hatred of female characters and "Mary-Sues"

[vegablack]

I read this quote in a blog by the author Justine Larbalestier who was writing about female readers hatred of the girl characters:

"Sarah Rees Brennan has written about this phenomenon most eloquently:

Let us think of the Question of Harry Potter. I do not mean to bag on the character of Harry Potter: I am very fond of him.

But I think people would be less fond of him if he was Harriet Potter. If he was a girl, and she’d had a sad childhood but risen above it, and she’d found fast friends, and been naturally talented at her school’s only important sport, and saved the day at least seven times. If she’d had most of the boys in the series fancy her, and mention made of boys following her around admiring her. If the only talent she didn’t have was dismissed by her guy friend who did have it. If she was often told by people of her numerous awesome qualities, and was in fact Chosen by Fate to be awesome.

Well, then she’d be just like Harry Potter, but a girl. But I don’t think people would like her as much."

This started me thinking about the hatred of Ginny, which often revolves around her popularity with boys, and her perceived skill at Quidditch. Larbelestier claims female fans judge her female characters more harshly than they do her male. Do you think this is true?

Is the above description fair? Would Harriet Potter be considered a Mary-Sue. Would readers hate her? Is Harry a Gary-Sue?

Is the only difference between the hero and a Sue is the skill of the writer?

[dancingpony]

To a certain extent, the difference IS the skill of the writer . . . perhaps the skill of the writer in making the character "three dimensional" . . . someone readers identify with and love despite his/her flaws . . . instead of a one dimensional "perfect" person. No one could ever claim that Harry is perfect, could they?

[MWPP]

There are some basic, Universal if you will, tenets that are valid throughout all human cultures. The Male Priciple is outgoing, Female is Receptive. Male is active, Female passive.

Harry had to be Harry (male). The style of action needed to be Male, and in some ways, to reach his desired goal he had to absorb the wisdom of the Female and sacrifice himself.


As to the "hatred" of female characters, it has to do with JKR tending to write females down a bit. It takes her quite a while (several books) to write any of them with respect. An example is treating Hermione's hair as a deficit. Curly/bushy hair is beautiful if you think it is, but JKR writes it as a negative until late in the series when it ceases to be commented about. Look at how many times it is mentioned up to book 4 or 5, and how little in 6 and 7. JKR seemed to be perfecting her craft and growing herself from the early books (which were a bit elementary) to the later ones which were much more complex and rounded (even if she did jam too much into the later ones instead of creating additional books so that things would flow more smoothly).

Ginny also gets short shrift. She is ojectified, part of the scenery, again until late in the series.

Another factor is the general age/developmental stage of the readers. Most filter their reading through their own pre-conceived "ships" and continue the objectification through those predjudices. [It works the same psychologically with the House choices, where most readers want to be Gryffindors. If sorted into another House at a fan site they go through a lot of predictable stages before coming to terms with it. There are all the mechanations to justify their own sorting into Slytherin by trying to make Draco a good person when JKR has plainly written him as the epitome of selfish spoiled rich kid. And the snarky responses developed due to having been told they are negative by implication. Etc.]

[birdg]

As to the "hatred" of female characters, it has to do with JKR tending to write females down a bit. It takes her quite a while (several books) to write any of them with respect.

I disagree completely. Both with the idea that JKR doesn't write the characters with respect and the idea that it's writing to blame.

I've been in other fandoms and watched them from afar and the hatred for female characters is near universal. Fandom, like the rest of society, is sexist and misogynistic.

treating Hermione's hair as a deficit. Curly/bushy hair is beautiful if you think it is, but JKR writes it as a negative until late in the series when it ceases to be commented about.

Er, I don't think that has anything to do with Hermione or JKR thinking curly hair is ugly but 1.) How Harry views her hair and 2.) JKR trying to give the characters humorous and distinctive physical traits. Dudley is described as being very fat, Ron is tall with a long nose, Snape has a big nose and greasy hair, Draco has a pale and pointed face, Umbridge looks like a toad, Luna has protuberant eyes, and Hermione has frizzy hair.

here are some basic, Universal if you will, tenets that are valid throughout all human cultures. The Male Priciple is outgoing, Female is Receptive. Male is active, Female passive.

Harry had to be Harry (male). The style of action needed to be Male, and in some ways, to reach his desired goal he had to absorb the wisdom of the Female and sacrifice himself.

