"Men With Boobs"

[serria]

I was reading a fantasy trilogy, and was reminded about how much the genre apparently struggles with women. The first book was an impulsive purchase at the bookstore, because I liked the cover artthought the description looked interesting. And I enjoyed it, more or less - not the greatest thing I've read, but relatively entertaining. The story was about a who boy gets trained as an assassin, and his adventures thereafter. Two other characters include his somewhat dry female love interest (kind of in the ballpark of stereotypical damsel in distress, not particularly captivating character to me) and another female character who is also an assassin. This character, though has a bit of a femme fatale entrance and follows kind of an "evil badass woman" trope throughout the second book, was still kind of interesting. I enjoyed a lot of her scenes, at any rate.

Anyway, I finished the second book, and there was an interview included at the end of it. One of the questions was about the whole "strong female character" thing, and the author (who is a man) gives quite a rant. He feels, apparently, that most "strong female characters" in fantasy are really just "men with boobs" but he is very excited about the direction his female assassin character is taking in the third book. He feels his portrayal is, I guess, very true to femininity and rounds out the character, etc.

So what happens in the third book? The female assassin falls in love with the male protagonist and spends the majority of the book crying and being emotional. As, you know, women do. :P

Fantasy and science fiction are my favorite genres, but I wonder if they tend to be more sexist than other genres. For the record, I don't think a female character falling in love with a male protagonist is sexist, nor is a previously cold character suddenly becoming emotional. But juxtaposed with the mindset of the author, that any "fighting female" character who isn't emotional or in love is a "man with boobs" - I think there's a reality here with how many female characters are portrayed.

I brought this up because I am writing a fantasy story which stars a female warrior. She has a female love interest. More than that, the leading male character is the one who has to be saved. I wasn't thinking about social issues or anything when I wrote this, but that's how it turned out. It was an unintentional subversion of gender roles. Of course, I am female myself, but I wonder if my protagonist is a "man with boobs." She is certainly not demure, emotional, or romantic. This accusation, though not (yet) directed at me, bothered me because my protagonist is really not at all defined by her female gender - by fantasy genre cliches, she should just be swapped into a male character. When I started overthinking it, I was even beating myself up over having a lesbian romance - does that (unintentionally) mean that she is taking the "male" role? Does that mean she is a "butch lesbian" (she's not, she's bisexual)? Is my story suddenly about gender roles when I never wanted it to be? What if I make her love interest male, is that better or worse? What if I have no love interest - does that also make a statement about a "masculine" female character?

Blah. I hate the phrase "men with boobs." I also hate the phrase "strong female characters." Like, what do they even mean!

Comments

[inkdust]

I find that so frustrating. Given, I don't read much scifi/fantasy (sort of funny, since most of my ideas fall at least slightly in that realm) but I think one significant reason for that is that the lack of female characters bores and aggravates me.

I love female characters who are "not demure, emotional, or romantic" and have written a couple myself. I do think the robot trap is very real for those, but I think the "man with boobs" is a concept invented by the combination of writers who can't actually write from a female perspective and readers with rigid ideas of how men and women should be.

I say write the character as the woman she is, as real as you can make her. If you're interested in advice, I'd say for the romance you can easily push back against the hetero gender role mapping by making it clear that the love interest isn't the damsel type either. And if she happens to be a more stereotypically feminine girl, just make it clear how awesome she is in ways unrelated to your protagonist. I bet you can create a great story with great female characters.

And I think the phrase "strong female character" is something trying to work for equality but falling into its own trap. We need more "strong character who's female" and "strong character who's male."

[serria]

Strangely, I get the impression that there are more female authors who are successful in the fantasy genre than in science fiction. Maybe I'm only saying that because several of the fantasy authors I grew up on were women. Not that I'm oblivious to the very normal sexism in the genre, or at least, tired old gender roles. And I don't know if this can be blamed entirely on the author, or if it's the cover artist, too. But when a female character is a protagonist (or more likely secondary character) who fights, she is almost always in a very sexual pose. Like, hips jutting to the side, boobs out, incredibly inappropriate clothing... of course, this IS fantasy, so it's not that I think that's inherently bad. But that's most of what we have in this genre.

I think my problem with "man with boobs" is that to me, it implies that a female character is unrealistic because she acts too much like a man. I guess there are two possibilities, both likely: first, that maybe these female warrior characters aren't actually well written, and are really nothing more than a damsel in distress who has a sword and curses more, or second, that some people just can't envision that a woman would be "strong" without being equally emotional, sexual or romantic.

Thanks for the advice. The love interest isn't a damsel type either, though she is a lady (who ends up instigating civil war because she wants to rule as queen). I guess there is a contrast between the two, in terms of the traditional feminine and the... not. I just truly don't want to send a message about anything there, especially not in regards to the more "masculine" protagonist - not a critique on femininity, not a man with boobs, not anything but a person who falls in love with another person. I guess all I can do is keep writing and do my best to make it genuine, and let potential future readers think what they like.

I agree completely with your phrasing, too! Just as we're people before we're men and women in real life, characters are characters before they are male or female in literature.

[splinteredstar]

....just gonna pop in to say that your love interest sounds amazing. That's badass, just in a different way that doesn't involve punching people.

[serria]

Thank you!! Not surprisingly, that was what I was going for. :P Hopefully the contrast between physically powerful and politically powerful doesn't seem too obnoxiously cookie-cutter.