31 October 2005
(or why it's dangerous to leave comments on the Observer blog)
So, back in May, I gently chided Rafael Behr about gender stereotypes in Sci Fi fandom on a post he made about Why men love science fiction so much. Didn't really think much more about it, and had mostly forgotten about it until last week, when an email dropped into my inbox(es) from Telegraph journalist Elizabeth Day.
The gist being that she'd seen my comment on the observer blog, hopped over to mine and wondered if I had an opinion on the news that for the first time ever, the Sci Fi channel's audience was now more female than male and if I'd spare a few minutes for a phone interview. This I did.
Then came the photo malarkey, detailed previously, the results from which, thankfully, did not appear in yesterday's paper.
My heart sank when I read the article yesterday, and I knew I'd have to write a rebuttal, but this became particularly urgent this morning since it seems to have (if I'm honest, probably justifiably) upset some of the lovely denizens of slashdot.
So, the actual article seems to have been rather too heavily pruned at the sub-editing stage, because given that Elizabeth was a previous winner of the young journalist of the year award, I'd really hope that the standards for that were a lot higher than the quality of the resulting article, entitled "Adventures of Buffy and Lara see female sci-fi viewers outnumber males".
Go read it, then come back for the corrections and clarifications.
First off, I am a Web Accessibility CONSULTANT not Officer. This might seem petty, but I've worked damned hard to get where I am today and earn the title of Consultant.
Secondly, at no point did I proffer Buffy or Lara Croft as an example of why women might like Sci Fi more now. Mostly cos neither of them are Sci Fi. I cited three examples of shows which I enjoy and consider to be quality Sci Fi which came to mind as having good, strong, female characters in them.
Thirdly, the first quote attributed to me - "People have an impression of sci-fi fans being small men who sit in the dark watching Star Trek but it's not like that now." has been pruned. I can't remember the exact words I used, but it was along the lines of the fact that the stereotypical impression of sci-fi fans being small mole-esque geeky blokes who sit in the dark obsessively watching Star Trek or the like, is, like most stereotypes, not the case (c.f. Stalker Boy), nor has it been my overwhelming experience (which was the essence of my original remark to Rafael on the Observer blog). That's not to say that I haven't met some seriously terrifying uber-geeks who fit that stereotype - of course I have - I've been to signings and conventions - but the majority aren't like that.
Fourthly, the second quote attributed to me - "There has been an increase in positive female role models, whereas in Star Trek, all the women were either aliens or wore short skirts. I have been watching sci-fi since I was two or three and the shows are better written and more mainstream." has also been seriously pruned and is a contraction of about 5 minutes worth of talking (and at the speed I talk, that's quite a lot of words missing in action, taking their context with them). So, let's take these in order then.
First up, the fragment "There has been an increase in positive female role models, whereas in Star Trek, all the women were either aliens or wore short skirts."
What I actually said was along the lines of "whereas, in the original Star Trek, the focus was mainly on Captain Kirk being all masculine and heroic and the female characters were mostly either aliens, love interests or crew members relegated to support roles and a lot of them wore short skirts or revealing outfits and were portrayed as being a lot more subserviant to the male characters".
I didn't mention later Captain Janeway or Star Trek stuff where this imbalance was redressed a fair bit (and perhaps this was a mistake), but I got the strong impression (backed up by Elizabeth herself saying she didn't really watch sci fi), that the distinction between differing flavours of Star Trek woud be lost on her, and mentioned Captain Kirk and original stuff more because I didn't like the later ST series' that much.
The quote "I have been watching sci-fi since I was two or three" came from an explanation of how, although when I was wee, Sci-Fi wasn't really seen as a girl's thing, my dad would let me watch Doctor Who (yes, I was that stereotypical kid, hiding behind the sofa when the Daleks and Cybermen came on screen), and that I never got the impression it was something I shouldn't like, so just enjoyed it.
The final bit "shows are better written and more mainstream" is a contraction from a lengthy explanation where I explained that I felt that Sci Fi is being increasingly more aimed at a mainstream audience rather than a niche audience, and that with the advent of stuff like Babylon 5 and Firefly, you've got stuff that's (arguably) a lot better written than some of the earlier stuff. Not that I'm saying the earlier stuff was all shit, because it isn't - and some of the dodgy writing can be excused when it's so bad it's good.
I also made the point (not reflected at all in the article) that I thought that one reason for the increase in interest was partly down to a lack of segregation in terms of subjects taught at school, giving the example of it no longer being the case that girls did cookery, needlework and art (or other traditionally "girlie" subjects) while boys do mechanics, engineering and science (and other traditionally "blokey" subjects).
Oh, and while I'm at it, I'm fairly sure I wasn't attracted to the Matrix for it's "complicated concepts of life and death". Well, not in it's entirety, at least. I was attracted to it beause it (at least, the first part of the trilogy) was cool, well written, had lots of black tight shiny stuff wrapped round fit bodies (what, I can't be a shallow geek?), had a great soundtrack and cutting-edge (for the time) special effects.
When it comes down to it, I'm a girl, I'm undeniably a geek, and I like Sci Fi (amongst other things). I know lots of other people who like Sci Fi too, of all shapes, sizes and geekery levels. I'm also quite glad that it's become more mainstream and that more people (of either gender) are getting into it, and quite glad to be proved right in my assertion to Rafael that the gender gap isn't as wide as it might be expected to be.
So the lesson for today is - just because it's a "quality" newspaper doesn't lessen the likelihood of being misquoted, taken out of context or otherwise misrepresented.