I disagree with this too. It sounds like it's based on Jung and Joesph Campbell and while they have brilliant ideas, they were only analyzing the work available to them which, surprisingly, only featured men as adventurous heroes.

It's a tautology to suggest that only men can be protagonists because only men have been protagonists.

Anyway, I think it's kind of funny that Justine Larbalestier quotes Sarah Rees Brennan aka Mistful since Mistful was rather faily when writing female characters, especially Hermione and Ginny.

That said, Mistful does have a point there. Harriet Potter would absolutely be considered a Sue. People considered Hermione and (more often) Ginny Sues and neither of them are as magically powerful or have as much happen to them as Harry does.

Harry, like most male characters, does push the Gary Stu envelope but I don't think he is one for the same reason Hermione and Ginny aren't - they're all shown to have flaws, shortcomings and things they are flat-out wrong about.

Female characters are usually hated for three reasons:

1.) They're held to unreasonable standards. They should be beautiful but not too beautiful or else they're vain bimbos or Mary Sues. They should be accessible to whatever male fancies them/male that the reader identifies with. If they're not they're stuck-up or a tramp. They should be likable and kind to everyone but not boring or a doormat. They should be smart and athletic but again not too much so or they'll be a Mary Sue. Being exceptional in any way is a sign of a Mary Sue and not being exceptional in every way is the sign of a deeply flawed character who could never be an equal to the male character.

2.) Shipping. Most people who hate Ginny do so because they wanted it to be Harry/Hermione or Harry/Luna or Harry/Draco. And it's not just that way with Ginny. I've seen people bash Hermione because it's not Ron/Pansy or Fleur because it's not Bill/Tonks or Asteria because it's not Draco/Anyone Else.

They always claim it's for other reasons but in the same breath will say Neville/Ginny or Theo/Asteria or Viktor/Fleur would be great. But the character hasn't changed, only the ship has. It's all about getting her out of the way.

3.) Society's own sexism and misogyny. Most people cannot view female characters as characters in their own right even when given as much depth as a male character. Ginny may not be as well-written as Harry or Ron but she's certainly on par with Seamus. In the same fandom that can wax poetic about how Draco has ~hidden depths~ doing the same for Ginny or any other female character shouldn't be that difficult. But, it's rarely done.

Female characters exist to prop up the male characters, to give birth to them and to raise them, to be love interests or obstacles to removed or ignored but never as people.

[queenie]

Oct 24, 2009 1:29:10 GMT -5 MWPP said:

As to the "hatred" of female characters, it has to do with JKR tending to write females down a bit. It takes her quite a while (several books) to write any of them with respect.

What? You mean people like McGonagall, Hermione, and Lily? If you ask me, the female character who got the least respect was Tonks, but that's purely based on what happened in book seven (with which I take many issues already), and since so much of her conflict and story was off-screen, it makes her development look unnatural and forced.

And possibly Merope Gaunt, with the whole "she wouldn't stay alive for her own son?" "No, she never had your mother's courage" bit.

[MWPP]

Dudley is described as being very fat, Ron is tall with a long nose, Snape has a big nose and greasy hair, Draco has a pale and pointed face, Umbridge looks like a toad, Luna has protuberant eyes, and Hermione has frizzy hair.

Look at the quick adjectives you chose for allthe females here (Ignore the truely negative characters, Umbridge is supposed to be repulsive) -
Luna's eyes. There are so many possible positive ways to describe her, she's quite beautiful and gentle in so many ways, and wise beyond her years. Instead the more negative quality comes to mind first because JKR wrote her down a bit.

I disagree with this too. It sounds like it's based on Jung and Joesph Campbell and while they have brilliant ideas, they were only analyzing the work available to them which, surprisingly, only featured men as adventurous heroes.

It's a tautology to suggest that only men can be protagonists because only men have been protagonists. ]/quote]

There is nothing in what I said about "only men (being) protagonists". What I said was that Harry had to be male due to needing to be an active outgoing/outreaching hero.
The old Myths didn't have only male protagonists, they simpley illustrated Universal principles. A great example of this is getting Golden Fleece. Jason, the male, had to go conquer obastacles and was fairly aggressive in doing so, whereas Psyche, the female, when set to the same task, waited until the sheep had run through thorn bushes then passively collected the wool from the thorns. Both protagonists collected the golden fleece as the Gods demanded. but the styles of doing it epitomized Universal male and female principles.

