Gender Value in Fantasy

I rarely ever start a post with a disclaimer, but it's important to establish right out of the gate that this particular consideration in fiction is highly optional. Through the way your society mirrors an existing culture or through the way characters and environments interact, your readers will both decide if there's a gendered bias or if it's even personally important for them to observe one at all. What I'm going to cover here is a consideration, an analysis, of the many ways we can exhibit this in action on a conscious level. It's not 'woke' or any attempt to establish superiority and inferiority, just techniques in exhibiting it on many levels.

The broader you go, the less you need to think about it. An entire world is rarely on the same page when it comes to gender roles, so we tend to skip an unified norm there. It tends to narrow down perceptibly within a country, and more so as you whittle down to maybe tribes or clans, communities-- but where it gets trickier to maneuver is where it comes to occupation and, most difficult of all, the individual.

What do I mean by occupation? Well, let's take it to the current stories I'm reading, Andrzej Sapkowski's The Witcher. 

If you haven't read them but would like to, you may want to avoid this post. I don't like to spoil things for people and it's unavoidable since I'm using some pretty prominent plots to form the examples.

Sorceresses/Sorcerors, as well as Witchers, tend to carry their own priorities on gender value, due to the limitations and advantages occupation places on them. In this case, it's not a simple as a career or job role; this one is partially a genetic or altered genetic state that chooses their job for them, but before I go into that... Purely occupation being the consideration, then you're probably personally familiar with the term 'work culture' where certain attitudes and ways of life become normalized, often outside of the influence of standard cultural norms. What is appropriate and inappropriate in male and female interaction tends to be a matter of what is enabled or shut down. Despite laws considering sexual harassment, for instance, if there's an air of permission that no one challenges, it tends to be allowed until opposition is made. Even then, the flow is sometimes so hard to divert that even higher managers and human resources personnel caught in it may deny that the problem exists rather than risk being accused of enabling it. You then have to find someone outside of that culture, who also feels the situation is inappropriate, to alter it. However, once you become a 'problem', you're better off working elsewhere because you will be shunned from that culture even once you've changed it. This is no longer a gender value concern because the champion of the cause is often simply avoided by all people involved. This is often why certain gender-related bigotry is simply suffered. The isolation in an environment you can't readily leave is damning. In some ways, to be a champion of a cause is often the luxury of those who already have an escape plan.

I realize I did a bit of wiggling, but occupation is often a 'destined' element in fantasy, and one with a more important context. So past the real world parallel that I jumped over to, we consider how gender is valued in the series I mentioned. Early on, it is mentioned that most sorceresses and witchers are sterile. Though how the sorceresses are only *sometimes* sterile is a bit vague, but the way that their vanity is fed by potions to erase their physical flaws and appear younger so they can charm people, while male sorcerors tend to aim to gain respect by looking older, it's very likely that the female's unique use of magic comes at the cost of a working womb. Now this is a bit of a complexity that whittles down to an individual character's dilemma--Yennifer of Vengerburg.

In different stories throughout, we learn small details of her mysterious past. In one, Geralt (the main character and Witcher, as well as her lover) suspects that her ministrations to become more beautiful were more of a trial than most. He is trained to observe the minute details of movement and anatomy and, when she is speaking to him while applying make-up at her dressing table one morning, he observes an odd gesture of shame that is characteristic to people born with a hunchback. In another instance, she wistfully talks about what it would be like to have a child, to be able to share her knowledge with a creature of her own making. While Geralt, in his usual practical matter of dismissing what can't be had comes to play, we see the bitterness lingers--it's clear she would never give up the mastery of her occupation, but the nurturing instinct most common in women still lingers uselessly, looking for a place to go.

Perhaps it's due to Yennifer's influence then, an empathy for the woman he loves (albeit questionably, given he tethered himself to her to save her from a genie), that Geralt, who seems immune to any kind of nurturing instinct, begins to take to the clever little Ciri and her resolute stance that they are destined to walk the same path. While he never seems resentful of the inability to father children, he also seems uninterested in children at all. He isn't unkind to them but, like with cats, they seem to naturally be repelled by him anyway; another reason why Ciri's fascination with him, her choosing to trust and be around him, unbalances him as it does. He seems so opposed to the idea of destiny, so opposite this starry-eyed girl, that it shakes his own sense of value. Rather than resigning his existence as a necessary evil, Geralt begins to accept his worth in the eyes of the women around him. It doesn't visibly soften his heart, but his actions begin to reflect their significance in his value. In most instances, he pulls back for self-preservation yet is still willing to die if he is inadequate. Where they are concerned, he never removes himself as their shield--except in the case where their strengths outweigh his own. He has the most brilliantly flexible ego, ready to always concede to the best possible weapon. And never afraid for a woman to wield it.

