BadRep: Tell us a little bit about the series in your own words.
Kathrynne Wolf: The Scarlet Line is an action-drama about a secret lineage of female bodyguards who are, when on active duty, code-named “Scarlet”.
Our premise is that the Line started with the famous “Jujitsuffragette” bodyguard team in Edwardian London. In the world of our story, after the First World War the organisation – ‘The Scarlet Line’ – went international and Scarlets have operated ever since then, protecting people who need their help.
“We blow the Bechdel test straight out of the water.”
Our main character, Amanda, is a retired Scarlet whose very ordinary life is suddenly thrown into chaos. Details of the reasons for this disruption, the purpose, history and future of the line get revealed throughout the season.
BR: What gave you the idea to do this?
KW: I was literally falling asleep one night when I had the idea for a secret lineage of female bodyguards, quietly going about the business of making the streets safer.
This is the sort of story I wanted to see on screen. It’s an old adage that you should write the story you want to read, be the change you want to see, and so on. I had been distressed by the narrow representation of women – and the UNDERrepresentation of interesting roles and stories for women in media – for a long time.
Two issues I find particularly insidious are the tendency for any female protagonist driving the story to be called a “Strong Female Character”, where this adjective seems unnecessary for a male protagonist, and the tendency for “Strong Female Characters” either to a) be somehow supernaturally or technologically augmented, or b) have a tendency to cry, even when on the job.
I wanted to see a story of a woman who kicks butt and takes names as a matter of course. It’s her job. She does her job, she does it well. The fact that she’s female is not excused, it’s not augmented, it’s not commented on; it is not, in fact, the point. The point is the story – there’s a crisis that needs solving, there are obstacles, stakes get raised, we wrestle with issues of morality, trust, crime, betrayal…
“The fact that she’s female is not excused, it’s not augmented, it’s not commented on; it is not, in fact, the point. The point is the story.”
The other major factor that made me want to tackle this project is that I come from a background of what is generally referred to as ‘Chicago Storefront Theatre’. We have over 150 small theatre companies in Chicago, producing shows in all kinds of spaces that weren’t originally intended to hold a theatre, because they have stories they want to tell. It’s very much a ‘do it yourself’ mindset.
That’s why I produced the web-series myself, rather than writing a screenplay and then sending it off to Hollywood, hoping it would catch someone’s eye and that it wouldn’t get lost in ‘option-land’… I wanted to see it happen.
BR: What made you decide to set the series in the US rather than Britain?
KW: The main factor is that I live in Chicago, and this is where I have connections, know the locations, and where it was, in fact, possible to produce the series.
That said, the ‘mythology’ of the Scarlet Line definitely lends itself to satellite stories. It would make a great CSI-style franchise. I would love to see The Scarlet Line: London, The Scarlet Line: Seattle, The Scarlet Line: Barcelona – I’d just need to figure out how to go about licensing the sucker.
BR: The lead Scarlet’s wig and makeup are very striking, and call to mind vigilante superheroes such as Catwoman, Silk Spectre from ‘Watchmen’ and Hit Girl from ‘Kick-Ass’. In other press, you’ve previously mentioned Wonder Woman in connection with the unusual ‘web’ weapon used by the Scarlets – are you inspired at all by comics, as well as martial arts and action cinema?
KW: I was raised on Wonder Woman and Kitty Pryde was my favourite X-Man. Like all storytellers, I can’t help but draw from everything I’ve studied, read and seen.
I would say the Scarlet character was drawn as much from The Equalizer and the Guardian Angels as from comic books and movies.
The lack of a current TV show like Wonder Woman is part of what goaded me into this. One of my oldest friends in the world had a baby daughter, and I had a “what will she WATCH???” moment of panic, as I considered the statistics that show that women’s representation in media has actually shrunk in the last few years.
I wanted to contribute to the ongoing development of a wider range of roles available to actresses and, therefore, role models available to young girls.
I don’t only mean morally upright ‘ideals’, I mean characters that represent the spectrum – that model all kinds of ways of being and behaving, living in the world, experiencing victories and consequences. The wider the spectrum presented, the more agency is given to young girls to figure out how they want to live for themselves.
The other major factor involved in the Scarlet wig and makeup is modern surveillance technology. The Scarlets have to keep their true identities secret, and research on the advances in facial recognition software led me to take the disguise angle to more extreme lengths than I’d originally planned.
It turns out that software has gotten scarily good at working around minor augmentations. Diana Prince’s glasses were NOT going to cut it.
BR: You perform quite a bit of realistic fighting in the episodes, as well as very kinetic movement with the Web weapons. Is it difficult to find film or theatre roles for women which showcase more realistic techniques?
KW: It is maddeningly difficult. For 13 years, I belonged to Babes With Blades Theatre Company, which is a Chicago company whose mission is to ‘place women and their stories centre stage’ using combat as a major part of their expressive vocabulary.
To do this, they’ve focused on developing new work, and they include an all-female-cast Shakespeare in every other season, as there simply are not many plays out there where women get to explore this range of human expression.
Again, it’s ridiculously rare in Western cinema, TV, and theatre that a female character is allowed to simply be proficient at combat without being superhuman, having a ‘super suit’, or being the ‘chosen one’.
