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You keep using that term, "fannish entitlement." I do not think it means what you think it means.
Cheryl Lynn wrote:
What do women want from comics? The answer isn't important. Here's all you need to know: No reader wants to be made to feel that he or she is inherently less than a member of another group when he or she picks up a book to enjoy.
And that, to me, in a nutshell, is the difference between "fannish entitlement" (which us uppity feminist comic book fans keep getting accused of) and real, actual issues that are worth fighting for.
Unless you are the type of delusional fan who regularly gets mocked on the internet for crying about shipping oppression, it does not make you feel like less of a human being when you open up your favorite comic book to find that your OTP has been broken up by this month's new writer. It does not make you feel like a second-class citizen if your favorite superhero gets a fugly costume makeover. It is not an affront to your human dignity if your favorite character only gets two lines of dialogue in the span of twenty pages, and both lines happen to be monosyllabic utterances.
Are these things annoying? Sure. Should you be blogging about them? Yes, if you make it a habit to regularly blog about what you like and dislike. Which is why a lot of us are here doing this, duh. Should you, however, be organizing a letter campaign, setting up an online petition, and instigating a boycott against Marvel until they cave to your demands that Wolverine revert his costume to the classy black-and-orange design from the 80's? No. Because going that far would be "fannish entitlement" in action, and that's. just. stupid.
Now let's contrast:
It does make you feel like less of a human being when you open up your favorite comic book to find that a character of your gender, race, religion, orientation, or disability only exists as the butt of a joke, or as cannon fodder, or as a grotesque, outdated stereotype. It does make you feel like a second-class citizen to see that each and every character of your gender is drawn as a vapid blow-up doll who can only appear in anatomically impossible poses designed to display the only important parts of herself, her tits and ass. It is an affront to your human dignity to hear, over and over again, that it is perfectly all right for you to be reduced to a sex object, to a disgusting stereotype, to a plot device, to a rape magnet... as long as you aren't the target audience for these degredations.
These things are worth caring about. These things are worth blogging about, but also worth organizing about, and worth being activist about. And in these cases, going that far is NOT "fannish entitlement." It's human entitlement. We are all entitled to a world where we are not regularly insulted, objectified, and degraded in our mass entertainment. Sure we aren't there yet, but we're fighting for it, because we deserve it. We ARE entitled to this. Just not fannishly. We are entitled to this as people.
And that's the difference between "fannish entitlement" and, well, not fannish entitlement. Really, it's not that difficult.
In sum: The merits of a particular romantic pairing, or the merits of Wolverine's color scheme of the moment, are debatable. The same can in no way be said for the existence of sexism, racism, or any other -ism in comics. So demanding an end to the Isms is in no way fannish entitlement. Because they shouldn't be there in the first place.
This rant has been brought to you by someone who is sick and tired of hearing that asking for less sexism in comics is merely "demented fannish entitlement."
Edit: Lisa Fortuner says it better, as usual. ;)
Edit again: Lord Dingsi says it better too.
What do women want from comics? The answer isn't important. Here's all you need to know: No reader wants to be made to feel that he or she is inherently less than a member of another group when he or she picks up a book to enjoy.
And that, to me, in a nutshell, is the difference between "fannish entitlement" (which us uppity feminist comic book fans keep getting accused of) and real, actual issues that are worth fighting for.
Unless you are the type of delusional fan who regularly gets mocked on the internet for crying about shipping oppression, it does not make you feel like less of a human being when you open up your favorite comic book to find that your OTP has been broken up by this month's new writer. It does not make you feel like a second-class citizen if your favorite superhero gets a fugly costume makeover. It is not an affront to your human dignity if your favorite character only gets two lines of dialogue in the span of twenty pages, and both lines happen to be monosyllabic utterances.
Are these things annoying? Sure. Should you be blogging about them? Yes, if you make it a habit to regularly blog about what you like and dislike. Which is why a lot of us are here doing this, duh. Should you, however, be organizing a letter campaign, setting up an online petition, and instigating a boycott against Marvel until they cave to your demands that Wolverine revert his costume to the classy black-and-orange design from the 80's? No. Because going that far would be "fannish entitlement" in action, and that's. just. stupid.
Now let's contrast:
It does make you feel like less of a human being when you open up your favorite comic book to find that a character of your gender, race, religion, orientation, or disability only exists as the butt of a joke, or as cannon fodder, or as a grotesque, outdated stereotype. It does make you feel like a second-class citizen to see that each and every character of your gender is drawn as a vapid blow-up doll who can only appear in anatomically impossible poses designed to display the only important parts of herself, her tits and ass. It is an affront to your human dignity to hear, over and over again, that it is perfectly all right for you to be reduced to a sex object, to a disgusting stereotype, to a plot device, to a rape magnet... as long as you aren't the target audience for these degredations.
These things are worth caring about. These things are worth blogging about, but also worth organizing about, and worth being activist about. And in these cases, going that far is NOT "fannish entitlement." It's human entitlement. We are all entitled to a world where we are not regularly insulted, objectified, and degraded in our mass entertainment. Sure we aren't there yet, but we're fighting for it, because we deserve it. We ARE entitled to this. Just not fannishly. We are entitled to this as people.
And that's the difference between "fannish entitlement" and, well, not fannish entitlement. Really, it's not that difficult.
In sum: The merits of a particular romantic pairing, or the merits of Wolverine's color scheme of the moment, are debatable. The same can in no way be said for the existence of sexism, racism, or any other -ism in comics. So demanding an end to the Isms is in no way fannish entitlement. Because they shouldn't be there in the first place.
This rant has been brought to you by someone who is sick and tired of hearing that asking for less sexism in comics is merely "demented fannish entitlement."
Edit: Lisa Fortuner says it better, as usual. ;)
Edit again: Lord Dingsi says it better too.
no subject
I'm so very sick of hearing that accusation as well.