Back on the sensitive subject of fertility, it is a privilege that no Witcher enjoys because their genes are altered, pushed to their limits, and they are no longer essentially human. Geralt expresses that they have no emotions, that only fear is preserved as useful. Witchers are never anything but male and are usually recruited through the law of surprise, an odd favor asked of someone they save without payment, claiming in return 'the thing that they did not expect to see on returning home'. Which is usually a fated child, coincidentally always a male. In this brutal world though, female fighters are fairly rare and short-lived (in human societies at least) and females are still pegged as emotional creatures, an attribute less than desirable in a warrior hoping to survive. So in a world where the alpha male reins, for anyone to think Geralt has emotions at all could be catastrophic. Despite Yennifer's suspicions that he is just good at masking his emotions, he lies that it simply isn't possible; that's how they were made to survive. In this world, the gender values are suitably shaky. Women are valued as abstractly as men and always with divisions considerate of culture, occupation, but most moving of all, in the individual. As with Yen's sensitivity about not having a child, this also means that she is not selective of its sex or the sex of any child determining its worth, a persistent trauma that actually does her credit in removing a gendered value. Which smoothly transitions into someone who wasn't so compassionate...

Geralt's birth mother, a sorceress. This is part of the reason why Yennifer is stunned that he knows only some sorceresses are sterile. It's knowledge they are rather keen on protecting, and largely because it appears that society is particularly against sorcerers and sorceresses breeding. It's unclear where Geralt falls in this, but we get the impression that his insistence that the 'law of surprise' is the only way to recruit young boys is bullshit and that his mother even willingly gave him up because she didn't want a son. I haven't read enough to know how accurate this assumption is or what it could mean about why she gave him up, but it is clear that Yennifer doesn't care what his mother's reasons were, simply hates the woman on principle because she was both able to have a child at all and was so quick to throw that away. For some reason, sorceresses seem to be more revered than their male counterparts, so I suspect that to be a factor. There tend to be a great deal more sorceresses than sorcerers floating around as well, even though sorceresses were persecuted en masse in the game I played. So it's possible women are simply naturally possessed of immense magical ability... or perhaps less guarded in having it to begin with.

While I'm straying from the gender value points only a bit here, one interesting feature of magic seems to be its tendency to 'skip a generation' when passed through a matrilineal line. It seems that females more readily genetically pass on powers, which makes them more frightening to ordinary humans. There seems to be a common belief that magic is simply learned, so I don't think it's common knowledge that there is a genetic thread or inherited gift at all. In fact, in one short story, the princess who discovers she inherited her grandmother's power not only is more powerful but when her power presents, it is dangerous and uncontrollable. It is also highly suspect that blood inherited powers are a sign of latent elven blood. It would explain the fear-based but long-buried persecution of both elves and sorceresses at least. This doesn't necessarily state a value or preference for females, especially since they aren't also given a societal advantage to put males at a further disadvantage. In terms of inheritance in human societies, women are not even considered. So race also bleeds into the factoring of male/female value.

Despite the possibility for a preference or value to be prevalent, I rather like when we, as readers, are informed of the actions and left to assume the reasoning behind them. If it's important enough to the story, it will recur time and again without having to beat the reader over the head with it. Of course, our own biases and imagination will sometimes create plenty of scenarios that were intended. All for the better. It's just important for writers to know that you can very effectively lace a gender value issue into the plot without making it so obvious or central. In fact, if you can make the reader forget about it until it's time to recall it, it can have an even more powerful effect.

So, what did you get out of this analysis? Hopefully, it's the sense that you don't blatantly isolate the male/female value from the elements of the story. If you place barriers on how your readers will perceive that balance, you're losing sight of how fiction weaves many threads. It's possible to explain these concepts without using an example story, but that would only help the non-fiction writer to write a step by step process. For the writer, it's simply more practical to weave in and out with an actual thread, to tell the story and infuse it with the possible reasons behind it.