Again, it’s ridiculously rare in Western cinema, TV, and theatre that a female character is allowed to simply be proficient at combat without being superhuman, having a ‘super suit’, or being the ‘chosen one’.
Don’t get me wrong – I love superhero stories, and am always happy for any opportunity actresses get to be that kind of hero. I just wanted to help open up the field so that they didn’t have to be somehow ‘other’ in order to do so.
BR: There are more women in TV and film who are action heroines these days, but they’re still often lone figures. Already in the trailers for early episodes we’re seeing that relationships (such as the one between Amanda and Marcus) are a big part of the story – are the relationships between female characters also focused on, alongside the ass-kicking?
KW: Most of the major characters in the series are women. We blow the Bechdel test straight out of the water.
The relationships are very important, and they’re explored much more deeply in Season 2. Season 1 is very much the set-up – it’s where the ball gets rolling. We introduce the major players, the major conflicts, the major themes, and some things get resolved by the final episode, but not all.
BR: What were the challenges of creating a web-series? Did the format give you more freedom to pursue feminist themes?
KW: The fact that we’re doing it all ourselves means we have no one to answer to. There’s no studio executive or marketing department saying ‘You have to include a male authority figure! She has to cry or it’s not believable!’ or any such nonsense.
The challenge, of course, is that we do not have studio resources. The good side of that is that no one is working on this project for any reason other than that they want to.
BR: What do you hope the series will achieve?
KW: I would love to inspire other folks with good stories to stop waiting for permission and MAKE THEM. I think the online short-form potential is evolving rapidly. The democratization of access to technical production capability is an amazingly wonderful thing, if you’ve got a story to tell.
I’d also like to help raise some awareness of some of the ass-kicking women of history – in fact, that is the subject of a panel I am doing at GeekGirlCon in Seattle in October – drawing from history to find inspirational stories of “non-super” superheroines.
If the series reaches some young (or not so young) folks who hadn’t yet realised that they’re allowed to take charge of their own stories and get them out there, and maybe some who hadn’t considered that there might be more roles for women than eye candy, damsel in distress or obstacle, even better.
The Scarlet Line Trailer 1 from Wolf Point Media on Vimeo.
- Huge thanks to Kathrynne Wolf for the interview, and we wish her all the best with the series! There’s a kickass trailer for Season 1 over here, and more info on the Facebook group and Scarlet Line website.
- Thanks also to Kathrynne’s husband Tony Wolf who wrote the book about the life of Edith Garrud, which prompted the original piece in our 2011 ‘Revolting Women’ series. Tony is currently working on a three-part graphic novel series inspired by the Ju-jutsuffragettes titled Mrs Pankhurst’s Amazons, due in 2014.
Everyone approaches veganism from a different angle.
Some vegans find their way into it through kindness and empathy for living creatures; others are swayed by hard facts and shocking images. Neither is more or less agreeable, and I suspect that in our day-to-day lives, most vegans use a combination of both when faced with questions from curious veggie or omni friends.
But then there’s People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA as they’re commonly known. PETA’s ongoing racist, misogynistic, homophobic, transphobic and fat-shaming ads and publicity stunts are frequently ripped to pieces online.
Plenty of veg*ns dislike PETA’s controversial tactics, yet many agree that at least their attention-seeking techniques shine a light on the fight and get results, regardless of the harm they cause to others in the process.
PETA are a massive organisation, and they spread a very clear message: animals are not ours to eat, wear, experiment on or use for entertainment – but we’ll appropriate the Holocaust (see below), slavery, women’s bodies, homosexuality and trans* stereotypes to further our cause – and we don’t give a hoot what oppression we’re supporting in the process.
One of the *less* triggering unhelpful images one’s Ble.at dashboard can get covered in.
PETA aren’t the only platform for animal rights, though. Vegans rejoiced a few weeks ago when the beta version of Ble.at finally went live. For you carnivores not in the loop, Ble.at is a social network for vegans to exchange recipes, activist resources, articles, images and videos.
It’s similar to Tumblr and Twitter insofar as the primary purpose is to upload original content that can then be reblogged (“rebleated”) by fellow vegans. It’s a great way for vegans to connect on a micro level, by spreading awareness of local causes and events, and on a macro level by communicating with vegans on a global scale.
For the first week, it was mostly gifs of piglets, infographics of banana ice cream recipes, and cartoon avocados. With 5,500 profiles created within seven days of the site’s launch, the content rapidly improved: awesome recipes, powerful pro-vegan ads, witty one-liners and inspirational quotes promoting veganism were rife. But unfortunately, so was rape culture.
Due to the reblogging nature of the site, the same images kept popping into my feed: an illustration of an angry cow squeezing the bare breast of a lactating woman, a cartoon of a robot raping a blood-covered cow1, milk being referred to as “rape juice” and the comparison between enjoying the taste of meat to the sexual pleasure a rapist experiences (below right).
Most shocking of all was a video entitled “Women forcefully milked in the street”. The short film documents a provocative street performance in which a lactating mother has her baby snatched from her arms by masked men with bloodied hands, who then tear open her blouse to reveal her bare breasts. The rest of the content is in the title. It’s absolutely horrific to watch.
Another less visually graphic, but horrible bit of viral reblogging.
When I mentioned my abhorrence of the casual connection between rape and the dairy industry on Twitter, a vegan pal asked, “What else would you call it?”
