Letters to the Editor
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Good stories don't come out of someone telling the writer what to write.
Too bad for Hollywood then.
If there has ever been a greater example of "art by committee" or "art by market demand" than the current American film machine I can't think of it off the top of my head.
They make what people want to see. If enough people say, "we'd like more female protagonists" (and then buy the tickets when those films are made) there will be more female protagonists.
(Whether a particular indivdual thinks this is an "improvement" or not is neither here nor there, Anon #4,937)
Its a matter of market demand. So, you know, demand.
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Professionalism and niche markets....
"For the other poster who said that men can write stories about women just as well as women can: in some cases, that may be true. But no storywriters tell good stories about things they don't want to write about. Good stories don't come out of someone telling the writer what to write."
Most of Pixar's films are written by a number of writers, so it's hard to have the idealized vision of the artist chasing after an individual dream. Let's face it, when you're working with a group, there's a lot of compromises and changes made from anyone's original plans (this is Hollywood). But that's what being a professional is about. (I mean, if Pixar really did animate what they'd really want, it would probably be more like their odd animated shorts than their kid friendly feature length films with all the commercial toy licenses that go with them.)
Overall, Pixar can't be both artists and thus above criticism in this manner since they're chasing their artistic dreams (it's a legitmate comment on their work... they do lack 50% of the planet's population.... even Snow White had seven little men running around to balance the gender inequality), and then say they're creating movies with mostly male characters because they're making legitmate commercial choices.... Well, maybe their tastes just coincide with the commercial.
(But there's a lot to be said about your comment about more women needing to join the studio system before things change. And to do that women need to be encouraged to do this. This probably is a factor. They live in a male-dominated world in the studio, and it's something that leaks into their work.)
Arguments can be made to say that no matter how well marketed your product is, you have to expand your target audience.
Comic books in North America are written for boys, and they have a rapidly shrinking market. In the end, the genre's being save by importing stories from Japan... with an explosion in shojo (girl's) manga sales.
African Americans were neglected by publishers, and in response African American writers wrote and published their own novels, and now it's a rapidly expanding market being exploited by publishers.
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How conceited and self absorbed
do you have to be to be a female that makes up imaginary monsters from whole cloth?!?
Today's Monster: "the big bad old boy network is preventing women from something"
If women put half as much talent into actually trying to produce something as they do in making excuses for theor lack of drive or talent, then they would all be getting somewhere.
The reality is that in a free market economy, gender is one of the last things to worry about in somebody making it big in a business.
But one cannot help that women in general have less talent than do men. (this apparently seems to be the case these days, what else could it be???)
NOBODY will pay for LACK OF TALENT. I went art school. While the boys were plotting how to take over the art world, the girls were all but making doilies and macrame (and these were seriously talented girls). Women apparently just do not have the drive in them to produce and succeed like men do.
NOBODY will indulge a dilletante playing with her finger paints.
Sorry, but reality just hit you in the ass again.
God, I am sick of the excuse making of you women.
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contemporary feminism's many magic wand solutions
Women like Price should stop whining about there not being enough top women engineers, animators, and other other such professionals, and start doing it.
If women want to see more women in those fields.... we're not going to import women from mars.. they're not going to have sex changes... they gotta come from somewhere.
If Price doesn't like PIXAR movies, start a boycott. Then in another 20 years when animation is totally 100% geared towards men, and there still aren't any women in animation, who will they have to thank.
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your problem
I didn't say men can't cook, but from the culture I come from, men aren't suppose to. They actually push him away when he volunteers in the kitchen. Sad. Gender roles being enforced like that. - redfish/bluefish
Then you must come from some kinda clueless backwards un-culture.
Every culture I'm aware of across the planet has male chefs. Who are the top chefs across the world? French, Chinese, Greek, Italian, etc all have predominantly male top chefs.
Some traditional cultures discourage men from specifically _domestic_ cooking, because labor is more gender segregated into housework (female) and external work (male).
Regardless, that wouldn't effect career choice, unless he's considering becoming a domestic spouse, as being a professional chef is a totally different matter.
I think your friend's family is just stupid and that's their problem.
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Amen "ricksparks" and "Brightstar65"
I was starting to think I was losing my mind with all the insane comments in this thread. Nice to know there are other folks living in the real world.
Think about this...
Imagine someone goes to a four-star Italian restaurant and eats a delicious meal. And as that person gets up from the table to leave, (s)he asks the waiter to tell the chef that the meal was absolutely fabulous - worth every penny. But could he please consider putting eggrolls on the menu. Because, you know, eggrolls are tasty, easy to make, and a lot of people like eggrolls.
That would be a pretty dumb thing to do, wouldn't it?
If eggrolls are so important that you can't enjoy a good meal without one, you should probably stay away from restaurants that don't serve them.
Same thing goes for movies. If it's really that essential that the movies you watch have female protagonists, you shouldn't spend your time and money on films that don't (and then whine about it later). That kind of behavior is counter-productive and obnoxious.
There are a lot of restaurants out there. Take the time to study the menu before you choose where to eat.