Strong Female Characters · 2:16am Feb 15th, 2014
My Little Pony has a lot of in-your-face ladies. Since most of the cast is female that's to be expected, but why don't we take a closer look?
Rainbow Dash and Applejack are clearly the sterotypical take-charge type of characters that this trope probably goes for. They are both tomboyish and less girly than the rest.
But is "butch-feminist-don't-need-no-man" the definition of strong female? Let's look at at a few examples of another type of character. Rarity is very girly, but she threatened to tear some dragons apart if they hurt Spike. Twilight Sparkle is a princess, has a pretty tiara, and loves books, but she's pretty much the most magically powerful pony anywhere.
Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy don't fit the same mold. Pinkie is random and silly. Fluttershy is a doormat. But we can argue that they are both well developed, high quality characters that are capable of driving their own storylines.
Yes, this means we have to define "Strong Female Character." Is it a strong female personality, or a strong character who happens to be female?
Here's a quote from Neil Gaiman:
"I always feel like the wrong person to be asked when I get asked that question because people say, ‘Well how do you write such good female characters?’ And I go, ‘Well I write people.’ Approximately half of the people I know are female and they’re cool, and they’re interesting, and so, why wouldn’t I? I think the big thing to point out to people is, you know, possibly they should go and hang around with some women. And also, it’s worth pointing out that people, unfortunately, misunderstand the phrase ‘strong women.’ The glory of Buffy the Vampire Slayer is it was filled with strong women. Only one of those strong women had supernatural strength and an awful lot of sharpened stakes. And people sort of go ‘Well yes, of course Buffy was a strong woman. She could kick her way through a door.’ And you go ‘No, well that’s not actually what makes her a strong woman! You’re missing the point.’"
Writing what you see in reality should be a good starting place for developing characters. Everyone has flaws and strengths. Richard Nixon did illegal things in the Watergate scandal, but he sent the United States to the moon and got us out of Vietnam. Genghis Khan killed millions of people, but you can't take over most of the world without seriously good military skills. Those examples are pretty extreme, but the point is that nobody in real life is ever truly without detail to flesh out their character.
Strong characters are important. Their gender is another matter. People are sexist. We make a big deal out of things. The first woman to do anything is lauded on the news and there are more than a billion internet search results for the phrase "first female." The media skews things unrealistically.
Guys have a save the girl mentality. This is fuel for the damsel in distress trope. A damsel in distress, if she could be easily replaced with an object to be saved, comes across as flat and uninteresting. Instead of being objectified, your female characters have to do something. Hermione, from the Harry Potter series, is a fine example of a strong character. Ron and Harry once had to rescue her from a troll, however, that wasn't her only contribution to the series. She wasn't just a damsel to be rescued.
Nobody talks about strong male characters. There are not many "dude in distress" stories, probably because they would be criticized as feminist by the media. This doesn't seem right. Equality is a two-way street.
An often-quoted standard of female equality is the Bechdel Test, which originated from Alison Bechdel, the creater of the comic Dykes To Watch Out For:
I think we can all agree that Ellen Ripley is a strong female character.
To summarize: the story being tested has to have at least two women who have a conversation that is about something other than men. This is a loose set of rules that establishes female characters as something other than a plot point. Another test is the Mako Mori Test, named after the character in the movie Pacific Rim. It states that a story has to have at least one female character who gets her own narrative arc that is not about supporting a man’s story.
Neither of these two tests is perfect. The Bechdel Test started out as a joke. The Mako Mori Test is failed by the very movie it was inspired by. Only about half of modern movies pass the Bechdel Test, and only about one in five pass both tests. Still, the tests can give an indication of having interesting, useful female characters while while the story itself can be something not girly at all - like Pacific Rim's epic robot fights.
Ultimately, that's the best takeaway from this. To be a strong character, they can't be useless in the story - no matter what the story is. Strong female characters have a slightly different set of rules to play by, modern gender relations being what they are, but they are strong characters first, female second.
Going too far can result in an unrealistic, unlikable Mary Sue character who unbalances the story just by being there. There's nothing wrong with a female badass, but she has to have a personality to go with it.
