Doctor Who fandom: where multiple intelligent women is ZOMGMISOGYNY!

[lizbee]

Quote that turned up on my Tumblr dash yesterday:

“What Doctor Who character do you think of when I describe this: “She is a beautiful, smart, teasing, flirty, confident woman who can do things the Doctor can’t”. Did you think of Amy Pond, Sally Sparrow, or River Song? Or did you think of the new character in this episode, who is exactly the same as all of these other characters? Objectively bad writing. She already has that idolising look, self-described genius to boot … I’m sick of this. You can just picture Moffat salivating. “A WOMAN! A brilliant sexy WOMAN! HOW EXCITING!”

(source)

Guys, I have a confession to make.

I, too, salivate at the thought of brilliant, sexy female characters.

I mean, not literally, but it makes me pretty happy.

I know. I'm sorry.

Worse, I also don't think that Amy, Sally, River or Oswin are interchangeable, on account of how they all have different personalities, manners of speech and ... are different. (Said weaver: "I keep forgetting that you’re only allowed to have one confident and successful woman per show. Silly old me.")

(I am reminded of the time someone kindly informed me that it is offensive to portray River as having a career and a personal life, because it's unrealistic. Sorry, girls, back in your boxes -- either get a divorce or quit your jobs, but stop trying to have even part of it all!)

Incidentally, when you say, "She is a beautiful, smart, teasing, flirty, confident woman who can do things the Doctor can't," this is who I think of first:

Comments

[wolfy_writing]

I'm also kind of bothered by the increasing Doctor-centeredness of River's story. I mean some of it's things that I'd be fine with if it wasn't combined with all of the other stuff, but there's more and more of it, and I'd really like more indications of her having a life that's her own.

And that's very different from "How dare she be so awesome?" (Or "It's unrealistic for her to have a relationship and a life!", which is weird because "Has an archeology career and a husband" is one of the few things about her that's actually possible.)

[aberration]

Yep, those are basically my feelings. And I would like to see more indications of River having her own life, at least beyond me thinking it and going "lalalal I can't hear you!!!" to canon.

The 'unrealistic' thing just boggles me, though. This is fucking Doctor Who. If I want a renegade time-and-space traveling archeologist alienish lady whose marriage to a time-traveling alien basically involves her randomly dropping in to make snarky comments at him, I can have that, dammit.

[wolfy_writing]

Yeah. I mean we got a bit with her getting her degree and having a career, but even then, there's the "This way I can track the Doctor!" aspect.

If someone only wants to watch realistic and plausible things, why would they watch Doctor Who?