I hesitate to use this story too freely from this point on. I've only read the two short story collections and played the third Witcher game, so my guesses could be very off. What keeps the story interesting is that the characters rarely wind into exposition about themselves. They're not mysterious just for the sake of dangling out the story, but because it is more than clear that trust, hope, and sharing are things more likely to get you killed than make you all warm and fuzzy about it. What is fed to the reader is slipped through the plots and it's quite the playground for possibility. It's actually the kind of story where it's both rewarding to guess and rewarding to be wrong. 

So if you've already read them and I'm off base, let me be. I'll get around to seeing if my questions are answered. I do, however, find value in analyzing possibilities well before they are revealed. It's good practice as a writer to maintain mental flexibility, even when it's not my own work. Especially when it isn't. I'm not as invested in the development, so it's a finished but verdant playground nonetheless!

Off I go, for now. Miles to go before I sleep, you know.

I Don't Consider Myself a Feminist, But...

Feminism used to be a word that empowered me. I was a precocious child and at times, I slip into a sort of naïveté and disbelief as an adult. In the 80s, feminism was such a positive idea. Mary Lou Retton was my role model. It had little to do with her being a woman. Like her, I was muscular and I was mesmerized by gymnastics. Women role models were ever more precious, not because they were rare but because they were still women, not 'women who thought they had to be like men to be important'-- if anything, they were masters of a craft and happened to have a vagina. Their strength, at least in my eyes, was not because they were women doing what only men could, but because they always seemed detached of expectations, truly passionate and focused on what they wanted. They drowned out all the voices that dismissed any failure from women as proof they weren't as good. In fact, because of that immediate dismissal, the inner drive had to be that much stronger to keep going anyway.

As a child, I wanted to try everything. My dad always had a 'stick with it' mentality and became exhausted with how something I begged to try wouldn't stick. Maybe it was the way he was raised, but he always gave me the impression that you should know if you want to do something before you've even done it and that was horribly confusing for me (and still is-- I never know if I'll like something until I try). My father also introduced the first edge of doubt about what I could do. His ideas of women came from the oppression his mother accepted, his ideas from a long string of traditional abuse that was simply historically accepted. So what he would even let me try was often restrained to what girls were supposed to be doing. When I wanted to be physically challenged, I begged to do karate and that was shut down-- instead I was signed up for dance class or Girl Scouts and only stuck it out because I thought I was supposed to. While I loved doing gymnastics and my first gym teacher even begged my mom to train me, it was too expensive and I doubt most of my family even remembers I was really fucking good at power gymnastics. In fact, they'll always mention my older brother and even my niece, but never me. When I wanted to be in band, I'd really wanted to play drums or trumpet, but I was told to chose between clarinet and flute. While I was damn good at flute and eventually did enjoy it, I never fully mentally embraced it since it was yet another thing I was 'supposed to do.' What I gathered early on was that what I wanted wasn't what a female was supposed to want. It caused a sort of melancholy and self-doubt that never quite went away.

Was art and writing and creativity in general a place where I could shed expectations? I can't deny that the appeal was there. I showed an aptitude and love for it long before anyone noticed, so it was always mine first. People would tell me I should do it for a living, but that's often where the support ends. It was beyond who I was as a woman though, so certainly it was almost otherworldly in its distance from reality. In fact, art was one of the few places where I wasn't so fervently compared to men. I wish I could say the same for writing, where I've heard the gripe that people can tell the difference between male and female writers because women 'write about thoughts and feelings' where men 'write about actions'. I'm still on the fence as to whether it insults men as being shallow and oblivious or women for not getting to the point. Either way, it assumes too much that men and women can't just fucking do both to tell a story... Whereas the art world has thrived well outside of any mainstream, the literary world is still a bit archaic in its growth. Nevertheless, I think indie/self-pubbing will help transform that.

If anything, my ability as a blogger to be wholly unable to stick to a single point brings me to the next point rather nicely.

