Letters to the Editor
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I've never watched Buffy, but
I read the Harry Potter series only to find out what Hermione is up to. For the first couple of books, she solved everything. Definitely no side-kick. Then, Harry had to become a man (yawn) or the "chosen one," and all of the endings were based on his specialness (snoooooooze).
In fact, I really liked the early Harry Potter books because it seemed without all of the help from various people, Harry wouldn't defeat Voldemort. And women roles were often vital.
So I guess it depends on how you read the book. But I think a lot of these discussions that assume there is one message that people are going to get from a text (any text) dumbs down the complexity that we all use in understanding stories.
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Other books about girls
I'm surprised no one so far has mentioned His Dark Materials. The trilogy is centered around a 12 year old girl, who is definately not girly. There are also a female scientist and good witches. Of course there are also male characters inculding a human boy, a Texan pilot and an armored polar bear. The author also wrote some historical fiction with a female protagonist as well.
I remember my little sister being crazy for the American Girl series too.
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Boo Fucking Hoo
OK, this from the crowd whose idea of mature discourse is, "Don't want an abortion? Don't have one!" OK, you whiners. Don't like children's literature, films, media? Go write your own, go produce your own, go do something better than what you're whining about that out there now. Otherwise, STFU, because so far you're a statistically immensurable sliver of a minority. Every time I take my daughters to a movie or Disneyland I see lots and lots of girls there, having a great time. Maybe you're the ones missing the boat.
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The Snow Queen, and an interest in girls
I saw an animated movie of The Snow Queen in the late 50's (the movie was released in 1957). From the IMDb I just learned to my surprise that it was a Russian movie, and that Sandra Dee spoke the voice of Gerda in English. Funny, I don't remember the live-action prologue with Art Linkletter at all. But it was a very good movie; somebody ought to release it on DVD (without the prologue).
But back to your comments, Anonymous: why is it that a boy will turn into a girl if he doesn't avoid the female in all things? And why doesn't it work the other way?
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I don't know why so many inist upon misreading what i said: I never said anyone would turn INTO a girl
I said that males have to prove themselves to females in order to have sex and females do not have to prove themselves to males in any comparable way and that this need creates a motive to demonstrate abilities that girls don't have. In fact it seems to me that all this "turn into a girl" talk indicates that everyone is VERY familiar with what I am talking about even if they choose to pretend that the whole thing is a social fabrication.
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Do they do it for females?
What about the gay guys who want to be more butch than thou? Are they trying to impress females? And what about Lestat's point that a woman won't scorn you for reading Jane Austen instead of Tom Clancy? And what about the common observation that boys have the least interest in anything girly at about the same age when they're least interested in impressing girls?
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When I first read you post I thought you said gay girls more butch than thou
which is a perfect illustration of what I was talking about. I've never seen a gay guy who wanted to BE butch, I've seen a lot of them who wanted to successfully display a butch STYLE which isn't the same thing. As I've said before I'm talking about instinctive programming so it's natural that it would manifest most strongly at key points in development and would not be entirley erased by awareness of present circumstances. The fact that the attitude becomes less pronounced (or at least less obvious) with time is just more indication that we're talking about something innate.
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My ex...
collected Barbie dolls. He liked cooking. He hung out mostly with feminists and gay men. He idolized butt-kicking women like Xena.
He also liked motorcycles, fast cars, leather jackets, and martial arts weaponry.
Most men who met him thought he was gay. But the women weren't fooled -- or driven off. While he was dating *me* he had flings with at least a dozen other women, including a wealthy Russian grad student studying finance, a woman his mom's age, an 18-year-old when he was 25, and a crazy stalker, which somehow didn't manage to put him off the concept of sleeping around. Oh, and he got to have a threesome with two bi chicks. Neither of whom, unfortunately, were me.
Newsflash: being interested in things that normally only women are interested in DOES NOT HURT your chances of getting laid, guys. It IMPROVES them. Haven't you ever read romance novels? Women want men who are just manly enough to make the women feel attracted to them, but with enough feminine traits that the woman can identify with them and she can imagine getting her own emotional needs satisfied by him. (In fact the biggest problem in my relationship with my ex wasn't the sleeping around; it was that I have a traditionally male attitude toward love and romance, ie, what's the point to saying it if you show it and who the hell needs flowers anyway, whereas he had the high-maintenance emotional needs most commonly seen in women.)
Men struggle to differentiate themselves from women because of a need in their *own* psyches, not because it helps them get laid. Being a little more feminine would actually help most guys. But the important thing, the all-important thing, in fact probably the only thing that matters, is self-confidence and liking yourself as who you are. The reason women don't like "nice" guys is not that "nice" guys are effeminate but that "nice" guys are pushovers who don't stand up for themselves or seem to be confident in themselves. Taking your girl out to the occasional chick flick and actually letting yourself understand and enjoy it will only improve your chance to get in her pants. (Unless she hates chick flicks. In which case she probably has some other hobby you could enjoy with her.) The frequent repetition here from guys of the idea that if men don't reject everything feminine women won't sleep with them is just as stupid as the female belief that if you aren't anorexic men won't sleep with you; men don't like fat women, but are less sensitive to what is considered "fat" than women are, and women don't like super-effeminate men (as boyfriends, anyway) but are not nearly as sensitive to the idea that certain things are girly and taint masculinity as the guys are.
Try getting into stuff that seems traditionally feminine. Your guy friends may laugh at you or call you gay, but you'll be stealing their girlfriends, so what do you care?