think so. Ripley was just a regular, somewhat fit woman, and the things she did were believable for someone with her physique and level of training. That's why that movie works.
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It is damn tin-eared to affix "she" to a female superhero's name. Or "black" to a black superhero's name.
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You should probably delve that particular line of thought more deeply, tbh.
I know you meant this flippantly but I came out as nonbinary last year; having (especially white) men act like entitled toddlers online was a helpful push into embracing more femininity.
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I'm man and one of my favorite type of stories are historical stories with women who defy the gender roles of their time.
Also in general historical stories from perspective of someone else than white guys.
I find them empowering even though they are not about my empowerment.
Also I just find the stories more interesting than watching just another historical war movie with almost all men except main characters wife at home or smth.Although there is this "girlboss" archetype I see in movies I really hate. Kind of one that feels like a committee wrote feminist character because it sells.
Well we are likely to see less of those with all the anti DEI stuff, so I guess monkey paw wish came true. -
I don't know. I'm a guy and I really enjoy the horizon games including the dialogue and character development. I don't think the interactions and dialogue would work if Aloy were a dude.
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I believe the answer can be broken into three parts:
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valid criticism, when a movie is genuinely bad and has a female lead, the valid criticisms of the film are overdhadowed by slop online articles criticizing fans for not supporting women and hating a female lead. Captain Marvel is a good example of this. The movie has genuine issues, and is not considered a good Marvel movie, but the overall online discussion focused around Marvel fans not supporting a female lead superhero movie, when Wonder Woman found success and Captain America: The Winter Soldier is arguably colead by Scarlett Johanson.
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Pre box office reactions. Any movie which can be summed up as “X but with women” lands here. Same with any movie which intentionally admonishes the male audience and advertises itself as for women and only, then get mad men didn’t see the movie. Charlie’s Angels, Ghostbusters, and Captain Marvel fall into this category.
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Genuine oddities and sexism. I believe this applies to the gaming industry more than the film indistry, but it can blead over. I believe the initial outrage over _The Marvels _ was this, but the movie ended up having major issues and went to category 1.
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I’m not sure the interpretation has to be that “female themes” are “lesser”. People will generally and naturally relate more to themes that strongly correlate with personal, lived experience. It is not strange that a man would relate less to motherhood as a theme. Similarly, a woman might naturally relate less to fiction on father-son relationships. A city dweller might relate less to stories about life in the countryside. And so on. It is useful and instructive to get out of one’s own skin and mind now and then. It helps build empathy and works or fiction can be very helpful in that regard. But that does not change the fact that themes hit much harder when you can relate from personal experience.
As a man, strongly female themes and lead female characters are a-ok and can be touching even, but some male themes hit me much harder because I know what that feels like in my own skin so to say.
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My favourite kind of movie is when they take a classic movie and recycle it by making a much worse version of it, but with female characters.
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I agree with you, I think that issue can be handled if they make her a great martial arts fighter.
But she can’t just magically know it, there has to be a reason why she knows how to fight, but that applies to men too.
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Can’t help but feel like you’re mansplaining how women are underrepresented and that your favorite female led shows and movies should be more appreciated and men are cancers.
It really is very simple. Well written shows and movies do well. Good actors/actresses make a well written movie better. It doesn’t matter if it’s men and women. I’m no expert but the majority of female led movies are poorly written and the actresses act bad but that may be because of the writing. That also doesn’t mean there aren’t good female movies that do well.
Where much of this marketing goes wrong is the studios try to take something that’s male led and change it to be female led. That will obviously not go well for an audience that preferred the male led material.
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I’m male, I’ve never complained about this. I think it’s not good to generalize everyone
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the majority of female led movies are poorly written and the actresses act bad
You were doing so well
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I'm a woman. Yeah it's bothered me my whole life. I used to be really angry about it. Now I just accept it as the status quo. In the last few paragraphs of your post you are basically describing the Smurfette Principle, Two Girls to a Team,and other tropes. Also the Bechdel test.
I heartily recommend Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Season 1 is rough, but it's got good gender equality.
Nowadays though, you get a lot more racial diversity on western TV than you used to. I think that's something which has improved quite a lot.
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I get you and sure some themes hit harder than others. I myself no kids etc thought pet sematary was an ok book and I have read many comments saying it hits harder being a parent/father.
But there is a difference between: will we get the male perspective and I am not interested in the plot of a female one. Therefore devaluing it.
In a radio show introducing an entertainment to your audience, giving a platform to an author and then being dismissive feels so stupid.
I am especially enjoyed since it was on air in the youth centre. Boys and man constantly use girl and woman and anything related to it as insult. (And obviously gay, which is my personal journey to remind everyone that it is not an insult.) Just selecting a female team in FIFA was nearly too much to ask.
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Yeah well I wasn’t there, so just going by your post and pitched in to say that it’s a valid question in general: how is this book relevant for me? If asked in good faith, the author I suppose can see it as an opportunity to explain for example why that woman’s story can be interesting to a male audience. Maybe even school the interviewer if so inclined.
I just feel like we should sometimes check our feminist impulses and recognize that some questions are valid, even when we may suspect that they come from a bad place.
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Yeah, fair point. I've got to watch Dollhouse and Firefly eventually.
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Charlize, not Anya.
And I read a lot of complaints about a woman leading a movie called Mad Max.