Well, the industry term for the bench on which female cows are artificially inseminated is often the “rape rack”, so referring to the process as rape isn’t a particular stretch. But the very fact that this is a common term within the dairy industry is a product of rape culture.
The pig factory employee found forcing metal rods and electrodes into the vaginas of sows is a product of rape culture. The flagrant disregard for the mental health of survivors by flaunting these triggering images to promote veganism is a product of rape culture.
By comparing the industrialised rape and infanticide of the dairy industry to the rape and infanticide of women and children, we are asking non-vegans to project the empathy for the latter onto the suffering of the former. The problem with comparing the dairy industry to rape is that we still live in a rape culture.
Unfortunately, we live in a world in which a teenage girl is gang-raped, photographed unconscious by her aggressors and is still blamed. We live in a world in which an accused rapist’s conviction is overturned because his disabled alleged victim did not resist the attack. We live in a world in which women are threatened with rape on a daily basis and are expected to laugh when comedians crack rape jokes. We don’t live in a world that cares enough about the rape of humans for the comparison to be truly effective.
By spreading these images of women being assaulted, we are supporting rape culture, and we are appropriating the suffering and strength of survivors. It is unacceptable to hijack, trigger and traumatise to forward a cause that has so many other convincing arguments to sway potential vegans into ditching the dairy.
Do we really want to be part of a movement that, like PETA, pushes animal rights forward with one hand and shoves civil rights, women’s liberation, LGBTQI rights, issues of race and body positivism aside with the other? That is not my veganism.
To paraphrase Flavia Dzodan, my veganism will be intersectional or it will be bullshit. From dressing up as the KKK to producing pro-domestic violence ads, PETA are absolutely rancid, poisonous and unforgivable. It’s also unforgivable to use triggering imagery of women being assaulted to push the vegan agenda.
- By day, Alice Slater is a writer and bookseller from London. By night, she is a horror film addict who always keeps the lights on. She writes for Mslexia and Drunken Werewolf, and she blogs about veg*n high jinx at SmokinTofu.com
- Ed’s Tiny Note: We’ve not linked these two as they really are truly unpleasant. They’re definitely real, though.
Sponsored by the US-based Viscera Film Festival, WiHM has really taken off since we covered it in 2011, and we’re very proud to be WiHM Ambassadors – check us out on the list!
We recently kicked off a set of posts on Women in Horror with a return to our soapbox by Irish horror author Maura McHugh, who returned to BadRep Towers to spotlights some women she admired working in the genre across a range of media.
Before we go further, though, we’d like to share the Women in Horror Month Mission statement.
This Mission Statement is taken from the Women in Horror Recognition Month website. They’ve asked that it be shared, quoted and spread about as much as possible, so we’re giving it the spotlight in itself for a moment, before we get down with our horror-nerdy selves in these pages.
***
The Mission
Women in Horror Recognition Month (WiHM) assists underrepresented female genre artists in gaining opportunities, exposure, and education through altruistic events, printed material, articles, interviews, and online support. WiHM seeks to expose and break down social constructs and miscommunication between female professionals while simultaneously educating the public about discrimination and how they can assist the female gender in reaching equality.
The Vision
A world in which all individuals are equally given the opportunity to create, share, and exploit their concept of life, pain, and freedom of expression.
IT’S THE YEAR 2012, NOT THE 1950s. IS THERE REALLY A NEED FOR WiHM?
Absolutely. Otherwise, WiHM would not exist. Women are still not offered the same pay and opportunities as their male colleagues in many industries, particularly the arts. Discrimination runs rampant in Hollywood and it’s very difficult for females (even well-known actresses) to get their films funded by major studios.
Statistics prove that women are still not offered the same opportunities as men due to an array of reasons, from discrimination to female professionals accepting less than they are worth in order to receive the same opportunities as their male colleagues.
In other parts of the world, women are still stoned to death for speaking their minds, excommunicated when they are sexually violated, and not offered proper education. Atrocities continue to happen that force the female gender to be subservient to a patriarchal system that tells them how to dress, who to marry, and what they should do with their lives. All discrimination must be exposed and obliterated for the female gender to truly achieve equality.
WiHM focuses on supporting the achievements of women who utilize the most extreme mirror available in storytelling: horror. We encourage women to explore and represent these horrors constructively, in positive environments.
WHAT ARE THE INDUSTRY’S STATISTICS?
- In the 1920s there were no more than 10 women working in Hollywood in leadership positions.
- In 2009, the mainstream film industry’s ratio was 16% women to 84% men.
- In 2011, women made up only 5% of directors working in Hollywood.
- www.womeninhorrormonth.com
- www.viscerafilmfestival.com
- www.facebook.com/WomenInHorrorMonth
- womeninhorrormonth.tumblr.com
- Ed’s Tiny Note: Our team are in full support of this; given the diverse make-up of our own team’s, we would likely expand this phrase where it occurs to “all genders” and “all gender identities, presentations and expressions”.
SO WiHM IS ALL ABOUT WOMEN. WHAT ABOUT MEN?
WiHM was created with no exclusion. Men play a vital part in the female gender reaching equality. There are many male WiHM Ambassadors and artists who choose to assist and work with professional and talented underrepresented female practitioners. Be a guiding example of a man who respects both genders equally.1
WHAT CAN THE PUBLIC DO TO ASSIST WOMEN?
