quote:Originally posted by Aros: I love soapbox arguments.
Note: There was no change from source material.
If you believe this, you're completely mistaken.
quote:Furthermore, male characters were the main protagonists in the later Oz novels.
quote:The books weren't a gleaming banner of feminism -- the earlier novels just happened to feature a couple major female protagonists (Dorothy, Ozma).
quote:Furthermore, male characters were the main protagonists in the later Oz novels.
quote:The books weren't a gleaming banner of feminism -- the earlier novels just happened to feature a couple major female protagonists (Dorothy, Ozma).
And I'll reference your same link. Not sure if you're a reader, but look at the plot summaries: - Books 7, 9, 10, 12, and 13 featured male lead protagonists. Books 2, 4, and 11 feature males in co-protagonist roles (or in the case of 2, you THINK she's a male).
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If you don't think it's a rarity for more than half the books in a series with multiple protagonists to feature a female protagonist who isn't someone's love interest, you need to read more.
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quote:Asking astronomers whether it's spring or not is like using a telescope to watch the traffic while you drive.
An astronomer who is not on Earth could identify the parts of Earth upon which she or he would expect to find astronomical Spring, but he or she would of course note that Spring also has a biological and ecological aspect that is affected by climatic changes that are not to do with astronomical effects.
That's fine. This, on the other hand...
quote:In the days before astronomy, our English forebears divided the seasons according to what was happening in the world around them.
But this whole thing is based on the Historian Peter Ackroyd's The History of England: Foundation is flawed. I like Ackroyd's tangly prose, but he's not an academic historian-- no footnotes or endnotes on this one, no primary sources.
It is of course true that people throughout human history have no doubt used biological cues to identify when to plant crops, when to harvest them, etc. But stargazing and solstice marking--for which we have tens of thousands of years of possible history--never intended to erode nor replace this.
We recognize the equinox for the same reason we always have: it's the half-way mark to the longest day of the year, or the shortest.
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quote:Originally posted by Aros: I love soapbox arguments.
Note: There was no change from source material.
If you believe this, you're completely mistaken.
Sam,
This movie was an original prequel set 20 years before the first book. It's not an adaption of anything.
You said "There was no change from source material."
The character of the Wizard of Oz is significantly changed from how he was originally written by Baum.
Yes, that includes the written story about how he usurped Ozma's throne with the assistance of Mombi.
The wording "there was no change from source material" is wrong. Likewise the wording "the earlier novels just happened to feature a couple major female protagonists." Neither of these descriptions is correct, and that's what I'm showing you.
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A film that isn't faithful to a book series? Say it ain't so. It's a good thing it didn't even attempt to be an adaption of one of the books. We'd never hear the end of it.
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So, just to clarify: you concede that there was a change from the source material and that the series did have a disproportionately large number of active female protagonists?
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No. The book is an original work intended to serve as a loose prequel to the original movie. Neither movie purports to be canon, and the new movie is a self-declared loosely defined prequel that only makes a small show to be faithful to continuity of the movie. To expect continuity to an obscure book series seems ludicrous to me.
And yes, the early books featured a large number of active female protagonists. I only posited that it wasn't true of the entire series -- that other entries in the series had casts that were almost entirely male.
Nothing I've said can't be readily proven. I just think that the feminism argument has no traction in this situation. The movie isn't meant to be a prequel to the book series. It's a Hollywood big budget popcorn flick, and any attempt to judge it based on extraneous merits will likely fail. As would a similar argument with most Disney "products".
Why aren't we arguing how unfaithful Disney princess movies are with regard to source material?
What a silly thread this has become.
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quote:Why aren't we arguing how unfaithful Disney princess movies are with regard to source material?
Possibly because most Disney princess films are based off source material that already has many different interpretations, and the films don't radically change from many of them whereas in Oz there is a distinct change of tone and portrayal whether it's intended as a 'loose prequel' or whatnot?
Just a thought. And for the record, you didn't just say 'the later books had male protagonists', you made a clear suggestion that the early stories and their unusual female protagonists weren't remarkable after all as though they were just another feature of the stories.
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quote:No. The book is an original work intended to serve as a loose prequel to the original movie. Neither movie purports to be canon, and the new movie is a self-declared loosely defined prequel that only makes a small show to be faithful to continuity of the movie. To expect continuity to an obscure book series seems ludicrous to me.
I'm afraid I have no idea what you are talking about anymore. What book is intended to serve as a loose prequel to the original movie?
