The issue is even the girlbosses aren't that stoic. They are abrasive, needlessly independent, and always all-powerful right from the start. It's an imagination of a man's existence from a woman's perspective.
If you have to make male characters look weak and pathetic then your characters are not strong. Half of the thing is an exercise in resentment and insecurity. People who feel reactive and anxious probably envy and dislike calm, assured, resilient leaders... but film scripts should not be exercises in projection or displacement. To be a writer you need a lot more than envy and resentment and these writers just don't have that. They don't have the life experiences or emotional health or positive self-image to tell stories that people love and it shows. That's how we end up with 'She Hulk' or 'Velma'. You don't have to be a writer to discern likeable characters and inspiring messages... but if you're a bitter or deeply insecure person you probably won't be able to create them.
My husband and I scroll through recent movie offerings on Amazon Prime and Netflix ....strong female.....next ....strong latina female......next.......strong black warrior female.......next.....let's watch a John Wick movie again....
It's confusing on its face because most of the market feels exactly the same. So WHY do they keep producing stories and concepts that people aren't interested in? Some of it was the bad incentives of ESG scores and virtue-signaling, but the bigger issue is that these organizations are packed with people who simply can't abandon their ideological bias. They don't see it as ideological. They see it as decent and feminist and racially tolerant... even though regular people and women and racial minorities aren't interested in their stories. If they really wanted to benefit women and black people they would produce shows and movies that women and black people want to watch. That is their primary function but they don't see it that way. The moral crusade has become a substitute for their proper role, because the moral crusade looks good, and the work they've chosen to do is difficult. It's easier to just churn out cliches and flat narratives. And it makes them feel good.
These organizations won't be able to reform themselves. They'll have to die and be replaced by new entrants, many of whom have already emerged to fill the gaping hole. Cultures need stories and they need heroes. The fact that we're having trouble manifesting them is a very bad sign.
This is why we love old movies....CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT. "Perfect" characters are BORING. "ISMS" are BORING. Politically correct is BORING. We want to watch imperfect, struggling, flawed people work through issues we can relate to and all face, especially under extraordinary circumstances. That is what makes a movie good. OR - lots of revenge killing by a bad assed MAN. 😁
In contemporary pop parlance, a "strong woman," is one who embodies the ancient, cross cultural stereotype of a stoic man. She can kick the crap out of any such man, however, or any number of such men, in a contest of strength, speed, aggression and brutality. I don't think this sends the message Hollywood thinks it's sending.
Yes… it’s a strange elevation of some qualities that are decidedly masculine. I suspect that the desire for gender equality is so deep and deranging in some people that it has essentially flipped values, and some now desire to see women physically and politically dominate men. Such people lack the ethical grounding that has restrained masculine ambitions throughout history though… and their immaturity and psychological longings lead them to be poor writers.
Aside from the cultural imperatives these characters are just boring and silly though. Women are not stronger and more assertive and more aggressive than men… and they probably never will be, regardless of the fantasies of Hollywood writers
I will say what I have noticed is that although some male virtues are mapped onto female leads, some are not. Often times you watch these shows or movies and the female lead is written to strong, tough, smart… but still emotionally volatile. It worries me not only because we’ve had masculinity erased but also we celebrate vice in all people.
It is silly, and I think most people grasp this intuitively (most people on Earth, certainly, but even most people in the West). These kinds of cognitive distortions seem to be mostly bad ideas inculcated in college and allowed to persist in our environment of absurd ease and comfort (historically speaking). Were the power to go out tomorrow feminism, as it's now constituted, would vanish within a week, never to reappear. That alone reveals the fantastical aspect of its worldview.
Certainly. Who does the erosion of criminal penalties for violent and gun crimes benefit? It obviously benefits some criminals but those are NOT the people advocating for them.
People tend to become invested in emotionally salient ideas (in my view). They adopt them to gain acceptance and status and avoid social penalties, but this adoption demands that they actually BELIEVE them, at least on some level.
In both cases I think we see flawed visions of human nature which are very difficult to correct because they're not built upon logic or experience, and everyone who questions them is labelled regressive or a bigot. When even considering alternatives makes believers feel guilty it's very hard to discuss them. It's the same mechanism religions use to enforce conformity, and the beliefs are actually pretty similar in their quality and reasoning. If you can make a certain population believe that any investigation or criticism of the concept of the patriarchy is itself sexist then you have fortified that concept in the minds of that group and social desirability bias and conformism and fear of stigma does the rest. What exactly is the patriarchy? How does it work? What are some feasible alternatives? These are questions that are NEVER explored among feminists because the point of 'patriarchy' as a concept is not to serve as an explanatory model for society or a blueprint for reform. It's to enforce conformity and advertise virtue. Their ideas are doing exactly what they're meant to. Unfortunately they're not meant to promote orderly or productive societies.