Personal Responsibility
We all must take personal responsibility for our beliefs, values, and actions. Participating in positive, constructive environments that encourage and provide a safe platform for women to share and explore is vital.
Education
Education is essential. Knowledge is power. Understanding history and where that puts us today, politically and socially, demonstrates how we are interpreting each other and ourselves.
Work with Women
Finding professional women to work with in leadership positions is one of the most important actions you can take to assist the movement. Don’t just work with a woman because of her gender, work with her because she has a lot to bring to the table.
Banish social constrictions
Stereotyping, judging, cattiness, competitiveness, comparing, and gossip – all of these actions hurt men and women. We are all on our own path in life, careers, and personal relationships. We are encouraged to play into these cultural expectations when we are young, which can create judgment of those who are different. Stop it.
Be a WiHM Ambassador
Every February, WiHM Ambassadors host charity events (blood drives, film screenings, art shows), write blogs and articles, conduct interviews, and create videos and podcasts for mass consumption. All of these events and content specifically represent and assist the underrepresented female genre artist and are for philanthrpopic reasons only. No profit is made from WiHM, or the Viscera organization.
Participate
Go to the events, read the articles, watch the videos. Be conscious of the fact that you are consuming different perspectives of a movement that is assisting a struggle that women have experienced for at least the last four thousand years: equality. We have incredible potential right now to destroy discrimination. It deserves your attention.
Donate
Donate to WiHM. All funds go directly into the organization to improve the events, materials, and outreach. WiHM needs the support of the public.
Support other organisations
Organisations such as CARE, Women for Women International, RAINN, and WIF. All these organisations work hard all year round to assist women in achieving equality. Visit their websites and educate yourself.
The Board
The Board of Directors for WiHM is comprised of women from all facets of the horror film industry, including WiHM founder Hannah Forman, Debbie Rochon, Jovanka Vuckovic, Heidi Honeycutt, Jen and Sylvia Soska, and Shannon Lark.
The Organisation
WiHM is a service provided by the Viscera Organization, a 501(c)3 non profit organization expanding opportunities for contemporary female genre filmmakers and artists by raising awareness about the changing roles for women in the film industry.
Origin of Species
Let’s start with a little background.
Once upon a time (1982), in a marketing meeting far, far away (Rhode Island), Hasbro decided to take on the My Little Pony intellectual property. They marketed it pretty much exclusively at girls. The toys were sold with world-shakingly innovative features such as brushable hair and a unique mark on each character’s butt.
The theme continued with a couple of animated series – in which the ponies partook in such riveting activities as going to school and dating – and even a feature film. This was pretty standard stuff for Hasbro, who had long since realised the value of getting kids involved with a cartoon. My Little Pony continued on form, with few variations on the core premise, until 2010.
My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
Everything changed in 2010. Lauren Faust, animator supreme, was roused from her cryogenic slumber. Her mission: to turn a tedious, gender essentialist franchise into something that would break gender boundaries and interest a whole new generation in animated ponies with magical tattoos.
There’s also the horse porn fanart, but we’ll get onto that later.
Faust lists the things that she hopes to achive with MLP:FiM in her Ms. Magazine article about the issue. To quote –
There are lots of different ways to be a girl.
[…] This show is wonderfully free of “token girl” syndrome, so there is no pressure to shove all the ideals of what we want our daughters to be into one package.
[…] Cartoons for girls don’t have to be a puddle of smooshy, cutesy-wootsy, goody-two-shoeness. Girls like stories with real conflict; girls are smart enough to understand complex plots; girls aren’t as easily frightened as everyone seems to think. Girls are complex human beings, and they can be brave, strong, kind and independent–but they can also be uncertain, awkward, silly, arrogant or stubborn. They shouldn’t have to succumb to pressure to be perfect.
Yes, My Little Pony is riddled with pink, the leader is a Princess instead of a Queen and there probably aren’t enough boys around to portray a realistic society. These decisions were not entirely up to me. It has been a challenge to balance my personal ideals with my bosses’ needs for toy sales and good ratings. […] There is also a need to incorporate fashion play into the show, but only one character is interested in it and she is not a trend follower but a designer who sells her own creations from her own store. We portray her not as a shopaholic but as an artist.
Lauren Faust, I think I love you. And, apparently, I’m not the only one. MLP:FiM gained a fucking enormous audience, across all gender identities. For example, let’s take a look at this video.
;
Just fucking look at it.
Right, good, so what actually IS a Brony?
Wikipedia will know, right?
Brony is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Krzyżanów, within Kutno County, Łódź Voivodeship, in central Poland. It lies approximately 12 kilometres (7 mi) south of Kutno and 40 km (25 mi) north of the regional capital Łódź.
No, probably not. Let’s try Urban Dictionary and ignore anything referring to a sex act or requiring specialist equipment. It might take a while.
A name typically given to the male viewers/fans (whether they are straight, gay, bisexual, etc.) of the My Little Pony show or franchise. They typically do not give in to the hype that males aren’t allowed to enjoy things that may be intended for females.
That’s better. Pretty accurate, too, though I understand that it’s not a gender-specific term (so pay attention to the word ‘typically’ there).
So what do bronies care about? Why are they bronies? I wouldn’t dream of putting uninformed words in their mouths. I went digging for some My Little Pony forums, and put out a little questionnaire via Twitter and Reddit’s /r/mylittlepony.