And you can decide that expecting continuity to an obscure book series is ludicrous, but that's completely irrelevant to the issue that the wizard's backstory was clearly written by baum, and was significantly changed for this movie.
You are explaining reasons why there were changes from the source material, not backing up the argument that there was no change.
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Wikipedia articles were fairly interesting to read, thought.
There is no novel which would center on how the wizard became the wizard of Oz.
However, there are several Oz books where the protagonist is male. So it's not really violating the tradition of the novels to have a protagonist who is male, especially since the focus of the story is on the wizard, making him the protagonist.
Wikipedia states this about the wizard:
"The history of Oz prior to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (often called the prehistory of Oz as it takes place before Baum's "histories") is often the subject of dispute, as Baum himself gave conflicting accounts.
In The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the title character recounts that he was a ventriloquist and a circus balloonist from Omaha, and during one flight the rope for his parachute vent became tangled, preventing him from descending until the next morning, and he awoke to find that he was floating over a strange land. When he landed, the people thought he was a great wizard because of his ability to fly. He did not disabuse them of this notion, and with his new power over them, he had them build a city with a palace in the center of Oz. He also ordered them to wear green glasses so it would appear to be made entirely of emeralds.[29] However, in the later Oz books the city is depicted as actually being made of emerald or other green materials.[11] The Wizard was a young man when he first arrived in Oz, and grew old while he was there.[40] Afraid of the Wicked Witches of the West and the East, who, unlike him, could do real magic, the Wizard hid away in a room of his palace and refused to see visitors. He lived in this way until the arrival of Dorothy in the first book.
In The Marvelous Land of Oz the prehistory was changed slightly. Glinda, the Good Witch of the South, reveals that the Wizard usurped the previous king of Oz Pastoria and hid away his daughter Ozma. This was Baum's reaction to the popular 1903 Broadway extravaganza Baum adapted from his book, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, in which the Wizard took the role of the main antagonist and the Wicked Witch of the West was left out.[41]
The wizard, however, had been more popular with his readers than he thought. In Ozma of Oz, he omitted any mention of the Wizard's having usurped the throne of Ozma's father,[42] but the largest changes occurred in the next book.
In the preface to Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz Baum remarks that the Wizard had turned out to be a popular character with the children who had read the first book, and so he brought the Wizard back. During it, the Wizard relates yet another account of his history in Oz, telling Ozma that his birth name was Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkle Emmanuel Ambroise Diggs, which, being a very long and cumbersome name, and as his other initials spelled out "PINHEAD," he preferred to leave just as O.Z. The balloon part of his story was unchanged, except for the detail added by Ozma, that the people probably saw his initials on his balloon and took them as a message that he was to be their king. She relates that the country was already named Oz (a word which in their language means "great and good"), and that it was typical for the rulers to have names that are variations of Oz (King Pastoria being a notable exception to this rule)".
...There was more, but that seemed the most relevant info to this discussion.
The important thing to notice is that different novels have quite a different versions of the Wizard's backstory. There isn't much stuff that could be said to be directly canon.
I guess one thing that is canon is that the Wizard was a balloonist, a liar, and a bit of a jerk. The film seems to get these things right.
Some of the things in the new film are based on the 1939 film. For example, in the novels the the witches of east and west are not sisters. In the old film they were, and so they are in the new film.
The greatest change would seem to be, that the film changes the Wicked Witch Of The West from a purely evil person into a naive girl who falls in love with Oz, and is then corrupted into evil.
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I think we should start giving women their own money. Like, an allowance or something. That way they'll have their own money to decide which movies to see and won't be forced to watch sexist films. Then all of these sexist films will fail, because it won't be just men deciding which films make money.
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quote:Originally posted by Aros: No. The book is an original work intended to serve as a loose prequel to the original movie. Neither movie purports to be canon, and the new movie is a self-declared loosely defined prequel that only makes a small show to be faithful to continuity of the movie. To expect continuity to an obscure book series seems ludicrous to me.
And yes, the early books featured a large number of active female protagonists. I only posited that it wasn't true of the entire series -- that other entries in the series had casts that were almost entirely male.
Nothing I've said can't be readily proven. I just think that the feminism argument has no traction in this situation. The movie isn't meant to be a prequel to the book series. It's a Hollywood big budget popcorn flick, and any attempt to judge it based on extraneous merits will likely fail. As would a similar argument with most Disney "products".