I don't think women naturally overthink. I look at women, of all ages, and I see the wheels spinning, talk to them about why they are so cautious, obsessed over dates and details and even habits. Overthinking, for me and many other women, became a byproduct of attitudes wherein others have attempted to define us or guide us. Yes, women are naturally sensitive, but even that word is misused. There's a power in the sort of intuition and adaptability that is overlooked. We're no more hormonal than men but one of our few privileges was always that emotional outbursts were not unusual for women. We just discharge hormones in bursts, powerful but very short-lived, where the male hormonal consistency tends towards aggressive grudges. However, the second edge of that sword is that we're also demeaned as showing weakness for it. We've had to consider whether what we wear will excuse how we're treated, if our emotional outbursts will give people reason to disqualify our body of work, whether we should be given opportunities or whether we'll 'flake' and let a man take care of us as we become wives and mothers. We can't not think about it when it's brought up in nearly every environment we challenge ourselves in. In fact, supposed 'philosophical' or 'psychological' thinkers even dangerously peg women as having some innate biological need to prioritize the creation of more human beings. It doesn't matter how many women drown their kids or never bond with them, there's still the general consensus that we're all magically built to be mothers and the failure to do so makes us just defects to the natural order. So, if anything, overthinkers (male and female) are more often the product of expectations that they have to battle to claim themselves. We have to analyze to pick our battles lest we waste too much damn time trapped in the absurd noise.

Society as a whole has always pegged genders too rigidly-- I have never denied that men have their own struggles and there was even a time where feminists didn't get pissed that men have had their grievances from societal and legal expectations either. When I speak of female empowerment, it's because I have a horse in this race. A society that treats men fairly is also extremely important to me since I'm raising two bright young boys who will be the men that are shaped by it. It becomes extremely important that they don't think of women as weaker nor underestimate the danger that jilted women can have them charged falsely with rape on a whim. They are about to navigate a world where alibis have to override hormones or their futures could be bleak. I have to find subtle ways to convey this without discouraging them from the amazing things they're capable of. They are encouraged to notice how men and women are different without assuming those things are exclusive. They do know that biologically, men are built stronger so the 'no hitting' rule mostly applies to women that aren't kicking your ass or trying to kill you. They have an aunt who struggled with gender identity, not because she ever doubted she was a woman, but because she defied anything that was expected of her because of it. They know that not all women crave being mothers or wives, that they can love crochet and video games and abhor skirts and pink. Women are also not just men without a penis. I can't properly convey how I teach them these things-- some are serious conversations, some are laced with my sense of humor. I find the opportunities and can see when they are ready (although sometimes it can't be so organic if it's overdue). It's tough work, this maternal role. I have to find a way to show them that my needs and desires are empowering and important while helping them build confidence and a conscience as young men.

Don't get me wrong-- I don't blame men, but there's still something that stings about how much 'they' try to speak to what a women can't or shouldn't do without at least allowing her a fair attempt at it. I don't want a world where things are dumbed down or adjusted just so women can participate. What we need is the sort of opportunity that doesn't make us settle for being taken care of because opportunities come too scarce out of fear we're only doing it until we find a man to take care of us. Yes, it's circular like that. I can't tell you how many older women have let loose a heavy sigh of regret following by wishing they hadn't started a family or that they'd followed through on something they were good at. Many of them hit brick wall after brick wall and the enormous pressure to fulfill roles they didn't wholeheartedly want. And yes, I know that men fall into these traps too from the other end-- they are forced to become providers in jobs they don't really want that women would never do. Still, this is why the backlash has been so misguided in trying to squeeze women into high-paying STEM fields rather than opening opportunities in more fields that women actually tend to aim for. While there is definitely a need to open up more professional opportunities to qualified women (hell, people in general need more fulfilling careers), I think that reform tends towards short-lived extremities doomed to failure. STEM fields aren't even what all men are drawn to. Those are highly intellectual fields that still exclude people whose strengths come from their physicality or opposing interests.