I didn’t have much luck finding any insights on the forums, but I found this post very sweet…
…and this reply absolutely hilarious when taken out of context…
…but I digress. I digress pervily, but it’s definitely digression. Let’s move on to the questionnaire.
The Bronies Speak
“What is your gender identity?”
I discovered after putting the questionnaire online that some female MLP fans call themselves “pegasisters”, so there’s potential selection bias in the results. Still, it validates what I was hoping for – that the majority of responses were coming from the male-identified side of the fandom.1
“Were you a fan of the My Little Pony franchise before Friendship is Magic started?”
The community seems to be nearly exclusively focused on the new iteration of My Little Pony, without any pre-existing interest in the older material.
“Would you be happy for most or all of the people you know to know that you identify as a brony?”
The number of positive responses to this surprised me. MLP fans get a hard time online, and it can only be worse in meatspace. Perhaps the show’s message of love and tolerance results in a more optimistic viewpoint, or attracts those already predisposed to one.
“What appeals to you about the show itself?”
I thoroughly enjoy the idea that a show can be feminine, and ‘made for girls’, without being an overblown, over-prissy tea party. The deconstruction of gender binary and gender stereotypes present in the show is admirable and wonderful.
– anon
It is refreshing to see a show, even amongst children’s programming, that is completely lacking in cynicism. The show and the characters within it are un-selfconciously idealistic and positive. It provides fantastic role models for children of all genders, and the world it has built feels rich and fully occupied.
– Tim (@trivia_lad)
The entire show just feels right. When I’m watching MLP:FiM, it’s like I’m a kid again and I can enjoy the childishness of the entire thing without care.
– Shawn X (@shawnyall)
The character diversity (for once in a children’s show, the fashionable one isn’t the bad guy) and I’m a sucker for the innocent humour included. The characters also have tragic (in the classical sense of the word) flaws: the representative of loyalty is self-centered, the representative of generosity manipulative, and when the representative of Kindness gets mad, even the Hulk would tell her to calm down.
– anon
“What do you dislike or resent about the show itself?”
The vast majority of responses to this question were “nothing, nada, zero”. It seems the community is generally very happy with the show.
It’s a shame Faust had to leave, season 2 was a very different show compared to the first and even though it’s still good something felt like it was missing. I attribute that to Faust’s absence.
– Bret (@the_red_bobcat)
Although strong, not-even-slightly sexualised female role models are a wonderful thing, I am not wholly comfortable with the representation of male characters in the show. With only one or two exceptions, male ponies are represented as stupid, or comic foils, with roles that tend to be service occupations. Unless an episode requires a stallion MacGuffin (See: a Canterlot Wedding, where you get a male character of high social status, though he is very easily manipulated by a strong, evil female character).
– MiaVee (@MiaVee)
“What are you particularly proud of about the brony community? What do you enjoy about being part of it?”
I’m proud of what we do. We start charities, we raise money, we’re so united and loving. Really, I enjoy the love in the brony community. Everyone is just so understanding, caring, and enjoyable. When I first started watching and putting myself into the community, I didn’t know what to expect. But as I opened up more and more, they accepted me without question. They gave my life an entire new part to enjoy, and changed me forever.
– Shawn X (@shawnyall)
I particularly enjoy the community’s openness towards almost every type of person (at least this is true for the Reddit section).
– anon
I am proud of the grown men who are not ashamed of watching a girls’ show just because it is for girls. I like the “love and tolerate” message and the lack of outright trolls.
– Meghan E
I think one of the strongest indications of how the brony community aren’t all creepy, socially inept, hygiene-incapable, sexual predators is the eagerness of the producers and actors on the show to engage with them. The Hub ident produced to promote the second series, a reskin of Katy Perry’s “California Girls” called “Equestria Girls” gives a shout out to bronies, Tara Strong on Twitter actively engages with bronies (as does Andrea Libman, to a smaller extent).
– MiaVee (@MiaVee)
“What negative experiences have you had or known about in the brony community? What would you change if you could?”
The only real negative experience that I’ve known about is the discrimination against a sub-section of bronies called ‘cloppers’ – people who fantasize/look at lewd pictures of characters from the show. The cloppers themselves don’t bother me – it’s the fact that most of the fandom acts like it’s this skeleton in the closet and are extremely ashamed of it, when really it’s not a big deal.
– Rpspartin (@rpspartin)
Anything involving shipping. No no no no no just stop. The show is cute and fine without shoehorning madeup lesbian relationships.
– anon
The only bad times I’ve seen are all the haters that continue to try to bully us. But I wouldn’t change anything. Some of these people just need a friend and we’re more than happy to be that.
– no name provided
Having people approach you and say “My Little Pony? Are you an 8 year old girl?” is part of being a brony, but you can live with it because once you tell them to watch the show it’s an amazing feeling to have that same person come back to you and say “Yeah, sorry bro. That show is amazing!”. Anything that’s rock and roll enough for Andrew W.K. (who’s hosting a “What Would Pinkie Pie Do?” talk) is rock and roll enough for me!