What? You mean people like McGonagall, Hermione, and Lily?

Exactly!
In the early books McGonagall is fairly uni-dimentional. It isn't until the last couple books that we see her as more than a stiff distant teacher (with the exception of one 20-second show of emotion when Harry and Ron lie to her when Hermione has been petrified by the basilisk). In later books her personality blooms, she shows more sides of herself and Harry's respect for her grows. She is much more positively portrayed later in the series than early on.
Or Lily - she's a plot device until at least Book Four, possibly later.

I stand by the statement that JKR wrote the female characters down until the last couple books.

[vegablack]

McGonagall had very interesting depths from book one or two on. In Book One she goes from the intimidating teacher to the teacher who moves heaven and earth to get Harry on the Quidditch team to buying Harry a special broom. She docks her own students more than Draco for the same crime. She is willing to dock Harry and company quite high amounts of points for their wrongdoing hurting her own house. She's shown to be more than just an intimidating teacher. She's fair, believes in holding to standards even when it hurts, is harder on her own students to improve them than others, is mad over Quidditch and is willing to do things slightly outside the rules for the sport. In book two she gets tears in her eyes over the thought that the boys were going to visit Hermione in the hospital. So we see her as a bit sentimental.

Harry is only eleven and is the point of view character. It's natural for him to have a limited view of McGonagall. How deep was your understanding of your teachers when you were eleven?

What was James in the early books? How can Harry gain any understanding of a mother he never knew? It makes sense that his understanding becomes more nuanced with time.

Luna may have a lovely soul, but why do we need to think she is physically beautiful? And on what basis would we do so? The actress who plays her in the movie is lovely, but why would we think the character was anymove than averagely attractive. Why would she need to be? Why is it bad to describe a female character as having unattractive physical qualities? Can't a great female character have ugly hair or a long nose or be overweight? Why would that be wrong for the author to write her so? I have very frizzy hair, much like Hermione's is described. Without a lot of work it is unmanageable. I was remineded of myself when I read Hermione. What is wrong with anyone thinking Hermione has unattractive hair? Can't she still be a great character?

[queenie]

Nov 7, 2009 21:38:15 GMT -5 vegablack said:

McGonagall had very interesting depths from book one or two on.

She was the very first member of the wizarding world we met - someone who could turn into a cat at will, and who waited on a stone fence all day and most of the night to make sure she heard the truth from a man she respected. We saw her emotional reaction to James and Lily's deaths, and to Harry's abandonment at the Dursleys. Even from when she opened the doors to admit in the First-Years, we knew there was more to her than some stern teacher.

[vegablack]

Good points Queenie.

[Author By Night]

I wonder if there'd be more romance for "Harriet." I'm thinking about other heroines - Bella Swan (Twilight), Buffy Summers, (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) Ayla (Earth's Children), and all of them are women with romance plotlines for a good amount of the time, if not all of the time. And yet male heroes don't seem as likely to end up having romantic plotlines - perhaps sexual ones, but not actual romance ones. Dean Winchester of Superatural, Luke Skywalker of Star Wars, and Harry... all of them have had minimal romantic plotlines. Even Harry's relationship with Ginny is pretty much off-screen. Now, that's my limit as far as romance in action/fantasy stories go (and EC isn't so much fantasy anyway as it is historical fiction), but that did just occur to me.

She was the very first member of the wizarding world we met - someone who could turn into a cat at will, and who waited on a stone fence all day and most of the night to make sure she heard the truth from a man she respected. We saw her emotional reaction to James and Lily's deaths, and to Harry's abandonment at the Dursleys. Even from when she opened the doors to admit in the First-Years, we knew there was more to her than some stern teacher.

Absolutely, though I don't think Harry acknowledge that until OoTP. He doesn't even know that she was watching for him while the rest of the world was celebrating his parents' deaths. Come to think of it, that makes for great fanfic opportunities...

[starsea]

Nov 11, 2009 9:39:04 GMT -5 Author By Night said:

Absolutely, though I don't think Harry acknowledge that until OoTP. He doesn't even know that she was watching for him while the rest of the world was celebrating his parents' deaths. Come to think of it, that makes for great fanfic opportunities...

I think it's a bit harsh to say that the rest of the world was 'celebrating his parents' deaths'. Vernon hears people mentioning the Potters and while he doesn't dare stay to hear more, I'm sure people were shocked and saddened by their deaths.

