#His and Ziyal's relationship here is shaping up interesting because Ziyal is aware of her class privilege as Dukat's daughter just as much

[bijoumikhawal]

the thing I'm struggling with in RTD (since a big theme is intergenerational trauma) is less instinctively pulling back from depicting fucked up shit that happens irl (though that happens) and more in Garak's case trying to balance fucked up shit happening to him and not making him fall into a weird position. I can't write him as doing fucked up shit so much- partially because he's had a bit of character development from the occupation, and partially because he's not in a position of power to act in certain ways.

[a-stitch-in-time-and-space]

ok i agree w/ everything you said about those ladies besides, lwaxana gives s*xual pr*dator vibes and that is why i dont like her.

I can see that reading for sure and all things are subjective. I do strongly disagree, but hey, fandom is a space for that! Super chill.

to go a little more into this though, since it's not really so much about what any of us feel, but more about how we engage with female characters (and I'll use your example of why you don't like her - not to drag you, your dislike is totally fair, she's fictional, she won't mind, but just because it's a single line that kinda puts her in a box. And not a very nice box to be in, that's for sure...)

a little tw for mild references to some of the shadier writings of star trek vis a vis sexual assault and otherwise sexist and/or strange relationship dynamics

okay so you know how Riker has like. two? episodes that're suuuper shady in terms of his treatment of women and the rest of the time it's pretty chill. and he's one of my favourite characters, but I have gotta skip those episodes, because whatever they were trying to do, they Did Not Succeed - and there's a reading of him that incorporates those elements and if you do you've gotta contend with the character being quite probably someone who's assaulted women.

or how Worf at times espouses sexist shit that makes me roll my eyes outta my head and you're either gonna say "I don't fucking like this character" (and again, totally fair, I've seen people who don't Vibe) or you've gotta find a way to make this work for you if you want to explore that character - or both of those things, you can dislike a character and want to write about them

Or some of the weird shit the writers have Geordi do (which, Geordi is my favourite character in TNG, but sometimes ya gotta breathe and go "the writers are fucking dumb, the writers are fucking dumb")

or - the spiritual successor of Geordi, Julian Bashir (my favourite character from DS9 - clearly I have a Type). You've gotta go: This is stupid writing. I can make it work with my own read of the character, but first and foremost The Writing Is Dumb!

Or hell, Q - since we're talking about Lwaxana and I assume her interactions with Picard and Odo, let's not forget to mention Q, both in TNG and on VOY with Janeway - some of the more urgh-inducing scenes between Q and Janeway are, I think, meant to be charming and funny? And I'm a massive QCard shipper here, okay, I actually vibe so hard with him as an alien who doesn't get shit about boundaries (this mostly with Picard, with Janeway I have gone: "Hm. This doesn't feel good" a fair few times).

or how the writers of DS9 had Garak be in a very uncomfortable relationship with Ziyal, who was a teenager, then not a teenager within much too short a span of episodes (and actress changes)

or Quark. Remember the episode in which Quark tries to get Kira's likeness so he can put it in a sex-fantasy roleplay that she did not consent to? or how there are two cold opens where his female employees are told they have to sleep with him to keep their jobs

or like... Neelix (okay, I am not a fan of Neelix anyway, but for people who are fans, there are times when you've gotta wonder what in the heck the writers are thinking - not the character, the writers)

what I'm trying to say with the post I wrote is that this same graciousness isn't offered to female characters - especially female characters of colour, but in the case of Lwaxana

she's older, she's an ongoing female guest star, she's very (sometimes uncomfortably) sexual towards especially Picard and for a short while Odo, before they become really good friends.

she's also in-text several times in positions in which men are trying to control her (the episode where she gets kidnapped, the episode in which the guy who's married her is a misogynist) and she uses or tries to use her "wiles" to escape these situations.

She's really more of a faded beauty who's putting a pressure onto her daughter (in a rare interesting, complex, fraught mother-daughter dynamic that I loooove) and refuses to let go of the past, because (and here we get into my read, but mildly supported by canon) it's the only way she seems to have learned how to be loved and have relevance. She's terrified of letting that go, because where does she go next, without everything that's defined her? which is why her final episode with Odo is actually so powerful to me.

Picard is never threatened by her in-text. He's not massively fond of her (at first, she grows on him... like a mold), he would prefer to avoid her, but he's not in a powerless situation here. She undoubtedly makes him uncomfortable at times in a way that - like some of the above examples have made me go "mmmmokay" but certainly not the worst example of this in the writing.

With Odo I also don't like how some of her interactions with him go in the first episode they're in together. But once they're friends and you see how easily she accepts him ("I can swim" is always going to be one of my favourite little chuckle lines) that no longer applies. He clearly likes her and enjoys her company. There's something incredibly lifelong platonic partners in their easiness with each other.

You can argue in both cases (and argue well) that there are scenes that are kinda sus. But there are lots of scenes that offer you depth of character. She's not one-note. She's got off moments.

Some of these guys (and others - I haven't watched as much TOS and Voyager so I don't want to misrepresent anyone, but I feel sure that Tom Paris has made me squint once or twice + I've not seen Enterprise yet) have whole episodes that make me shudder.

It's really - within this fandom for sure - open how we interpret characters and I'm not saying anyone needs to read Lwaxana like this or change their minds and like her.

The point of the post is not to say you have to like any of these characters. Or even to say you have to engage with them regardless of how you vibe or don't vibe with them. It's just... I have listened to several up-until-then-enjoyable deeply analytical podcasts where at some point one of the (guys... always guys... I'm guessing white) makes a sneering comment completely dismissing their value within the series.

My point is that Lwaxana (since we're on her) has value as a character within the Trek universe. She added something important. She's not everyone's cup of tea, but it's a big series, we're not all guaranteed to like everyone.

and in the original post I used "shrill" and "cringy" on purpose, because those are descriptors I've heard. And they are absolutely rooted in misogynist dismissals of female characters no matter what shape they take (Keiko, Lwaxana, Michael, and Ezri are radically different from each other and yet all easily brushed aside regardless of screentime, personality, show, age, role/job).

I'm not making points about having to engage with or like characters. I'm just saying we need to be aware of how easily we specifically look down our noses at female characters (and specifically female characters of colour - apologies, this was just because we were talking about Lwaxana, but some of the shit I've heard about especially Michael and Keiko have made me want to bang my head against a wall... or other peoples heads against walls... you know, for a nice change)

so how much sympathy or analysis of behaviour is afforded to female characters vs their male peers. What judgements are we making and how do they compare to our readings of their male counterparts?

sidenote: I hate using male and female about star trek, my brain is just like "why anyone gender? why do this? you're in space? there are aliens? y'all can't chill with the binary for two fucking seconds?"

different post