Why aren't we arguing how unfaithful Disney princess movies are with regard to source material?
What a silly thread this has become.
Apparently there is another Oz movie in the works, that is actually based on a book by a relative of Baum's. Maybe you are completely confused because you heard about that movie instead. It's not out yet:
quote:Originally posted by Tittles: I think we should start giving women their own money. Like, an allowance or something. That way they'll have their own money to decide which movies to see and won't be forced to watch sexist films. Then all of these sexist films will fail, because it won't be just men deciding which films make money.
I think you won the thread by default, because nobody on the other side of the argument wants to get into all the tortured justifications as to why you're somehow still wrong.
And that's not to say I don't understand those justifications, or even partially agree with them. HOWEVER...my wife has her degree in gender studies from Smith, and she doesn't feel the movie has much of an anti-woman slant. She's pretty pro-feminist, too...we've definitely had our arguments over these issues before.
anyway, SMH at this thread. ROFL
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Tittles and steven can hang out in the special too cool for this thread pen we made for them. Lots of laffs for you both!
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quote:Originally posted by Parkour: Tittles and steven can hang out in the special too cool for this thread pen we made for them. Lots of laffs for you both!
So do you not know the justifications I mentioned, or are you too lazy to type them out or look up a link, or what?
Dude, I can do this allll day. I took women's studies classes in college, I know my Michel Foucault, my Tzvetan Todorov, etc.. AND I have argued these issues regularly with my wife, who is quite a bit more well-read than I am in women's studies.
I think I can actually argue your side better than YOU can. Would you like me to help you do that?
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I don't think it's necessary to come up with tortured justifications to contrast with the opinion "it's okay for this movie to be offensive to women, because women who find it offensive can not pay money to see it." Because of course that's true.
In fact, it can be true and simultaneously validate Sam and Parkour's previous arguments, in that it implicitly acknowledges that, yes, the film portrays women in a poor light -- but, hey, they should just vote with their wallets. Which is exactly what the original reviewer was suggesting, after all.
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I've got to admit I'm dying to hear which 'tortured justifications' are necessary to support the primary point being made: the movie portrays women in a secondary, victimized, and/or rescue-needing light (that is, sexist) and there's an extra layer of irritation given the source material.
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quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: I don't think it's necessary to come up with tortured justifications to contrast with the opinion "it's okay for this movie to be offensive to women, because women who find it offensive can not pay money to see it." Because of course that's true.
In fact, it can be true and simultaneously validate Sam and Parkour's previous arguments, in that it implicitly acknowledges that, yes, the film portrays women in a poor light -- but, hey, they should just vote with their wallets. Which is exactly what the original reviewer was suggesting, after all.
Her reasoning is incredibly weak, though. She'd have been better off saying "this movie isn't awesome, unlike the original 1939 one. Don't get your hopes up"...and shutting up about the feminist angle.
Why? Because most people who would be especially interested in the feminist angle are feminists who have read/loved most/all of the original Oz books. THAT'S a smaller audience than "all adults who read Jezebel.com articles and might pay to see the Oz movie".
Granted, she posted it on Jezebel.com, so it's not fair for me to act like it's for Maxim's Movie Reviews (assuming they actually exist), or whatever.
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quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: I've got to admit I'm dying to hear which 'tortured justifications' are necessary to support the primary point being made: the movie portrays women in a secondary, victimized, and/or rescue-needing light (that is, sexist) and there's an extra layer of irritation given the source material.
Rescue-needing? Oz lucked his way into the situation, then had his life saved by Glinda. The main reason he was useful in the battle was because of his fresh perspective on the situation. He was a scammer with big dreams who got lucky. The witches could have snuffed out his life at any moment. Dude, come on. Can't you do better?
Victimized? What movie did you even see?
Secondary? Maybe. But I saw a whole lot of Oz getting lucky, and succeeding through circumstance and a few tricks. I saw the witches being the goddesses of the kingdom. That's the closest thing you have to a real point.
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I am just profoundly fascinated with 'I can argue the feminist side better than you can' and 'you're better off shutting up about your feminist angle, feminists' coming from the exact same man here.
Like above all else, even the reflexive anti-feminist dismissals, the entitling of it as a "feminist rant" or "screed" I just cannot help but be amazed at the typification of response I am seeing here.
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quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: I am just profoundly fascinated with 'I can argue the feminist side better than you can' and 'you're better off shutting up about your feminist angle, feminists' coming from the exact same man here.
