I have a bone to pick with the “feminists” of the world regarding the subject of the Strong Female Character. I have been growing increasingly frustrated at the portrayal of the Strong Female Character for a while now, but this frustration bubbled over after reading some of the “feminist” criticism thrown at Joss Whedon in response to the new Avengers: Age of Ultron film.
In the film, Natasha Romanov (the ex-assassin superhero Black Widow, the only woman on the Avengers) is in love with Bruce Banner (the Incredible Hulk) and pursues this romance in the face of Banner’s reluctance. Furthermore, themes around Natasha’s past are explored, including her sorrow at not being able to have children.
Let me get some of the basic disclaimers out of the way. My ire is not directed at those who feel the pairing isn’t right or lacks chemistry (which is frankly a personal and subjective opinion). Neither is it aimed at those who have ranted, quite rightfully, at Marvel’s unfair treatment of female heroes (the lack of Black Widow merchandising or a standalone Black Widow film, for example).
My anger is directed toward the “feminist” critics who blogged, tweeted, raged and shed online tears over how Whedon managed to “reduce” Natasha to a female clichéd trope; that he took her from competent ninja superhero, a Strong Female CharacterTM, to a woman who is in love with a man (how dare she!), needs his reciprocated affection (oh, the blasphemy!) and feels incomplete because she can’t have children (how unnatural!).
Our efforts at raising and building a Strong Female Character stem from years of being subjected to damsels in distress, meek housewife tropes and beautiful women playing the foil to the protagonist. These experiences, however, have forced us into a corner of writing Strong Female Characters who –karate-chop supervillains but do little else.
The result is that we have simply replaced “Waiting in an ivory tower to be rescued” with “Knows Kung Fu and is not afraid to use it” and “Very photogenic while wearing black leather and shooting at aliens”. We have picked up a bunch of characteristics associated with the word “Strong” (historically, with masculine connotations), slapped them on to a beautiful woman and labelled her, Exhibit A, Strong Female Character. The problem with this approach is the lack of agency. Why does Natasha do what she does? Why does Katniss Everdeen fight?
Black Widow can take down twelve goons with a pen knife and some rope (as she did in Iron Man 2); she can climb on alien flighter jets and close interdimensional wormholes (as she did in the Avengers); she can be strong and trained in martial arts; she can be cold and professional; she can set emotions aside to get the job done. However, she cannot also pathetically moon after a man she adores; she cannot be a real person who is affected by the horrors that made her sterile, she cannot think of herself as a monster because the mafia turned her into a weapon.
I am sick and tired of the Strong Female Character trope, and the insistence that a woman cannot also need a man, be hurt, fall in love, have trust issues or be rescued by the hero. Real people change all the time; real people don’t always win; real people have to depend on the others in their life, including the men. Real women have agency. If portraying women as meek, submissive housewives was wrong, portraying them as completely invulnerable ninja heroines is no better.
Can we please take a break from writing “Strong” women and instead write real women? Real women who can run a business or a company, direct board rooms, win Olympic medals, volunteer for the Red Cross, serve in the military, but who also get their hearts broken, depend on the support of their husbands, boyfriends or partners, have trust issues, struggle to balance raising children and growing a career, worry about money, and yes, pathetically moon after the objects of their crush.
When faux-feminists reject female characters that need a man or depend on a relationship, they are essentially saying that these qualities are not “Strong”. That wanting to have children or be a mother is not “Strong.” That any trace of vulnerability, defeat or sensitivity is undesirable. I refuse to accept this ideology as “feminist”, because it perpetuates the notion that only some characteristics (and usually, these are characteristics historically attributed to the masculine) as being Strong.
There is nothing weak about falling in love, about learning to trust someone, about facing the occasional defeat and disappointment. Hermione Granger isn’t any lesser for needing Ron or for crying over his departure in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Be it Bella Swan of Twilight who desperately needed her boyfriend, but had enough agency to stand up to him when it came to the birth of her unborn child or Katniss Everdeen, who is straight out of the Strong Female Character textbook; it is wrong to pit one as undesirable and the other as desirable.
I hear criticisms of poorly fleshed-out heroines like Anastasia Steele from Fifty Shades of Grey all the time, pointing at her lack of agency outside that of the male protagonist. I don’t see how that is any different from locking female characters like Natasha into “Strong” roles with no narrative contribution. If Ana Steele is bad for the feminist cause, so is an invulnerable Natasha Romanov.
Nandhini Narayanan is a student in the Master’s of Engineering Management program.
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