Oh, Mister.

dontstartlethewitch:

ohmister:

I think my reply got cut off, so here’s the actual thing, lol.

Basically, anyway, cos I have to retype it BUT: Thanks for the info! I remember that now, lol.

tbh I don’t think Moffat will manage “heartbreaking”, though. I don’t think he’s capable of that caliber of writing, really. His stories generally lack in an emotional payoff for me. He’s such a bad writer omg.

(And well, I’ll be celebrating. I signed up to watch “Doctor Who,” not “The Adventures of Steven Moffat’s Pet Characters and Sometimes in a Manner of Speaking the Doctor”. UGH. I’ll be glad to see them go.)

And sorry for my tl;dr and Moffat hate. I’ve spent the last couple of days watching some of RTD’s best and I’m being more than a little bitter about Moffat’s basically ruining the entire freaking show for me »; ALL HAIL NINE.

I can’t say I agree with you - I think Moffat is responsible for some of the best writing on Doctor Who (The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances, The Girl in the Fireplace, Blink, Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead, etc etc). 

As far as Amy and Rory go, my only qualm with them is the way Moffat writes his female characters, and that’s an entirely different story. River Song storyline aside (which I have some serious issues with), I love the fact a married couple is taken on board the TARDIS and their relationship (unlike Mickey and Rose’s, which falls apart at the first appearance of the Doctor) stays remarkably strong. I love that Rory, Rory who seems unremarkable at first, is a much better man than the Doctor. I think they’re extremely strong in their own rights. 

Agree to disagree?

Oh god, no, I just— oh dear. I think we’re going to have to agree to disagree, definitely, because while I enjoyed The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances, “The Girl in the Fireplace” is, imo, the most OOC trash in series 2, “Blink” is incredibly overrated, and “Silence in the Library”/”Forest of the Dead” is the absolute worst of the worst. And I hated every single episode of series 6 with the fire of a thousand suns. I just can’t with Moffat’s shallow characterizations, massive plot-holes, tendency to change characters’ entire personalities just to suit whatever story he wants to tell, blatant and ever-present misogyny, inability to write an original story to save his life, attempts to one-up RTD’s stories, and other general bullshit. I just can’t.

(I realize I’ve just single-handedly made myself THE most unpopular Doctor Who fan ever. Yes, that’s right, ladies and gents, I even hated “The Doctor’s Wife.” COME AT ME.)

I also really, really didn’t think Amy and Rory’s relationship was “strong.” In s5 at least I felt it was strained at best - Amy treats Rory TERRIBLY, like he’s her dog, and Rory is basically a very clever doormat. I have serious issues with Amy’s attitude in general, though. I do like Rory alright, but he has some moments where I really hate him (he can be very possessive of Amy in a way that I don’t like). That said, I would have less of a problem if it weren’t for a) Moffat’s sexism influencing EVERYTHING EVER, and b) the fact that their characterizations are incredibly shallow and basically never change. Rory is the character with the most growth out of the entire cast, and I still don’t see a lot of major change in him between the beginning of s5 and the end of it; I can’t speak for s6 because I haven’t watched it in a while and Moffat basically turned everyone in circles characterization-wise in that (agian, to suit his plots and probably due to backlash wrt Amy and Rory’s relationship).

I also really, really take issue with the fact that Moffat has essentially made Amy and Rory the main characters of the show rather than, you know, the Doctor. It’s a sad day in a show called Doctor Who when instead of RTD’s “Doctor lite” episodes, Moffat gives us “Amy and Rory lite” episodes where we actually get to focus on the Doctor for a few minutes.

Basically I HAVE A LOT OF FEELS and I loathe everything Moffat has ever written. He is a disgusting misogynist and a terrible writer. I don’t really blame people who like his writing? (Though I wonder how they could not see how awful it is!) But yeah. I hate it.

He ruined my favorite show for me to the point where it’s taken me til now to get over s6 enough to even watch the older episodes again and feel something. I’m very bitter. He makes me angry. :\

Well, since I doubt River Song counts — someday I’ll get into all the different reasons I loathe that character, but it won’t be today — I’ll have to pick Amy Pond.

This is a very near thing, and I don’t really feel fair choosing either of the major contestants for this since it’s neither of their fault that their plots and writing sort of sucked. I didn’t like Martha Jones during her tenure because I felt that her crush on the Doctor when he was obviously not interested, and that continued to hang over their relationship. She had some unrealistic expectations of him as a result and I really did not like that. I loved a lot about her, though, and she improved big time in series four, after she’d left the Doctor, so she can’t really be counted as anywhere near the least favorite.