Like above all else, even the reflexive anti-feminist dismissals, the entitling of it as a "feminist rant" or "screed" I just cannot help but be amazed at the typification of response I am seeing here.
Do you even know who Michel Foucault is, without Googling?
Please, Sam, I really CAN argue your side of the argument better. I'm not interested in tortured justifications, though. If the author of the article wants nobody to SEE the movie, then she's better off speaking to a broader audience, in a way that motivates them.
As far as sexist movies, there are SO many others that are SOOO much worse. I think you know that, too. It looks to me like you're just arguing because you want to win, not for any other reason. Would you say that's true?
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quote:Please, Sam, I really CAN argue your side of the argument better.
Absolutely nobody is stopping you from attempting to argue in favor of these valid feminist concerns. You are more than welcome to show us your listed feminist critical theory cred, or whatever. You have my blessing.
quote:As far as sexist movies, there are SO many others that are SOOO much worse.
There sure are, and I have no trouble talking about those too. Yet it doesn't impact the validity of these observations about the subject we are talking about now, Oz the Great and Powerful, one iota! ..Except to note the pervasiveness of limitation and typical confinement of female roles. Which, I guess, is appreciated.
quote:. It looks to me like you're just arguing because you want to win, not for any other reason. Would you say that's true?
I argue for many reasons. One can traduce those reasons down to "You're just trying to score points!" or "You're just arguing because you want to win!" but honestly as far as I am concerned, arguing the winning side is often just a side consequence of being generally more reasoning and educated and fairly often picking the correct side, and winning is just a side benefit I'll gladly take.
But telling someone that you think that they're arguing just because they want to win is kind of a pablum statement that could just as easily (and pointlessly) be levied either way.
quote: If the author of the article wants nobody to SEE the movie, then she's better off speaking to a broader audience, in a way that motivates them.
More commentary on her ends and means which speaks not at all to the validity of her statements re: the movie.
and lastly:
quote: I'm not interested in tortured justifications, though.
Okay, and you are the only one who has supposed that they are tortured justifications on her end. They really aren't!
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quote: If the author of the article wants nobody to SEE the movie, then she's better off speaking to a broader audience, in a way that motivates them.
Frankly, I think the author was a) writing to a feminist audience; b) in a bit of univerally-applicable criticism, arguing that lazy characterization makes the film weaker; and c) also writing in hopes that people will wake up to the fact that filmmakers still have a troubling habit of turning female characters into hapless, lovelorn, and unambitious sponges, and thus -- once aware of the problematic nature of that decision and its effects on some women's self-image -- either stop rewarding such decisions with money or, if they're in a position of power in the industry, stop doing it.
She was not writing an article that sought, as its highest goal, to minimize the number of dudebros paying for admission to the film.
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Sam, in all my life, I've accused exactly two people of "just arguing to win." You and TomD. Take it for what it's worth.
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You know, realizing that you think winning an argument -- that is to say, demonstrating the rightness of your position to the satisfaction of the other people in the conversation -- is a bad goal to have explains so much about the quality of your arguments.
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quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: You know, realizing that you think winning an argument -- that is to say, demonstrating the rightness of your position to the satisfaction of the other people in the conversation -- is a bad goal to have explains so much about the quality of your arguments.
Dude, you've never convinced me of anything. For that matter, I don't see you convincing anyone of much of anything. Not that that matters. I really don't think it's your goal.
MY goal, as we BOTH well know, is convincing hearts. I'm a salesman, a preacher, etc.. It's not what I think is the best thing to be. It simply is what I AM. I used to put on a hat and preach to an imaginary congregation when I was 4. My lifelong friends grooooaaan every time I get a new obsession, whether it's music, martial arts, nutrition, Jyotish, Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, blah blah blah, etc.. Why do they groan? Because I do the same thing with them that I do here re: nutrition. I sell. I sell hard. I sell to people's hearts, baby.
Note that I don't think that's the best way to be. It simply is what I am, and I'm pretty sure I was born this way, because I don't ever remember being different.
I remember going on a anti-sugar campaign when I was FIVE YEARS OLD, because a dental hygienist came to my kindergarten class and talked about sugar's effect on teeth. I was deeply anti-sugar, and preaching about it, for at least 2 years. That's tough when you're a kid, too, ROFL I mean, people offer you candy, and you WANT the candy, and all the foods that are unsweetened taste AWFUL in comparison (to a kid raised on sugar).
So you see? Even the style of this post is further evidence of my basic nature.