So where does this leave us for My Little Pony? The Mane 6 are all female. Some are more Action Girl than others, but all are vital to the story. Someone did their homework to establish a group of personalities that balance and complement each other, and feel real (if, admittedly, slightly more exaggerated than real life)
Write what you know. Write who you know. There's no better way to create strong characters than portraying the real people in your life - not gender stereotypes.
This was originally posted as a love note to my wife. She would not be a very good character. She's unbelievably flawless.
And oh yeah, today is my two year anniversary of joining FIMFiction
happy anniversary and thanks for making me feel better about being a girl and knowing im not the only person who hates the "guy must save girl, girl is defenseless and needs saving, princess" trope. Pretty much the reason I dislike Mario games...Peach always gets kidnapped, which makes no sense.
Touching on a very interesting subject my friend, and honestly one that there will be many different opinions on. The main book series I follow has the main character as a strong female character, I write strong female characters. But as you said about the Sues the main thing is that can't always be strong, and it's not because they are women but it's because they are a person. And a person has weaknesses, or when reality hits break down a cry. Unfortunately... no there is no need to go there CP, that would bring about madness...Sorry I have Frozen on the brain thus Disney as well so you can probably guess at a bit at what I really don't want to say.
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Also happy 2 years
She is totally not watching your screen while you type.
...I favorited this blog post. Like, not even in Fimfiction, just in my bookmarks. I intend to throw this at people next time my friends get talking about strong female characters. They told me I was crazy-- but if someone on the internet agrees with me, I HAVE to be right!
Seriously though, I've had this discussion with too many people, and I don't think they were ever quite convinced. Loved the Neil Gaiman quote.
One thing though:
The Bechdel Test is not a good test. It's not meant to be. It's a gag. A joke. It's not a good thing that so many movies fail, but it's not meant to actually test a film's "feminist score" or whatever.
I mean, when you actually start thinking about it as a means of telling whether a movie has strong female characters, it's a way of telling whether or not a movie has a villain who's a man, or the main character is a man.
I mean, a few very misogynistic films actually pass the Bechdel test, while many films that actually have strong female characters fail.
PASSES: Manos: The Hands of Fate, Bikini Car Wash Company
FAILS: The Godfather, Star Wars, Terminator 2, Citizen Kane, debatably Alien (The titular alien is genderless)
...Sorry, just had to get that out of my system.
EDIT: Oh, and, there's a much better test for finding strong female characters, the Mako Mori test (Named after the character from Pacific Rim, which fails). The test goes "Must have at least one female character with a narrative arc that doesn't exist solely to support a man's narrative arc".
Awwwww. That last line is so sweet!
1835980 I think that there is no truly perfect test for strong women but The Bechdel Test and the Mako Mori test aren't bad for generally gauging things.
I am interested to hear how you mean the only purpose of the Bechdel test is to see if the main character or villain is male. I mean I can see that fact skewing things but I'm not sure I totally understand.
Also congrats on the two year and nice valentine for your lady. It suits you well.
Woah now, no need to hate so lividly on Purplesmart fans!
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I'm saying the only purpose it could realistically serve is to gauge whether or not the female characters in the movie have a large amount of males to talk about. The villain or main character is a male?
Well, then they would be talking about that, after all, if a film were to take time away from the central plot to talk about something totally unrelated to the main plot or conflict, without any reason to do so, it's a bad film.
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Hey guys. I just updated this blog. Some people have shown interest in posting it elsewhere, so I'm putting more effort into making it better. I'd love your suggestions on how to improve.
Neil Gaiman is always great with insight like that. Joss Whedon has some brilliant words as well.
(Skip to 3:30, and make sure to listen to the end.)
Also, because the title is so apropos, check out Strong Female Protagonist
1841367 I looked at the updates and it looks quite solid to me. I somewhat question the useless to the story line though. I think the character could be strong but still be completely useless to the story. If you put them in a situation they have no knowledge or experience or simply are unable to assist. But definitely likely a bit simpler to lean towards that rule.
I'm trying to recall other folks who've said interesting things on strong female characters and while I can recall plenty, I can't necessarily recall the sources.
Either way, I think you've acquitted yourself well and can be proud of your words.