links: the guild; scary fem rant...

[amezri]

Hrm. I think I sewed my flag patch to my BDUs crooked. *sigh*

In other news, I have discovered the comedy wonder of The Guild. That's right, people, a silly comedy web series about people who play World of Warcraft (Or WoW-like as they don't specifically mention what game). And it's HI-larious. The show is written and produced by Felicia Day, who is starring in Joss' Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog. Point of interest: Felicia Day's blog is also very amusing.

Check it out. You will be entertained.

And checking in with the people who have had too many crazyflakes, I've stumbled upon this post in LJ land:

A Rapist's View of the World: Joss Whedon and Firefly
This is a really long rant about Joss Whedon's Firefly. Why? Because I'm angry and I think it is really important that feminists don't leave popular culture out of the equation. Especially considering that popular culture is increasingly being influenced by pornography.

Good. God. WHAT? Look, I don't have a problem with feminists or feminism or anything related to equality and rights for women. Obviously. But seriously, there are some fanatics in every group and I've found one here.

So in the very second scene of the very first episode, an episode written and directed by the great feminist Joss, a white man tells a black woman to 'shut up' for no apparent reason. And she does shut up. And she continues to call him sir. And takes his orders, even when they are dumb orders, for the rest of the series.

Right. Uhm. Okay. Clearly she missed the part where Zoe and Mal were in the military and Mal is her ranking officer, so she's going to have to listen to his stupid orders no matter how dumb they are. Calling him "sir" is military protocol. This behavior is the same for men as it is for women in the service OHMYGOD.

Jayne asks Mal to get Kaylee to stop being so cheerful. Mal replies, "Sometimes you just wanna duct tape her mouth and dump her in the hold for a month." Yes, that is an exact quote, "Sometimes you just wanna DUCT TAPE HER MOUTH and DUMP HER IN THE HOLD FOR A MONTH.” Kaylee responds by grinning and giving Mal a kiss on the cheek and saying, "I love my Captain."

I don't see the problem here. He's JOKING. JOKING. I have on occasion made jokes similar with my friends - both male and female - and they've done the same with me. WE ARE JOKING.

Don't even get me started on the whole Inara-is-selling-herself-to-her-rapists thing and how "servicing" the crew apparenlty includes, oh, I don't know talking to them. I just... I'm not going to touch that.

Completely unnecessary and unprovoked violence is a spontaneous result of this hypermasculinised male character. In Serenity, Mal enjoys using a character called Simon as his personal punching bag. In one scene he walks up to him and smashes him in the face, without any provocation or logical reason. In another scene Simon asks Mal a question and Mal smashes him the face again.

Erm. If you were watching, I think you'll find there was provocation for both punches to the face. I have to admit telling Simon that Kaylee was dead was pretty messed up though.

Zoe, of course, is meant to be our empowered, ass-kicking sidechick. Like all sidechicks she is objectified from the get go. Her husband, Wash, talking about how he likes to watch her bathe. Let me just say now that I have never personally known of a healthy relationship between a white man and a woman of colour. I have known a black woman whose white husband would strangle and bash her while her young children watched. My white grandfather liked black women because they were 'exotic', and he did not, could not treat women, especially women of colour, like human beings. I grew up watching my great aunts, my aunty and my mother all treated like shit by their white husbands, the men they loved. So you will forgive me for believing that the character, Wash, is a rapist and an abuser, particularly considering that he treats Zoe like an object and possession.

Uh. I'm... sorry your family is so fucked up? Zoe could totally kick Wash's ass and he knows it. In "Our Mrs. Reynolds," Wash is amused over the way Saffron fawns over the Captain and jokingly implies that Zoe behave similar. Zoe is thoroughly unamused and Wash backs down immediately. I really don't think Wash is forcing her to do anything she doesn't want to do. Seriously. WTF.

And finally, this reply to a comment makes me particularly annoyed:

I feel awful for Joss Whedon's wife. From what I've read about him and the interviews I've watched, I'm fairly certain that he rapes his wife and abuses her in various other ways. I honestly can't think of anything worse than living with a man like Joss who thinks of women like the way he portrays in his tv shows. How awful. The comment about the money was meant to be about how I personally could see no benefit from being with a man like Joss OTHER than money. Joss uses and abuses her. Probably rapes her and thinks of women as whores etc, etc. Obviously, Ms Whedon has her own reasons for staying. Fear, patriarchal concepts of love, etc. But I would argue that she gives everything and gets nothing. Money is the only concrete thing that she could possibly gain. But as I said money is worth nothing compared with self-integrity, self-esteem, love (sister/lesbian/gynaffectionate love) etc. So she still loses out. Poor woman.

I just. I. Can't even begin to understand. There's feminism and then there's feminism on hyper-crazyflakes.