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It must be horrible to have your self-image tied up so tightly to something you're terrible at.
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quote:Rescue-needing? Oz lucked his way into the situation, then had his life saved by Glinda. The main reason he was useful in the battle was because of his fresh perspective on the situation. He was a scammer with big dreams who got lucky. The witches could have snuffed out his life at any moment. Dude, come on. Can't you do better?
Yes, Glinda saved Oz's life...after he, the agent of kingdom-saving prophecy, was sent on a quest to vanquish her. He then saved her life at great personal risk to himself-not having the power of the witches-against not just a bunch of flying baboons and Winkie guards, but the two 'goddesses', so this rather balances out.
The witches could have killed him, but they didn't. Even the wicked one who saw through his sham from the start but then forgot she thought he was a con and ran away screaming. These 'goddesses' were utterly stalemated until Oz came along, effectively void in terms of impact on the setting. Then one (in the stereotypically most silly, most romance-addled rube-ish way) falls in love with him, and then in hate with him...notice how her entire life is about Oz the moment she meets him?...the other despite being a ruthless, intelligent goddess immediately fears him in spite of seeing he's a fraud, and the third is idealistically exasperated with him as the flawed agent of prophecy, orienting her goddesslike powers to whatever plan he comes up with.
Yeah, Steven, I can do better. So have other people. Name dropping and talking up your passions isn't actually a substitute for an argument, or even a rebuttal.
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quote:Rescue-needing? Oz lucked his way into the situation, then had his life saved by Glinda. The main reason he was useful in the battle was because of his fresh perspective on the situation. He was a scammer with big dreams who got lucky. The witches could have snuffed out his life at any moment. Dude, come on. Can't you do better?
Yes, Glinda saved Oz's life...after he, the agent of kingdom-saving prophecy, was sent on a quest to vanquish her. He then saved her life at great personal risk to himself-not having the power of the witches-against not just a bunch of flying baboons and Winkie guards, but the two 'goddesses', so this rather balances out.
The witches could have killed him, but they didn't. Even the wicked one who saw through his sham from the start but then forgot she thought he was a con and ran away screaming. These 'goddesses' were utterly stalemated until Oz came along, effectively void in terms of impact on the setting. Then one (in the stereotypically most silly, most romance-addled rube-ish way) falls in love with him, and then in hate with him...notice how her entire life is about Oz the moment she meets him?...the other despite being a ruthless, intelligent goddess immediately fears him in spite of seeing he's a fraud, and the third is idealistically exasperated with him as the flawed agent of prophecy, orienting her goddesslike powers to whatever plan he comes up with.
Yeah, Steven, I can do better. So have other people. Name dropping and talking up your passions isn't actually a substitute for an argument, or even a rebuttal.
And? he still accomplished most things by sheer luck. I'm not saying there's not tinges of sexism her and there, but...come on, dude. You are in the box, and I am not. Peek out for a moment. There's more to this movie than it's feminist bona fides. Remember what the thread was about to begin with?
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quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: It must be horrible to have your self-image tied up so tightly to something you're terrible at.
Well to be fair, he hasn't exactly argued that he's good at selling to people's hearts, baby. Though it is implied.
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quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: You know, realizing that you think winning an argument -- that is to say, demonstrating the rightness of your position to the satisfaction of the other people in the conversation -- is a bad goal to have explains so much about the quality of your arguments.
Dude, you've never convinced me of anything.
He's also never convinced ron lambert of anything. Whatever that point intends to accomplish doesn't really work, yanno.
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quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: It must be horrible to have your self-image tied up so tightly to something you're terrible at.
Self-image? This isn't something I'm particularly proud of. I didn't even realize it about myself until probably the last 4 or 5 years. I was too busy preaching and selling to ask myself "am I a preacher/salesman type?"
And actually, I am fairly good at it. I've worked in several call centers like Blayne did, where sales were a condition of employment. I was often the top salesperson on my team. Certainly never the best in the building, but always in the top 10 or 15%. And bear in mind, I was usually selling things I couldn't care less about.
I guarantee you, I could start a drumming thread that would have 5 or 6 people going out and buying drumsticks, watching youtube videos on drumming, telling all their friends about their new drumming habit, etc.. However, because that was the passion of ca. 1988 to ca. 2000, I doubt I'll ever make such a thread. Had you known me then, I'd have told you all about the awesomeness of Bob Becker, the world's greatest xylophonist (and a cool dude, too...Bob's a humble guy), preached to you the wonders of the Hinger timpani method, blah blah blah.
