Howard,
I completely agree with you that women seriously interested in something
other than romance and family, are usually looked down upon as losers who
somehow missed out on "real womanhood", or at least had an unhappy
childhood. (Example: the heavily discussed on this list movie _Contact_. If I
remember right, Jodie Foster's character did not have a very happy
childhhood, which was supposed to explain her obsession with
extraterrestrial contacts). It seems like any "unusual" behavior of a
woman needs an "explanation", like a rare desease or abnormality. Another
example: _Xena -the Worrior Princess_, which I used to like. Every episode
of that show contains numerless references to her dark past. It is being
explained again and again, that the only reason she is a hero is that she
used to be a villain, and then "repented" and decided to serve good. This
idea is most exploited during her encounters with Callisto.
At the same time, _Hercules_, which is on right before _Xena_ presents a
hero that never has any explanation, why he is roaming around fighting
everyone instead of sitting at home and raising kids. He simply enjoys
that kind of lifestile, which is accepted and admired. And therefore, he
can be a hero without being a reformed criminal.
Anyway, the Outer Limits presented something totally different --
confident, beautiful, seemingly happy woman that still is able to build a
time machine.
Another thing is that (maybe it is out of the topic) this episode
remonded me of a huge argument I once had with my psychology professor.
He talked about sex criminals, and how their behavior is very likely to
be direct consequence of child abuse from an older female, usually
mother. And I said, that if every _woman_ abused as a child went on a
killing spree, there would be no males left in this world for a long,
long time. He replied that there was not a lot of scientific evidence of
female serial killers. So, women probably react on abuse differently, they
may not feel it as strong.
I do not think it's the case, and I believe that the reason why for girls
the history of abuse is more likely to result in depression, alcoholism,
and abusive relationships, rather than in violence, is that they
are taught that any violent behavior is strictly male prerogative.
However, the only other movie on this matter I've seen was _Never Talk to
Strangers_. The main character there was not a scientist, nor did she
seem to be in any way "disturbed", even though she had been repeatedly
raped as a child by her father and then forced to help him cover her
mother's murder (and the daddy was still alive and around). She was either a
cop or a prosecuter and very good in catching serial killers. And at the
same time, every time she fell in love, she became psychotic and
eventually killed her lover.
I apologize if this is off-topic, but I've been always interested in
representation of female violence in culture. Any ideas -- maybe from
science fiction?
Marina
"Femininity is code for femaleness plus whatever society
happens to be selling at the time."
Naomi Wolf
On Tue, 29 Jul 1997, HScott/PAronoff wrote:
> There is a hoary
> old myth that women who are successful in non-traditional fields are
> somehow failures a "normal" women. The scientist in the original time-line
> could have fit into this stereotype, brilliant and driven in her work, but
> socially dysfunctional. The storyline here rejected that myth. The changed
> scientist was just as successful as a scientist, while being happy and
> gregarious.
> >
> The scientist had a way of justifying her killing: all the men she killed
> has already been properly tried, convicted, and executed "before" she
> killed them. She was merely carrying out a legal sentence, just doing it
> early and actually preventing the crimes. Without capital punishment, she
> could not have used the same argument. (An alternative argument could be
> that taking one life to save an innocent life is justified, and in these
> cases she could be absolutely certain she was saving lives.)
>
> Howard
>
> Scott & Aronoff Translation & Editorial Services
> Montreal, Quebec, Canada
> alterego@alterego.montreal.qc.ca
>
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu May 25 2000 - 19:06:31 PDT