Which brings me to Amy. I actually wouldn’t mind Amy if she were written with more depth, which is why I say it’s not really her fault I don’t like her any more than it’s Martha’s fault that RTD wrote her as having a ridiculous crush that overshadowed pretty much everything else during her season. Steven Moffat sucks at writing deep, believable characters. His characters tend to be shallow as a puddle, and Amy is no exception. She’s not so much a character as a walking plot device, which is always something guaranteed to piss me off.

I like that Amy is a strong character, but I really dislike her abrasiveness. She’s abrasive in a mean way. I mean, Donna Noble was somewhat abrasive, too, but she was mean in a different way, and she grew out of it. Amy doesn’t so much grow out of it as it’s willed away in series 6 because Moffat realized she was getting bad feedback for being horrible to Rory. Whiiich is another of the reasons I really dislike her: She treats Rory terribly, and if we’re to believe the flashback in “Let’s Kill Hitler,” she always has. When he first comes onto the TARDIS in “Vampires of Venice,” she pretty much treats him like the dog, and openly flirts with the Doctor and states a preference for him right in front of Rory. She’s needlessly cruel to him in a way that made me sad and angry for Rory — and I’m saying that as someone who wasn’t overly fond of Rory, either.

And of course, there’s the sexual assault. (I can hear some fans going, “What sexual assault!?”) Remember when Amy tries to kiss the Doctor and get him to have sex with her, and he jumps over the bed and tries everything to get her to stop, but she won’t? Yeah, that’s actually sexual assault and it squicked me the fuck out. That Amy didn’t back off the FIRST time the Doctor indicated that he was not interested, and not only kept trying but got up and crossed the room after him to push him up against the TARDIS and try to get him to kiss her was just.. disgusting, honestly. (And here, again, I feel this is not entirely her fault. Moffat strikes me as the type of bass-ackward jerk who thinks men can’t possibly be sexually assaulted or raped.)

That’s really just the tip of the iceberg. And it is such a pity, because I don’t even come out not liking Amy — she’s my least favorite companion, but I don’t hate or even really sincerely dislike her. I feel like her character had enormous potential — potential which Moffat as a writer was simply not skilled enough to develop.

I actually love roleplaying with my girlfriend, who often plays Amy opposite my Eleven. I think she can be a great, deep and complex character in the right hands. Moffat’s are not the right hands.

I know Amy got shafted terribly in the series. Moffat used her to shove buckets of sexism into the show (especially with his incredibly squicky “you’re pregnant and you don’t know it, now become conscious just in time to give birth!” plotline, oh my god, I had nightmares) and basically fucked with her personality at will to suit whatever story he wanted to write at the time (just like he does everyone on his show). I feel like if she had been written better, she could have been a great, flawed, interesting, growing character who really would have interested me. But under Steven Moffat, it’s just not gonna happen.

So I guess basically what I wrote this novel to say is that I don’t dislike companions, I dislike Steven Moffat! lol. Seriously, don’t even start with me about Moffat, I loathe him. He is the worst television writer I have ever had the misfortune to have writing for a show I otherwise enjoy. WORST.

Also I suck at picking least favorites in Doctor Who. Just ask me about writers next, or River Song, or something! Them I can freely dislike!

Back on Tumblr! Yay! Would have been earlier, but a) exhaustion is a bad look on me and b) my internet was down this morning. Obviously it’s back up now (I don’t do lengthy Tumblr posts from my phone, Swype hates me and I have a thing about misspellings).

Anyway, I dropped my girlfriend off for the bus home earlier, boo. I’m pretty sad, but I guess you guys benefit because I can post more? Bright sides, etc.

So, speaking of which, let’s talk about the latest episode of Supernatural, “The Slice Girls.

This episode was… wow. I think I turned to my girlfriend as soon as it was over and said, “I’m really glad that I’m not invested in this show anymore.” It was so bad I had to pause and rant several times within the episode. I described it to my aunt later as looking like “they’d been told they’re being sexist so many times and, instead of learning, decided to take that as permission to just go all-out with it.”

Spoilers begin now.

