Femininity and Fanfiction: A Meagre Foray into the Fandom Wilds of Gender Disparity, Gender Equity, and the Epic Hoax of the Emotionally Supine Woman

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Title:	Femininity and Fanfiction: A Meagre Foray into the Fandom Wilds of Gender Disparity, Gender Equity, and the Epic Hoax of the Emotionally Supine Woman
Creator:	amyhit
Date(s):	November 20, 2010
Medium:	online
Fandom:	X-Files
Topic:
External Links:	here, Archived version
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Femininity and Fanfiction: A Meagre Foray into the Fandom Wilds of Gender Disparity, Gender Equity, and the Epic Hoax of the Emotionally Supine Woman is an essay by amyhit.

It has a second subtitle: "aka Dana Scully: "She's my story and I'm sticking to her.""

The Introduction

"After reading a thousand or so pieces of X-Files fanfic, one comes to a number of conclusions about personal taste. One of the conclusions I've come to - about 995 fics back, admittedly - is that I am obviously sensitive to seeing Scully disempowered in fanfic, much more than I am to seeing Mulder disempowered. Even in situations where her disempowerment is temporary and completely understandable, the fact that a fanfic writer chooses a scenario that disempowers her will often be enough to give me pause."

The Conclusion

"Scully is female. She's small, and monsters follow her around. She has lips that bring to mind a myriad insinuations, and hair like a matador's flag. She's built like a miniature Venus. She has a voice that could talk the fuzz off a peach. She's missing three months time. She's missing her ova. She doesn't cry when it feels like maybe she should. She spends time with corpses. She carries a gun. She says she's fine. And she's Scully. Not despite these things or because of them, but including them. She's Scully, and despite the negligible inclusion of women to the X-Files writing staff, prior to season 8 at least, she and Mulder have probably the most gender-neutral full-bodied relationship I've ever seen in fiction.

Because of that, I'm sensitive to how fanfic treats Scully. Heteronormativity is ubiquitous, basically by defintion, and whether I read it and deplore it or read it and relish it, I insist on considering it for what it is. No, I don't think for a second that if you relish it when Scully cries in Mulder's arms it means you think suffrage was a bad idea. I mostly think it means you're human. And probably a shipper. But I also think fanfic is a valuable literary avenue for isolating and provoking questions, and as with most things, I find certain basic considerations worthwhile: What does this imply? What do I think? What do I want? What do I value?"

Parts

• Fanfic Example: Butterfly by Oracle
• The Orchestration of a Piece of Fiction (and what 'belongs' to whom)
• Upholding Characterization when it Opposes Heteronormativity
• 'Natural' Female Vulnerability

Fan Reactions

I think what I like about Mulder's emotionalism and vulnerability and Scully's stoicism (though really, when you think about it, as sensitive as Mulder is, he's stoic, too) is that it's like this fantasy that takes me away from the real world where there are these gender norms that I've never felt entirely comfortable with. The unfortunate thing is that, while I recognize sexism in society, I've almost bought into it -- and I think a lot of people have -- and so my way of fighting against it is to suppress any "feminine" qualities in myself -- I've tried to train myself towards stoicism because to be emotional is to be weak and to be weak is to be feminine and to be feminine is to be inferior. So that's why I think Scully's stoicism resonates with me, why I don't like seeing her vulnerable, why I don't like seeing Mulder be "protective" of her. Of course, when it's Mulder who's being vulnerable, then Scully has to go into this stereotypical female role of the nurturer.

(I hope that wasn't too rambly and convoluted.)

Anyway, nice meta. I always like to read stuff like this. :)

I thought this was an interesting read, especially as I'm reading a lot around gender in the media, the male gaze, gender and SF and all that jazz.

What interests me is that you (the general 'you' not the specific 'you') could almost argue it both ways. That when Scully is being stoic, brave, objective, she is 'better' because she isn't conforming to the silly girl stereotype - she can be strong and brave and intelligent and do just as well as any man even though *gasp* she's a woman. Yet by denying her the chance to show emotion you're buying into the sexist statement that women are weak precisely because they show emotion. I think that's a pretty prevalent attitude in most professions, especially the FBI.

(Side note: talking about Habermas and the notion of the public sphere in class this week we were discussing Habermas' very bourgeois notion of what the public sphere was. There's no room for women, the working class, homosexuals in Habermas' public sphere so each of these groups creates their own public sphere, which can impact upon the larger public sphere. Femnisim was a key point because until ideas of sexism and domestic violence could be discussed 'rationally' (which has its own connotations) they were very much reduced to discussions taking place in the feminist public sphere. And the feminist 'logo', for want of a better word, is that the personal is public. Anyway, to make this relevant to this reply, I argued that emotion (anger, grief, whatever) isn't a bad thing - isn't something that prevents discourse taking place. It's only because of the view put forward by those men in power than things have to be discussed rationally (and therefore emotionlessly) that emotions, and by extension I think, women, have been seen to be inferior.)

Okay, I think that may have been a bit rambly.