We don't have to live in an either/or world, but it can be disheartening how often we're expected to fill the pettier parts of societal roles, gender laced or not. Now, as I've aged and found more mature friends, this sort of thing is less likely to happen. Yet it still happened in my 30s that a man tried to bargain for my time and my body by using the 'nice guy' bullshit that 'not many men will be as patient with you as I am.' Some things you think were just part of the manipulative tactics of youth are more present than you know. A woman often has to learn the hard way-- through trial and error that some men will say anything to get sex. Even if they think their intentions are good because they want to stick around, the dishonest way some people use to trick people into a relationship they don't want is a thing. I flipped that to 'people' intentionally because I've seen just as clearly that women manipulate (although it's less about sex and more about power, the procurement of wealth and/or security). Men should be cautious of women as well, and largely because there are man-hating feminists hiding everywhere. It does make me sad that there is a culture of distrust and segregation so prevalent in American culture, but I do my best to counter it with my constant brand of plain honesty. Not brutal, because that shit is exhausted, but I don't give people room to misinterpret.

I'll continue to have struggles that are unique to women, just as I'll also care about and attempt to understand what affects men. I'm not under some illusion that our lives will be magically better if only I could shape society or remove false expectations. I'll be frustrated and angry in my own way, not because of people failing to meet my expectations, but through professional obstacles that will probably always exist and I will always need to overcome. I still live in a country where education, healthcare and the economy is a bigger struggle than just how my gender factors in, yet it still needs to enter the discussion lest government ever think that it's okay to cover pills for erections but not give women, even in marriage, the power to decide when she's ready to bear children. Maybe these men are terrified that just putting a ring on a finger or their cocks inside unwilling women doesn't guarantee their genes will continue, but it doesn't change that women, no matter their intent, should have this agency because their actual lives matter over a theoretical one. Aside from bodily autonomy, I live in a time where full time work doesn't generate a comfortable living wage and those jobs are scarce even with experience and education. Women's issues are not 'the biggest' but they aren't inconsequential either. All special interests balance precariously on the borders of regressive extremes and actual reform but it's extremely important that handing out advantages does not cripple someone else. Children will inherit our bullshit economy, our bullshit attitudes, and yes, even our bullshit ideas. Say what you want about millenials or gen x'ers and so on, but they have every right to bitch, expected to contribute to a society that asks so much of them and doesn't make good on the return.

I need to add that I never wanted to be a mother, but somehow I'm one hell of a parent to my nephews. Nurturing was never really an instinct for me, but I do have the more masculine-edged 'protective instinct' in my favor. I was the reckless one that stood between my friend and groups of angry bullies without batting an eye. I'm less likely to kiss boo-boos, more likely to follow a wry laugh with 'you won't do that again, now, will you?' I get why women might prefer to be stay-at-home moms (stay-at-home dads, I feel you too). It's tough, handling how kids navigate through life, figuring out how to discuss these things without indoctrinating them to our own pain and struggle. It's tough just stepping outside, trying to figure out how we can not fuck things up worse or dealing with people who just don't give a shit about the world at all. To be a working parent, it's a huge mental leap between the big bad world and translating that into what it takes to introduce a kid to it without fucking them up. I'm sure some people can 'have it all'. In fact, most families I know, it's even impossible to survive if both parents don't work, so single parents are hardly enjoying the jet-setting life.

Seeing how inglorious 'having it all' was, it had always been the plan to choose a career. So yes, it was a big blow when my nephews needed a stable parent. Yet, maybe because I saw my role had the loophole of not being borne from my own body, I so stubbornly decided that I would still chase my dreams around the role of a parent. The sacrifice was that I couldn't just go get a job after college. I had to take on the unconventional sort of stay-at-home role as an artist and writer. Freelance was a headache (take note: work at home jobs are fucking exhausting. You think it's all pajamas and choosing your hours, but more often than not, it's negotiating with nasty hateful people that don't understand you have no 401K, insurance, have to pay full-price for all equipment and materials and do charge for labor). However, this meant I could focus on being available for my dad and my nephews while gaining every available opportunity to just self-educate and work on my own projects. It's not wonderful. I miss making money. I mostly spend every available dollar on fish supplies or writing supplies. My computers are on their last legs, inching up on being ten-years-old. Even though I deal with chronic pain, I'll probably have to get a shitty job within walking distance just to scrounge up enough money to replace them when they give up on me. I don't have a set dream. Secretly I hope I can make something of myself as a writer and artist, but realistically, I still have to stay sharp and look at graphic design jobs. Being a parent with a job is one thing. Being a parent with a DREAM job is another.