So, we begin the episode by finding out that men are being murdered, with strange symbols carved into their chests and their hands and feet cut off. Okay, that’s an okay setup, but it gets problematic, fast, as it turns out that the ones doing the killing are Amazons.

Amazons. As in, the strong Greek women who kept away from men and only used them for procreation (to my knowledge, they did not, in the original myths, kill the men? Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong).

In Supernatural, the Amazons seem to exist simply to demonstrate/”prove” some really sexist cultural tropes in America. For example, the whole “evil women just have sex with unsuspecting men so they can get pregnant~” screed, with a side of “gold digger” with all the men being successful. Not to mention, you know, the complete demonization of women who don’t want to be with men but might want to have children, but I’ll get to that in full momentarily.

To make matters worse, it turns out that the daughters of the Amazons are the ones killing their fathers. Immediately I know how it’s going to turn out: Someone is going to kill that little girl, and that someone is going to be Sam. Lo and behold.

(Somewhere in here, Sam starts telling Dean that Emma isn’t “really” his daughter. Er, since he contributed half her DNA, yes she is. Even if he isn’t a father to her, she’s still genetically his daughter. Sam, stop saying shit to try to make yourself feel less guilty. You killed a little girl.)

I won’t even… wait, yes I will, what the fuck were the writers thinking having Sam shoot that little girl?! She was THREE DAYS OLD, physically only sixteen! She hadn’t killed anyone, and the Amazons were shown to only kill one person (their father) in their lives. Ergo, if they convinced her not to kill Dean, she could have gone on to… not kill people. Shooting her was both morally wrong and STUPID. That the writers thought it was okay to show their hero shooting and killing a young girl who, as yet, hadn’t harmed anyone? They’re pretty out of touch.

(I’ve seen a number of people propose that this was “payback” for Amy at the beginning of the series. Major differences that should make people rethink that: Amy had actually killed people and, if her son got sick again, she would probably kill more people; Dean let Amy’s son go even though he would inevitably kill people, proving that on Supernatural, children’s lives are only valued if they’re male; oh yeah, Amy wasn’t THREE DAYS OLD; and finally, women’s lives are not fodder for some “tit-for-tat” sibling rivalry)

But that’s just the story. Let’s get to the meat of the sexism here: The demonization of women who don’t need men.

The Amazons don’t like men. They don’t need them or want them around. They want to have children, though, so they sleep with men in order to become pregnant, but don’t keep the man in their lives. Apparently, the Supernatural writers thought this was such a horrible idea — women who don’t need men!? Oh my stars! — that they needed to demonize these women and make them ~evil (because what is more evil than a woman who doesn’t need or want a man, am I right?).

(And I looked — just on Wikipedia, but still — and no, the Amazons of myth did not kill their sexual partners. They did kill or send away any male children that resulted from that sex, but infanticide was hardly uncommon or taboo at the time, particularly in myth. So recreating the Amazons as murderers of men is both ridiculous and sexist.)

The Amazons in the show are presented as being every bit as bad as the other monsters the show has portrayed, despite that they kill only once in their lives, where those other monsters kill habitually and often recreationally. I suppose that a woman who kills a man must be so horrible to them that it stacks up.

And you know, I’m not saying women should be allowed to kill men or something (lest one of the jerks from the other day show up to suggest it). I personally think Supernatural shouldn’t have tried to portray Amazons AT ALL — it doesn’t make sense and it just stinks of a sexist and anti-feminist agenda.

But then, what do I know? I’m just a woman who doesn’t want or need a man. I must be just as bad as those Amazons.

And that’s not even really going into depth on the whole “female children are expendable, male children are valuable” shit Supernatural has going on this season. (THREE DAYS, you fuckers. Anyone who is okay with Sam shooting that girl… well, let’s just say I have problems with you. BIG ones.)

Suffice to say, though I won’t go into further depth on it because I feel I have addressed my points sufficiently and also because I am.. going to Target with my aunt soon and can’t be online typing a screed against Supernatural all night, that this episode was fucking disgusting and incredibly sexist.

Way to go, Supernatural. You made me really, really glad that I stopped watching and giving a fuck about you. I hope you’re really happy.

Actually, no, wait, I hope you’re fucking miserable, you sexist garbage.  

Latest episode of Supernatural (“The Slice Girls”):

Really fucking sexist thing, or MOST really fucking sexist thing?

Seriously I want to throw something or strangle somebody oh my god. That was fucking horrific. Fucking sexist jackasses.

hisblogger:

I want to talk for a minute, about Irene Adler. The Woman.