It's disappointing though, I had hoped for better.
Fortunately I haven't had any run-ins with the media, but I can't say I'm surprised that your conversation was cut so much and so much taken out of context, but it's a shame that it was.
Personally I think the gender gap is being reduced because the quality of the Sc-Fi beign produced is improving dramatically taking Babylon 5 (which was much more gritty and "realistic" compared to the "peace and harmony on Earth" approach taken by the original Star Trek series for example) and Battlestar Galactica (which as you say took the very brave and interesting step of casting Starbuck as a woman) as prime examples.
I tend to think that "the proliferation of heroines such as Buffy, Lara Croft and Xena" is aimed entirely at the male audience who are much more inclined to watch attractive women on television even if the scripting or the show as a whole are not up to par.
As a woman do you really find that Xena, Buffy and Lara Croft make you want to watch more Sci-Fi?
I will refrain from going on endlessly about Star Trek's extremely positive contributions towards bringing women to sci-fi and portraying strong female characters. Istead I will ask: Who is the world would contend that Firefly wasn't sci-fi?
"Dear, you live on a space-ship."
No, Xena, Buffy and Lara Croft don't make me want to watch more Sci-Fi.
Watching anything Lara Croft related would be more likely to make me want to watch something _anything_ with better quality writing and plot.
Buffy I liked and enthusiastically watched.
Xena was also good, in a kind of "if there's nothing else on, it'll be amusing to find out how much stealth lesbianism they've managed to get away with this week" kind of way.
What often makes me want to watch more Sci-Fi is watching or reading good Sci-Fi. :)
Dan - bunch of people in the slashdot thread, for starters.
I disagree, obviously, but they're entitled to their opinion.
and yes, I know that Star Trek has played a role in bringing forward strong female role models, but I happen to think that some other stuff did it better :)
Ha! So I was right. You really can't trust the Torygraph! Seriously though, that sounds like a call to 'sack the sub' needs to be heading their way.
Telegraph in "misquoting" scandal.
News on Page 32.
Bummer that it was all misquoted (or at least hacked to pieces) Pix, but hey, at least you got in the paper! (and missed having the photo published - bonus (in your perspective, anyway))
It was not worth the £1.40 paid for it, mean Scot that I am.
It's only when the media report on something (or someone) close to you, that you realise how much of what they write is over-simplified and inaccurate.
Oh Dear ! It all happened to me about 45 years ago ( the first time) - then they made me a "Press Officer" and I went and did the course - but it didn't get any better. I think the worst bit is when you have tried really hard to cooperate with the media, and then realise that you have simply been (ab)used. Perhaps an article about Sci-Fi is not toooo serious, but what will you now make of an article about (say) Iraq ???? or bird flu ???
HAHA slashdot... (they so silly)
wonldn't it be nice, with all this hyper-linking on the internet, that when someone quotes someone else they could just link to a text doc on the quoted's site, everything right on the net. (:
If it's any consolation, that original blog post, and subsequent refutation in comments led me to completely abandon my spurious 'why men like sci fi' theory. So your wisdom has prevailed in at least one corner of the 'quality' press.
Lesson 1. Always ask how much space the interview will fill in the paper. That gives you an idea of how little you actually need to say to avoid heavy subbing. Interviewees always talk far too much and rarely realise that there will only be space in a paper or magazine for a fraction of the interview material.
Lesson 2. Insist on seeing the subbed piece before it's published or refuse the interview.
Lesson 3. Never, ever trust the papers.
(I'm a magazine journo)
I was called by a journalist today seeking a quote for a paper on a vaguely work-related matter. I demured (it was a bit too far outside my field for me to feel comfortable commenting) and felt bad for doing so afterwards. After reading about your experience I think I might have made the right choice. The prospect of a rampaging horde of shalshdotters coming after me sounds terrifying! :)
The thing about most journos is that they already know what they want their story to say before they go out to do interviews. They just want to find the supporting statements to confirm the picture they want to paint, if they cant get it they will misquote you until they do.
So you're buggered before you start really. I once had the experience of being interviewed by a R4 journalist who just kept on asking me to rephrase my answers, practically telling me what he wanted me to say. It was only after about 10 mins of this that I undestood what was going on. I was so dissapointed, I had some romantic idea about investigative journalism and so on..
But anyway, yay for sci fi !
The thing about most journos is that they already know what they want their story to say before they go out to do interviews. They just want to find the supporting statements to confirm the picture they want to paint, if they cant get it they will misquote you until they do.
Ain't that the truth? The Telegraph once put a quote into my mouth which was actually said by someone complete different. I feel they simply couldn't be bothered to check who said what.
You don't need to correct the article with regard to the bit about Matrix as they are comments attributed, via context, to Adam Roberts. The bits about Lara Croft and Buffy are attributed to the Sci-Fi cannel.
You may need to suggest that people at slashdot read the article more carefully though!
Yes the article was cut to shit and believe it or not, I find that as frustrating as the rest of you.
You say that "the stereotypical impression of sci-fi fans being small mole-esque geeky blokes who sit in the dark obsessively watching Star Trek or the like, is, like most stereotypes, not the case."
Similarly, the stereotypical impression of all journalists being untrustworthy tossers who can't be bothered to check their facts is very wide of the mark.
But I'm sorry if any offence was caused. It certainly wasn't the intention.
... the online home and (not very) alter(ed)-ego of Ann McMeekin, a recently freelance Web Accessibility Consultant.
... passionate about many things, most of which will turn up on this site at some time or other.
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