On Feeling Left Out
Jul. 29th, 2011 10:27 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
deirdreThis is going to be a rambly post, and I can't help it.
It's about why I think Thor is the best of the summer superhero movies (though I haven't seen Captain America yet), why Kij Johnson's story "Ponies" is incredibly awesome [note: may be very disturbing to people who've been bullied] (and, given that it's been nominated for a Hugo, a Nebula, and now a World Fantasy award, apparently others agree with me), and why I felt so emotionally raw after reading the story of Kyrax2's Batgirl at San Diego Comic Con.
Oh, and why I think Harry Potter resonates with so many people. Read the opening of HP1. It's all about the need to belong.
That's probably not everyone's core issue, but it certainly was mine. My nickname was Weirdre. I was always "the weird kid." Eventually, I learned to embrace that, but for many years, I didn't like the othering phrases used to describe me. Then, in high school, I dated someone who read science fiction. His name was Lynn, so he was quite used to othering. Anyhow, that's how I got into SF.
It's not so easy for me to identify why I stopped reading comics. I read comics until I was about 30. My best friend, Dino (may he rest in peace), read a lot of comics, so it was an activity we shared. When I moved away, I sold my collection and was never tempted to pick any up again. Honestly, though, I never thought the art was all that. I never thought the writing was all that. I stuck with it long past the point where I'd have done it on my own, and I did it partly out of loyalty to a friend. I'm kind of sad that I didn't continue that tradition when he was dying of AIDS, but I'd lost my ability to relate to the genre.
Kyrax2's interview made me realize: I didn't lose my ability to relate to the genre -- the genre was never for me nor about me. As I grew up and out, there was nothing really for me to grow into. Instead, I really lost my love of not just comics, but all cartoons. People can say, "Oh, you should see this cartoon, it's hilarious!" I go look, and invariably I ask myself, "Srsly? Hilarious?" My ability to relate to cartoons or comics at all completely broke -- except, apparently, for Randall Munroe and the occasional w00t t-shirt.
That I dedicated so much of my energy throughout my life to a genre that, well, thinks women are unimportant -- that hit me hard last night.
Which brings me to Thor. Yes, I know, a lot of you who saw the movie or read the review probably wondered if I lost my mind up there in the second sentence, but I'm absolutely serious.
In the opening of the movie, Natalie Portman's character is a scientist. She has a hypothesis about the occurrences she's recording. Men tell her she's idiotic for believing said hypothesis (throughout the movie), but she remains steadfast, and she is right. Yes, the science is preposterous, but I totally get why Natalie Portman, who has an Erdös number (and an Erdös-Bacon number of six, the same as Richard Feynman) found that role appealing to do. She's a geek. I'm a geek. The movie has more than one female geek. We relate to the movie in that way.
How else am I supposed to relate? I never had a pony.
It's about why I think Thor is the best of the summer superhero movies (though I haven't seen Captain America yet), why Kij Johnson's story "Ponies" is incredibly awesome [note: may be very disturbing to people who've been bullied] (and, given that it's been nominated for a Hugo, a Nebula, and now a World Fantasy award, apparently others agree with me), and why I felt so emotionally raw after reading the story of Kyrax2's Batgirl at San Diego Comic Con.
Oh, and why I think Harry Potter resonates with so many people. Read the opening of HP1. It's all about the need to belong.
That's probably not everyone's core issue, but it certainly was mine. My nickname was Weirdre. I was always "the weird kid." Eventually, I learned to embrace that, but for many years, I didn't like the othering phrases used to describe me. Then, in high school, I dated someone who read science fiction. His name was Lynn, so he was quite used to othering. Anyhow, that's how I got into SF.
It's not so easy for me to identify why I stopped reading comics. I read comics until I was about 30. My best friend, Dino (may he rest in peace), read a lot of comics, so it was an activity we shared. When I moved away, I sold my collection and was never tempted to pick any up again. Honestly, though, I never thought the art was all that. I never thought the writing was all that. I stuck with it long past the point where I'd have done it on my own, and I did it partly out of loyalty to a friend. I'm kind of sad that I didn't continue that tradition when he was dying of AIDS, but I'd lost my ability to relate to the genre.
Kyrax2's interview made me realize: I didn't lose my ability to relate to the genre -- the genre was never for me nor about me. As I grew up and out, there was nothing really for me to grow into. Instead, I really lost my love of not just comics, but all cartoons. People can say, "Oh, you should see this cartoon, it's hilarious!" I go look, and invariably I ask myself, "Srsly? Hilarious?" My ability to relate to cartoons or comics at all completely broke -- except, apparently, for Randall Munroe and the occasional w00t t-shirt.
That I dedicated so much of my energy throughout my life to a genre that, well, thinks women are unimportant -- that hit me hard last night.
Which brings me to Thor. Yes, I know, a lot of you who saw the movie or read the review probably wondered if I lost my mind up there in the second sentence, but I'm absolutely serious.
In the opening of the movie, Natalie Portman's character is a scientist. She has a hypothesis about the occurrences she's recording. Men tell her she's idiotic for believing said hypothesis (throughout the movie), but she remains steadfast, and she is right. Yes, the science is preposterous, but I totally get why Natalie Portman, who has an Erdös number (and an Erdös-Bacon number of six, the same as Richard Feynman) found that role appealing to do. She's a geek. I'm a geek. The movie has more than one female geek. We relate to the movie in that way.
How else am I supposed to relate? I never had a pony.