(no subject)

[dreamer_easy]

Browsing through Enterprising Women over on Google Books, I found some evidence to back up one of my hunches: that a lot of fangirls are mutants like me. The author, Camille Bacon-Smith, recounts how many female fans have experienced "scorn" for their "masculine" interests. She describes Star Trek fangirls growing up during a time when, as teenagers, they were expected to give up any tomboy inclinations, and defer to and flatter boys. "Many women in fandom, however, did not make this transition". Some were outcasts because of their physical appearance; some refused to mask their intelligence. Even in fandom, some suffered ostracisation or harassment from male fans. (That said, as a teenager, I was far more bullied by girls than by boys.) It's possible this explains some of the sensitivity around issues of gender and inclusion into which I have poked my thumb.

Some data points on the gender makeup of fandom. Firstly, from Enterprising Women: in 1988, an index of 34,000 Star Trek fanzines included only 4 edited by men, and only 10% of contributors were male. Polls of readers of sexually explicit Trek zines found they were mostly women. Secondly, this list of 80s/90s fanzines gives a snapshot of offline Doctor Who fandom in the UK: there are women editing and writing, but they're a tiny minority.

Comments

[alryssa.livejournal.com]

I wonder if permanent cast size had anything to do with it. After all, the Doctor only had one companion at a time - usually - and if you weren't really a fan of that companion (or, as some feminine psyches might interpret a female companion as 'competition' at some subconscious level), the other alternative was to self-insert oneself into the fiction. Trek offered a wider variety of cast options and a lot more in the way of romantic subtext (unless you were reeeeeally reaaaaaally projecting/looking for it, with the possible exception of Romana II) that just wasn't visible in DW; not until 1996.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

cast size

I think that's a really interesting point. The opportunities for slash were much reduced, too.

some feminine psyches might interpret a female companion as 'competition' at some subconscious level

NO NO IMPOSSIBLE THAT WOULD NEVER HAPPEN *ahem*

[alryssa.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't say there were flamewars on the level of Marfa/Rose craziness, but I do recall some measure of female fans being a little, "She's not good enough for him," or dismissing the moment as "post-regenerational crazy," which (while I didn't subscribe to it) was hellishly ironic, given that Segal had just done what female fandom had pined so long for. Of course, it sent the male fandom into near-apoplexy and instant denial of it even approaching 'canon'.

Which I found utterly hilarious, given how readily some fanon is absorbed into the complex ether of continuity.

[jblum.livejournal.com]

Not so much "competition", as what Donna Lettow over on Highlander (talking about fan antipathy to Duncan MacLeod's love interests) once referred to as "Not Good Enough For My Dunkie Syndrome"...