Letters to the Editor
alarajrogers
Published Letters: 449 Editor's Choice: 87
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Sigh. How, uh, timely. Not.
[Read the article: Science fiction for women]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]In *1986*, for a school project I did an analysis of currently available science fiction and fantasy novels by author sex, by going down to Waldenbooks, counting up all the books, and assessing the sex of the author (male, female or unknown).
At that time, something like 70% of all fantasy fiction and 30% of all science fiction on the bookshelf that day was written by women. I suspect the stats now, if anything, have moved to favor more female-written sf.
It is not exactly news that women read, write and enjoy science fiction. For many years, the teen market has been dominated by science fiction and fantasy, and the majority of teens who read books at *all* are girls. I, personally, have never read the work of Lidda Bray, or any science fiction which features corsets (fantasy, yes, sf, no), but it is certainly true that science fiction and fantasy can (and do) portray societies that are sexually egalitarian, female-dominated, or simply have completely different assumptions about sex and gender than our society. (Mercedes Lackey's fantasies featured the Triad Goddess archetype -- Maiden, Mother and Crone -- as a Tetrad with "Warrior" added... in the early 1990's. And Mercedes Lackey has *never* been cutting edge.)
Here's a newsflash. Women like science fiction! Also, we watch Star Trek, and Farscape, and Battlestar Galactica! And (gasp) we READ COMIC BOOKS! And we've done these things since at *least* the mid-80's!
Newsweek being way behind the curve in an understanding of women and pop culture hardly surprises me, but the "golly gee whiz, us girls really like this stuff!" attitude from, of all people, a *Salon* writer is just plain ridiculous. I mean, where was Page Rockwell when Salon did critical analyses of Buffy, Xena or Battlestar Galactica? SF hasn't been a boys' world since the early 90's, fantasy hasn't been since the late *70's*, and the condescending "oh, sci-fi is for geeky boys" attitude from women is crap I thought I had gotten away from when I graduated high school.
Perhaps next we will be treated to another newsflash: Men like stories about women who kick butt! A brand new trend that's only been known about since Aliens and Terminator 2 came out! Or perhaps we'll hear about this brand new trend for women to fall for sexy smart men on TV, like perhaps Mr. Spock! That one's only about forty years old; surely if Newsweek doesn't devote an article to it Broadsheet could talk about it!