– Bret (@the_red_bobcat)
There is still a lot of misogyny and ableism. Many bronies seem to think that because it’s good, it can’t possibly be for girls, and thus deny that it’s a girls’ show. Alternatively, many get offended when it’s called a girls’ show because they still equate “girly” with ’bad.“ I’d rather seem them embracing the girliness of it, and responding ”yes, it’s for girls, because girls are awesome. Everything for girls should be this awesome.”
– Meghan E.
I’m reluctant to use the term “brony” to describe myself because in every corner of the internet are snarky non-fans seeking to smear every adult fan of the show […] as a fandom overall it seems a lot more welcoming, gentle and understanding than the elitist bullcrap you can get around diehard fangirls and boys for any other show/game/movie.
– MiaVee (@MiaVee)
“Free text time! Tell me whatever you think that I should know. Trivia, gossip, you name it. This is your moment.”
The brony community is huge, and rapidly growing. Like any other community of fans, it is impossible to define the composition, interests, and behavior of its members succinctly. I’d ask, gently, that you please keep this in mind while writing your article.
– anon
I became a slightly more positive and confident person by watching the show.
– anon
All ponies are equal, but some ponies are more equal than others, including Rarity exclusively.
– DocTavia
Rarity is best pony. Anyone who says otherwise is just jealous they aren’t as fabulous
– anon
The only thing I request is that it be made known that Rarity is easily my favourite.
– Bret (@the_red_bobcat)
“The Derpy Controversy”
Derpy Hooves is what’s called a ‘background pony’. She appeared in the crowd in one of the early episodes, and her unusual eyes earned her an instant cult following in the MLP fandom.
Ever attentive to their fans, Lauren Faust and the rest of the team decided to put Derpy in more prominent positions, and even give her a few lines.
This prompted a few equality-minded fans to complain – ‘derpy’ being a reference to presentations of learning disability. From One Survivor To Another wrote an open letter to Lauren Faust on the issue, and followed up with a smackdown to many of the privilege-tastic counter-arguments that were made.
A modified version of the episode featuring Derpy was released on iTunes with ‘fixed’ eyes; however, the original version was contained in the DVD release.
I’m not going to get into the rights and wrongs of this one here – you can read more about Derpy Hooves’ history on Know Your Meme if you like – but my point is simply that there was discourse in the fandom on the matter. There were strong feelings on both sides, but it’s nice to know that at least the argument could be conducted (mostly) reasonably.
What did we learn?
What, other than the fact that anyone who has expressed a preference wanted to be very vocal about their love for Rarity?
Well, it seems that the MLP fandom are extremely accepting. “Love and tolerance” – a term so popular that I presume it’s from the show – is paramount. We’ve seen this before, in communities like furries and otherkin. Don’t get me wrong – it’s an admirable trait – but it does lend itself to being accepting of the extremes of the community without significantly challenging them. Deserving or undeserving, that’s something that can get a community a bad name in general.
There is an undeniable degree of childish naïveté in the community. Potentially expected due to the nature of the show, it does seem to result in marginalising those who ‘clop’ or enjoy fanart/fanfic of the characters in adult situations. Controversial one, this, and this is only a personal view – but I see it as slightly odd but harmless. The fanart and fanfic are drawn and written, and so they don’t harm any real person. If someone wants to pat their flanks to imaginary ponies in compromising scenarios, it doesn’t harm anyone else.
The community seems to revel in the fact that the production team for the show is interested in what they care about, and are willing to name or give cameos to formerly nameless ‘background ponies’ that gain popularity with their fandom.
Bronies – and the ‘pegasisters’ that I’m sorry to have neglected in the survey – seem to be, on the whole, genuinely lovely people that just so happen to like cartoon ponies. Is their fandom a bit strange? Sure. That said, though, how many fandoms aren’t?
And now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to watch the first few episodes of the first season. It might be terrible – it might be great. What I’m fairly certain of, though, is that it’s not going to piss me off.
- Ed’s tiny note: I’m wondering how our trans* readers may feel about the way we’ve differentiated our categories here. On reflection, it might have been more inclusive to label the “male” and “female” categories “cis”. We did want to avoid any implication that someone who is trans* cannot simply have access to the general terms of “male” or “female” – this is not a view we hold! – but we may not have succeeded, and it’s just as arguable here that we’ve done the opposite. Similarly, the question of whether to involve more or fewer ‘categories’ took some ruminating, and Dave took a while crowdsourcing views on this. In any case, I thought I’d say we’re always happy to receive feedback for future surveys.
A confession: I write fanfiction.
I’ll let that sink in for a moment, whilst you judge me and leap to all the usual conclusions. At least half of them will be reasonably correct.
For starters, let’s clear up some myths. Fanfiction isn’t about porn. Or, at least, it isn’t all about porn. There are as many different genres out there as there are genres of fiction, as many reasons for reading and writing it as there are readers and writers of it. And it isn’t exactly an obscure pastime; on fanfiction.net (the largest, if most mainstream and therefore frowned-upon collection of fanfic) there are 593,713 fics listed under the Harry Potter category alone.