I’ve been pretty deep into the Sherlock Holmes fandom lately, specifically the BBC Sherlock series, the recent American Sherlock Holmes movies, and the original stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. I am not here to preach any of these as…

 Really good post.

Of course, what stood out the most to me was the fact that I have never seen a recent/modern adaptation of Sherlock Holmes wherein Irene Adler was not a criminal with a connection to Moriarty -  as if no woman could possibly best Sherlock Holmes without the help and information given by a powerful man (Moriarty). As if no one could possibly go against Sherlock Holmes in any fashion without being a criminal mastermind. As if — for bonus sexism — no woman who is intelligent would ever not be a manipulative, conniving, poisoning criminal and thief.

These kinds of portrayals demonstrate a disturbing kind of sexism that reeks of the “faux-feminism” I’ve mentioned before on my blog — a habit of trying to make a woman look “strong” by having her be audacious and often excessively sexual while ignoring both the implications of that and the deeply sexist parts of her portrayal, and begging the audience to do the same. (For examples of this, one need look no further than both recent Irene Adlers, as well as Doctor Who’s River Song and Amy Pond.) Basically, the writers believe that they can fool the audience into thinking that their version of Irene Adler is a “strong female character” and thus appease female fans, whilst simultaneously making said Irene weaker, overly sexualized, dominated by the men in her life, stereotypical in sexist ways (failing because of love/feelings, the “lesbian falls in love with a man” schtick, and so on), etc. etc.

And I am not, you know, wild about the idea that women in media have to be “role models” or anything. I think female characters should be able to just be people, with all the flaws and humanity that comes with. But I do think there is something deeply wrong with the idea of presenting a deeply sexist portrayal of a character and calling it “feminist” or a “strong woman”.

 Of course, there’s another aspect to it. As the OP asks, “Does it make a woman inherently stronger to be unmarried?” Stephen Moffat certainly seems to think so — his reasoning, given in an interview, as to why his version of Irene Adler is “feminist” boiled down to “she doesn’t get married in the end.” Why this means we should suddenly, magically be okay with all the rest of the sexist bullshit in “A Scandal in Belgravia” is really beyond me. Then again, Moffat’s views about women and marriage have also been well-documented — as he once famously said in an interview that he believed women all just want to get married and are obsessed with it, while men are all running screaming from the concept (obviously, this is paraphrased). Presumably his idea of the ideal woman would be one who would “rise above” this supposed wedding-obsessed nonsense.

(As to another question posed in the OP, I haven’t the slightest why every adaptation has Irene Adler having a romantic/sexual thing for Sherlock Holmes. Personally, I think it would be more interesting and fun to watch if she didn’t, and he didn’t for her. But I suppose they feel they have to assert the heterosexuality [or, in the case of BBC!Irene, the bisexuality] of both parties, lest someone think they were — gasp! shock and horror! — gay or something.)

(On that note, please do not get me started on the Sherlock Holmes movies and the “requisite pretty woman of the movie” requirement.)

Of course, the OP also asks why, if the writers so obviously do not want to write Irene Adler, do they not “make [the character they so obviously want to write] instead? Why not throw in the ridiculous idea that more than one woman on the planet may be able to give the great Sherlock Holmes a run for his money?” The answer is mostly sexism (because not only can there only be one significant woman in Sherlock Holmes’s life [other than Mrs. Hudson], because it’s “sexier” if Irene Adler is a hot criminal who has UST with Sherlock, because it’s “boring” to them to have a female character who is just a woman going about her business, because then they would have to come up with another female character, etc.), with a side of wanting to throw in a name that is recognizable to fans of the stories.

Finally, the OP asks, “They are not afraid of moving away from the original works, so why not make use of that? If they need a well-known right hand man for Moriarty, why not bring a twist onto things and make Sebastian Moran female, for instance?” at which point I would ask them to marry me, but since hisblogger is already my girlfriend, that seems a little bit superfluous.

with-cherry-on-top:

ohmister:

Someone tagged the secret I last responded to with the following:

Tagged as: I’m a feminist. I ship Sherlock/John like there’s no tomorrow.and I absolutely love Moffat’s portrayal of Irene Adler. but the more I think about it the more I’m convinced that all the hate for Moffat’s female characters has nothing to do with feminism. or feminist ethics or whatever.but with the fact that he writes really strong women. and it can sometimes be difficult for teenage or twenty-something girls to identify with them. like most of us are more like Molly than Irene or River.