The whole point isn't necessarily to convince. It's an unconscious thing, almost like a compulsion. And, like I said, not something I'm especially proud of. I feel bad for having foisted my obsessions du jour on the people around me AT FULL VOLUME. It's rather gauche. A bit of a faux pas, old boy, don't you know? ROFL
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quote:I guarantee you, I could start a drumming thread that would have 5 or 6 people going out and buying drumsticks, watching youtube videos on drumming, telling all their friends about their new drumming habit, etc.
huh. so you DO have your self-image tied up in this stuff.
I would also comfortably bet against this if it were possible to control it for purposes of a contest. I think you really overvalue the quality of your salesmanship.
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quote:I guarantee you, I could start a drumming thread that would have 5 or 6 people going out and buying drumsticks, watching youtube videos on drumming, telling all their friends about their new drumming habit, etc.
huh. so you DO have your self-image tied up in this stuff.
I would also comfortably bet against this if it were possible to control it for purposes of a contest. I think you really overvalue the quality of your salesmanship.
No, I assure you, it embarrasses me, and I find it quite awkward. It's a little like catching yourself picking your nose in public, again and again, and always forgetting that you are, now, picking your nose, about to pick your nose, etc..
It really is like a compulsion. I indulge in it still somewhat with young people, as long as I am giving factual information. Hey, they need facts, right? (Yeah, I already know, don't bother)
Otherwise, unless there are health and safety issues involved, I generally try to abstain. TRY. I'm not 100% successful. When it comes to nutrition, that's where I usually fail hardest, perhaps partially because it's a health and safety issue. I kind of have a weird personality quirk around health and safety issues. I react out of all proportion to perceived threats to my physical safety.
One of the main reasons I STARTED curbing myself is because people were always so bewildered when I dropped a specific obsession. I got tired of feeling bad about their bewilderment. They, in many cases, were getting into it (at least partly) to make me happy, because they loved me, you know? It's not cool to take advantage of that, perhaps. Even unintentionally.
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ok. that's all explanatory in a very humanizing way. I don't doubt much of it. But what I interpret so far is that part of this self-image thing is not that you are struggling to control the preaching/salesmanning, but how the preaching/salesmanning is genuinely taken by others, especially when they are aware of your habits.
like would you say here that, because of your compulsion to sell/preach/convince hearts that you have here on the subject of Oz expended energy into something particularly convincing? Do you see anything here as having been good salesmanship, argumentative-wise?
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It seems my post went unnoticed, despite it being strongly connected to many things that have been said in this thread.
I assume that people who have said that an Oz story should have a strong female protagonist, now have changed their opinion. And we can all agree that the movie can have a male protagonist instead, because that would be canon, and perfectly in line with Baum's series of Oz novels? Correct?
Also I assume that people who have argued that the film is not respecting the canon, because of changes it makes to the Wizards origin story (And the timeframe of those events), now agree that Baum himself wrote completely contradictionary versions of the events in different Oz books? And thus it's really hard to say what is canon, and what is not? And this actually gives the filmmakers a greater freedom to write their own imaginary story? Correct?
Because I don't know how you could logically argue either of those things, unless you want to argue with L. Frank Baum.
You can still argue that the female-characters in the film were too weak-willed, and maybe indeed Baum never wrote a novel with equally weak-willed female characters.
And you can still argue that the film is bad, because that's pretty subjective.
But please don't argue that something is canon, when it's not.
Posts: 273 | Registered: Jul 2009
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quote:I assume that people who have said that an Oz story should have a strong female protagonist, now have changed their opinion. And we can all agree that the movie can have a male protagonist instead, because that would be canon, and perfectly in line with Baum's series of Oz novels? Correct?
As I've heard it told to me from experts of early americana lit and Baum in particular (who have lit up at the opportunity to discuss all this, hur hur, pun intended), you could have central male protagonists easily, but ones that pulled a Lion King dynamic onto the women of the story would be completely out of character for any of Baum's books, even the ones with the male leads. Baum's portrayal of Oz was typified by having women being the effectual central driver of the resolution of plot and dynamic, and the male leads of his books were ineffectual, even if well meaning. There was probably only one real exception to this rule in the form of a boy named Ervic. And his story certainly didn't come at the expense of sponging/lionessing the women in the story, so
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: ok. that's all explanatory in a very humanizing way. I don't doubt much of it. But what I interpret so far is that part of this self-image thing is not that you are struggling to control the preaching/salesmanning, but how the preaching/salesmanning is genuinely taken by others, especially when they are aware of your habits.
like would you say here that, because of your compulsion to sell/preach/convince hearts that you have here on the subject of Oz expended energy into something particularly convincing? Do you see anything here as having been good salesmanship, argumentative-wise?
