{"id":10895,"date":"2014-05-01T22:51:26","date_gmt":"2014-05-01T22:51:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/2014\/05\/01\/i-was-referring-to-a-very-specific-character-trait\/"},"modified":"2014-05-01T22:51:26","modified_gmt":"2014-05-01T22:51:26","slug":"i-was-referring-to-a-very-specific-character-trait","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/2014\/05\/01\/i-was-referring-to-a-very-specific-character-trait\/","title":{"rendered":"I was referring to a very specific character trait I sometimes see in these so-called unrealistically perfect characters that bothers me – the rest of the self-insertion, perfect characterization, I enjoy the hell out of that. I agree with you that when the term is thrown around, it is incredibly gendered. The particular character trait I was speaking of, I see across gender lines, which is what I meant by that. I am sorry I was not more clear. I am not articulating well today."},"content":{"rendered":"

scifigrl47<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

(Okay, just one more! \u00a0Since I reblogged squeelokitty\u2019s reblog of my post, it is only fair I answer this ask publicly, especially since their original post was completely fair and addressed their particular concerns)<\/p>\n

I actually totally agree with you. \u00a0And the thing is? \u00a0That sort of focusing on tragic backstory is almost exclusively a male privilege in popular culture.<\/p>\n

Women don\u2019t get to fixate. \u00a0They\u2019re expected to \u2018get over it,\u2019 and \u2018get on with their lives.\u2019 \u00a0 But two thirds of Batman media I\u2019ve ever been exposed to has been \u201cDEAD PAAAAAAARENTS.\u201d \u00a0Loki\u2019s creeping \u201cI\u2019m the victim here!\u201d mentality is from the same vein. \u00a0It\u2019s manpain.<\/p>\n

What are the worst insults aimed at men? \u00a0\u201dYou fight like a girl.\u201d \u00a0\u201dStop being a p\u2014-y.\u201d \u201cYou\u2019re such a little bitch.\u201d \u00a0The c-word.<\/p>\n

The worst thing a male can be called in our society is a girl. \u00a0When we use Mary Sue, even in a \u2018non-gendered\u2019 way, we\u2019re adding to that. \u00a0We are using a distinctly female name as an insult. \u00a0This isn\u2019t a nonsense word. \u00a0This isn\u2019t an invented word. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Using the name genders the insult. \u00a0And it is leveled as an insult. \u00a0If someone says, \u201cThis character is far too fixated on their backstory, I find this boring and frustrating to try to read, and find their current relationship with character X to be more interesting,\u201d that is criticism. \u201cThis character is SUCH a Mary Sue\u201d is an insult. \u00a0It provides no criteria. \u00a0It provides no actual information. \u00a0It is just a slur that you can level without having to provide any context. \u00a0And by doing that, even if you use if on a male character, we\u2019re tarring a character with a negative, specifically feminine brush.<\/p>\n

If we have a problem with a character, I just wish we would address our particular issue, instead of using the term as a shorthand. \u00a0Because it\u2019s worse than useless, for the writer and the fandom at large.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

scifigrl47: (Okay, just one more! \u00a0Since I reblogged squeelokitty\u2019s reblog of my post, it is only fair I answer this ask publicly, especially since their original post was completely fair and addressed their particular concerns) I actually totally agree with you. \u00a0And the thing is? \u00a0That sort of focusing on tragic backstory is almost exclusively … Continue reading I was referring to a very specific character trait I sometimes see in these so-called unrealistically perfect characters that bothers me – the rest of the self-insertion, perfect characterization, I enjoy the hell out of that. I agree with you that when the term is thrown around, it is incredibly gendered. The particular character trait I was speaking of, I see across gender lines, which is what I meant by that. I am sorry I was not more clear. I am not articulating well today.<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[804,135],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10895"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10895"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10895\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10895"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10895"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10895"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}