And I just… no. All my rage, I just. Flames. Flames… on the side of my face.

I hate this shit. I hate this dismissive bullshit that says you can’t possibly be offended or see sexism in Moffat’s female characters, you’re just ~jealous because you’re not as “strong” as they are. It strikes me as, despite the author’s claims to be a feminist, very anti-feminist and sexist in and of itself (“oh, you silly girls are just jealous, you don’t really have legitimate concerns!”). Dismissing women’s concerns as simply “jealousy” or an inability to identify with strong women? God, that’s pretty fucking sexist, isn’t it?

I won’t start in on Moffat’s women in Doctor Who. To be perfectly honest with you, I’ve had that discussion so many times by now that it runs my temper straight into surface-of-the-sun temperature range and I just… can’t. But the next time you think Moffat isn’t sexist, just remember what he did to Amy Pond. Just remember River Song running about asking if she looks fat or her hair’s alright in the middle of World War II.

As far as Sherlock goes, I agree wholeheartedly with what someone once said here on Tumblr (I don’t have the source, though): Any story in which Irene Adler loses to Sherlock Holmes is inherently sexist. That doesn’t touch the character, but I feel it sets the tone. I won’t go into all my issues here, because… frankly, I have a bus to catch in a few hours and shouldn’t do it on an empty stomach. But a few points, briefly:

1) Moffat’s Adler is a “strong women” brought to her knees - in the end literally - by her emotions. Her feelings. She was beaten because she ~fell in love. If you really think this isn’t ridiculously sexist, I don’t think we’re watching the same show.

2) Her sexuality was everything. Literally. Everything about her seemed defined by her sexuality. Her profession, her personality, her manner of dress, her interactions with others, etc. Sure, this can look like “empowered woman who is secure in her sexuality”… but to me, it’s an unrealistic portrayal that reduces Adler to her sexuality and nothing more. It is everything. Which brings me to my next point.

3) They sexualised and demeaned her “title.” In the short story, “A Scandal in Bohemia,” Sherlock Holmes is the one who gives Adler the name of “The Woman” - a title of respect from a nineteenth century man who has never met a woman of his match before, who outwitted him and thus became singular in his view. In Moffat’s Sherlock, “The Woman” is Adler’s working title as a dominatrix, making it something that she did not earn through her own virtue as well as making it an inherently sexual title - which adds to point number two as well as making me, personally, feel incredibly awkward when Sherlock addresses her that way (because it is her title as a sex worker, her byname, his refusal to call her by name rather than using that seems dirty, demeaning — it indicates a lack of respect, where in the ACD stories the title was a mark of respect). The sexism here should be quite obvious even to the most casual viewer.

4) Her, um, lesbianism. I don’t know about you all, but as a queer woman, this infuriated me. I was on with the idea of a lesbian Irene Adler. I love that, I think it would be awesome. But no, lo and behold, Moffat has the only person Adler actually falls for be… a man. Sherlock Holmes. She is never shown to have an actual relationship or anything of the sort with a woman - she is shown “working” with one woman,  and makes one or two comments about her assistant, and that’s it. This is both homophobic and sexist, as it reeks to high heaven of the straight male fantasy that lesbians will suddenly stop liking women for the “right guy”.

5) Irene Adler in the original story was far from a dominatrix or a master criminal. She was an adventuress and former opera singer, with no actual malicious aims. I find portraying her as a criminal mastermind to be fairly sexist if only because it implies that an “ordinary” woman could not possibly be the woman who bests Sherlock Holmes - she must be evil.

6) She couldn’t, apparently, figure out what to do with all that blackmail material  she had… until she was told what to do with it by a man. Er. What.

As I said, not an exhaustive list— but enough to be getting on with. I’d like to disclaim here before someone accuses me of it that I do not, for the record, believe that sex or sex work is inherently demeaning or “dirty” in any way. I am a sex-positive feminist who supports legal, heavily-regulated sex work under certain circumstances. However, I must stress that I had many issues with the way Irene Adler was portrayed as a sex worker in the show, especially within the larger cultural context, the fact that the character herself seems to have been largely exported from Stephen Moffat’s wet dreams, and the overall sexist themes emenating throughout the episode. I do not mean this to be in any way a commentary on my general feelings about IRL sex work, merely the depiction of it in this show. I do, however, firmly believe that taking a title borne of legitimate respect and turning it into something basely sexual and devoid of respect is wrong and sexist, and nothing will change my mind on that.