[queenie]

Not celebrating his parents' death, certainly, but their first priority was celebrating Voldemort's downfall, which they saw as being for once and for all. Even Daedalus Diggle was shooting stars off in Kent - though that could have been a tribute to the Potters as much as a celebration. The wizarding world is small, but the Potters couldn't have been friends with everyone. However, Voldemort was everyone's enemy.

[Author By Night]

Exactly, Queenie. I don't think anyone was actually celebrating the James and Lily's deaths, perhaps that was a wee bit harsh, but they were so focused on the fact that Voldemort was gone. Don't get me wrong, I understand, but I think it's saying something that while they were celebrating Voldemort's "defeat" and Harry being a hero, McGonagall was waiting for him to arrive safely. Heck, she even tried to get Dumbledore not to leave Harry with the Dursleys. McGonagall was always Harry's protector, but Harry never knew it.

And this is giving me way too many fanfic ideas.

[starsea]

Nov 14, 2009 17:23:33 GMT -5 Author By Night said:

while they were celebrating Voldemort's "defeat" and Harry being a hero, McGonagall was waiting for him to arrive safely. Heck, she even tried to get Dumbledore not to leave Harry with the Dursleys. McGonagall was always Harry's protector, but Harry never knew it.

Which makes her refusal to sign his Hogsmeade permission form even more poignant because she KNOWS what his relatives are like!

[vegablack]

To a certain extent, the difference IS the skill of the writer . . . perhaps the skill of the writer in making the character "three dimensional" . . . someone readers identify with and love despite his/her flaws . . . instead of a one dimensional "perfect" person. No one could ever claim that Harry is perfect, could they?

Yes, Dancing Pony I think skill is the major issue. Harry especially in the early books could be considered a gary-sue. There's much about his character in the first book that satisfies wish-fulfillment of the reader: he's a Quidditch star for goodness sake.

Yet the first book is so well written we don't care. (Harry's flaws don't start showing up till later.) If a fanfic writer were to write an amateur version of Harry we would all consider him a stu.

Lily has a lot of Mary Sue qualities, yet JKR does let us see her flaws, in Snape's worst memory scene especially, but again we don't really see them till the later books.

I'm coming to the conclusion that most leads in an adventure story are Sues, just very well written sues.

[queenie]

Dec 6, 2009 1:32:24 GMT -5 vegablack said:

Harry especially in the early books could be considered a gary-sue. There's much about his character in the first book that satisfies wish-fulfillment of the reader: he's a Quidditch star for goodness sake.

I don't think so. In the first book Harry's main flaw is his ignorance of the world around him and his uncertainty about what to do next. He's just finding stuff out. We have less of his own internal struggles because the first book is more about his discovery of the world, and we discover with him. CoS sees him deal with real unpopularity, and his lack of tactfulness, and his need to go risking his neck for those he cares about. In other words, CoS is where his real flaws come into light.

Now, even in PS/SS, he may be a Quidditch star, but he has to fight for popularity in even measure - after he is caught with Hermione & Neville and loses 150 points for Gryffindor, he is reviled by three-quarters of the school. With Harry, popularity is never in halfsies.

A real Stu (like Bella Swan) would have everyone adoring the protagonist at once and forever unless they're completely and utterly villainous (which Malfoy is, but we allow that because a school story isn't complete without a good rival.)

[birdg]

In the first book Harry's main flaw is his ignorance of the world around him and his uncertainty about what to do next.

Those aren't flaws. He can't help not knowing about this new world.

Flaws would be his anger and tendency to lash out at people, Draco's racism and arrogance, Hermione's bossiness and tendency to think she always knows what's right and so on and so forth.

[vegablack]

I felt the first book especially acted as a kind of wish-fulfillment fantasy for a child reader. Harry discovers he's a wizard and can do magic, not just any wizard but one with a special past and perhaps its hinted a destiny. He is a star at the school's only sport and is sought after by older children because of it. He's fearless and is placed in the house most attractive to many of the readers, the house accorded the most status by the author. Hermione calls it the "best house." Every one accords him special attention even Snape (negative attention, but still attention).

He turns out to be a gifted flyer of brooms without knowing it. He's rich and can buy things without ever worrying about cost. He owns the coolest pet and the best broom. He owns a magical object that no one else has -- his invisibiltiy cloak. (Not to mention the marauder map later.) He has private meetings with the headmaster and is promoted as the team seeker by the house head as well.