The issue is even the girlbosses aren't that stoic. They are abrasive, needlessly independent, and always all-powerful right from the start. It's an imagination of a man's existence from a woman's perspective.
If you have to make male characters look weak and pathetic then your characters are not strong. Half of the thing is an exercise in resentment and insecurity. People who feel reactive and anxious probably envy and dislike calm, assured, resilient leaders... but film scripts should not be exercises in projection or displacement. To be a writer you need a lot more than envy and resentment and these writers just don't have that. They don't have the life experiences or emotional health or positive self-image to tell stories that people love and it shows. That's how we end up with 'She Hulk' or 'Velma'. You don't have to be a writer to discern likeable characters and inspiring messages... but if you're a bitter or deeply insecure person you probably won't be able to create them.
My husband and I scroll through recent movie offerings on Amazon Prime and Netflix ....strong female.....next ....strong latina female......next.......strong black warrior female.......next.....let's watch a John Wick movie again....
It's confusing on its face because most of the market feels exactly the same. So WHY do they keep producing stories and concepts that people aren't interested in? Some of it was the bad incentives of ESG scores and virtue-signaling, but the bigger issue is that these organizations are packed with people who simply can't abandon their ideological bias. They don't see it as ideological. They see it as decent and feminist and racially tolerant... even though regular people and women and racial minorities aren't interested in their stories. If they really wanted to benefit women and black people they would produce shows and movies that women and black people want to watch. That is their primary function but they don't see it that way. The moral crusade has become a substitute for their proper role, because the moral crusade looks good, and the work they've chosen to do is difficult. It's easier to just churn out cliches and flat narratives. And it makes them feel good.
These organizations won't be able to reform themselves. They'll have to die and be replaced by new entrants, many of whom have already emerged to fill the gaping hole. Cultures need stories and they need heroes. The fact that we're having trouble manifesting them is a very bad sign.
This is why we love old movies....CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT. "Perfect" characters are BORING. "ISMS" are BORING. Politically correct is BORING. We want to watch imperfect, struggling, flawed people work through issues we can relate to and all face, especially under extraordinary circumstances. That is what makes a movie good. OR - lots of revenge killing by a bad assed MAN. 😁
In contemporary pop parlance, a "strong woman," is one who embodies the ancient, cross cultural stereotype of a stoic man. She can kick the crap out of any such man, however, or any number of such men, in a contest of strength, speed, aggression and brutality. I don't think this sends the message Hollywood thinks it's sending.
Yes… it’s a strange elevation of some qualities that are decidedly masculine. I suspect that the desire for gender equality is so deep and deranging in some people that it has essentially flipped values, and some now desire to see women physically and politically dominate men. Such people lack the ethical grounding that has restrained masculine ambitions throughout history though… and their immaturity and psychological longings lead them to be poor writers.
Aside from the cultural imperatives these characters are just boring and silly though. Women are not stronger and more assertive and more aggressive than men… and they probably never will be, regardless of the fantasies of Hollywood writers
I will say what I have noticed is that although some male virtues are mapped onto female leads, some are not. Often times you watch these shows or movies and the female lead is written to strong, tough, smart… but still emotionally volatile. It worries me not only because we’ve had masculinity erased but also we celebrate vice in all people.
Male the virtues great again.....
They did Napoleon the dirtiest
It is silly, and I think most people grasp this intuitively (most people on Earth, certainly, but even most people in the West). These kinds of cognitive distortions seem to be mostly bad ideas inculcated in college and allowed to persist in our environment of absurd ease and comfort (historically speaking). Were the power to go out tomorrow feminism, as it's now constituted, would vanish within a week, never to reappear. That alone reveals the fantastical aspect of its worldview.
Certainly. Who does the erosion of criminal penalties for violent and gun crimes benefit? It obviously benefits some criminals but those are NOT the people advocating for them.
People tend to become invested in emotionally salient ideas (in my view). They adopt them to gain acceptance and status and avoid social penalties, but this adoption demands that they actually BELIEVE them, at least on some level.
In both cases I think we see flawed visions of human nature which are very difficult to correct because they're not built upon logic or experience, and everyone who questions them is labelled regressive or a bigot. When even considering alternatives makes believers feel guilty it's very hard to discuss them. It's the same mechanism religions use to enforce conformity, and the beliefs are actually pretty similar in their quality and reasoning. If you can make a certain population believe that any investigation or criticism of the concept of the patriarchy is itself sexist then you have fortified that concept in the minds of that group and social desirability bias and conformism and fear of stigma does the rest. What exactly is the patriarchy? How does it work? What are some feasible alternatives? These are questions that are NEVER explored among feminists because the point of 'patriarchy' as a concept is not to serve as an explanatory model for society or a blueprint for reform. It's to enforce conformity and advertise virtue. Their ideas are doing exactly what they're meant to. Unfortunately they're not meant to promote orderly or productive societies.