In short, my issues with Irene Adler have nothing to do with being unable to relate to her. They have everything to do with her being a sexist caricature who was treated horribly by Stephen Moffat as her writer. Though, you are right about one thing, tagger — I can’t relate to Irene Adler as written in Sherlock. She comes across to me as entirely too one-dimensional to identify with.

(I also really, as an aside, dislike a) the idea that teenage and twenty-something girls are somehow “too immature” to identify with those characters and this is somehow a flaw rather than a fault of the writing, b) the implication that Molly is not a strong female character, and c) that there is something wrong with being like Molly. There is nothing wrong with “being a Molly” and it hardly means that you are weak or immature. For the record, I do not identify more strongly with Molly, though I love her and all other loyal, sweet Mollys out there - I identify the most with Sherlock, for reasons that are probably significantly less obvious on this blog than they are in real life.)

Anyway, now that I’ve done that tirade, I’m off to make something to eat.

If you don’t agree with me, I will ask that you do me the respect of not flaming me. I’ve got quite the day ahead of me on very little sleep, and I don’t want to start a Tumblr flame war.

 Let’s say I more or less agree with some points here. There is no denying that Moffat is a sexist douche, there are evidence to it, sure.

But riddle me this:

How is Irene being fascinated by Sherlock’s mind and intellect considered falling in love with him as a whole? And how on Earth is that sexist or homophobic?

 It is implied in the dialogue that she “fell for him,” and at the very least that she was sexually attracted to him (the pulse scene).

It is sexist because it implies, once again, that the downfall of a woman is in her feelings; further, because it once again demonstrates that a woman isn’t “allowed” to just be on a television show without falling for one of the leading men.

It’s homophobic because, as I pointed out in my post (did you finish reading it?), lesbian women falling for men is an age-old homophobic trope, implying that women aren’t “really” lesbians — they just need to meet the right man. Etc. You see it now? It’s additionally homophobic in that she is shown to have sexual attraction to Sherlock - a man - but outside of her job isn’t shown having real sexual or romantic attraction to any women.

I don’t really have the time to do a long, well-written rebuttal to this right now; I’m helping my girlfriend clean. So please accept my apologies for a brusque and short reply. If my thoughts are less than clear, I hope you’ll forgive me, I’m a bit distracted.

All I can taste is dust.

Someone tagged the secret I last responded to with the following:

Tagged as: I’m a feminist. I ship Sherlock/John like there’s no tomorrow. and I absolutely love Moffat’s portrayal of Irene Adler. but the more I think about it the more I’m convinced that all the hate for Moffat’s female characters has nothing to do with feminism. or feminist ethics or whatever. but with the fact that he writes really strong women. and it can sometimes be difficult for teenage or twenty-something girls to identify with them. like most of us are more like Molly than Irene or River.

And I just… no. All my rage, I just. Flames. Flames… on the side of my face.

I hate this shit. I hate this dismissive bullshit that says you can’t possibly be offended or see sexism in Moffat’s female characters, you’re just ~jealous because you’re not as “strong” as they are. It strikes me as, despite the author’s claims to be a feminist, very anti-feminist and sexist in and of itself (“oh, you silly girls are just jealous, you don’t really have legitimate concerns!”). Dismissing women’s concerns as simply “jealousy” or an inability to identify with strong women? God, that’s pretty fucking sexist, isn’t it?

I won’t start in on Moffat’s women in Doctor Who. To be perfectly honest with you, I’ve had that discussion so many times by now that it runs my temper straight into surface-of-the-sun temperature range and I just… can’t. But the next time you think Moffat isn’t sexist, just remember what he did to Amy Pond. Just remember River Song running about asking if she looks fat or her hair’s alright in the middle of World War II.

As far as Sherlock goes, I agree wholeheartedly with what someone once said here on Tumblr (I don’t have the source, though): Any story in which Irene Adler loses to Sherlock Holmes is inherently sexist. That doesn’t touch the character, but I feel it sets the tone. I won’t go into all my issues here, because… frankly, I have a bus to catch in a few hours and shouldn’t do it on an empty stomach. But a few points, briefly:

1) Moffat’s Adler is a “strong women” brought to her knees - in the end literally - by her emotions. Her feelings. She was beaten because she ~fell in love. If you really think this isn’t ridiculously sexist, I don’t think we’re watching the same show.