Yes after losing the points he is a pariah for a time. That supplies some plot and tension to the story and makes it a functional story as opposed to an extended day dream, but in the end after defeating an evil wizard who has been overlooked by even the adults, he wins back all the points he lost and is a huge hero, cheered by almost the entire school.

You don't get much more wish fulfilling for a child than that.

JKR once said that Harry had made himself cool. This remark amused me, because of course Harry didn't make himself cool she did. She gave him two attributes that really help to be cool in child world. Money and opportunity to buy the most sought after brooms, pets, clothes etc. and the athletic talent to be a Qidditch star. (She even implies that he is good looking when he's a teenager.) It's very common for the class star athlete who has the money to buy cool things and is good looking to be considered cool. Really coolness is his to lose.

It's interesting that Ron is tall and Ginny is short, how convenient that genetics didn't go the other way. Ron could have been short for a boy and Ginny tall and gawky for a girl, but then would Ron have been sought after by Lavender and readers and would Ginny have been considered attractive? (I will admit to personal experience here. I'm six feet -- tall for a woman. This was not a desired trait in my youth. My husband is 5'6 short for an AMerican man, also not a popular physical attribute. ) I was amused that of course Ron had to inherit the height in his family and of course Ginny the girl did not. Would she have been desirable girl-friend material by the standards of what was cool if she'd been taller than Harry? I doubt it. But the genes to be tall was still in the family, they just conveniently avoided Ginny.

[queenie]

birdg, when I said flaws, what I meant were the qualities that keep Harry from being an utter Gary Stu in the first book. Of course his anger and tendency to lash out and act rashly count against him, but... okay, you're right, I misued the word flaw entirely.

vegablack, I fail to see what money has to do with Harry's popularity.

First of all, Harry never actually bought a broomstick McGonagall either dipped into the school funds or into Harry's family vault to buy him the Nimbus 2000. Sirius Black purchased the Firebolt for Harry out of his own account. Harry never buys anything - unless it's little treats for himself like a Zonko's Joke shop bag or candy on the Hogwarts Express - which he immediately shares with Ron. He rarely used his money for any personal gain, least of all for his popularity's sake.

No one seems to know how rich Harry is - the only people who go about bragging about how rich they are are the Malfoys. Since Hogwarts has uniforms the idea of buying the top-notch fashions is pretty pointless. Harry never tried to be popular - just to be generally well-liked would be a huge plus over the Dursleys. He talks about Cho Chang - probably the most popular girl in Ravenclaw - as being out of his league. It's not until Book Six that he gains any cred with the ladies, and he doesn't even really appreciate that.

And I cannot remember any place where Ginny is described as being short. Her height seems to be kind of moot. If she's the same height as Harry that puts her on the tall side of girls - but Harry wouldn't notice, because she's his same height. Her height just never becomes an issue. And height in her family seems to correlate with plumpness - witness Charlie and the twins, who are both described as short and stocky (James and Oliver Phelps notwithstanding). If that had ever been mentioned, then the vitriol spun about her character on the hatedom sites would definitely have mentioned it.

[vegablack]

Money is an aid to popularity. Harry doens't have to endure in the wizard world the type of situation that
Ron is in where he has to where Robes that make people laugh at him.

I didn't say he bought his two broomsticks. I said he had two of the best broomsticks. I didn't say how he got them. However he got them they are a desired object that he owns and fit with the idea of wish fulfillment. What kid doesn't want the best of what ever item isn;t the desired one for his school and agegroup? This is about the readers reactions -- wishfulfillment for themselves.

People don't have to know Harry is rich for it to help him. He lives with the results. He can have the best of what he needs new robes when Ron can't for instance.

Besides the money issue was just one point among many.

As to Ginny being short I might be remembering wrong. Doesn't one of the twins say of her that size has nothing to do with power and uses her as an example?

The Lexicon says this about her size : "the short Weasley variation (like the twins rather than Ron). " That line may have given me the idea.


I don't think this is all a bad thing. I thought it was genius when I read the first book. I thought a child would love to read about a kid who satisfies their deepest fantasies and desires this way.

And Harry doesn't start to be interesting to girls till he's at an age where he would want to be and when he doesn want to be he gets to go out with the prettiest girl in the school.

He's second girl friend is described as being very popular.