Image: Jose Carlos Norte, Flickr (jcarlosn)
Here’s one of my favourite quotes about it, used by Sheenagh Pugh in her book The Democratic Genre: Fanfiction in a Literary Context:
It’s always been high praise in Fannish circles to be told that you wrote a story so good it should be published, but sometimes, the highest praise is that it can’t be. Its very uniqueness, what creates it, makes it impossible to be anything else. Lots of people can write stories that fall into readable (more than you think, actually, but I’m flexible on the idea of readable), and many can write stories I’d pay to read, and even some write stories that could be published and be great. But there’s this small, fascinating group that write a story that belongs only to the fandom that created it. It’s like having a treasure you never have to share. It wraps itself in the canon and fanon and the author’s own mind that created it and takes it as its own so perfectly that you are so damn glad you went into that fandom, just grateful, just absolutely thrilled, because you get to read this.
Every fic, without exception, is a product of its fandom. Reading a fic is not just reading a simple story: what you’re actually reading is an intertwining of fanlore, mixing in-jokes and terminology from one particular fandom, as well as from the broader history and narrative of fandom. That’s why they can appear so incoherent and ridiculous to the outside world at times. Fanfiction authors are less writing a story than weaving together a cultural tapestry.
Fanfiction has a proud and noble tradition, as anyone entrenched within the community will tell you. Every student of fanlore knows where the term “ship” arose (X Files fandom), and where the term “slash” arose (Star Trek fandom). We have our own history; from the pre-internet fanzines, to early Usenet groups, right through to the great shipping wars of Harry Potter and the arguments over whether RPF (Real Person Fic; fanfiction about “real” people) is morally acceptable (the earliest known concrete example of RPF comes from the Bronte sisters, who used to write reams of stuff about the fictional country of Gondal. It can be easily argued that there was a huge amount of RPF within the oral tradition, as people passed down stories about folkloric legends such as Robin Hood, King Arthur, and – yeah, I’m going to go there – Jesus). We know our lore and our mythology and our terminology, and we study it as arduously as disciples of any other body of text.
Whilst I do stress that a lot of fanfiction out there is non-sexual and non-romantic in content (it’s called gen fic, yo, look it up), there’s an inarguable trend towards sexytimes. I’m all down with that; I like a bit of story with my porn, and I’m not a very visual person, so fanfiction is where I discovered a lot about myself and my own sexuality. I think I started reading fanfiction when I was about 13 or 14, and nowhere near, ahem, “active”. My first ever ship was Rupert Giles/Jenny Calendar. It was a while after that until I discovered slash, although that discovery was, frankly, inevitable – I had a bit of a sweet-tooth for Harry/Draco (Drarry, if you will). Fanfiction was (and still is!) a safe space to explore my own sexuality, and discover the kaleidoscope of sexualities, genders and identities that are out there. It was many years before I’d hear the name Judith Butler, or even hear the slightest mention of ‘queer theory’, but when I did, none of the ideas seemed particularly new to me.
Whilst there are plenty of male writers of fanfiction (especially within the gaming community – shout out to my little bro!) authorship is overwhelmingly female, and I don’t think that that’s a coincidence. Out in the real world, it’s difficult to own our own sexuality; there’s simply no room for shades of grey. You’re either frigid or a slut; you’re either straight or gay; your sexuality and identity is whatever people perceive when they look at you. But within the fanfiction community, away from the patriarchal mainstream, we can discover and explore how we feel about our own sexual and gender and personal identity. That’s something that I think has had more effect on my life than anything else. Through the medium of fandom, we can find out who we are, and what we like, and how we feel, all through just reading stories together. And then hopefully – eventually – we get to write our own story.
This is people writing because they love it, for no purpose other than writing for themselves and for other people who they vaguely know on the internet. It’s done purely for the joy of the thing. And it isn’t just about the fic itself; the fandom community is the most genre-savvy, theory-aware, innovative group of people I’ve ever had the pleasure to tangle with. This is a community alive with discussion about narrative, metanarrative, referentialism & self referentialism, literary theory, gender and sexuality, social justice, morality, pop culture and in-jokes. I’d also argue that it’s an innately queer community; it not only exists between the cracks, but thrives on the cracks. And in a world where deconstruction and theory are often frowned upon as “thinking about things too much”, fandom is where I found a home.
- Nat Guest is a girl who writes some things for some people some of the time; usually about pop culture, feminism and current affairs. She tweets over-excessively at @unfortunatalie and can play the spoons.
Don’t get me wrong, I have a history with kitchen equipment – it’s a sad, sad story involving a large quantity of Red Bull, an all-nighter at University, an offer of 50p, a camera, a toaster, and my genitals. The problem is that the output of my culinary bodgejobs tend to be either inedible, burned, or contain more cheese than the average human is capable of dealing with.
It’s hard to deny that cookery is fun, though. Get in a kitchen, crack out all kinds of implausibly-shaped apparatus, put squishy and goopy and chewy things together, bung it in the oven, hope for the best. It’s like science, but with an end product that will either serve as your dinner or a cheaper alternative to Polyfilla.
So, if you’re like me and you feel that, for the sake of all involved, cookery is best done vicariously – it saves on cleanup, anyway – fear not, because the Internet is here to help.
It Begins: Epic Meal Time
Epic Meal Time is where it all started. A bunch of guys got together with a camera and made some brilliant, stupid food. The preview frame for each video contains a picture of the eldritch horror that is produced, along with its calorie count.
Previous creations include their riff on the turducken – the TurBacon Epic (79,046 calories, pictured above, and described as ‘a bird in a bird in a bird in a bird in a bird in a pig’), Fast Food Sushi (11,816 calories of I assure you that you really don’t want to know), and the Valentine’s Day special – 190,400 calories of ‘Super Sloppy Sundae‘.