2) Her sexuality was everything. Literally. Everything about her seemed defined by her sexuality. Her profession, her personality, her manner of dress, her interactions with others, etc. Sure, this can look like “empowered woman who is secure in her sexuality”… but to me, it’s an unrealistic portrayal that reduces Adler to her sexuality and nothing more. It is everything. Which brings me to my next point.

3) They sexualised and demeaned her “title.” In the short story, “A Scandal in Bohemia,” Sherlock Holmes is the one who gives Adler the name of “The Woman” - a title of respect from a nineteenth century man who has never met a woman of his match before, who outwitted him and thus became singular in his view. In Moffat’s Sherlock, “The Woman” is Adler’s working title as a dominatrix, making it something that she did not earn through her own virtue as well as making it an inherently sexual title - which adds to point number two as well as making me, personally, feel incredibly awkward when Sherlock addresses her that way (because it is her title as a sex worker, her byname, his refusal to call her by name rather than using that seems dirty, demeaning — it indicates a lack of respect, where in the ACD stories the title was a mark of respect). The sexism here should be quite obvious even to the most casual viewer.

4) Her, um, lesbianism. I don’t know about you all, but as a queer woman, this infuriated me. I was on with the idea of a lesbian Irene Adler. I love that, I think it would be awesome. But no, lo and behold, Moffat has the only person Adler actually falls for be… a man. Sherlock Holmes. She is never shown to have an actual relationship or anything of the sort with a woman - she is shown “working” with one woman,  and makes one or two comments about her assistant, and that’s it. This is both homophobic and sexist, as it reeks to high heaven of the straight male fantasy that lesbians will suddenly stop liking women for the “right guy”.

5) Irene Adler in the original story was far from a dominatrix or a master criminal. She was an adventuress and former opera singer, with no actual malicious aims. I find portraying her as a criminal mastermind to be fairly sexist if only because it implies that an “ordinary” woman could not possibly be the woman who bests Sherlock Holmes - she must be evil.

6) She couldn’t, apparently, figure out what to do with all that blackmail material  she had… until she was told what to do with it by a man. Er. What.

As I said, not an exhaustive list— but enough to be getting on with. I’d like to disclaim here before someone accuses me of it that I do not, for the record, believe that sex or sex work is inherently demeaning or “dirty” in any way. I am a sex-positive feminist who supports legal, heavily-regulated sex work under certain circumstances. However, I must stress that I had many issues with the way Irene Adler was portrayed as a sex worker in the show, especially within the larger cultural context, the fact that the character herself seems to have been largely exported from Stephen Moffat’s wet dreams, and the overall sexist themes emenating throughout the episode. I do not mean this to be in any way a commentary on my general feelings about IRL sex work, merely the depiction of it in this show. I do, however, firmly believe that taking a title borne of legitimate respect and turning it into something basely sexual and devoid of respect is wrong and sexist, and nothing will change my mind on that.

In short, my issues with Irene Adler have nothing to do with being unable to relate to her. They have everything to do with her being a sexist caricature who was treated horribly by Stephen Moffat as her writer. Though, you are right about one thing, tagger — I can’t relate to Irene Adler as written in Sherlock. She comes across to me as entirely too one-dimensional to identify with.

(I also really, as an aside, dislike a) the idea that teenage and twenty-something girls are somehow “too immature” to identify with those characters and this is somehow a flaw rather than a fault of the writing, b) the implication that Molly is not a strong female character, and c) that there is something wrong with being like Molly. There is nothing wrong with “being a Molly” and it hardly means that you are weak or immature. For the record, I do not identify more strongly with Molly, though I love her and all other loyal, sweet Mollys out there - I identify the most with Sherlock, for reasons that are probably significantly less obvious on this blog than they are in real life.)

Anyway, now that I’ve done that tirade, I’m off to make something to eat.

If you don’t agree with me, I will ask that you do me the respect of not flaming me. I’ve got quite the day ahead of me on very little sleep, and I don’t want to start a Tumblr flame war.

Yeah, god damn those feminists, hating a really misogynistically-written caricature of a character! How fucking dare they, right? I mean, they should all just bow down to Moffat’s second rendition of “I’m going to try to make this character look like a Strong Female Character so you’ll all ignore the heaping, blatant tons of sexism I’m piling on.” They should never feel uncomfortable or conflicted about a character whose entire being is defined by their sexuality.

