Author: Olivia Schlamp, Southlake Carroll Senior High, '22
Television has become a comfort to thousands, partly because many find relief, fun, and experience through the adventures of their favorite show. Because in reality, that is what TV is‒a series of adventures one after another, episode after episode, where we are all holding on to the plot like children dangling from monkey bars. The modern generation is addicted to television because, simply, it is our adult playground. Similar to how a playground is a place of imagination and wonder, television allows you to be transported to a world where almost anything can be fabricated and we can become friends with our favorite stars. In the last half-century, the media has leaned toward portraying more modern and diverse characters with more realistic reputations of real-life everyday protagonists, and this is created by having characters that counter many of the world’s stereotypes and stigmas. With this decision has come many new character tropes, and while we all want film and media to take steps forward, we still all have a long way to go before we get our perfect play-place.
In the last few decades, there has been an influx of a new type of character in television: single adult working women. In the 1800s and early 1900s, the majority of adult female characters were portrayed as either avidly looking for love or avidly serving a husband and kids. Female stereotypes in the media have reinforced a social stigmatism surrounding women that continues to dampen the effects of feminism. Many feminist figures in film are painted with false pretenses of being man-haters; characters who are painted as strong, positive influences for young girls usually having the same plotline: woman is unkind and not relatable to the audience, woman meets man, woman falls in love with man, woman becomes extremely likable to our audience. Why are women in film of this current age still portrayed as constantly dependent on a man to make them happy and/or successful?
Even if this trope of dependency on men doesn’t seem necessarily harmful at first glance, it actually enforces the inequality women face every day. When was the last time you saw a female on television not become completely involved in a romantic interaction or go through their personal journey without a male swooping in to save the day? The damsel in distress trope is still extremely prevalent, and it shows up in hidden and mysterious ways. Even characters who are designed to break female stereotypes have moments where the damsel in distress peeks through their strong and independent self. These characters are a paradox of independence; they break the stereotype that a family should be a woman’s only priority as well as highlight complete obedience when it comes to a male figure by slowly losing herself for a romantic partner. This paradox, which I have labeled as the “Fe(male) Protagonist,” is becoming more and more common. The Fe(male) Protagonist is painted as an independent woman who isn’t actively looking for love but is instead putting all of her focus on other factors of her life, such as her career or family. Yet, all of these protagonists have one weakness—their love interest. These women are presented as strong forces to be reckoned with, but then the audience sees them slowly give up their goals and dreams for a guy over multiple seasons. The media has been able to disguise the female stereotype (a girl always needing a guy for her to be happy) under female characters who are supposed to go directly against that stereotype. The “male” part of the Fe(male) Protagonist has a tendency to overshadow everything else, separating the female from what she originally wanted and forcing himself to be part of her. These Fe(male) Protagonists are the damsel in distress trope hidden under a shell of the exact opposite, and this is a dangerous suffocation of feminism.
In Friends, Rachel Green gives up her dream job of working in Paris for Ross Geller. Is it possible that they are meant to be together? Sure..., but why doesn’t Ross need to make small changes to be with her instead of having Rachel rearrange her whole life to be with him? The show doesn’t even allow the two to have a conversation about how they can be in a relationship together while still following their separate career paths. Does this mean Rachel is a bad feminist or woman? Absolutely not. It is perfectly fine for a woman to change her life or career for someone she cares about, if that is what she wants to do, but the media needs to represent a huge group of women who are just not willing to stray from the path they have chosen. Women have goals in their lives, but the media continues to throw their ambitions out the window without any consideration among the characters in the show. Conversation is healthy and needed, and women should always have a voice in that conversation instead of being constantly driven by last-minute romantic plots.
In Grey’s Anatomy, we see the amazing doctor Cristina Yang completely change herself to make her husband Owen Hunt happy. During the show, Owen constantly puts her in inappropriate situations where their relationship affects both of their work lives. Owen also constantly describes Cristina to his friends as being selfish all while he makes every decision for their relationship. They get an apartment together because he wants to, and they get married because he wants to...anyone see a pattern here? When the couple is broken up, or even before they were together, the show writers and producers paint Cristina as longing for Owen instead of being focused on her job, as she had always done before Owen came into the picture. The writers took a character who many people look up to as being passionate about her career and happy with herself and turned her into someone who seriously considered giving up everything she had worked so hard for in order to please her partner. Cristina represents a struggle many women go through when deciding if they want to start a family and how that will affect their careers. She represents the old tell question of “can a woman have both?,” but in the end, she realizes she doesn’t need both to be happy, she just needs her career. So why do I still label her as a Fe(male) Protagonist? Well, because throughout the show, Cristina fully knows she never wants children, but she seriously considers having them for her spouse. That is the thing about characters who are Fe(male) Protagonists: their stories are complicated, strung out, and tragic. And more than tragedy, they represent a form of oppression silently being put onto all women.
Lastly, one of the most plaguing examples of how we see the damsel in distress trope hidden under an independent female protagonist is in the show Gilmore Girls. The show stars Lorelai and Rory Gilmore, a mother and daughter pair. Lorelai leaves home at 16 to have Rory completely by herself and works her way up in life from being a maid to the manager of an inn. This was one of my absolute favorite shows growing up because Lorelai is the complete opposite of the usual mom figure on television. Before Gilmore Girls, almost all motherly figures were painted as settled and all-knowing, but the show breaks that stereotype by allowing Lorelai to have an adult coming of age story. Lorelai encompasses realism because she is a mom who sometimes struggles financially, and through everything, her daughter is always her main focus. Lorelai even tells a guy she’s dating that she isn’t perfectly comfortable having him in her house, as for such a long time it was just her and Rory. However, across multiple seasons we see Lorelai put a romantic relationship before her connection with her parents, as well as her career, and then... even her daughter. When Rory decides to quit college and start a path of just partying, Lorelai forces herself into an engagement and focuses on wedding plans instead of her daughter. Is this an unfeminist decision? Immediately, let me say, no; if Lorelai wants her wedding to be the priority, she should do what she wants, but she makes a decision to place her prenuptial plans before her daughter when previously she was constantly painted as a woman who wouldn’t make this choice. She doesn’t fit the criteria of the typical TV mom, but she also doesn’t fit the televised stereotypes of the common single young woman. She is a Fe(male) Protagonist, and like every other one under this label, she is extremely complex, as the lines of the media portrayal of the obedient wife mix with the common stereotype of a completely career-minded woman. These characters are supposed to be “progressive,” but they still seclude millions of women who aren’t and shouldn’t be willing to comprise what they want.
It is hard to condense these characters into categories, as they all go through seasons of growth and change. These characters are all amazing women, but I can’t help but wonder if they make decisions based on what they truly want or based on what the world expects of them. Female representation in media still has a long way to go before it is truly accurate, and although Fe(male) Protagonists definitely have a place in that mix, there also needs to be a spot for women who never question what they want for a guy as well as women who are willing to give up everything for a guy. The media needs to portray women who make their own decisions and go after any and all of their dreams because women and girls deserve to rule their own personal playground of adventures. Women deserve to be the “(FEMALE) PROTAGONIST” of their own story.
Graphic by Shani Glassberg
Comments