You're the one selling hard in this thread, not me. You tried to sell a terribly shallow and largely irrelevant article, and I am not buying.
Here's a clue. You want to really understand where academic feminist critique is coming from? Read your Foucault. Also, read some criticisms of Foucault. This article was unable to pass muster with my wife, an intelligent woman who literally has a degree in gender studies. Take a clue from that, and actually do some real scholarship in the area.
Just because some women preach this stuff, doesn't mean you have to buy it wholesale, without examination, in order to understand women. Modern intellectual feminism is more about social justice and equality than about women specifically. Understanding women is something you either can do naturally, or you struggle with it, and hopefully get better at over time. I'm mostly in that second group. It sounds like you are too, although maybe I'm wrong.
Perhaps you are uncomfortable with your wealthy white male status? I can't help you too much there. I'm from an underprivileged part of Appalachia. Where I come from, the great majority of people are poor or lower-middle-class, and destined to stay that way. They might be "white", but they're not getting many of the benefits that supposedly always come with it. Neither I, nor most of them, even know any trust fund babies.
If your conscience is making you uncomfortable about your privilege, then take it for what it is.
And I don't mean that to sound as harsh as it does.
Posts: 3354 | Registered: May 2005
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quote:Modern intellectual feminism is more about social justice and equality than about women specifically.
So, um, your criticism of her article is that it doesn't concern itself enough with the social justice ramifications of portraying women as ineffectual, lovesick puppies? *laugh* Dude, you took entirely the wrong lessons from whatever conversation you had with somebody about Foucault fifteen years ago.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:Modern intellectual feminism is more about social justice and equality than about women specifically.
So, um, your criticism of her article is that it doesn't concern itself enough with the social justice ramifications of portraying women as ineffectual, lovesick puppies? *laugh* Dude, you took entirely the wrong lessons from whatever conversation you had with somebody about Foucault fifteen years ago.
I'm no huge fan of his. He made some excellent points about the use of language in mass media by those in power to control large groups of people. Beyond that, he's not excessively noteworthy, AFAIK.
Posts: 3354 | Registered: May 2005
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quote:You're the one selling hard in this thread, not me. You tried to sell a terribly shallow and largely irrelevant article, and I am not buying.
I believe this is what you think, but you've come across in this thread as 'selling hard' yourself. None of us know what you selling hard *really* looks like or whatever, but it certainly doesn't look like a soft sell.
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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quote:Modern intellectual feminism is more about social justice and equality than about women specifically.
So, um, your criticism of her article is that it doesn't concern itself enough with the social justice ramifications of portraying women as ineffectual, lovesick puppies? *laugh* Dude, you took entirely the wrong lessons from whatever conversation you had with somebody about Foucault fifteen years ago.
I'm glad that we can agree that the characterization of a single character can be taken as a broad categorization of their entire gender. So, since Oz is a man, the movie is telling us that all men are lying, egomaniacal charlatans?
Glad we cleared that up.
Posts: 1204 | Registered: Mar 2003
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quote:You're the one selling hard in this thread, not me. You tried to sell a terribly shallow and largely irrelevant article, and I am not buying.
I believe this is what you think, but you've come across in this thread as 'selling hard' yourself. None of us know what you selling hard *really* looks like or whatever, but it certainly doesn't look like a soft sell.
I'm pretty sure you DO know what me 'selling hard' looks like. You were here for the Dr. Price threads back in 2005.
Posts: 3354 | Registered: May 2005
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quote:I'm glad that we can agree that the characterization of a single character can be taken as a broad categorization of their entire gender.
Leaving aside the question of whether the author was criticizing a single character -- she wasn't, of course; she was pointing out that all the major female characters in the film exist only to react to Oz's application of dynamic power -- I should point out that anyone who claims to understand how minority dynamics work in the media should find your complaint here ridiculous.
Consider: do you feel that it is a valid criticism of horror films (and, say, The Walking Dead TV show) that there's only ever allowed to be one black guy, and he generally dies -- to the extent that the very few horror films in which the black guy survives to the end are seen as deliberate subversions of this trope? If so, would you say that those people making this critique are asserting that the filmmakers obviously believe that all black men are more likely to die in life-threatening situations?