I mean, feminism is all about loving every single female character in anything ever, uncritically, and especially so if the straight white dude who wrote her says she’s a feminist portrayal, right? No one should ever have strong feelings about why that character might, in fact, be a really freaking sexist portrayal, or just plain not like a character because they think she’s obnoxious, or… I mean, what is the world coming to when those uppity women think they’re allowed to have opinions and feelings about things, especially when they sort of relate directly to feminism and how women are portrayed in media?

In case you couldn’t tell, that was all sarcastic. And I couldn’t give less of a fuck if you hate me, secret OP, for daring to hate a character whom I find obnoxious and whose screen presence makes me uncomfortable (hi, I’m asexual, excessive sexuality on my TV makes me uneasy), and who is an incredibly sexist, homophobic and frankly gross depiction of a character whom I have liked very much in the past (in ACD canon and other intepretations), among having other reasons to hate her.

Oh, and I don’t “call myself a feminist” — I am one. Not liking Moffat’s sexist, homophobic portrayal of Irene Adler doesn’t make me any less of a feminist, so thanks for that implication.

Sincerely,

A Sherlock fan who does not get on with Moff’s Adler

(Source: bakerstreetconfessions)

Uh, how about no.

Really, no. I don’t have to like Stephen Moffat to be a true fan. I can love this thing he created without loving its creator, just like I can have a nostalgic love for Ender’s Game whilst acknowledging that Orson Scott Card is an enormous douchebag who shouldn’t be allowed access to writing implements or communications devices lest he continue to be such.

Stephen Moffat is a misogynist. Period. If that were the only thing I knew about him - and I would know it from his portrayals, both in Sherlock and Doctor Who, even if I’d never read a single interview of his - I would still loathe him. But toss into it the fact that his writing is as original as apple pie (that is— everyone else has done it first), that he’s homophobic as well (hurrah, two for one!), that he relies on the same tired tropes repeatedly (time loops!), and the complaints go on and on… and you have a thoroughly detestable, honestly bad writer. It has nothing to do with his trolling.

(Seriously, if he were any other writer, if he were just.. not a sexist and homophobic douchebag.. I would love the trolling. I think that shit is hilarious. But not from him. From him it comes off as patronizing and obnoxious - largely because I find him patronizing and obnoxious as a person.)

Also, I really, seriously object to the idea that I have to “show respect” to a sexist, homophobic man (especially as I am a queer woman!) in order to be considered a “real” fan of something. Bullshit I do! Seriously, screw anyone who thinks this way. And the tone of that— “show respect,” ugh. Speaking of patronizing and obnoxious!

Ending it here as I’ve got shit to do, but… seriously, secret OP, fucking no. Okay? Maybe if Moffat ever decides not to be a sexist little shit… but I don’t see that happening anytime soon.

(Source: bakerstreetconfessions)

selkieskins:

I think that Moffat can get away with these sexist things because he is otherwise a good, well respected writer. The whole issue of Amy Pond’s body being used as a plot device (growing a baby inside her without her knowledge or consent) in Doctor Who is evidence of that.

 I wouldn’t say that Moffat is “otherwise [a] good [writer]” because frankly, he isn’t (he’s a poor writer of snappy dialog, imo), but I agree that he is respected. He’s also the lead on the show, meaning he at least seems to have more creative control. Finally, he wraps his portrayal of Adler up in the same faux-feminist, “look it’s a strong woman, just ignore the really gross sexism and homophobia!” bull that he wrapped River Song up in… which seems to be enough to fool a lot of the fans into thinking he’s some sort of feminist and thus somehow incapable of being a sexist pig (which he is… a sexist pig, I mean, he is one), still less his coworkers and friends.

Also, you know, people are less likely to call their friends and loved ones out on sexism and homophobia, and Moffat and Gatiss are friends while Vertue is his wife. Few people like to admit that their friends and family are bigots.

Basically, what I’m trying to say is this: Yes, it was sexist. Yes, it was homophobic. Yes, Stephen Moffat got away with it, just like he did in Doctor Who.

Why people still love this man as a writer is beyond me, really. I was through with him after reading his “Women are neeeeedy, they neeeed men and all just want to get married!” interview years ago.

(Source: bakerstreetconfessions, via selkieskins-deactivated20120124)