I'm swirling around these ideas just to warm up for another round of the 'WriMo, but I balk at the idea that women need feminism. Feminists don't need feminism. I even watched 'Feminists: What are You Thinking?' on Netflix, prepared for a cringe fest. Instead I found it delved in to the actual lives of strong women, the ideal that banding together as women wasn't about forcing society to bend but about being true to themselves and genuinely lifting each other up. You just don't see that much in modern feminism. You see women who either parrot flimsy extremist ideas or damn near excommunicating and devaluing women who don't fall into step. Women don't need another oppressive regime, least of all from other women. We need to pool our individual strengths and work WITH men to reach understanding and fair reform.

I don't need to be a feminist to understand that I, as a woman, have unique struggles. Yet I just can't prioritize it over the blanket of human rights as a whole. I can't choose atheism or my own sexuality or any categories of identity as more important than the next. They coexist within me and I'm going to prioritize them differently than you will. What is most important is carving out skills, to find some sort of independence. If not financially, then at least let me be the pioneer of my own thoughts. Least of all do we need telling people how to identify nor expecting total strangers to fall into invented vocabulary. I may not be a feminist, but clearly bodily autonomy is important to me. Opportunity is important to me. Being a woman for exactly what I am is important to me. So if I adopt a feminist issue, don't group me with every feminist issue. I have agency to pick  and choose my battles and I will damn well do so.

What we need is to stop fighting the tides and learn how to work with the ebb and flow. The ocean itself doesn't need to be anything but what it is. However, trying to dam it or still it or swim against the undertows does not make it better. The problems exist from always fighting it. We don't need to work on control, but on releasing the grip. Humans are born to certain proclivities and there's really not shit you can do about that except punish and reward; it could reform them, it could set an example. The best we can do is learn to stop valuing wealth, stop rewarding people for the shitty ways they obtain it, stop placing people in power who can't even handle their own shit well. We have too many self-serving people in power, not enough public servants. Try and correct why these attitudes are abhorrent and you'll get some smug moron pointing out that an idiot sits in the White House, as if that justifies it. Because, see? Malignant narcissists, psychopaths and morons are successful! Annnnnd that, kids, is why you CAN'T use society as a mirror for personal fulfillment! On the very, very slim chance you might actually find a loophole, you'll sooner see the underside of a more successful person's shoe kicking you back down than helping you up. By all means, find hope that you don't have to be super smart or strong or beautiful to get ahead. Shit, Trump is zero of those. Still, I hope you realize that is a very fucking unfortunate exception rather than a model that will gain you any happiness. Not being smart, beautiful or strong more often benefits from humble strengths like kindness, patience and effort. It's really dumb luck to get anywhere in life if you're dumb, ugly, weak and a lazy, impatient asshole.

Build your own ladders. Whenever possible. Even dumb-dumbs can do it and it's not beneath the geniuses either. Seriously, how many fucking seminars will you buy on FaceBook ads before you realize their 'secrets' are that they can convince gullible, desperate people to buy their seminars? Don't trust that there's an easy way up. Not a single high-paid author I like ever caught an easy break. (Keep in mind that despite success stories like Paolini, the author of Eragon, I never got into it, hence the 'I like' part. Also, the whole rich white supportive parents thing certainly didn't hurt.) We take some sick pleasure from that-- that many of our favorite artists were the 'grin-and-bear-it' sorts that bled sick and dark until stumbling on good fortune. We even learned that you need to bank on your name to continue your success, that JK Rowling was rejected as 'Robert Galbraith' (but of course revealed her game so she could capitalize on it later).

Maybe it's because of attitudes of the literary crowd towards what and how 'women' write, how traditional publishers still tokenize women with the double-edged message that women can write too, or that trad-pubbing representatives have gotten lazy about marketing period... maybe those are the reasons my old-school feminist roots are so attracted to the risks of circling the gatekeepers, pecking at the broken order of things. I'm wary of 'how things should be done.' Because the ones I admire most always proved that wrong, always got me more than those who should have. When I felt isolated from family and friends, it was books and games and movies and improving myself that paved the way to those shining nuggets of happiness. None of that was ever handed to me in neat little packages and I don't know how to trust anything that is.

I don't hate the ones that want to claim that f-word positively, by the way. How do you use your position as a 'feminist' to help others or empower yourself? Do you enforce your beliefs rigidly or allow room for discussion?