I think we can rest assured that this is the kind of cookery that would give Jamie Oliver an aneurysm, and the rest of us a nasty case of angina. And why the hell not? It’s your body, and you should choose exactly what you want to put into it. If you can have a good time with your friends in the process, so much the better.
Epic Meal Time was brilliant, witty, and otherwise furiously entertaining for a long time. It got the idea that cooking could be a gentlemanly pursuit out there to a lot of eyeballs, and that has value. What ruined it though was, like so many things, its own success. Suddenly, the self-parodying bravado of this group of friends became actual bravado. A sponsorship deal and continuous references to ‘Internet Money’ took the metaphorical axe to the humour.
Behold: Epic Meal Time’s personal twist on gender balancing.
It wasn’t just that, though. You can be damn certain that if I’m getting the arse on at something on BadRep, there’s a gender angle too, and sure enough, there is. When the bravado became too genuine, the continuous (and already tenuous) references to ‘bitches’ went from problematic to outright misogynist. Attractive women started to feature in the videos – but only eating the food, never participating in its creation as part of the group. I can’t even remember a single video in which you hear a female voice.
Once it stopped being self-parodying and just became self-aggrandising, the shark had been jumped.
Scandinavia Steps In: Regular Ordinary Swedish Meal Time
A Swedish gentleman with the kind of facial hair not seen since the heady days of Technoviking decided that Sweden could do better without making any special effort.
With the ancient Swedish tradition of bacon tug-of-war, everyone’s a winner.
Our host regaled us with fairly uninspiring, everyday meals, prepared in a wonderfully over-the-top manner. Mayonnaise was eaten straight from the jar (“PRE DINNER SNACK. IT’S GOOD FOR YOU”). Butter was smeared by punching it. Cardboard packaging was opened with teeth. Water for boiling pasta was collected in the form of snow.
There’s undeniable machismo, but since this show is meant as a parody of Epic Meal Time, I think there’s a reasonable argument to be made for it being exaggeration for the sake of comedy. It doesn’t grate in the same way that Epic Meal Time started to.
Cooking is a better experience when combined with facial hair and shouting. Fetch yourself a horn of mead and check it out.
The obligatory, if unorthodox, musical: Vegan Black Metal Chef
Black metal conjures up imagery of teenagers in too much makeup running through the woods, filming themselves on their Dad’s camcorder, while they scream about the Grim Frostbitten North and wield ludicrous knives that they bought on eBay.
What it doesn’t conjure up, however, is vegan cuisine.
This is exactly the reason that Vegan Black Metal Chef is amazing.
The Dark Lords of the Deep are well-known for their vegan tastes.
The effort that goes into the Vegan Black Metal Chef kitchen is pretty mindblowing. The whole place is outfitted with studded black leather, occult symbols, skulls, you name it. The food isn’t particularly inspiring, but that might just be how I see vegan food. Fortunately, the food is far from the point.
Black metal is another field of intense bravado. Though I don’t want to paint an entire subculture by the failings of its extremes, it’s hard to avoid the fact that black metal fandom is a subculture full of homophobia and transphobia, and is often popularly associated with Nazi music. It’s wonderful, then, that Vegan Black Metal Chef is so inherently subversive. It’s self-deprecating mockery in which you’re invited to laugh with someone at the sillier bits of their own subculture, and that makes it a pleasure to watch.
The extensive make-up is a wonderful parallel here with more ‘traditional’ female-led cookery shows, particularly Nigella Lawson’s sexualised content where her appearance is pushed to the audience just as much, if not more, than the actual food. Vegan Black Metal Chef, it could be argued, takes host-over-food cookery content to the next level.
In any case, do you want to see a man in corpsepaint invoke Lovecraftian horrors over a bowl of Pad Thai? Of course you do. Vegan Black Metal Chef is for you.
Booze and brilliance: My Drunk Kitchen
As far as I’m concerned, My Drunk Kitchen is the best cooking show on the Internet right now. Hosted by Hannah Hart, it’s a very simple premise – drink booze and cook some stuff.
Shortly after this frame, the self-heating bag begins to billow smoke. If that isn’t selling you on My Drunk Kitchen, I don’t know what will.
It’s the first of the shows that I’ve covered here to feature a female host, and what I find particularly important is that it doesn’t fucking matter. There’s the occasional line that bugs me, but by and large the humour is genderless, and there’s no (or very little) cutesy look-at-me-I’m-a-girl-on-the-Internet-teehee. Hannah Hart is Hannah Hart, and she’s drinking beer and belching and overdoing it with the cheese and burning herself on the oven because fuck you, that’s why.
Far and away my favourite episode is the one where the good Ms. Hart tackles military Meals Ready to Eat – known as MREs – outdoors and clad in a bodgejobbed Braveheart-esque shawl.
It’s not going to teach you to cook. It’s going to make you grin repeatedly. Watch it.
And the rest
I’m absolutely certain that I’ve missed some gems. Have I neglected to mention your favourite homebrew cookery show? Let me know about it in the comments. If there are enough, and BadRep haven’t fired me for overuse of the term ‘bodgejob’, I’d love to write a followup with the fan favourites that I’m currently unfamiliar with.
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