Of course not! The criticism is that the sample is so disproportionately small that deliberate plot-driven decisions disproportionately get applied to that population; since black guys never get to be the protagonist, they suffer more often the fates reserved for secondary characters. The women in the latest Oz film don't all fall over Oz because he's a man; they fall over him because he's the protagonist, and no one saw anything wrong with reducing them all to plot appendages who sit around waiting to react to the protagonist. That this happens disproportionately often to female characters is pretty obvious once you start looking for it, and I certainly understand why it's frustrating. (I mean, I as a fat guy certainly pick up on cases where fat men are reduced to food-obsessed comic relief.)
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:I'm glad that we can agree that the characterization of a single character can be taken as a broad categorization of their entire gender.
Leaving aside the question of whether the author was criticizing a single character -- she wasn't, of course; she was pointing out that all the major female characters in the film exist only to react to Oz's application of dynamic power -- I should point out that anyone who claims to understand how minority dynamics work in the media should find your complaint here ridiculous.
Consider: do you feel that it is a valid criticism of horror films (and, say, The Walking Dead TV show) that there's only ever allowed to be one black guy, and he generally dies -- to the extent that the very few horror films in which the black guy survives to the end are seen as deliberate subversions of this trope? If so, would you say that those people making this critique are asserting that the filmmakers obviously believe that all black men are more likely to die in life-threatening situations?
Of course not! The criticism is that the sample is so disproportionately small that deliberate plot-driven decisions disproportionately get applied to that population; since black guys never get to be the protagonist, they suffer more often the fates reserved for secondary characters. The women in the latest Oz film don't all fall over Oz because he's a man; they fall over him because he's the protagonist, and no one saw anything wrong with reducing them all to plot appendages who sit around waiting to react to the protagonist. That this happens disproportionately often to female characters is pretty obvious once you start looking for it, and I certainly understand why it's frustrating. (I mean, I as a fat guy certainly pick up on cases where fat men are reduced to food-obsessed comic relief.)
And you don't believe that this happens disproportionately often to female characters because nearly all of the characters other than Oz were females?
It's all well and good to use a piece of media in an attempt to moralize. My only qualm here is that you're reading WAY too much into it.
Oz was a flawed character who needed to change his life. He wanted to become "good". The land of Oz was controlled by powerful women with different agendas, all nearly godlike, who were in a stalemate situation. Oz didn't have power because he was a man -- he had power because he had a fresh perspective. Yes, this is another trope, but it had nothing to do with gender.
Was the "instant love" angle a little poorly handled? Sure. Was the forced love plot merely jammed in there because it's a Hollywood convention? Of course. But there was nothing sexist about the movie, in relation to a normal mainstream release, unless you want to start painting motivations over the top of the actual characterization. But you can do that with any movie.
You want to talk sexist, look at Hunger Games, Brave, and Snow White and the Huntsman.
Posts: 1204 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
Can we make the argument that the original Oz was sexist? None of the men had any power -- one was without courage, one without a heart, one without brains. They all looked to Dorothy to save them. The wizard turned out to be impotent, and the only characters with any power were Dorothy and the two witches.
Or is it the newcomer upsetting the status quo trope?
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posted
Don't be ridiculous. It's impossible to be sexist against men, just like you can't be racist against white people.
Posts: 200 | Registered: Jan 2013
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quote:Was the "instant love" angle a little poorly handled? Sure. Was the forced love plot merely jammed in there because it's a Hollywood convention? Of course. But there was nothing sexist about the movie, in relation to a normal mainstream release...
So we agree that there was a poorly-handed instant love angle, forced in there because it's a Hollywood convention? And agree that there was nothing more sexist about the movie than the typical mainstream release?
The difference is that you don't seem to think that's a problem. Whereas I think the fact that most mainstream releases are that sexist is in fact a problem worth pointing out, especially when it winds up inserting a sexist and unnecessary romantic subplot into a series that is notable for the opposite. No doubt someone who actually writes criticism from a feminist perspective cares even more deeply about how poorly mainstream releases do in this regard.
quote:Can we make the argument that the original Oz was sexist?
For a given definition of "sexist," sure. I don't use that definition myself, but I think there was a very deliberate decision made to make all the men largely ineffective. If you consider that sexism, that was indeed sexist.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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